Chapter 26: Tactics And Measures

"Sunset!"

Sunset turned to see her friends walking up to her.

"Any luck?" Rainbow Dash asked, kicking her football as they came up.

Sunset sighed and shook her head.

"Nope. No luck."

"Awwww!" Everyrone groaned in dismay.

"Well, we might as well get back to Silver's room first." Applejack suggested. "Twilight did text us about Adagio's device."

The others chattered out their agreements.

"Yeah!"

"That sounds good…"

The group of six walked back to the lobby. As they neared, however, they were rather surprised to see a familiar blue haired girl already standing there.

They were even more surprised to see her making out with a particular brown haired boy.

"Sonata?" All of them said at once.

Upon hearing her name, Sonata's eyes shot open, and she and the boy jerked their heads away from each other.

"Sunset? Guys?" She sputtered in disbelief.

Pinkie's mouth fell wide open while the others coughed awkwardly.

"Is that who I think it is?" Fluttershy asked, staring at the brown haired boy, whose face was flushed with embarrassment.

Sonata blushed and nodded.

"Uh…Concerto, these are my friends…Sunset Shimmer, Applejack, Pinkie Pie, Fluttershy, Rarity and Rainbow Dash. Guys, this is Concerto Dawn, he's…my boyfriend now."

"Ooh!" Pinkie squealed, enthusiatically bouncing over and shaking Concerto rapidly by the hand. "Nice to finally meet you!"

"Ni-i-ce to-o mee-et you to-o…" Concerto replied, jiggling from Pinkie's overly enthusiastic handshake.

The others clambered around, greeting them.

"Why are you guys back so early?" Sonata asked curiously.

Sunset stepped closer and whispered something into her 's eyes widened with horror.

"What?!"

In Silver's motel room, Silver and Twilight were muttering out numerous scientific terms, scribbling down notes and discussing how to deal with the new problem. Aria was still resting in Silver's room, Cleffis by her side.

The doorbell rang, and Silver quickly opened the door for Sonata and the Mane Six.

She was astonished to see Concerto with Sonata.

"Oh hey, Sonata, you're back. And why is…?"

Concerto was even more astonished when a door behind Silver opened, and Cleffis and Aria poked their heads out of it.

"Oh hey Concerto!" Cleffis said, waving cheerfully.

Aria was not that surprised to see Sonata and Concerto standing next to each other, but she hoped the tension between them was gone.

"Sonata, you're back." She said, coming out of the room, as Cleffis trailed behind her.

Aria pulled Sonata in for a brief hug.

"How's things with Concerto?" She whispered into her friend's ear.

Sonata gave Aria a happy smile.

"We're okay now."

Then, after a moment's pause, she added, "You were in on the whole songwriting thing, weren't you?"

Aria gave her a sheepish grin."Yes I was."

"Uh, I really hate to interrupt everything," Twilight interrupted. "But we have something serious to discuss here."

Knowing what was to come, Sonata glanced briefly at Concerto before turning to Silver and Twilight.

"Should I ask him to…uh…go or something…"

"I think it's totally fine, Sonata." Silver reassured her. "He could come in useful."

Concerto, who was hearing everything, shot Silver and Sonata a blank look.

"What?"

"It's okay Concerto." Sonata reassured him. "Cleffis knows about this."

Standing a distance away, Cleffis looked at Concerto and nodded.

Meanwhile

Adagio tapped her device with a rather impatient expression on her face.

"You're kidding me…"

As it turns out, Twilight's and Silver's hypothesis about her locket device had been accurate. Having salvaged the remaining shards from her previous pendant and the remnants of Twilight's device, Adagio had fused them to create a smaller device that hung rather lightly and easily around her neck. Currently, having absorbed both Sonata's magic and Aria's magic had filled the device rather significantly. Unfortunately for Adagio, if she needed the minimum amount of magic to trigger a transformation, she did not have enough just yet.

Much to her frustration, after having walked around a lot after a period of time, there was no sign of any of the Mane Seven. Where would she get magic from now?

A thought occured to her. She knew that Aria and Sonata's magic could easily recuperate after a while, but for some reason, there was something holding her back from going after them again. She knew how weak they were getting after the magic was drained out of their bodies, and she didn't want them to become too weak…wait, what?!

Adagio blinked and shook her head with a frustrated scowl. I can't believe I still have some amount of sentiment for those two idiots…I knew that spending too much time near normal humans would affect us! We were supposed to merely use them, but no, Sonata and Aria had to be infected by their soft hearted mentors!

Was Allegro a soft hearted mentor? A voice asked quietly in her head.

At that, Adagio faltered slightly.

Her heart still fluttered at the thought of the reddish brown haired boy, and she subconsciously pictured his turquoise eyes shining brightly as he stepped out on the stage to take the microphone. She remembered his voice, almost as powerful and hypnotising as her own echoing through her ears, tugging feverishly at her heartstrings as it did with other girls.

A sudden gleaming of red light from the pendant snapped Adagio out of her thoughts, and waking from her dreams, she resolutely pushed the images out of her head. If the pendant was glowing, that meant that something-or someone-with Equestrian magic was nearby! Adagio's eyes lit up with glee. I wonder who it is this time.

Warming up her vocal chords a little, Adagio looked round the corner. Her mouth fell open in disbelief when she saw who it was.

The street was pretty quiet, and night would fall in a matter of time.

Allegro strolled down the pavement, whistling rather relaxedly to himself.

Today had been a great day indeed. Ever since Mr Biz's change of heart a day ago, the stress and pressure on Allegro seemed to have been alleviated. The concerts had been a success, Concerto's handwritten song was doing tremendously terrific, and the obnoxious Citrine Gem had been kicked out of his life.

Still, Allegro wondered how he was going to tell Adagio about this, not that she didn't know already. After all, she hadn't answered his calls at all ever since a few days ago. Just what was eating that girl?

His train of thoughts was broken when a melody flooded his ears.

"Aaa-aaaa-aaah….Aaa-aaaa-aaah…."

Suddenly, Allegro was a little weak in the knees. He swayed slightly before collapsing onto the ground. "Hey, What the…"

As the singing continued, the energy in Allegro's body seemed to drain out of him. He struggled to keep his eyes open, and to his shock, he saw some kind of red glittery clouds flowing out from him.

"What's going on…" Allegro tried to yell, but his sudden lack of energy only allowed him a murmur.

He was really frightened and confused about what was happening to him, but for some reason, his whole body was completely drained. He couldn't run or shout or do anything.

As the beautiful but haunting melody continued to resonate in his ears, Allegro's eyelids sank closed. The last thing he saw was a figure with rose pink eyes standing over him, a flash of golden hair beneath her hood.

...

"So how do we stop Adagio?" Cleffis asked. "She didn't seem to care a bit about taking magic from Aria."

"She fused her gem shards with the remnants of my device." Twilight explained. "If I'm not wrong, we have to get the locket away from her before she gets enough power to trigger a transformation."

As Twilight explained all the scientific mumbo jumbo behind the theory, Sonata leaned to Concerto's ear.

"You…don't mind this?" She asked, having explained the whole magic and siren business to him earlier.

She had expected a repeat Cleffis to come her way, but instead, Concerto turned to her with an understanding smile.

"I can take it, Sonata. Relax."

"Really? You don't mind me and my friends having magic and me being a formerly evil siren who fed off negative energy?"

"I'm new to this whole magic thing, but honestly…you being a siren is actually pretty cool."

"It is?"

Sonata blushed.

"Yep."

Concerto blushed back.

Even though the two knew their feelings were mutual, saying compliments like that among many other friends was still pretty awkward for them.

Cleffis couldn't help looking at Concerto with embarrassment.

"You seriously took that a lot better than I did." He remarked, sharing a glance with Aria.

Twilight was still talking when Aria's phone beeped.

"A text message? At this time?" She muttered, pulling her phone out of her pocket and checking it with a bored look on her face.

The bored look vanished when she read what was on the screen.

"Aria? Are you alright, darling?" Rarity asked with concern, leaning over.

Aria showed everyone the text message.

"What?!" Shrieked a rather horrified Pinkie Pie.

"What is she doing?" Rainbow Dash gasped.

"I don't understand." Sunset said. "Allegro doesn't have any magic. Why would she-"

"Sunset." Chandelier spoke up suddenly.

"Yes?"

"Maybe…"

Chandelier's eyes widened, and quickly she looked up at Cleffis and Concerto.

"You two know Allegro pretty well, right?"

"Well…of course." Cleffis said.

"We've known him for quite a long time." Concerto said.

"Do you know any of Allegro's relatives?"

"Um…yeah…"

"I don't get it." Applejack said. "What does Allegro's relatives have to with this?"

"Guys…Adagio has to have a reason for just texting us that she took Allegro and is seemingly holding him for ransom. There has to be more to Allegro than we know."

"Chandelier has a point." Sonata pointed out. "I've known Adagio for years. She's much smarter than that."

"So…you're just planning to go ask one of Allegro's relatives and see if they know stuff about him we don't already know?" Aria asked, slight sarcasm in her voice.

"There has to be something." Chandelier said. "And I'm pretty sure there is someone we know that already knows about magic in some way."

"Who?" Limelight asked.

"Remember? I don't really follow Triple Rewind myself, but I have pretty good memory. I'm very sure Allegro's last name is Flare?"

"Yeah, it is." Concerto replied with a nod.

Catching on to what Chandelier was talking about, Fluttershy spoke up.

"One of the Crystal Prep students on the Shadowbolts team during the Friendship Games…her name was…"

"Sunny Flare. That's right, she's one of my classmates." Chandelier said, nodding.

"Oh wait, Sunny?" Concerto scratched his head, before his eyes widened.

"Allegro mentioned he had a cousin named Sunny once, I think."

"That's right! Maybe Sunny could know something." Rarity said.

"Do you know where Sunny lives?" Silver asked curiously.

"Of course I know, she's a pretty close friend of mine now." Chandelier replied with a smile. "I'll just give her a text."

"Until now, it almost didn't occur to me Allegro had the same last name as Sunny." Pinkie Pie piped up with embarrassment.

"I know, right?" Applejack said with a shrug. "Well, it's not everyday you find out someone in Crystal Prep High has a relation to a famous pop star."

Cleffis looked a little confused.

"You know, Allegro does actually go to Crystal Prep."

Everyone gawked at him.

"He does?!" Rainbow Dash said in disbelief.

"He does." Cleffis replied. "He was on tour with us during the Friendship Games."

The whole group was completely speechless.

"You knew about this, Twi?" Applejack asked.

Twilight nodded shyly.

"Yeah…I didn't talk to him much, but he was pretty nice for a Crystal Prepper. He wasn't arrogant or concerned much with winning. He helped me when I dropped my stuff and when I bumped into him, he never glared at me. He just smiled and said that it was alright. He did seem very stressed, though. He sometimes came late to school, and he had dark circles under his eyes."

"Yeah…" Cleffis nodded with a sigh.

"Allegro came under a lot of pressure because he was in Crystal Prep. Believe me, Concerto and I met him while he was in Crystal Prep and still an average student."

"Really?" Sunset asked.

Concerto smiled as the memories came back to him.

"Yes. It's a very long story, though…"

...

Splashfire99: Yes, it will be a story :). Sorry about this chapter being so short, I was at a loss at how to make it longer xp. However, as I have implied, I may be writing a short story on how Triple Rewind actually met, probably after I finish this story. I really want to develop on Allegro, Cleffis and Concerto as characters(since I have mentioned above that Allegro attends Crystal Prep).