When Rarity opened her eyes, she realized she wasn’t at the back of her boutique anymore. She probably wasn’t in Ponyville anymore. She was in a gigantic library the kind of she had never seen before. Not in the capital city of Canterlot. Not even in the crystal empire. The architecture didn’t seem to make much sense and there were books piled everywhere in a huge mess. Thousands and thousands of books everywhere.
She opened one and gasped, as she already knew the content way too well for it to be a coincidence.
Twilight exulted. The spell had worked. Or at least, it seemed it had. She now was inside of Rarity’s mind and could freely access all the information she needed to become a very good friend. All she had to do was to read books and she was very good at that.
But as she was about to grab the first one, her body refused to obey. She still had a perfect control over it. Her movements were completely free. There was just a part of her that had rebelled against her will. A part of her that was stating she shouldn’t be there and that was refusing to have anything to do with it.
And Twilight knew she shouldn’t be there, in somepony’s else mind. She remembered why she had never tried the spell in the first place and suddenly grasping the measure of what she had done, she crawled onto herself.
But then, just in front of her nostrils, one book between all the others caught her attention. It was simply titled “Twilight Sparkle”.
This one, she might have a right to read.
She opened it.
Rarity couldn’t really understand where she was, even if all the books she had looked in had contained memories of hers. It was just a bit too much to accept for the unicorn. She knew, however, that it had to have something to do with Twilight and that the alicorn had to have come to that place at the same time as she had.
Following that logic, Rarity had decided to look for Twilight, calling her name, looking under piles of books and complaining over the dust some of them were covered with, as they were obviously not used often.
But as she was about to give up and just clean the place, she heard a noise coming from a place further away. Unable to identify it right away, she opted to rush towards it to find out if it could lead her to Twilight.
And in fact, there she was. The alicorn was curled up in a corner, against a pile of books. When she approached, Rarity heard her friend repeating “I’m so sorry”.
“Twilight? Where are we? What is going on?” Rarity asked, already knowing her friend wasn’t feeling alright.
“I’m so sorry Rarity. I did everything wrong. Every single thing.” the alicorn replied, still curled up. "I understand that you won't want to be my friend anymore..."
“I am really not sure that I understand what you are talking about dear…” Rarity said.
But Twilight suddenly turned back to her and confessed with tears in her eyes the big crime she was guilty of:
“I’m a terrible friend! I never considered important to learn anything about you and you know every important thing about me. You know what my favorite book is. You know the name of the first spell I ever cast. You know me almost better than I do and I can only show how selfish and self-centered I was. I’m so, so sorry!”
“Is that what you are worried about?” Rarity asked. “That I know more about you than you do about me?”
“Yes.” Twilight admitted with shame.
It was all over. Now Rarity knew what kind of “friend” Twilight truly was. And it was only a matter of minutes, if not seconds, before their friendship the alicorn cherished so much would end. And she had nopony else to blame but herself.
Twilight was feeling miserable.
And then she heard Rarity’s response which was as far away from what she had expected as she could have imagined:
“Twilight, dear, you are a great friend. Why in Equestria would you think otherwise because of mere details?”
The alicorn stopped crying from the surprise and the kindness of those words.
“Come on Twilight…” Rarity continued. “I know you, as you said, and that means I know you aren’t the type of pony that can easily remember personal information. You already have your head full with all those books you spend all your time studying. It’s quite alright.”
“But I don’t even know when your birthday is, or your favorite color…” Twilight explained, while realizing she might have overestimated the problem just a tiny bit.
“So what?” Rarity asked. “You think Rainbow Dash knows when our birthdays are? The only one you can be certain knows is Pinkie Pie and that’s her special talent.”
“But…” began Twilight, without really having anything to retort.
“But nothing.” said Rarity. “If you want to test your knowledge about me, let’s do it right here and now, so you’ll be fixed. I only have two questions.”
Twilight shivered. That was the big moment where she would fail. But she would face it with as much dignity as she could.
“First question.” Rarity began. “Do I want to be your friend?”
“Yes.” Twilight instinctively replied.
“So second question: why is it I want to be your friend?”
“I…” Twilight thought about it, but found no answer. “I don’t know…” she said, having failed like she knew she would.
But to her surprise, Rarity hugged her:
“It’s because I like you!” the white unicorn told her. “I simply like you. I like spending time with you, I trust you and I respect you. It’s all that matters to me.”
Hearing those words, Twilight broke into tears, joyful tears that took away all of the worries and fears she had accumulated during the day.
“That and we did successfully work together to defeat Nightmare Moon, Discord, king Sombra, queen Chrysalis and Tirek. Which is quite a good record I dare to say.” Rarity added with a smile.
Twilight smiled too. Being forgiven something she thought was unforgivable felt so good. She knew her friends were great, but not to this point. Good friends, true friends, best friends. The denomination was slowly gaining a new meaning.
“You know, maybe you should have become the princess of friendship…” Twilight suggested, actually taking the idea seriously.
“I admit, I wouldn’t mind the princess title” Rarity responded. “But I couldn’t give up sewing that easily. Also, being a princess seems to create way more stress than I could handle, judging by how worked up you’ve managed to get.”
She was referring to the total messes that were Twilight’s mane, tail and fur.
“Shall we go now?” Rarity asked. “This place isn’t really fit for ladies if you want my opinion.”
“Sure.” Twilight replied.
But she then stumbled on another book. A big one with a title she wouldn’t have expected to find in Rarity’s mind. Rarity saw it too and tried to quickly hide it.
“Is that book about hoofball?” Twilight asked.
“Yes, no, I mean it’s just some dusty old book, let’s forget about it.” Rarity replied.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to force myself into your private life like that…” Twilight said, realizing that it was exactly what she had done and why she had felt she shouldn’t be there. “It’s just that you never seemed to be the type of pony who would have an interest in hoofball.”
“Well…” Rarity slowly began, pondering if she should reveal her secrets or not. “I happened to have been quite the player back in the days, when my parents took me to Fillydelphia. I haven’t played in a long time, but I do sometimes remember how great it felt to play and run with everypony else. Quite barbaric, but fun.”
“I would never have guessed.” admitted Twilight.
“Also, the stallions playing professionally tend to be pretty good looking nowadays…” Rarity added with a smile and a wink. “But please keep this all a secret. I have a reputation to maintain.”
“You can trust me. I won’t say a word.” Twilight assured her.
“I know I can trust you dear.”
“I know you know…” Twilight whispered, blushing over that realization.
She cast her spell once again and both mares woke up in their respective body in two hospital beds where they had been brought after they had seemingly lost consciousness following Twilight’s spell.