Seconds passed, but Sunset remained frozen. Alabaster coat instead of alabaster skin, a coiffed purple mane instead of hair. There was absolutely no mistaking it, even before Aloe dashed towards the new pony and embraced her.
"Rarity! I was beginning to wonder if you had not already left."
The unicorn returned the hug as waved of the other mare's concern with a huff. "Oh don't be ridiculous darling, as if I would make the trip without a good long pampering. One must always look presentable, especially at festivities like these."
Absolutely no mistaking it. Not just the name, but that voice-
"Oh my apologies, did I interrupt you while you were busy?" The unicorn's voice snapped Sunset back as she noticed blue eyes hand landed on her.
"Miss Shimmer and I were just about to say goodbye, don't worry about it."
A spark of recognition flashed through though blue eyes and Sunset could feel her heart beating faster. "Miss Shimmer? Sunset Shimmer?"
Her heart leapt to her throat. Sunset lit up her horn, conjuring in her mind one of the few recently familiar places in Equestria, and in a flash of red light and a pop, Sunset vanished from the Ponyville spa.
Silence reigned in the spa's lobby until an utterly confused Rarity turned to an equally confused Aloe. "Was it something I said?"
There were few recent places in Equestria Sunset was familiar with. That she had travelled to the Ponyville Spa by teleport hadn't helped with that, though it had been helpful in giving her a trace to return to. From the few places she was familiar with, she could count the ones that made her feel safe on her hoof. By all logic it made perfect sense she ended up where she did.
Not that it made her current predicament any less embarrassing.
"This is stupid." Sunset grumbled from underneath the blankets of her bed. So much for getting back into gear. Luna had warned her that the motivation she'd felt in her dream was just that, but for her to be terrified by a single pony? 'Dream's courage' indeed.
With the benefit of hindsight and a few moments to calm down and piece things together, Sunset realized just how much of an idiot she'd made of herself. Of course this world had its own Rarity. Of course she lived in Ponyville. Twilight had only told her about her adventures with Rarity and the other Equetrian counterparts of her classmates a hundred times. And yet the moment this Rarity had shown up, all Sunset had done was clam up, panic, and teleport under the cover of her bed like a scared little filly.
With a growl, Sunset shrugged of the cover. Twilight would probably get worried when news of her little stunt got back to her. Best to just apologize and put it behind her.
Without Spike or Twilight to guide her, it took a while for Sunset to get her bearings in the castle. In Canterlot she would have walked up to a guard or maid by now, but she hadn't spotted any staff on her way so far. No maids cleaning the halls or rooms, not even a single guard patrolling the hallways.
As she trotted down the hallways, Sunset's ears twitched as the sound of voices reached her ears. Following the voices led her to a half opened door, but before she could push it open the voices became clear and Sunset swallowed as she recognized one of them. Silently sneaking forward, she glanced through the half opened door.
A round room with a big crystal table surrounded by six and a half crystal... thrones? A pair of square rimmed glasses and Twilight's twin of her journal lying on a throne with Twilight's cutie mark, while Twilight herself stood next to it alongside this world's Rarity, concern on both their faces.
"I am so sorry Twilight, I never meant to startle the poor dear," Rarity said.
Twilight shook her head. "It's not your fault Rarity, Sunset is just... going through a rough patch right now. I can't say too much behind her back, but she's had a bit of an argument with her friends and she's here to cool off a bit."
Rarity's ears perked at the word friends. "A friendship problem, then?"
This managed to conjure a smile on Twilight's face. "Yes, I suppose so. The map might not have sent me out, but I'm not going to leave a friend alone like that."
Rarity smiled back and leaned forward for a quick nuzzle. "You wouldn't be you if you would, darling," she replied before leaning back. "Do give Sunset my apologies, would you? I'd hate to have ruined her stay here."
"I will. And you get back to Aloe and Lotus. Sweetie Belle isn't going to survive the trip to your family if you don't get your beauty touches in."
Rarity huffed as she raised her nose into the air. "I will have you know that I am a perfect lady at all times."
Twilight hid a chuckle behind her hooves. "And I'm sure you'd be very lady-like in letting Sweetie know how much you need another spa treatment for the long trip."
The mock glare and exaggerated sigh from the alabaster unicorn did nothing to hide to sarcasm in Rarity's voice. "Oh fine" she sighed, then turned her glare into a smile again. "You really should join me again one of these days Twilight, Lotus misses working with your mane."
"Tell her to put me down for tomorrow," Twilight replied. "They deserve an explanation for putting up with my sudden request anyway."
Rarity waved a hoof in dismissal. "Oh pish posh darling, you know those two enjoy coddling their customers, regardless of their status."
"I wish that was all it was," Twilight sighed, turning away from Rarity until a white hoof stopped her and turned her head back to meet Rarity's eyes.
"You know they do this because they care for you, don't you?" Rarity questioned. "Even if they coat it with fancy words like Princess and your Highness, everyone in Ponyville loves you for who you are, not the crown on your head." Rarity sighed blissfully. "An absolutely stunning crown, even more magnificent than your first. Elegant, yet humble, why if I had such a crown-"
"-You'd never take it off, and would even sleep with it," Twilight finished, the roll of her eyes softened by her smile. "Alright, alright. Now get going before they end up closing shop," Twilight said, giving Rarity a light nudge with her shoulder that send the unicorn moving with a chuckle.
"And Rarity?" Twilight called after her friend, causing the unicorn to pause. "Thank you."
"Any time Twilight," Rarity replied with a smile.
As Rarity left the throne room, Twilight gave another sight. A happy one though, one filled with gratitude for friends that looked after her. In the back of the room, Sunset nudged the door open and one of Twilight's ears flicking at the soft creek of the frame.
"Rarity came to apologize for startling you," she called over her shoulder.
"I know," Sunset muttered. "I heard."
"So what happened?" Twilight asked.
"Didn't Rarity tell you?"
"I got Rarity's side of the story, but I'd like to hear yours too. According to Rarity, you took one look at her and teleported out of the spa like you were being chased by Tirek."
"That about sums up what happened, yeah." Sunset muttered.
"Even though she's not the Rarity you know?"
Sunset winced. "I know that, Twilight. I mean, I know that intellectually, but the moment I saw her, the moment I recognized her and she recognized me, I just panicked and ran away."
Twilight eyes shone with concern. "Sunset, this is not a good sign. If you can't even look at the mirror versions of your friends, how are you going to face yours?"
"Well maybe I don't want to," Sunset muttered.
"You don't mean that Sunset. I know you don't." Twilight not so much said as stated, sheer conviction rolling of her voice.
Sunset sighed. "Look, for what it's worth, I'm sorry too. I know I overreacted, but things finally felt like they were going somewhere nice and all of a sudden I got slapped in the face with the very people I'm trying to avoid. Or I thought I did, anyway." She turned her head to the door Rarity left through. "I should... probably apologize personally."
"Later," Twilight said.
Sunset blinked and turned back to Twilight. "But I-"
"Later. Trust me, I know Rarity. If you were to chase after Rarity, you'd apologize, then she'd apologize and you both would get stuck in an apology loop until Rarity decides she has to do something right here and now to show just how sorry she is."
Despite her dropped mood, Sunset couldn't help but let loose a snort of amusement. "What, does she think apologies are a competition?"
"I blame my Applejack and Rainbow Dash," Twilight replied dryly.
"So are you sure I shouldn't..."
"Yes, I'm sure. I'm pretty sure that right now she's going to the spa and take her mind of things, then she's going to join her her sister on the train and head off to see her family for Hearth's Warming."
"So you're not upset at my freakout over this?"
Twilight snorted. "Sunset, I'm the last pony in Equestria to scold others on freaking out at unexpected things."
"What, you? But you're... well..." Sunset gestured aimlessly at Twilight, as if trying to point at something specific but unable to find it. "You."
Twilight raised an eyebrow. "I'm 'me?'"
Sunset nodded. "Yeah, you know, Princess of Friendship, saviour of Equestria who stood up against multiple threats without flinching, myself included. I mean, you saved me when I turned into a raging she-demon, and then stood up to the sirens even without your magic with nothing but a song."
Twilight smiled warmly at Sunset, but shook her head. "Sunset, you've seen me at some of my better moments, and we've talked a little bit since we found the journals, but I'm not Celestia. I have enough test anxiety that I sing entire freakout arias over them."
Sunset raised an eyebrow. "What, really?"
Twilight nodded. "I've been told they're quite good. But that's nothing compared to the time I freaked out over not being able to send a Friendship Report to Celestia and decided to create my own friendship problem by casting a Want It, Need It spell on Miss Smarty Pants."
Sunset's mouth had dropped wide open as she gaped at Twilight. "You- you did what?"
"Cast a Want It, Need It spell on my doll, then tossed it at the ponies here in town." Twilight repeated, her smile growing more strained and a blush appearing on her cheeks.
"So you just-"
"Eeyup."
"Did you at least imprint it to the people you wanted to catch?"
"I didn't even know that was possible until after the fact."
Sunset winced "So the entire town..."
Twilight nodded, no longer smiling but instead feeling her head sink lower and lower. "Princess Celestia had to break up the resulting fight herself."
"Wow," Sunset let the world out in a breath of air as she flopped down on her haunches. "I never would have thought the Princess of Friendship would ever do something crazy like that for a report."
Twilight raised her head again, her smile returning. "Well I wasn't a Princess at the time, just her student, but I made a mistake that day and I learned from it. One of the many lessons I learned, but a very important one: Sometimes friends make mistakes." She glanced at the giant table. "I still make mistakes even now. Friendship isn't something you can study like an exam, I'm always learning new things about friendship, one friend at a time."
Sunset let Twilights words roll round in her head for a moment. Even Twilight freaked out and made mistakes.
"So... how did you fix it?" Sunset asked.
"We sat down and talked," Twilight answered. "We explained what went wrong and apologized, we learned our lessons and we moved on."
Sunset chewed the inside of her cheek. She realized she might have placed Twilight on a pedestal, like everypony did with Celestia, but if Twilight could make mistakes like these and still remain close with her friends, maybe... maybe she could-
Sunset stubbornly shook her head. This was the exact opposite of why she came here. She looked at Twilight and saw a concerned look cross the alicorn's face. Averting her own eyes, she glanced at the journal on the table and the reading glasses next to them.
"... Since when do you need reading glasses?" Sunset asked.
"Huh?" Twilight blinked, confused by the sudden shift in topic. She followed Sunset's gaze and her eyes widened in realization, a wide smile made its way on hr muzzle as her ears perked up in enthusiasm. "Oh! I don't need reading glasses, I've just been trying to enchant these glasses to read the human writing."
"English." Sunset corrected automatically, and lifted the glasses in her magic, peeking through one of the lenses. "So how does it work?"
"Well, you know how when the portal transforms us it also casts Starswirl's Comprehensive Comprehension on us?"
"Found that out when I first tried to read something after just having finished a conversation," Sunset confirmed.
Twilight nodded enthusiastically. "Exactly! Starswirl's Comprehensive Comprehension works by translating what a person wants to convey rather than trying to hammer out a complete grammar and syntax from words alone. But texts don't have a thinking mind behind them, so the spell has nothing to work with. But then I remembered Haycartes' technique and how going in a book lets you understand the author's intent and started thinking: can I apply a variation of that spell to a pony or object to allow that pony to understand the written work?"
Sunset's eyes focused on the glasses as old memories rose back to the surface. Spell equations and evocations that she hadn't used in close to a decade rose back to her mind. "That- yeah, that could work. But you're running into the problem that Haycartes' method, last I checked, relies on being inside the book to experience the feelings of the author."
"That is what I'm running into as well," Twilight agreed. "I've got the translation matrix, and I've got Haycartes' spell, but I can't get the two to work together. As long as Haycartes' spell doesn't let me get understanding out, the translation matrix has nothing to work with."
Sunset narrowed her eyes at the glasses hovering in her magic, humming as she ran down her memory, thinking of and discarding hundreds of spells she had learned over the years.
"Have you tried a clairvoyance spell yet?"
Twilight blinked. "Clairvoyance?"
"Yeah," Sunset said. "Like for example a See Through You spell, that lets you see through another pony or solid object."
"That wouldn't really be going inside the book though," Twilight started to point out, but then her eyes widened and her ears perked. "But by almost all factors we would be looking inside the book, almost as if we were inside."
"Which might be enough to trick Haycartes' spell to spill its understanding," Sunset continued.
"Which even if it's not the full emotional understanding could be enough to feed the translation matrix!" Twilight finished, a look of pure wonder making her way across her face. "Sunset, you're a genius!" A small frown interrupted the wonder. "Now we just need to find a way to cast three spells and have them work together in something as small and fragile as a pair of glasses.
Sunset blew out a breath in a puff. "Yeah, okay, that's... a tall order. How far did you get?"
"I got Haycartes' spell and the translation matrix on the glasses, just not working together."
Sunset raised an eyebrow "You got those two on a pair of glasses in such short order? Impressive."
Twilight huffed and buffed a hoof to her chest. "Well I was your successor as Celestia's prized pupil and the Element of Magic," Twilight smirked as she tilted her nose in the air, glancing down at Sunset from the corner of her eye.
Sunset blinked. Was Twilight... bragging? After that entire humility speech? She opened her mouth to ask, but then she caught it. A glint, quick as a whip, in the corner of Twilight's eye.
Oh.
Oooooh.
Sunset grinned. "Oh it is on your royal worshipfulness. Give me those glasses, I'll show you how you properly mix a translation matrix with See Through You and Haycartes' spell."
Twilight laughed as she floated the glasses over to Sunset and the two made their way back to the library.
For the moment, Sunset wasn't going to worry about her friends at CHS just yet. Right now, her friend right here had taken the unwise risk of challenging Sunset in a contest of magic. And Sunset wasn't planning to back out.