Lines, lines, production lines, and factories. Chop. Churn. Cut. Chomp. Sewsewsew, and then the stamp: et voilà! Factories and factorise; art reduced to an equation. Not all of it, oh no. Just enough for it to hurt.
“And this is...?”
“This is your Elusiva,” the stallion said. “In the silk and...”
“Yes,” she said, with a thin sort of smile. Elusivo. “Thank you.”
The saddest thing about it was that most ponies simply wouldn’t notice. She’d held out long enough for machines to advance so far that the untrained eye could hardly spot the difference. There it was, though: subtle; extant nonetheless. And the smell: beneath the perfume, yes, you could smell the oil on the thing. She would have preferred to keep it all hoofmade, but that was expensive, wasn’t the way the industry was headed, so here, she had this, instead. Rows of flawless little stitches, straight and flat and perfectly soulless.
“Do you see it?” asked Rarity, pushing the sad little hat across the table. Sweetie Belle picked it up with a frown. Mystified.
“Huh?”
“Let me take a look,” said Diamond Tiara, leaning over to pluck it out her partner’s hoof. She peered down at it critically, turning it this way and that. “Ah.”
“Mmn.”
“What?” Sweetie stared between the two of them. “Something only ponies with glasses can see?”
Diamond Tiara giggled, showed her, and passed it back. “It’s good, though,” she said, as Rarity filed it away again. “I’d buy it.”
That was not exactly what was bothering Rarity. At least, she reassured herself, the ribbons would still be added by hoof. That, she’d insisted upon, made absolutely clear, had underlined, so it really should not have come as any sort of surprise when Blazing Saddles pulled her into his office one morning to tell her that was going mechanical, too. Well, she’d get it written into contract, next time. Then they couldn’t go back on it, or...or...
Was it her? Was she simply asking too much? Everypony else seemed to be adjusting well. Coco, why, she was doing wonderfully! Less of an adjustment, more of an embrace, welcoming this newly senseless fashion with open hooves and fresh-made biscuits. Right this way, no, that’s all right, you can keep your horseshoes on, come on in, take a seat – please, wherever you want, I was just warming it up for you – oh! you like it? family heirloom yes; yes, of course it’s yours if you’d like it, feel free to ask for anything, what’s mine is yours, yes, anything at all. She wanted to be happy for her friend, she really did. Wanted to admire how well her old pupil had made her mark on this new world, had taken it in her stride and sewn a vision all her own. She didn’t like that every show of Coco’s she attended now drained away just a little more of the respect she’d once had for the mare. Goodness knew what Coco thought of her designs. Old, she didn’t doubt. Outdated, out of touch: archaic. No, she wasn’t being fair. That wasn’t Coco, just her own secret cruelty rising as it liked to do at night, fed by the reviews she knew she shouldn’t read, few at first, but growing larger. Dinosaurus.
And it wasn’t like she was completely behind the times. There were things – not many, no, but some – she still enjoyed, in every season. Change was good, it really was. Just most of what was changing wasn’t changing for the better. Like this: new management, new CEO, new owner of whatever company her company’s company’s company reported to. Orders from on high: Less focus on the catwalks, more focus on the everycreature. Well, Rarity wasn’t totally against the idea, not exactly, not in theory – but in practise what it meant was a whole lot less haute couture, and a whole lot more Manehattan stores. Less originality, more production management. Less time at her sewing station, more time at her office.
“Aha, but less is more, Rarity!” the mare had said, with satisfaction. Rarity hadn’t found the will to argue further.
Restrictions bred creativity, but this wasn’t restriction, this was...why, yes, this was constriction. Like a snake, like some enormous python (with apologies to Fluttershy’s new python, Mr. Cuddles) winding itself around your body, squeezing tighter, tighter, until you couldn’t breathe, couldn’t shout, couldn’t even find it in yourself to argue, any longer.
HEADLINE: Department Store Announces 20 New Locations.
HEADLINE: Rarity’s Boutique Pivots To Tinned Pasta.
Page thirteen, bottom corner: Rarity, An Obituary.
She laughed, at that. All she needed now was a tub of ice cream and her old chaise longue and why, she’d be in paradise. Couldn’t eat ice cream like that now, though, not at her age. Sick for days. Time is money. Have to clock in, now. Where had it begun? Might she have avoided it, if she’d swatted the mosquito away those years ago? No, on reflection, probably not – if not this company, then another, surely. At least here, she told herself, she was paid well enough. Do a job you like, you’ll never work a day in your life.
“Applejack, darling, how go things at the farm?”
“Weather’s sour,” said Applejack. “I keep tellin Rainbow to get up there and sort things out, but she keeps sayin it’s against the rules. Ha! You ever heard Rainbow Dash to care about the rules? Something about hard-workin weatherponies not needing any of our nonsense, but far as I make it, they ain’t comin out here much anyway. See em, what, three times a year? Hay, I doubt they’d even notice.” She sighed. “Can’t complain too much, though.” From beneath the wide brim of an old friend, a wry smile. “Why, you thinkin of changing careers?”
Rarity arranged her saucer, notepad, pen upon the table. “Maybe,” she said, “you never know.”
No, not really. She loved the work. But it was nice to imagine, sometimes...
The thing that stopped her, though, the cage that sprung up every time she thought about escaping – well, aside from the name, the love of the craft, the ponies that relied on her, the ones she actually liked, aside from all that – was the thought that really, without it, what did she have left? What was Rarity without her Boutique? What else could she even do?