Lies
"Are you sure, Twilight?" Naudia asked, looking at the carousel-themed building anxiously.
"Yes, I've told you before: If you want to get in touch with the working pony, you have to understand what they do all day." Twilight held up a wordily titled reference book. "That's what it says in the 'Conspicuously Titled Book for Getting Princesses In Touch With the Common People.'"
Naudia had some doubts about the authenticity of the book. Twilight wouldn't let her read it and the ink on the cover was suspiciously fresh when she picked it up.
"All right, I'll take your word for that."
Naudia pushed open the door, took one look inside the building, turned around, closed the door and looked directly at Twilight.
"I am not going to be a mannequin today, am I?" Naudia asked Twilight in no uncertain tones.
"Ummm...." Twilight looked even more nervous than when Naudia picked up the not at all fake book. "No, not at all, let me go inside and..."
"...tell her you're coming to work for her!" Twilight blurted out. "Don't want to shock her, she might faint."
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"What was I thinking?" Rarity said, shocked, "That pattern looks absolutely tacky there, now I'll have to tear out those stitches. Awww." Rarity said, pouting as if the stitchwork would remove itself from words alone.
"Err. Rarity?" came a voice from behind her.
"Not now, dear, I'm working on a very important dress now." Rarity gestured at the mannequin which was larger than any other in the shop, dressed up in a flowy, almost gauzy, dress that seemed to sparkle and flow without any apparent wind.
"But Rarity we've got serious trouble. Code L!"
"I"m sorry, dear, what?"
"Uggggh. Don't you remember the codewords from last night?" Rarity gave Twilight an indignant look. "All right, Rarity. Luna just told me in no uncertain terms that she WASN'T going to be your dress mannequin today."
"But, Twilight! I may never get a chance to work on such a royal form ever again!" Rarity almost shouted.
"All I know is that she is NOT going to be your dressmaking form today. You're going to have to find something else to do with her."
"Well..." Rarity looked pensive for a moment. "I suppose..."
"Yes?" Twilight looked hopeful.
"I suppose I could use an assistant for today, but-"
"Good enough!" Twilight said, ponyhandling Rarity to the door, "Now go. I have to have a serious talk with Rainbow Dash."
"But Twilight-"
"I won't hear any of that, now GO."
"Twilight, this is my house, and we'll be working in here." Rarity said, unamused.
"Oh..." Twilight looked more than a little embarrassed. "Gotta-go-bye!" and Twilight was gone in a purple flash, leaving Luna still standing on Rarity's doorstep.
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Twilight stomped through town, embarrassed, angry, and impatient. Every time she saw a cloud that could hide a certain rainbow-maned pegasus, she magically popped it with a speed that, were she a pegasus herself, would get her signed onto the weather team in a flash.
To her eternal frustration, the mare in question appeared right next to her sans spy gear.
"Sup, Twilight," Rainbow Dash said, in a voice that normally would have startled Twilight out of her horseshoes.
"Rainbow Dash." Twilight said, her voice cold, "I've been meaning to talk to you about something."
"Yeah, yeah, I know," Rainbow said, waving a hoof, "I shouldn't have been spying on you yesterday without you knowing about it."
"And Twilight," Rainbow pawed the ground nervously, "I was thinking about what you said last night, and I had a talk with Applejack this morning and..."
Rainbow Dash shut her eyes, and blurted out the next sentence so fast Twilight almost didn't catch it.
"You were right we were being too hard on Luna."
Twilight almost looked smug at this.
"So I told Pinkie Pie that we should set up a 'sorry for spying on you party' for tonight, after you tell her that we've been spying on her."
"...You did what?" Twilight's face could have been cast and sold, for poker players the world over to try and imitate.
"Weelll, you see, since it was your idea to spy on her and all, we thought you should be the one to tell her." Rainbow Dash was looking shifty again, "And we all agree that, while she has changed, by our count she isn't a changeling."
Dash's voice accelerated under the indignant stare of Twilight.
"And we'd all like to apologize for how we've treated her, and we figured that the best way to do that would be to tell her what we've been up to first."
Rainbow Dash threw Twilight what she hoped was a winning smile, but really just betrayed her nervousness, as steam began to swirl its way out of Twilight's ears.
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"Ah, good, darling. I was right on the mark, minus one or two minor details," Rarity said, rolling up her dressmaker’s tape.
Almost immediately there was what sounded like a fiery explosion in the street outside, accompanied by a blinding flash.
"What was that?" Luna asked, more than a little worried.
"Oh that was just Twilight reacting to some bad news, nothing to get excited about."
"NOW this," Rarity said, brandishing a bolt of gauzy sparkly cloth, “is something to get excited about!"
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Dash peeked out from behind a soot-blackened market cart.
"Ok then, Twilight, sooo..." Dash visibly shrank under Twilight's glare. "See you at the party tonight then!"
And Rainbow Dash was flying back to her cloud house, leaving nothing behind but a puff of dust.
Twilight sulked back to her library, and sulkily sat down to sulk her way through a book.
How could her friends spring something like that on her NOW?
Finally, after getting nowhere with the book, she took a deep breath and actually thought about the whole situation.
Horn glowing, she brought out a scroll and started scribbling on it.
Question 1: Why were they spying on Luna in the first place?
"Well," wrote Twilight, "To see if she's a changeling or not."
Question 2: What have you determined since she's got here?
"We have determined that she isn't a changeling."
Question 3: Then why do you want to keep spying on her?
Twilight's quill stopped then and there. That was a hard one to answer.
But no, she told herself. That one was a hard one to admit to herself.
Eight and a half arduous minutes later, she had her answer written down on paper.
It had always calmed her down before, to have everything written down and laid out and planned to the best of her abilities. It was from there she could look at it from a distance and really see what needed to be done.
It stared her in the face now. The writing on the paper below was a tangled mass of half truths, guilt, and selfishness. All of them pointed accusingly to one conclusion.
She had been lying to Luna--and in admitting the truth, she might lose her.