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Prologue984 words
Ch 1 - Artisan or Artist?2,856 words
Ch 2 - Confessions3,342 words
Ch 3 - Time Marches On2,631 words
Ch 4 - Discovery2,791 words
Ch 5 - Therapy?2,809 words
Ch 6 - Mending Bridges3,578 words
Ch 7 - New Beginnings5,356 words
Ch8 - Getting to Know You4,124 words

Ch 2 - Confessions

Ponyville had grown considerably since the events surrounding the attack of Tirek. Being the home base of sorts for some of Equestria’s most high profile heroes would do that, and there now being a majestic castle in place of its former library only served to attract even more attention.

It was that last part that rather irritated Twilight Sparkle. Was the average pony so shallow that they only really acknowledged her once she had the right kind of accommodation? It would make for an interesting sociological study, she supposed, but her days of being able to churn out hundred page research papers just because she felt like it were long behind her. Increased visibility meant increased duties, and as much as the purple alicorn loved to be able to reduce a little of Celestia and Luna’s workload her own studies were suffering as a result. Not that she had all that much in formal studies to complete, of course, but there were always new boundaries to push in magical research, and there were still areas where her apprentice Starlight Glimmer needed to improve. Deep down, however, Twilight really needed to keep her mind occupied lest her overactive brain start inventing problems to solve. Unfortunately royal duties took a lot of time but were rarely mentally taxing. The last time she had sat in on Canterlot’s royal courts the matters had been so insignificant that she had thought of five different ways to reform the system to solve them, five hundred ways that failing to do so would somehow doom the planet, then five thousand ways that doing anything would actually somehow be worse. In the end Luna had wound up having to drag the newest princess out of the bathroom by the tail, Twilight shuddering on the floor and muttering something about needing to work out how to change the process of applying for building permits in order to save ponies from burning to death.

And so it came to this, a mercifully slow week, where the purple mare could actually engage her brain for a while and put off getting help for her increasingly obvious OCD symptoms for a little longer. It had started off well, a few paragraphs about her concerns over the similarities between Discord’s magic and Pinkie Pie’s randomness here, a few tweaks to potions and spells there. She would have just lost herself in her laboratories had Spike not pointed out that she would regret not using her free time to hang out with her friends.

“Yo! I’d say a bit for your thoughts, but you’re you, Twilight, I’d either not get it or you’d make me worry.” A loud, rough voice almost directly in her ear made the Princess of Friendship jump in surprise, hanging in mid air as her wings reflexively kept her off the ground. “Oh man, you should see yourself! I know you can space out and all but wow, that was a… a…. Buck it, that was hilarious!” The blue pegasus that had apparently been following Twilight as she traipsed through town was literally rolling on the floor laughing.

“Rainbow Dash, how many times do I have to tell you to stop startling me?” Twilight Sparkle frowned, annoyed. With a smooth beat of her wings she landed next to her mutlicoloured maned friend. “And shouldn’t you be training or something?”

“Ah… sorry, Twi!” Rainbow Dash threw a foreleg over her friend’s shoulders and gave her a friendly squeeze by way of apology. “You’re just too easy a target!”

“Wait, you say sorry, then imply it’s somehow my…” Twilight shook her head, realising what a lost cause this was. “You know what, never mind. What are you doing around here anyway, Rainbow?”

“Eh, needed to take a break and hit up Sugarcube Corner,” Rainbow Dash shrugged. “You know how it is, even I need to stop to eat sometimes, and the Wonderbolts training is pretty intense! You?”

“Ugh.” Twilight rolled her eyes. “Heading to the Carousel Boutique myself. I haven’t really seen Rarity since I got back from Canterlot, so I was going to see if she was free and…. I guess brace myself if she needs me to do alterations to my Gala dress.” Twilight cast her glance backwards over her body in annoyance. “Between you and me this whole alicorn thing is a bit annoying on that front, turns out my measurements change every couple of weeks.”

Rainbow stifled a yawn. “Yeah what’s with that, anyway? You look kind of bigger now you mention it.”

“A function of age and power according to Celestia,” Twilight explained, suddenly sounding excited. “It’s not really been researched fully since there’s only…. well, four fully grown alicorns that we know of, two of whom are more or less goddesses anyway. I’ve established that the changes are most notable after pushing my magic to its limit, and I have my own theories on that, but I wonder if there's an end to it? Is Celestia the peak of an alicorn, or could even she push herself further? Ooh, Cadence isn’t that much further than I am in progression, maybe she could.... I’ve lost you haven’t I?”

“Around the word ‘function’. Sorry.” Rainbow Dash chuckled. “Let’s say I don’t envy you, I think Fluttershy’s the only one of us who doesn’t mind posing for Gala dresses. I mean, Rares is cool and all, she invents cool in that silly girly world she lives in, and she'll be up for anything if you push her buttons enough, but…” Here Rainbow leaned in conspiratorially, “...you know, I think she’s about as sane as Pinkie sometimes.”

“I’m pretty sure that applies to the whole lot of us in some way,” Twilight giggled, her mood lifting. “Look, don’t let me keep you if you needed to grab a snack, but I was going to call in on everyone eventually, drop by the castle later when you’re free. I… uh, could still do with a bit of tutoring at flying, I’m barely faster than Fluttershy when I don’t have adrenaline backing me up.”

The sentence was music to Rainbow Dash’s ears apparently, because she grasped her friend’s hooves eagerly. “Are you kidding? I’ll always make time to help you on that score! You got the most awesome flyer in Equestria to help you with your wings, bet the other princesses are jealous they never had someone like me around!”

“Riiiight….” A twinge of concern passed through Twllight Sparkle’s mind. Lately it seemed as if Rainbow Dash’s bravado had changed from a coping mechanism to full egotism, as if she had been telling everyone how great she was for so long that the pegasus had managed to fall for her own hype. But right now she had another friend to visit, and no doubt a good hour’s worth of being very uncomfortable as gown tweaks were made to accommodate a body that hadn’t seen such unpredictable growth spurts since she was a filly. “So I guess I’ll see you when I see you?”

“Pretty much,” Rainbow grinned. “Just.... don’t expect it to be too early, okay?”

Carousel Boutique was closed, but this was hardly unusual for this time of year. These days the pretty lilac and white building was more Rarity’s workspace than it was a store, the unicorn’s more common lines being sold in her Canterlot and Manehattan branches so that she could focus on her commissions. One of which was for a certain purple princess, who both wanted to see a good friend and get a mildly frustrating part of gown design over and done with.

“Hey, Rarity?” Twilight rapped on the door, rather used to this scenario. “It’s Twilight, are you there?”

“Coming darling!” A few bangs, a couple of very unladylike curses and a few more bangs followed, before a paint-splattered unicorn donning an olive smock and dark blue beret threw open the door triumphantly, a huge grin on her muzzle and a look in her eyes that made her alicorn friend just know this was going to be at least a three hour refitting session. “Oh it’s so good to see you, I’d give you a hug but… hold on…” Pale blue magic energy removed Rarity’s protective gear, and Twilight was vaguely relieved to see that the splatters left in her pelt were old and well dried before her friend hugged her warmly. “Twilight, darling! Please, come in, would you care for a cup of tea?”

“Oh!” Twilight Sparkle had almost forgotten about yet another reason she had wanted to drop by. Her horn flared and lifted a saddlebag over to her friend, who accepted it with her own magical hold. “No need, I have that covered. I figured you were working hard at this time so would likely be wanting some coffee and snacks. Given your previous habits from when we’ve spent time together I was hoping you’d like a salted caramel doughnut and a double strength cinnamon latte?”

“Darling you are a star, no wonder your cutie mark turned out as such,” Rarity squealed in happiness as the two made their way through the main room of the boutique. “Please do give me a moment to wash up though.”

As the white unicorn dashed off to at least clean her hooves in the sink, Twilight had to ask what was on her mind. “Okay, Rarity, what’s with this? I get that you love acting like a cliche, but you answered the door in full artist garb. Plus I know that you hate getting messy, but your nose is literally yellow right now. You’re going to show me something amazing or something scary, I’d really like to know which it is so I can figure out which way I need to lose my mind.”

There was a long, poignant pause before Rarity stuck her head, mercifully without paint splatters, out of her kitchen. “Let me serve some drinks, and I’ll explain.”

“So this was just another case of you being okay with getting messy in certain circumsatnces? In this case if it’s making art?” Twilight stifled a giggle. “Rarity, truth be told I had a bet about this exact thing with Applejack and if you’ll admit to it she owes me twenty bits.”

“No, it’s…. Look, darling, I’ll gladly win you your bet, there’s more to it than my not noticing any mess I made on my person,” Rarity grumbled, taking a sip of coffee. Her horn began to glow and a canvas levitated over to the small table the two ponies had set up. “Take a look at this. My first wholly successful attempt with watercolours. I didn't want to do anypony's likeness a disservice whilst I was learning, so... Well, this was a self portrait, as I hope you can see, but it was.... Frustrating!” The unicorn stamped a pale while hood in frustration, but her friend didn’t understand her annoyance at all. She was looking at a near photorealistic attempt at Rarity’s own form wrapped in a stunning green gown with a remarkable amount of lace around the shoulders.

“I… I’m not seeing..?”

“Darling, I know this looks fine, and it will continue to look fine as I use it to hone that dress but I was so strongly in work mode for that picture!” Rarity was almost screaming at this point. “If I wanted my images to be like real life I would have taken up photography!”

“Whoa. Whoa, who, hold up,” Twilight held her hooves up, about to placate her friend. Fortunately Rarity's mood seemed to shift in an instant.

“I’ll return to that, though. Case two, Rainbow Dash.” A second canvas floated over, displaying a shocking likeness of their friend producing a Sonic Rainboom, only heavily inspired by comic book art. “This one worked. Rainbow is… not exactly complicated so the concept was easy, you’d rather not know how many materials I wasted getting used to dealing with acrylic paints though! Here’s Applejack, I thought she must have a rustic theme…” The next canvas was oil and heavily inspired by the work of artists well in the past, and in spite of what Rarity had said previously was highly realistic. “There’s no other way to picture her though, unfortunately, as much as I was trying to add a certain flair.... Well, her flair is ‘what you see is what you get’. Now to the next…” Another passed, and Twilight Sparkle found herself gaping at a pastel pink monstrosity that screamed Pinkie Pie in spite of looking nothing like her. Everything was stretched, moved out of proportion, it was too much.... “Sorry darling! I rather forgot your dislike of that kind of thing!” Rarity moved on quickly.

“What… was that?” Twilight Sparkle eventually breathed.

“Surrealism, or at least my first attempt at it,” Rarity giggled nervously. “I must admit, this was a rather sudden shift, Fluttershy suggested I get out of my comfort zone as it were, and I’m enjoying it a lot,. If it’s worrying you though…”

“No, not at all!” Twilight almost yelled at this point.

“Thank you! Why bother create if you have nobody to create for???” All of a sudden a whole lot of Rarity’s ethos made far too much sense. Twilight decided to just carry on listening. “And here you go, I was going to hold onto this but.... I just can’t, I really hope you like it!” The next canvas was Twilight, in her current alicorn form and in a style that perfectly matched the Royal portraits in Canterlot, only…

Twilight gasped. “Did you… you have the magialchemical formulae for teleportation and telekinesis engraved in the background? You… you did! I didn’t even notice and....” All of a sudden a thought stopped Twilight’s brain, one that made this moment all too bittersweet. “...And as absolutely amazing as this picture is, and as much as I’m going to make sure Celestia hangs this up somewhere nice, I think you’ve missed one of us.”

“Ahahaha, I do know but I tried so hard and couldn’t quite…”

“Rarity, you’re a terrible liar. What happened to your take on Fluttershy?”

“I... “ Rarity hung her head solemnly. “Nothing. It came out too well, if you must know.”

“Too well?”

“Fine, look if you must!” Rarity all but screamed, dragging over one final canvas before hurling herself face first into her sofa. “Then exile me if you must, at least I have an emergency exilation kit packed!”

Twilight was about to commiserate with a ‘wow, you have one of those too?’, only she finally paid attention to the picture in front of her. “Oh wow…” she gasped, her eyes studying a picture of a beautiful pink maned mare ascending to the skies like an angel, draped only in the softest robes. It was easily on a par with any of the classical artwork Twilight had studied.

It also screamed loudly how much the artist was obsessed with their subject matter.

“Oh. Wow.” Twilight finally managed to stammer.

Several moments passed.

And then Twilight had finally passed through a billion responses, filtered them down to the best hundred, briefly checked each until she was down to ten then set those head to head until the winner shone through. “Rarity…” she began, “it’s really okay. Nobody wants to see you exiled. Nobody will even care. I doubt you ever saw what happened to the last pony who was outspoken about mares loving mares or stallions loving stallions.” Twilight chuckled almost cruelly. “Trust me, if you think Luna can get carried away at times you’ve not seen anything compared to when Cadence loses her cool. So, you know, your image wouldn't suffer, you know that, and I know none of us will think less of you, but…”

“But what to do now,” Rarity finished flatly, finally pulling herself upright and starting to go about fixing her running mascara. “For a start this rather dashes the plans I had of gifting these for now, I couldn’t possibly let poor Fluttershy see something so blatant while she’s unaware of how much I adore her.”

“Have you tried, I don’t know, talking to her about any of this?” Twilight was trying hard not to sound short with her friend, but the solution did appear rather obvious at first glance. “I mean, you two already seem the closest out of any of us emotionally.”

The white unicorn gave a bitter laugh. “If only it were that easy! The chapter on the book of Fluttershy pertaining to romance is locked tight, it would seem. Trust me, I have tried, but I’ve seen her more comfortable around dragons than she is when the conversation turns to matters of her heart. I have no idea where her preferences even lie, darling. And even if I did, I fear that any confessions on my part would only leave the poor dear nervous around me.”

“There’s got to be some way to work this out!” Twilight surprised herself with the passion in her voice. “Maybe you’re not giving her enough credit? Sure, Fluttershy’s timid… and a bit emotional… and prone to hiding in small spaces when she gets overwhelmed… but, but, but even with all that, she’s still your best friend isn’t she? She’d stay that way no matter what happened, right?”

“Twilight, darling, as much as I love your conviction, I fear this silly little crush is destined to stay hidden and one sided.” Rarity drained her tea, ignoring the alicorn’s protests. “I can’t risk hurting what we have already. I can’t risk hurting her. No, best leave angel pegasi to my fantasies, I’ll just have to try again and see if I can’t rein myself in a touch this time.”.

Twilight was still very dissatisfied by this resolution, but was at a loss as to how to proceed. Part of her had resigned itself to just leaving well alone for now, part was so convinced that the two ponies seemed so right for each other that it saw a duty to go above and beyond to fix this, a third, more selfish part agreed with the second because otherwise it just knew that she was going to be up until 3am worrying, and a fourth just wished that the other parts would stop bickering so she could go back home and continue research into trying to eliminate her need for sleep entirely. “But… fine,” she said finally, defeated. “What are you going to do with the picture? It’s just too good to throw away!”

“On that we agree,” Rarity nodded as her alicorn friend finished her own cup of tea. “I was thinking maybe keeping it stashed somewhere in the attic for now. Bring it down on occasion to sigh wistfully at it and think of what might have been, maybe weep a little and go ‘oh! Woe is me! I shall never know such perfection again!’ Things like that.” She had raised a white hoof to her forehead in emphasis as she spoke. It seemed that the side of Rarity that loved hamming things up was firmly in control again. Which meant that soon…

Twilight Sparkle’s eyes widened and a chill ran down her spine as she finally heard the words she had been dreading. “But enough about me, what about you? You seem to have grown another quarter inch since I last took your measurements! Come now, we simply must make sure that your latest dress will still fit you!”

Noooooooooo!

Author's Note:

Protip: Do not be openly homophobic around a heavily sleep deprived Princess of Love if you value your ability to walk.