Chapter 1
This. Was. A. Nightmare.
Thankfully not the one where she finally had a chance to present her latest fashion line in Manehattan and got laughed off the stage as a small-town country fraud because all her beautiful dresses had turned into dirty old overalls that even Applejack would refuse to wear, but surely there was no other explanation than ‘nightmare’ for her current predicament: standing in a damp, dark, musty old cavern.
And yes, Rarity could clearly remember how she got here – Sapphire Shores’ visit, sweet-talking Spike into coming gem-hunting with her, getting dragged down a terrible dirty hole, and tossed into this – honestly calling it a “room” was giving it entirely too much credit, there wasn’t a decoration or a piece of furniture in sight, just rock walls and a barred door that looked like it was only held together by rust –
Was it a cell? Had she been kidnapped? That just wasn’t done!
No, no, this clearly must be a nightmare.
She paced the length of the cell, but it was as bare as it had appeared at first glance. A tug at the door with her magic confirmed that it was shut tightly and probably locked. Maybe Applejack could have kicked it down if she were here –
I wish my friends were here.
Well, maybe not here, here. This cell was awfully small, it’d be entirely too cramped with everyone else in it, too. But Applejack probably would kick the door down, or Rainbow Dash would come up with some exciting plan that would probably involve her flying circles around the dogs, or, or Fluttershy would find a mole to talk to that could dig a path out of here before they came back –
She … she could dig too, couldn’t she?
Rarity approached the farthest, darkest, dankest corner of the cell (ugh), closed her eyes, and pawed at the ground. Shuddered, reopened her eyes, and checked her hoof over carefully.
It was covered in at least three layers of dirt, but her ponypedi still looked safe. One eye tentatively open this time, she tried again. There was … a little bit of a dent in the dirt now?
Oh, this was impossible.
Surely Spike had escaped, at least? Dependable little Spike, he'd have run straight back to Twilight and told her everything, and surely Twilight would have a plan to rescue her? She had a plan for everything.
If Spike had escaped. Maybe they kidnapped him too, or – or worse.
The cell door creaked, and Rarity whirled to face it as three of the horrible dogs – her kidnappers – entered.
The hole! Dent. Whatever. She couldn’t let them see it; what if they realized she’d been trying to escape? Distract them. She had to distract them somehow. Pleading might work? Playing helpless?
She opened her eyes wide and blinked up at them. “Oh, please let me go.”
But they were still approaching and – the wall, she couldn’t back up any further, and now her tail was probably messed up and dirty too, and she simply couldn’t stay here forever, she’d never survive –
Wait. All they wanted was for her to find some gems for them?
This was still no way to conduct a proper business transaction and she certainly wouldn’t accept any further commissions from them if they came knocking at her door in the future, but if that was all it took to get them to let her go? She concentrated for a moment, and the cave around her lit up from her gem-sensing spell. She even took a moment to pick the largest nearby cluster – let no one say she wasn’t generous – before trotting over and marking it.
There. Now all this horrible business would be done with, and she could treat it like the passing nightmare it really ought to have been, and –
Now there was another dog.
And he was pointing a spear at her?!
They wanted her to dig the gems up herself? That’s what she had Spike for!
Spike. She still hadn’t seen him. Surely that meant that he had escaped, that he wasn’t shut up somewhere else in this horrible dungeon, but back home gathering the others and rushing to her rescue. All she needed to do was hold on a little while longer.
She steeled herself and pawed lightly at the ground. The dirt was softer out here than in the cell, and her ponypedi still seemed to be unharmed. She … she could do this. Just, a few more times, she was sure of it; it never seemed to take all that long for Spike to dig gems up.
And the diamond dogs didn’t understand because of course they wouldn’t, it didn’t look like any of their claws had ever been within even the same neighborhood as a salon, but she simply couldn’t chip a hoof! Not only would she be the laughingstock of the town, but it’d been such a nice afternoon; Fluttershy had joined her, and Rarity had told her all about her newest project – the outfit that Sapphire Shores herself had said just earlier today that she wanted to order!
She simply must tell Fluttershy about that the next time she saw her.
… If she got out of here. If she ever saw her friends again.
No. Rarity pawed at the ground with slightly more emphasis. She would get out of here. She must.
Somehow.
“Oh, for goodness’ – fine! Just stop.”
Rarity was too much of a lady to show her surprise, of course, as her clearly reasonable objections convinced the … ringleader dogs? to order their minions to dig for the gems in her place.
She minced backwards, away from all the dust being kicked up; she was sure she was already covered in the horrid stuff, but that was no reason not to avoid getting even dirtier.
Maybe … maybe if they were willing to see reason about her ponypedi, this wouldn’t be so bad?
She still couldn’t possibly stay here forever, of course. But if she could hold out until her friends got here –
Her coat was ruined. Her skin itched where the dogs’ horrid nails had scratched her. What if they had fleas? What if they’d given her fleas?
And the harness was horrid and rusted and heavy and she did not pull carts like a common workhorse, she was no Applejack to take some strange pleasure in hard manual labor, how could she be expected to do anything in these conditions?
Applejack. “You need to stop being so dang fussy,” Rarity remembered her saying, at that utter mess of a slumber party that had turned out … surprisingly fun, in the end, “and help me move the one big thing in here that actually matters!”
The one big thing was getting out of here.
But this cave system was just so large. Even if Spike managed to lead them back to the hole that they’d dragged her down, how would they even find her, with so much to search? She needed to make noise somehow. Ideally something that would be recognizably her.
… The dogs had stopped making her try to (shudder) dig, even if they then inflicted her with this horrifying harness. So maybe having appropriate standards (she was not ‘fussy’, thank you very much) was exactly what this particular situation called for?
She was not Fluttershy, with a singing voice so beautiful it was honestly a travesty she refused to sing in public. But she knew a few things about pitch and projection; a lady, of course, would never yell, but she could certainly ensure that each and every one of these dogs knew exactly what she thought of this operation and the role they were forcing her into – and if that helped her friends find her, even better.
And it did seem to be having an effect on the dogs too – the smallest one in particular seemed to be twitching increasingly with each comment she made.
She could see the moment he cracked, twisting and pulling at his ears and telling her to be quiet. They’d stopped making her dig, earlier, maybe they’d stop making her pull the cart if she pushed just a little bit –
Whining.
Whining.
They thought her very reasonable complaints were whining? That it hurt their precious ears?
She’d show them whining that hurt.
One dove for cover, the other two flinched away, and one finally broke and implored her: “Stop whining!”
Well. No sibling, lady or not, could let an opening that obvious pass her by.
Rarity took a deep breath, tossed her head back, petulantly stomped her hooves several times for good measure, and whined with all her might,
“But I thought you wanted whining!”
Now this was more like it.
Yes, the water wasn’t sparkling, and she was carefully refraining from thinking too hard about how well the goblet had been washed – it at least looked clean – and the cave was still dark, and dank, and full of dirt, and she still wanted more than anything to just go home, but at least the ribbons helped brighten the place up a bit, and their entire operation was clearly running far more smoothly with her in charge.
Now she just needed to convince them that they didn’t need her around to find gems for them now that she’d whipped their processes into shape – honestly, how could you not keep records of where the best veins usually were? Just because she had a spell that could help her pinpoint the gems’ location once she found a good source was no excuse for being sloppy – and surely they’d let her go this time.
She might not even need her friends to come find her. Yes, things really were looking up, especially now that she no longer had that awful harness on her any–
What.
Rarity turned her head, hoping her senses were deceiving her, but no, that horrid mutt had just attached the dirty, rusted thing even tighter than before, and – and her water, she couldn’t drink it off the ground, it’d be mud, and her whining suddenly wasn’t working –
“Hyah, mule!”
And he slapped her flank. What sort of monster did that?
She could feel the tears welling at the edges of her eyes. She’d been trying so hard, and maybe her friends weren’t coming after all, maybe they thought she was just as annoying as the dogs did, just went along because it was easier than telling her to go away, maybe they were glad to be rid of her. Maybe she’d be stuck here forever with these horrible stinky dogs who thought she was a mule, though of course they would, with how terribly unkempt she must surely be now –
“Don’t be silly, silly.” Pinkie Pie’s voice rang in her head, so clearly that for a moment she expected her vivacious friend to appear from midair. Sure, her friends annoyed her sometimes, but that didn’t mean they weren’t still her friends. And – and, if they were all still friends with Applejack, who Rarity swore sometimes spent the entirety of apple-bucking season looking like a mess just to spite her, surely – surely even if she did look like a mule now –
She didn’t think laughter would do anything but confuse these brutes (sorry, Pinkie), but – but maybe, if whining didn’t work anymore, crying would.
One of the armored dogs stuck his head down through a hole in the ceiling. “Intruders!”
“Well, what are you waiting for? Deal with them!” The tallest of the diamond dogs snapped. The other dog yelped and disappeared from sight.
Rarity cleared her throat, doing her best to keep the flare of hope from showing on her face. “As I was saying, it’s particularly important to have an effective system for storing your records; if you can’t find anything, that’s no better than having no records in the first place. And you simply must find somewhere that is adequately dry; in this muck any paper will turn into a moldy mess in no time at all –”
The small brown dog was twisting his ears again. Really. And here she was, generously offering genuinely useful advice when she didn’t actually have to, she could have gone back to complaining about their breath, which by the way, really was still horrendous –
She pouted, letting tears well up in her eyes again. “Are – are you ignoring me?”
“No, Miss Rarity,” all three dogs said hastily.
Then the smallest one groaned. “I – I can’t take it anymore! Even intruders would be better than this!”
And before Rarity could reply further, he turned and ran, the other two hot on his heels.
Rarity blinked several times, somewhat nonplussed. And – was that crashing noises?
Well, only one way to find out.
She followed after the dogs at a much more genteel pace, arriving just in time for Spike to toss a – stalactite? She wondered what that was all about – on the ground and rush over to hug her.
She smiled down at him, then at each of her friends in turn. It was so good to see them all again.
“Hello, girls.”
Hm. And if the dogs really were as desperate to get rid of her as they sounded … perhaps they wouldn’t mind giving her a little going-away present …
“I can’t believe you found all these gems!”
“I can’t believe you tricked all those dogs!”
Sunlight. With the sun shining on her, surrounded by her friends, Rarity almost didn’t care anymore that she still had that horrid harness on. The cart really was a bit too large for Spike to pull, and sometimes sacrifices must be made on behalf of her art.
She smiled at Rainbow Dash. “I had them wrapped around my hoof the entire time.”
Making even the most difficult task appear simple and effortless was the ladylike thing to do, after all, and it really wouldn’t do to admit that she had – just for a moment – had even the teensiest bit of doubt in her friends.
“What should we do with the carts?” Twilight asked, once all the gems were properly stored away.
“Burn them, for all I care,” Rarity declared, shuddering. She’d checked several times in her mirrors as she passed, and although her mane and coat were just as much of a mess as she had feared, it didn’t look like the rust had left stains. Still, she should probably check again.
Really, the only thing that would make her feel properly clean again would be –
Actually, that was a brilliant idea. Even more brilliant than crying about being ugly had turned out to be.
“We should go to the spa!” Rarity said. “My treat. No, I insist, as thanks for your aid in bringing the gems back.”
And as she trotted spa-wards, the rest of her friends falling in behind (Rainbow groaning in the background, because some ponies had even less taste than Applejack), all was once again right with Rarity’s world.
(Except the fleas. She still needed to check for fleas.)