Sweetie Belle couldn’t sleep. She was walking in circles on her bed, fuming silently. When Rarity had at last returned from her gem gathering and seemed to have forgotten the morning’s incident Sweetie had seen her chance to find out what had really been going on. The only possible explanation was that something was different with Rarity’s … whatever it was. And so, she had decided to investigate:

~Rarity was chopping carrots on the table, humming something indistinct around the handle of the knife. Sweetie trotted up just behind her. “So, how did the hunting go? Did you find much?” she squeaked. She waited until her sister was deep in her story. Making sure to keep as much distance between herself and the lovely plot before her, she cocked her head and loosely took the purple tail in her mouth. She gingerly pulled it out of the way and got a look at a set of hindquarters which seemed very similar to her own. Puzzled, she leaned in to look a little closer.

She was on the floor, again. It really hurt, again. Her sister was giving her that disgusted look, again. She started to rise unsteadily to her hooves, again. Rarity’s front right hoof rose off of the floor. It crashed sickeningly into her cheekbone. She was on the floor, again. “What the hell?” she heard the older mare scream, “What is wrong with you?” The filly was terrified. Her lungs heaved in air, her joints went limp, and she felt tears running across her face and dripping off her temple. Rarity had lost it. Her sister was going to beat her. Anticipatory scenes of horrible brutality ran through her imagination. What if her back broke? She was only a filly, it was quite possible, and if that happened she might never walk again. Who knew what this monster in her beloved sister’s skin could do? She might die. She couldn’t even scream through her hyperventilating sobs. A slam of sickening force came. Her attacker had stormed out.~

How could she possibly lie down and sleep in peace when such a transformation had come over Rarity? When her sister was hiding something that had happened to her, awful enough to turn the perfect pony into such a vile mare? Her dear sister had brutalised her. She thought of what agony the gorgeous mare must be in to even consider doing what she had done to her own adorable sister. Her will hardened. No matter how scary it was, no matter that she may well die in the attempt, she had to help her hero in any way she could. But she had to find out the cause of the problem to be of any use. She jumped down from the bed.

She slipped in to the dark bedroom as quietly as a cat (quieter, certainly, than Opal ever was). From just inside the doorway she could hear her sister moaning in pain as she slept, the hint of pleading in that beautiful voice breaking her heart. She would go through dragon fire to ease its owner’s pain. Ever so slowly, she wriggled her way to the foot of the bed on her stomach. A momentary pause to rally herself. The top of her head popped over the edge of the bed and stared cautiously at her sister. Her fears were confirmed. She could see the insides of the slit clearly, it being held open by the strange position of the rest of the body. Rarity was on her back, with her hind legs stretched out and apart; it looked deeply unnatural. The exposed flesh itself was clearly painful: it was bright red and swollen, it was even covered with a thick film of secretion. A hoof was subconsciously scratching at its edge.

Sweetie now understood her sister’s unthinking reaction. Her rough tongue on such a sore must have been acutely painful. That hoof couldn’t be helping things at all, but Rarity was clearly itching badly down there. Swallowing her disgust at the pussy mess, the foal decided to help as far as she could. She knocked the hoof gently aside and started to run the soft fur of her cheek in light strokes along the wound, hopefully it would be enough to satisfy the itch without causing further damage. After maybe a minute the larger body started to shudder. A strangled gasp made Sweetie look up just as the first true spasm came. She was staring into Rarity’s saucer-like eyes. Neither could move, or even think, for several long seconds as stream after stream left the elder and soaked the younger’s downy chest fur. After those few seconds the patch looked like it had just been in the bath, and the steamy liquid was running down onto her stomach.

“Sweetie Belle,” the voice was utterly hollow, “get out.” A small twitch showed itself above the left of the top lip on the deadpan face. “Get out of my house.”

The soft white filly bolted through the rain.

+++++

An orange hoof hammered furiously on the door. The sound of somepony galloping heavily down a flight of stairs added to the din. The door was jerked open and Rarity squinted out.

“Mind tellin’ me what the hay is goin’ on?”

“Urgh. What is it, dear? I’ve been asleep.”

“Mind tellin’ me why yer sister came jumpin’ into my bed in the middle of a stormy night?”

Rarity gave Sweetie Belle an appalled stare. “Apple Bloom said that I couldn’t sleep with her because she was sick,” the mumbled explanation came from the filly’s hiding place behind her saviour’s legs. Rarity’s mouth fell open.

Her brain reengaged a couple of seconds later and she started apologising profusely. “I am so sorry. I didn’t realise that she would do … that. Something truly vile has come over her, these past few days. She did the same to me, that’s why I kicked her ou…”

“WHAT?” Applejack’s voice could have stopped a train, “Sugarcube, you’d better not be tellin’ me that you threw Sweetie out into that storm just because she jumped on you in the night.”

“I knew she would just go to a friend’s house. I realise that I over reacted, but really, what could you expect m…”

“Shut. Yer. Mouth.” Rarity had to cower away to keep their muzzles apart. “Ye’r disgustin’. How come the Element of Generosity can be the most selfish pony Ah know? Ye must be the worst sister since Nightmare Moon,” AJ sneered, “Ye went an’ put Sweetie through all that fear, hurt and rejection just fer breakin’ yer comfort? If she didn’t love you more than anythin’ else in the world, Ah’d buck you in the face for her right now!” The earth pony stomped away, her face contorting as she snarled angrily to herself. Something about beauty sleep not being able to fix what a good beating would do.

Rarity looked shell-shocked.

+++++

Sweetie Belle sat sadly in the corner of the dress-making room, head drooping. She sighed, screwed up her courage and opened her mouth, “Why don’t you love me?” Rarity turned to look at her, pain filling her eyes.

“I do love you, Sweetie. I swear, I will never do something so monstrous again. I have been quite awful to you; you are just a confused little filly after all. You cannot, however, keep acting like you have been. I love you ever so much, and I am so very sorry for what I did, but you just can’t do that. It isn’t something you can do with family, no matter how much you love them.”

“But I was talking to Apple Bloom about it this morning, and she said the opposite. She said that Big Mac and AJ did it to her and to each other and they all had a great time doing it, because they loved each other. She said that you could only do it with family, and shouldn’t even talk about it to anyone else.” Rarity didn’t even respond to her sowing machine ravaging her latest creation; she seemed to be freezing in place a lot recently. “I’ve always known you didn’t love me as much as Apple Bloom’s sister loves her,” a wince, “but do you really not want anything to do with me? I saw how much you liked it, until you woke up and saw that it was me. Would you really love any old stranger that much more than you love me? Why? What do I do wrong, why do you always hate me?” Hot trails were now soaked into the fur on Sweetie’s cheeks.

“Apple Bloom said… what…?”

“You, you didn’t even listen! You don’t even care that I love you! You don’t care how much you hurt me!” Sweetie Belle galloped to her room, only pausing to pull herself back up on the two times that she tripped forwards while running up the stairs.

She threw everything but her bed against the back of the door, barring it shut. When her heartless sister finally bothered to come up and knock, she screamed wordless bile at the door, searing her throat.

Author's Note

Please only leave the constructive type of criticism below. (Well, I'm fine with the not constructive type as well if it's amusing.)

If you just want to tell me that you hate me, then there's a down-pointy-thumb at the top of the page for you to use.

I'm not too happy (read: not happy at all) about my dialogue, it just seems too choppy. I'm also not sure how well I managed to imply the complete mismatch between what happened and what Rarity thought had happened. Feel free to join me in bitching about it in the comments below, I enjoy the company of a good complainer.