Chapters Minutes flew by as Rarity made herself up with surgical precision. She applied more brands of cream than the spa carried, and scoured her entire body for any hints of blemishes. Finished and somewhat satisfied, she pranced out onto her patio and sniffed the cool air. Sitting with her legs crossed, she gradually entered into a hypnotic state of meditation. Her heart slowed and she breathed with a perfect rhythmic cadence. Well over an hour passed before she decided to halt her spiritual journey and head back inside. Sweetie Belle was at Sweet Apple Acres, the newspapers were laid, and every item on her mental checklist was completed and accounted for. She was ready.
Not ten seconds after she retreated indoors, a pleasant twang echoed throughout the carefully decorated rooms of Carousel Boutique. Rarity gasped excitedly at the sound of the doorbell and rushed downstairs to welcome her guest in. Before she opened the door, she primped her mane one last time and picked at her teeth with her hoof. Grinning from ear to ear, she swung the door open to reveal a suave wheat colored pegasus with a glossy coat and shimmering eyes. Rarity bade the beautiful pony in and showed her over to a tidy coffee table. They hugged and exchanged pleasantries.
“I'm so excited you're here!” said Rarity with a trill. “I can hardly believe it – the illustrious Regal Beats taking an interest in my designs! This is so surreal, like a dream! Oh, listen to me ranting. This isn't about me, it's about you, and you look absolutely stunning this morning.”
“As do you, Miss Rarity!” said Regal in a creamy voice. “Thank you so much for agreeing to meet me on such short notice. I imagine that you're a very busy mare, after all. This is such a nice little place you have here, too. There's plenty of space, but it's quiet and rustic at the same time. Simply perfect. Anyway, I'm extremely excited as well. To say your creativity caught my eye is an understatement! It's always the same stuffy designers prancing up and down Canterlot, offering the same old recycled patterns season after season. The monotony drives a mare crazy, you know? I figured, 'Hey, I should go fashion hunting!' I had no earthly idea that Ponyville had such a premiere fashion expert hiding right under my nose the whole time! I'm sure this will be wondrous for both of us.”
“Absolutely,” Rarity agreed. “There are pictures of my newest line in that album there,” she said while pointing to a binder on the table. “Feel free to browse; I'll be right back. Let me fetch you something to drink. What's your poison?”
Regal giggled. “Oh my, isn't it a little early in the day?”
Rarity shot her a coy smile. “Don't be silly, darling. Why not celebrate a little? I may live in Ponyville, but I still know how to have fun. Come on now, don't be shy.”
“Very well. I suppose a glass of rum wouldn't hurt.”
“Excellent!” Rarity cantered into the kitchen and extracted two glasses out of the cabinet. She magically lifted a bottle of rum from under the sink and hovered it in front of her. Sweeping the glasses up in the magic, she walked back toward the parlor. Her preferred tool was still right where she'd left it: propped innocently beside the doorway.
The glasses clinked delicately as Rarity placed them onto the table. She smiled politely at Regal and poured two generous glasses of rum. She then took a seat across from her client and observed her leafing through the pages of images. After a few sips of her drink, Regal looked up and spoke in a sing-song voice.
“Well Miss Rarity, I love everything I'm seeing so far. Your line is positively vibrant! I can feel the energies and inspirations bursting from the seams, and let me say, I want in. Shall we discuss the specifics? Shipping, prices, the like?”
Rarity refilled her glass and felt a small twitch in her eye. “Of course. Have you already selected the ones you want? Do you have an estimate on the size of your order? We'll just have to work out all the small things first.”
Regal answered, and the two mares began conversing back and forth about the details of the sale. Rarity flipped to certain pages and pointed out specific things about her designs, and Regal provided plenty of positive feedback. The two drank a little here and there, but Rarity always insisted on refilling Regal's glass. Her alcohol never ran dry during their interaction. As could be expected, she eventually spoke minutely slower, and with minor difficulty. Rarity kept the rum coming, and Regal continued to intoxicate herself. Eventually the talk shifted away from fashion designs and derailed into a myriad of topics.
“He was so fine! ” hissed Regal with a squeaky giggle. “You could totally tell he was into me...”
“Aaaaand?” Rarity pressed. She swirled her glass around, watching the liquid move. The smile never left her face as she grilled Regal for juicy details.
“So after that I, you know...” Regal puffed her cheek out with her tongue and made a back and forth motion with her hoof.
“You didn't! ” gasped Rarity.
Regal flopped onto her side and broke into a fit of giggles. “Ssh! Don't – don't tell anypony!”
“Oh, I would never.”
“Have you ever -” She cracked up again before she could finish.
Rarity stood up and glanced toward another room. “Oh Miss Regal, what a taboo subject! A lady of my stature should never disclose such sensitive information. However, if you truly want to know, follow me into the other room. It's a little more private.”
Regal got up too, swaying from side to side. “Ooh! This is scandalous! L-let's do it!”
The two walked into a large room with paintings lining the walls and an expensive looking record player sitting near the back wall. Rarity walked to a nearby trunk and propped it open, eyeing her expansive collection of vinyls. Regal plopped into a chair and took another swig of rum.
“Come on, Miss Rarity, you've sucked a dick haven't you?”
“Oh yes, dozens,” said Rarity without looking up from her records.
Regal howled with laughter and nearly fell out of her chair. “I thought so! Oh that's great! You little slut!”
Rarity selected one of her favorites and set the record playing. As the music filled the room, she reached behind the trunk and pulled out a thin transparent raincoat. She set it on the floor and attempted to squirm into it.
“What else have you done? How far have you gone before?” asked Regal. She played with her wing, keeping herself entertained.
“You first,” Rarity said, grunting as she struggled into the zip-up coat.
“Oh Celestia, I've done some nasty things before.”
Rarity finally slid the rest of the way in and zipped up the coat. She increased the volume of the music and said, “Do tell. I promise your secret is safe with me.”
“Well,” Regal began, “sometimes one stallion just doesn't quite satisfy me...”
“Miss Regal, how lewd!” breathed Rarity. She stepped backward into the door to the parlor. “Excuse me for just one moment, darling. I forgot something important.” She walked through the parlor and into the kitchen doorway where her tool was sitting. She dragged it back with her hoof, opting not to use her magic. When she returned to Regal, she set the tool down and hummed along to the music, bobbing her head rhythmically.
“Hey Miss Rarity,” said Regal quietly. “Why are there copies of the style section all over the floor? Do you have a dog? A little chow or something?” She laughed rather loudly.
“No, Miss Regal,” Rarity answered with a curt grin.
Regal looked over her shoulder and squinted her eyes. “Is that a raincoat?” she asked with a hoof pointed at Rarity.
“Yes it is!” Rarity picked up her tool and watched the metal glint in the fluorescent light. “As for me, I'm a very old fashioned kind of mare. I haven't actually had many sexual partners before, but there are a few that I've had my eye on for a while. The way society works to a mare's disadvantage really discourages me from ever finding a stallion of husband material, and don't even get me started on the moral decay in this country! All the voyeurs and shameless panderers make me want to vomit! There's no sense of sanctity or family values anymore! We might as well just rut ceaselessly in the streets like common swine! Hey, Regal!!!”
Regal looked back.
Rarity levitated the ax with her magic and recklessly charged forward, screeching harshly at the top of her lungs. She ripped the ax down into Regal's back, tearing right through her shoulder and much of her spine. An arching spray of blood burst from the fatal wound, coating Rarity's front in deep crimson. She grabbed the handle of the ax and lurched it out of the corpse, releasing another splash of blood. She then gently set the dripping weapon against the wall and shoved Regal's body onto the floor. With the chair now free, Rarity stripped out of the raincoat and sat down.
“Goodness, I must look a mess,” she mumbled to herself. She levitated a cigar off of the record table and lit it with her magic. “Going to take forever to scrub my face clean...” She crossed her legs, puffed on the cigar, and stared blankly at the pegasus' crumpled body. Sighing, she stood up again and made a noise of disdain. “Guess I better clean this up before Sweetie Belle gets home.”
Rarity sat at her vanity table and straightened her mane with religious fervor. Each morning brought the grim reminder that hair care equaled grief. Her unruly licks of wayward hair refused to cooperate, causing her to growl in agitation. As she struggled to bring her raging locks under control, she heard the pad of small hoofsteps entering the room.
Sweetie Belle plodded in with the house phone held up by magic. She approached her sister and relinquished the phone, stating, “Princess Twilight is on the phone.”
“Oh. Thanks Sweetie,” Rarity said. She set her straightener down and picked up the phone. “Twilight! I haven't seen you in almost a week. How have you been, darling?”
Twilight sounded as gleeful as ever. “Hi Rarity. I'm great! I've been up to my ears in errands lately, but that's nothing new. There's hardly been time to sit down and catch up with anypony since the last world-threatening villain fiasco. That's actually why I called you. See, I made a reservation at this new restaurant in Canterlot -”
“Horsia!?” Rarity barked excitedly.
Twilight giggled. “Yes! I'm trying to get everypony together for dinner tonight. The rest of the gang is coming and naturally I hoped you could too. I apologize for such short notice; I kind of dropped the ball on that one. Can you make it all the way up to Canterlot by six o'clock?”
Rarity didn't hesitate to accept. “As if I would ever decline an offer to see you! If you don't mind me asking, how in Equestria did you get a reservation at Horsia anyway? They never have openings!”
“Well,” Twilight began with a lighthearted sigh. “I have to admit something. I may have used my official Princess stature to wiggle my way into a reservation. No harm done, right?”
“Not at all! Hey, you deserve a little special treatment once in a while,” agreed Rarity. “Besides, I'm sure your presence will do wonders for their public image.”
“Probably. So, we'll expect to see you at six?”
Rarity nodded despite talking on the telephone. “You bet. I can hardly wait!”
“Great! Okay, see you then. Bye Rarity.”
“Goodbye Princess Twilight.” She trilled the R to emphasize the role's importance. Twilight hung up and Rarity set the phone down on the table. Now her first order of business was the resumption of hair straightening.
Like the day before and hundreds of days before that, she applied her knowledge of cosmetics into making herself a beautiful porcelain doll. Her image was perfect. Once finished with her beauty regimen, she exited her bedroom and headed downstairs to forage for a light lunch to tide her over until six. On the way, she passed Sweetie Belle playing a video game in the living room. The filly was thoroughly engrossed in the game, unaware of even the most raucous extrinsic stimulus.
Rarity wrinkled her nose in disgust as she watched the images on the screen. The game was more visceral than any of Sweetie's previous games; the characters brutally killed one another and dismembered the corpses in grizzly, albeit creative, processes.
What a repugnant game, Rarity thought to herself. Where did Sweetie Belle ever get her hooves on that? She left her sister alone to her vicarious pleasures and trekked the rest of the way into the kitchen. Six o'clock felt like an an eternity out of reach. Noon hadn't even rolled around yet. Rarity made herself a small sandwich and wracked her brains for something to do. If not for Twilight's call, she would have been bored and lazy the entirety of the day. She didn't feel like working on her dresses, and she was totally caught up on all of her reading. Finally, she formulated at a semi-satisfying plan.
I suppose I'll ask Sweetie if her game is two-player.
Evening over Canterlot was divine. Rarity stepped off the train and headed into the city, overjoyed to visit her favorite city once again. The day's restaurant of interest, Horsia, had only been open for two weeks; it was no surprise that when she arrived, a line of eager ponies wrapped around three corners of the building. Rarity buzzed with an excited energy as she bypassed the line and pranced into the lively eatery. So entranced by the high class atmosphere, she almost decided to emulate Pinkie Pie's springy jump. Each envious stare from the hungry ponies around her only contributed to her feeling of stardom.
“I take it you have a reservation?” questioned a young maitre d', looking back and forth between Rarity and his guest list.
“I do,” answered Rarity politely. “I'm with the party of Princess Twilight Sparkle. Now I know you didn't know that, that's why I won't saw your ribcage open and feed you your own intestines. But if you ever speak to me so brutishly again, I might not be so understanding.” She brushed past him with a Hmph! and continued into the dining area. Her friends sat at a wrap-around booth, laughing and sampling complementary Bellinis. Rarity approached and announced her presence.
“Hey, I'm glad you made it!” said Twilight. She stood and hugged Rarity.
“How are you all?” Rarity asked her friends, taking a seat.
Applejack lifted up her drink in a mock toast. “Not too shabby! How are ya, Rares?”
“Oh, I'm fabulous,” she said as she opened her menu. “I've been dying to try this place since it opened. Having a princess friend definitely has its perks!”
Pinkie Pie tapped her chin and narrowed her eyes, clearly irked by something.
“Why are you scowling at the menu?” Twilight asked.
“I can't read the names of the dishes on here! They're too fancy!”
Rainbow Dash couldn't help but groan. “Oh, Pinkie. Somepony help her.”
Rarity leaned over and made some suggestions to the perplexed earth pony, explaining the descriptions and foreign ingredients listed.
“I think it's wonderful that we can just relax for an evening,” said Fluttershy. “No monsters, no ancient villains, just good food in the company of friends.”
“I totally agree,” said Twilight while chewing on a roll.
“Don't talk with your mouth full, darling,” Rarity scolded.
Twilight blushed and covered her mouth. “Oops, sorry.”
The group conversed happily until their waiter arrived and humbly stood by for their orders. The young stallion was as formal as they came. His blond mane was slicked back into a perfect shape and he sported a double-breasted tuxedo from a brand Rarity didn't recognize. Pinkie insisted on having her order taken first, urgently claiming she'd forget what she wanted otherwise. None objected, so the waiter started with her. He made his way around the table and courteously waited as each pony questioned him about specific details of the courses. When Rarity's turn arrived, she voiced her choice and motioned for the waiter to come closer. He leaned in toward her, and she whispered in his ear.
“It's been a long time since my friends and I have gotten a chance to unwind and have a good time together. It would help me out oh so much if you could make sure we had our peace and quiet, maybe make sure the tables around us stayed empty for a bit. We don't want to be bothered by any loutish drunks, or tourists. I promise there will be quite a handsome tip for you if you keep us isolated.”
The waiter nodded slowly and receded, choosing his words carefully. “Well miss, I can certainly try, but that's not exactly in my power, or fair to the other guests. I mean, I...” He trailed off, not sure how to further clarify his refusal.
Rarity grabbed his lapels and brought his face down to hers. “Listen you insipid swine, I don't give a tuppenny fuck about the other 'guests.' I am a customer here, and my needs will not go unattended. Now either secure my friends and I some privacy, or I'm going to break my wine glass over your head and give you an enema with the fragments! Not only that, I will make sure your uncivilized ass is thrown out on the streets and you never work in this town again!”
The waiter scampered off without a word, utterly terrified.
“Whoa! What did you say to him!?” asked Dash in amazement.
Rarity adjusted her mane. “I just told him that I'd give him a little extra tip if he made sure we had our privacy tonight. That's all.”
“Oh, that does sound nice,” Fluttershy said as if weighing an option.
“Darn tootin',” AJ agreed. “Canterlot types can get kinda unruly.”
“Yes well, all should be fine,” Rarity assured them.
As the comrades waited for their food, Twilight regaled them with an unorthodox tale of how she discovered a sentient chiffonier in her new castle, and through a miraculous error on the IRS's part, wrote it off as a tax deduction. Rarity passively listened. She felt herself dipping into the familiar urge. The urge of a defective soul – blood lust. She rested her head in her hooves and sighed quietly. The urge gradually increased into a gnawing hunger. Somepony had to die.
A gang of four corporate looking stallions sat down at a table not far from the mares. Rarity growled inwardly as she watched the males laughing uproariously and high-fiving each other over presumably sexist jokes. She watched them harass their female waiter, eating her up with their eyes and whistling as she walked away. The group only grew louder as the minutes passed. Even when her food arrived, Rarity found it difficult to focus on her friends and their own conversations, as the racket from the males overshadowed them completely.
“Hey Rarity,” AJ said in a hushed tone, “One of those guys over there is eyein' ya. I'm willin' to bet he's single...” She raised her eyebrow flirtatiously.
Indeed, a jet black unicorn sat with a less than subtle stare in Rarity's direction. He winked, and audaciously blew a kiss at her.
Rarity looked away and tried to focus on her food. “Lowlife,” she grumbled to herself. Periodically she looked back to the other table. More than once, the stallion stared back. Minutes passed and the mares were almost done with their food. Rarity noticed the black stallion getting up from his table and heading toward the restroom.
“Hey,” she announced. “I'll be right back. Excuse me a few minutes, please.” Before she departed, she casually picked up her steak knife and carried it with her, making sure it was well out of sight. Around the corner near the restrooms, she leaned up against the wall and waited for her target to emerge. Luckily the wait didn't last long. As the door opened and the stallion got an eyeful of Rarity, his face lit up with an almost childlike delight. He sauntered up to her and introduced himself as some financial big-shot that she really couldn't care less about.
“Who might you be, my dear?” he asked, touching Rarity's chin softly.
She didn't flinch. “My name is Rarity,” she said in a completely serious tone.
“Well Rarity, my friends and I couldn't help but notice how drop-dead-gorgeous you are. You really stick out above your friends, a true beauty.”
“Look,” she said, losing her patience. “How about you and I go outside? I want to fucking murder you.”
“Oh, I bet you do!” he said joyously. He pushed himself up against her and kissed her neck, then took her hoof and lead her into the back parts of the restaurant. Rarity felt only hatred for the male and reveled in her dark anticipation. They pressed out of a side door into an empty alley lit by the light of the moon. Aside from a dumpster and billowing steam from a manhole, they were alone.
Immediately the stallion shoved Rarity against the wall and jammed his tongue in her mouth, all too eager to acquire his prize. Rarity on the other hand did nothing, and felt nothing. She stood stoically while the drunken stallion wormed about, thinking himself a regular cupid. When he eventually grew bored of nonreciprocating kissing, he lay his hoof on Rarity's back. Caressing her slowly, he slid farther toward her backside. Rarity told him to stop. He did, confused by her mixed signals.
“Up against the wall,” she commanded flatly.
“Ooh, very nice...” he slurred. “I see where this is going.”
He and Rarity swapped positions. She advanced upon him slightly, pushing him softly against the brick. He reared up on two legs and leaned backwards, expecting something pleasurable. Rarity glanced down at him curiously and stifled a laugh. She figured, apparently, that there were some things that money just couldn't compensate for.
“Come on babe, I didn't take it out for air,” the stallion said expectantly.
Rarity reached up with her free hoof and covered his mouth. “Close your eyes,” she said.
He obeyed and clamped his eyes shut. Now blind and mute, he was at Rarity's mercy, just where she wanted him. She tenderly kissed his chest, then whispered, “I'm going to stab you in the throat.”
He voiced a muffled Mmph? but kept his eyes closed. Rarity lifted up her steak knife and rotated it around, admiring the way the moonbeams glinted off the cool metal. Then she cocked her arm back, and quickly heaved the serrated blade into the stallions exposed neck. He jerked with an epileptic violence and squealed futilely into Rarity's hoof. She twisted the blade and ripped it out, unsealing a spring of steaming blood. Rarity watched as her victim plummeted to the ground and clutched his neck, sputtering and choking as a shining pool rapidly formed around him. His eyes reflected a horrified desperation as his body convulsed on the ground. The wet rasps he repeatedly made reminded Rarity of a fish out of water, which brought a slight smile to her lips.
When he finally stopped twitching and lay still at last, Rarity enveloped him with magic and slowly lifted him into the air. She watched the blood run off his body and drip onto the ground, wishing she had more time to enjoy the moment. Now she had a corpse that needed disposing of. So, she gently levitated him over to the dumpster and set him inside, making sure to close the lid afterward. Her coat wasn't marred by blood as far as she could tell, thus, she decided it was safe to head back inside.
Each pony was finished with their dinner by the time she sat back down to the table. They laughed and welcomed her back, unaware of her outside escapade.
“I'm afraid I must be going now,” Rarity informed her friends. “My stomach is acting up and I think I'd like to lie down for a bit at home.”
“Aww, do you have to go?” Pinkie asked with a quivering lip.
Applejack belched. “That's Rarity for ya. Dainty as a butterfly. She's always squeamish over one thing or another. Oh well. It was good seein' ya again, Rares.”
Rarity spat her tongue out playfully. “It was nice seeing you too. I'm surprised you took a day off from wallowing in mud to come all the way up here.”
The friends laughed and waved her goodbye. As Rarity placed bits on the table and turned to leave, Twilight called after her. She stopped and looked back to the princess.
“Thank you for coming, really,” said Twilight. “It means a lot to me. You know how crazy things have been lately. Anyway, we'll have to do this again sometime soon.”
Rarity smiled wide, feeling her eye twitch just slightly. “Oh, we will. We definitely will.”
Urgency spurred her into a gallop. Rarity tore through Manehattan with savage abandon. To her, tardiness was abhorrent, especially when a handsome stallion was expecting her imminent arrival. She didn't date often and she certainly didn't want to sully the times she did.
Damn it all... she muttered. Ponies griped hotly at her as she hurtled by with no care as to whom she smashed into. Her date was scheduled for six o'clock. The event was nothing fancy – just dinner at a local eatery and a popular stage performance afterward. Nevertheless she made a beeline for the restaurant. Her charming and presumably upset stallion was likely fed up with waiting.
Earlier in the day, Rarity had undergone a beauty and cleansing routine the likes of which she'd never attempted before. Her bathroom resembled a botanist's laboratory with the sheer amount of oils, creams, and rejuvenating herbs strewn about the counter. The source of her current lateness and great indignation was the sleep brought on from a particularly relaxing facial cleanser. Once she'd applied it, relaxation turned into drowsing, and that turned to slumber. What felt like a light nap to her was a loss of hours in reality.
The moment she woke up, she morphed into a raging tempest. She abandoned the rest of her beauty regimen and rocketed out of Carousel Boutique, cursing the narcoleptic effects of her cream. By this point the streets of the city were stuffed with hungry ponies swept up in the dinnertime rush. Rarity swerved erratically to avoid full-on collisions with passersby, but indirectly smacked into half a dozen or so ponies.
“Watch out you crazy-ass psycho!” yelled a disgruntled stallion after dodging Rarity's onrush.
“I'll tear your throat out!” Rarity growled fiercely, not bothering to look back at him. She continued on for several hundred feet then rounded a corner, coming to a screeching halt in front of the restaurant. Not stopping to catch her breath, she hurried inside. The eatery was at total capacity. Two sizable families had already sat down near the entrance doors in wait for the next available table. Young fillies wallowed about on their parents' laps, much too bored to wait for food. One of the youngsters hopped down and dashed across the room, cutting right in front of Rarity's path.
“Control your children!” Rarity snapped at the embarrassed mother. She tried to ignore the growing throng and shoved her way into the dining area. Her stallion of interest was brilliant red with a blue mane, and a dashing personality as jubilant as his color palette.
There wasn't a free booth or table in the restaurant. Rarity hopped up and down in an attempt to locate her date. Why they hadn't agreed to meet elsewhere, she had no idea. Angry grunts surrounded her as the crowd grew weary of her persistent movement. Despite seeing ponies of every color on the spectrum, including many red ones, she couldn't spot hers. A crushing sadness threatened to overwhelm her as if the situation was somehow her fault. Now acting more on instinct, she exited the crowd and took her sentry mission into the aisles of the restaurant.
“Excuse me miss, do you work here?” a pony asked from a booth.
Rarity ignored her and kept a brisk trot through the aisles. Over every booth and each table she searched, but to no avail. With a huff, she began to resign herself to the fact that Mr. Handsome simply wasn't there.
“Excuse me,” she said to a passing waitress. “Have you seen a red stallion in here? Tall, handsome, blue mane?”
“I have,” the waitress responded. “Is he your date?”
Rarity nodded and smiled with minor hope.
“Well...” The pegasus sighed. “He left a little bit ago. I'm sorry, hon.”
Her stomach dropped. “You're certain?”
The waitress nodded. “Yeah. He was here for a while but I guess he thought you weren't coming. Again, I'm sorry.”
“Thanks.” Rarity's voice was barely audible. She whimpered in despair and hid her face from the waitress.
“Sorry,” the pegasus consoled.
Rarity strode out of the restaurant with tears streaming down her face. The only thing silencing her baleful wails was the shame she felt from the public eye. It was her own fault, or so she thought. If only she hadn't stayed out so late last night indulging in her “hobby.” If only she'd been more rested, she wouldn't have shot herself in the hoof, so to speak. Damn it! she thought. Wondering about her date's feelings made her own quite a bit worse. The poor stallion must have been devastated. Or enraged. He must have thought she was too petty and fickle to meet him. A floozy! A tease!
These projected opinions soured her already terrible mood. The flood waters of her sorrow were quickly mounting and she needed to reprieve herself before she exploded. An alleyway beckoned to her as if it was offering shelter. She cut through the cramped path until she arrived on the next street over. This still wasn't good enough. She wanted to be miles away from there. Preferably in another country. Every passing pony jeered at her in her mind. They snickered at her passively and whispered nasty things to their friends.
Rarity crossed several more streets over until she found herself on the outer fringes of the city. The sidewalks here were cracked in some places and outright shattered in others. Normally that part of Manehattan was reserved for lower income families and immigrants. Rarity hated the thought of being there for any reason other than to criticize it. Yet she stopped along the front of an abandoned shop to catch her breath and work through her cloying sadness. There were only a sparse number of problems that crying it out couldn't alleviate in some way.
The root of the problem was that Rarity felt she'd really lost a good one. Mr. Handsome had been the first stallion in months that seemed normal, not a pompous airhead who considered Rarity a “trophy” marefriend. The fact that she had wrecked a future relationship before it even started was almost too painful to handle.
The setting sun personified Rarity's spirit. She hugged herself and whimpered vainly, still sitting against the cool bricks of the building. Two ponies walked toward her in the distance. Her thoughts gravitated to all the negative happenings she'd incurred within the last few days. Opal had a vet visit coming up which she didn't feel like dealing with, Sweetie Belle bombed a school project and was harshly reprimanded, her own clothing line was selling poorly, she hadn't seen her friends in over a week, and now her love life was back to square one.
A wolf whistle sounded from the sidewalk. Two boorish stallions walked by, slowing briefly to ogle Rarity from afar.
“How you doing, baby?” one of them called.
“Piss off, you thugs!” Rarity snapped.
The two looked at each other and one of them said, “Damn girl, be nice! We were just trying to compliment you! What's a pretty unicorn like you doing out here crying all by herself?”
Rarity growled to herself. She did not have time for this. “Leave me alone!” she warned.
The males approached her. Not again... she thought.
“You really ought to be nice to people,” said the second pony. “Being mean ain't going to get you nowhere. Me and my friend here saw you all distressed out here and we just wanted to help. Do you need a hug? We'd be happy to snuggle with you if you want.” They both snickered.
Rarity stood up and carefully straightened her mane. “Do you know what I do for fun?” she asked.
The friends hooted at each other. They misconstrued Rarity's question as a response to their offer.
“What do you do, baby?” asked the first one.
“I murder criminals like you for fun,” Rarity told them matter-o-factly. “Get the hell away from me or I'll slash your throats and play around in your blood.”
The duo's expressions changed to confusion. They looked at each other again and took a step back.
“Whatever, bitch,” said the first one. “Let's go.
“Yeah,” the friend agreed. “Forget this psycho cunt.”
“How dare you!?” screamed Rarity, smacking him on the back of the head. “You have no idea who I am or what I've been through! How dare you call me a cunt!? You little rat! Look at me!”
The males both reacted by extracting switchblades from their bags and shoving Rarity backwards. Rarity levitated a nearby brick with her magic and brought it up beside her. “Don't test me!” she seethed.
“Fuck you!” the first stallion shouted.
Without another word, Rarity smashed the brick into the side of his face, causing a bloody eruption of teeth and skin. He fell silently onto the ground. The other stallion was temporarily stunned from the brutality of the gruesome act. Rarity levitated the brick again and slammed it down onto the stallion's face in the exact same spot just to make sure the job was done. After gazing at the pulpy and unidentifiable corpse with complete indifference, she hurled the gory brick behind her onto the top of the building.
“Oh fuck!” the remaining pony squealed. “What the fuck!?” He bolted toward the street with primal fear as a fuel.
Rarity galloped after him, not keen on leaving witnesses. “Why did it have to be today?” she whined at her fleeing victim. “Why did you have to pick today to make me do this? I'm not even enjoying it!”
The stallion pulled a jackknife turn onto a dimly lit street. Rarity kept hot on his heels as he fled. He led her further into the derelict portion of the city. The houses grew ever shabbier the deeper they ran. Though she knew the city well, she had never ventured this far into its slums.
She was gaining on her witness. He fled into an alleyway to the right. When Rarity rounded the corner, she was confronted with a T shaped alley and no stallion. He'd either ran down and turned left or right. Rarity took her time vigilantly searching for the pony. At the right on the intersection was a dead end. However to the left, she spied her target banging frantically on a dark metal door.
“Let me in!” he begged. “Hurry! She's here!”
Rarity located a broken piece of pipe laying under a pile of refuse. She extracted it and inspected its piercing capacity. The pipe was shattered at the halfway point and made of a compact material. Perfect. Rarity angled it in front of her and set up aim. The stallion was still begging for his life to be let through the door. Whoever was on the other side wasn't paying much heed to his pleas. With one eye closed for maximum accuracy, Rarity lobbed the pipe forward like a javelin. Right as the door swung open, the pipe blasted into the stallion's neck and ripped out of the other side, creating a perfect skewer. He fell forward into the doorway, blocking it from closing again.
A huge pegasus revealed himself in the doorway, horrified at the corpse before him. Rarity attempted to leave before the door guard laid eyes on her, but she didn't get far before she heard, “Freeze!”
She turned around to face the guard and stopped. The muscular pegasus drew a pistol from his flank and trained it on Rarity. “Who the fuck are you?” he pressed.
“I'm a very upset lady,” Rarity informed him. “Your comrade harassed me and then tried to assault me. I had no choice but to dispose of him.”
The guard frantically did a double-take between Rarity and his dead partner. “That's it!” he shouted. “Y-you're going down!”
Before he could pull the trigger, Rarity ripped the gun out of his hoof with her magic and turned the weapon onto its master.
The guard took a sharp breath. “What the-”
Crack! The bullet struck his forehead, bathing the walls behind him in a dripping mess. Now that he was taken care of, it seemed that all the witnesses were gone. That is until Rarity heard a muffled voice coming from the guard's flank. She trotted over and spotted a small walkie-talkie strapped to his leg.
“Hello? Come in!” the voice barked from the device. “Is there a problem up there? Answer me, damn it. Alright that's it. I'm sending more guards.”
Rarity let out a heavy sigh. Typical. Things always got much worse before they got better. Her nauseating day still wasn't finished.
In light of the new circumstances she found it necessary to keep herself armed with the guard's pistol. Carefully stepping over the skewered brute from before, she entered the sinister doorway to find herself on an elevated metal platform inside a moldy basement type room. A single light bulb hung tentatively from a stripped wire. At this point Rarity knew that she had stumbled onto something much bigger than she had anticipated. Unfortunately for the opposing force, she had missed out on a date and was more bloodthirsty than she could ever remember feeling. It was worth any effort just to exact revenge for inconveniencing her.
She descended the steps and pulled open the next door, which led into a grimy hallway choked with pipes and steam. The hall continued on for some time almost like a maze. After a couple minutes of blindly wandering around muggy corners, she emerged in a huge laboratory-like room in which rows upon rows of ponies in medical masks measured fine white powder on long tables.
Oh Celestia... she thought to herself. She immediately hunkered down around the corner so as not to be seen. There were a lot more guards and they were a lot better armed than the first one. Rarity wasn't what a lot of ponies would call street smart, but it didn't take a genius to figure out that she'd stumbled into one of the biggest cocaine distribution plants in Manehattan, possibly even Equestria.
As such, she initiated her assault in the most efficient way she could think of: no guard and guns blazing. She whipped around the corner with her gun ready and instantly targeted one of the guards. Shrieks of terror echoed throughout the room as she blasted him into oblivion. The workers all dove for cover in unison. About one hundred ponies all covered their heads and took shelter under the tables. They scrambled for the exit in which Rarity had entered. The seven remaining security guards zeroed in on Rarity's position and opened fire with their automatic weapons.
Rarity realized that her plan might not have been such a fantastic idea. She dropped to the floor and flattened herself as best she could. From this vantage point, she managed to shoot the guard closest to where she was. She crawled on her stomach over to his corpse where she exchanged her almost empty pistol for his much more useful machine gun. Now the odds were slightly more even.
A shadow passed over her. Rarity whipped over onto her back just as another guard lurched down with a massive knife aimed at her. She instinctively rolled to her left under one of the measuring tables, where she manually lifted her gun and unloaded a large number of bullets into the unlucky guard. His blood splashed onto her, warming her up in the otherwise chilly room.
Five guards to go. A hailstorm of bullets whizzed by above her and grazed the tops of the tables. Instead of wasting time picking off one guard at a time, Rarity aimed upward to the buzzing lights and let loose, trying to hit as many as she could. Showers of glass rained down upon everyone in the room. Rarity took advantage of the temporary distraction and sprang up, surveying the room for the remaining guards. All five of them stood on the far side of the room in front of another door. Luckily they too were busy shielding themselves from the razor sharp hail.
Rarity aimed her gun at them and charged forward at full speed. “You stupid motherfuckers!” she screamed, spraying bullets back and forth over a wide angle. The trick worked. The guards were helpless to the barrage and fell like bowling pins as Rarity approached. Now that all the workers had presumably evacuated and the security was effectively neutralized, all was quiet. Rarity looked at the pile of bodies she'd created in front of the door. This was horrible. She barely even enjoyed killing these goons. To make matters worse, she had a pounding headache.
She shot each guard in the neck to make sure they were dead, and as a final insult. Then there was the matter of the door. Whatever was inside must have been of paramount importance since the dimwit security team had all clustered around it. Rarity hefted the door open and crossed into a waiting room-like area with a tacky rug and a couple of overstuffed couches. Not even the electrical whine of the lights could be heard. The room was soundproof. However since it was of no interest to Rarity, she moved on to the next door. Pressing her ear against it revealed moaning sounds coming from within. Ever so delicately, she cracked open the door just widely enough to see inside.
The room was a makeshift office furnished with a hardwood desk and two expensive chairs. The occupants of the room were a skinny stallion in a gaudy mustard colored suit, and a mare that was bent over his desk whom he was vehemently humping. The two were busy going at it and failed to notice Rarity pick up her gun and silently slip into the room.
A burst of gunfire into the ceiling was enough to grab the attention of the salacious ponies. They screamed and looked at Rarity in sheer terror. The stallion, caught with his dick out, stumbled backwards off his partner and fell into the corner of the room where he slouched down in a defensive position.
“Wait! Wait!” he pleaded. “Don't kill me! Stop!”
Rarity calmly waited for him to make his pitiful spiel.
“I'll give you whatever you want! All the coke you can handle! Just hold on!”
“I do not want any of your drugs,” Rarity said condescendingly.
The mare slowly rolled off of the desk and subsequently hid under it.
“W-what do you want from me?” gasped the stallion. “I've got all sorts of connections. I can make you rich!”
Now the fun was coming back to the sport. Rarity was starting to enjoy herself again. “I want nothing from you,” she said. “Beg for your life, worm. Beg for your life and I might let you live.”
The stallion, still erect, crossed his legs to hide this. “Yes! Anything! I beg you! Whoever you are! I'll kiss the dirt under your hooves!”
Rarity smiled and relished the words. “One of your little cronies harassed me this evening,” she informed him. “He said some very awful things to me. I want you to apologize on his behalf.”
“I'm sorry!” gushed the stallion. “I'm so sorry! He shouldn't have said whatever he did! He's an idiot!”
“He's dead now,” Rarity pointed out.
The stallion closed his eyes and gulped.
“He called me a cunt,” she went on. “I find this very offensive. You don't think I'm a cunt do you?”
“N-no!” he stammered. “Of course not!”
“Thank you,” said Rarity. “I didn't think I was. It really hurt my feelings to hear that, especially as a respectable mare of high social status. In any case, because you seem reasonable, I will not torture you. I will not stick barbed wire up your urethra, and I will not fill your stomach with cement. In fact you don't have to feel any pain at all.” With that, she shot him once in the head. She then crouched down low to the shivering mare's level. She gave her a look of “you could have done something with your life” and then shot her too.
Outside in the alleyway, Rarity was in a funk. She should have felt elated. She should have felt rejuvenated and spunky, but she didn't. She felt like her head was permeating in a thick fog. The buzz she felt from her freshest murders didn't last nearly as long as it should have.
She wandered out into the street and searched for the quickest route back to Carousel Boutique. Eventually she wound up on a more populated street, where startled cries pierced her mental numbness every time she walked under a street light. Oh yes, she thought. I'm covered in blood. Someone called out to her, but she ignored them and trotted down the street. More ponies screamed as they saw her bloodied form pass under a light. She began to run. Two police ponies emerged from a shop a block ahead of her. She saw them but didn't register them in her mind. They shouted at her. They commanded her to stop. She kept running. She kept running and her thoughts started blending together. It was hard for her to focus on anything. The street lights began to soften and bleed together. Her lucidity wavered until she felt like she was in a dreamlike trance. Yet the pain in her head persisted.
She knew the police were chasing her. She knew she was in trouble. Still, she kept running homeward. Her headache intensified with each step she took. After every light, every sidewalk square, her pain grew tenfold until it felt like someone was taking a jackhammer to her skull. She screamed into the night sky and started crying and wiped her bloody mane and kept running and the police were still chasing her and she was so far away from home and her head hurt and-
---
Carousel Boutique was dark. Rarity had no idea how she made it home. She fell to the floor as soon as she'd entered and crawled into the living room, not caring about staining the carpet with blood. The murk in her head was still in full effect. She felt like a ticking time-bomb.
“Sweetie Belle?” she called out in a frail voice. No answer. “She must be at Applebloom's house,” she said out loud.
A hot shower eased her pain a minor degree. Rarity curled up in a ball and watched the blood from her fur slowly running down the drain. She would have fallen asleep if not for the unusual sense of paranoia that gnawed the fringes of her mind. It seemed that miraculously, incredulously, she'd escaped. She was free. Yet there was a constant shadow of suspicion telling her something wasn't right.
She crawled out of the bathroom and down the stairs where she poured herself a tall glass of water and laid herself on the living room couch. The nightly news was talking about a breaking story from Manehattan about cocaine and things Rarity vaguely remembered. For some reason the newscast brought tears to her eyes, and she had never felt more alone or helpless in her life. She sobbed uncontrollably on the couch, using her expensive throw pillows to periodically wipe her nose on. Minutes passed before she regained a slight semblance of composure.
With a trembling hoof, she reached for her phone and dialed the number for Twilight's house. Four rings came and went before a young male answered the phone.
“Hello?” said Spike from the other end. “This is Twilight's house. Who's calling?”
The voice soothed her. “Spikey, it's Rarity,” she answered. “I really need to talk to Twilight. Can you put her on the phone for me please?”
The dragon was delighted to hear his crush. “Rarity! Where were you?” he whined. “We're throwing a party over here and Twilight wanted to invite you! She couldn't get a hold of you this evening. Is everything alright?”
Rarity rubbed her forehead. “Spike, just please put Twilight on the phone for me, okay?”
“Okay, hold on,” he said.
Twilight's familiar voice sounded a moment later. “Hey Rarity! What's going on?”
Rarity clutched the phone tightly to her ear and closed her eyes. “Listen Twilight, there's something really important I need to tell you. This is really really important.”
“Okay, go on,” said Twilight quizzically.
“I killed somepony,” Rarity squeaked. “More than one, actually. A lot. I – I just had to tell somepony...”
Twilight took a second to respond. “What? Hey, it's loud over here and I've had a little bit to drink. Try to speak loudly and clearly, okay?”
“I murdered a lot of ponies today!” Rarity screamed into the phone. “I killed at least ten ponies! And that was only today! I've been killing for years! It's all me! It's all my fault! I just can't take it anymore! I feel all this horrible pain and suffering and the only thing I can do is make others suffer just as bad!”
Her breathing was erratic. She gulped and squeezed the phone. “I'm in a lot of trouble, Twilight. They're going to come after me any minute now and take me to prison. Up until now I've been avoiding it, but I can't run anymore. All the ponies I've killed, all the murders, they're catching up with me. I had to tell you because you're my best friend and I need your help. Please help me, Twilight...”
Sounds from the party bled through over Twilight's voice. “I'm really sorry Rarity, but I didn't catch much of that. Something about a zebra going to prison? It's a little racist for my taste, but it still sounded funny. You'll have to tell me again in person.”
“It's not a joke!” Rarity cried. “I'm not joking!”
Twilight laughed. “Right, right. I'm sure it really happened, whatever it is. Hey, come over here and join us! We've got another few hours of party left. You can tell me your joke. What do you say?”
Rarity was numb. “Okay,” she said quietly, before hanging up and dropping the phone onto the floor. Totally void of any further thought, she got up and fetched her jacket. The news was still playing when she was prepared to leave. Before she turned off the television, she broke through into a lucid state long enough to hear the announcer say that police were searching for a red male unicorn as the sole suspect of the murders.
“Alright then,” Rarity said to herself. “I guess I'll go to Twilight's.”
At the party, all of her friends greeted her. They smiled and hugged her and shook her hoof. Spike was particularly fond of her surprise appearance. She drank and chatted idly with all of the guests, but continued to feel as if a black hole had appeared where her heart should have been. That's it, she thought to herself. They're not even looking for me. I got away with it. She took a seat next to Twilight, who asked her how she was doing.
“Fine,” said Rarity, smiling politely. “I'm doing just fine.”
“Great!” said Twilight. “Sorry I couldn't hear you over the phone. I'm sure what you said was wickedly funny.”
Rarity took a sip of her drink and relaxed back in her seat. It's pointless, she thought. I've learned nothing. Not from any of this. I've gained no deeper knowledge of myself. No new revelation can be extracted from my confession. It was pointless. My confession has meant nothing. My confession... has meant... nothing.
