“So, when I got into town it was real quiet, you know, not a pony anywhere. And then suddenly there’s this shout that sounds like Twi, sayin’ to fuck her harder. So I go check it out, ya’know, and like, outside the library there’s all these ponies singing and dancing. I waited until they were done and asked what was going on. Turns out they heard Twi scream as well, and thought getting the face of the stallion that did her in the paper would be worth bits, big bits. But none of ‘em were mare enough to go in there and find out, something about hearing that Twi was crazy and would do things like turn them into dolls or something if they were caught. So, me being as awesome as I am, decided to volunteer to go find out, and you’ll never guess what I found.”

Rainbow monologued at Fluttershy and Rarity, who were taking a break from caring for Walter the whale, as he was stable for now and taking a nap, and had just gotten off the train from Canterlot respectively.

After meeting Rainbow at the station, Rarity had sent Spike to her house to drop her things off while they walked. The polychromatic mare had said that she wanted to go talk to Twilight about something and that Rarity would want to hear it too.

On the way there they ran into Fluttershy, who was heading to the market to get some groceries, because feeding a whale was by no means easy, or cheap. When they got to talking, Rainbow brought up her need to talk to their princess friend and said that Fluttershy should come as well. Fluttershy being Fluttershy couldn’t find a real reason to refuse.

Once they had continued on their journey to the library, Rarity asked why Rainbow needed to talk to Twilight so badly, which resulted in the monologue that Rainbow had produced earlier.

Rainbow stopped talking when they rounded a corner and the library came into view, getting a thoughtful expression on her face before momentarily shifting to a pair of glazed eyes and a dopey smile, before she serious’d-the-fuck-up and a determined expression settled on her face.

As they approached the door, they heard the sound of two ponies arguing. Both sounded female, one sounded like Twilight’s, but none of them could recognize the voice of the other mare.

“Perhaps your mystery mare is in, Rainbow?” Rarity asked with a raised eyebrow at her friend.

“Y-Yeah, maybe.” The cyan mare responded as she tried the door handle, the argument inside calming.

“Aw mare, it’s still locked!?” Was hissed under the pegasus’ breath in frustration.

“Please allow me, darling.” Rarity said, stopping the frustrated mare’s ineffectual jiggling of the door knob. She then lit her horn and, with a click, the door popped open...

...Just in time for them to see a young pegasus mare sitting on the library floor in a maid outfit, one that Rarity recognized. The mare looked close to crying as she looked up at twilight with one of her front hooves hugging the other. As well as all the mares at the door hearing a certain colorful word that all of them knew Twilight didn’t know.

“Fuck.”

Alex and Twilight turned in shocked silence as the door slammed into the wall of the tree. Both of their eyes immediately widened in surprise at the entrance of the three mares.

After a few seconds of the two groups staring at each other, one of them broke the silence.

“U-Um, hey girls. What are you doing here? ” The princess asked, breaking the others out of their staring contest with Alex, who had taken to looking at the floorboards to avoid their gazes. ‘ I thought I locked the door. ’

Alex was having a small panic attack of his own. Here he was in clothes he had dreamed of wearing some nights, and it scared him how good it felt. He had seen himself in the mirror in the bathroom. It had shocked him to say the least. If he could, he would probably have snuggled or fucked himself. He could easily imagine doing that to the form in the dress and socks Twilight had just put on him.
Alex slowly shuffled behind Twilight. Just because he liked the way he looked didn’t mean he wasn’t embarrassed enough to die from being caught in it.

Twilight looked on as the three stared at Alex, Dash having a silly smile on her face as she groped him with her eyes. Rarity, once she broke out of her shock seemed to be thinking about something on the edge of pissing her off, and Fluttershy seemed to be doing something similar to her 'stare' the difference being that A) she wasn't glaring, B) her jaw was figuratively dropped to the floor, and C) her wings had shot open with a little *pomf*.

Rarity and Fluttershy both had trouble taking their eyes off the pony behind Twilight. She was just as Rainbow Dash had described. The short stature, the flared hips, the adorable blue eyes, the pure white coat, the brown hair.

Fluttershy's eyes slowly glazed over, her brain flooding with epinephrine, dopamine, phenyl ethylamine and endorphins as every reward feedback system in her body was telling her to go forward and slip between the covers with the cute mare before her.

And through those glazed eyes was Fluttershy's vision of the poor colt she thought was a mare. The background of her vision faded into a light pink as she stared at Alex's still watery eyes that were looking back at her, the blush that had grown on his face due to the unwanted attention framing them nicely, until her view was interrupted with a purple face she vaguely registered as belonging to one of her friends.The face’s lips moving as if she were saying something. Thankfully a yellow hoof came out of the left side of her vision and gently pushed the lavender interloper away. With visual contact re-established she went back to her fantasies as she stared. Until the purple one came back again, armed with words.

"Fluttershy, are you alright? You're acting really, really weird right now." Fluttershy stopped herself and looked around, realizing that she had walked halfway to Alex. She wasn’t quite sure when that happened, but for some reason Alex still felt too far away. Already she found her hooves moving again. “Fluttershy!”

Alex slowly backed up, confused at Fluttershy’s zombie-like approach. This whole situation was starting to get really weird.

Alex stopped to consider how easily he was accepting all of this.

He continued to back up, confused by (with) Fluttershy's zombie-like approach, the mare matching his pace until his back met one of the library shelves. Cowering as the strange mare came even closer. His eyes darted to the others in the room, who were all sharing confused glances while they watched the usually timid mare close in on him, not sure what she was doing or why but still absolutely certain she wouldn't hurt him. It was Fluttershy after all. His eyes came back to the front when he felt a pair of hooves squish his cheeks together, only to see a pair of vivid green eyes stare intensely into his soul.

With an angry huff and a flash of light, Alex was teleported out of Fluttershy’s grasp, and onto Twilight’s back. “Okay, Fluttershy, please quit marehandling my maid.” Alex and the visitors turned to Twilight in confusion, but Alex managed to, sort of, hide his confusion under his lace bonnet.

"Yes, that explains the outfit perfectly, Darling. Now, I wonder, how is it that the dear is wearing one of my designs when I haven't brought it to the public eye yet, Twilight? I am oh-so curious to hear how she got it."

"W-Well, um. You see. Ah, well, it's like. *Ahem* You see my maid here c-came today to answer an add I put in for a maid, except, she didn't have h-her own uniform. So... I kinda went to the Carousel Boutique to look for s-something she could use until I could ask you to make one for her. Aheh, um, y-you aren't too mad at me, are you Rarity? I just couldn’t think to use any other tailor’s work, and this one was just so cute.” Twilight sweated profusely as she lied, hoping her flattery would win Rarity over .

"Well, I must say she does look very nice in it. Mmm, I suppose I can't be mad at you for wanting her properly uniformed... Very well Darling, I forgive you for stealing the outfit, on one condition. You order a full wardrobe of the various designs I'll make around the base you stole, that you will return once I finish the first one. Does that sound fair, dear?" Twilight nodded eagerly, glad to have avoided disaster.

“So Twi, who’s the sexy in socks?” Rainbow Dash inquired with a smile.

"Sh-she's... Ice Closet! I, um, ran into her the last time I was up in Canterlot and we got to talking. She was coming on some hard times, so I offered her a job if she needed it. She, um, finally took me up on it earlier today." All three of the visiting mares nodded in at least a modicum of acceptance.

“Fair enough… is she staying with you?” Rarity punctuated her question with an eyebrow wiggle, reminiscent of how Mayor Mare had acted before.

"Um, no actually. I don't have a guest room, and w-while Ice and I are friends, I'm not comfortable sharing a bed with her, ((shrink)) just yet anyway ((shrink)). The couch is far too uncomfortable, and we, um, we were actually planning on going out to see if we could find a place today."

“Oh Darling, you have not thought this through! I know of several ponies who would love to house this new friend of yours.” Rarity smiled as she put a hoof on Twilight’s shoulder. “In fact, I know of three sisters who would love to let her stay with them.”

“Y-you do?” Twilight began nervously, glad her lie was paying off. Rarity nodded.

“Of course, darling. I do believe that the spa sisters were renting out a loft for use. A very cozy one, unfortunately it’s not that spacious. On the other hoof, that just means it’s economical, and I can’t believe that your hiring budget is large enough to afford something too large.”

Alex’s adorable and nibbleable ears perked up. He hadn’t even considered living with somepony else, but it would be a good idea now that he thought about it. It would give him time to consider how rapidly everything was moving, what Discord had tricked him into… if it could be considered trickery. Every way he looked at it, Discord had delivered exactly what he had promised while disguised as Twilight.

Still… the reality that had been before him hadn’t really… made sense. It had all been so fantastical at the time, even with those hours of contemplation. H-he would be separated from everyone he knew and loved for four years, and then return with them having no clue of all the experiences he had been put through.

It was a frightening concept…

While Alex lost himself in thought, Rarity herself was thinking on the reaction she had seen from himthe pony when she had mentioned a place that he could stay. 'My, how curious. What in the world could make a pony confused to just hear that they would be staying somewhere with a roof? ...Oh, oh my. The poor dear's been homeless hasn't she? Yes, that's the only thing I can think of to justify a reaction like that. Though, that begs the question, just how did she get by? Was she a beggar? A thief perhaps?' Rarity broke from her thoughts to look at what she thought was a mare again.

'Well, I must say, for being homeless for as long as she had to have been, she certainly kept herself looking well... No, no it couldn't be. She... she made do by selling the only thing she had left... Herself. O-oh dear. To think, for a mare so young to be brought so low, a-and what must her cutie mark be with such a past? I can only imagine it would need to be... covered. That's why Twilight was so desperate for the uniform, if her cutie mark was really so bad, along with the poor mare being homeless it's little wonder Twilight took her in as she did.

‘But Twilight is such a naive mare, and Rainbow Dash implied there was a boyfriend who had covered this poor mare in cum. What sort of perverse situations… wait. No, Twilight would never force a mare to do that. Perhaps the boyfriend forced the mare after Twilight collapsed, and since he is not here…. Twilight is acting very odd. Perhaps she found out and is ashamed. Obviously that would mean that she had dumped her coltfriend. Poor dear, she is probably in shock after that happened.

'It-it would also explain why Twilight lied about her couch earlier. I know for a fact that her couch is simply divine to fall asleep on, especially seeing how many times she has slept on it after one of her many late night study sessions and been fine afterwards. It would make sense that Ice would want to spend as little time here as possible after something like that. Twilight probably feels so much guilt over the matter.

‘This is the worst possible thing!’

“Rarity… are you okay?” Twilight asked, concerned for her friends as they were all acting a bit odd.

Author's Note

I bet you were wondering why the spa sisters got tagged. Hopefully this will eventually answer your questions in that regard.

Big thanks to tschloken