A She-devil in Plain Sight

Around ten minutes of walking through the crowded streets later, Rarity arrived in front of her destination, Sugarcube Corner, a mock Tudor-style two-story building with pink walls, round windows in the upper floor and two large shop windows revealing an extensive selection of pastry, one ranging from glass urns brim full of raisin cookies to cream cannoli, passing through elaborate chocolate sculptures and pyramids of gianduiotti wrapped in golden foil and sustained by several still-foiled dark chocolate bars.

After quickly checking that no one was standing just next to the door, Rarity pushed the door inwards and her senses were soon assaulted by their respective impressions: she saw a rather large crowd walking all around, as she stepped inside she heard a subtle bell ringing underneath hustle and bustle accompanied by the sound of ceramic and metal clashing together at various intensity, she smelt the smell of raw flour and cocoa coming from the kitchens and the smell of light sweat from the people nearby, she felt her back pushed forward by an uncaring elbow. With a small grunt Rarity wedged herself in the crowd, before sliding her pursue off her shoulder and setting it over her head and then trying to elevate herself above the crowd by standing on her feet’s tips and thus walking on them.

In-between the variegated humanity occupying the various tables while eating and loudly chattering, Rarity spotted her friends sitting in a far corner, close to the counter’s metal swinging door in front of the thick semi-transparent tent-door leading to the kitchen.

As she approached her destination while navigated through the sea of people passing by, Rarity could see Pinkie Pie’s left arm was firmly wrapped on her chest thanks to a dark blue sling and a few white bandages, her healthy hand grasping a milkshake glass' stout stem, while Rainbow Dash’s right hand was wrapped in a cocoon of patches and gauzes and holding onto a sugar-encrusted Bundt cake, chewing and talking at the same time.

As soon as she was out of the thickest part of the crowd and, thus, much more visible, Rarity soon saw Pinkie Pie spring up and use her healthy arm to both wave at her and invite Rarity to join the group, as Twilight timidly waved and Rainbow kept on chewing -- or perhaps had tried to greet with her mouth full and without turning around at all.

Rarity lowered her pursue, sliding it onto her left shoulder while she sped up her march to the table.

“Hello there, my dear gals!” Rarity said as she swiftly pushed a chair close to the table. “I came here bringing gifts from a most unlikely source.”

“Gifts? Really?!” Pinkie Pie said, bouncing on her seat a little. “Oh what are they, what are they?! Who sent them?!”

“Lemon Turner sent all the objects I am going to give to you now.” Rarity set the purse onto the table and quickly opened up the brass zipper and spread the two velvet halves apart, revealing in full view the candies’ tins, the flute’s container and the emerald envelope containing Lemon Turner’s compensations for Pinkie Pie’s ruined party. Rarity immediately handed the envelope to Pinkie Pie, saying. “This is for you, Pinkie Pie. It is the payment of the ‘war reparations,’ presumably he sent money to pay for the party he spoiled and for the arm he indirectly shattered.”

“Aaaww.” Pinkie Pie’s hair deflated a little bit as she took the envelope with her useful hand and looked at it with her shoulders drooped. Meanwhile, Rarity pulled out the candies’ tins and the flute’s box, before pushing them towards a baffled Twilight.

“These are his gifts to you, Twilight,” she said. “A stash of Piedmontese candies that will probably last you for a few months and a transverse flute, which he claimed to be the musical instrument you have always wished to play.”

Twilight Sparkle cautiously pulled both the tins and the flute’s container towards her, before taking one of the candies’ small boxes in her right hand, silently inspecting its exterior by slowly rotating her wrist around and bobbing her head back and forth.

“Is something the matter Twi?”Rainbow Dash asked, slumping herself onto the table as she leaned her head forward towards Twilight. “Is that guy insulting you or something?”

“N-no… it’s just that this… is a bit odd.” Twilight said, lifting her glasses up and looking closer at the labels. “I mean, he used to give these to the girls that had done him a favour or stuff like that, but I don’t recall anything I’ve done to him he could be grateful for. And then there’s the flute. Yes, I kinda wanted to learn to play it, but… with all the stuff that has happened, I’ve never got around to talk about it much, let alone try out.”

Rarity arched an eyebrow just as Rainbow Dash did.

“Wait, wait, wait… then why didn’t you join our band? We could’ve taught you how to!” Rainbow Dash said while quickly raising her head and staring at Twilight, who was slightly blushing and averting her gaze.

“I just thought that you had no use for a flute, being a mostly rock band and all.”

Rainbow Dash threw her arms outwards and up in the air, chuckling somewhat.

“Oh c’mon, really? We’ve accepted Fluttershy in our band and she used to play on the tambourine! The tambourine! But then I-- I mean we, managed to teach her how to use the drum machine. And sing without losing control of herself. ” Rainbow Dash said. “‘Sides, we can always use a flute player: Rarity has been tryin’ to find one since forever so that she could play her dusty old music with us, maybe she could finally do that. She deserves it, after all the trouble she went through due to Lemon Turner and his attempts to convince her to do horrible things.”

Rarity recoiled as she forced a grin on her face, her ivory skin suddenly creating pearls of sweat that melted and striped her face a little, the fear of the past period resurfacing with brutal and ruthless vigour as she subconsciously brought her shirt’s left sleeve close to her mouth. Twilight turned around with her left index lifted up like a banner’s stand in the midst of an heated battle.

“She was never under his control, Rainbow Dash.” Twilight said. “She has been like this for… what, several years.”

Recovering most of her courage and inspired by Twilight’s first strike forward, Rarity put her arm down and, by springing up from her heat, counter-attacked her hesitations and its ally terror.

“I have been wishing to have sexual contact with little boys since I was, I think, eleven. However, I recognized those longings as a mental illness only a month or so ago, namely, around the time you first talked about Lemon Turner with me.” Rarity said, resting her hands onto the table’s surface and holding her knees onto the table’s edges. “But worry not, my friend, you have done nothing but bring me closer to understand myself and to cope with a matter it was best revealed to me and then made mostly harmless. All I need right now, besides psychological help from a trained professional, is for you to accept me the best way you can, not break off either in terror of complicity’s punishment or disgust at what the least-civilized part of my mind tends to conjure up.”

Rainbow Dash -- slack-jawed and silenced by the sudden response -- silently stared at Rarity. Rarity gulped, as she forced herself to look right into Rainbow Dash’s eyes and not fidget too much.

“Uuuhh… you two feeling alright?” Pinkie asked, waving her hand in front of Rarity’s eyes, causing the latter to blink and shake her head.

“Oh, yes, I am.” Rarity said. “I would not be so sure about Rainbow Dash, thought, considered the… rather statue-like gaze she has currently.”

And, just as if her words were a magical spell to bring her back to life, Rainbow Dash shook her head. Then she threw her arms high up in the air, squeaking and hissing nonsensical monosyllables as she looked up at the ceiling and set her hands into her rainbow hair and violently ruffled it as if it was an egg prepared to be turned into omelette on a searing hot plate.

Then, she got up and look around her, her mouth still producing only the basest of sounds, as she now looked down at the gray stone floor covered in discarded receipts and crumbs, setting off towards the crowd and, presumably, the exit.

“Hey! You still have to pay for the bagel!” Pinkie Pie shouted towards Rainbow Dash, before realizing her friend was crossing a far too deep spot of the river of people to hear her. “Ah, nevermindies. She’ll give the money tomorrow.”

Rarity, confused by what had just happened, looked at Twilight. Twilight looked back with a slight frown, leaving behind an awkward silence. Then, after what felt like an eternity, Rarity nodded and so did Twilight, confirming both’s question on the event.
“Anyways, what do we have here?” Pinkie Pie asked as she opened the flute’s dark box, revealing all of its contents, flash drive and booklet included.

“Oooh, it’s a music book!” Pinkie Pie said while quickly browsing it. “I wonder if there’s the Falalan in there or El Condor Pasa or Samarkand or…”

“I am sure it does.” Rarity said, stretching her right hand forward towards Pinkie. “Just… put it down please.”

Pinkie Pie did so with a sigh. Meanwhile, Twilight timidly pushed the chair closer to the table, thusly allowing her left arm to rest on Rarity’s shoulders, which Rarity reciprocated.

Later that day, Rarity -- dressed in a light red silk dress with a narrow pleated long skirt and a waist-long shirt with two roses, one black and one white, embroidered on each side, white at the sleeves’ hem, diamond-shaped light blue cufflinks and half-white half-black neck buttons of the same shape as the cufflinks’, golden rings with a thread of tiny pearls and an equally-small brilliant as earrings, and a deep red small purse with dark brown leather strap and brass rings -- was walking up the theater's red marble stairs that lead up to the main entrance, which was hidden by a dark blue gold-trimmed curtain and guarded by two tall ushers clad in gray and white suits.

Rarity briefly stopped. extracting the bronze-coloured ticket from her already open pursue and, with an agile hand play, held it between her index and her middle finger as she went towards the ushers. One of them took the ticket, stamped it and moved the curtain aside, revealing a seemingly-endless sweep of red padded seats lined up before the stage -- which was already occupied with the orchestra’s battlements.

“Seat ninety-nine on the left, third-to-last line.” the usher said with a small bow. “Enjoy the show, madam.”

Rarity did a small curtsey, before walking inside the theater itself and extricated herself through the maze of seats, both empty and full alike, until she arrived to her destination, which was just next to a speaker hidden inside a niche and surmounted by a naked caryatid holding on a lamp shaped after a lily flower.

Rarity set her bag underneath the seat, before holding onto her skirt as she sat down with a small sigh. She then looked up, awaiting for the presenter and the musicians to walk forth onto the stage and, thus, start the concert. While she waited, she looked all around her: she saw five men carrying an harpsichord and placing it in the middle of the two semicircular galleries; she saw a sharply-dressed couple vividly chatting while they looked for their seats, before exchanging a fugitive kiss on their cheeks, bringing a smile to them both and to Rarity as well; she saw a small mixed group of people of her age bickering over the seats’ disposition; and she saw persons just walking inside and taking their own seats by their own and, among them, much to her surprise, Rarity saw Lemon Turner approach her row.

He was clad in a bourdeaux and Pompeian yellow vertically-striped outfit, composed by trousers tucked inside his black boots and a shirt neatly folded and with a black handkerchief folded inside the breast pocket.

Rarity wiggled around, setting her knees onto the seat’s cushion and turning her back to the stage to instead watch Lemon Turner approaching.

“What are you doing here Lemon Turner?” Rarity asked to him, as he walked past her row’s empty seats towards, apparently, a seat beside her. “Why are you --”

“Oh, greetings Rarity,” he said, stopping to bow before her. “I failed to see you. If you are wondering, currently I am not accused of, or, rather, I did not confess of executing, a crime deemed grave enough to require preventive arrest for the duration of the judicial process. I have to show myself at the police station every day at the same exact hour and, for the time being, I am banished from the villa that I sieged and ordered to assault viciously.”

Rarity furrowed her eyebrow at his explanation, and she squinted her eyes to look at his half-shaven face to catch any subconscious hint.

“That is… odd. But I guess that confessing a crime may have its benefits.” Rarity said. Lemon Turner turned up his nose, before walking to the seat at Rarity’s left side.

“I must say, I am surprised that you are present here in this location, assisting to this upcoming concert.” He said as he slowly descended onto the seating, his right arm firmly grabbing onto the somewhat scraped wooden armrest and his left left one doing a whirling gesture towards the air. “Is there any reason for this?”

Offended, Rarity slightly recoiled, her right hand closed in a fist onto her chest and a frown onto her face. However, she quickly regained composure and wiped her grimace off her face to properly answer.

“There is no real reason, besides my appreciation for the music that is going to be played here,” arity said calmly, before letting a small grin escape her as she thought up the question she was going to ask. “Why, are you here for any particular reason?”

“Actually, yes. I had attained two tickets for this concert, one for me and one for my love interest, but, sadly, after my action at the villa, I deemed inappropriate to go out with her to listen to a concert.” He said, a small blush growing on his cheeks as he spoke. “She should be educated that actions have consequences for all, you know, and at such a young ag --”

He immediately froze up, his face now completely red and his ears seemingly producing small clouds of steam. Then, he bent over, covering his mouth as he swore, in turn causing Rarity to chuckle at his unintentional declaration of engagement. Her chuckles ended soon, however, as her mind unearthened memories of her own fight with her condition and the words that Lemon Turner spoke to ease up her burden as manner of reprimand, Rarity’s hilarity suddenly disappeared and was replaced by vague concern and guilt.

“It is fine, Lemon,” Rarity said. “Besides, I am in no position to either judge or spread around the news of your infatuation with a girl that is much younger than you”

He let out a bellow-like sigh as he rose up again and his face went back to its usual colour.

“Thank you very much, Rarity. I shall remember this.” He said.

And, just as soon as the vague echo of his words faded, the lights slowly dimmed until they went off completely, thusly calling his and Rarity’s attention to the stage.

In the center, highlighted by a blue light standing against the darkness, a white man dressed in orange and purple with a shirt with inflated shoulders and trousers with bloated thighs, was holding onto a microphone, while the musicians themselves were in the dim light left by the spotlight.

“Good evening, sirs and madams, and welcome to our third encounter of our concert plan, ‘World’s Music Throughout History: A Rapid Discourse,’ brought by the efforts of the Atrium Musicae Upsaliensis and the here present Arouser.”

“Good, I was afraid they were going to propose the Hymn to Nikkal and the Epitaph of Seikilos.” Lemon Turner muttered, causing a confused Rarity to turn her head around towards him, which prompted him to answer. “If you are confused, I already went to the first two encounters with my school for our studies on the art of music and harmony throughout the ages of History, but, all too sadly, it turned out to be much less interesting than I was expecting it to be, no thanks to the constant intermission by our Music teacher Mister Antorpheus and his obsession for the cithara coupled with this presenter’s clear lack of sleep the previous night.”

Rarity nodded, before hearing an harpsichord being played at a rather vivid pace.

“And, now, we shall begin this concert with one of the musical symbols of this era, ‘Mr. George Whitehead His Almand,” the presenter said, bowing and walking out the scene, as the harpsichord faded and was followed by a string of violin, in turn followed by another harpsichord crescendo. Rarity, mentally raptured by the music, stopped listening to Lemon Turner’s rant and let the notes’ flow bring her somewhere high and away from the seat she was sitting in...