The Great Thaw

by RadiantBeam

Rating: everyone
Tags: Rarity, Sunset Shimmer, Alternate Universe, Romance, Equestria Girls
Length: 5426

In Equestria, ponies only experience winter until they find their soul mate. Problem is, Sunset isn't in Equestria anymore, and her soul mate is human. And she doesn't know what to do about that at all.

In Equestria, the only season ponies can experience until they meet their soul mate is winter. When Sunset crossed over to the human world, she met her soul mate, and was able to experience the other seasons. The problem is, she isn't in Equestria anymore, and her soul mate is human.

And Sunset doesn't want to force that onto Rarity when to humans, the term soul mate applies to something that isn't real.

Cover art designed by the very generous Novel-Idea! Thank you so much!

Published 2016-09-09 00:50:01 UTC
Last updated 2016-09-09 00:50:01 UTC

The Great Thaw

Sunset Shimmer stared down at the device that Twilight had slid onto the table—human Twilight, she always had to remind herself of that, it was human Twilight Sparkle, not Princess Twilight Sparkle—for a long moment, saying nothing. She let the silence drag on, long enough for Rarity to absently brush her thumb over the top of her hand and for Fluttershy to cough nervously, before she finally looked up at the purple girl that was sitting across from her, squirming in place.

“Does this really have to be recorded?” she finally asked, though she had a feeling she already knew the answer.

Practically vibrating with energy that was a mix of scientific excitement and social nerves, Twilight nodded. “It would help,” she said, nervously stroking at a strand of hair that had worked itself free from her new ponytail. “I find that I tend to do better with my research when I’ve recorded things so I can go back and listen to them, you see…”

Sunset lifted a brow, valiantly fighting back a smile. “Research?”

Twilight squeaked. “That was the wrong word! I’m sorry! I’m not researching you, I swear! I-I just want to examine you—wait, no, that sounds even worse! I just want…”

Sunset laughed, breaking the tension in that moment and leaning forward. “Twilight, relax, I’m joking. I don’t mind that you want to record me.”

Twilight’s eyes were the size of dinner plates behind her glasses. “Y-You just sounded upset…”

“I was messing with you. I wanted to see how far you would go with this.”

“… That was mean,” Twilight said, but she let go of her strand of hair.

“Which is why I’m here,” Rarity cut in quickly, giving Sunset’s hand a squeeze under the table. “Don’t you worry about a thing, Twilight, dear. I’ll make sure Sunset is good and behaved so you get everything out of her that you can.”

“And I’m here for moral support!” Fluttershy chirped, encouragingly rubbing Twilight’s back. “But if you really want to know how mean Sunset used to be, I have some stories—“

“Thank you, Fluttershy,” Sunset cut in, rolling her eyes at her pink-haired friend’s overly innocent grin. “And sorry, Sparks, I was just having fun. I never get much of a chance to tease Princess Twilight, so I guess some of that came out. The recording really isn’t an issue, and you can ask me anything you like.”

She must have said the magic words, because Twilight’s eyes lit up with a fire Sunset had never seen before. She immediately regretted what she’d said.

“Oh, excellent!” the purple girl squealed, diving into her backpack to fish out her journal. “Honestly when you said you were okay with talking to me about Equestria and its magic and how you came over from there to here, I was so excited! I only have a few questions! Well, actually, I mean, I have 1,623,058, but of course I’m going to pace myself…”

“Oh dear,” Rarity said delicately as Twilight placed the journal onto the table and flipped it open, chattering all the while.

Nestled in her backpack, Spike chuckled fondly. “Yeah, she’s great,” he sighed, then leaned over and gently nudged her with his nose. “Twilight?”

Twilight blinked owlishly at him, “Yeah Spike?”

“You’re getting ahead of yourself again. Might wanna slow down.”

“Oh! Right! Sorry! I’m just excited, I’ve been tracking the magic around Canterlot High School for months, but I never thought I would get the chance to speak to the one girl responsible for bringing it over to our world in the first place!”

Sunset bit her lip to resist pointing out that magic hadn’t been involved in the human world until after Princess Twilight had crossed over from the portal; it had all happened anyway because she’d stolen the crown in the first place, so she supposed that regardless she was ultimately responsible for all of the magical events that had unfolded since then. “Right,” she murmured, slumping back in her chair and rubbing her eyes with her free hand.

She had a death grip on her girlfriend’s hand, at this point. Rarity had definitely noticed, because while Twilight was preoccupied she leaned over to whisper into Sunset’s ear, “Are you sure this is okay, love? You seem rather… tense.”

Sunset shrugged. “It’s fine. It’s kind of funny, actually. When I was Princess Celestia’s student, I would have given anything to have this kind of attention. Now that I’m actually getting it, I don’t know how I feel about it. It’s not at all what I expected.”

Rarity hummed, resting her cheek against Sunset’s shoulder. “Well, when you become a big, famous celebrity that will surely attract the attention of men and women everywhere, I hope you remember your friends and girlfriend in the little town of Canterlot. We’ll miss you if you ever leave.”

Sunset snorted, swallowing back a laugh. “You will?”

“I’ll especially miss you terribly.”

The former Equestrian was about to speak up, to happily reassure Rarity that she was pretty sure nothing like that was going to come from this small moment of indulging scientific curiosity, but Twilight had finished unpacking all of her things and was switching on her recorder. Immediately Sunset straightened, though it did nothing to dislodge Rarity from her favorite snuggling position.

“I’m going to start small,” Twilight said. “I just want to talk about how you came over to this world and why you acted the way you did, if that’s okay? I spoke with Fluttershy about your first few days at Canterlot High, and she told me some things that seemed a little strange.”

“I bet,” Sunset sighed, remembering all too well how long it had taken her to adjust to her new human body. Fluttershy shot her an apologetic look, visibly relaxing when her friend waved it off. “Go ahead, Sparks, though most of it will match what the princess told you about her first experiences over here. I had to work out how a human body worked just like she did.”

“Princess… oh, right, you mean the other me!” Twilight adjusted her glasses. “It’s still so weird to think that in another world, I’m a magical winged unicorn princess of friendship. And yes, she told me all about that and I figured you had a similar time. I meant more specifically how you came over dressed.”

Sunset blinked, lifting a brow. “How I was… dressed?”

“Your clothes, yes. I said I was going to pace myself, right? I figured we’d start with something small and simple that I was curious about.”
“Well, if you’re asking me how the portal makes them, I’m afraid I can’t give you much of an answer to that. I even talked to the princess about it because we were both wondering about it, and we couldn’t work anything out—“

“I don’t care about the clothes being made,” Twilight cut in. “I care about the clothes you came over to our world in. I spoke with our friends, and a few other people at Canterlot High to expand my sample size…”

“Sample size?” Fluttershy whispered to Spike, who gave an amused shrug.

“… And they all confirmed that when you first came in for classes at school, you were basically bundled up like you’d walked out of a massive blizzard.”

Ah, Sunset thought, and had to bite back the urge to sigh, had to fight the instinctive temptation to tense up. Twilight was edging dangerously close to a topic the former unicorn wasn’t ready to discuss with her human friends, but if she let it slip at all that she was uncomfortable, Fluttershy and Rarity would notice immediately and become concerned. Rarity even more so, considering she was still cuddled into her girlfriend.

Her girlfriend who’s been lying to her this whole time about a huge part of what she is, a dark voice whispered in the back of her mind. Sunset soundly squashed that voice dead and buried it.

It was fine. She already had an answer to this; she had practiced it in the safety of her own home, and she had known sooner or later this would come up. Honestly, she was shocked this hadn’t come up sooner with how much she had shared classes with her friends before they’d become her friends, but the girls had always been polite and respectful at the oddest of times.

Sunset leaned against the table easily, giving Rarity’s hand a slight squeeze, if only to reassure herself. “I’m afraid there’s no big mystery to that,” she laughed. “When I crossed over from Equestria to the human world, it was the middle of winter. We had a huge snowstorm raging outside. I charged in and ran through the portal without thinking, and didn’t realize it until I stumbled out as a human in full winter gear.”

Twilight blinked once. She blinked again. And then, as if to simply drag the moment, she blinked a third time.

“… Really?” she finally said, and there was no hiding the absolute disappointment in her voice.

“Really,” Sunset repeated.

“Are… are you sure? I’m not going to lie, I was sort of hoping there would be more to it than that…”

Sunset shrugged, “Sorry to disappoint you, but it’s true. The weather in Equestria doesn’t always match the weather in the human world. It was still winter when I crossed over, and I still felt the chill for awhile.” She paused. “… I also needed to buy new clothes, to be frank. That winter gear was all I had.”

“Oh.” Twilight deflated like a balloon stuck with a pin. She spun her pen between her fingers, completely forgetting that she still had her recorder running. “I even had this really cool magical theory about it, too…”

Fluttershy squeezed her shoulder comfortingly and gave Sunset a look that was a mix between amused and apologetic. “She was really excited about this. It took me awhile to even convince her to ask you about it.”

Well, now. She couldn’t go and disappoint a budding scientist like that, could she? The lie still stung even if Sunset knew she’d told it for her own good, but there was still a way that she could turn this around and give Twilight at least a little bit of what she wanted to hear. “You didn’t ask how I bought those clothes,” she hummed, smiling when Rarity gave her a rewarding nuzzle.

Twilight stared at her. “Eh?”

“I bought those clothes with some gems I brought over. You know, from Equestria. They were magical gems. I still have a few of them left, if you want to check them out sometime.”

For a single instant Twilight’s eyes widened, and hope blazed in her eyes again. She immediately stopped twirling her pen and yanked her journal close, quivering with the force of questions she desperately wanted to ask but was biting back to be polite.

Fluttershy’s eyes shone with relief and appreciation, and Sunset knew she’d made the right choice. So she started to talk, speaking of how common gems were in Equestria, how dragons ate them and ponies used them for fashion, but every once and awhile magic was channeled through them—magic that, in the right hooves and with sharp minds, could become magical objects and possibly even weapons.

She changed the subject gently but firmly, and no one at the table with her seemed any the wiser to it.

The lie still stung, and it continued to sting for the rest of the day.

Sunset found that sometimes, she missed the days when lying came to her as easily as breathing and she’d felt no pain for it.

Sunset Shimmer wasn’t human.

She knew the facts: she had chosen to remain in the human world even when Princess Twilight had made it clear that she would be more than welcome to return to Equestria and reconcile with Celestia, and for as long as she remained in the human world she would take on a human form. That was simply how the magic of the portal worked (and human Twilight had had plenty of theories about that). The portal had made Sunset look human, and while on some intellectual level she was sure her friends knew she wasn’t, they knew it in the sense that they had been told about it but had never seen it. As far as they understood it Sunset was human, simply because she had been a human for as long as they had known her.

She looked human. She acted human. But at the end of the day, Sunset knew what she was: she was a pony of Equestria, a unicorn if she wanted to be more specific. She wasn’t human, and nothing in either world would ever permanently make her a human.

And because she wasn’t human, it meant that things that had applied to her when she had been a unicorn in Equestria still applied to her; they only applied to her now when she wore a human skin. She’d learned that the hard way.

She’d learned that the day she had crossed over from Equestria during a raging blizzard—an apt description, though Twilight wasn’t aware of it—and had stumbled out into the human world only to discover she was still caught in a raging blizzard.

She’d learned that the day she locked eyes with Rarity during class and quite suddenly, the blizzard had died down like it had never existed, and she could feel a season that wasn’t winter.

Shortly after Sunset had crossed into the human world, she had met her soul mate.

The problem was, humans didn’t have soul mates.

And that was fine. It really was. Even after finding her soul mate on the other side of the mirror, Sunset had never intended to actually do anything about it; the whole concept of soul mates was something she’d scoffed at back in Equestria, and she hadn’t even liked Rarity all that much when she had first joined Canterlot High. If anything, finding her so soon had simply made it more convenient to settle down in the human world; her heavy winter gear had attracted its fair share of stares and whispers.

For three years, the fact that she had a human soul mate had been perfectly fine in Sunset’s book. She’d dated Flash, she’d taken over the school, she’d then fallen and been picked back up by Princess Twilight and her human friends, and her soul mate hadn’t impacted any of that.
But now she and Rarity were dating. Now—at least in theory—they were being completely honest with each other about how they felt. Rarity knew Sunset wasn’t human, and she was perfectly okay with that.

The problem was, Sunset was beginning to realize she wasn’t. Soul mates meant something completely different to ponies than they did to humans, and it was a harsh reminder to the redhead that no matter how she looked and how she acted, she would never be human.
Once, the thought of lying about something like that hadn’t bothered her. But she wasn’t that person anymore, and she’d already had one serious relationship fall apart on her because she had consistently put herself above the other person. She didn’t want that to happen a second time.

And, if she was being completely, utterly honest with herself, she already suspected she liked Rarity more than she had ever liked Flash. That was a whole other thing she would deal with, at a later date.

For now, she needed to talk to Rarity. She needed to be honest with her girlfriend.

Sunset stared at the glowing screen of her phone, breathed out a little mental prayer, and sent the text she’d been staring at for the last fifteen minutes. She didn’t even want to think about how long it had taken her to even compose it. Once it was sent, she put her phone down screen first, then restlessly got to her feet. Her phone vibrated almost immediately, but she was suddenly too scared to check if Rarity was confirming her request to meet or if she was saying she’d be too busy to make it.

It might not have even been Rarity, but now that she had put her phone down she’d made up her mind. If she didn’t do this now, she knew she never would.

And even if she didn’t know how this would turn out—this reminder to her girlfriend that ultimately, Sunset wasn’t human—something in the former Equestrian’s chest quieted at the thought that she was finally going to be completely honest.

That had to count for something.

The stairs in front of Canterlot High had become one of Sunset’s favorite places to sit and think, when she wanted to go somewhere quiet. Nobody lingered around the school during time off, and the closeness to the portal sent faint pulses of familiar magic washing through her body. The combination was usually enough to quiet any unrest Sunset felt, and now was no exception.

She was beginning to wish she’d checked her phone, regardless of her nerves. She’d been relaxing on the stairs now for some time, and there was still no sign of Rarity. Even if being out here was calming for her general state of mind, there was no real reason for her to linger if for whatever reason her girlfriend wouldn’t be able to make it and wasn’t going to show.

Just as Sunset was about to get up, however, she saw Rarity coming along the path to school. Amused by the timing of it all, the other girl shifted on her favorite seat instead of getting up and waved. Rarity smiled and waved back, picking up the pace.

“I’m so sorry I’m late,” Rarity rushed out as she sat down next to her girlfriend. “I got your text as soon as you sent it, but I was still on my shift at work and you didn’t answer my text.”

Sunset shrugged, “Not your fault. I kind of just left my phone in my apartment after sending that text and came right here.”

All things considered, she was probably lucky that everything had worked out so well in terms of timing. And now that Rarity mentioned it, she did look like she had just gotten off of work from the boutique; Sunset could still smell the lingering perfume she only ever used for her working hours, and while the fashionista always prided herself on dressing well, there was a little extra flair to impress that wasn’t usually present during her off hours.

Immediately Sunset felt a surge of guilt, and she took both of Rarity’s hands in hers. “I didn’t get you in trouble, did I? I didn’t even think that you’d be at work, and if you left so suddenly like that just to come and see me because I asked—“

Rarity laughed and squeezed Sunset’s hands. “Relax, love. I was already at the end of my shift anyway, so I’m not going to get in trouble.”

“… Right.” Sunset breathed the word out and tried to relax. She must have been failing miserably on every account, because Rarity gently pulled her in by her hands and snuggled her close, tucking her head against her shoulder and brushing loose strands of hair out of her eyes.
Sunset sighed, closed her eyes, and let her girlfriend fuss until she was satisfied. The moment wouldn’t last forever, she knew that; she wasn’t even trying to hide her tension anymore. But she wanted to take it while it lasted.

She liked being close to Rarity like this.

“I lied,” she finally mumbled. “When I talked to Twilight earlier.”

“Oh, Sunset,” Rarity sighed, her fingers gently lacing in mixed strands of red and gold. “I already knew that.”

Sunset sputtered. “Y-You did?”

“Well… yes. I mean, texting me so soon after that chat saying you want to talk about something? I figured you either felt guilty about lying, or you wanted to break up with me. And considering I’m quite certain you have no reason to want to break up with me…”

“I don’t!”

“Point proven! Which means you lied, and you feel terribly about that, and so you texted me because you wanted to talk and be honest.” Rarity paused. “Though, to be fair, I’m not quite sure what you lied about when you were talking to Twilight, especially considering she didn’t ask you very much at all.”

“… I love you,” Sunset said, awed and a little terrified.

“I love you too, darling, but that doesn’t address my confusion very much.”

Sunset bit her lip and chewed it, letting the silence linger for a moment as she tried to think of the best way to finally start this frankly long overdue conversation. At the very least, Rarity was willing to give her time to compose herself, content with simply keeping her close and continuing to stroke her hair until she found the words.

Finally, though, she pulled away nervously and took a deep breath, playing with her hands. “We have soul mates in Equestria.”

Rarity blinked. “Soul mates?”

“Yeah. That’s like… an actual thing, for us. It’s not just an expression, and it isn’t fictional like romance novels and movies. We have them, and until a pony finds their soul mate they, uh…” she trailed off, gesturing helplessly. “Y-You remember what I told Twilight about my winter gear?”

Rarity’s brow furrowed. “Yes?”

“That’s what I lied about. I wasn’t dressed like that because it was winter in Equestria, I was dressed like that because I hadn’t found my soul mate by the time I crossed over to the human world. The only season we can experience until we meet our soul mate is winter, and I guess the rule still applied in the human world because I was technically still a pony. The portal didn’t fundamentally change that.”

Rarity’s eyes widened in understanding, a hand coming up to her lips. “Oh my,” she murmured. “So when you actually changed your clothes…”

“That was because I saw my soul mate and could experience other seasons, yeah.” All nerves now, Sunset restlessly got to her feet and began to pace. “When I was introduced to the class, I locked eyes with them. I-I didn’t even think we could have soul mates who weren’t other ponies, so it was… a bit of a shock.”

“Oh. Oh, Sunset, darling, I’m so, so sorry.”

Sunset cringed, waiting for the explosion.

“All this time you’ve been watching Flash with Twilight—the princess, I mean, not the human one—and you’ve been encouraging them, and… oh!” Rarity surged to her feet, grabbing Sunset’s hands suddenly and yanking her into a tight embrace. “I can’t even begin to imagine how it must feel to see your soul mate with another woman!”

Sunset’s jumbled thoughts came to an abrupt, screeching halt. “What.”

“And here I was at the start, teasing him about his crush on her! Oh, Sunset, sweet thing, I apologize! You should have told us all sooner! If I had known, I would have never—“

Oh.

Oh, wait. Rarity thought…

Oh, no.

“Rarity.” Sunset wriggled away from Rarity’s embrace, grabbing her hands when she gasped and tried to pull her back in. “Rarity, I don’t mean—it isn’t Flash!”

Rarity was brought up short, frowning as her fingers curled against Sunset’s. “Beg pardon?”

“It isn’t Flash,” Sunset repeated. “Flash isn’t my soul mate. I dated him right after coming to the human world, yes, but that wasn’t the reason.”

“… You could have said something sooner.” Rarity pouted. “Here I was worrying. I must have made quite the fool of myself.”

Sunset chuckled and leaned in to kiss Rarity’s forehead, unable to resist. “It was cute. I appreciate you worrying so much on my behalf, but I wanted to stop you before you got too far with that train of thought. I did care about Flash at one point, but he was never my soul mate.”

Rarity flushed a light, pretty pink, and huffed quietly as she brushed her hair back behind her shoulder. She took a small step back, settling down on the stairs again and gently tugging Sunset along with her so the other girl sat beside her once more.

“Well then, darling, you know now that you’ve started this conversation I have to ask who your soul mate is. I would imagine that’s what you wanted to talk to me about, now that we’ve gotten this far. Yes?”

Sunset winced and sighed, resisting the urge to pull away from her girlfriend and bundle up into a little ball. “Yes, I… I was going to tell you that.”

Rarity leaned forward, bumped their foreheads together encouragingly. There was a moment of silence as she seemed to contemplate what she wanted to say next, before she brought Sunset’s fingers to her lips and gave them a gentle kiss. “I could keep guessing if you like,” she said softly, “but judging from your reaction and your request to talk, I think I know who your soul mate is, Sunset.”

Sunset breathed out, and tried very hard to ignore the tightening in her chest. “Who do you think it is, then? Since you seem pretty confident.”

Rarity’s eyes met hers, and for that single instant Sunset was in front of the class again, locking eyes with her for the very first time as the snowstorm she’d known all her life until that point died around her and she became aware of how warm the world could be.

“Just a guess,” she murmured. “But would your soul mate happen to be me?”

Sunset breathed out, and felt her chest loosening up as if in response to it. “If I said yes?”

Rarity leaned in, giving her a chaste kiss before bumping their foreheads together gently. “Then I would remind you that I believe I’m the protagonist of a romance novel, Sunset. I’ve gone to dances in the past expecting to find my Prince Charming who would sweep me off my feet. Being told I’m someone’s soul mate, your soul mate, would thrill me beyond relief. It’s just so terribly romantic.”

“… You don’t mind? I-I mean, humans don’t actually have soul mates, and I didn’t want to…” Sunset trailed off, rolling her shoulders restlessly. “It’s an Equestrian thing. I didn’t want to bring it up and force it on you. I didn’t want to remind you that I’m not… you know. Human.”

The purple-haired girl chuckled at that. “Sunset, darling, I’ve had plenty of reminders that you aren’t human, believe me. Why, did you know Twilight had that little recording session with all of us, not just you? She wanted varied opinions on the magic that was occurring around the school.”

Said part of magic occurring around the school chuckled. “Really? Did she ask you anything interesting?”

“Well, she did ask me how I felt about dating a horse.”

Sunset choked on the air she was breathing, collapsing into a helpless fit of giggles. “I never would have expected that from Sparks! She actually asked you that?”

“She did indeed. It had nothing to do with magic, but I just think she couldn’t resist asking.” Rarity smiled gently. “I was quick to correct her, though. You’re a unicorn from Equestria, and as far as I understand it, that’s quite a different thing from a horse.”

“Well, thank you for standing up for me.”

“I also informed her that I was well aware of what she was really asking, though she was trying to be a dear and be polite about it. I did appreciate that, and I’ll tell you the same thing that I told her: I’m well aware of the fact you aren’t human. I’ve been aware of that fact for some time. If it was something that really bothered me, I wouldn’t be dating you. It’s that simple.”

Rarity paused, waiting for Sunset to say something in response to her words. When she didn’t, though, the fashionista continued speaking. “But I suspect that isn’t what’s bothering you. You should already know this by now.”

Sunset sighed, “I do. I pretty easily admit that it bothers me more than it bothers you. I just… don’t like the reminder that I’m not human, I guess. It wasn’t something I used to think about, but the fact that I’m from Equestria has caused us so many magical problems…”

“It’s also given us quite a few benefits,” Rarity pointed out gently, but she settled down to let her girlfriend finish talking.

“But there’s no benefit to you being my soul mate!” Sunset finally burst. “Like okay, yeah, me not being human brought magic to your world, and that had its good parts and its bad parts. It was at least something that helped you out! But you don’t get anything out of being my soul mate, it’s just something that is and it doesn’t have the same meaning to humans and I don’t—“

She pulled away from Rarity and shuddered, exhaling shakily as she tried to compose her thoughts. The other girl was quiet, giving her that distance and that time to think about what she wanted to say.

“I don’t want to force it on you,” Sunset said at last, raggedly. “That’s why I kept it to myself for so long. It’s a reminder that I’m not human and it doesn’t even help you, it’s not something you asked for.”

It clicked into place for Rarity, then, and she understood in an instant why this bothered Sunset so much. She kept her silence, though, waiting for the other girl to settle down uneasily in one place before she gracefully got to her feet, closing the distance between them in continued silence. She reached out and gently took Sunset’s hands in her own again, pressing a warm white finger to the Equestrian’s lips when she started to stammer. Once she was sure the redhead wouldn’t try to speak, she removed her finger.

“You’re right,” she said. “This clearly isn’t something I got any say in, and I agree with you that for us humans, soul mate means something very different.”

Sunset’s shoulders slumped.

“However,” Rarity continued, “this is clearly something very important to you and your culture, and while I would have liked to know sooner, I appreciate you telling me now. I appreciate you taking the time to explain it to me, and I appreciate your concerns.”

Sunset nodded, not sure what she should be bracing herself for. Rarity leaned in closer, whispering right against her ear and sending a shiver shooting down her spine at the warmth and the intimacy of the gesture.

“But as I said, the whole thing is terribly romantic. I’m already planning out matching soul mate dresses.”

Sunset sputtered, then started laughing, the sound muffled as Rarity grinned and took advantage of their closeness to kiss her fully on the lips. The two of them simply stayed huddled together like that for awhile, enjoying the warmth of each other, before they finally pulled apart enough to head down the stairs. Sunset’s fingers absently laced with her girlfriend’s as they walked, the two of them heading towards the fashionista’s house.

Sunset had insisted Rarity come all the way out here, after all. It was only fair to walk her home.

“I’m sorry,” she said at last. “It must seem silly to you, me making such a big deal out of it. I knew you wouldn’t have any real problems with it, but once I started thinking about it…”

Rarity chuckled, squeezing her hand gently. “You do tend to think too much, but don’t worry, I find it rather charming. And you owe me about three years’ worth of catching up where I was your soul mate and I never knew, so I demand that you tell me all about it.”

Sunset hummed and tried very hard to not smile. “What do you want to know?”

“Well, start from the beginning, of course! How did you feel when you saw me, hm? Was there a light shining down from the heavens? Choirs of angels? Did something you never knew was missing click into place?”

Sunset glanced at Rarity, drinking in the sight of her in the light of the sun, and finally gave in and smiled.

“I felt warm.”

Author's Note

I will always and forever blame Monochromatic and her story "Colors of the Soul". That is all.