Friendship is Failure #2: Fallout Fashions

ACT THREE

Once at the police station, Rarity pleaded her case that she was not stalking Manny, but merely questioning him for his baffling behavior.

Since she didn’t seem the stalker type, nor of criminal traits, she was let go, but never had she felt so incredibly humiliated in her life.

All she could do was go back to her hotel room, and throw herself onto her bed sobbing hysterically.

Applejack came back to the room, looking frazzled and exhausted. She had been all over the city tracking Pinkie Pie down, and finally got her to come back with her to the hotel.

Both of them were rather astonished to see Rarity still sobbing after all this time and not seem dehydrated.

“I just got back from the police station!” she told them.

“WHAT?!” the others snapped! “What in tarnation were ya doin’ there?” asked Applejack.

Rarity told them everything. “Huh? Manny Collars is Needle Stitch?” asked Pinkie, and then she spouted really fast “The pony from your story-- the one’s whose dress you claimed was your own, and he got mad and ran away?”

Rarity only nodded.

“Oh, gee… wow.”

“Uh, you sure about this?” asked Applejack. “He doesn’t even look like the way you described him.”

“I know it’s him, Applejack.” said Rarity “He even confessed to me… not directly… but I know it is him, and it’s obvious he still ha-a-a-ates me-e-e-e-e!”

“Oh, so that’s why he banned her from the store.” said Pinkie. “Sure makes some sense.” added Applejack.

Rarity continued to bewail of her humiliation as well as her realization, which again brought on painful memories of her old friend and how she hurt him.

Pinkie Pie comforted her. She wasn’t pretending to be like Fluttershy, she really meant it. “I’m so sorry, Rarity. I wish there was something I could do.”

Then she was about to get another idea, but Applejack covered her mouth, “Oh, no ya don’t. I’m not goin’ through all that again. Besides, I got an appointment to see the guy this evening. I’ll talk to him then.”

Rarity and Pinkie both gawked at her, and just as they were about to suggest going with her, she put her hoof down, “Oh, no! I think you two have gotten into enough trouble already. Now, I’m gonna do this my way; calm, quiet, and honestly.”

Then she left.

Pinkie Pie, of course, wasn’t going to be shunned out like this. “Come on, Rarity.” she said, pulling her off the bed.

“Whoa! Pinkie, where are we going?”

Manny’s store had finally calmed down; all of the screaming and excited customers had gone. There were no more copies of his Fiery Heart dress to purchase until he made new ones, but he did make a lot of money on just the ones he sold, and had tons of orders on layaway. He even got honors from magazines and offers to appear on fashion networks for the spring lineup.

“Sure is tough being popular.” Manny said as he worked in his office balancing his books and schedules. “At least I don’t have to put up with that loudmouth backstabber anymore!” he grumbled, thinking of Rarity.

He checked his next appointment, which was to see a pony named Applejack. “Good, I could use something to get my mind off things.”

Soon, he met up with Applejack in the main store, and realized “Hey, I know you. You’re a friend of…” he want to say her name.

“Eeyup, and more importantly, I know who you really are.”

Manny was really starting to lose his cool, but didn’t angrily shun Applejack out of the store, as he didn’t want to cause a scene in front of all his customers.

At the same time, two mover ponies came into the store-- actually Pinkie Pie and Rarity in disguises-- “Yeah, uh we got some supplies to deliver to the storerooms.” Pinkie said in a thick gangster male accent.

One of the greeters signed the clipboard and handed it back to Rarity, not recognizing her. “Thank you-- er, ahem… Thanks a bundle.”

Rarity had nearly blown her cover by speaking in her normal voice. Nevertheless, she and Pinkie were permitted to pass, yet the greeter swore, “I’m positive I’ve seen those two, somewhere before.”

“Ugh, I can’t believe I just spoke like that.” grumbled Rarity “And this polyester suit is nothing short of distasteful!”

As they wheeled the huge crate along, they saw Applejack talking to Manny.

“Look, I don’t want to make any scenes. Will you please just leave my store?”

“Look, I don’t want any trouble neither…” said Applejack “But I don’t like it when ponies treat my friends so badly.”

Seeing no other way to get rid of her fast enough, and not wanting to talk about it where his customers could hear. Manny invited Applejack to his office in the back where they could speak in privacy.

Pinkie and Rarity decided to follow them; they had to move their crate to the back room anyway.

Leaving the crate in the middle of the hallway, the girls saw which room was the office, and with the door shut, Pinkie held out two plastic cups, “Come on… let’s listen in.”

“What…?!” Rarity snapped, ever so softly so as not to be overheard. “Pinkie Pie, I will not resort to spying on private conversations.”

“But how will you find out what the big problem is if you don’t?”

Despite it being against her better judgment, Rarity conceded, and she and Pinkie listened against the door with the cups they held to their ears.

“Look, Needle…” Applejack said.

“Please don’t call me that.” Manny cut in “And… my decision is my own priority: I want Rarity nowhere near my shop, near me, or anything in my life at all.” He looked back at his blank flank, “That’s the main reason I had my cutiemark permanently removed! I want anything that was ever to even slightly do with Rarity out of my life!”

Rarity, listening outside the door, felt heartbroken to hear such a horrible thing.

“Look, I get where you’re comin’ from and all that.” said Applejack “Rarity told us all about it--you and the dress, and all that-- but surely it ain’t worth holdin’ a grudge on her for this long.”

“Oh, really?” said Manny “I doubt what she told you was the truth!"

The others blinked in confusion, and Rarity suddenly looked very nervous-- even bit her hoofs.

Manny recounted during the time he fought back to prove the dress was his, but as it turned out, not only had Rarity held back in vouching that the dress belonged to him, but she made it look as if he was being the bad one to her.

“How dare you insist that I would ever steal such a thing from you.” she cried with her crocodile tears, “I thought we were friends, you and I? How could I want to sell me out over something as trivial as a dress.”

Applejack was shocked, that Rarity deliberately lied like that. “She never told us that.”

“Of course she wouldn’t…” confirmed Manny “She’d do anything to protect her own reputation, and gain the interests of prestigious potentials.”

Applejack couldn’t deny that.

By this point, Rarity lowered her cup and stopped listening and twiddled her hoofs nervously, but Pinkie Pie gazed down at her in shock and shame, but she continued to listen to Manny’s story.

“I’ll bet she also didn’t tell you that because of her lie that I was publicly humiliated. Shunned and ostracized by many, which cost me a lot of business.

Unable to take much more pressure and harm, and realizing I would be ruined if I remained there any longer… I grabbed the last of my cash flow and ran away to Manehatten. I legally changed my name to Manny Collars, and I used what was left of my cash to alter my appearance and remove my cutiemark so that others would never recognize me.

I found work in a tailor’s shop to rebuild my life, and finally after much toil and hardship, I became the living legend that I am now…

…But I never forgot the horrible humiliation and pain I had suffered, which still haunts me to this day, and it was all because of Rarity and her lies! I just said nothing about it to anyone as I didn’t wish to make things any worse.”

Applejack looked as if she had just heard such a horrifying ghost story, she could hardly move, blink her eyes, or shut her mouth.

Pinkie felt the same way as she stood outside the door.

As for Rarity, she was biting the ends of her hooves so hard, you'd think she was trying to chew them off.

Manny turned his back to Applejack, hanging his head low and in despair. It felt so hurtful for his wounds to be stretched wide open. “Please… just leave me in peace. I just cannot and will face it all again.”

Seeing how upset he was, and now having a new view of things, Applejack decided to leave, opening the door, only for Pinkie and Rarity to fall into the office.

Worse than that, the greeter came back with two angry mover ponies that demanded their uniforms back from Rarity and Pinkie.

Manny turned, and was horribly enraged to see Rarity, and completely lost his temper.

Before the girls knew it, all three of them had been ejected from the store. Manny even hung two new ban-signs on the door. Now Applejack and Pinkie Pie were also banned from the store.

Applejack was most annoyed with the others, but more at Rarity, for having deliberately holding some things back.

Rarity was in disgrace!

There was much worse to come as the three of them got back to their hotel room, and who was there waiting for them… but Twilight and Spike, and neither one of them seemed rather pleased.