“The skin is the best part!” Rainbow Dash flew in Applejack's face.
“Don’t be a bird brain, it's the worst part by far!”
Pinkie pronked between the two of them “Nah-ah, cousin, mixing the skin into custard is the best thing ever!”
“That's sacrilege” Twilight gasped, wings flaring a little “Custard should be smooth and consistent throughout”.
Starlight facehooved “We are NOT having this debate again!” she shouted, before putting a hoof over her mouth as the words echoed loudly around the Cutie Map hall. The six ponies (Well five, as Fluttershy had already slinked underneath the table after the argument had started) turned and stared at her.
Starlights ears feel back in embarrassment at snapping at her friends “Sorry”.
“No, you're right, it's a stupid debate.” Twilight agreed as everypony returned to their seats, before whispering internally Because we all know custard skin is disgusting.
“How did we even get back onto another custard conversation?” Fluttershy asked sticking her head gingerly up from below the table, peaking out from between her mane.
“It was my fault I’m afraid. I was talking about how I was thinking about creating haute couture out of all this spare custard flowing around the place.”
“And I said ‘Wouldn’t it just be ‘haute custard’ and then Rainbow said ‘you mean ‘hot custard’ and then Twilight said…” Pinkie began to ramble, before an orange hoof met her mouth.
“No need for the play-by-play replay Pinkie” Applejack interrupted “But beside Rarity, I don’t think food stuffs will make a good dress.”
Seeing the fashionistas eyes light up, everypony knew they were in for a monologue. “But darling, that is the challenge. I made a fashion line out of a hotel room! A good designer can make anything out of anything. So I, Rarity, will make fashion out of custard””
Starlight Glimmer was not the only one to facehoof this time.
“Er, didn’t we make those dresses?” Fluttershy added quietly.
A few days later, and back at her boutique home, Rarity paced around a blank ponyquin trying to decide how exactly how to proceed. “What have you set yourself as a task this time, Rarity” the unicorn spoke to herself. “Custard is not a foodstuff you can easily craft with. Lettuce leaves, apple peels, all sew-able. But custard?”
“Wait, did I just think about making a dress out of Apples...I have been spending too much time round Appleack. I suppose I could simply cover myself in custard and wear it like some sort of skintight catsuit. Might raise a few eyebrows at the scandal of it -” Rarity giggled slightly “- but it would count as an outfit and I would have completed my task.”
Rarity turned round and spotted Spike standing there, arms crossed and giving her a less than amused look. The fashionista quickly replayed what she just said out loud in her mind and cringed internally.
Rarity let out a little cough “Let's just pretend I never said that shall we?”
Spike, having already mentally filed away the image under ‘Stupid Sexy Rarity’, nodded in agreement.
Rarity sighed, and collapsed onto a conveniently positioned chaise lounge “It’s hopeless Spike, it simply is not possible to do it. I’m a failure -” Rarity's tone started heading towards her wallowing state “- a fail-lu-re”
Spike rolled his eyes out of sight, and then went and put a comforting claw on her shoulder “Look Rarity, you’re thinking about a custard as a liquid, so that will never work.”
“But a skin is still not solid...despite how much some ponies love it”
“What if you were to dry out the skin under some heat? Sure, you won’t a full sheet like a roll of fabric, but you can probably just solidified enough parts to fix them together into some sort of workable material?”
“You mean like scales, or feathers? Ohh, the could really work. The flakes could probably be coated in a gloss to make them sparkle as well. Spike, you are a genius!”
Spike the brave and glorious thrice saviour of the Crystal Empire, blushed wildly “Shucks Rares!”
“How can I ever repay you Spikey Wikey?”
“You could cover yourself in a skintight custard catsuit?” Spike replied with a comical raised eyebrow.
Rarity sighed and put her head in her hooves to cover the blush “You’re never going to let me live that down are you?”
“To quote the town's resident chatterbox, Nope” Spike finished with a Big Mac impression. “But let's just get to work...you go draw up some designs, I’ll start scorching custard into workable pieces.”
Sweetie Belle was looking forwards to spending the week together with her elder sister. After that unfortunate weekend of being treated as a small filly, the past few visits had been a lot less bothersome. Rarity respected her as the young mare that she was now, but equally knew that they still needed to have some fun.
It like she had learnt something over the seasons Sweetie Belle thought to herself as she walked into her sisters home “Rarity, your best sister has arrived…Why does it smell so sweet in here?”
The purple maned unicorn stuck a head around the corner from one of the back rooms, a dollop of yellow on her muzzle “Oh, hello dear sister. We’re in the kitchen.”
Sweetie levitated her bags to one side and joined her sister in the kitchen, which was filled with custard. Vats of Custard filled the kitchen. A quick explanation was in order and Rarity filled in Sweetie Belle with the plan.
“Great thing I’m here then, I can help you with all the preparation.”
“Oh Sweetie, are you sure?”
“Don’t worry, mothers said my cooking's come on leap an bounds!”
There is a phrase in Equestria that there is no smoke without fire, or the worse scenario of a dragon. Ponies only used that phrase if they had never seen Sweetie Belles cooking for could she not only burn juice, she could do so without using heat nor magic.
Once the fire ponies had been persuaded that there was nothing to worry about, and Fluttershy disarmed for fighting another dragon, Rarity returned inside her home where Sweetie Belle was stood looking very sheepish.
Rarity let out a deep breath, and went and hugged her sister “It’s okay, there’s no harm done except a bit of smokey residual left in the kitchen, but I can clean that up later.” she smiled.
The smaller white unicorn was confused “You mean, your not going to yell at me?”
“Oh sweetie, you only wanted to help so it would be most unfair to blame you for trying.”
“You mean it?”
“Of course...along as you leave the kitchen and never step foot in it again.”
Sweetie Belle could pick up the hint that it was best to get out of her sisters way “Okay...why don’t I go out to see if Applebloom or Scootaloo are up to anything?”
“That sounds perfect, and if you get dirty make sure you clean up before coming home, okay?” Rarity asked in the slightly higher than normal tone that Sweetie Belle knew meant that if she didn’t, she would not be having the best of times (or any treats) for the rest of the week.
The six friends had not heard or seen Rarity, or much of Spike for that matter, for a weeks. The concern was growing but Spike assured everypony that Rarity was okay simply busy with her usual work and her desert based project. Therefore the invitation to the grand unveiling was a relief to the friends now waiting outside the Boutique.
Upon entering, the word “crème brûlée” came to everypony’s mind, but seeing their friend looking cheerful and in her usual extra coiffed appearance soon brought them back to the boutique rather than fond memories of Pinkie Pi’s short lived Prench pastry obsession.
After a little bit of a speech, Rarity revealed her newest outfit - a glittery sparkling custardy number. It was in a word breathtaking, except for Pinkie who could only think and say the word ‘Tasty’.
Applejack walked over to friend and shook her hoof “Well, you did it Rarity, you made an outfit out of custard. Not sure if anypony would buy it but…”
“It’s already sold!” Rarity boosted proudly.
“Wait, really?” Twilight asked in surprise “to who?”
“Sapphire Shores” Rarity replied nonchalantly, causally looking at her hoof.
“Sapphire Shores?” her friends replied in synchronised astonishment
“Sapphire Shores” the fashionista continued in an even tone, despite her inner fan-filly practically screaming the name. “A griffon pop star recently wore a outfit made of meat..”
“Oh, that's terrible!” Fluttershy meeped.
“And disgusting” Starlight Glimmer grimaced.
Rarity nodded “I know, but when Sapphire heard about the custard dress, she was all over it. It seemed a but derivative, but i think she also wanted to make a point that you don’t have to kill some poor animal just to make a statement.”
“Well, I may not know fashion, as we know from that little episode, but I know what I like...and it’s this” Applejack gave Rarity a hug.
“I’ll eat to that!” Pinkie declared but seeing the look of shock on her friends face quickly ended “At Hayburger I mean” to the excited agreement of the other friends who started to leave the Boutique.
“I’ll catch up with you girls in a minute, I need to give Spike his payment” Rarity called out.
“Payment?” Spike asked in slight confusion.
Rarity waited until the last of her friends had left the boutique, before replying “Spike, you wanted to see me covered in custard did you not? Well, it's only fair.”
The dragon stood there basically frozen, sputtering to try to form a sentence. Rarity booped him on the nose “Gotcha!” she winked at him.
Spike blushed a little “Okay, fair point, I won’t make another joke about it”
Rarity swaggered towards the door and toss a look back over her shoulder “Who's joking...when you're old enough of course”
At the concert, which Rarity had got eight backstage passes for her and her friends, the group looked on as Sapphire Shores sang her latest hit wearing the exceptionable but unobjectionable outfit.
“That custard dress at least proves that custard can be made into anything”
“I still say the skin is the best part to eat rather than making dresses out of” Rainbow crossed her hooves.
Rarity facehooved.
Fluttershy simply just flew away muttering “Not this again”
