"Fear later, now presents"
A blood red ray of light cut diagonally through the bedroom, piercing the deep purple darkness that had enveloped it during the night. Outside of the window, the dying remains of the Sun hanging in the sky slowly spread their sickening colours over the barren lands, as dawn came over the world and the creatures who had crawled in the shadow ran away, hunted by more terrible ones that roamed during the day.
Rarity perked up in her bed, stretching her front legs. The light blue glow of her magic wrapped around the screaming assemble of bones on her nightstand, and levitated it to run its pointed ends through her mane as she got up from her bed. Singsonging a cheerful tune to herself, she ignored the creature clawing against her window, walked past the image of herself pounding against the glass on the other side of the mirror, and fetched the unreasonably large pile of presents she'd left in a corner of her room. She had to make up for the year before, after all.
Walking through the corridor that led towards the staircase, she stopped by the entrance to her sister's room and placed a hoof on the doorknob. "Happy Hearth's Warming," she declared, as the door opened with a click.
Inside the room, Sweetie Belle hung suspended in mid air, her limbs tied to strings that stretched on towards the infinite skies that had replaced the ceiling. Below her, the floor was slowly sinking further down. On it were cut-outs of her friends and family, but from her position the small unicorn couldn't tell they were not the real ones. She tried to speak, but opening her mouth only allowed her to sing. And with her singing came around her a cacophony of flashing light and thundering applause, drowning out her expression and words.
Rarity took a pair of scissors from a nearby drawer in the hallway, and snipped off the strings, bringing her sister down. Then she fetched a small package, wrapped in striped green and white paper, and placed it into the highly confused filly's hooves before closing the door. Then she trotted down the stairs, picked up a scarf and hat from the coat rack at the bottom of it, and walked out from the secondary entrance to her boutique. It was problematic to use the main one, as the mannequins had come alive and taken on a rather unfriendly nature.
Still carrying her load of gifts, the mare walked into the streets of Ponyville. She stepped past the jaws that had appeared along the road, ignored the howling of the giant spiders nesting between the buildings, and carefully took a detour to make sure she didn't accidentally fall into the flaming pits that had replaced the park. She was glad she hadn't picked anything too dark a shade of blue to wear, it really wouldn't have looked nice under that red light.
"Going somewhere?" came a voice from above her, belonging to the only other creature who apparently wasn't concerned by the situation.
"I have presents to deliver, you know how it is," answered Rarity, without looking away from the road.
Discord slithered down from the invisible branch he'd seemingly been perched on. "Don't you think you should be working to fix this?" He made a wide gesture with his paw, pointing at the everything around them.
A tangle of twisted limbs that had probably been Lyra at some point ran through the streets, screaming.
"We'll work on it later. For now, gifts!" Rarity kept trotting along, sidestepping a column of pure darkness and the pony trapped inside it. "I thought you would be having fun with all this."
The draconequus huffed, rolling his eyes in opposite directions. "Chaos is only fun when it's my chaos, Rarity. Besides, everypony is too busy shaking in terror to do anything. This is far from entertaining. I already took Fluttershy out, I'll take hers." He took a bright red envelope away from Rarity's magic. Then he also grabbed the only non-giftwrapped box in the pile. "Thank you, by the way," he added before disappearing with a snap.
Chuckling to herself, the unicorn took a turn to the right at the sea monster extending its tentacles from the fountain and reached her first destination for the day. What had once been Sugarcube Corner was instead a decaying assemble of something that distinctly looked, smelled, and felt like flesh. It probably tasted like it too, given the disgusted expressions of the ponies buried halfway into the walls.
Rarity pushed past the suspiciously entrail-like curtains at the entrance, walked up the jagged bones that had replaced the staircase, and opened the door to Pinkie's room. "Happy Hearth's Warming, Pinkie!" she greeted the rather deflated-looking mare.
Pinkie didn't answer. She sat in a corner, her mane limp and grey, and behind her were the shattered fragments of a mirror. After a moment of silence, the pony finally turned, exposing the lack of a mouth on her face and the black lines left by tears streaking her cheeks.
"Oh, please, darling." The unicorn took out a neckerchief from beneath her hat and cleaned Pinkie's face. "Cheer up! It's Hearth's Warming." She cocked her head to the side for a moment, thinking to herself. "Oh, yes." Lipstick flew out from where the neckerchief had, and a curved red line was drawn over Pinkie's mouthless face. "There you go, dear," said Rarity, before leaving one of her many packages on the ground and exiting the room.
Pinkie sat there for a moment, then shuffled forward to the nearest piece of glass to look at herself. Then there was a commotion. Soundless, but it still looked like laughter.
Twilight was sighing over the pile of ash and rubble she sat atop of when Rarity cut through the crystal wall of the maze her castle had been turned into. She didn't care about the unicorn. She was faced with the inevitable loss of all culture and knowledge, faced with her destined fate being that of a lone wanderer of the dying cosmos with no one to share her story with, faced with the fact that there were things she would never know, stories that would be lost forever, faced with the pointlessness of everything in the face of eternity. Why would she care about mundane things like holiday traditions?
"Want to open your present, Twilight?" asked the unicorn, holding up a large square package that left little mystery as to what it contained.
"No."
Rarity clicked her tongue, and ripped through the paper herself. "You haven't read this yet," she teased the alicorn, dangling the book in front of her.
Twilight looked up at the tome. "Oh." It did indeed look new. Hesitantly, she took it in her hooves.
"Have fun with it!" the white mare said as she walked away. On her way out, she gave a kiss to Spike's forehead along with a present, snapping the dragon out of his trance and distracting him from his visions of cities burning in his flames and ponies crushed by his claws.
With Starlight and Trixie visiting Sunburst in the Empire and their presents already sent in advance, Rainbow Dash was next on the list. Rarity found the pegasus wingless on top of a pillar below where her house should have been. Thankfully, not anything levitation couldn't help her reach, and she was glad she'd asked Starlight to teach her about that. "Happy Hearth's Warming, Rainbow!"
"I can't make it." That was all the shaking pegasus said, almost a whisper as she looked towards the ground below.
"Oh come on now!" The blue glow of her magic enveloped the other mare, and Rarity carried them both back to the bottom of the column. "You don't have to make it on your own, darling. You have friends." She left a present by Rainbow's side, and began to walk away.
The pegasus stared at her for a moment, seemingly processing something in her head. "Thanks!" she finally shouted, shaking herself out of her stupor.
"Applejack?"
"They're all gone."
"Applejack."
"It's all my fault."
"Applejack!"
"They were my family and I-"
"APPLEJACK THEY'RE RIGHT THERE!" Rarity grabbed the pony's head and forced it to stare away from the gravestones on the ground in front of her and towards the rest of her family.
"Uh..." Applejack dumbly mumbled for a moment.
"Happy Hearth's Warming, darling," said the unicorn, setting a present down at the earth pony's side and moving on to saving Apple Bloom from the horde of living apples carrying her away.
The train was a monstrous, deformed creature, similar to a centipede. Rarity entered through the hole in its side, and took a seat among the bloodied chairs.
The pony sitting beside her, the one with a knife in his back, turned his head towards her with a crack of his neck, revealing the twisted mess of scratches that was his face. "Your soul shall be swallowed and torn to pieces!" he howled from some distant abyss.
"Could we do that later, darling?" Rarity stared at the clock she'd pulled from her hat. "I have presents to deliver. I'm on a schedule here."
Canterlot city was as wonderful as ever. Every bit as torn by mayhem as Ponyville, but still wonderful. The nightmares there were high class. Mountains of gold imprisoning ponies, dragons sweeping down from the sky, rivers of wine pouring down the streets. Even the army of dresses she'd had to save Sassy from had been quite pleasing to watch. Seen from the balcony of the castle, the city truly was a spectacle. A worrying one, but still a sight to behold.
"How?" the voice to her side asked.
"A lady doesn't give away her secrets so easily." Rarity turned towards the glowing purple alicorn shape, and stared right in its eyes. "Besides, I could ask you the same question. How did you get out?"
"Somepony let me in," came the laconic answer. "Feel free to try to figure out who in Ponyville to blame."
"They have nothing to be blamed for," replied the unicorn. "Though I suppose my words can't reach her now." She looked into the creature, trying to find any signs of Luna within it. Sighing, she stepped away from the balcony and towards the inside of the castle.
"Wait!" The creature turned, and a series of dress-like monsters appeared in front of Rarity, baring their fangs at her.
"Oh, yeah, oh my, how terrible." Rarity brought a hoof to her head in a poorly feigned display of fear, then simply walked past the growling fabric.
"How?" the creature asked again as the monsters disappeared, an angry, frustrated sound.
"Your mistake was assuming a pony's worst fear can't be something they go through daily," Rarity whispered to herself. There was only one present left, floating by her side. And beneath the doors in front of her, she could spot the fiery light coming from the mane of the pony it was destined to. Swallowing, she pushed them open.
Celestia sat on a pillow, her back to the entrance. For a moment, Rarity couldn't tell the difference between her tail and the fire roaring in the fireplace in front of her. Hesitantly, the unicorn stepped forward, leaving soft imprints in the ash covering the floor. And a few moments later she was at Celestia's side.
The alicorn didn't look at her. She just stared at the fire, with gleaming eyes. Rarity thought she saw a tear fall from one of them, but a moment later it wasn't there, and the unicorn couldn't tell if she'd imagined it or if the heat had taken it away.
"Happy Hearth's Warming," she finally said, barely audible above the roar of the fire, as she held the present in front of Celestia. The paper around it began to burn, and Rarity quickly pulled it back.
Celestia was staring at her now. This time, Rarity was sure she hadn't imagined that tear. Swallowing once more, though it hurt, though it burned, though her mane caught on fire, she opened her hooves and leaned forward, hugging the other mare.
A moment later, Celestia hugged her back.
