On Pins and Needlesby The DescendantChaptersChapter 1: PinsChapter 2: NeedlesChapter 3: Sewing it TogetherChapter 1: PinsOn Pins and Needles Written by The Descendant Chapter 1: Pins Falling dreams are supposed to be nightmares. Falling dreams are supposed to make those who dream them come awake with screams. Falling dreams are supposed make the dreamer pour sweat upon their sheets and sit up in their beds and tremble with a thick, palpable fear. This was no nightmare. The dreamer did not come awake. Instead the dreamer kept her mind in the moment, fought to remain in the dream. This was no nightmare. This was the sweetest kind of dream. Rarity felt the tears in her eyes, but it was not fear that drew them from her. It was not the wind that the dream was whistling past her ears that forced the tears from her. The tears welled up in her from deep within… they welled up as she stared into Spike’s eyes, and once again the little whelp plummeting through the sky with her prepared to say the words. “Rarity?” In the imperfect reality her dreams sheltered her from, there had been no choice but to lift her hoof at that point, place it across his lips. But here, in the dream, she just stared on as he prepared the words and the tears streamed from her eyes and the smile grew wider across her face. “Rarity?” She pressed her hoof to her heart, pressed the fire ruby closer to her chest. “Rarity? Rarity, I’m sorry to wake you…” It was not Spike’s voice. As her mind raced out of the scene Rarity felt herself coming awake, losing the perfect scene once more. Rarity raced out of the dream. Her eyes opened, blinked, and settled on the underside of the canopy that hovered over her deep, soft bed. Her nap was over. The dream had flown away. Her hooves rested upon something, and looking down she found them still wrapped around a familiar black velvet box. “Rarity? Rarity, I-I’ve got to tell you something really, really, really important…” Rarity placed the velvet box on the nightstand as her eyes settled on the doorway. Fighting to put away the drowsiness of her nap she found a dearly familiar form standing at the threshold of her bedroom. “Sweetie? Oh, Sweetie! Come in, Dearest, what is so important?” asked Rarity as she lifted her forelegs to her little sister. Sweetie Belle came prancing across the floor, a wide smile on her face informing the older unicorn that whatever was so important it probably didn’t involve anything disastrous, such as another charred interpretation of breakfast. As Sweetie Belle hopped upon her sister’s bed the smaller unicorn beamed with pride. “Rarity, do you remember me saying that my class was going to Canterlot, that I was going to be in the national geography bee?” Sweetie Belle asked. Even as she did Rarity’s face grew with pride. “Sweetie!” Rarity cried, scooping her little sister up in a great vast hug, “Are you saying that you won? My dear little sister is so very smart!” “Oh, oh… no, but-but I came in third,” interrupted Sweetie Belle, looking back up over her shoulder, her pride seeming to diminish. It quickly returned as Rarity hugged, squeezed, and tickled her baby sister once again. “Heh!” laughed Sweetie Belle, turning to her sister and showing off a bronze medallion. “I’m so very sorry, Dearest, that I could not be there to see you compete,” said Rarity as her voice trembled at the fact. She continued her apology even as she kept reading from the description that sat upon the medal. “I-I had to save all of Equestria from an ancient, nameless, unspeakable evil, you know… being the Element of Generosity and such…” “It’s okay,” said Sweetie, falling back into her sister’s hug, “I know. You can come to the after party, though, right?” Sweetie didn’t even have time to turn on her puppy-dog eyes before her sister was promising her that she would. “Yay!” called Sweetie Belle, hoping jubilantly around the bed, “There’s gonna be cake, music, a high tea, and we’re all gonna wear beautiful new… Oh! Rarity, this is the most important part!” Sweetie Belle turned to face her sister. “Sis, would… would you make me a new dress, one special for the party? Please?” said Sweetie Belle. Rarity replied with a smile that seemed to imply levels of joy that would have been commensurate with being offered a day spent at the spa sipping fine wine and nibbling upon dark chocolate. “Of course, Sweetie! Oh, I should love to!” answered the older sister, helping the smaller one from the bed. “We shall get started right away, why once Spike gets here he can help…” Spike. “Oh, Sweetie,” answered Rarity once more, “why… why don’t you make us something to snack upon, and then join me in the Inspiration Room?” Rarity watched with a smile as a gleeful Sweetie Belle bounced from the room, and her heart swam in her little sister's achievement. She wished that she had always been the type of sister who Sweetie could talk to, who she could share such things with, who she would want with her in important moments. Alas, thought Rarity, I have not been… Rarity looked back to the black velvet box that sat on the nightstand. She walked slowly to where it had been deposited, and slowly she opened the top. As she gazed upon what sat inside her thoughts concluded. … but I’ve always wanted to be, haven’t I? That’s who I’ve wanted to be… for her and for you? I’ve always wanted to be the mare that you think you see. Twilight Sparkle was generally considered to be among the most educated and intelligent unicorns that her friends knew. She was generally respected as a learned individual. There was even a certain owner and operator of a noted doughnut shop in Canterlot who frequently referred to her as “a smart cookie”. Not much would escape her grasp, and even fewer things than that would get past her analytical eye. One would wonder then why something as normal and commonplace as the growth of someone as close to her Spike would not register with her, as it had during his spell of greed-driven growth. How could it have surprised her so? Why did she need to take him to the doctor just to be informed that he was simply growing? The simple answer, she would have told you, is because that is not the way that Spike normally grew. Spike, she would state in a matter-of-fact tone, grew through a series of molts, and had been doing so ever since she had hatched him. Spike, while this was being explained, would most likely be staring at the floor and blushing. Yes, Twilight would have gone on to explain, she had helped him through the difficult process at times, especially when he was still a fingerling. She would also have said, with some hesitance, that as he aged the strips of decayed scales had become something of a problem between them. When Spike had first come to her after his few years in the nursery, they had shared her bed in Canterlot, not unlike siblings would do. That ended as he grew bigger and after a particularly hard spring molt that ended with her sitting in class discretely trying to pull his old scales from her mane. The next spring had found a young whelp who started to cry as soon as she had placed him in the bassinet the nursery had provided. His tears had continued all that long night. All that he knew was that a filly whom he simply wished would pick him up and share her warmth was not doing so. Instead she was telling him that he was "a big boy now" with his own "big boy crib." In Twilight’s mind, she could remember seeing how little he understood it, and could still hear him calling out to her that he was sorry and that he would be a good boy, her little whelp believing that he was being punished for something. Twilight remembered sitting up all that long night trying very gently to explain to the wailing child that she simply was tired of waking up covered in his discarded scales and getting odd looks from classmates. Spike, if he were still within earshot as the story was revealed, would generally blush even brighter and look even more uncomfortable. Later it only became more problematic. As Spike grew into a little boy, he saw no problem with simply picking at himself during his molt, often doing so at inopportune times and in embarrassing circumstances. It progressively got worse as he began chasing screaming fillies with hunks of his shriveled flesh, something that caused a rather put-upon Twilight to have to genuinely reprimand him. A younger Spike had spent many spring afternoons sitting in "time out" as Twilight inked letters of apology to foreign diplomats. Spike, upon hearing that story recounted, would usually blush deeper and run his foot across the floor while desperately avoiding eye contact and praying that Rarity would never hear of it. Spike, though, was now a mature whelp of some twelve years or thereabouts, and he was safely beyond all of that. He had taken his molting as something that showed his growing maturity… … well, as mature as a baby dragon could, as his current use of his molt showed that he still had something of a child’s unusual sense of fun about him. A sense of fun that still was able to gross her out. “Blegh!” called Twilight, recoiling a touch at the sight of what he had done. “Spike, that’s so gross!” “Awww, no it isn’t, Twi, it’s cool!” he called back, just finishing up with his markers. “C’mon, Twilight, look! Look at how I got it all off in one piece this time! I’m getting’ to be a pro at this!” Twilight swallowed her revulsion long enough to approach the molt. Her tongue hung out as she saw how he had apparently spent his free morning stuffing the almost entirely intact shell of his former self with old copies of Equestria Daily and was just now finishing coloring his masterpiece with thick markers, their scent sitting heavily in the room. “I kinda had to wiggle out backwards so that really messed up the frills and spikes. The eyes are ping-pong balls. I had to make new ones out of cardboard and construction paper so…” Twilight wrinkled her nose as the thick smell of the markers and the slightest hint of old perspiration wafted from the art project. As she gave a single gagging cough, Twilight turned her attention from the macabre statue and to the body of her little whelp. Even as he continued to go on and on about his rather unique art project she ran her hoof up and down his newly revealed scales, checking them for any imperfections as she always had. He was always so soft and shiny afterwards. Very soft and, yes, just a touch taller. She smiled for the first time since returning home to find he had already completed his molt. As she made him lift his arms she thought about how these soft scales would soon harden, and about how her little whelp would grow into them quickly over the next year. Don’t grow up too fast, Spike. “Spike,” she asked, more concerned with his present well being than his artistic endeavors, “did you stretch when you were done with the molt? Did everything feel right? Nothing felt tight?” “Yeah,” he said, turning back to her, standing beside his counterpart and putting his arm around his own shoulder, “everything came out fine, Twi.” Spike did a few impromptu jogging exercises and a couple of quick squat-thrusts to show himself to be in proper order. “Tada!” he announced as he stood. She then waited for him to catch his breath. To her surprise he took the arms of his flaky counterpart and made it clap its rather distressing hands in approval. “Thank you, thank you!” Spike answered. “It was nothing, really!” “Okay, yeah,” replied Twilight, her body giving a shudder of horror as she watched him readjusting his doppelganger, “this thing is gonna be in the house for about another fifteen minutes…” “Aw, c’mon Twi, I was thinking that I could put it in the window and…” “No.” “Oh… or, maybe have it hold a sign outsi…“ “Nope.” “Or have it next to the mailbox so that…” “Oh, no, no, no, no, no…” She smiled over him as he fumed. “Spike,” she asked as she ran a cloth over his shiny new scales, freeing them of the marker ink, “why did you even make this thing? Don’t you have anything else you could have been doing? Weren’t you supposed to help Rarity today?” “Yeah,” he said, holding his arms out to her so she could get the last drops, “but not until noon. Isn’t there anything else I can do for you? Is there anything I can do?” Twilight laughed a small laugh. “No, today is your day off, and I’m glad you were being… uh, creative, with the time,” she said, pondering the husk once more with a shudder. “You use it as you see fit.” “Alright!” called Spike, “Up high!” The figure shook noticeably as he slapped its hand. Twilight made disgusted sounds as a few loose scales fell to the floor. Twilight had been just about to tell Spike to take the thing outside and burn it when the clock chimed that it was a quarter to noon. She watched as Spike’s face began to swim with anticipation. “Are my scales straight? Did my frills come in taller? Am I shiny? Too shiny?” he asked as his attention shifted from artistic pursuits to thoughts of the elegant mare he was soon to visit and assist. She giggled as she ran her hoof across his frills. Twilight smiled to herself again as Spike ran about, searching out mirrors and wiping any trace of his artistic pursuits from him with loose towels, napkins, and the tablecloth. Twilight recovered it from him before it became too dirty, and as her magic took it from his grasp, she reminded him of the post-molting protocols they had established long ago. “Stay clean,” she told him as they approached the door, “and don’t do anything that could crack your scales. You’re still very soft…” “Right, nothing that could break the scales, gotcha,” he said as he leapt up to grab the door handle, turning it quickly. He had already begun to walk out into the street, his head in a cloud of expectancy, when an “Ahem!” caught his attention and drew him back to the library door. “Oh!” he said, turning back to the mare who stood there, and quickly being gathered into her hug, “Sorry Twi, got ahead of myself. Have a good afternoon, okay?” “You too, Spike. Remember, careful for your new scales, and listen to Rarity, okay? She released him from the hug. Twilight watched as he waved and then disappeared into the street, moving quite quickly in an impressive effort to be at the side of his ladylove at the scheduled time. Twilight felt herself smiling. “Don’t grow up too fast, Spike,” she said aloud. She felt herself hanging around the doorframe, pondering the cityscape of Ponyville. As she did she thought about Spike, how he was growing, about his crush on her friend… how it, despite how deep and earnest it was, would have to reach some sort of finality. She wondered how long Rarity would humor him, but she knew that the elegant mare had needs… ones that Spike was not able to fulfill. She sighed as she thought of them, wondered how things were going to work out... how the innocent love of a child could ever be reciprocated without complications. She trusted Rarity, loved her as a friend, and knew that the mare would not hurt him, neither in letting him down from the pedestal on which he had placed her or by taking his feelings too far. Twilight knew Rarity would not intentionally hurt the whelp, the one they both cared for. She simply wondered how it would all end. Twilight began to close the door, but even as she did so she felt a set of eyes upon her, and she jumped in alarm. Upon seeing whose eyes they were she frowned at herself and answered them with an accusatory glare. “Oh! Don’t judge me!” she told the husk of Spike’s former scales, the figure apparently having been left leaning on the circular library table in a pose of distant adjudication, “Like you haven’t thought about the same thing!” Spike slowed himself down as he gained the main square. He lifted himself up to gain a view of Carousel Boutique as ponies passed in and out of his view. With a few small movements, he subtly gathered up a few flowers from the public garden and then sauntered to the door of the boutique. As the distant clock tower struck noon he knocked upon the door, and with that he was ushered within. “Oh Spike, they’re wonderful!” Rarity proclaimed, “And just on time, as always. Such a gentleman.” Spike blushed as Rarity’s magic wafted the vase before him. Her magic quickly cut off the ends, and with that the flowers sat upon the pedestal nearby as Sweetie Belle explained to Spike all of the distant places that she had described and found to win her medal. “And I knew everything except where the minotaurs come from. Turns out that they’re from a big island in the Mareiteranean called Crete. That makes them Cretans. Isn’t that unfair?” asked Sweetie as she walked up to the platform upon which Rarity always stationed her models, “I wouldn’t want to be called a Cretan. Would you? Hey! You’re all shiny! Why are you so shiny, Spike?” “I, oh… umm, yeah, I just molted, so these are my new scales!” he said, foregoing any discussion about unfortunate naming practices and instead focusing on that which would show Sweetie (and far more importantly, her older sister) just how fast he was maturing. “I’m gonna grow into ‘em over the next year, so right now I’m still kinda…” Spike’s explanation was interrupted as the soft feel of a familiar, and deeply appreciated, hoof drew across his frills. “Oh my, Spikey-Wikey, you are positively gleaming,” asked Rarity. “You certainly are growing into a handsome young dragon, aren’t you?” Rarity walked a few steps away, giggling to herself as she felt the heat of Spike’s blush radiating from him. She listened as the two younger creatures finished their small conversation and ate the snacks that Sweetie had prepared. As they did she finished rolling the fabrics that she wished to use in the dress, make real the images that had already appeared in her mind. Her mark alit inside her, and with that the preparations came to an end. Across the room, another creature began to observe what was happening, and at once an important thought fell through his mind. “Ummm… Rarity?” Spike asked, noticing the way the graceful unicorn had laid out her materials. “What, what are we going to be doing today?” “Oh, we are going to be making Sweetie a new dress, on that she can wear to the after-party for the geography bee!” she said. With that she lifted her design to him, levitating it in her magic. “Gee Rarity, that’s really nice of you to do that… really nice…” he said. Spike looked up from the drawing to see Rarity looking at him, and he smiled back up at her. Rarity looked down, saw the expression sitting across his features. “Do you really think so, Darling?” she asked in a quiet tone. “Well, yeah…” he replied. Sweetie Belle rolled her eyes and grinned. Rarity hovered there for an instant, a wide smile upon her face, and then turned back to her carefully arranged materials with a giggle. I’ve always wanted to be the mare you think you see... Spike once again looked past Rarity. He looked at the carefully arranged components that Rarity had prepared for the crafting of the dress: the cloth, the threads, the lace, the pins... The pins. Twilight’s warning thundered through Spike’s mind. “Uhm, Rarity?” asked Spike, “What, ummm… what did you need me to do today?” "Well, Spike, I should be making use of those wonderful tough scales of yours again," she began, "It is so very helpful to me when I have you nearby as I work, you know... it does not interrupt my creative process. Oh, I suppose it lends my work a certain je ne sais quoi when I do not need to go back to my pin cushion or wear it on my... Spike?" Rarity pondered him. As she did she saw an unfamiliar expression cross his face. “Rarity, is that… that all I can do for you? Is there anything else I could do, like sort your fabric remnants or…” “Well,” she said, sharing a confused glance with her sister, “No, not really, I’m afraid. Is there a problem, Spike?” “I-I mean, really, isn’t there anything else… that I could do?” he asked, the stammer growing in his voice, “So, so that I could help you? I-I want to help…” “No, there’s really nothing else you could do for me at the moment,” Rarity said, tilting her head back and forth. After a long moment she lowered her head to his, “Do, you not like being my own little pincushion? I-I thought you liked helping me in that manner, in all honesty. You don’t have to…” Twilight’s implore that he protect his newly revealed scales repeated in his mind. At once it did battle with the thought of not being useful to Rarity. Spike reacted quickly, hopping over to where all the finery lay ready for the construction of the dress. It can’t be that bad, right? I mean… it can’t hurt all that much, and it can’t really mess up my scales, right? Right? “No, no! I-I like helping you… I like it fine. It’s just that, oh…nothing, nothing,” he said, dancing his fingertips against one another, “Hey, let’s, let’s get started! Yeah! Yeah…” Rarity pondered him for a few moments. She shared her concern with Sweetie Belle, catching her sister in another glance. Yet it seemed that the child had reached the end of her ability to guess her sister’s meaning, and with a sigh Rarity settled back into her creative mode. “Very well,” she said. As the first bolt of fabric came undone Rarity began to drape it across the shoulders and withers of her little sister. As the fitting progressed, normal conversation began again. As she went along Rarity began to pull the pins out of their tiny metal box and place them to her lips, waiting for the correct moment to use them to tie the bunting to the lace that sat upon her sister. It may have been her imagination, but she could have sworn she heard Spike gasp when she revealed them. “There, Sweetie, we’ll try something chic this time. Oh, yes, that is quite marvelous…” As the sewing needle came up and went to work, drifting on the currents of her magic, she slowly removed the pins. As Sweetie’s voice drifted out into the room the sisters made small talk about how things had gone, about what was going on at home with mother and father… … and out came the pins, and into the tough scales of Spike’s back they went. Or so Rarity assumed. It might have been her imagination, but to Rarity the pins seemed to slide amid his scales with suspicious ease. Had he drawn a sharp breath as the first settled amid his scales? She looked down at him, saw him stare back to her with his usual smile, but perhaps just a slight tremble as well… Rarity waited a moment, and then continued her work. “I dare say,” continued the mare, “that this work will meet any critique leveled upon it. You’ll be the envy of any debutante at the party, Dearest…” “Do you really think so?” asked Sweetie Belle, the younger unicorn giving a small leap of happiness that warmed Rarity’s heart. Her reflection was interrupted as a few more pins magically wafted to her side, and as they found their resting spot a yelp lifted into the room. Rarity startled and looked down at Spike. He was biting the back of one of his clawed hands, a distant look crossing his eyes. It might have been her imagination, but he seemed to be in pain. The very thought… “Spike?” she asked, tilting her head from side to side to ponder him again, “Are you alright, Darling?” “Yeah! Yeah… I, I just bit the back of my arm… is all,” he said with a noticeable tremble. “Well, yes, I can see that, Spike,” she said as she examined his limb, completely missing the source of his growing torment, “but the question is why, isn’t it?” “Oh… oh, I… I just remembered a job I have to do for Twilight that I don’t really wanna do,” he said, trying to paint truth into the words. It was a lie, and it hovered there before him. It might have been her imagination, but Rarity believed she saw something hidden behind Spike’s smile, and his eyes seemed to be starting to fog. He seemed to be trembling as he spoke with her… shaking, arching his back. “Yes, well, we’ll have to speak with her about it if it’s causing you that much concern…” Rarity returned her attention to Sweetie Belle, and as she did Spike turned away. As he did he grimaced, pulled at the rug, tore at it with his claws. He had lied to her! That only added to the pain, made it that more real… the awful foreign feeling of the pins drawing down into his soft flesh, the perfect pain that shot through him from his shoulders to his hips… the lie made it that much worse, burning in his gut. Each movement brought new agony as the pins drew imperceptibly deeper and deeper into his newly revealed scales and the soft flesh beneath. Spike bit the inside of his own cheek, the very act of walking beside the graceful mare seeming to drive new shocks of pain across his back. But he didn’t say anything, didn’t want to risk being asked to leave. At once there was the feeling of a tear, a ripping of his flesh and scale, and he winced again. Now something wet began to slide across his back, and he knew very well what it was. With that he felt the magic of the mare he held dear cross his scales, felt the wet pop as the large hemming pins came out… … only to be replaced by a new torture as the larger, winged basting pins took their place. Spike covered his mouth with his hands and attempted to muffle his cry. “Ewwww! Blood!” called Sweetie Belle as she took a step backwards. “Oh! Did I stab you with my needle, Dearest?” called out Rarity as she immediately began to check her sister over, “I’m so sorry!” “No, not on me, on the pin!” said Sweetie as she motioned to the pin that floated in Rarity’s magic, the one she had just withdrawn from Spike’s scales. Rarity’s eyes flew to the pins that hovered in her purple aura. There, indeed, swam a few drops of red that dripped to the floor in small, almost imperceptible drops. In an instant a horrible insight grew upon the unicorn, and she missed a breath as her mind made a ghastly connection. “Spike!” called Rarity, spinning to where the whelp had been creeping along beside her. Instead of finding him there she had to pan her eyes across her studio, waiting until Sweetie’s cries of alarm pointed her towards the opposite side of the room. The two unicorns looked on in horror as a high, shrill call of pain finally escaped the lips of the whelp. As he did he went to the carpet arching his back, trying desperately to reach behind himself, to grasp at the pins that only drove deeper into his new soft scales as he fought them. “Spike!” she called again, dropping her materials as he began spinning about upon the carpet, fighting against the pain like a wounded animal. At once he collapsed into the pedestal. It fell over him, causing the vase to come crashing down and the flowers to fall around him as he fought to his knees. A new cry fell from him as he wrapped himself around the fallen pedestal. His claws tore at the alabaster surface, marring it as he called out in pain. “Rarity! He's bleeding!” came Sweetie’s alarmed voice, the little unicorn struggling out of her dress as Rarity rid herself of her accoutrements. “Spike!” called Rarity once more, racing to him as the slick surface of his scales reflected the mid-day light, the wetness shimmering from where each tiny movement drew new wells of blood from his broken scales. With a cry of her own Rarity was upon him, and as she grasped him by her teeth she pelted towards the stairs. As they ascended them the rhythmic pitter-patter of his blood on the steps and the sound of his cries echoing off the wall filled the stairwell. Chapter 2: NeedlesChapter 2: Needles Rarity looked more like a mother cat carrying her kitten than a studious fashionista racing to provide aid to a dragon whelp. Indeed, as Spike wrapped his arms and legs closer, as his tail came up between his legs, he played the part even more so. As the pain coursed through him he curled tighter and tighter into a ball. The sensation of hanging by the scruff of his neck from Rarity’s lips only added to his discomfort. Rarity had no time to ponder that. As her magic flew in front of her the bathroom door flung open, and as soon as she was inside she withdrew a white towel from the linen closet. She laid him there, upon the bathmat, spinning it around before she lowered it so that the length of Spike’s body sat upon the soft, shaggy surface. His little body settled down into a figure of abject unhappiness, seemingly aware that his deception was now to be called into check. Rarity’s horn came alight again, and what little healing magic she knew drifted over him as she stared upon what she had unknowingly done to the boy. Her pins still stood out upon his back. The different crystal heads reflected the bathroom light oddly, sending tiny drops of color across his back. She looked down over him, seeing how his arm was still in his own mouth, muffling his cries of pain. She saw how his eyes were clamped shut against the torment… and to keep from having to look at her. “Spike… I-I need you to look at me. Talk to me, Darling…” she said, touching her hoof to his head, fighting to find some place where her limited healing arts could fall over him. Yet the dragon simply lay there, wincing in pain as the pins continued to shoot new hurts through him with every twitch. To Spike every tiny movement seemed to crack his newly formed scales, driving pain arising from where they left his tender flesh. There was a small movement at the door, and Rarity heard the familiar footfalls of her sister nearby. “Spike, Darling, look at me… I need you to help me,” she said as the worry grew deeper in her own voice. But he didn’t open his eyes. He didn’t look back at her. “Rarity? Is Spike okay?” came the voice of her little sister, noticeably large with worry even as she stood partially hidden behind the doorframe of the bathroom. “No, Dearest, he isn’t,” she said, stopping as a fresh set of whimpers arose from the prostrate form of the whelp, “and I fear it will only be made worse as we attempt to make it better.” Rarity looked across him, saw the pins driven deep into what had always been the toughest of his scales. Now she saw the redness where they met his flesh, and even as he sat there pools of his blood were forming where the pins pressed into his soft, young scales. Suddenly Rarity realized what had happened, what the fact that he had just molted truly meant. She berated herself in her own mind for not realizing it, for not seeing it. Yet, it had happened. She had done this to him… and he had not stopped her. Why hadn’t he tried to stop her? The thought didn’t linger in her mind for very long before she realized why he had. Her eyes fell across his twitching frame. “Oh, Spike…” Rarity turned back to the doorframe, looking to Sweetie Belle as the younger unicorn peeked around the edge. “Sweetie,” Rarity said, “could you do me the favor of holding Spike’s hand?” Sweetie Belle came forward and looked piteously upon the form of the boy laying on the bathmat. “Hurry now, Sweetie,” Rarity said, hurrying her along, “I… I have to pull the pins out, and he’ll need somepony to keep close.” Sweetie Belle sat down before him. She took his free hand in her hoof, and even as he kept biting upon the other she tried to give him words of encouragement. “It’s-it’s okay Spike, my sis is gonna take care of you. We’re gonna make everything better… it’s okay…” Rarity stared down at the two of them, watching as Sweetie ran her hoof over his arm and her little words echoed off the tiled walls of the bathroom. Beneath her Spike still bit into his own arm as the pain shot into him, tears welling in his eyes and dripping down his jaw. Rarity focused on the pins, and for the first time truly understood from where his pain was rising. The scales were split, torn in half by the pins. Each motion of Spike's body was making the damaged scales draw the needles that much farther into his flesh. There was nothing else to be done. With that Rarity lowered her lips and found the crystal head of the first pin. With that she captured it in her teeth and began to pull it free. Spike gave a sharp cry, and Rarity winced at the sound of it. With that she spat the pin into the porcelain sink. Even as the sound of it rolling around lifted around the room the lips of the mare were to him once more, finding the next pin and pulling at it with tiny motions… motions that even her magic, as dexterous as it was, could not match. It mattered little. Even if she pulled as gently as she could it still caused him to twitch, to utter little calls of pain that even Sweetie’s tender words and soft touch could not lessen. For long, agonizing minutes that was how it went. As the light fell through the distant window, muffled cries lifted from him, each followed by the "plink" of pins falling into the sink. The noises of the pins rolling around within were slightly silenced when they ran over trails of blood their predecessors had left upon the white surface of the porcelain. They rolled back and forth before finally settling with a metallic sound upon one another and in a small pool of red. “Last one, Darling, last one…” Rarity said long minutes later, spitting the final pin into the sink. Her magic lifted the towel that had rested by her side, and she laid it across him gently. With her own touch she now pressed it over his back, applying pressure upon the dozen holes that she had unintentionally placed in the child. Together the three lay there in an odd silence, Sweetie casting her worried glances between Spike and her sister. Upon the face of the younger unicorn a dozen questions sat in a cloud of confusion and fear. Spike had not said a word since being brought up to the bathroom. He had only whimpered in pain and bit at his arm as the bathmat became an impromptu operating table. Rarity looked down over him, saw the fear and pain that sat hidden behind eyes that he had clamped shut. She brushed her hoof across his frills, and to her subtle relief she saw his expression relax a shade. For what it was worth, Rarity dropped every bit of healing magic she knew across the whelp. As she raised the towel, the soft purple aura of her magic settled over him. It was not to be. Her magic, not designed for healing, fell across even his wounded scales in rolling wafts of uselessness… the imperviousness of dragon magic beyond anything her own power could overcome. A small jolt of panic swept through Rarity as she lifted the towel. The direct pressure, the most basic first aid she knew, had failed. Even as she lifted the towel, wet as it already was with the deep red stains, more blood came trickling to the surface. As Rarity’s mind raced she saw how the wounded scales moved against themselves, how Spike’s blood filled the cracks as the broken scales spread like butterfly wings with every subtle movement. “I… oh my,” she whispered as the blood came to the surface, sitting there in a bubble that soon collapsed on itself and dribbled down the spaces between his scales. Her mind raced to find another way to help him. She looked around herself, the unicorn mare reaching through everything she knew, believed she knew, or thought she knew about first aid. There were bandages in the cabinet, but if the direct pressure hadn’t helped, how could the bandages? Calm, Rarity, calm… what else do we know? As she looked around her bathroom an old beauty trick came to mind, a way to make one lose a flush. It was one that drew the blood away from the surface of the skin. It was the best shot she had. Yet, it was something that she knew would be difficult and… disturbing, for Sweetie to see. She'd already put her sister through enough. Fortunately, there was something she knew she had to have her sister do. Rarity cleared her throat even as she dropped the towel over Spike once more, pressed it against his wounded scales again for what little good it seemed to do, and then spoke. “Sweetie Belle, Dearest, would you please go fetch Twili…” she began. “No!” the little dragon cried as he spun about, his voice coming alive for the first time since they had entered the bathroom. “No, please… please don’t get Twilight! Please? S-she told me to be careful, not to do anything that would harm my scales, anything that would… I-I didn’t listen. I’ll get in trouble! She’ll get mad! Please? Please, I-I just wanted to… wanted to…” Rarity ran her hoof over his frills, calming him. “That may or may not be, Spike,” she answered, pushing down upon the sopping towel once again, “But Twilight knows best how to help you now, so it is to Twilight that we turn. Hush now, you’ll be alright.” She watched Spike bury his head into the crux of his elbows and heard him give a few more sobs. His deception was revealed, and now he was to pay the price, both in terms of damage to his own body and the lost trust of his caregiver… … and perhaps, he feared, even more. “Sweetie, please go and fetch Twilight,” Rarity spoke again, motioning to her younger sister. “Is Spike gonna be okay?” asked the little unicorn, her glances going from her sister to the dragon whelp and back. “Yes, Dearest, he… he just made a mistake,” she said, motioning towards the door. As Rarity watched, something wonderful happened. As Sweetie began to move away she took a grand total of about two steps towards the door before turning back to where Spike lay. “You’re gonna be okay, Spike,” said the younger unicorn as she touched her face to his, “My sis said so, okay?” Spike lifted his head just a touch. His eyes were still closed and filled with tears, but he answered her just the same. Rarity dared to breathe a little bit easier. She watched Spike breathing for a long moment, hoping against hope that his pain had lessened. She gently lifted the towel once again, but to her disappointment even the act of Spike slowly lowering himself back to the bathmat after answering Sweetie's nuzzle caused the blood to flow again. With Sweetie Belle gone, Rarity and Spike were left alone in the bathroom. Some small movement caused the pins in the sink to settle further their metallic tinkle sounded out around them. Rarity sighed and lifted the towel once more. The blood was coming slower, but it was still coming. She sincerely doubted that Spike would bleed out here in her bathroom… that Spike’s dying words would be spoken among her hair curlers and shampoos. Still, blood was blood, and knowing that the whelp who cherished her so was in such distress filled her with emotion. Come now, Rarity, she thought to herself, it’s not pleasant, but it is all that we have left to try, isn’t it? It was unladylike to make an appearance in a formal setting whilst flushed, and as such cool water was often applied to one’s face before making an introduction. In short, she remembered, cold water constricts blood vessels. Spike heard the soft, graceful fall of Rarity’s hooves cross behind him and then beside him. Soon the sound of running water came cascading from the bathtub, and the soft waft of mare’s magic enveloped him. Rarity’s magic… it felt different than Twilight’s. Twilight’s felt like his blanket, like having it wrapped around him. Twilight’s magic was warm, familiar. Rarity’s was different. To Spike it felt like drifting on satin sheets, and with it came a feeling of something he could not name. It drifted around him like flower petals being driven on a warm breeze, calling to a part of him he did not know how to answer. It felt… lovely. The sensation washed away as her magic deposited him in the bathtub. As his clawed feet scratched about on the enamel he felt how cold the water was, and a series of thoughts went through his mind. Memories found him; memories of a time long ago when somepony else he loved had put him away from her… of another mare who he cherished, of a time when that mare had not shared her comforting warmth. “Spike,” came Rarity’s voice, “this will be difficult, Darling, but it’s all that I can think to do…” With that, the cold water began rushing from the faucet head, and as Rarity’s magic adjusted the nozzle, the frigid water began to run down his back. Some small part of her died as she watched his expression fade to one of shock, as he began to tremble and shake. She could only watch Spike jump, reach up, and try to grasp at the edges of the tub. She was, in point of fact, spraying a child with the coldest water she had, and not stopping at signs of his discomfort. She was suddenly very glad that she had sent Sweetie away. With that she brought the nozzle closer to him. Spike’s eyes came open at once, and he gave a yelp in surprise. He danced his feet and gave a few more cries of surprise as the icy feel of it fell across him. The cold had sent yet another feeling through him, one more foreign feeling that this day had brought him. As the chilly water washed down his back he began to tremble more forcibly. He lifted his head to look at Rarity, trying to gauge her expression. His eyes caught hers as he looked up to her over the edge of the bathtub, and his expression made her pause. It was a plea, it was him begging for some sign from her that things weren’t nearly as horrible as they seemed in that moment. Oh, Spike, don’t look at me like that, she thought as she fought to adjust the faucet, that’s not the look I adore seeing upon your face… that’s not the face you wear when you look at her… “Lean… lean into me, Spike,” she said, sliding closer to the edge of the tub. “Here, lean into me.” Rarity leaned across the edge of the tub, her forelegs wide. As her magic pressed the towel to his back once again it also ushered him forward, closer to her embrace. As the spray of the frigid waters splashed over him he barely noticed. Instead he settled into Rarity’s forelegs. “My poor Spikey-Wikey,” she said softly as his arms came up to her. “Oh, my poor Spikey-Wikey.” The warmth of Rarity’s chest enveloped him, and even as the cold waters continued to slide over him and the towel pressed against him Spike cared little. Sheets of white draped around him, the soft feel of her coat wrapped him closer to her. To Spike it was as though a dream had overtaken him, only his own shaking and the pelting of the water reminding him that he was in the waking world. Her touch was gentle, and as his wet scales brushed her coat she gave a few trembles of her own, the two shaking as the water sloshed about in the tub. He could go no farther into her chest. The edge of the tub separated the dragon whelp and the mare, so he stood there feeling Rarity’s breathing as she lay against him, listening to the sound of it leaving her nose. The blessed heat of her body fell into him, sheltering him from the driving cold, and the rhythmic beating of her heart called out to him over and over in a steady cadence that called him deeper, deeper in ways Spike struggled to understand… As the spray of the frigid waters caught her, strands of Rarity’s mane began to fall loose and drift over him. Rarity could only try to gently lift them away as his arms came up beneath her forelegs, slowly crept up her ribs to find the warmth there that she offered him without hesitation. This is fine, this is normal, there’s nothing to this, she told herself over and over as she listened to Spike’s breath, as she leaned over the lip of the tub that much more. This is a friend helping a friend. This is Rarity, a mature, adult mare, helping Spike, a child that she cares about… nothing more, nothing more… Rarity lifted her body higher. As she did he did as well, and the new contact with the frigid waters that clung to him made her shudder through her movement. She slowly turned off the water even as she cursed herself for putting him through this, for not being able to find some other way to help him, and in doing so she dropped the towel. Inside her something grew, an emotion she had not expected. Spike, though, did not notice. All he knew was that her beautiful scent was washing over him, her wondrous heat was falling through him, and that the feel of her coat was around him and over him. It was all so… lovely. Rarity looked down over the towel, past Spike’s head, and down into the bottom of the gleaming tub. The red of his blood had faded to purple; something that she soon realized was part of his draconic nature. She looked down across his back, and there, to her immediate relief, she saw no more blood welling to the surface. A quick scan of her eyes saw that even the cracked scales still held fast to his body. With a large sigh she lowered her head to Spike’s, just to give him that much more assurance that everything was fine… everything was fine. The bleeding had stopped, none of the broken scales had fallen away, and the cold water was gone. Everything was going to be fine. Spike moved, pressing his hands closer around her. He gently lifted a wafting bit of her mane, set it carefully behind her ear once more. Rarity felt his head move, felt him slowly nuzzling closer to her chest. He slowly nestled to her, wiping his face against her chest and up to her neck and back before giving a contented hum… It almost worked. It almost drew her away from the emotion. It was almost enough to make her forget what had transpired in her home that day. It was such a warm feeling, the way he was cuddling to her, the way he was so happy just to be with her. It made her happy to accept the gift of his affection, to hold him close as the last of the cold water gurgled down the drain. It was... lovely. But it could not last. Rarity pulled him closer, wrapped her forelegs around his head to force him to stop moving. Spike jumped in alarm, his hands hovering around her before settling down upon the lip of the tub to balance himself. Upon feeling his awkwardness she lowered him, let the edge of the tub sit firmly between them once more. There must always be something between us, Darling, it seems… They sat there, just listening to each other breath, wrapped tight in an embrace as she prepared her words. She let him hold her even as she made ready to speak the truth that would bring this act to a close. “Oh, my poor Spikey-Wikey,” she said, letting the last few drops of water drip from her mane, watching as it left a trail down his back before dropping into the tub. “Oh, Spike… can you even know how furious I am with you right now?” Spike bolted upright, his eyes coming wide in shock at her words. “Rar…” “I am absolutely livid, Spike!” she said with a tremble. “Livid!” “Rarity, I… I don’t, didn’t…” he said as he tried to look up to her. Rarity, though, still held him, and didn’t let go. She made him simply stand and listen, refused to let him look at her with the deep concern and worry that she knew was already painted on his face. You aren’t to look at me like that, she thought. Not yet, I’m not ready to forgive you yet. This must be said… “I’m so very angry with you, Spike,” she continued as her eyes misted over, “for letting me hurt you. How, how could you do that to me? How could you let me do that when… when you knew it would hurt you so?” She felt him blinking, felt his eyelashes rubbing softly against her coat as he began to comprehend what she was saying. “And, and… you lied. You lied to me, Spike!” she said as a few more wet drops fell from her and dripped down the length of his body to the tub below. She allowed him to think that they were a few more stray drops of the cold water falling from her mane. In truth, that which dripped from her was far warmer than that, and began not in her mane but at the corners of her eyes. “You lied to me so that I would keep hurting you! How… how could you do that to me, Spike!? That’s horrible! I-I never want to hurt you again! I… care, about you, Spike. It’s awful, awful for me to think…” She stopped as the feeling of his clawed hand running up and down her foreleg reached for her. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, Rarity, I didn’t mean to lie. I was just afraid that, that if there was nothing else for me to do that… that you might make me leave…” Spike took a step backwards, and for the first time since he had been deposited in the tub he looked up to her big blue eyes and met them with the same sincerity that he hoped she would always see in him. “I want to come here, I like being with you. I like working with you, spending time with you,” he began, his words reaching out for her, “I’m sorry I lied, but I was just, well… afraid. I was afraid that, well, if I’m not useful to you, like I am with Twilight, that you might not want me around…” Rarity’s mind splashed through the first few months that they had spent in each other’s company, the first time that he’d asked to help her here in here shop, the times she had borrowed him to fetch gems. Yes, she had been aloof, had sensed his feelings then. She had known, but what had it been to her? He had just been a child, one with a crush. If he wished to serve at her beck and call she had hardly been one to turn down a free set of hooves. Err, hands. But that had all been before. Couldn’t he see how much more she saw in him, how things had changed since that wonderful day? Couldn’t he see how she had allowed herself to fawn over him, how much harder she was trying now? By Celestia! She’d even been willing to fight for him! She! Rarity! That’s all I can do for you, Darling, that’s all I know to do for you. Can’t you see that I… Rarity looked back to him, saw him staring at her, waiting for her with his hands curled around the lip of the tub. “No, Spike, please,” she said as she stepped forward, sitting before him. “I-I had promised you this afternoon with me, here. I meant it. I should not send you away, not at all. I like having you here as well. A lady appreciates the presence of a gentleman, you know…” “A lady,” repeated Spike. With that his smile grew wide, and she looked down to see that marvelous expression across his face. It was the same one he wore when she had presented him with the gem for all of his hard work, the same he wore when he had fanned her at the spa, the same he always wore when he looked at her with those charming emerald eyes… Who is the mare that you think you see when you look at me like this, Darling? Who is that mare who has earned such devotion? Shall I ever meet her? Should I be jealous of her? Rarity took a step forward, laid her head to his, forehead to forehead. “Spike,” she said in a whisper, “promise me. Promise me that you’ll never, never, never let me hurt you again. You don’t deserve to be hurt, by anyone, and especially not by me. Promise it to me, Spike. Swear it to me, swear that you’ll never let me hurt you again… in any way… in any way…” “I-I promise,” spoke the whelp, jumping a touch as she slowly rocked her head back and forth on top of his, granting him the nuzzle that she had pulled out of before. The subtext that scared her was gone; this truly was simply an act between friends, ones who now had healed the gap between them. “Do you forgive me?” she asked softly. “Do you forgive me, for hurting you?” “Of course,” he said quickly, returning the nuzzle, “You didn’t do it on purpose. You didn’t know. It was my fault. I’m sorry… I don’t blame you…” With that the two lifted their heads, smiles across both of their faces. As they stared at one another the soft, wet sounds of the bathroom sounded out around them. “Rarity?” asked Spike, hiding slightly behind the edge of the tub, “Can I, uhhh… can I tell ya’ something embarrassing?” At once Rarity bit the inside of her lip. The same feeling of anxious anticipation flew through that she had felt as they had fallen through the sky together, the sense of being on pins and needles as she suspected that he was about to make known his feelings for her. She moved to stop him, to once again put her hoof to his lips. But something caught her, a little voice inside her mind made her question herself. Oh, it said, let him tell you! Twilight knows, Pinkie knows… half of Central Equestria knows! Why don’t you let him tell you? Because, she answered herself, reaching for him, you know how I am with precious things. But it was too late. Spike had already begun to speak… “I’m stuck.” “What?” she asked with more than a little confusion. “I’m sorry, Darling, what was that?” He blushed and looked down across the wet interior of the tub and the sopping wet towel that sat stained red and purple with his blood. He lifted his eyes to her again as his embarrassment grew. “The inside of the tub is all wet and slippery, and it’s kind of big, and I can’t get any foothold and it hurts if I try to lift my arms to climb and… and I’m, stuck…” He peered at her over the lip of the bathtub, and she gazed down at him. Her confusion gave way to something less. As they looked at one another smiles graced their faces, and with that they began to laugh. As her soft magic wafted over him once more, their laughter filled the bathroom. As it lifted him from the tub it echoed around them, ending only as she embraced him in a gentle hug, carefully avoiding the wounds that seemed somehow already to be healing in a very special magic that superseded any simple spell or incantation. Chapter 3: Sewing it TogetherChapter 3: Sewing it Together “Now, it’s just peroxide, Darling, but it will sting.” “That’s cool, no problem.” “I just want to be sure that your poor back is disinfected before I put the bandages on.” “Yeah, no, I get it… it’s fine.” “It shall sting a bit, Darling. Are you ready?” “Sure, no problem. Go ahead and pour it all over, I’ve got this.” “You’re sure, Spike? It’s going to sting, you know…” “Right, yeah, I’m good.” “Alright then, if you’re ready. Here it comes…” “…” “Spike, Darling, kindly dis-attach yourself from my bathroom ceiling, your claws are damaging the stucco.” They stood together before the door, Spike wrapped tight in his bandages, as they waited for Twilight to arrive. To her surprise, Spike actually wrapped his arm around her foreleg as he looked at the door. She looked down to see him appearing very worried. Could Twilight, the dear Twilight she knew and loved, truly be that harsh a disciplinarian? Rarity gulped a little. She, like Spike, would have to make a confession before Her Royal Majesty’s Designate Twilight Sparkle… one that would determine many things. She hoped that Spike’s apprehension was entirely as overblown and needless as the time, as Twilight had told her in secret, that he’d mistakenly believed he’d interrupted a romantic tryst between his caregiver and a local yokel. If Spike’s reaction was warranted, then this whole thing could end badly… very badly indeed. A soft knock sounded out at the door. She quickly looked down, gave him a reassuring smile, and called “Come in!” The door creaked open to reveal a rather shell-shocked Sweetie Belle, the young unicorn seemingly awash with apprehension. “Sweetie? Dearest? What’s wrong?” asked Rarity, motioning to her younger sister, lifting her hoof to her in surprise and alarm. “Rarity…” breathed Sweetie Belle in a horrified tone, one of restrained panic. Before she, or they, could even move… it was upon them. “Hey everypony!” came the oddly familiar voice of Twilight Sparkle, apparently trying (and failing utterly) to sound like Spike. Twilight continued her impression from behind the doorframe, trying to hide herself (and failing utterly) from the onlookers. Before her hobbled the playmate that Spike had fashioned from his own discarded scales, dancing about in the magic of the unicorn. “I’m Spike!” Twilight continued in her poorly disguised tone as she bobbled the thing along in front of her, trying to approximate his little wobbling walk (and failing utterly). “I’m usually a good little guy, but sometimes I just don’t listen!” Rarity pulled Sweetie Belle closer as all three of the onlookers had expressions of confusion, puzzlement, and disgust fall through them. “I’m gonna just go and get myself all hurt… deedle, deedle diddy dee…” she began, once more attempting to mimic Spike (and failing utterly). As Twilight carried the stuffed doppelganger forward in her magic, she finally noticed the looks across the faces of the two other unicorns and the bandaged dragon whelp. “… dumm dee, dumm… deedle, dee… dee… what?” she asked as the realization sank into her that her little marionette was not being well-received, “What? What! I-I thought that it would be… funny? I guess?” “Twi,” said Spike, pinching the bridge of his nose as Twilight dropped his scaly counterpart, “seriously, we’ve got to work on your sense of humor.” “When Sweetie Belle told me that you got hurt,” Twilight said, brushing away his criticism, “I was so worried! You know that I had told you about your new scales, you knew about our plans for after your molts…” Rarity watched Spike slink down into a pose of supplication, perhaps anticipating some form of discipline, one that he knew he rightly deserved. “But, Sweetie Belle told me how scared you were,” Twilight said, her tone dropping down into one that was far more concerned and gentle, “and I wanted to think of something… something to show you that it was okay. It’s going to be okay, Spike.” Rarity watched as Spike lifted his head. As she followed them with her eyes she saw Twilight looking back at Spike, saw how much concern floated above her friend. Even as she looked on the features of the other unicorn they became softer, and she lifted her hoof to him. Spike took two hesitant steps towards Twilight. Rarity watched as Twilight lifted her hoof to him again, showed him that everything was indeed alright. To Rarity it seemed as though a world of worry left Spike, as though his fears about his judgement had been cleared away. He smiled as though oceans of apprehension had washed out of him, took a few long strides, and leapt up into the offered embrace. Something moved through Rarity in a happy wave as she watched Spike lean into Twilight, as he hugged her and said that he was sorry for not listening, for doing something that he knew would get him hurt. “We make mistakes, Spike,” Twilight said, using her magic to peak beneath the bandages even as she still embraced him, “and it sure looks like you’ve already learned yours, I see. You’ll... huh, you won’t be swimming in lava any time soon, that’s for sure.” Rarity felt herself becoming just a touch jealous of Twilight, able as she was to embrace him for this long. Twilight, she knew, was free to offer him the reassurance of her touch. But Rarity was happy. She was happy that at least his immediate worries were gone, lost in the warmth of the lavender coat of the pony he knew best in the world. As Rarity looked on, she knew that Twilight was showing him that he was forgiven. His caregiver, sister, mother, and friend was showing him that she worried about him and loved him. At that, at least, Twilight had succeeded completely. She hoped that Twilight would be just as understanding with her. Together the four sat in the small shelter of the Inspiration Room, enjoying a late lunch made up of yet more snacks that Sweetie had taken upon herself to prepare. Rarity watched her little sister serve the three others, and then herself, just as a lady would. She smiled and gave a small laugh of approval. True, Sweetie’s snacks were a touch lop-sided, and perhaps the presentation could have used a touch more panache, but she was so proud of her. She smiled to Sweetie, and her sister answered her in the same way. Their relationship had grown, that the secrets of cooking and poise that she was teaching her sister were showing. She knew too that the sense of fun and freedom that her sister was teaching her in return were evident as well. She had changed, she was a better pony now. She wondered if she’d even recognize herself from Twilight’s first slumber party. Her relationship with the two friends at the table, to Spike and Twilight, that had made it all possible. She moved now to test that relationship, see if there had indeed been a breach, one for which she took the responsibility. “Spike?” Rarity whispered. “Would you please keep Sweetie company as I show Twilight something interesting?” “Sure! Oh, ummm, I mean, of course,” replied the whelp, smiling at her once more as the familiar expression fell across his face. You’re looking at her again, she thought. What does she look like at this moment, that mare that you think you see? Is she beautiful, Spike? “Twilight?” she asked, painting calm certainty into her face. “May I show you something interesting in the kitchen?” “Oh, certainly,” said Twilight, setting down her cup of tea and standing to follow her graceful friend. Together they walked the short distance to the nearby kitchen. As she entered the room she cleared her throat, and as she did the feeling of being on pins and needles went through her again. It remained as she stood before a familiar appliance. “This,” she began, “is my icebox. Isn’t it interesting, Twilight? I was told that it’s the top of the line, at least it was three years ago when I purchased it. I found it fit the décor of the room nicely.” Twilight arched her eyebrow, eyed the icebox, and turned back to Rarity with some doubt. “Ummm, yeah,” she said, “That’s… interesting?” “I’m glad you think so, Darling,” Rarity said, tossing her mane, “that makes it so that we’ve actually seen something interesting, and so therefore I’ve told the truth to that fine young man out there…” Rarity nodded towards the door, the two listening as a few happy sounds rose from where Spike and Sweetie still sat speaking. “… and that means I can now move on to why I really asked you back here, out of earshot, as it were.” Twilight turned to Rarity, tilting her head and seeking her friend’s eyes. Rarity, though, stared at the icebox door once more, trying both to find the words she needed and the strength to say them. You must tell her, Rarity, the unicorn told herself as she bit her lip, No secrets, no lies. That can only make things worse. Keeping this a secret would make it wrong, keeping it a secret would make it shameful. If you honestly believe you were doing it for him, then you must tell her… “Twilight,” she said meekly, “when Spike was in the bathtub, we were using the cold water to help stop the bleeding, as I said. Now…” “That was a good idea!” Twilight interjected, stealing some of Rarity’s resolve. “I’m impressed that you knew to….” “Yes, thank you,” Rarity interrupted, fighting to keep her momentum. “Well, Twilight, dear, you see… he got so cold. So very cold, Twilight, so I had him… had him lean into me, so that I might keep him warm.” “Uh huh,” answered Twilight. Rarity waited a few moments, swallowed again, and then continued. “I had him… hold me, so that he might keep warm,” she said, “ and, even after the water stopped, as he was still cold, he held me… and I held him, you see.” “Okay,” said Twilight. Rarity stared, blinked, wondering if Twilight could really be missing her meaning. “Even, even after he was warm, after he’d stopped trembling,” she continued, her voice beginning to rise, “I let him hold me… even though, it wasn’t absolutely necessary…” “Were you uncomfortable with him showing you that much affection?” Twilight asked, her expression barely changing. “No!” Rarity called, immediately placing her hoof to her mouth. After she regained herself she continued. “No, not at all,” she said, looking deep into Twilight’s eyes, “and that’s… that’s what I need to tell you. That I-I… I appreciate his affection, and that I did let him show it. That I showed it to him.” Twilight’s mouth came open in just the slightest, and Rarity’s eyes dove for the floor. “I… I was just so worried over him, and I wanted him to be all right! He’s… he’s dear to me, Twilight, and I… I just…” Twilight Sparkle was generally considered to be among the most educated and intelligent unicorns that her friends knew. She was generally respected as a learned individual. There was even a certain owner and operator of a noted doughnut shop in Canterlot who frequently referred to her as “a smart cookie”. Not much would escape her grasp, and even fewer things than that would get past her analytical eye. One would wonder then how something as obvious and as the growing relationship between her little summoner and her stylish friend, the one that had changed so much over the last year, could escape her notice. The simple answer, of course, is that she did know about it. The simple answer is that she understood. Rarity’s mind came alive with the soft feel of Twilight nuzzling beneath her, the touch of the other unicorn falling through her in the most unexpected way. “You wanted me to know,” Twilight said, lifting the head of the surprised mare across her shoulder, “because you never want to hurt him, that you want me to know you don’t want to hurt him… in any way…” “Twilight,” Rarity breathed. Twilight gently rocked her friend and let the feeling of her coat sit against that of the other unicorn. “I-I just don’t want, want to do anything… improper. Not that I would!” stammered the elegant mare, “Or that I’d think of it, but… I don’t want to turn him away either, or make him feel… Oh, Twilight, he hurt himself, for me! To be with me! What kind of boy does something like that? Why?” Who does he think he sees when he looks at me? Who is that mare? Why has she earned his affection? His… love… Twilight rocked Rarity that much longer, the two mares standing in the silent kitchen and swaying together as voices filtered in from the nearby room. “What kind of boy?” answered Twilight softly, lifting her head from across Rarity’s withers. “Let me show you…” Twilight turned towards the door. Lifting her hoof she beckoned Rarity to come look, and there the two unicorns stood watching the children who sat at the table in the Inspiration Room. Together they watched as the two young creatures embarked upon an impromptu science experiment, the children giggling as Sweetie arranged the cups and Spike used a tiny touch of his fire to ignite a paper napkin. As Sweetie applauded Spike looked on as the air in the glass was consumed by the flame, and the glass filled itself with water through the force of the vacuum alone. Together the two celebrated their victory, jumping happily claw-in-hoof as they sat unknowingly under the gaze of the unicorns. “The kind of boy with a great big heart,” said Twilight softly, whispering into Rarity’s ear. “One who wears his heart on his sleeve. Well, heh, if he had sleeves, of course.” Twilight and Rarity turned back into the kitchen. As they did Rarity saw Twilight smile slightly. Even as she did she became more introspective. “You know that he hugged Applejack over and over at his birthday, and you should have seen him when we went to find Fluttershy, before the hydra showed up. He’s always been my missing gregarious part, at least until I met you and the girls. He’d always go to parties in Canterlot on my behalf, and he’s always made friends so much easier than I have. He’s just that kind of guy… he’s just a great little guy…” Twilight turned back to Rarity. “He loves us, worries about us, wants to be there for us,” she said. “He tries so hard. He shows us all affection, in whatever way he knows how. He always has…” Twilight paused a moment, and then spoke a truth that Rarity had forbidden the boy in the room beyond to speak. “He loves you, you know. I mean, more so, than the way he loves the others…” Rarity took a small breath, and once more she found herself looking into Twilight’s eyes. “I know. I do know, and I don’t let him tell me. I don’t let him tell me because, because…” “Because you don’t want to hurt him,” Twilight concluded. “You don’t know how to answer him… because he’s still just a kid…” Rarity’s eyes misted over. Even as they did she felt Twilight’s nuzzle reaching for her again, and she fell freely into her touch. “He’s dear to me, Twilight. His affection means something to me. I’m sorry, but it does. I don’t want to hurt him, I don’t know how to reply…” A few tears began to roll down her face. As Twilight rocked her once again she friend moved to assuage Rarity's fears. “I trust you, Rarity,” Twilight said, leaning deeper into the purple mane of her friend, “You are dear to me, and I love you. You’re one of the best friends I’ve ever had. I trust you. I know you won’t go anywhere with his love that would hurt him, that you won’t misuse it. I believe in you, I know who you are inside…” Oh, Rarity mused as she wiped her face along Twilight’s shoulders, another resident of the library who sees that mare? I presume such insight must be a family trait, then. I wonder if the Owliscious and the fledgling share in it as well… “No, I wouldn’t,” she said, lifting her bleary eyes and looking into Twilight’s face, “I’d not do anything that changes the way he… sees me. I do love his little signs of affection though, I must admit. I do so enjoy the way your great little guy is so free with his feelings…” Twilight laughed a little, lifted her hoof to wipe the tear from Rarity’s face. “I do too,” said Twilight, “He’s such a great little guy… our great little guy.” With a shared whimper the two mares smiled and rested their heads together once more as the small, happy sounds continued to lift from the two children in the room nearby. “I do like your icebox, Rarity,” said Twilight with a tiny laugh that got lost in sniffle. "Thank you, Darling," Rarity answered, a smile seated on her face and a tear escaping her eye. “But, but I already said I was sorry, Twi,” spoke Spike earnestly, trying to turn and look up to her as she readjusted some of his bandages. “Yes,” she said, “but I want to hear it. Oh, and we are going to talk about some appropriate discipline when we get back home. You did intentionally ignore our ‘Post Molt Contingencies’, after all.” Spike’s expression deflated again, and he ran his hands up and down his arms. “I’m sorry,” Spike replied. “Rarity, I’m sorry that I lied to you. I’m sorry that put you through all of this.” Rarity smiled down at him. “Well,” she said as she helped Twilight put the bandages back in order, “we do make mistakes, and we’ll know better in the future, shan’t we?” Something hung there in the air as they wrapped him once more, as the faintest of red marks appeared against the bandages and began to dry into the purple she had seen earlier. She waited, knowing full well what fear still hung upon him. “Rarity?” Spike asked, still rubbing his arm with his clawed hand. “Is that true, about the future? Am… am I still allowed to come here, even after all of this?” He looked up to find her staring down over him with a smile. Her purple mane, uncharacteristically loose after the odd day that had developed, fell around him as she looked him in the eye. “You are always welcome here, Spike,” she said with a soft giggle, “A lady appreciates the presence of a gentleman, you know.” “A lady…” he answered once again. His expression went soft, and once more she basked in the feeling of sitting in his gaze. Does she look back at you in a way that you adore, Spike? How do you know that she appreciates the way you look at her? How did that mare earn your adoration, Darling? “Alright Spike,” Twilight said, turning through the doorway of Carousel Boutique, “let’s get you home and…” Twilight stopped. As she looked upon them Spike’s arms came up slowly, but quickly retreated. Soon he began to lift them again with small motions, almost as though he was unsure. It took Twilight a second, but as she saw Rarity making small motions of her own she quickly realized to where they were moving. Twilight stood standing in the doorway as Spike and Rarity embraced one another, the ambient sounds of the streets of Ponyville sitting around her as the light of the afternoon sun played in the windows of the boutique. Rarity watched and waved as Twilight and Spike prepared to leave. She suddenly realized that Sweetie Belle wasn’t at her side. In fact, she hadn’t seen or heard a word from her sister since the group had returned to the doorway. “Sweetie?” she called as she turned and looked across the room. “Come and say goodbye to Twilight and Spike, Dearest…” As Rarity found her sibling, the face of the older unicorn mirrored the disgust and horror that sat upon the face of her younger sister. Rarity’s magic wrapped around her sister, freeing her from the awful enchantment and pulling her away from the scene that had frozen her in disgust. With that Rarity’s magic opened the door and her voice rang out into the street. “Twilight!” she desperately called, waving the doppelganger made of Spike’s molt above her. “You will be taking this, won’t you? Please?” Completing the outline of Sweetie Belle’s dress took a few minutes longer than Rarity had anticipated. As she looked down at the pincushion that she wore wrapped to her hoof she realized that she hadn't enough pins to continue her work. She sighed as she realized there was only one place where she could find more. She looked up to see her sister smiling at her with a devilish grin. What could she be thinking? “Sweetie, Dearest?” she asked, lifting the form of the dress from her sister, “Would you perhaps do me a favor? Could you go straighten up the kitchen? I have to… well, tidy up the bathroom.” Sweetie began to step down, her knowing smile still spread across her face. “Oh? And what is it that has you smiling so, Sweetie?” Rarity asked as she gently folded the nascent beginnings of the dress over her outstretched foreleg. “Heh, Rarity, do you know that Spike loves you?” Sweetie Belle sang out, her characteristic squeak accenting the crucial word. Rarity tried to hide her surprise, not even turning to look upon Sweetie’s wide grin. Still, she had given a small jump. Even as she went through the motions of gathering up the rest of her materials, she prepared the best way to phrase what followed. “Yes, I’m aware that he’s fond of me, Sweetie,” she quickly stated before attempting to change the topic, “Did you two have fun with your little experiment? While I’m not fond of you playing with an open flame, I did see that you were learning about…” “Do you lo…” Sweetie Belle began. She was made to stop very quickly, as in one quick motion Rarity’s hoof had sat gently but firmly against her lips. A long glance fell between the sisters. “Please do finish up cleaning the kitchen, Dearest,” Rarity said as she lifted her hoof from Sweetie’s lips. She ushered her sister along, watching the bouncing steps of the foal as some small song began to rise from her sister. After a few moments, Rarity sighed once more and climbed the stairs. Rarity looked down over the small pile of pins that sat in the sink. Little lines of purple traced the bowl of the sink, marking where they had rolled along before settling to a stop. Rarity found herself pondering what part of dragon’s blood made it change color from the deep red of earlier to the purple that sat before her. Oh Spike, you poor dear, you poor darling boy, she thought, looking from the deep purple of her own mane to that of the pool at the bottom of her sink. You even bleed purple, in the end. Does she know how much you love her? What has she offered you in exchange for such devotion? She opened the tap, and as the sound of the warm water splashed through the bathroom, she carefully washed each pin, letting each one rest upon the damp remains of the towel, the one that was now forever stained with his blood. He did this for her, she told herself as she scrubbed away the last of the stains upon the porcelain. He did this for that mare, that beautiful, wonderful, generous mare he thinks he sees. He hurt himself just to be near her, to be close to her. She looked over the bathroom one last time, and as she departed to the Inspiration Room that thought lingered in her mind. He loves her, wants nothing more that to be with her… make her happy. Why? What can he possibly see in her? As she sat herself down at her sewing machine, Rarity began to attempt to work upon the dress, but soon she found that she had already stopped and was simply staring at the wall. She began again, looking over the design once more before squinting past the glasses that sat upon her nose and concentrating on the work. It was useless. In a few moments, she found herself simply staring at the wall once more as the sewing machine slowed to a stop and the glasses hung limp upon her face. She’s given him practically nothing! She’s taken, well… asked for, in all fairness, far more than she’s given him! Rarity rested her head in her hooves, unknowingly jarring her glasses even farther askew. As she looked up to the sewing machine again she sat for another long moment. He goes through that just to be with that mare… he just wants to be with her, be near her. He doesn’t want anything from her, there’s no price he wants for his affection. He doesn’t want anything other than to be with her. He’d even risk hurting himself just to spend time with her… that mare he thinks he sees when he looks at me… He loves her. He loves me. As Rarity wiped her hooves across her mouth and across her eyes, she knocked the glasses from her face and sent them falling to the floor. Inside Rarity different emotions flew around, each one bouncing off of her perceptions. She stared down at the sewing machine, simply gazed over the embossed steel name of the manufacturer as remembrances drifted through her. She’d had stallions profess their love to her over and over. She’d had colts spinning in the twist of her elegance since she was in grade school. Candy, flowers, cards… jewels rare and valuable. These had all been heaped upon her by stallions who had lied to themselves… or who had lied to her boldly. “Love”, they would say, and she would pretend to believe them. It was not love that had made them play their games. It was lust. Desire. Desire to possess her, to have a beautiful mare. These things she had come to accept as a parody of love. These things she had learned far, far, far too early to take in place of what her heart truly demanded, what it longed for. And she had played the game right back at them. She had batted her eyes at them, pouted her lips. She had taught herself to paint the farce, to use her charms to catch the eye of stallions in high places and with "the right contacts". She was just as guilty as they were. It had been a lie shared between her and the willing participants in that mockery of love, the parody of love that fell far short of the romantic notions she had once held. That was over. That was gone. That Rarity, long ill and fading, had died in a fit of rage at the gala. That Rarity had drowned that night in the indifference of a prince whom, if the rumors were correct, had (at that time) been more concerned with what went up his nose than what sat before his eyes. This Rarity had no need for that, for any of that. This Rarity had no need for that because Spike loved her. “Here!” she cried aloud, waving her arms dramatically, invoking the voice of the cruel reality. “Do you wish to finally have someone in your life who loves you for who you truly are? Someone whom looks upon you in adoration for doing nothing more than being true to yourself? Someone who sees not the flaws, but what lies beneath? You do? Well, here!” Rarity spun from the chair. She stood upon her rear legs, placed the back of her foreleg to her forehead. With an impassioned moan she collapsed upon her bed. There she continued to play the part of the cruel fates that tormented her. “Do you wish for such a stallion? Do you truly wish for such a man? One who loves you without condition?” she continued as her legs kicked at the air. “Not asking for much, are we, Rarity? Here then! Have one!” “Oh! By the way, Rarity, you old dried-up Jezebel,” she choked as her body deflated, “he’s a boy of about twelve… and a lizard. Surprise.” It was unfair. It was utterly unfair. Rarity blinked her eyes, forcing the water from them before they could become tears. She focused on her breathing. She let her head settle farther back onto the bed for an instant before sitting upright. There, upon the nightstand, stood the black velvet box. Rarity gently lifted it from the table, held it to her chest as though it were a sacred relic. She opened it slowly. She had a dozen names for the fire ruby. The Heart’s Desire, the Heart’s Afire, the Light of Love, each one sappier and less easily explained than the last. None of them came to her now, though. Now she stared down into it as it sat perfectly in the gold setting, shining in the soft velvet lining of the box. Hello, she said, staring into the eyes of the mare who was reflected back to her in the shimmering surfaces of the ruby, Would you, by any chance, be that mare, the one that Spike sees? The one who has earned and deserves his love? Are you the mare who can be trusted with his perfect love? Are you the mare who merits the love of that child, innocent and pure as it is? If you are, please, please, please help me become you… please, oh please I beg of you… please… She studied the fire ruby some more, once again pondering the very minutes that it had shown her how deep and real his love for her was… how he’d given it to her of his own free will and without expectation of reward. How he’d been dragged back from the monster he’d become when she had placed her hoof upon it and refused to surrender it. The vision returned to her as she stared deeper into the ruby. Once again she saw him begin to tell her of his crush, to make the deliberate, certain steps towards professing his love as they plummeted through the sky together. It was not a lie. There had been no other motives. It had been real. It was an honest, earnest desire to let her know what he felt. Once again she felt herself place her hoof to his lips, let him know that she knew. It seems there must always be something between us, Darling, she told herself as she ran her hoof across the surface of the ruby, because you know how I am with precious things. No, she could not have let him say it then. She cannot let him say it now. She could not because it terrified her. If he had said it, what other choice would she have had but to tell him the truth? If she told him the truth, then his heart would be hers, and that truly and utterly terrified her. How easily he’d simply give it to her, let her claim it forever. Terrifying, completely and absolutely terrifying. A majestic, wondrous heart that could beat for centuries, a millennia, or more… what could possibly make her worthy of such a precious gift? Spike was still a child, and as such he had no notion of the things that she’d mistaken for love. His was the love of a child, a love without the complications of adult drives and feelings. His love was still pure, uncomplicated, unblemished. She was... blemished. But not irrecoverably so. His love had proven that to her, had shown her that despite her vanity, her apparent shallowness, her complaining (and whining), that there was still a very real reason why the Element of Generosity had chosen her. There must be some twinkle in her eyes, something of the mare Spike saw. She must be there, hiding in her own eyes. She had once called him her hero, had said it there on the bridge before she’d given him that second, well-deserved kiss. That remained true. It remained so utterly true. He had saved her, had saved her in the light of his love… helped her see that she had worth. She was getting better, recovering in his love. Not just his love though, but also in the love of her friends, the love that Twilight had brought all of them. She was so much better now, so different. Would that Rarity, the dead one, have worried over Fluttershy so when that Cretan changed her? Would that dead and decaying husk have been so upset over the loss of Sweetie’s love? Would that ghost have fawned over Spike so? No, but this Rarity would. This Rarity did. This Rarity, she thought, is becoming the one Spike sees. She’s trying so hard to become her. She leaned backwards and fell into the pillow as the ruby glistened in the sun that streaked through the window. Rarity stared back into the Heart’s Afire, looked back into the eyes of a Rarity that sat somewhere between the dead one and the one she longed to be. She did not know when she fell asleep, but she knew that she had because the wind was whistling by her ears. Falling dreams are supposed to be nightmares. Falling dreams are supposed to make those who dream them come awake with screams. Falling dreams are supposed make the dreamer pour sweat upon their sheets and sit up in their beds and tremble with a thick, palpable fear. This was no nightmare. The dreamer did not come awake. Instead the dreamer kept her mind in the moment, fought to remain in the dream. This was no nightmare. This was the sweetest kind of dream. This was the dream where she was carried through the air by a grown dragon, one that sat his clawed hands gently against her forelegs as they wrapped around his neck. Together they fell through the sky as he swooped low and they parted the clouds, her jubilant cries filling the moist air. This was the dream where they landed upon a high ledge beside the great cascading waterfalls, a place only they knew. This was the dream where they had their picnic among the great mossy oaks that clung to the mountainside as the cascades fell and became vapor far beneath them. This was the dream where he laid her down in the sweet smelling grasses, the dream where he ran his fingers through her mane and told her over and over how beautiful she was, how much he adored her. This was the dream of that perfect time in the future, of that time where fate had not been so cruel and they could finally be together, of the time where she could let him say the words. This was the dream of the time when she no longer had to be on pins and needles as he began to make his profession. The large, powerful dragon stared tenderly into her eyes and began to finally say the words… “Rarity?” She reached up, put her hoof beside his face… guided his hand down to her even as he prepared the words, let him touch her. To her it felt like being touched for the first time, touched by someone who truly loved her instead of just lusted for her. His lips came open… “Rarity?” No, it was not his voice, the voice of the mature dragon. It was not Spike’s voice, but that once again of Sweetie Belle. Rarity awoke once more to find that she had dozed off again, the afternoon having sped on that much more. Rarity found the black velvet box still upon her chest. She wiped her eyes with the back of her hoof and looked to the door. “Sweetie,” Rarity asked blearily, “is something wrong?” “Ummm, yeah,” Sweetie said, wiping her hoof back and forth a little bit across the floor. “Hey, Rarity, you know how you asked me to clean the kitchen? Well, ummm, I tried… but I kinda, well, made it worse…” “Oh dear,” she said with a startle. She quickly regained herself and painted a mischievous smirk. “Is anything on fire, Dearest?” “Oh, ummm… no, not really,” Sweetie said as she took a few more steps into the room. “Oh, well,” Rarity continued, letting her head rest on her hoof, “Is anything down there turning into a huge, threatening monster that could possible devour Ponyville, Sweetie?” “Umm, no?” answered Sweetie Belle, looking back to her sister. “Ah. I take it that you opened a portal to some other dimension, then, and some horrible demon is now emerging in my kitchen? Defiling my teapot, is he?” Rarity answered as she smiled back at Sweetie. “No, wait, what?” asked Sweetie Belle, arching her eyebrow. “Ah, well… if there’s no real immediate threat to our well-being then I suggest only one course of action,” Rarity said, lifting her forelegs to where the little unicorn stood. “Namely, my dearest little sister, please come here so that I can fix your mane.” It took Sweetie Belle a second to understand, but as soon as she did her face came alight. “Really?” she asked as her squeak once more sounding out around the room. A radiant smile beamed from her as she pranced forward into Rarity’s offered hooves. Soon the peals of her Sweetie’s laughter filled the room, her sister tickling her over and over as they sat upon the bed. Soon they had settled, and as Rarity worked to put her sibling’s mane in order she teased her, mentioning the names of young colts at school whom she thought might have crushes on her baby sister. The other Rarity, the dead one, she’d not do this. She’d not have been so sweet with her little sister, she thought as Sweetie laughed and denied each claim with cries of “Ewww!” or “He’s gross!” She would not have been so forgiving with her after the Gabby Gums unpleasantness. She would not have covered herself in mud to salvage this love. Rarity felt Sweetie growing quieter, felt the tiredness that the unusual day had draped around the little girl. She quieted her voice, and soon her little sister was napping across her forelegs. Rarity moved dinner an hour or so in her mind, re-arranged the rest of her day, and then laid her head upon the pillow once more. She ran her hoof through Sweetie’s mane, listened to her little breaths, and thought once more of those other mares. I’m not her. I’m not either of them. I am not the one who I left behind. Yet, I am not the one you see, Spike. I wish to be her, but I am not her. I am only myself. This Rarity, she thought as she slowly gathered the sleeping form of Sweetie Belle closer, can only be herself, Spike. She cannot deny her feelings, cannot help but appreciate the love you give her, Darling. That beautiful, unconditional, pure love… the innocent love, the one you give so freely. This Rarity honors that. Rarity turned her head, and with a tender smile she gazed over the fire ruby once more as it sat shining in its box. This Rarity has a hero. This Rarity has a Prince Charming, one she waits for as he gallantly goes off on his crusades to save her heart from its perils. She turned and rested her head above that of Sweetie Belle. She listened to the sounds of the city streets of Ponyville that came in through the window on the small breezes, bringing with it spring scents and distant voices. This Rarity knows of your feelings, Spike. She cherishes them. This Rarity loves you. She closed her eyes. In moments Rarity was drawn down once again into her interrupted nap. Soon she dreamed of being the mare that Spike saw when he looked at her, the radiant mare buried deep within her. This was the sweetest kind of dream, a dream where she floated on waves of happiness as she became that mare, the one he adored. In the dream she transfigured herself into that mare, the one who had earned the way he looked at her with warm emerald eyes, the one who he saw when he floated in her presence. As their dreams overtook them the sisters napped softly. Around them the afternoon wore away and slight spring breezes jostled the curtains. End.
Chapter 1: PinsOn Pins and Needles Written by The Descendant Chapter 1: Pins Falling dreams are supposed to be nightmares. Falling dreams are supposed to make those who dream them come awake with screams. Falling dreams are supposed make the dreamer pour sweat upon their sheets and sit up in their beds and tremble with a thick, palpable fear. This was no nightmare. The dreamer did not come awake. Instead the dreamer kept her mind in the moment, fought to remain in the dream. This was no nightmare. This was the sweetest kind of dream. Rarity felt the tears in her eyes, but it was not fear that drew them from her. It was not the wind that the dream was whistling past her ears that forced the tears from her. The tears welled up in her from deep within… they welled up as she stared into Spike’s eyes, and once again the little whelp plummeting through the sky with her prepared to say the words. “Rarity?” In the imperfect reality her dreams sheltered her from, there had been no choice but to lift her hoof at that point, place it across his lips. But here, in the dream, she just stared on as he prepared the words and the tears streamed from her eyes and the smile grew wider across her face. “Rarity?” She pressed her hoof to her heart, pressed the fire ruby closer to her chest. “Rarity? Rarity, I’m sorry to wake you…” It was not Spike’s voice. As her mind raced out of the scene Rarity felt herself coming awake, losing the perfect scene once more. Rarity raced out of the dream. Her eyes opened, blinked, and settled on the underside of the canopy that hovered over her deep, soft bed. Her nap was over. The dream had flown away. Her hooves rested upon something, and looking down she found them still wrapped around a familiar black velvet box. “Rarity? Rarity, I-I’ve got to tell you something really, really, really important…” Rarity placed the velvet box on the nightstand as her eyes settled on the doorway. Fighting to put away the drowsiness of her nap she found a dearly familiar form standing at the threshold of her bedroom. “Sweetie? Oh, Sweetie! Come in, Dearest, what is so important?” asked Rarity as she lifted her forelegs to her little sister. Sweetie Belle came prancing across the floor, a wide smile on her face informing the older unicorn that whatever was so important it probably didn’t involve anything disastrous, such as another charred interpretation of breakfast. As Sweetie Belle hopped upon her sister’s bed the smaller unicorn beamed with pride. “Rarity, do you remember me saying that my class was going to Canterlot, that I was going to be in the national geography bee?” Sweetie Belle asked. Even as she did Rarity’s face grew with pride. “Sweetie!” Rarity cried, scooping her little sister up in a great vast hug, “Are you saying that you won? My dear little sister is so very smart!” “Oh, oh… no, but-but I came in third,” interrupted Sweetie Belle, looking back up over her shoulder, her pride seeming to diminish. It quickly returned as Rarity hugged, squeezed, and tickled her baby sister once again. “Heh!” laughed Sweetie Belle, turning to her sister and showing off a bronze medallion. “I’m so very sorry, Dearest, that I could not be there to see you compete,” said Rarity as her voice trembled at the fact. She continued her apology even as she kept reading from the description that sat upon the medal. “I-I had to save all of Equestria from an ancient, nameless, unspeakable evil, you know… being the Element of Generosity and such…” “It’s okay,” said Sweetie, falling back into her sister’s hug, “I know. You can come to the after party, though, right?” Sweetie didn’t even have time to turn on her puppy-dog eyes before her sister was promising her that she would. “Yay!” called Sweetie Belle, hoping jubilantly around the bed, “There’s gonna be cake, music, a high tea, and we’re all gonna wear beautiful new… Oh! Rarity, this is the most important part!” Sweetie Belle turned to face her sister. “Sis, would… would you make me a new dress, one special for the party? Please?” said Sweetie Belle. Rarity replied with a smile that seemed to imply levels of joy that would have been commensurate with being offered a day spent at the spa sipping fine wine and nibbling upon dark chocolate. “Of course, Sweetie! Oh, I should love to!” answered the older sister, helping the smaller one from the bed. “We shall get started right away, why once Spike gets here he can help…” Spike. “Oh, Sweetie,” answered Rarity once more, “why… why don’t you make us something to snack upon, and then join me in the Inspiration Room?” Rarity watched with a smile as a gleeful Sweetie Belle bounced from the room, and her heart swam in her little sister's achievement. She wished that she had always been the type of sister who Sweetie could talk to, who she could share such things with, who she would want with her in important moments. Alas, thought Rarity, I have not been… Rarity looked back to the black velvet box that sat on the nightstand. She walked slowly to where it had been deposited, and slowly she opened the top. As she gazed upon what sat inside her thoughts concluded. … but I’ve always wanted to be, haven’t I? That’s who I’ve wanted to be… for her and for you? I’ve always wanted to be the mare that you think you see. Twilight Sparkle was generally considered to be among the most educated and intelligent unicorns that her friends knew. She was generally respected as a learned individual. There was even a certain owner and operator of a noted doughnut shop in Canterlot who frequently referred to her as “a smart cookie”. Not much would escape her grasp, and even fewer things than that would get past her analytical eye. One would wonder then why something as normal and commonplace as the growth of someone as close to her Spike would not register with her, as it had during his spell of greed-driven growth. How could it have surprised her so? Why did she need to take him to the doctor just to be informed that he was simply growing? The simple answer, she would have told you, is because that is not the way that Spike normally grew. Spike, she would state in a matter-of-fact tone, grew through a series of molts, and had been doing so ever since she had hatched him. Spike, while this was being explained, would most likely be staring at the floor and blushing. Yes, Twilight would have gone on to explain, she had helped him through the difficult process at times, especially when he was still a fingerling. She would also have said, with some hesitance, that as he aged the strips of decayed scales had become something of a problem between them. When Spike had first come to her after his few years in the nursery, they had shared her bed in Canterlot, not unlike siblings would do. That ended as he grew bigger and after a particularly hard spring molt that ended with her sitting in class discretely trying to pull his old scales from her mane. The next spring had found a young whelp who started to cry as soon as she had placed him in the bassinet the nursery had provided. His tears had continued all that long night. All that he knew was that a filly whom he simply wished would pick him up and share her warmth was not doing so. Instead she was telling him that he was "a big boy now" with his own "big boy crib." In Twilight’s mind, she could remember seeing how little he understood it, and could still hear him calling out to her that he was sorry and that he would be a good boy, her little whelp believing that he was being punished for something. Twilight remembered sitting up all that long night trying very gently to explain to the wailing child that she simply was tired of waking up covered in his discarded scales and getting odd looks from classmates. Spike, if he were still within earshot as the story was revealed, would generally blush even brighter and look even more uncomfortable. Later it only became more problematic. As Spike grew into a little boy, he saw no problem with simply picking at himself during his molt, often doing so at inopportune times and in embarrassing circumstances. It progressively got worse as he began chasing screaming fillies with hunks of his shriveled flesh, something that caused a rather put-upon Twilight to have to genuinely reprimand him. A younger Spike had spent many spring afternoons sitting in "time out" as Twilight inked letters of apology to foreign diplomats. Spike, upon hearing that story recounted, would usually blush deeper and run his foot across the floor while desperately avoiding eye contact and praying that Rarity would never hear of it. Spike, though, was now a mature whelp of some twelve years or thereabouts, and he was safely beyond all of that. He had taken his molting as something that showed his growing maturity… … well, as mature as a baby dragon could, as his current use of his molt showed that he still had something of a child’s unusual sense of fun about him. A sense of fun that still was able to gross her out. “Blegh!” called Twilight, recoiling a touch at the sight of what he had done. “Spike, that’s so gross!” “Awww, no it isn’t, Twi, it’s cool!” he called back, just finishing up with his markers. “C’mon, Twilight, look! Look at how I got it all off in one piece this time! I’m getting’ to be a pro at this!” Twilight swallowed her revulsion long enough to approach the molt. Her tongue hung out as she saw how he had apparently spent his free morning stuffing the almost entirely intact shell of his former self with old copies of Equestria Daily and was just now finishing coloring his masterpiece with thick markers, their scent sitting heavily in the room. “I kinda had to wiggle out backwards so that really messed up the frills and spikes. The eyes are ping-pong balls. I had to make new ones out of cardboard and construction paper so…” Twilight wrinkled her nose as the thick smell of the markers and the slightest hint of old perspiration wafted from the art project. As she gave a single gagging cough, Twilight turned her attention from the macabre statue and to the body of her little whelp. Even as he continued to go on and on about his rather unique art project she ran her hoof up and down his newly revealed scales, checking them for any imperfections as she always had. He was always so soft and shiny afterwards. Very soft and, yes, just a touch taller. She smiled for the first time since returning home to find he had already completed his molt. As she made him lift his arms she thought about how these soft scales would soon harden, and about how her little whelp would grow into them quickly over the next year. Don’t grow up too fast, Spike. “Spike,” she asked, more concerned with his present well being than his artistic endeavors, “did you stretch when you were done with the molt? Did everything feel right? Nothing felt tight?” “Yeah,” he said, turning back to her, standing beside his counterpart and putting his arm around his own shoulder, “everything came out fine, Twi.” Spike did a few impromptu jogging exercises and a couple of quick squat-thrusts to show himself to be in proper order. “Tada!” he announced as he stood. She then waited for him to catch his breath. To her surprise he took the arms of his flaky counterpart and made it clap its rather distressing hands in approval. “Thank you, thank you!” Spike answered. “It was nothing, really!” “Okay, yeah,” replied Twilight, her body giving a shudder of horror as she watched him readjusting his doppelganger, “this thing is gonna be in the house for about another fifteen minutes…” “Aw, c’mon Twi, I was thinking that I could put it in the window and…” “No.” “Oh… or, maybe have it hold a sign outsi…“ “Nope.” “Or have it next to the mailbox so that…” “Oh, no, no, no, no, no…” She smiled over him as he fumed. “Spike,” she asked as she ran a cloth over his shiny new scales, freeing them of the marker ink, “why did you even make this thing? Don’t you have anything else you could have been doing? Weren’t you supposed to help Rarity today?” “Yeah,” he said, holding his arms out to her so she could get the last drops, “but not until noon. Isn’t there anything else I can do for you? Is there anything I can do?” Twilight laughed a small laugh. “No, today is your day off, and I’m glad you were being… uh, creative, with the time,” she said, pondering the husk once more with a shudder. “You use it as you see fit.” “Alright!” called Spike, “Up high!” The figure shook noticeably as he slapped its hand. Twilight made disgusted sounds as a few loose scales fell to the floor. Twilight had been just about to tell Spike to take the thing outside and burn it when the clock chimed that it was a quarter to noon. She watched as Spike’s face began to swim with anticipation. “Are my scales straight? Did my frills come in taller? Am I shiny? Too shiny?” he asked as his attention shifted from artistic pursuits to thoughts of the elegant mare he was soon to visit and assist. She giggled as she ran her hoof across his frills. Twilight smiled to herself again as Spike ran about, searching out mirrors and wiping any trace of his artistic pursuits from him with loose towels, napkins, and the tablecloth. Twilight recovered it from him before it became too dirty, and as her magic took it from his grasp, she reminded him of the post-molting protocols they had established long ago. “Stay clean,” she told him as they approached the door, “and don’t do anything that could crack your scales. You’re still very soft…” “Right, nothing that could break the scales, gotcha,” he said as he leapt up to grab the door handle, turning it quickly. He had already begun to walk out into the street, his head in a cloud of expectancy, when an “Ahem!” caught his attention and drew him back to the library door. “Oh!” he said, turning back to the mare who stood there, and quickly being gathered into her hug, “Sorry Twi, got ahead of myself. Have a good afternoon, okay?” “You too, Spike. Remember, careful for your new scales, and listen to Rarity, okay? She released him from the hug. Twilight watched as he waved and then disappeared into the street, moving quite quickly in an impressive effort to be at the side of his ladylove at the scheduled time. Twilight felt herself smiling. “Don’t grow up too fast, Spike,” she said aloud. She felt herself hanging around the doorframe, pondering the cityscape of Ponyville. As she did she thought about Spike, how he was growing, about his crush on her friend… how it, despite how deep and earnest it was, would have to reach some sort of finality. She wondered how long Rarity would humor him, but she knew that the elegant mare had needs… ones that Spike was not able to fulfill. She sighed as she thought of them, wondered how things were going to work out... how the innocent love of a child could ever be reciprocated without complications. She trusted Rarity, loved her as a friend, and knew that the mare would not hurt him, neither in letting him down from the pedestal on which he had placed her or by taking his feelings too far. Twilight knew Rarity would not intentionally hurt the whelp, the one they both cared for. She simply wondered how it would all end. Twilight began to close the door, but even as she did so she felt a set of eyes upon her, and she jumped in alarm. Upon seeing whose eyes they were she frowned at herself and answered them with an accusatory glare. “Oh! Don’t judge me!” she told the husk of Spike’s former scales, the figure apparently having been left leaning on the circular library table in a pose of distant adjudication, “Like you haven’t thought about the same thing!” Spike slowed himself down as he gained the main square. He lifted himself up to gain a view of Carousel Boutique as ponies passed in and out of his view. With a few small movements, he subtly gathered up a few flowers from the public garden and then sauntered to the door of the boutique. As the distant clock tower struck noon he knocked upon the door, and with that he was ushered within. “Oh Spike, they’re wonderful!” Rarity proclaimed, “And just on time, as always. Such a gentleman.” Spike blushed as Rarity’s magic wafted the vase before him. Her magic quickly cut off the ends, and with that the flowers sat upon the pedestal nearby as Sweetie Belle explained to Spike all of the distant places that she had described and found to win her medal. “And I knew everything except where the minotaurs come from. Turns out that they’re from a big island in the Mareiteranean called Crete. That makes them Cretans. Isn’t that unfair?” asked Sweetie as she walked up to the platform upon which Rarity always stationed her models, “I wouldn’t want to be called a Cretan. Would you? Hey! You’re all shiny! Why are you so shiny, Spike?” “I, oh… umm, yeah, I just molted, so these are my new scales!” he said, foregoing any discussion about unfortunate naming practices and instead focusing on that which would show Sweetie (and far more importantly, her older sister) just how fast he was maturing. “I’m gonna grow into ‘em over the next year, so right now I’m still kinda…” Spike’s explanation was interrupted as the soft feel of a familiar, and deeply appreciated, hoof drew across his frills. “Oh my, Spikey-Wikey, you are positively gleaming,” asked Rarity. “You certainly are growing into a handsome young dragon, aren’t you?” Rarity walked a few steps away, giggling to herself as she felt the heat of Spike’s blush radiating from him. She listened as the two younger creatures finished their small conversation and ate the snacks that Sweetie had prepared. As they did she finished rolling the fabrics that she wished to use in the dress, make real the images that had already appeared in her mind. Her mark alit inside her, and with that the preparations came to an end. Across the room, another creature began to observe what was happening, and at once an important thought fell through his mind. “Ummm… Rarity?” Spike asked, noticing the way the graceful unicorn had laid out her materials. “What, what are we going to be doing today?” “Oh, we are going to be making Sweetie a new dress, on that she can wear to the after-party for the geography bee!” she said. With that she lifted her design to him, levitating it in her magic. “Gee Rarity, that’s really nice of you to do that… really nice…” he said. Spike looked up from the drawing to see Rarity looking at him, and he smiled back up at her. Rarity looked down, saw the expression sitting across his features. “Do you really think so, Darling?” she asked in a quiet tone. “Well, yeah…” he replied. Sweetie Belle rolled her eyes and grinned. Rarity hovered there for an instant, a wide smile upon her face, and then turned back to her carefully arranged materials with a giggle. I’ve always wanted to be the mare you think you see... Spike once again looked past Rarity. He looked at the carefully arranged components that Rarity had prepared for the crafting of the dress: the cloth, the threads, the lace, the pins... The pins. Twilight’s warning thundered through Spike’s mind. “Uhm, Rarity?” asked Spike, “What, ummm… what did you need me to do today?” "Well, Spike, I should be making use of those wonderful tough scales of yours again," she began, "It is so very helpful to me when I have you nearby as I work, you know... it does not interrupt my creative process. Oh, I suppose it lends my work a certain je ne sais quoi when I do not need to go back to my pin cushion or wear it on my... Spike?" Rarity pondered him. As she did she saw an unfamiliar expression cross his face. “Rarity, is that… that all I can do for you? Is there anything else I could do, like sort your fabric remnants or…” “Well,” she said, sharing a confused glance with her sister, “No, not really, I’m afraid. Is there a problem, Spike?” “I-I mean, really, isn’t there anything else… that I could do?” he asked, the stammer growing in his voice, “So, so that I could help you? I-I want to help…” “No, there’s really nothing else you could do for me at the moment,” Rarity said, tilting her head back and forth. After a long moment she lowered her head to his, “Do, you not like being my own little pincushion? I-I thought you liked helping me in that manner, in all honesty. You don’t have to…” Twilight’s implore that he protect his newly revealed scales repeated in his mind. At once it did battle with the thought of not being useful to Rarity. Spike reacted quickly, hopping over to where all the finery lay ready for the construction of the dress. It can’t be that bad, right? I mean… it can’t hurt all that much, and it can’t really mess up my scales, right? Right? “No, no! I-I like helping you… I like it fine. It’s just that, oh…nothing, nothing,” he said, dancing his fingertips against one another, “Hey, let’s, let’s get started! Yeah! Yeah…” Rarity pondered him for a few moments. She shared her concern with Sweetie Belle, catching her sister in another glance. Yet it seemed that the child had reached the end of her ability to guess her sister’s meaning, and with a sigh Rarity settled back into her creative mode. “Very well,” she said. As the first bolt of fabric came undone Rarity began to drape it across the shoulders and withers of her little sister. As the fitting progressed, normal conversation began again. As she went along Rarity began to pull the pins out of their tiny metal box and place them to her lips, waiting for the correct moment to use them to tie the bunting to the lace that sat upon her sister. It may have been her imagination, but she could have sworn she heard Spike gasp when she revealed them. “There, Sweetie, we’ll try something chic this time. Oh, yes, that is quite marvelous…” As the sewing needle came up and went to work, drifting on the currents of her magic, she slowly removed the pins. As Sweetie’s voice drifted out into the room the sisters made small talk about how things had gone, about what was going on at home with mother and father… … and out came the pins, and into the tough scales of Spike’s back they went. Or so Rarity assumed. It might have been her imagination, but to Rarity the pins seemed to slide amid his scales with suspicious ease. Had he drawn a sharp breath as the first settled amid his scales? She looked down at him, saw him stare back to her with his usual smile, but perhaps just a slight tremble as well… Rarity waited a moment, and then continued her work. “I dare say,” continued the mare, “that this work will meet any critique leveled upon it. You’ll be the envy of any debutante at the party, Dearest…” “Do you really think so?” asked Sweetie Belle, the younger unicorn giving a small leap of happiness that warmed Rarity’s heart. Her reflection was interrupted as a few more pins magically wafted to her side, and as they found their resting spot a yelp lifted into the room. Rarity startled and looked down at Spike. He was biting the back of one of his clawed hands, a distant look crossing his eyes. It might have been her imagination, but he seemed to be in pain. The very thought… “Spike?” she asked, tilting her head from side to side to ponder him again, “Are you alright, Darling?” “Yeah! Yeah… I, I just bit the back of my arm… is all,” he said with a noticeable tremble. “Well, yes, I can see that, Spike,” she said as she examined his limb, completely missing the source of his growing torment, “but the question is why, isn’t it?” “Oh… oh, I… I just remembered a job I have to do for Twilight that I don’t really wanna do,” he said, trying to paint truth into the words. It was a lie, and it hovered there before him. It might have been her imagination, but Rarity believed she saw something hidden behind Spike’s smile, and his eyes seemed to be starting to fog. He seemed to be trembling as he spoke with her… shaking, arching his back. “Yes, well, we’ll have to speak with her about it if it’s causing you that much concern…” Rarity returned her attention to Sweetie Belle, and as she did Spike turned away. As he did he grimaced, pulled at the rug, tore at it with his claws. He had lied to her! That only added to the pain, made it that more real… the awful foreign feeling of the pins drawing down into his soft flesh, the perfect pain that shot through him from his shoulders to his hips… the lie made it that much worse, burning in his gut. Each movement brought new agony as the pins drew imperceptibly deeper and deeper into his newly revealed scales and the soft flesh beneath. Spike bit the inside of his own cheek, the very act of walking beside the graceful mare seeming to drive new shocks of pain across his back. But he didn’t say anything, didn’t want to risk being asked to leave. At once there was the feeling of a tear, a ripping of his flesh and scale, and he winced again. Now something wet began to slide across his back, and he knew very well what it was. With that he felt the magic of the mare he held dear cross his scales, felt the wet pop as the large hemming pins came out… … only to be replaced by a new torture as the larger, winged basting pins took their place. Spike covered his mouth with his hands and attempted to muffle his cry. “Ewwww! Blood!” called Sweetie Belle as she took a step backwards. “Oh! Did I stab you with my needle, Dearest?” called out Rarity as she immediately began to check her sister over, “I’m so sorry!” “No, not on me, on the pin!” said Sweetie as she motioned to the pin that floated in Rarity’s magic, the one she had just withdrawn from Spike’s scales. Rarity’s eyes flew to the pins that hovered in her purple aura. There, indeed, swam a few drops of red that dripped to the floor in small, almost imperceptible drops. In an instant a horrible insight grew upon the unicorn, and she missed a breath as her mind made a ghastly connection. “Spike!” called Rarity, spinning to where the whelp had been creeping along beside her. Instead of finding him there she had to pan her eyes across her studio, waiting until Sweetie’s cries of alarm pointed her towards the opposite side of the room. The two unicorns looked on in horror as a high, shrill call of pain finally escaped the lips of the whelp. As he did he went to the carpet arching his back, trying desperately to reach behind himself, to grasp at the pins that only drove deeper into his new soft scales as he fought them. “Spike!” she called again, dropping her materials as he began spinning about upon the carpet, fighting against the pain like a wounded animal. At once he collapsed into the pedestal. It fell over him, causing the vase to come crashing down and the flowers to fall around him as he fought to his knees. A new cry fell from him as he wrapped himself around the fallen pedestal. His claws tore at the alabaster surface, marring it as he called out in pain. “Rarity! He's bleeding!” came Sweetie’s alarmed voice, the little unicorn struggling out of her dress as Rarity rid herself of her accoutrements. “Spike!” called Rarity once more, racing to him as the slick surface of his scales reflected the mid-day light, the wetness shimmering from where each tiny movement drew new wells of blood from his broken scales. With a cry of her own Rarity was upon him, and as she grasped him by her teeth she pelted towards the stairs. As they ascended them the rhythmic pitter-patter of his blood on the steps and the sound of his cries echoing off the wall filled the stairwell.
Chapter 2: NeedlesChapter 2: Needles Rarity looked more like a mother cat carrying her kitten than a studious fashionista racing to provide aid to a dragon whelp. Indeed, as Spike wrapped his arms and legs closer, as his tail came up between his legs, he played the part even more so. As the pain coursed through him he curled tighter and tighter into a ball. The sensation of hanging by the scruff of his neck from Rarity’s lips only added to his discomfort. Rarity had no time to ponder that. As her magic flew in front of her the bathroom door flung open, and as soon as she was inside she withdrew a white towel from the linen closet. She laid him there, upon the bathmat, spinning it around before she lowered it so that the length of Spike’s body sat upon the soft, shaggy surface. His little body settled down into a figure of abject unhappiness, seemingly aware that his deception was now to be called into check. Rarity’s horn came alight again, and what little healing magic she knew drifted over him as she stared upon what she had unknowingly done to the boy. Her pins still stood out upon his back. The different crystal heads reflected the bathroom light oddly, sending tiny drops of color across his back. She looked down over him, seeing how his arm was still in his own mouth, muffling his cries of pain. She saw how his eyes were clamped shut against the torment… and to keep from having to look at her. “Spike… I-I need you to look at me. Talk to me, Darling…” she said, touching her hoof to his head, fighting to find some place where her limited healing arts could fall over him. Yet the dragon simply lay there, wincing in pain as the pins continued to shoot new hurts through him with every twitch. To Spike every tiny movement seemed to crack his newly formed scales, driving pain arising from where they left his tender flesh. There was a small movement at the door, and Rarity heard the familiar footfalls of her sister nearby. “Spike, Darling, look at me… I need you to help me,” she said as the worry grew deeper in her own voice. But he didn’t open his eyes. He didn’t look back at her. “Rarity? Is Spike okay?” came the voice of her little sister, noticeably large with worry even as she stood partially hidden behind the doorframe of the bathroom. “No, Dearest, he isn’t,” she said, stopping as a fresh set of whimpers arose from the prostrate form of the whelp, “and I fear it will only be made worse as we attempt to make it better.” Rarity looked across him, saw the pins driven deep into what had always been the toughest of his scales. Now she saw the redness where they met his flesh, and even as he sat there pools of his blood were forming where the pins pressed into his soft, young scales. Suddenly Rarity realized what had happened, what the fact that he had just molted truly meant. She berated herself in her own mind for not realizing it, for not seeing it. Yet, it had happened. She had done this to him… and he had not stopped her. Why hadn’t he tried to stop her? The thought didn’t linger in her mind for very long before she realized why he had. Her eyes fell across his twitching frame. “Oh, Spike…” Rarity turned back to the doorframe, looking to Sweetie Belle as the younger unicorn peeked around the edge. “Sweetie,” Rarity said, “could you do me the favor of holding Spike’s hand?” Sweetie Belle came forward and looked piteously upon the form of the boy laying on the bathmat. “Hurry now, Sweetie,” Rarity said, hurrying her along, “I… I have to pull the pins out, and he’ll need somepony to keep close.” Sweetie Belle sat down before him. She took his free hand in her hoof, and even as he kept biting upon the other she tried to give him words of encouragement. “It’s-it’s okay Spike, my sis is gonna take care of you. We’re gonna make everything better… it’s okay…” Rarity stared down at the two of them, watching as Sweetie ran her hoof over his arm and her little words echoed off the tiled walls of the bathroom. Beneath her Spike still bit into his own arm as the pain shot into him, tears welling in his eyes and dripping down his jaw. Rarity focused on the pins, and for the first time truly understood from where his pain was rising. The scales were split, torn in half by the pins. Each motion of Spike's body was making the damaged scales draw the needles that much farther into his flesh. There was nothing else to be done. With that Rarity lowered her lips and found the crystal head of the first pin. With that she captured it in her teeth and began to pull it free. Spike gave a sharp cry, and Rarity winced at the sound of it. With that she spat the pin into the porcelain sink. Even as the sound of it rolling around lifted around the room the lips of the mare were to him once more, finding the next pin and pulling at it with tiny motions… motions that even her magic, as dexterous as it was, could not match. It mattered little. Even if she pulled as gently as she could it still caused him to twitch, to utter little calls of pain that even Sweetie’s tender words and soft touch could not lessen. For long, agonizing minutes that was how it went. As the light fell through the distant window, muffled cries lifted from him, each followed by the "plink" of pins falling into the sink. The noises of the pins rolling around within were slightly silenced when they ran over trails of blood their predecessors had left upon the white surface of the porcelain. They rolled back and forth before finally settling with a metallic sound upon one another and in a small pool of red. “Last one, Darling, last one…” Rarity said long minutes later, spitting the final pin into the sink. Her magic lifted the towel that had rested by her side, and she laid it across him gently. With her own touch she now pressed it over his back, applying pressure upon the dozen holes that she had unintentionally placed in the child. Together the three lay there in an odd silence, Sweetie casting her worried glances between Spike and her sister. Upon the face of the younger unicorn a dozen questions sat in a cloud of confusion and fear. Spike had not said a word since being brought up to the bathroom. He had only whimpered in pain and bit at his arm as the bathmat became an impromptu operating table. Rarity looked down over him, saw the fear and pain that sat hidden behind eyes that he had clamped shut. She brushed her hoof across his frills, and to her subtle relief she saw his expression relax a shade. For what it was worth, Rarity dropped every bit of healing magic she knew across the whelp. As she raised the towel, the soft purple aura of her magic settled over him. It was not to be. Her magic, not designed for healing, fell across even his wounded scales in rolling wafts of uselessness… the imperviousness of dragon magic beyond anything her own power could overcome. A small jolt of panic swept through Rarity as she lifted the towel. The direct pressure, the most basic first aid she knew, had failed. Even as she lifted the towel, wet as it already was with the deep red stains, more blood came trickling to the surface. As Rarity’s mind raced she saw how the wounded scales moved against themselves, how Spike’s blood filled the cracks as the broken scales spread like butterfly wings with every subtle movement. “I… oh my,” she whispered as the blood came to the surface, sitting there in a bubble that soon collapsed on itself and dribbled down the spaces between his scales. Her mind raced to find another way to help him. She looked around herself, the unicorn mare reaching through everything she knew, believed she knew, or thought she knew about first aid. There were bandages in the cabinet, but if the direct pressure hadn’t helped, how could the bandages? Calm, Rarity, calm… what else do we know? As she looked around her bathroom an old beauty trick came to mind, a way to make one lose a flush. It was one that drew the blood away from the surface of the skin. It was the best shot she had. Yet, it was something that she knew would be difficult and… disturbing, for Sweetie to see. She'd already put her sister through enough. Fortunately, there was something she knew she had to have her sister do. Rarity cleared her throat even as she dropped the towel over Spike once more, pressed it against his wounded scales again for what little good it seemed to do, and then spoke. “Sweetie Belle, Dearest, would you please go fetch Twili…” she began. “No!” the little dragon cried as he spun about, his voice coming alive for the first time since they had entered the bathroom. “No, please… please don’t get Twilight! Please? S-she told me to be careful, not to do anything that would harm my scales, anything that would… I-I didn’t listen. I’ll get in trouble! She’ll get mad! Please? Please, I-I just wanted to… wanted to…” Rarity ran her hoof over his frills, calming him. “That may or may not be, Spike,” she answered, pushing down upon the sopping towel once again, “But Twilight knows best how to help you now, so it is to Twilight that we turn. Hush now, you’ll be alright.” She watched Spike bury his head into the crux of his elbows and heard him give a few more sobs. His deception was revealed, and now he was to pay the price, both in terms of damage to his own body and the lost trust of his caregiver… … and perhaps, he feared, even more. “Sweetie, please go and fetch Twilight,” Rarity spoke again, motioning to her younger sister. “Is Spike gonna be okay?” asked the little unicorn, her glances going from her sister to the dragon whelp and back. “Yes, Dearest, he… he just made a mistake,” she said, motioning towards the door. As Rarity watched, something wonderful happened. As Sweetie began to move away she took a grand total of about two steps towards the door before turning back to where Spike lay. “You’re gonna be okay, Spike,” said the younger unicorn as she touched her face to his, “My sis said so, okay?” Spike lifted his head just a touch. His eyes were still closed and filled with tears, but he answered her just the same. Rarity dared to breathe a little bit easier. She watched Spike breathing for a long moment, hoping against hope that his pain had lessened. She gently lifted the towel once again, but to her disappointment even the act of Spike slowly lowering himself back to the bathmat after answering Sweetie's nuzzle caused the blood to flow again. With Sweetie Belle gone, Rarity and Spike were left alone in the bathroom. Some small movement caused the pins in the sink to settle further their metallic tinkle sounded out around them. Rarity sighed and lifted the towel once more. The blood was coming slower, but it was still coming. She sincerely doubted that Spike would bleed out here in her bathroom… that Spike’s dying words would be spoken among her hair curlers and shampoos. Still, blood was blood, and knowing that the whelp who cherished her so was in such distress filled her with emotion. Come now, Rarity, she thought to herself, it’s not pleasant, but it is all that we have left to try, isn’t it? It was unladylike to make an appearance in a formal setting whilst flushed, and as such cool water was often applied to one’s face before making an introduction. In short, she remembered, cold water constricts blood vessels. Spike heard the soft, graceful fall of Rarity’s hooves cross behind him and then beside him. Soon the sound of running water came cascading from the bathtub, and the soft waft of mare’s magic enveloped him. Rarity’s magic… it felt different than Twilight’s. Twilight’s felt like his blanket, like having it wrapped around him. Twilight’s magic was warm, familiar. Rarity’s was different. To Spike it felt like drifting on satin sheets, and with it came a feeling of something he could not name. It drifted around him like flower petals being driven on a warm breeze, calling to a part of him he did not know how to answer. It felt… lovely. The sensation washed away as her magic deposited him in the bathtub. As his clawed feet scratched about on the enamel he felt how cold the water was, and a series of thoughts went through his mind. Memories found him; memories of a time long ago when somepony else he loved had put him away from her… of another mare who he cherished, of a time when that mare had not shared her comforting warmth. “Spike,” came Rarity’s voice, “this will be difficult, Darling, but it’s all that I can think to do…” With that, the cold water began rushing from the faucet head, and as Rarity’s magic adjusted the nozzle, the frigid water began to run down his back. Some small part of her died as she watched his expression fade to one of shock, as he began to tremble and shake. She could only watch Spike jump, reach up, and try to grasp at the edges of the tub. She was, in point of fact, spraying a child with the coldest water she had, and not stopping at signs of his discomfort. She was suddenly very glad that she had sent Sweetie away. With that she brought the nozzle closer to him. Spike’s eyes came open at once, and he gave a yelp in surprise. He danced his feet and gave a few more cries of surprise as the icy feel of it fell across him. The cold had sent yet another feeling through him, one more foreign feeling that this day had brought him. As the chilly water washed down his back he began to tremble more forcibly. He lifted his head to look at Rarity, trying to gauge her expression. His eyes caught hers as he looked up to her over the edge of the bathtub, and his expression made her pause. It was a plea, it was him begging for some sign from her that things weren’t nearly as horrible as they seemed in that moment. Oh, Spike, don’t look at me like that, she thought as she fought to adjust the faucet, that’s not the look I adore seeing upon your face… that’s not the face you wear when you look at her… “Lean… lean into me, Spike,” she said, sliding closer to the edge of the tub. “Here, lean into me.” Rarity leaned across the edge of the tub, her forelegs wide. As her magic pressed the towel to his back once again it also ushered him forward, closer to her embrace. As the spray of the frigid waters splashed over him he barely noticed. Instead he settled into Rarity’s forelegs. “My poor Spikey-Wikey,” she said softly as his arms came up to her. “Oh, my poor Spikey-Wikey.” The warmth of Rarity’s chest enveloped him, and even as the cold waters continued to slide over him and the towel pressed against him Spike cared little. Sheets of white draped around him, the soft feel of her coat wrapped him closer to her. To Spike it was as though a dream had overtaken him, only his own shaking and the pelting of the water reminding him that he was in the waking world. Her touch was gentle, and as his wet scales brushed her coat she gave a few trembles of her own, the two shaking as the water sloshed about in the tub. He could go no farther into her chest. The edge of the tub separated the dragon whelp and the mare, so he stood there feeling Rarity’s breathing as she lay against him, listening to the sound of it leaving her nose. The blessed heat of her body fell into him, sheltering him from the driving cold, and the rhythmic beating of her heart called out to him over and over in a steady cadence that called him deeper, deeper in ways Spike struggled to understand… As the spray of the frigid waters caught her, strands of Rarity’s mane began to fall loose and drift over him. Rarity could only try to gently lift them away as his arms came up beneath her forelegs, slowly crept up her ribs to find the warmth there that she offered him without hesitation. This is fine, this is normal, there’s nothing to this, she told herself over and over as she listened to Spike’s breath, as she leaned over the lip of the tub that much more. This is a friend helping a friend. This is Rarity, a mature, adult mare, helping Spike, a child that she cares about… nothing more, nothing more… Rarity lifted her body higher. As she did he did as well, and the new contact with the frigid waters that clung to him made her shudder through her movement. She slowly turned off the water even as she cursed herself for putting him through this, for not being able to find some other way to help him, and in doing so she dropped the towel. Inside her something grew, an emotion she had not expected. Spike, though, did not notice. All he knew was that her beautiful scent was washing over him, her wondrous heat was falling through him, and that the feel of her coat was around him and over him. It was all so… lovely. Rarity looked down over the towel, past Spike’s head, and down into the bottom of the gleaming tub. The red of his blood had faded to purple; something that she soon realized was part of his draconic nature. She looked down across his back, and there, to her immediate relief, she saw no more blood welling to the surface. A quick scan of her eyes saw that even the cracked scales still held fast to his body. With a large sigh she lowered her head to Spike’s, just to give him that much more assurance that everything was fine… everything was fine. The bleeding had stopped, none of the broken scales had fallen away, and the cold water was gone. Everything was going to be fine. Spike moved, pressing his hands closer around her. He gently lifted a wafting bit of her mane, set it carefully behind her ear once more. Rarity felt his head move, felt him slowly nuzzling closer to her chest. He slowly nestled to her, wiping his face against her chest and up to her neck and back before giving a contented hum… It almost worked. It almost drew her away from the emotion. It was almost enough to make her forget what had transpired in her home that day. It was such a warm feeling, the way he was cuddling to her, the way he was so happy just to be with her. It made her happy to accept the gift of his affection, to hold him close as the last of the cold water gurgled down the drain. It was... lovely. But it could not last. Rarity pulled him closer, wrapped her forelegs around his head to force him to stop moving. Spike jumped in alarm, his hands hovering around her before settling down upon the lip of the tub to balance himself. Upon feeling his awkwardness she lowered him, let the edge of the tub sit firmly between them once more. There must always be something between us, Darling, it seems… They sat there, just listening to each other breath, wrapped tight in an embrace as she prepared her words. She let him hold her even as she made ready to speak the truth that would bring this act to a close. “Oh, my poor Spikey-Wikey,” she said, letting the last few drops of water drip from her mane, watching as it left a trail down his back before dropping into the tub. “Oh, Spike… can you even know how furious I am with you right now?” Spike bolted upright, his eyes coming wide in shock at her words. “Rar…” “I am absolutely livid, Spike!” she said with a tremble. “Livid!” “Rarity, I… I don’t, didn’t…” he said as he tried to look up to her. Rarity, though, still held him, and didn’t let go. She made him simply stand and listen, refused to let him look at her with the deep concern and worry that she knew was already painted on his face. You aren’t to look at me like that, she thought. Not yet, I’m not ready to forgive you yet. This must be said… “I’m so very angry with you, Spike,” she continued as her eyes misted over, “for letting me hurt you. How, how could you do that to me? How could you let me do that when… when you knew it would hurt you so?” She felt him blinking, felt his eyelashes rubbing softly against her coat as he began to comprehend what she was saying. “And, and… you lied. You lied to me, Spike!” she said as a few more wet drops fell from her and dripped down the length of his body to the tub below. She allowed him to think that they were a few more stray drops of the cold water falling from her mane. In truth, that which dripped from her was far warmer than that, and began not in her mane but at the corners of her eyes. “You lied to me so that I would keep hurting you! How… how could you do that to me, Spike!? That’s horrible! I-I never want to hurt you again! I… care, about you, Spike. It’s awful, awful for me to think…” She stopped as the feeling of his clawed hand running up and down her foreleg reached for her. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, Rarity, I didn’t mean to lie. I was just afraid that, that if there was nothing else for me to do that… that you might make me leave…” Spike took a step backwards, and for the first time since he had been deposited in the tub he looked up to her big blue eyes and met them with the same sincerity that he hoped she would always see in him. “I want to come here, I like being with you. I like working with you, spending time with you,” he began, his words reaching out for her, “I’m sorry I lied, but I was just, well… afraid. I was afraid that, well, if I’m not useful to you, like I am with Twilight, that you might not want me around…” Rarity’s mind splashed through the first few months that they had spent in each other’s company, the first time that he’d asked to help her here in here shop, the times she had borrowed him to fetch gems. Yes, she had been aloof, had sensed his feelings then. She had known, but what had it been to her? He had just been a child, one with a crush. If he wished to serve at her beck and call she had hardly been one to turn down a free set of hooves. Err, hands. But that had all been before. Couldn’t he see how much more she saw in him, how things had changed since that wonderful day? Couldn’t he see how she had allowed herself to fawn over him, how much harder she was trying now? By Celestia! She’d even been willing to fight for him! She! Rarity! That’s all I can do for you, Darling, that’s all I know to do for you. Can’t you see that I… Rarity looked back to him, saw him staring at her, waiting for her with his hands curled around the lip of the tub. “No, Spike, please,” she said as she stepped forward, sitting before him. “I-I had promised you this afternoon with me, here. I meant it. I should not send you away, not at all. I like having you here as well. A lady appreciates the presence of a gentleman, you know…” “A lady,” repeated Spike. With that his smile grew wide, and she looked down to see that marvelous expression across his face. It was the same one he wore when she had presented him with the gem for all of his hard work, the same he wore when he had fanned her at the spa, the same he always wore when he looked at her with those charming emerald eyes… Who is the mare that you think you see when you look at me like this, Darling? Who is that mare who has earned such devotion? Shall I ever meet her? Should I be jealous of her? Rarity took a step forward, laid her head to his, forehead to forehead. “Spike,” she said in a whisper, “promise me. Promise me that you’ll never, never, never let me hurt you again. You don’t deserve to be hurt, by anyone, and especially not by me. Promise it to me, Spike. Swear it to me, swear that you’ll never let me hurt you again… in any way… in any way…” “I-I promise,” spoke the whelp, jumping a touch as she slowly rocked her head back and forth on top of his, granting him the nuzzle that she had pulled out of before. The subtext that scared her was gone; this truly was simply an act between friends, ones who now had healed the gap between them. “Do you forgive me?” she asked softly. “Do you forgive me, for hurting you?” “Of course,” he said quickly, returning the nuzzle, “You didn’t do it on purpose. You didn’t know. It was my fault. I’m sorry… I don’t blame you…” With that the two lifted their heads, smiles across both of their faces. As they stared at one another the soft, wet sounds of the bathroom sounded out around them. “Rarity?” asked Spike, hiding slightly behind the edge of the tub, “Can I, uhhh… can I tell ya’ something embarrassing?” At once Rarity bit the inside of her lip. The same feeling of anxious anticipation flew through that she had felt as they had fallen through the sky together, the sense of being on pins and needles as she suspected that he was about to make known his feelings for her. She moved to stop him, to once again put her hoof to his lips. But something caught her, a little voice inside her mind made her question herself. Oh, it said, let him tell you! Twilight knows, Pinkie knows… half of Central Equestria knows! Why don’t you let him tell you? Because, she answered herself, reaching for him, you know how I am with precious things. But it was too late. Spike had already begun to speak… “I’m stuck.” “What?” she asked with more than a little confusion. “I’m sorry, Darling, what was that?” He blushed and looked down across the wet interior of the tub and the sopping wet towel that sat stained red and purple with his blood. He lifted his eyes to her again as his embarrassment grew. “The inside of the tub is all wet and slippery, and it’s kind of big, and I can’t get any foothold and it hurts if I try to lift my arms to climb and… and I’m, stuck…” He peered at her over the lip of the bathtub, and she gazed down at him. Her confusion gave way to something less. As they looked at one another smiles graced their faces, and with that they began to laugh. As her soft magic wafted over him once more, their laughter filled the bathroom. As it lifted him from the tub it echoed around them, ending only as she embraced him in a gentle hug, carefully avoiding the wounds that seemed somehow already to be healing in a very special magic that superseded any simple spell or incantation.
Chapter 3: Sewing it TogetherChapter 3: Sewing it Together “Now, it’s just peroxide, Darling, but it will sting.” “That’s cool, no problem.” “I just want to be sure that your poor back is disinfected before I put the bandages on.” “Yeah, no, I get it… it’s fine.” “It shall sting a bit, Darling. Are you ready?” “Sure, no problem. Go ahead and pour it all over, I’ve got this.” “You’re sure, Spike? It’s going to sting, you know…” “Right, yeah, I’m good.” “Alright then, if you’re ready. Here it comes…” “…” “Spike, Darling, kindly dis-attach yourself from my bathroom ceiling, your claws are damaging the stucco.” They stood together before the door, Spike wrapped tight in his bandages, as they waited for Twilight to arrive. To her surprise, Spike actually wrapped his arm around her foreleg as he looked at the door. She looked down to see him appearing very worried. Could Twilight, the dear Twilight she knew and loved, truly be that harsh a disciplinarian? Rarity gulped a little. She, like Spike, would have to make a confession before Her Royal Majesty’s Designate Twilight Sparkle… one that would determine many things. She hoped that Spike’s apprehension was entirely as overblown and needless as the time, as Twilight had told her in secret, that he’d mistakenly believed he’d interrupted a romantic tryst between his caregiver and a local yokel. If Spike’s reaction was warranted, then this whole thing could end badly… very badly indeed. A soft knock sounded out at the door. She quickly looked down, gave him a reassuring smile, and called “Come in!” The door creaked open to reveal a rather shell-shocked Sweetie Belle, the young unicorn seemingly awash with apprehension. “Sweetie? Dearest? What’s wrong?” asked Rarity, motioning to her younger sister, lifting her hoof to her in surprise and alarm. “Rarity…” breathed Sweetie Belle in a horrified tone, one of restrained panic. Before she, or they, could even move… it was upon them. “Hey everypony!” came the oddly familiar voice of Twilight Sparkle, apparently trying (and failing utterly) to sound like Spike. Twilight continued her impression from behind the doorframe, trying to hide herself (and failing utterly) from the onlookers. Before her hobbled the playmate that Spike had fashioned from his own discarded scales, dancing about in the magic of the unicorn. “I’m Spike!” Twilight continued in her poorly disguised tone as she bobbled the thing along in front of her, trying to approximate his little wobbling walk (and failing utterly). “I’m usually a good little guy, but sometimes I just don’t listen!” Rarity pulled Sweetie Belle closer as all three of the onlookers had expressions of confusion, puzzlement, and disgust fall through them. “I’m gonna just go and get myself all hurt… deedle, deedle diddy dee…” she began, once more attempting to mimic Spike (and failing utterly). As Twilight carried the stuffed doppelganger forward in her magic, she finally noticed the looks across the faces of the two other unicorns and the bandaged dragon whelp. “… dumm dee, dumm… deedle, dee… dee… what?” she asked as the realization sank into her that her little marionette was not being well-received, “What? What! I-I thought that it would be… funny? I guess?” “Twi,” said Spike, pinching the bridge of his nose as Twilight dropped his scaly counterpart, “seriously, we’ve got to work on your sense of humor.” “When Sweetie Belle told me that you got hurt,” Twilight said, brushing away his criticism, “I was so worried! You know that I had told you about your new scales, you knew about our plans for after your molts…” Rarity watched Spike slink down into a pose of supplication, perhaps anticipating some form of discipline, one that he knew he rightly deserved. “But, Sweetie Belle told me how scared you were,” Twilight said, her tone dropping down into one that was far more concerned and gentle, “and I wanted to think of something… something to show you that it was okay. It’s going to be okay, Spike.” Rarity watched as Spike lifted his head. As she followed them with her eyes she saw Twilight looking back at Spike, saw how much concern floated above her friend. Even as she looked on the features of the other unicorn they became softer, and she lifted her hoof to him. Spike took two hesitant steps towards Twilight. Rarity watched as Twilight lifted her hoof to him again, showed him that everything was indeed alright. To Rarity it seemed as though a world of worry left Spike, as though his fears about his judgement had been cleared away. He smiled as though oceans of apprehension had washed out of him, took a few long strides, and leapt up into the offered embrace. Something moved through Rarity in a happy wave as she watched Spike lean into Twilight, as he hugged her and said that he was sorry for not listening, for doing something that he knew would get him hurt. “We make mistakes, Spike,” Twilight said, using her magic to peak beneath the bandages even as she still embraced him, “and it sure looks like you’ve already learned yours, I see. You’ll... huh, you won’t be swimming in lava any time soon, that’s for sure.” Rarity felt herself becoming just a touch jealous of Twilight, able as she was to embrace him for this long. Twilight, she knew, was free to offer him the reassurance of her touch. But Rarity was happy. She was happy that at least his immediate worries were gone, lost in the warmth of the lavender coat of the pony he knew best in the world. As Rarity looked on, she knew that Twilight was showing him that he was forgiven. His caregiver, sister, mother, and friend was showing him that she worried about him and loved him. At that, at least, Twilight had succeeded completely. She hoped that Twilight would be just as understanding with her. Together the four sat in the small shelter of the Inspiration Room, enjoying a late lunch made up of yet more snacks that Sweetie had taken upon herself to prepare. Rarity watched her little sister serve the three others, and then herself, just as a lady would. She smiled and gave a small laugh of approval. True, Sweetie’s snacks were a touch lop-sided, and perhaps the presentation could have used a touch more panache, but she was so proud of her. She smiled to Sweetie, and her sister answered her in the same way. Their relationship had grown, that the secrets of cooking and poise that she was teaching her sister were showing. She knew too that the sense of fun and freedom that her sister was teaching her in return were evident as well. She had changed, she was a better pony now. She wondered if she’d even recognize herself from Twilight’s first slumber party. Her relationship with the two friends at the table, to Spike and Twilight, that had made it all possible. She moved now to test that relationship, see if there had indeed been a breach, one for which she took the responsibility. “Spike?” Rarity whispered. “Would you please keep Sweetie company as I show Twilight something interesting?” “Sure! Oh, ummm, I mean, of course,” replied the whelp, smiling at her once more as the familiar expression fell across his face. You’re looking at her again, she thought. What does she look like at this moment, that mare that you think you see? Is she beautiful, Spike? “Twilight?” she asked, painting calm certainty into her face. “May I show you something interesting in the kitchen?” “Oh, certainly,” said Twilight, setting down her cup of tea and standing to follow her graceful friend. Together they walked the short distance to the nearby kitchen. As she entered the room she cleared her throat, and as she did the feeling of being on pins and needles went through her again. It remained as she stood before a familiar appliance. “This,” she began, “is my icebox. Isn’t it interesting, Twilight? I was told that it’s the top of the line, at least it was three years ago when I purchased it. I found it fit the décor of the room nicely.” Twilight arched her eyebrow, eyed the icebox, and turned back to Rarity with some doubt. “Ummm, yeah,” she said, “That’s… interesting?” “I’m glad you think so, Darling,” Rarity said, tossing her mane, “that makes it so that we’ve actually seen something interesting, and so therefore I’ve told the truth to that fine young man out there…” Rarity nodded towards the door, the two listening as a few happy sounds rose from where Spike and Sweetie still sat speaking. “… and that means I can now move on to why I really asked you back here, out of earshot, as it were.” Twilight turned to Rarity, tilting her head and seeking her friend’s eyes. Rarity, though, stared at the icebox door once more, trying both to find the words she needed and the strength to say them. You must tell her, Rarity, the unicorn told herself as she bit her lip, No secrets, no lies. That can only make things worse. Keeping this a secret would make it wrong, keeping it a secret would make it shameful. If you honestly believe you were doing it for him, then you must tell her… “Twilight,” she said meekly, “when Spike was in the bathtub, we were using the cold water to help stop the bleeding, as I said. Now…” “That was a good idea!” Twilight interjected, stealing some of Rarity’s resolve. “I’m impressed that you knew to….” “Yes, thank you,” Rarity interrupted, fighting to keep her momentum. “Well, Twilight, dear, you see… he got so cold. So very cold, Twilight, so I had him… had him lean into me, so that I might keep him warm.” “Uh huh,” answered Twilight. Rarity waited a few moments, swallowed again, and then continued. “I had him… hold me, so that he might keep warm,” she said, “ and, even after the water stopped, as he was still cold, he held me… and I held him, you see.” “Okay,” said Twilight. Rarity stared, blinked, wondering if Twilight could really be missing her meaning. “Even, even after he was warm, after he’d stopped trembling,” she continued, her voice beginning to rise, “I let him hold me… even though, it wasn’t absolutely necessary…” “Were you uncomfortable with him showing you that much affection?” Twilight asked, her expression barely changing. “No!” Rarity called, immediately placing her hoof to her mouth. After she regained herself she continued. “No, not at all,” she said, looking deep into Twilight’s eyes, “and that’s… that’s what I need to tell you. That I-I… I appreciate his affection, and that I did let him show it. That I showed it to him.” Twilight’s mouth came open in just the slightest, and Rarity’s eyes dove for the floor. “I… I was just so worried over him, and I wanted him to be all right! He’s… he’s dear to me, Twilight, and I… I just…” Twilight Sparkle was generally considered to be among the most educated and intelligent unicorns that her friends knew. She was generally respected as a learned individual. There was even a certain owner and operator of a noted doughnut shop in Canterlot who frequently referred to her as “a smart cookie”. Not much would escape her grasp, and even fewer things than that would get past her analytical eye. One would wonder then how something as obvious and as the growing relationship between her little summoner and her stylish friend, the one that had changed so much over the last year, could escape her notice. The simple answer, of course, is that she did know about it. The simple answer is that she understood. Rarity’s mind came alive with the soft feel of Twilight nuzzling beneath her, the touch of the other unicorn falling through her in the most unexpected way. “You wanted me to know,” Twilight said, lifting the head of the surprised mare across her shoulder, “because you never want to hurt him, that you want me to know you don’t want to hurt him… in any way…” “Twilight,” Rarity breathed. Twilight gently rocked her friend and let the feeling of her coat sit against that of the other unicorn. “I-I just don’t want, want to do anything… improper. Not that I would!” stammered the elegant mare, “Or that I’d think of it, but… I don’t want to turn him away either, or make him feel… Oh, Twilight, he hurt himself, for me! To be with me! What kind of boy does something like that? Why?” Who does he think he sees when he looks at me? Who is that mare? Why has she earned his affection? His… love… Twilight rocked Rarity that much longer, the two mares standing in the silent kitchen and swaying together as voices filtered in from the nearby room. “What kind of boy?” answered Twilight softly, lifting her head from across Rarity’s withers. “Let me show you…” Twilight turned towards the door. Lifting her hoof she beckoned Rarity to come look, and there the two unicorns stood watching the children who sat at the table in the Inspiration Room. Together they watched as the two young creatures embarked upon an impromptu science experiment, the children giggling as Sweetie arranged the cups and Spike used a tiny touch of his fire to ignite a paper napkin. As Sweetie applauded Spike looked on as the air in the glass was consumed by the flame, and the glass filled itself with water through the force of the vacuum alone. Together the two celebrated their victory, jumping happily claw-in-hoof as they sat unknowingly under the gaze of the unicorns. “The kind of boy with a great big heart,” said Twilight softly, whispering into Rarity’s ear. “One who wears his heart on his sleeve. Well, heh, if he had sleeves, of course.” Twilight and Rarity turned back into the kitchen. As they did Rarity saw Twilight smile slightly. Even as she did she became more introspective. “You know that he hugged Applejack over and over at his birthday, and you should have seen him when we went to find Fluttershy, before the hydra showed up. He’s always been my missing gregarious part, at least until I met you and the girls. He’d always go to parties in Canterlot on my behalf, and he’s always made friends so much easier than I have. He’s just that kind of guy… he’s just a great little guy…” Twilight turned back to Rarity. “He loves us, worries about us, wants to be there for us,” she said. “He tries so hard. He shows us all affection, in whatever way he knows how. He always has…” Twilight paused a moment, and then spoke a truth that Rarity had forbidden the boy in the room beyond to speak. “He loves you, you know. I mean, more so, than the way he loves the others…” Rarity took a small breath, and once more she found herself looking into Twilight’s eyes. “I know. I do know, and I don’t let him tell me. I don’t let him tell me because, because…” “Because you don’t want to hurt him,” Twilight concluded. “You don’t know how to answer him… because he’s still just a kid…” Rarity’s eyes misted over. Even as they did she felt Twilight’s nuzzle reaching for her again, and she fell freely into her touch. “He’s dear to me, Twilight. His affection means something to me. I’m sorry, but it does. I don’t want to hurt him, I don’t know how to reply…” A few tears began to roll down her face. As Twilight rocked her once again she friend moved to assuage Rarity's fears. “I trust you, Rarity,” Twilight said, leaning deeper into the purple mane of her friend, “You are dear to me, and I love you. You’re one of the best friends I’ve ever had. I trust you. I know you won’t go anywhere with his love that would hurt him, that you won’t misuse it. I believe in you, I know who you are inside…” Oh, Rarity mused as she wiped her face along Twilight’s shoulders, another resident of the library who sees that mare? I presume such insight must be a family trait, then. I wonder if the Owliscious and the fledgling share in it as well… “No, I wouldn’t,” she said, lifting her bleary eyes and looking into Twilight’s face, “I’d not do anything that changes the way he… sees me. I do love his little signs of affection though, I must admit. I do so enjoy the way your great little guy is so free with his feelings…” Twilight laughed a little, lifted her hoof to wipe the tear from Rarity’s face. “I do too,” said Twilight, “He’s such a great little guy… our great little guy.” With a shared whimper the two mares smiled and rested their heads together once more as the small, happy sounds continued to lift from the two children in the room nearby. “I do like your icebox, Rarity,” said Twilight with a tiny laugh that got lost in sniffle. "Thank you, Darling," Rarity answered, a smile seated on her face and a tear escaping her eye. “But, but I already said I was sorry, Twi,” spoke Spike earnestly, trying to turn and look up to her as she readjusted some of his bandages. “Yes,” she said, “but I want to hear it. Oh, and we are going to talk about some appropriate discipline when we get back home. You did intentionally ignore our ‘Post Molt Contingencies’, after all.” Spike’s expression deflated again, and he ran his hands up and down his arms. “I’m sorry,” Spike replied. “Rarity, I’m sorry that I lied to you. I’m sorry that put you through all of this.” Rarity smiled down at him. “Well,” she said as she helped Twilight put the bandages back in order, “we do make mistakes, and we’ll know better in the future, shan’t we?” Something hung there in the air as they wrapped him once more, as the faintest of red marks appeared against the bandages and began to dry into the purple she had seen earlier. She waited, knowing full well what fear still hung upon him. “Rarity?” Spike asked, still rubbing his arm with his clawed hand. “Is that true, about the future? Am… am I still allowed to come here, even after all of this?” He looked up to find her staring down over him with a smile. Her purple mane, uncharacteristically loose after the odd day that had developed, fell around him as she looked him in the eye. “You are always welcome here, Spike,” she said with a soft giggle, “A lady appreciates the presence of a gentleman, you know.” “A lady…” he answered once again. His expression went soft, and once more she basked in the feeling of sitting in his gaze. Does she look back at you in a way that you adore, Spike? How do you know that she appreciates the way you look at her? How did that mare earn your adoration, Darling? “Alright Spike,” Twilight said, turning through the doorway of Carousel Boutique, “let’s get you home and…” Twilight stopped. As she looked upon them Spike’s arms came up slowly, but quickly retreated. Soon he began to lift them again with small motions, almost as though he was unsure. It took Twilight a second, but as she saw Rarity making small motions of her own she quickly realized to where they were moving. Twilight stood standing in the doorway as Spike and Rarity embraced one another, the ambient sounds of the streets of Ponyville sitting around her as the light of the afternoon sun played in the windows of the boutique. Rarity watched and waved as Twilight and Spike prepared to leave. She suddenly realized that Sweetie Belle wasn’t at her side. In fact, she hadn’t seen or heard a word from her sister since the group had returned to the doorway. “Sweetie?” she called as she turned and looked across the room. “Come and say goodbye to Twilight and Spike, Dearest…” As Rarity found her sibling, the face of the older unicorn mirrored the disgust and horror that sat upon the face of her younger sister. Rarity’s magic wrapped around her sister, freeing her from the awful enchantment and pulling her away from the scene that had frozen her in disgust. With that Rarity’s magic opened the door and her voice rang out into the street. “Twilight!” she desperately called, waving the doppelganger made of Spike’s molt above her. “You will be taking this, won’t you? Please?” Completing the outline of Sweetie Belle’s dress took a few minutes longer than Rarity had anticipated. As she looked down at the pincushion that she wore wrapped to her hoof she realized that she hadn't enough pins to continue her work. She sighed as she realized there was only one place where she could find more. She looked up to see her sister smiling at her with a devilish grin. What could she be thinking? “Sweetie, Dearest?” she asked, lifting the form of the dress from her sister, “Would you perhaps do me a favor? Could you go straighten up the kitchen? I have to… well, tidy up the bathroom.” Sweetie began to step down, her knowing smile still spread across her face. “Oh? And what is it that has you smiling so, Sweetie?” Rarity asked as she gently folded the nascent beginnings of the dress over her outstretched foreleg. “Heh, Rarity, do you know that Spike loves you?” Sweetie Belle sang out, her characteristic squeak accenting the crucial word. Rarity tried to hide her surprise, not even turning to look upon Sweetie’s wide grin. Still, she had given a small jump. Even as she went through the motions of gathering up the rest of her materials, she prepared the best way to phrase what followed. “Yes, I’m aware that he’s fond of me, Sweetie,” she quickly stated before attempting to change the topic, “Did you two have fun with your little experiment? While I’m not fond of you playing with an open flame, I did see that you were learning about…” “Do you lo…” Sweetie Belle began. She was made to stop very quickly, as in one quick motion Rarity’s hoof had sat gently but firmly against her lips. A long glance fell between the sisters. “Please do finish up cleaning the kitchen, Dearest,” Rarity said as she lifted her hoof from Sweetie’s lips. She ushered her sister along, watching the bouncing steps of the foal as some small song began to rise from her sister. After a few moments, Rarity sighed once more and climbed the stairs. Rarity looked down over the small pile of pins that sat in the sink. Little lines of purple traced the bowl of the sink, marking where they had rolled along before settling to a stop. Rarity found herself pondering what part of dragon’s blood made it change color from the deep red of earlier to the purple that sat before her. Oh Spike, you poor dear, you poor darling boy, she thought, looking from the deep purple of her own mane to that of the pool at the bottom of her sink. You even bleed purple, in the end. Does she know how much you love her? What has she offered you in exchange for such devotion? She opened the tap, and as the sound of the warm water splashed through the bathroom, she carefully washed each pin, letting each one rest upon the damp remains of the towel, the one that was now forever stained with his blood. He did this for her, she told herself as she scrubbed away the last of the stains upon the porcelain. He did this for that mare, that beautiful, wonderful, generous mare he thinks he sees. He hurt himself just to be near her, to be close to her. She looked over the bathroom one last time, and as she departed to the Inspiration Room that thought lingered in her mind. He loves her, wants nothing more that to be with her… make her happy. Why? What can he possibly see in her? As she sat herself down at her sewing machine, Rarity began to attempt to work upon the dress, but soon she found that she had already stopped and was simply staring at the wall. She began again, looking over the design once more before squinting past the glasses that sat upon her nose and concentrating on the work. It was useless. In a few moments, she found herself simply staring at the wall once more as the sewing machine slowed to a stop and the glasses hung limp upon her face. She’s given him practically nothing! She’s taken, well… asked for, in all fairness, far more than she’s given him! Rarity rested her head in her hooves, unknowingly jarring her glasses even farther askew. As she looked up to the sewing machine again she sat for another long moment. He goes through that just to be with that mare… he just wants to be with her, be near her. He doesn’t want anything from her, there’s no price he wants for his affection. He doesn’t want anything other than to be with her. He’d even risk hurting himself just to spend time with her… that mare he thinks he sees when he looks at me… He loves her. He loves me. As Rarity wiped her hooves across her mouth and across her eyes, she knocked the glasses from her face and sent them falling to the floor. Inside Rarity different emotions flew around, each one bouncing off of her perceptions. She stared down at the sewing machine, simply gazed over the embossed steel name of the manufacturer as remembrances drifted through her. She’d had stallions profess their love to her over and over. She’d had colts spinning in the twist of her elegance since she was in grade school. Candy, flowers, cards… jewels rare and valuable. These had all been heaped upon her by stallions who had lied to themselves… or who had lied to her boldly. “Love”, they would say, and she would pretend to believe them. It was not love that had made them play their games. It was lust. Desire. Desire to possess her, to have a beautiful mare. These things she had come to accept as a parody of love. These things she had learned far, far, far too early to take in place of what her heart truly demanded, what it longed for. And she had played the game right back at them. She had batted her eyes at them, pouted her lips. She had taught herself to paint the farce, to use her charms to catch the eye of stallions in high places and with "the right contacts". She was just as guilty as they were. It had been a lie shared between her and the willing participants in that mockery of love, the parody of love that fell far short of the romantic notions she had once held. That was over. That was gone. That Rarity, long ill and fading, had died in a fit of rage at the gala. That Rarity had drowned that night in the indifference of a prince whom, if the rumors were correct, had (at that time) been more concerned with what went up his nose than what sat before his eyes. This Rarity had no need for that, for any of that. This Rarity had no need for that because Spike loved her. “Here!” she cried aloud, waving her arms dramatically, invoking the voice of the cruel reality. “Do you wish to finally have someone in your life who loves you for who you truly are? Someone whom looks upon you in adoration for doing nothing more than being true to yourself? Someone who sees not the flaws, but what lies beneath? You do? Well, here!” Rarity spun from the chair. She stood upon her rear legs, placed the back of her foreleg to her forehead. With an impassioned moan she collapsed upon her bed. There she continued to play the part of the cruel fates that tormented her. “Do you wish for such a stallion? Do you truly wish for such a man? One who loves you without condition?” she continued as her legs kicked at the air. “Not asking for much, are we, Rarity? Here then! Have one!” “Oh! By the way, Rarity, you old dried-up Jezebel,” she choked as her body deflated, “he’s a boy of about twelve… and a lizard. Surprise.” It was unfair. It was utterly unfair. Rarity blinked her eyes, forcing the water from them before they could become tears. She focused on her breathing. She let her head settle farther back onto the bed for an instant before sitting upright. There, upon the nightstand, stood the black velvet box. Rarity gently lifted it from the table, held it to her chest as though it were a sacred relic. She opened it slowly. She had a dozen names for the fire ruby. The Heart’s Desire, the Heart’s Afire, the Light of Love, each one sappier and less easily explained than the last. None of them came to her now, though. Now she stared down into it as it sat perfectly in the gold setting, shining in the soft velvet lining of the box. Hello, she said, staring into the eyes of the mare who was reflected back to her in the shimmering surfaces of the ruby, Would you, by any chance, be that mare, the one that Spike sees? The one who has earned and deserves his love? Are you the mare who can be trusted with his perfect love? Are you the mare who merits the love of that child, innocent and pure as it is? If you are, please, please, please help me become you… please, oh please I beg of you… please… She studied the fire ruby some more, once again pondering the very minutes that it had shown her how deep and real his love for her was… how he’d given it to her of his own free will and without expectation of reward. How he’d been dragged back from the monster he’d become when she had placed her hoof upon it and refused to surrender it. The vision returned to her as she stared deeper into the ruby. Once again she saw him begin to tell her of his crush, to make the deliberate, certain steps towards professing his love as they plummeted through the sky together. It was not a lie. There had been no other motives. It had been real. It was an honest, earnest desire to let her know what he felt. Once again she felt herself place her hoof to his lips, let him know that she knew. It seems there must always be something between us, Darling, she told herself as she ran her hoof across the surface of the ruby, because you know how I am with precious things. No, she could not have let him say it then. She cannot let him say it now. She could not because it terrified her. If he had said it, what other choice would she have had but to tell him the truth? If she told him the truth, then his heart would be hers, and that truly and utterly terrified her. How easily he’d simply give it to her, let her claim it forever. Terrifying, completely and absolutely terrifying. A majestic, wondrous heart that could beat for centuries, a millennia, or more… what could possibly make her worthy of such a precious gift? Spike was still a child, and as such he had no notion of the things that she’d mistaken for love. His was the love of a child, a love without the complications of adult drives and feelings. His love was still pure, uncomplicated, unblemished. She was... blemished. But not irrecoverably so. His love had proven that to her, had shown her that despite her vanity, her apparent shallowness, her complaining (and whining), that there was still a very real reason why the Element of Generosity had chosen her. There must be some twinkle in her eyes, something of the mare Spike saw. She must be there, hiding in her own eyes. She had once called him her hero, had said it there on the bridge before she’d given him that second, well-deserved kiss. That remained true. It remained so utterly true. He had saved her, had saved her in the light of his love… helped her see that she had worth. She was getting better, recovering in his love. Not just his love though, but also in the love of her friends, the love that Twilight had brought all of them. She was so much better now, so different. Would that Rarity, the dead one, have worried over Fluttershy so when that Cretan changed her? Would that dead and decaying husk have been so upset over the loss of Sweetie’s love? Would that ghost have fawned over Spike so? No, but this Rarity would. This Rarity did. This Rarity, she thought, is becoming the one Spike sees. She’s trying so hard to become her. She leaned backwards and fell into the pillow as the ruby glistened in the sun that streaked through the window. Rarity stared back into the Heart’s Afire, looked back into the eyes of a Rarity that sat somewhere between the dead one and the one she longed to be. She did not know when she fell asleep, but she knew that she had because the wind was whistling by her ears. Falling dreams are supposed to be nightmares. Falling dreams are supposed to make those who dream them come awake with screams. Falling dreams are supposed make the dreamer pour sweat upon their sheets and sit up in their beds and tremble with a thick, palpable fear. This was no nightmare. The dreamer did not come awake. Instead the dreamer kept her mind in the moment, fought to remain in the dream. This was no nightmare. This was the sweetest kind of dream. This was the dream where she was carried through the air by a grown dragon, one that sat his clawed hands gently against her forelegs as they wrapped around his neck. Together they fell through the sky as he swooped low and they parted the clouds, her jubilant cries filling the moist air. This was the dream where they landed upon a high ledge beside the great cascading waterfalls, a place only they knew. This was the dream where they had their picnic among the great mossy oaks that clung to the mountainside as the cascades fell and became vapor far beneath them. This was the dream where he laid her down in the sweet smelling grasses, the dream where he ran his fingers through her mane and told her over and over how beautiful she was, how much he adored her. This was the dream of that perfect time in the future, of that time where fate had not been so cruel and they could finally be together, of the time where she could let him say the words. This was the dream of the time when she no longer had to be on pins and needles as he began to make his profession. The large, powerful dragon stared tenderly into her eyes and began to finally say the words… “Rarity?” She reached up, put her hoof beside his face… guided his hand down to her even as he prepared the words, let him touch her. To her it felt like being touched for the first time, touched by someone who truly loved her instead of just lusted for her. His lips came open… “Rarity?” No, it was not his voice, the voice of the mature dragon. It was not Spike’s voice, but that once again of Sweetie Belle. Rarity awoke once more to find that she had dozed off again, the afternoon having sped on that much more. Rarity found the black velvet box still upon her chest. She wiped her eyes with the back of her hoof and looked to the door. “Sweetie,” Rarity asked blearily, “is something wrong?” “Ummm, yeah,” Sweetie said, wiping her hoof back and forth a little bit across the floor. “Hey, Rarity, you know how you asked me to clean the kitchen? Well, ummm, I tried… but I kinda, well, made it worse…” “Oh dear,” she said with a startle. She quickly regained herself and painted a mischievous smirk. “Is anything on fire, Dearest?” “Oh, ummm… no, not really,” Sweetie said as she took a few more steps into the room. “Oh, well,” Rarity continued, letting her head rest on her hoof, “Is anything down there turning into a huge, threatening monster that could possible devour Ponyville, Sweetie?” “Umm, no?” answered Sweetie Belle, looking back to her sister. “Ah. I take it that you opened a portal to some other dimension, then, and some horrible demon is now emerging in my kitchen? Defiling my teapot, is he?” Rarity answered as she smiled back at Sweetie. “No, wait, what?” asked Sweetie Belle, arching her eyebrow. “Ah, well… if there’s no real immediate threat to our well-being then I suggest only one course of action,” Rarity said, lifting her forelegs to where the little unicorn stood. “Namely, my dearest little sister, please come here so that I can fix your mane.” It took Sweetie Belle a second to understand, but as soon as she did her face came alight. “Really?” she asked as her squeak once more sounding out around the room. A radiant smile beamed from her as she pranced forward into Rarity’s offered hooves. Soon the peals of her Sweetie’s laughter filled the room, her sister tickling her over and over as they sat upon the bed. Soon they had settled, and as Rarity worked to put her sibling’s mane in order she teased her, mentioning the names of young colts at school whom she thought might have crushes on her baby sister. The other Rarity, the dead one, she’d not do this. She’d not have been so sweet with her little sister, she thought as Sweetie laughed and denied each claim with cries of “Ewww!” or “He’s gross!” She would not have been so forgiving with her after the Gabby Gums unpleasantness. She would not have covered herself in mud to salvage this love. Rarity felt Sweetie growing quieter, felt the tiredness that the unusual day had draped around the little girl. She quieted her voice, and soon her little sister was napping across her forelegs. Rarity moved dinner an hour or so in her mind, re-arranged the rest of her day, and then laid her head upon the pillow once more. She ran her hoof through Sweetie’s mane, listened to her little breaths, and thought once more of those other mares. I’m not her. I’m not either of them. I am not the one who I left behind. Yet, I am not the one you see, Spike. I wish to be her, but I am not her. I am only myself. This Rarity, she thought as she slowly gathered the sleeping form of Sweetie Belle closer, can only be herself, Spike. She cannot deny her feelings, cannot help but appreciate the love you give her, Darling. That beautiful, unconditional, pure love… the innocent love, the one you give so freely. This Rarity honors that. Rarity turned her head, and with a tender smile she gazed over the fire ruby once more as it sat shining in its box. This Rarity has a hero. This Rarity has a Prince Charming, one she waits for as he gallantly goes off on his crusades to save her heart from its perils. She turned and rested her head above that of Sweetie Belle. She listened to the sounds of the city streets of Ponyville that came in through the window on the small breezes, bringing with it spring scents and distant voices. This Rarity knows of your feelings, Spike. She cherishes them. This Rarity loves you. She closed her eyes. In moments Rarity was drawn down once again into her interrupted nap. Soon she dreamed of being the mare that Spike saw when he looked at her, the radiant mare buried deep within her. This was the sweetest kind of dream, a dream where she floated on waves of happiness as she became that mare, the one he adored. In the dream she transfigured herself into that mare, the one who had earned the way he looked at her with warm emerald eyes, the one who he saw when he floated in her presence. As their dreams overtook them the sisters napped softly. Around them the afternoon wore away and slight spring breezes jostled the curtains. End.
