Celestia’s sun shined down brightly on Ponyvile’s marketplace, giving light to not only the shops and their merchandise, but to the ponies shopping as well. One pony’s white coat shined the brightest out of all of them, but what else did one expect from somepony so fabulous?

Rarity hummed to herself as she trotted through the market. Her saddlebags were stuffed to the seams with faric only found in excoit places. Oh, what a lucky find she had found! It was amazing that a shopkeeper from Ponyville was able to get so many, and selling it for a price that she could afford. How much had it been? For some reason she couldn’t re--

“Oh!” A surprised gasp escaped her when she saw Amethyst standing in the middle of the busy crowd, her back towards Rarity as she looked at something. “Oh, Amethyst dear~” Rarity sang out as she ran over to her. “Darling, I was hoping to run into y--”:

“Why, Rarity?!” Lemon Heart suddenly turned around, causing Rarity to jump back a bit. Tears streamed down her face as she continued to yell, “why did you ruin our friendship?!”

None of the ponies in the market paid them any mind, as if they weren’t there. Nopony flinched as Amethyst screamed at her and cried in the middle of the street.

Rarity frowned. “Amethyst, I-I didn’t mean to.” She spoke softly, afraid that anything she said would upset Lemon Heart further. “It was an accident.” She gulped. The rising guilt in her chest weighing her down even more than the gems stuffed inside her saddlebags.

“An accident?! You spied on me!” The yellow coated mare yelled. “If you hadn’t, none of this would be happening! I would still have my best friend!”

“I didn’t know I was spying on you!” Rarity held her hoof out to Amethyst, but the mare stepped away from it. “I really did think it was play!”

“Are you stupid?!” Amethyst screamed in the empty streets. Steam rose from her face as her tears evaporated the moment they left her eyes, caused by the rising heat from the fire surrounding the world around them. “Why would we be in a play?! Even if we were, why would it be about what happened with Colgate!”

“I DON’T KNOW!” Rarity shouted. They were standing twenty feet a part on opposite sides of the dark, closed off room. The lantern hanging above them swung from side to side, at times illuminating Lemon Heart’s purple coat. “I JUST...I JUST COULDN’T BELIEVE THAT THE RADIO COULD ALLOW ME TO HEAR YOUR CONVERSATION!”

“You’ve ruined my life!” AmethLemon yelled. The two ponies were fused together with Amethyst being the right side, and Lemon Heart being the left. They stood beside Rarity’s kitchen table. On the table right by them was the radio. It crackled and made static noises, but Rarity could hardly hear it. She was more focused on AmethLemon, standing an inch from their faces.

“I-I didn’t--” Rarity started, but a shout from AmethLemon cut her off.

“I don’t want to hear it! You ruined our friendship! It’s all your fault! All your fault!” They repeated the last sentence over and over, getting louder and louder each turn. Spit flew from their mouth and landed on Rarity’s face, but she didn’t care. All she could do was stand there, her body shaking like a leaf, while tears poured down her face.

“All your fault! All your fault!” A deep darkness crawled from somewhere and slowly covered everything around her. Everything it touched disappeared into its inky darkness, no longer existing. She couldn’t say anything as the darkness crawled up AmethLemon, erasing them right before Rarity’s eyes. Despite this though, their voice was still heard, now louder and clearer now that there was nothing to absorb the vibration of their voice.

“All your fault! All your fault!” The voice echoed around her and multiplied, sounding like it was being shouted by a hundred ponies at the same time.

Rarity whimpered as she stumbled back. “I’m sorry!” She cried out, but the voices ignored her and continued to chant at her, growing louder with each second.

:I’M SORRY! I’M SORRY! I’M SORRY!” She screamed at the top of her lungs, but she couldn’t hear her own voice among the sea of voices.

“ALL YOUR FAULT!”

“Please, stop!”

“ALL YOUR FAULT!”

“Help! Somepony help me!”

“ALL YOUR FAULT!”

She clasped down to the floor. Her body shook as her sobs escaped her lips, coming out more of a scream than a cry. She pressed her hooves against her ears, but the sounds of this dark world continued to move past and straight into her brain.

“ALL YOUR FAULT!”

Her head ached with each new yell, feeling as if it would break open at any moment. In between the yells there was a crackling noise. It started off soft, but soon grew and grew in volume until it matched the volume of the voices.

The scream that came out of Rarity could only be described as blood curling. “MAKE IT STOP!” She cried. “STOP IT! STOP!”

“Stop!”

Her eyes flew open with a jolt. Her vision was a lurred mess of light, but before she could focus and fix it, a sharp pain struck her head. She groaned and shut her eyes. She raised her hoof to rub at her temple, but that did nothing soothe the ache.

What seemed like minutes--but was more likely a few seconds--her brain started to wake up and recognize her surroundings. The first thing she noticed was the cold feel of tiles pressed against her fur. A shiver ran over her body, causing her limbs to twitch.

‘Where am I?’ She thought to herself.

Her ears twitched as a familiar sound finally registered in them. The grating sound of static broke through the haze that covered her mind. She groaned and slowly opened her eyes.

Unlike before, her eyes adjusted faster to the environment before. What was once a blurry mess, was now the familiar sight of her kitchen ceiling. She squinted as Celestia’s sunlight lit up her small kitchen, illuminating everything there, something that only happened in the afternoon when the sun was at its highest.

‘I must have forgotten to close the curtains.’ She mused before her situation truly came to her mind. ‘Wait, why am I here? Why aren’t I in my room, in my comfy bed and under my silk sheets?’

She turned her head to the side and saw the radio sitting beside her. She let out a frightful scream and smacked her hoof against it. The radio flew back from her smack and rolled across the floor until it landed under her table. The static continued to pour from the speakers, though now quieter than it had been next to ear.

She scrambled up to her hindquarters, and scooted in the opposite direction from the radio until her back was pressed up against her cabinets, stopping her from going any further. Her heart pounded against her chest, her breath fell from her mouth in heaves, and sweat trickled down her forehead. All from just seeing the radio.

‘Get ahold of yourself, Rarity!’ She scolded herself. ‘It’s just a radio. No need to be afraid of it.’

It wasn’t just a normal radio though. A normal radio would just play music, the local news, or a skit. It wouldn’t broadcast the private conversations of ponies. Something was different about this radio. Something wrong.

Who would make such a thing? And how? The only ponies she could think of would be ones in the military services. Using it to spy on enemy nations, like the changelings. That would make the most sense, but....then why was it sent to her? The package clearly had her name on it. She doubted there was a military pony with the name Rarity, and even if there was, why would it be addressed as being sent from a secret admirer?

‘Unless...that was just to keep enemy spies away from it.’

She gasped. She could see it now: A mare named Rarity was to receive a package that contained a radio that would allow her to hear the secret conversations of Equestria’s dangerous enemies. To make sure no one else got it, an address was not written on it, and it was signed as from being a secret admirer, but there had been a mix up at the postal service, and the package had been sent to Rarity, the fashionista located in Ponyville. The radio had focused on her neighbors and revealed their conversations to her, if she used the dials to focus on the correct locations.

Now the military was no doubt wondering where their package was, and would no doubt be searching all over Equestria for i--

A loud shriek escaped from her mouth. Before she knew what she was doing ,her body was up and her horn was lit up in its familiar light blue aura. She ignored the rising headache from using her magic in her distressed state. She reached out with her magic to grab the radio and lift it off the ground.

She turned and ran out of her kitchen. She didn’t need to think about where she was going, because she already knew. She knew the one place that would keep the radio away from the eyes and ears of other ponies. A place nopony would dare to look.

She threw the door open and threw the radio inside. She slammed the door just as the sounds of boxes falling, and the hard smack of the radio hitting the floor was heard. She didn’t care. She hoped it broke for all she cared.

She glanced up at the white sign she had put on the door. It was similar to the other signs she had put up on the door all those years ago, when she first opened her Boutique. In cursive hornwriting, two purple words were written on the sign; storage supply.

It was a simple sign that let customers know that what was behind the door was not for them, and that only employees were allowed in it. She wasn’t naive though. No, no, no. She knew a simple sign wasn’t enough to keep curious young hooves, and nosey older ponies from trying to get inside. To keep them out would require the next step.

She ran from the door and rushed up the stairs leading to the second floor of her Boutique. She let out an annoyed grunt as her right front hoof slipped on a step, almost causing her to fall down. She quickly forced it back up and continued to run.

She slammed her hooves into her bedroom door with all her strength. It flew open and slammed into her wall, but she paid it no attention. Instead her focus was on the large vanity that sat across from the doorway’s entrance. She didn’t waste a second as she ran over and jerked the drawer in it open. The sudden jerk shook the vanity, and moved what was inside it around. She levitated a key out from the drawer and held it before her eyes.

It was a silver key with two bits at the end. A long body ran from the top of the key to the bottom, where it turned into a diamond shaped handle, making it look exactly like one of the diamonds’ on Rarity’s flank.

The key was part of a three part series she had, with the other two locking other parts of the Boutique. They looked all the same to the average pony, but to the trained eye one could see a difference in each. Only Rarity knew which one went into each lock. It was the perfect thief protection.

She had the other two keys located in different locations, but that didn’t matter right now. All she needed was this key.

She turned and once again ran out of her room, and down the stairs. Her hooves quickly rushed out in front of each other, trying to get her down them as fast as possible. By some miracle she hadn’t tripped and went head first down the stairs, or even stumbled like she did going up them.

She slammed her hooves down on the floor when she neared the door. With timing that the likes of Rainbow Dash could easily pull off, she slid until she stopped in front of the storage room door. She shoved the key into the lock and turned it as fast as she could. The second she heard the click of it locking, her body suddenly became heavy. Her knees buckled and she fell to the floor, unable to hold up her weight.

She wasn’t aware until that moment just how hard her breathing had become, shaking her body with each pant she let out. She ached all over as her muscles screamed at her for overusing them, reminding her that she was a fashionista, not an athlete. She could hear her heartbeat in her ears, beating a mile a minute. The sound only increased her headache, making it pulse almost as bad as her heart rate.

She groaned and tried to lift her front hoof to press against her head, but a sudden sharp pain halted her movement. She let out a hiss between her clenched teeth. What was that?

She looked down and saw in the middle of her leg had been scrapped, removing a patch of fur and exposing the skin underneath. A thin trail of blood traveled down her leg.

‘How...how had I not noticed this?’ She thought, her mind a bit sluggish from the overwork of her body. She thought back to when she rushed up the stairs like a madmare, and had stumbled. ‘I guess the stairs cut my leg. It’s nothing too bad, so it can wait.’

She closed her eyes and lit up her horn. A sharp pain struck the base of her horn. She could feel her magic almost canceling out. She gritted her teeth and forced the rest of her energy into her horn. She knew it was never advised to push past one's own limits, and she always obeyed that rule, but right now she needed to do this.

She clenched her eyes tighter as she focused on the spell she wanted. It wasn’t a difficult one, but it took a lot of energy and magic to use it. Many unicorns could learn it, but many chose not to. Rarity herself only used it in dire situations. The only unicorn she knew that used it frequently was her friend, Twilight Sparkle, who didn’t seem to tire out from using it. A unicorn’s magic power not only came from practice, but also their cutie marks. Spells that related to the unicorn’s talent took less energy to use than it did for ponies whose talent was something else. So it was no surprise that Twilight--who’s cutie mark was magic itself--had no trouble casting a spell as if it was a low level spell not unlike levitation.

She opened her eyes just as a purple cushion appeared before her in a white flash. It fell onto her front legs with a soft ‘plop.’ The cushion was from her living room sofa.

The aura around her horn fizzled out. Small sparks shot out from her horn, signaling that she was out of magic and that it would take awhile to build back up. She expected this though. She knew it was a huge risk to use a spell of that level in her state, but she also knew that if she had stuck with the levitation spell, the pain in her head would have increased with each passing second. The pain would have worn on her until she gave up. It was better to have one huge pain at once instead of dragging it out after all.

She laid her head down on the cushion. If she was going to be stuck there while her body rested, she might as well be comfortable.

She hadn’t noticed earlier, but now that she was more calm, she could feel the hot sweat that stuck to her body. She could just imagine it clinging to her fur. Not to mention the germs from laying on her floo-

“If I think anymore, I might throw up,” she gagged. She shook her head to get the images out of her mind. “Just relax. All this will be future Rarity’s problem--” she paused “--just like getting the blood stain out of the cushion.”

She let out a sigh, relaxing all the muscles in her aching body. As sleep slowly consumed her, she thought one final thing;

‘I hope future Rarity is a better mare than I.’

Author's Note

This chapter was rewritten 3 times. The first time I already described in my blog post, the second time was due to me logging out of my google account and losing the password and having to make a new one. What's interesting is how different each chapter was: The first chapter was a large timeskip, second one I can't talk about cause it'll happen next chapter, and this one is the aftermath of the last chapter.

Be sure to comment~