It was sunset on the third day, and after dealing with another crowd for a few hours, things had settled down again. I'd come to start sincerely liking the dress, and I was slowly learning how to tolerate the heels as well. I still didn't like them, but in my situation, I really had no choice.

As I was cleaning a glass, the chatter got killed when the saloon doors dramatically got slammed open. I looked up, half expecting a fight, but there in the doorway was Rainbow Dash herself. When she saw me, her eyes shrunk to pinpricks and her wings shot straight up so quickly, I felt a light breeze from the motion. "Uhhh. . ." was all she got out before she ran off, leaving the doors to slowly close on their own.

"What was with her wings?" I thought as I went back to glass cleaning, soon not worrying about it.

"Guys, I can't go in there!" Rainbow moaned to her friends, her wings still up. "I. . . I just can't!"

For a moment, everyone was quiet, wondering just what could have evoked such a reaction. Finally, Applejack did. “What was it, sugarcube?”

“Y-Yang. She. . . She’s. . .” Rainbow took a calming breath before continuing, her wings starting to relax. “Do you remember that time we came here and Pinkie put on a lame musical number about sharing and wore that dress? This is like that, but, like, a hundred times worse.”

Rarity stepped up and put a foreleg across Rainbow’s withers. “It will be fine, darling. It was that saloon over there, right?”

“The Rusty Horseshoe, yes.”

“Such a dreadful name, but I will endure. Who else is coming with me?”

A few minutes after Rainbow dashed off, Rarity came in with a light purple suitcase, and stopped after only a few steps in when she saw me. “Oh. . . Oh my.”

I happily waved to the stunned mare. “Hi, Rarity!”

One stallion at a table near the door took a look at Rarity, slammed down his cards, and walked up to her, already mad about something. “You lookin’ to cause trouble here, missy?”

Rarity slightly recoiled from the stallion with a foreleg defensively raised. “Sweet Celestia, no! I’m just here to deliver something to Yang, that’s all.”

I slowly dragged a gloved hand down my face. “He’s fanatic. . . And now she’s getting surrounded. What can I do, what can I do?”

The office door opened up and Mr. Tender looked over the scene. “Again?”

I could sense the rising tension and felt that nobody could stop the fight, so I went up to my temporary boss. “Mr. Tender, can you do something for me really fast so I can stop the-” A stallion threw a punch at Rarity, who dodged and somehow pulled off an elegant roundhouse kick counter “-fight.”

Not wanting to get involved in the growing fight, he turned to me. “Name it.”

“I have a belt with pouches on it in my room, and it would be faster if you got it for me so I can put a stop to this. I can’t run in these heels.”

“. . . Ah hope you’re right, Yang.” Mr. Tender ran up the stairs as the fight started escalating. To my amazement, Rarity was actually holding her own really well, surprising me with what looked like kung fu, or some kind of martial art. When Mr. Tender came back with the belt, Rarity had managed to get to the point where she was kicking off of the ponies that were trying to beat her up, stallions and mares alike. “Here.”

I accepted the belt, reached into the pouch for bands, and pulled a purple one out before walking towards the fight, slotting the ammo into one of the Ember Celica. “Mr. Tender, you can take any repair costs out of my pay. Shouldn’t be much, though.”

“Repair costs?”

I aimed the gauntlet towards the roof and slam fired one round. Immediately, the fight came to a stop and I felt my eyes go red as I assumed authority. “Anyone who doesn’t want to get thrown across the street, back off of the white unicorn and settle down!” Immediately, Rarity and her suitcase were given a clear space. “Thank you.” I waved Rarity towards me, and as she followed with the suitcase, I turned to Mr. Tender, my eyes going back to purple. “I’m taking my break, sir.”

“O-of course, Yang.” Mr. Tender said before taking my place behind the bar in the silence that followed my actions.

I lead Rarity upstairs and to my room, and I sat down on the bed as she closed the door. “Oh, that wasn’t a good thing to see.”

“I wasn’t expecting such. . . hostility from them,” Rarity said as she came over. “I mean, the Appleloosans have always been a bit rowdy, but that was just uncalled for.” After putting the suitcase on my bed, she continued. “Changing topics, you look amazing! Who made that ensemble for you? It’s simply amazing!”

“Silk, one of the showmares. Unicorn.”

Rarity’s tone became a bit more interrogative. “And how, exactly, did she convince you to wear it? And those shoes! How did she manage to get you into those?”

“It was more of a desperate thing on my part, really. I didn’t think she would make anything like this, and I didn’t have any other choices that I’d feel good about making.”

“Hmph. Anyways, Luna asked me to bring some things here for your time here, so there you are.”

I opened the suitcase and smiled at the contents. “Thanks, Rarity.” I’d never been so happy to see clean underwear before, along with some clothes I didn’t recognize. “Did you make all these from scratch?”

“All of it. I even made a new ensemble for you, on the bottom. When she told me you were in Appleloosa, I felt inspired and just had to make it.”

After moving the normal clothes on top aside, I found a box, labelled Sunflower, that took up nearly a third of the suitcase and opened it up. The first thing I saw was a pair of boots with pointed toes, heels that looked really easy to walk in compared to the ones I was wearing, and yellow laces on the front. Right under them was a stetson hat with my emblem on the front of it. Under the hat was something else, something I wasn’t expecting: a picture. “Rarity, what’s this?”

The white mare somehow grew pale at the sight of the picture. “Uhhh. . .”

I looked through the rest of the box’s contents and saw more pieces of the outfit, though I didn’t see any of the armor pieces, which worked for me. “You know, now that I think about it, didn’t you also make an outfit for me from a picture around Nightmare Night? Where did you get this?”

“Twilight gave it to me, like the Nightmare Night one.”

I narrowed my eyes at Rarity. “Where did Twilight get it, then?”

Rarity fidgeted a bit before answering. “I. . . sort of know. I know how she gets to the place, and where she goes and leaves from, but I’ve never been there myself.”

I looked at the picture again. “Tell her that I want to know. Is she in town?”

“Rainbow, Fluttershy, Pinkie, Applejack, and Twilight came with me, yes.”

“And they didn’t come in because. . .”

Twilight raised a hoof. “I would cause too much of a commotion as a Princess.”

Fluttershy raised a hoof. “I don’t like the smell.”

Applejack raised a hoof. “Ah wouldn’t be caught dead around here with a suitcase like that.”

Pinkie raised a hoof. “I’m still banned from the saloons here.”

Rainbow buried her face in her hooves as her wings went back up.

“They all had their reasons, dear. I’ll let Twilight know about your interest in that picture’s source.”

“Thanks. I’ll try it on whenever I'm off. Is there anything else that's been happening?"

"Well, Twilight cured the ponies that got sick from that sludge stuff. They're all making good recoveries. She also destroyed all the samples she had after that. Like her, I couldn't see anything good coming from such a toxic substance."

"Neither can I. So, are we done here?"

"I believe so. I'll see you later, then." With that, Rarity left the room and I started putting things back in the suitcase.

It wasn't long before I saw Rarity again. She'd managed to pull Silk offstage and was sitting at a table with her, just talking it up, likely about their shared skills and interest in making clothes and the fact that both had made things for me. Truly, it was a very exclusive club they were in.

About half an hour after I returned to my spot behind the bar, Applejack came in and found Rarity. They talked for a bit, then Rarity was stunned when she saw the clock. After some quick farewells to Silk, she went with Applejack, both of them waving back to me as they left the saloon.

A few minutes later, Mr. Tender came over to me. "Who was that unicorn? You seemed rather protective of her."

"Her name's Rarity," I started explaining. "She helped me out when I first arrived in Equestria, and is a good friend of mine. I also do business with her, and she brought me a few things to make my stay here a bit easier."

"Like what?"

"Just some clean clothes. Nothing to worry about."

Mr. Tender looked over the saloon for a bit. "Well, if you say so. Keep up the good work. Oh, and before Ah forget, you have tomorrow off."

"Sweet! Am I working the three days after that?"

"All three. Ah take it that won't be a problem?"

"Not at all." I turned from Mr. Tender to a mare that came up to the bar. "Hello, what would you like?"

The towel thief struck yet again. Fortunately, my new fleece lined sleepwear was untouched, and even just going from the shared bathroom to my room, I could feel the warmth it held from my body making me drowsy, helped by the feel of clean underwear. "I'm probably the only one in the world that wouldn't mind dark, insulated clothes in the desert. That sounds like a nap and a half right there."

After I got in my room, I came up with a short list of things to do on my day off, set the boxed outfit on the desk, and went to sleep a few seconds after that.

Author's Notes:

Yeah, Applejack's reason for not going in is pretty weak, but I couldn't come up with anything else. At least Yang's going to have an easier and more comfortable time in Appleloosa.