“The good news? The first shipment from Tall Tale will be here in three weeks. Maybe less.”

Twilight Sparkle blinked. Only three weeks? “The schedule called for four.”

Moondancer giggled softly, her hooves making soft ringing noises on floor. “That’s only when you don’t offer them a new exhibit of Starswirl Manuscripts.”

“T-That’s cheating!” Twilight flushed, completely annoyed by the underhanded trading on the great unicorn’s works and not at all annoyed by the fact that she’d never thought of it.

“That’s the library system,” Moondancer shrugged, glancing back at her and adjusting her new cat-eye glasses.

“Okay, fine, what else?” Twilight demanded as she flung open a door to hide the fact that she wasn’t thinking about how much those glasses made Moondancer look her new part.

Moondancer flushed. Her ears flatted even though Twilight caught a hint of a smile. “In order? Since Manehattan is already in the works, Hollow Shades, Somnambula—the town, not the pony—and Mount Aris."

Twilight’s brain locked up before her body as she crashed into Moondancer. Physical contact made her brain go from a locking up into twisting in on itself. She had to teleport herself a few feet away as she stared at her friend. “You… you managed… you managed to get a deal for a book exchange with a foreign nation?”

Moondancer sat there and seemed to hunch over. She flushed and slowly nodded, biting her lip. “Is… is that okay? I mean… oh, please tell me I didn’t break some trade embargo or treaty or something…”

Twilight had never even attempted such a thing. Sure, she’d visited other nations, but never in her role as a… well, that wasn’t important right now because that wasn’t her role instead the role would be filled by this wonderful, insightful and by-Celestia-she’s-good-at-this pony.

“No… no that’s… that’s, um… fine,” she managed to stammer.

“Fine?” Moondancer answered hollowly, not quite meeting her eyes.

“Great, actually! Sorry, fine is… well, you’re definitely fine, but better than fine and now let’s focus just on how much more you’ve already done for this place than I ever did because of… things demanding attention that won’t let me—” Twilight shut down her vocal chords through an intense act of will—which was far less embarrassing than having to use magic to lock her own mouth shut. “I’m… just really impressed, Moondancer. I never… you were made for this job. I’m… surprised you aren’t running your own library.”

“Well…” Moondancer played with a few stray locks of her purple and red mane. “No library really… there wasn’t one that really ever fit.”

Awkward silence teleported into the hallway. A lot of it. A whole huge mess of it. Enough that the door she’d flung open actually had time to close on its own. The bang startled both of them and brought them back into reality.

“Okay, right!” Twilight cried. “I should… right. Need to finish the tour!”

“Right.”

“Right.”

“Right.”

Twilight marched forward and didn’t focus on the faint blush still present on Moondancer’s cheeks for… reasons. She didn’t focus on her own unsteady heartbeat. She also didn’t focus on things other than the thing she was supposed to be doing!

“And, of course, we have the Central Library right here!”

A flash of raspberry magic pushed the massive doors inward, revealing the three-story room packed with shelves upon shelves of books in every shape, color and size. Beauty incarnate, right here. Everything anypony could ever want, really. It was perfect.

“Oh… oh wow.”

“I know, right? It’s not as homey as the Golden Oaks, but at least you don’t have to go from room to room to find that one volume! Right? Right.”

Twilight had finally gotten the twitch repressed. It had taken years, but she wasn’t going to crack today of all days. She’d worked too long and too hard to make this day a reality. Didn’t matter what it had cost. It was necessary. She was good at that. Doing what’s necessary.

Anyway, a twitch would demand questions. Questions would demand answers. And answers would demand the mare beside her flee from the crazy princess who still had more emotional baggage than she knew what to do with.

Yeah!

Everything was fine.

“I… this? I get to actually run this?” Moondancer adjusted her glasses and peered up at Twilight. Her eyes were wide and her normally pale cheeks were flushed with color, like most of the times she ended up spending around Twilight and/or large numbers of books. “All of this? All of these books?”

“Uh…” Twilight blinked a few times. Had she missed something? They’d just been talking about her plans on filling the gaps in the library’s catalogue. In fact, Twilight had been very clear in her letters and her personal visits. She’d even had the official offer notarized by Ditzy Doo herself, which was no mean feat! Though for reasons beyond Twilight’s comprehension, Moondancer had seemed briefly disappointed by the offer. “Yes? I thought we talked about this. Like… five minutes ago? You talked about the orders and the exchanges…?”

“We did!” Moondancer squealed, then clapped her hooves over her mouth.

Twilight couldn’t help but scratch her head.

“I’m sorry,” Moondancer said, her ears and tail down in embarrassment. “I’m… I’m just excited. Really excited. I… it’s just a lot to take it all at once. This is just the biggest library in the Castle and… yeah, I’m excited.”

“You are? I mean, of course you are!” Twilight laughed in a way that wasn’t nervous or awkward or anything like that. “Who wouldn’t be? I mean, it’s not the Canterlot Cosmopolitan or the Royal Canterlot Archives, but since Ponyville’s new public library won’t be open for at least ten more years…”

“Wait a minute…” Moondancer cocked her head, a bit of a red-and-purple mane falling over her right eye. Then, she slowly began to smile. “Did you have trouble finding someone to take the job, Princess?”

“No!” Twilight cried—and clapped her hooves over her mouth. “No, not at all and anyway why would you say something so silly?”

“Because you’re… well, you’re sort of rambling.” Her ears flicked slightly.

“Am I rambling? I do that when I’m excited, not that I’m too overly excited just the regular kind of excited! I’m just happy to have someone get to actually take time and take care of my—I mean Ponyville’s—books. That’s all!”

“Twilight?” Moondancer’s smile grew a little. “Please. How long have we known each other? What’s really going on here? Are you setting me up for something? Again?”

That smile—normally somewhat charming—was actually rather annoying at the moment. As if she knew some deep dark secret of Twilight’s which was totally impossible unless she had forgotten something bad from her past which she couldn’t really be sure of and—

“Twilight?”

The second repetition of her name—this time using a vague note of concern—caused a sudden halt to Twilight’s brief spiral of… whatever that had been and allowed her to focus on the pony standing beside her in the Castle of Friendship’s Central Library. Now, if anything, Moondancer looked rather concerned. Her little topknot twitched back and forth as she studied Twilight. She adjusted her glasses in a bit of her pink magic before blinking owlishly at her.

“Twilight… I was just trying to tease you. I know you probably had thousands of ponies lined up for this.” Now, the teasing tone was entirely gone, replaced by a frown and a much stronger note of concern. “What’s wrong?”

“Who said anything was wrong?” Twilight asked with a laugh, waving her wings to make the question fly away to somewhere it was wanted or needed which was anywhere that was not here. “Nothing’s wrong!”

“Then why are your wings flapping like that?” Moondancer pointed at her sides. She looked rather unimpressed. Which was wrong because she was in the Central Library of the Castle of Friendship! “I’m not blind, Twilight. Something’s bothering you.”

“Oh, probably just nerves. Princess or headmare stuff causing additional unconscious stress. Instead, we should be focusing on you! You’re the one who just arrived to your new home and your new job! Not that I’m worried about that of course!”

“No, I don’t think you’re worried about that at all,” Moondancer stepped a bit closer and Twilight studied her neat little black sweater, noting that the thread binding her second button was somewhat loose. She definitely didn’t study the fact that Moondancer’s blush was still there or she looked really worried or that she showed no interest in the books and instead studied her like she was some sort of crazy pony!

“Twilight, we’ve been friends for years. Yes, we had some time where we weren’t really friends. But that was a long time ago. So, be honest. What’s wrong?”

“Nothing’s wrong! Just a teeny tiny tad overworked and overstressed and overloaded from… all the things. So, you should probably familiarize yourself with the manual on this section of the Library! You can find the manual over there at the new circulation desk! Which of course you know because you wrote like… half of it! So it’ll be an easy read!” Twilight pointed with a wing at the giant crystalline desk festooned with folders, files, parchment and records that would allow Moondancer to be an excellent librarian—besides her innate skills of course which went completely without mention. “I’ve updated some of the terminology and made a few modifications to the catalogue system after I reviewed the various codexes and bylaws of the RCA and sixteen city-wise library systems as a basis point to cover the Central, East, West, North, South, Upper and Lower libraries of the Castle of Friendship. And I know it’s a lot to take in, but I’ve found in something like this the best way is to jump right into things and not worry about anything Princess and/or Headmare-related that might be causing stress to an old friend, so with that I’ll let you get started and check on you later!”

Moondancer opened her mouth to say something, but thankfully, Twilight teleported away before she managed to speak.

Twilight arrived exactly where she intended to, namely, in her own private library, which was nice and safe as part of her suite of quarters in the Castle behind a few dozen shields and wards that would alert her if anypony—or anycreature—tried to come in.

She also arrived in a ball on the floor. That was off-target. Simply inexcusable. She’d missed the pillow she’d been aiming for. However, a second teleport fixed that and she mentally committed to a new morning regimen of precision teleports every morning after dawn for the next six weeks to make sure it never happened again.

Then she was comfortably huddled on the pillow on the floor, away from anypony who could see her. Or interrupt her. Or bother her. Or—

“Hey, Twi.”

“Gak!” Twilight immediately tried to teleport to Sonambula—the town, not the pony. However, a magic nearly as strong as hers snapped into place, locking her to her present dimensional plane and preventing her from escaping. It was rather rude, really. Who did that? With that escape plan foiled, she continued to hide in her ball, hoping the pony who had invaded her special place would take the hint and leave post-haste.

She could run or fly, but then she’d have to interact with other ponies even more. That was not an option.

“So, you’re going to just stay curled up in that ball?” said a familiar—and unwanted—voice. “I mean, don’t get me wrong, your wings are nice and all, but I really prefer seeing the pony. I don’t get to see her as a pony as often as I’d like, you know.”

“Go away,” Twilight mumbled, trying to curl up a little further and covering her head with her feathers.

“Yeah, we both know that’s not going to happen, Twi.”

“I’m not entertaining guests at the moment,” she mumbled and then realized she needed to preen a little better. Rainbow Dash would be furious at the current state of her feathers. Problems for another time. When ponies weren’t harassing her for absolutely no reason! “Please leave a message at the… honk?”

“It’s beep, Twi.”

“Beep, then! I knew that. Of course I knew that! BEEEEEEEEEP!”

Then, unsurprisingly, she was completely silent. Just to annoy Twilight, obviously.

Of course. Offer Sunset Shimmer a chance to actually explain the reason she’s bothering the Princess of Friendship in her private library and she wouldn’t take it because it just wasn’t her style.

Typical. Just typical.

“You done being dramatic?”

“No. Rarity’s been giving me lessons and I have at least twenty-two other techniques before I move into her advanced material!”

“Sure she has.” Sunset actually let out a little sigh. “Okay, we’ll do this the hard way.”

Before Twilight could get a ward up, Sunset teleported her onto one of the library’s many comfy sofas. At least she was nice enough to do so with a pillow—sadly smaller than her floor pillow—which Twilight immediately grabbed and clutched in front of her like an ancient shield. Without much choice—due to the smaller pillow—Twilight decided to peek out from behind her shield and upon the pony who had so rudely intruded into her life.

Sunset Shimmer had changed her mane a little. The fiery wash of hair now waterfalled more to the right than the left. Twilight’s right, not Sunset’s. The amber unicorn had curled up on the other side of the long couch, smiling a strange little smile that was half motherly and half impish. Her eyes danced as she watched Twilight as calmly as Princess Celestia once had whenever Twilight had a exceedingly rare incident of becoming slightly overwhelmed.

“Who sent for you?”

“Starlight.”

“I’m going to fire her in about ten minutes.”

“No, you’re not.”

“Ugh, fine, no I’m not!”

Sunset’s smile grew.

“What did she say?” Twilight demanded, her ears flat and her voice gruff.

“Let’s see, Dash is off on tour in Griffonstone. Pinkie’s still on her honeymoon with Skystar, Spike’s helping Rarity do Fashion Week in Canterlot, Fluttershy is hosting an animal care seminar at her sanctuary and Applejack’s preparing for the Zap Apple Harvest. Busy week for everypony really. And a little weird to go to two Pinkie Pie weddings in one week, but hey, it was pretty wild. I like this one better, though. The fins were fun.”

Twilight raised an eyebrow and glowered at her.

Sunset continued without missing a beat. “Starlight and Trixie are holding down the fort during the extended school weekend. And you haven’t told anypony else—including your best friends—about what’s been freaking you out. The only reason they haven’t figured it out is because they’re all crazy busy, otherwise, they would have beat me to this. Starlight tried and you promptly vanished from your office. So, she called in reinforcements rather than chasing you down herself. You should be proud of her. Good instincts.”

“I’m surrounded by traitors to the crown.”’

“Would you like me to get out your crown so I can kneel properly before you?” Sunset smirked. “I could use a stretch.”

“No!”

“Yeah, didn’t think so. Anyway, kneeling to you would be just… weird.”

“Starlight really told you all that?” Twilight demanded, still staying as hidden as she could be behind her pillowy-shield. “Why would she tell you all that?”

“Because usually one of your Ponyville friends normally gets you to chill before reach this level of freakout. Since they were busy and you wouldn’t listen to her… it was either me or Celestia. We both agreed you’d become a lot worse if we involved Celestia.”

“That’s completely untrue!”

“Starlight found out about the Smarty-Pants Incident.”

“You’re sure I can’t fire her? Maybe just banish?”

“Nope.”

“You’re all evil.” Twilight groaned and buried her head in her pillow. She tried again. “Go away?”

“Not happening,” Sunset replied in a song-song voice.

“How’d you even know to come here?” Twilight mumbled.

“I saw you coming into the castle with… Moondancer, right? Then I just waited for a wild teleport spell. Since you’re giving up control over most of your books… I knew you’d end up here. Also, that’s the third time you’ve asked for explanations about me being here instead of talking to me about why you’re here.”

“I really hate my life.”

“No, you don’t.”

“No, I don’t!” Twilight screamed and flung the pillow at Sunset, who caught it in her magic without even a blink. “But I do want to be left alone right now!”

Sunset tossed the pillow aside and scooted closer until she could wrap a foreleg around Twilight. Too exhausted to fight back, Twilight let the annoying unicorn pull her against Sunset’s chest. A few moments later, Twilight could hear Sunset’s annoyingly calm breathing and equally-annoying steady heartbeat.

Despite every instinct in her body, Twilight found herself relaxing. She wasn’t sure how long they sat there, as Twilight had closed her eyes to prevent herself from watching the clock, because clocks—while important—often caused anxiety in lavender Princesses. Well-known scientific fact. One that had been gleefully proven by one Starlight Glimmer—with the assistance of most of Ponyville, her friends and students included.

However, the time did come to a close when Sunset gently pulled away from her. For a moment, she found herself missing Sunset’s warmth, but she managed to sit up instead of whining. Well, whining much. After all, if she wasn’t against Sunset, she’d have to deal with the thing that made her freak out. Eventually.

“How are you doing, Twi?” Sunset asked, her voice even and calm, though Twilight suspected she sensed a tiny bit of worry in Sunset’s tone.

Great. Now she was upsetting her friends. And now she had guilt! Better than panic, she supposed.

“I’m… better,” Twilight mumbled, having to fight the desire to sulk. “Thanks.”

Sunset nodded, apparently having no desire to rub it in. Not that she would… usually… but Twilight probably would deserve it. Instead, Twilight just looked at Sunset, watching her eyes.

“You know the rest of the girls aren’t all out of town, don’t you?” Twilight said with a defeated sigh as she stared at her hooves.

“I did think it was a bit too convenient for Fashion Week, the Zap Apple Harvest and a Griffonstone Wonderbolts Show to all happen at the same time. As far as I could tell, the only one missing is Pinkie, of course.”

“Starlight should be a better liar,” Twilight growled to nopony.

“I guess you reformed her too well, so that’s your fault,” Sunset replied with a smirk.

“Har, har.”

“So, real question: why are you avoiding all of your friends? Starlight was telling the truth when she said they’re the ones who usually get you to relax.” She chuckled. “Half of the time with a song.”

Twilight flopped back on the couch and cuddled another pillow on her chest, squeezing it as hard as she could. She lay like that for a little while before the words finally demanded to be said. At least some of them. Sunset didn’t get to know all of them.

“There’s… well… it’s complicated.” Twilight groaned. “Ever know someone so well that you know what they’re going to say without asking?”

Sunset snorted lightly. “Yeah. I know a few girls like that.”

Twilight waved her hooves in the air, then went back to trying to strangle her pillow. “It’s… that. I know what they’re all going to say. And the words just… drive me crazy! I’ve heard it all before! And… well… I’m… not sure what to do about it.”

Sunset waited, probably hoping that Twilight would say something else. “Do you want me to guess?” she finally asked.

“No.” Twilight sighed, rubbing her eyes. “No, I don’t.”

Sunset stood up and walked over so she could peer down at Twilight.

“I’ve got at least three,” Sunset offered. “I could—”

“Don’t.” Twilight stared up at her friend, letting a little bit of pleading slip into her voice. That’s all. She wasn’t… about to… actually…

She blinked a few times and swallowed. “Please?”

Sunset relented, but only a little. Which was about what Twilight had expected. It would have to do.

“Then you have to tell me why you had a total meltdown.”

Twilight closed her eyes and covered her head with her pillow. “Probably because all three of your guesses are right.”

Silence.

Silence was… unproductive! She didn’t need silence! She needed… well, she didn’t know what she needed, but it wasn’t silence. So, she peeked out again.

Her answer had seemed to take Sunset back a little. Literally. She’d climbed onto the couch again and now she was leaning back against it now, studying Twilight with a piercing gaze only an empath could have. Sunset had long ago developed an innate skill for reading both ponies and people after so much exposure to—and practice with—the Empathy Gem. A gem she noticed Sunset wasn’t wearing this time.

Something about that fact sent a wave of soothing down Twilight’s spine. Enough to relax her a little physically, though her mind still raced at its somewhat above-average pace.

Then, Sunset leaned forward, smiled warmly and asked, “Can I help?”

“I’ll tell you one of the three,” Twilight said slowly. “But only one. And then… I’ll go back to… back to Moondancer.”

“Does she know?”

“She might suspect them,” Twilight muttered. “She’s not the Moondancer I knew.”

“And you’re not the Twilight she knew,” Sunset pointed out, putting a hoof on hers. “Now, why don’t you tell me a story?”

“A story?” Just those two words were enough to get her wings to unruffle. “I think I can do that...”

Author's Notes:

For some reason, writing neurotic Twilight comes easily to me. I can't fathom why that's the case, but here we are. If you've got a skill, I guess you should use it?

Also, can you imagine? Two SkyPie weddings?! How awesome must that have been?!

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If you come across any errors, please let me know by PM!