“Mademoiselle,” says the butler, addressing his master as he opens the door. “Miss Rarity.”

“At this time of night?” Basket Case spins in place on her leather chair and, placing down her book, turns to me.

“Yes,” I answer, stepping to the interior, “at this time of the night.”

The butler closes the door behind us as I walk in. He steps beside by the doorway, standing still like a royal guard and like one of the many furnishing in Basket Case’s office.

Unlike her parties, the office–which I heard to have belonged to her husband’s father until just recently–has yet to be invaded with her tasteless flamboyance. The room is still arranged in a geometric symmetry and looks as though it smells of shellac varnish. A purple Saddle Arabian rug, with embellish linings of gold-colored threads, covers most of the dark brown floor in a perfect angular square. The desk is of carved mahogany that shines somewhere between a Venetian red and sepia; a glass globe stands on its right side. The inscriptions on the wall, little touches of orchid engravings here and there, give the illusion of the room’s expanded vertical dimensions. The windows on my right remain wide open to serve as the room’s ventilation, but the curtains that hang still show no sign of wind tonight. Finally, behind and above the desk, hanging on the far end wall, is a giant oil painting of Basket Case’s recently deceased fourth husband.

She watches me watch the room, waiting for my compliment, drumming the book’s spine against the desk's top surface. “To what do I owe the pleasure of this late and strange visit, Miss Rarity?”

“Business,” I answer, pulling my eyes off the oil painting and back to her.

“Ahh, business,” she moans, giggling. “‘Business never sleeps’, my husband would have told you if he was here. But I am but a mere housewife, Miss Rarity. I do not know what sort of business I can offer you.”

“You don’t have to worry about that, I’m the one who came here to offer you something.”

“Oh,” she challenges, as if to summarize the whole thought of: what can you possibly offer me as you are now? She taps the thick book on the desk again. “Is this one of those long and intense stallion-y negotiations?”

“We’ll try not to make it long.” From the pocket of my dress, I produce a cigar case. “Do you mind?” I ask.

“Not at all,” she says, taking a cigar of her own from a box on the desk.

I place the fat brown stick between my lips and light the tip with a spark of my magic. Basket Case does the same, only she uses a cigar cutter to amputate the filter. I look at her brand. Mine is more expensive.

Heaving out a smoke, she says, “May I offer you something? Tea or Coffee or... Anything?”

“Red wine,” I answer, releasing my own curls of gray into the air.

“Excuse me?”

“A Rioja, preferably, a whole bottle... If you can spare it of course.”

“Of course, I can,” she says, her smile stiffening. “Uhm... Silver Tray,” she calls to the butler, “be a dear and go to the wine cellar, fetch a bottle of our finest... uh...”

“Ri-o-ja,” I repeat, with the utmost syllabication of emphasis one articulates to a retard.

“Rioja, yes... for our guest here.”

The butler becomes animate once more. He bows his head in acknowledgment of the order, fixes his black bowtie, and steps out of the room.

Once the door shuts, Basket Case reclines back in her seat. “Won’t you have a seat, Miss Rarity?”

“I would rather stand, thank you.”

“It is very late at night, Miss Rarity,” she snickers. “I could’ve already been sleeping. Should we proceed to this penny ante or should we wait for the wine? ...That is to say, how can I help you?”

Trotting near the window, I release another drag of smoke out into the open. “Let’s spare ourselves the pretension that we are on civil terms and would like to help one another. Your butler is already gone, after all.”

The upward curves of her face droop down and she, too, sighs out. “Very well,” she says, pushing away the book and placing a metal ashtray in its place. “What do you want? After what happened at my party I thought you wouldn’t show your face again. But that was wishful thinking for somepony as conceited as you, is it not?”

“It is.”

“Begging me won’t stop that sort of scandal from spreading.”

“Did you really have such a low estimation of me?” I say, and she chuckles in response. “As I’ve said, I’m here for a business proposition.”

“I did not think you were so crude as to offer me bits to–”

“Bits?” I laugh. “Oh, no, no. That’s the currency of plebeians, darling. We’re not aristocrats of money. Our... rate of exchange is something money can’t buy.”

It is hard to form a proper facial expression between deals of expert conspirators. She wants to smile, no doubt, for being commended as one of those few who know this game of adults. But the fact that it is a game played only by cheaters, scoundrels and liars, it leaves little innocence to experience joy. The smile and the frown cancel each other out in her face, leaving only a blank face devoid of its emotional features.

“What do you want, Miss Rarity?”

I move away from the window and march straight to her desk. “I am getting married, tomorrow night, and I want you to pull your strings to assist me in making it the grandest wedding Equestria has ever seen.”

“Which strings?”

“All of them.”

Leaning back on her chair, Basket Case closes her eyes, and takes a deep drag from her cigarette. As she breathes out the smoke, I can see the smile slowly win over the frown and the manifestation of that famous impish grin of hers, the one that shows her chipped premolars in its broadness. And I know it is not a smile anymore, but a permanent smirk stapled to a pair of lips that readies itself to undercut anything it is afraid of with an ungracious laughter. Even as she takes another deep long drag of her cigar, the smirk does not vanish.

“I’ll pull my own strings as well,” I add. “I still have a group of faithful loyalist who are indebted to me: Pep Talk, Madame Chatterbox, and even Sapphire Shores. They’ll pull their connections when I tell them to. I’ll also finally contact Social Register, she and her small group have been itching to get my attention for quite some time now. Make sure you contact Lyrica and Upper Crust as early as tonight for their gossip column. Try to wire Oil Well, he’s a useless bore but his wife is in the Department of Internal Affairs and one word to her would be enough to reserve the castle’s ballroom. Once the stage is set, we’ll have Wet Ink and Newsprint and your what’s-her-name make–”

“Head Line”

“–Yes, Head Line. They’ll make the news of my wedding a front page event. As soon as The Hermes, The Canterlot Gazette and even The Royal Press is shouting and preaching the occasion, the small newspapers will follow with their own extras. By tomorrow morning, I want ponies jumping on the bandwagon. I want word of it to spread to every corner of Equestria. I want everypony to know about my wedding, from Celestia herself to the earth pony shoe cleaner in Baltimare. I want everypony tripping over themselves for invitation cards and blackmailing each other for a place on my guest list.”

“And you are to prepare this grand wedding of yours... tomorrow?” she asks. There is a tone of malicious amusement in the way she asks.

“Yes.”

“Miss Rarity,” she says, shuffling in her seat. “As splendid as this plan of yours might be, I am afraid it cannot be done overnight. And even if it can, springing something like this on Canterlot will not salvage your reputation if you are going to stand on the altar beside a... an earth pony mare from Ponyville.”

“Oh, but my darling Basket Case, whoever said I’m marrying Applejack?”

“Huh?” The sudden jolt of her reaction makes the line of cinders in her cigar crumble, missing the ashtray and spraying the gray dust on the desk.

“Tomorrow night,” I declare, “I will be married to Prince Shining Armor.”

I then wish that I had a camera in hoof to take a snapshot of Basket Case’s face. The portrait would look good hanging on top of my soon-to-be fireplace, a trophy to be triumphed before my future guests for them to laugh at.

She stands, all four of her hooves shaking in the excitement of fear and fear of excitement. She cannot stop herself from smiling now–smirking, rather–that I have a clear view of her chittering set of teeth. “Where is that wine?” she says.

Three knocks come from the door, the knob twists, and in comes Silver Tray, levitating with him a wine bottle and a pair of wine glasses. He places all on top of the desk and makes his retreat out the door at the hoof signal of his master.

Basket Case pours herself a glass, downs the first shot without tasting it, and pours again for the both of us.

“To be honest,” she says, gurgling the wine in her throat in laughter, “I do not know if you’re joking or not, but that caught me off guard.”

I take the glass, swirl it in my hoof for a few seconds, and nip myself a taste. “And so will the whole of Canterlot.”

“But–”

“You have a lot of questions,” I interrupt, “and that is what I want to prevent. Do you know when Fleur will be back from her honeymoon?”

“I lied,” she says, placing her glass down, “she didn’t leave for a honeymoon.”

“You lied to piss me off?”

“Yes, I lied to... piss you off, as you put it.”

“So where is she?”

“She’s still loitering somewhere here in Canterlot before they leave for Neighagara Falls next week. I heard she’ll have a small tea party at her house tomorrow afternoon.”

“Perfect. We’ll rip her guest list right under nose. Nopony will have any party whatsoever on the day of my wedding.”

“You’ll invite Fleur, of course?”

“No, I will not.”

“But she’s one of the more popular mares right now, especially just after her wedding.” Remembering that she has a cigar waiting, she takes in another pull of the tobacco. “And she’s friends with Parti Pris, Silver Tongue, and other influential ponies. You wouldn’t dare make an enemy out of her.”

“She has power; she either doesn’t use it or knows how to. Parti Pris is best friends with Silk Chiffon, who’s a stooge for Cherry Chime, who’s a stooge for me. I’ll have Parti Pris on my side before sunrise. As for Silver Tongue, he’s a snob; but he has always proudly said that his influence is for sale. And no, Fleur won’t be invited to my wedding, and I’ll make sure it’s known that she’s the only pony who wasn’t invited and that her closest associates deserted her, for me. So when rumors start popping out that I stole Shining Armor from that bitch Cadance, or that I’m a gold digger–and no doubt those rumors will come–then we’ll start screaming our brains out saying all those nasty scandals are vicious lies made by an envious trophy wife who wasn’t invited to the wedding.”

“You’re... You’re using Fleur as a scapegoat?” she asks. Whereas I expect her to laugh, the humor is lost somewhere between a choke. “She was your friend wasn’t she?”

“Don’t be naïve, Basket Case, friendship is foal stuff.” Then pausing momentarily, I add, “There’s no place for friendships in the world of grownups.”

“Oh... yes. Yes, of course! I only concluded as much because of Fleur’s foalish attitude. Well, the beau monde is easy but what do you do about the middle-class? Unless you have a hold in each and every one of them–”

“They’re all posing to be our equals. They’ll believe what I tell them to believe.”

“And the lower-class won’t buy it, that’s for sure.”

“They’re mostly earth ponies. Firstly, they can’t think. Secondly, they don’t want to.”

Basket Case laughs. I knew she would like that joke. “But we seem to be forgetting something: if not bits, what is that ‘bits can’t buy’ proposition you wish to offer me?”

“‘We’ didn’t forget. Isn’t it implied in each of our sentences? You knew it the moment I told you what you have to do.”

“I want to make it official by your words.”

“Very well,” I sigh, “you will get my string to pull. Upon marrying Shining Armor, I will become a princess, even by extension. And nopony, not even Cadance, would dare cross me with the hold and influence I will have on everypony then. But you would have the strings on top of my head, for you to pull or hold or make me dance; if you slip in the word through the pipelines that you put me where I am then that’ll be the end me. They’ll believe you, of course, because they know it. Only nopony among them has what it takes to say it. And they’ll see how I do my best to kiss your flank in holding parties and toasts in your honor... Basically, I’ll be your bitch.”

“Don’t be so vulgar, Miss Rarity. It shows how desperate you are.”

“If I am not desperate, I wouldn’t have knocked on your door in the first place... So, would you do it?”

“Would it ruin you if I said no?”

“Yes.”

“Then tell me why I shouldn’t just ruin your carefully stacked deck of cards and pick up what’s left behind.”

“Because you’re not an Element of Harmony, and you don’t have a princess to use as a stepladder. Right now I still have both, but it’s only a matter of time before I lose them. So if you ever want to climb the last few steps of this pyramid of ponies with crab mentality, then you will need a princess in your pocket. Right now you have two choices: we both pull each other up, or I fall and you remain where you are for the rest of your life... But it’s not much of a choice, is it? We both already know which one you’re going to pick.”

Basket Case flicks her hoof against her cigar, not bothering to aim for the ashtray anymore, so that the burnt residue adds to the previous motes collecting on the desk. “So...” she hisses in between her teeth, “your strings, huh? Truly, something bits can’t buy...”

She takes out a whole set of writing pads from the desk’s drawer and places them on the top surface, unmindful of the ashes. She sighs, one that contains a hint of laughter and amusement. “Looks like I won’t get much sleep tonight,” she says, giggling, “with all these wires I need to send... Shall we have an early toast to your wedding, Princess Rarity?”

Princess Rarity, the title cannot but give me a shameless and shameful smile. I march toward Basket Case, and snatch the Rioja from her hooves. “Perhaps next time,” I say, inspecting the red wine’s brand. “We have a lot of things to do tonight. I still have ponies to contact and banks to visit.”

“With the amount of bits you plan to loan, do you think they’ll give it to you?”

“Gold has its weigh in gossip. Once news of my wedding spread, they’ll be throwing bits in my pocket.” Heading to the door, I add: “And I plan to pay my debt using your next husband’s income tax.”

Basket Case howls in laughter, rising to her feet and giving me an applause. “Marvelous!” she laughs. “Marvelous.”

“Was that joke so funny?” I say, looking back over my shoulder.

“No... It’s this.” Still clapping her hooves, I do not know if this demonstration is out of sheer mockery; it isn’t.

“This, what?” I ask.

“All of this, high society, culture and interrelationships of ponies. I remember my sociology professor telling me–damn him for failing me in class, by the way–that society is some sort of super organism and that each and every individual is but an irrelevant microbe in this suprastructure. But looking at you now, Miss Rarity, you have proven him wrong. These...strings... as we have put it are so complex and intertwined a system of pony interaction that everypony has a pull on everypony else, and nopony moves because nopony knows who’ll crack in what direction and when. The stakes are only getting higher and higher and it get so twisted that the strings now looks like a very intricate web. And you, Miss Rarity, are the spider weaving everything into a perfect trap. But what is it that you would like to snare? Surely not Shining Armor, he’s just the bait. There’s something else behind it, something you’re after, a principle maybe... But I’m not drunk enough to find out...”

“What are you saying?” I ask. The question came out as a challenge, to dare her to speak out loud what it is she is implying.

“Did you try to kill to Cadance to get her husband?”

I turn around to her, ready to break her face with the wine bottle or break the wine bottle with her face, whichever comes first.

“Don’t answer that question because the answer does not matter,” she laughs. “Whether you tried to kill her or not is irrelevant. What the majority of ponies choose to believe, is.”

“I did not try to kill Cadance,” I hiss.

“As I’ve said, you don’t need to answer. Society is the most complex organism after all: dog-eat-dog, snakes in grasses on a rat race towards gopher holes, all of them tangled on a spider’s web. Yes, that’s society. I just figured it out, whereas you have known it from the start.”

How should I react, to such a statement. I cannot summon a smile at a compliment of that nature. When evil compliments evil, does one derive a sense of pride and self-esteem? I do not know; neither do I wish to find out anymore.

“Thank you very much for the Rioja,” I say, returning the bottle to my side. “I’ll be sure to hold my first party as princess in your honor.”

“I look forward to it.”

“I don’t,” I say. I slam the door closed to block the sound of her laughter as I walk out.

Canterlot awoke with a jolt and a shot of adrenaline. Before Celestia raised the sun, wires and letters and telegrams ran through the deep roots of the capital and in and out of the networks of the suites and houses of the most influential ponies. Straight from the top, the letters trickled down the tree of society, pushing back feasts, meetings, dates, and deadlines, to accommodate the event that fell on them from the sky. It is as though another day of the year sprang somewhere between yesterday and tomorrow, to be labeled as Rarity and Shining Armor’s wedding.

As early as five, newspapers rolled out of the printing press with the precision and speed of a Las Pegasus card dealer, stacking the presses eight feet high on newsstands.

At six, an army of papercolts sped through every nook and corner of every house and alleyway of the city with an alarming tempestuous hoarse of “Extra! Extra-ay!”

Around seven, ponies of all races and status held the crisp and fresh papers that proclaimed the headline of my marriage, the still-wet and warm ink dripping on their hooves.

Come eight, the shopping districts opened earlier to welcome wave after wave of mares rushing in to buy the most expensive dresses and perfumes they could find, whatever it was.

At exactly nine, word of my wedding is on everypony’s lips. It becomes their greeting, their icebreaker and their entrustment of good faith. Although, there is a peculiar hint of desperation in the way they express their excitement and commendation to my wedding, as though they are incessant to find a confidant to which they can convey not what they say, but the fact that they had said it. “Yes, I am on Rarity’s side,” they seem to say among one another, to be followed by a mixture of a challenge and threat, “Are you as well?”

Though the questions still linger on the tip of everypony’s tongue–“Why is Rarity marrying Shining Armor?” “Isn’t this too sudden?” “Isn’t he still married to Cadance?”–the words never pass further than their teeth. Everypony asked; nopony asked aloud, which was safer than mutism.

And those few among the lower class who dared utter the slightest of protests were met with such arrogant hauteur from their superiors: “Do you have to poke your nose into everything?” “You know nothing of the affairs of high society!” “You must be friends with that scandalmonger Fleur de Lis, aren’t you?” “Why don’t you just let those two be happy, you cheap gossip!?”

At precisely ten, I am already in Canterlot’s grand ballroom, overseeing the preparation:

“What!?” I scream at the young brown-coated colt.

“I-I... I’m sorry, Miss Rarity,” he stutters, holding his hat against his chest. “But... but... Coal Adit said there’s... no way for the train to make it here with the supply of gold... and... it’s not possible with the amount of time before the ceremony...”

“Make it possible!” I yell, stomping my hooves.

“B-But... We can’t...”

“Damn you all! What the hell do you think I’m paying you for?”

“I’m sorry. P-Please don’t blame me. It was Coal Adit... he said...”

“To hell with Coal Adit! If he thinks I’m gonna put a chandelier made of ormolu and rhinestones in my wedding then I’ll destroy his business. He’ll never have another contract with anypony else. Now go tell him that or you’re fired as well!”

“O-O-Of course, Miss Rarity,” the colt says, galloping away.

I have already exhausted all of my sighs. I lean my head against one of the marble columns of the grand hall of the castle. I no longer care for any pretense of tolerance. It should be understandable even for them, they the lower class, that a bride has rights she may administer and demand in keeping the standard of her wedding. I bark at them, with words a few letters short of profanity, for every causeless mistake they make. They do not work for me, I know; but they know, as well as I, that they work for those who enslave themselves to my call. Today and tonight, pulling all my influence and gathering all my power, my word is more absolute than even that of Celestia herself.

Around me, the ponies, mostly the uninvited working for those who are, scatter all over the ballroom to finalize the last touches of decoration. A flock of pegasi fly from one corner of the ceiling to another, from one marble column to the next, tying the knot of the silk taffeta curtains to the colossal windows and hanging the vermeil candelabras on the high walls. Some earth pony stallions and some unicorns carry a stained window–a gift from Glass Blower–towards the far end behind where my table will be; whereas most busy themselves covering the glass tables with rich gilded linen, and effloresced Casaflanka Lilies and Hydrangeas.

“Miss Rarity?” says a mare from behind me.

“What?” I turn, recognizing her to be one of my several wedding planners.

“There has been a... complication about the cake.”

“What is it?”

“Well...” she says, eyes avoiding mine, “it turns out that... both Miss Pine Leaves and Mister Hoity Toity hired a patisserie to make the wedding cake and we need you to choose which one–”

“Choose the most expensive one,” I answer, almost immediately.

“E-Excuse me?”

“Did I stutter?”

“I’m sorry... of course,” she says, but does not yet leave. She waits for a moment, until the group of stallions carrying the silverware and fine china pass by. “A-And the... the centerpiece fountain–”

“Oh, don’t tell me the ice sculpture melted or I’ll have Ice Pick’s head for this.”

“N-No... The sculpture is fine but... Mr. Wheat Barrel would like to... confirm your order here. I mean... H-He’s asking if you really want to... to have champagne flowing out of the fountain...? Because he thinks it’s... it’s... –Oh, please, understand that he used this word, not me–he thinks it’s... prodigal.”

“What!?”

“In his humble opinion–”

“Tell him that I’m paying him for his liquor, not his opinion!”

“Oh, yes! I mean, no! I mean... He... he just wants to make sure...”

“And tell him I want pure champagne in there. I want my guests to be able to hold their cups to it. If he so much as thinks of diluting the wine, rumors of his bootlegging–true or not–will reach the Royal Guards.”

Yes, the top of the social pyramid, to which all of them look up to.

Slowly and surely, it feels as though all the wealth of Equestria is flowing into the bottleneck entrance of the castle as ponies after ponies enter through the colossal twin doors, carrying in their hooves or magic every manner of glinting gold and polished glass. The caterers, who dragged with them the silver tanks and silver trays of an ample supply of beluga caviar, blini, buttered truffles, mushroom salads, and other such recipes, resign themselves to the corner, ready to serve meals to the earliest and most impatient of the guests. On the opposite side, several bars stand far remote from the tables as I believe that, later, there the guests will flock to sample the wide selection of vintages if the mountains of wine already stacked on their tables do not to suit their tastes or drinking habits. The first group of the orchestras, which my guests would have normally paid thousands of bits to hear a note from the cellist alone, ready the arrangement of their instruments to fill the grand hall with their stringed concerti grossi. With a flick of my horn, a small fire lights inside every glass bulb of the raised lanterns. The light that shatters from it bursts forth into a kaleidoscope of brilliant white and gold rays that shower the room, and all its decorations, to an opulent scintilla. The flooring, carpets and tablecloths, glitter like sand dunes beneath the whiteness of the sparkling sun and stars hanging on the walls and ceiling.

But it is not yet complete. Soon, hours from now, the lasts of the decorations will take their place at the table. All of them, raffish stallions in black ties and heron-like mares in gown, will be deposited from a long line of carriages, and race for the nearest seat to my dais. And there they will be, glistering like rubies, emeralds, topazes, and sapphires, popping champagne corks and flashing wives that flashes ornaments, will surfeit themselves in the overindulgence of my beauty as I–the great Rarity of Canterlot!–shall be heralded as this jewel box’s most precious and most prized treasure.

I wake up–to the sound of a loud pounding on my door–sometime around six or seven in the young evening, having caught what sleep I could for the few brief hours after having finished my wedding dress. Perhaps it is because I am still exhausted after a night of sculpting the perfect bridal gown, on top of scurrying between mansions full of important ponies and contracts, that I am in no mood to rise from the work desk where I rest my head.

It is insulting to myself, that the very day I have yearned for is now here in my hooves and, yet, I do not have the stomach to live through to it. Even the magnificent reception that I single handedly constructed this morning, undoubtedly now welcoming the first of my excited guests, arouses a feeling of tempting displacement, as how a drunkard is drawn to the bar. I rationalize it to be my own repletion towards beauty; I need for myself a moment’s reprieve prior to my finale.

For what else can it be?

A marriage with a prince! ...What more could have I ever wanted?

I press my face against the work desk still, covering my eyes with my hooves. I feel neither the energy nor the enthusiasm to rise; but I know I have to, sooner better than later. I heave my body up, straining with the burden of having to live, and open my eyes as I sigh.

It is the perfect afternoon that precedes the young night. The pegasi have accomplished the temperate sunny day as I have instructed Sky Wiper. I close the window and the curtains.

Running to the kitchenette, I draw out another bottle of red–I do not bother to look at the name or brand–and pour myself two glasses to sip. Shining Armor is at the table beside, still refusing to speak, with a glass of bourbon in his hoof. He is trying to get drunk, I imagine, with two and a half empty bottles of whisky before him. But he cannot drown his reason with wine, not with his anger still there to give him enough focus.

“Get some sleep, dear,” I tell my fiancé, circling around him. “Our wedding is just a few hours from now. I’ll take care of the rest.”

I wrap my hooves around his shoulders from behind, leaning my head on his shoulder.

The pounding on the door continues. I have forgotten it is still there, believing it only to be the throbbing in my temple.

“Brother! Open up!” Twilight’s voice erupts from the other side. “I know you’re in there! I need to speak to you.”

Before Twilight’s anger makes her resort to the use of her black magick, I open the door for her with a flick of my horn. As soon as the opening is made, the room breathes out the trapped dense air and inhales the fresh gust from the outside.

Twilight Sparkle enters, stomping her hooves about, marching towards I and my dear.

“Good afternoon, Twilight... Sparkler, was it? Or Sparkle?” I say, cuddling Shining Armor. “How can I help you today?”

“You can start by getting your hooves off my brother,” she barks.

I lean forward him further, wrapping my hooves around his docile head, and run my flat wet tongue against his cheekbone for Twilight to see.

“I said get off him!” she practically shouts.

“Such violence,” I laugh, pulling my hooves away and raising them as to show my innocence. “Can I get you something,” I ask her, moving towards the shelf.

“Don’t start the nice sister-in-law act. There’s nothing here that you can get for me,” she says, scowling. “This is Cadance’s room, not yours.”

“Some of the reds here are actually mine, and not Cadance’s.” From the second top shelf, I drag out a bottle of claret. “Such as this Bordeaux. I’ve had a lot of time to put some of my own vintages here.”

“Was that before you stole her husband the second she’s in a coma, or after?”

“Please don’t talk as if my fiancé is not here listening to us.” I lay down a fresh glass, pour in some of the red wine and push it to Twilight.

Twilight looks at the glass. She does not touch it. “I didn’t come to drink or celebrate. I came here to talk to my brother.”

I pour some more wine for myself, just a tad bit, and gesture to her with my glass. “Go ahead.”

“Alone,” she hisses.

“There’s not a thing you can tell to a stallion without telling his soon-to-be lovely wedded wife.”

“You are not going to be his wife!” Twilight yells, slamming down a newspaper on the tabletop. “He’s still married to Cadance.”

On the fresh and crumpled front page of the newspaper, half-covered with pictures of monochromic photographs of I, the front page headline proclaims, in big fat bold letters, the highlight for tonight.

RARITY AND SHINING ARMOR’S WEDDING TONIGHT!!!

I sigh, “I told them to write down Prince Shining Armor.”

Twilight ignores my commentary and marches closer to my fiancé. “Brother,” she pleads, half kneeling to look at his face. “Tell me what’s happening. Tell my why you’re marrying... marrying somepony like her! You love Cadance, don’t you?”

For the first time today, I hear Shining Armor’s voice, muttering with what excess strength left of an anemic wan body: “I do... more than anything.”

“Then why are you marrying Rarity!?” Twilight peers in closer.

Shining Armor, unable to look at her own flesh and blood, turns his head away. “It’s complicated Twilight,” he squeaks out. “It’s not something you... I mean... You can’t understand it.”

“But–”

“Please, Twily,” he says. He is not shouting, but his voice is slowly growing in the desperate need to urge. “Just... let Rarity and I go.”

“W-What?”

“I said... Just let Rarity and I get married... and get everything over with.”

“But you don’t love her! Don’t you remember Cadance?” she insists, tears now forming in her eyes. “Remember when she and I were being teased by bullies because of Smartypants and you came out of the bushes to protect us, and you got your cutie mark, and she said that you’re the bravest stallion she ever met! And just weeks later, while I was playing, I saw you two kissing in the park. You were lovers since you were foals, since we were foals! It’s always been Cadance, isn’t it!? Don’t you remember her?”

I know I cannot fight Twilight by sheer force of magic, but this influx of memories she spouts risks having Shining Armor find renewed motivation to try and get back to Cadance. And in the surge of panic that flows from that same blabber of razbliuto, I would have no doubt contested against Twilight if not for Shining Armor’s faithfulness in me, proving that no such battle is necessary or possible.

“No, Twily,” he says, “I’m trying not to remember everything.”

Her eyes, which have been skittering about to and fro Shining Armor and the newspaper, then focuses on me. “What did you do to him?”

“I? Whatever are you talking about?” I shrug, laughing. “Do you take me for some sort of Changeling queen sucking out thy brother’s love? Well, I do suck something out of your brother, but it’s not love. That I can tell you.”

Twilight winces. Bookworm as she is, she cannot be ignorant enough not to know what it is I refer to.

“But Cadance! She... She’s gone!” Twilight says again to his brother, standing up. “I went by her room just now and she’s missing! The nurses tell me she must’ve flown away, nopony can find her anywhere; I don’t know!”

Even my attention is captured with this sudden revelation. Shining Armor too, perking his ears, feels a visible shudder running up his spine. But it is not a shudder of fear, as one who does not know him might think, but that faint illusion of hope to which he still clings. A hope that, somehow, we will not be wed and Cadance will return to him. A hope to which he ties the rest of his sanity. A hope anchored to nothing.

But as I run my hooves against the tight brawn of his forelimb, the shudder is gone.

Has Cadance regained her strength already? I think, looking out the window. Is she coming here to put a stop to me and my night? No. She knows the consequences if she chose to. And if she did chose to, she would have been here by now before Twilight.

“You see, darling,” I say, acting upon the conclusion, “this is why you don’t understand anything. What makes you think that Cadance does not consent to Shining Armor and I being together?”

“What!” It is not a question. She exasperates, not believing it of course, thrown aback by the preposterousness of my lie.

“There, you see, such foalish naivety. You’re still a foal, Twilight, albeit all your knowledge of the sciences. This is why Cadance loves and trusts me more than you. There is no conspiracy here, little filly. Cadance approved of me for Shining Armor. She’s on my guest list, if you care to take a look. And I am willing to gamble that right now, as we speak, she’s already in somewhere in Prance to buy herself a dress.”

“I don’t believe you! This... This doesn’t make any sense!”

“It’s superfluous to discuss now. So, if you don’t mind, I still have to oversee the preparations below. There is still much to take care of before my wedding tonight.” I take Twilight by her hooves and yank her from the floor; with doubt clouding her mind she will not dare harm me.

But then she shouts, “What the hell happened to you?” She throws my hooves away from hers. “Why are you doing this? You’re not Rarity anymore!”

“Oh, contraire, I’ve never felt more of a rarity than I do now.”

She has stopped crying, but the remnants of tears still remain in her eyes. She does not wish to wipe them away, I believe, in her refusal to acknowledge its presence. “I believed in you,” she says, between gritting teeth. “I believed in you! All this time, you were lying to all of us. You looked all of us in the eye and lied to us!”

“Perhaps I did.”I shrug. “What of it?”

“And you were lying... to Applejack even when she–.”

Tsk “I think it is best that you leave now, Twilight.” I cannot hide the indignation from where such words come from. It is to my frustration that she, to whom I do not hide my contempt, also triumphantly sees that I failed to hide my contempt from myself.

“What’s the matter?” she says, taking advantage of my sudden lost of control. “Did I strike a nerve when I said Applejack’s name?”

I turn my face away, unable to look at her or Shining Armor. Not even the darkness, either from my closed eyes or the dark lightless spot in the room, can shroud the utterance of the name from which I have closed off my mind, and now has ultimately pierced its way back.

Applejack, still my dearest Applejack...

No, not anymore. Shining Armor is my dearest. Shining Armor is my one and true love.

I turn to him, to my prince. Having seen my lowered disposition to hearing the name of that...

That lowborn simplistic earth pony...

...he turns away, stabbing vengeance to me–causeless and mistaken vengeance!–with the solid stare of his eyes.

“Will it strike another nerve if I ask you whether you just tore out her heart, or just spat on it?” Twilight continues.

“I said get out.” I manage to contain the tempting yell.

“You don’t own this place!” she answers, trying to outshout me. “This is Cadance’s castle. And if you think that I’m gonna let somepony like you steal my brother from her then–”

“Get out of here, Twilight!” The thunderous pained bellow comes from Shining Armor. “And... and don’t ever come here to see me again.”

Caught off guard, even I am shaken by the force of his roar. When I turn to Twilight again, having fought off the shiver from my spine, she is paralyzed from the neck down. In her wide-eyed expression, she is only a slap away from crying again; and I wonder whether I should make it happen. Has Shining Armor yelled to her like that before? That I do not know. But the impact of his voice is a punch to her gut which, surely, is something he had never done to her until now, and which he does now in order take his stand beside me, against his own sister who had done nothing but muster the courage to fight for the rest of her brother’s life.

When Twilight turns her eyes to me, shaking her head, I am not smiling anymore, showing her the gravity of the situation which she is too eluded to grasp at face value. After rubbing away the reemerging painful throb in my temple, I place a hoof around Twilight’s shoulder and lead her out the door. She no longer resists, or has no resistance to offer.

“But please do come to my wedding,” I tell her, forcing a smile for her at least. My words now feel heavy, taking great effort to lift them up from my stomach. I even fear that it is not word, but vomit, that will spout out my mouth next. “And please bring the girls along. You are my bridesmaids and best friends after all... Encourage them to come... And tell... tell Applejack to be a sport and mature about these things...”

Closing her eyes, Twilight nods. With her ears down and her tail drooping, I have to watch her make her way down the stairs lest she trips, falls, and break her neck.

Did I just think that? I think, rewinding my previous thoughts. Did I just want Twilight to fall and die?

No, I shake my head, I did not.

I return to the room, taking a tiger-skin sable from the coat hanger.

“I’m going back to my room to get myself ready,” I say, putting on the fur. “We’d be wed in two hours. In a few minutes, I’ll send some servants to come here to help you get ready. I’ll meet you in the altar, dear.”

I approach him and kiss him, again, only on his cheeks. With this victory, I want to whisper to him in the kiss, do you still ‘feel sorry for me,’ my prince?

But I do not wish to hear any answer.

Turning back, I head to the castle of my city.

A few hours more... Just hold on for a few hours more...

Looking to my right, past the bleak horizon, the sun is setting again. Already, the dreary lights of Canterlot illume from the spires and towers. There is much more this time of the hazy lights as guests from all over Equestria, and perhaps past that, arrive for the reception of my grand wedding. To my left, where the weary night crawls and wash over the rest of daylight, I hear a small pop, followed by a splash and scatter of an iridescent luster of lights. The firsts of tonight’s trigger-happy firework is already visible against the blackened sky.

“...Isn’t it more comfortable like this?” I ask, staring in front of the vanity mirror as I attach my eyelashes. I blink into the reflection twice. “Lots of elbow room and breathing space. But I am still dying to know what are in those bridal-gifts. A new perfume perhaps? Dresses? That biggest one–from Mrs. Fund Raiser–must be a carriage, isn’t it? I mean, what else can it be?”

Until my entry, my room cannot be called a ‘living quarter’ as it was more appropriate to call it a storage room. As I entered, all around me, literally–and I mean literally–thousands of presents of all shapes and sizes and boxes and wrappers and ribbons are stacked together. Even just outside before I came in, the numerous gifts, which can no longer fit through the door, waited to be opened. I had to ask several servants to move all of which down the hall, just beside my table, and arrange them to a compose pile for my guests to admire. No doubt, the collection will be big enough to occupy most of the dais and touch even the ceiling.

“I need to get my wind together too,” I blabber about. “Did you see how many guests are there outside? When I go down later, they’ll be fighting for my attention. And if words can pull, why, I’d be dismembered after the first minute.”

In my mind’s eye, I can see–or hear?–the tick-tock of an invisible clock tower that counts the seconds of the last half-hour before my wedding. I sit now in front of the vanity, enjoying the seemingly expanded space after the haul, and flattering myself with every glance of my reaction.

I am wearing on me the dreams of a million ponies: a pristine wedding gown of diamonds. It is not a gown made with diamonds, but is, in fact, a gown of diamonds. The dress, the dream, made real and eternally aglitter. The ne plus ultra and the fare-thee-well stitched together to the ideal ensemble. From the bodice to the train-tip, the hemline to the collar, every inch of it is a sprinkled dust of a mare’s best friend. And the veil–no, there is no veil,–the tiara holds in its center piece the biggest one I have even seen in my life, an egg-shaped diamond almost a pound in weight, which in itself is also surrounded by dozens of the same smaller jewels circling from its crown.

Yes, I think, running my hoof against the dress, this is what makes a mare happy. Not the bits or the diamonds, but the grandiose superiority they signify, the demonstration that one has conquered the hardest and most precious children of the earth, and worn them for display. That one no longer belongs to the mud, but to the stars which they sparkle so alike. One more minute of looking at the diamonds, I tell myself, and I will feel happy. A minute pass; nothing happened. I imagine how convincing I can describe this scene to my friends–no, not those bunch of backwater fillies! What do they know?–to see them squirm and turn green with envy. A mare, who climbed from ragged Ponyville to rich Canterlot, wearing a diamond dress and diamond tiara, accompanied by her best friend and bridesmaid, to ready for a wedding with a prince.

Yet why is it that I myself am not convinced?

How ponies have bled and died to reach where I am. I have everything there is to have. I want riches–and the royal treasury of Canterlot is for me to dispose of. I want power–every pony is subject to my will. I want fame–and my name is on every lips and newspaper. I want love–and she...

To our left, the small open window shows the crackle of fireworks lighting the sky. Even in my own suite, the light of the fireworks reach, illuminating the expressionless face of Fluttershy and throwing the prism to my dress which it similarly reflected.

“It’s beautiful, isn’t it?” I say, looking at the fireworks. I am referring to how the colors reflect on my dress.

If there are any other ponies in this room, Fluttershy would not have nodded, hoping that question is addressed to somepony else. She has yet to say a word beside a few half-chewed ‘yeses’ since I have demanded her in my room.

“It’s just such a shame that you girls couldn’t throw me a bridal shower,” I say, putting on my eyeliner. “These are busy times, I know. But it still means so much to me that you can make it here to help me dress.”

Fluttershy nods again, trying not to listen to me, as she busies her hooves against my mane. She is unneeded beside me right now to help me dress, of course. She is aware of it; that is the problem. Dear Celestia knows I can do a finer and more thorough job with my magic than the pegasus’s own absentminded, if not careless, dexterity of her hooves.

Does she even know why did I invite her here, to my room?

Her silence says she does.

“Fluttershy, dear, “ I try again, “you don’t know how much this means to me.”

I wait for her to ask what it is I refer to. She does not ask.

“This wedding, I mean.” I turn to her and her hooves stop running the comb down my mane. “You know, Fluttershy darling, that this is the most important night of my life and I want express how glad I am that–”

“Rarity–”

“–that you and the others are–”

“Rarity,” she squeaks out again, and this time I allow her to interrupt me. “Please...”

“Please what?”

“Please... don’t talk,” she says, hiding behind her fringes. “I... really... just... don’t want to hear your voice right now. Let’s get your mane done... so I can go.”

“What do you mean? Am I speaking too loud for you?”

She peeks out, a little cautious, from the slits of her mane. “You know what I mean.”

Of course she does, and I do as well.

I half believed, and half hoped, that she will at least entertain me with a polite conversation. She, after all, is the only bridesmaid whom I have invited here to my room.

I turn around, back to the mirror, watching Fluttershy move her hooves against my mane. But as soon as the light pull of the comb tugs at my scalp, I turn around again, facing Fluttershy once more. I swear I hear her sigh as soon as I look at her.

“Fluttershy,” I say, my head up. “I would very much like to explain myself to you.”

Her hooves, which had remained raised in the air, refold back to her sides. She turns away from me, her eyes darting to the floor.

“I know that you think that...,” I sigh, “that I might be some sort of conceited opportunist. It might be... forgivable that I have been sleeping with a married stallion but I know that it is hard to forgive me for what I’m doing now... That I’m taking Cadance’s place as soon as she meets an accident... B-But I’m just being pragmatic about this... I want you to know that I feel guilty about it too. Honest. Like you, I wish life can be fair and all good. But life isn’t like that. It’s not simple good versus bad, either-or, and sunshine and gumdrops... It’s very complex.”

I hold my tongue for a while, looking for some sort of reaction. There is none.

“About what happened, between you and our Dashie,” I continue, “I want you to know that... even if you did told everypony about Shining Armor’s affair with me, I wouldn’t spread any rumors about what you... did with Rainbow Dash. It was just an empty threat, believe me. That’s why I don’t want any ill feelings between us. You see... It’s like... –Look, why don’t you let me talk to you for a second.”

“You are talking to me,” she answers, her tone flat.

“But... I want you to talk back.”

“I have nothing to say to you.”

“I want to clear some misunderstanding.”

“There isn’t any misunderstanding.”

“I want us to remain friends.”

“I don’t want to be your friend.”

Fluttershy remains composed, her lower lip between her teeth, her face still away from mine, desperately trying to maintain control of her limbs that do not try to cover her ears. There are no grounds for me to think this, and nothing in Fluttershy’s character would have given me reason to invent such a thing except in what I see. But, as I look at her now, I almost believe that rather than fear it is anger which restricts her movements. Her forehoof, which had been shaking, does not shiver in nervousness, but in tense readiness to inflict the avenging strike of a slap to my face. But she will not do so, not for all her benevolence, not for her intention to prove to the both of us that she is the better mare.

Fluttershy, finally, looks up and straight to me. Her eyes are not serious, dejected perhaps, but still confident of her words:

“After tonight you’ll be living here in Canterlot…” she says. “In that case, please don’t visit me in Ponyville anymore. I... We don’t want to see you again.”

In the ensuing silence, the blood-red light of a firework seeps in from the window.

I leap from my chair, the furniture tumbling to its side. “You self-important bitch!” I hiss between gritting teeth. “You think I give a damn about your approval?”

She remains standing there, unfazed.

“Do you think I give a damn about what you think of me!?” I shout. “Look at me! Look at where I am! I’m a princess! Do you know I have thousands–literally thousands!–of ponies worshipping me and showering me with gifts?”

And, even as I take a bottle of perfume and propel it to pieces against the wall, Fluttershy remains unmoved.

"Oh, where have you been all these years!? What sort of world do you think we live in?”

“I’ve always thought that... we choose to make our world.”

“You have no right to blame me, goddamn you! I didn't make this world! Don't look at me like that. You can't judge me!"

"...Don’t you have a wedding to get ready for?"

"Oh, get out of here you rotten moralistic cunt!"

Fluttershy nods, out of courtesy. She turns around, leaving the bright gold comb on top of the dresser, and walks towards the door.

"And don't forget to write down your best mare speech," I add. "I don't want you stuttering in front of my guests."

She opens the door, stops, and looks over shoulder.

"I... I think I get it now..." she mutters suddenly, “those mannequins... all faceless and no soul... just dresses of jewels and gems... they’re... they’re made up of plastics, aren’t they?"

"I said get the hell out of here!" I scream at the top of my voice.

I slump down on the vanity, pinning my hooves against my eyes. Then I realize that doing so might ruin my make-up. I stand again, briskly, flinging another perfume bottle on the floor with a violent whip of my hoof. The bottle shatters to pieces with a crash, and the strong scent concoct to a stinging mixture in the air.

"Goddamnit all," I say. There is nopony to hear it, not even I.

I sigh again, fighting the urge to smash every breakable in this room. What do I see, in these bottles, that infuriate me so? Or perhaps it is what I do not see that arouses my anger.

And I realize that it is not just the perfumes, but everything in the room is repulsing to me. The bottle of expensive wine on my vanity–which has remained untouched after the first sip–had a taste so rancid it took all my will not to spew it out of my mouth. The perfumes, which until now had existed only in the cutouts of my magazines in Carousel Boutique, is nauseous to the lungs. And even the brightness of the diamonds–the diamonds!–is a needle to my eyes. I do not wonder why these treasures of mine aroused vexation. No, it is wrong to put it that way. I, in fact, know why I detest the very same riches delivered in my name. I deserve this, don’t I!? But I do not try to think it; I fight not to think it! Every scurrying thought that dares to question the value of my material belongings to me is preemptively blocked by a wall, a blind alley of evasion made of cowardice to truth.

In the next instant, there is a knock on the door that makes me rise. I do not notice that I have slumped down to my vanity. The knock is not a pounding, which removes any suspicion that it belongs to any of my friends. Quite the contrary, there is a pattern, a musical melody even, in the way the pony on the other side insists entrance to my room.

I clear my throat, make sure that the arrangement of my mane remains perfect, and smoothen whatever creases there is on my dress and lips. I assume it is an impudent guests, Basket Case perhaps, to be conceited enough to interfere with a bride getting ready in her dress.

"Come in," I try to sing, my voice comes out as a croak. I pull open the door.

"Hey-a! Rarity?" Pinkie Pie laughs as she hops in.

What is this now?

"Oh, it's... you,” I manage to say, quite thrown aback. “I'm quite surprised... I mean, I didn't expect you."

"I didn't expect me here either."

When was it, the last time I have seen her? It is three days ago, I remember, a length of time that seems so far back. But the aftertaste her presence reminds me of gives me a clue that we did not part in the best of terms.

"So... what brings you here?"

"Oh, just wanna see my bestest friend before her bestest wedding." Then she bobs her head up and down. "And I need your help to fix my mane, I can't seem to get the right zap and bounce."

"Zap and bounce?"

"You know, zap as in like zappy!”–she darts across the room–“And then like bounce as in bouncy!"–then starts to hop on the bed, which is inadequate considering her hooves already have springs somewhere in them.

“Your mane?” I fix the bed from where she jumped as she hops down. "Is that all?"

"Yep, that’s all.” She squeaks out a smile.

"I guess I can spare some of my time.” I smile in turn. “I mean, because you are my bridesmaid after all.”

“I’m your bridesmaid,” she repeats, her tone higher than mine.

“I'm sure I can fix your mane into a... zap and bounce in a minute or two." I stand aside and point to the vanity where I just sat. "Please, have a sit."

With one great leap, Pinkie Pie somersaults and lands on the chair as gently as how would a feather kiss the surface of water, without as much as a ripple.

"Thanks Rarity," she laughs, before making faces on the mirror. "I knew I can count on you."

"You're welcome." I approach her from behind, comb in hoof. "Now let's get the mane fixed."

As I run the comb against Pinkie's mane, it becomes apparent that it is not only dexterity, but strength as well, that is needed to groom her encolure. It is as though each strand of her forelock is a twine of nylon, recalcitrant to resistance and elastic. With each movement, every strand springs back to its original position with a twang. I wonder if even a crimping iron or a straightener would do anything against the rebellious nature of her mane. But still I try, if only to keep my mind away from my wedding.

"Ooh! I'm so excited for your wedding," she says, clapping her hooves. "It's gonna be the biggest, bestest, most hugest wedding party of all time in the whole universe ever! Aren't you excited? I’m so excited."

Her head looms down, chin touching the desk, as she prowls the perfume bottles. The dreaded silence returns again, as she relaxes her muscles in the pleasurable sensation of being groomed. The genteel atmosphere she lets out, be it in her snorting laughter or her bubbly giggles, washes away the air of Fluttershy’s presence.

And the same infectious easiness in how she vegges out, grants me the same security of lowering down my guard.

"Pinkie Pie...” I say, the weight in my chest melting. “I really want to ask–"

"Nu-uh.” She shakes her head. “I'm not gonna use my Pinkie sense to tell you what’s in your presents."

"No... I just want to ask: do you really... feel happy for me?"

Pinkie Pie's bright blue eyes look into the mirror, and the stare, with its raised eyebrow, is reflected back to me.

"Let me... rephrase that," I turn my face away from the mirror. "Why aren't you... angry at me? Why are you actually happy to be my bridesmaid? You know... the things I did... to you and everypony. You know what I’m doing now, with Shining Armor, just because Cadance is sick... or missing. You know that I've hurt... Applejack... and..."

I stop.

In shock, I realize, with the sudden somatic looseness of my muscles, that the comb that I run down her mane is no longer met with any resistance. It slides down, evenly, smoothly, parting each strand with firm consistency, like a rock against water. And I look, in horror, to see what it is that caused this sudden change.

I retreat, almost jumping. Pinkie Pie's mane is no longer permed to its wavy curls, but flowing like a blood-red waterfall, evenly sharp on the edges as though it was sliced by a knife. I know then that I am not looking at the back of my friend, but at that unknown persona wearing Pinkie Pie's skin.

"And you were doing so well," it sighs.

From my vantage point, having backed several hoofsteps, I cannot see the face, even from the reflection, of that creature sitting in front of me.

"Why did you have to drop off your mask, now of all times?" it says, grabbing a random perfume and spraying herself with it. "I thought I have warned you against it already?"

"W-What?"

"But I guess it is fine, then." It reached for a hair clip, and pinned a small parcel of her hair. Observing the change, she decides against it and throws the pin aside. "It is just the two of us here, after all. Even we, at least, deserve some form of temporary respite from the platform and retire for a few bleak minutes behind the backstage."

She stands up, giving one last brush of her mane, and finally turns her face. Where I expect to see another, I do not know what to make of what I am seeing. The face which had once hidden itself beneath the mask of comedy, is now revealed to me. On the surface, it is the same face as that of Pinkie Pie only that Pinkie Pie never had such a visage. Her figure, elegant and dangerously poised in its caution, holds a felid quality in its movement that is precise and baleful. She is smiling, this figure in front of me, in such a way that Pinkie Pie would not: with an upward curve that shows the glare of the fang, a cheek wrinkled by a small sunken bony depression. Her eyes and eyelashes are sharper, intelligent, half open in an aspect not of exhaustion or a glare but a combination of both and neither. A firework exploded, and the color that seeps from the window bathes the prim posture of her outline in a brief shade of green, which, for a moment, camouflaged the icy blue of her carnassial irises and the pale blood-red mellow of her mane.

"W-W-Who are you?" is all I can ask.

"I’m the face deformed beneath a mask worn too long and too tight.” She tilts her head.

"W-What do you want?"

"What I want is to not see your face," she hisses. "I cannot stand it, but I have to learn to, from time to time, if just to keep the both of us sane. But, as a trade, you’d have to get use to my face as well. Wouldn’t you agree?"

"I don't know what you're talking about!"

"Seriously?" The shape and movement of her mouth indicates that she should be laughing, but there is no sound coming from her lips. "In that case, I must have overestimated you. But I didn't. You know what I'm talking about, even if you don't have the words for it now like I do. I can see it in every careful gesticulation of your body and in the escapism of your euphemisms."

"Don't talk as if you know me." I say it, because everything she said is true.

She trots close. "But I do know you. I know you more than anypony else, more than Shining Armor, more than yourself... and more than Applejack."

There is something in the way she looked, in the way her irises holds up my eyes. Before she can come any closer, those pair of icy blue knives inching closer to me with each step, the same paralyzing shock that renders me immobile now propels me to the door. I turn around and run towards the exit.

"Stop, Lapis," she says.

And, on impulse, my whole body freezes, my hoof drawing back as though the knob is still scorching fresh from the foundry.

"Something told you to do what I said, didn’t it? That's the proof of the fear I just talked about. Cherish that fear, Rarity, it’s worth millions. If you look back, you would notice that all your achievements here is grounded upon your paranoia."

"Fear?” I bark, whirling to her. “What do I have to fear against you?"

"You who just scrambled for escape, and found none, dare to ask me that?" she laughs. "That's another proof of that fear; like that of a cornered animal between a wall and its predator, resorting to fight back. Very well, I don't enjoy putting it this bluntly but if you insists... You have nothing to fear from me, except for what you fear in yourself. Which is what exactly?”

“Nothing!” I hiss curtly.

“Oh no. It’s everything.” She clicks her tongue, shaking her head. Then closing her eyes for a second, she opened it again, this time brimming with unforgiving intelligence. “First off, your real name isn't Rarity, it’s Lapis Lazuli."

"H-H-How did you...?" I can no longer control the muscles of my face. The blast of appalling memory contorts my muzzle, and the polarity is reflected in the amused frown forming in hers.

"Well, I am one of your wedding planners after all–or didn't you know that?–that I just had to take a peek in the Canterlot archives for your records to complete the form of your wedding papers. And strangely enough there isn't a unicorn pony named Rarity. What kind of name is that even? Rarity? It reeks of desperate egotism. Even after hours of searching, I still can't find it. So I searched for Sweetie Belle’s instead and here I found a startling discovery:

“Sweetie Belle's mother, Pearl, was a widow to a stallion named Diamond Dust before remarrying a unicorn quarterback named Magnum. Diamond Dust, however, was a widower to a mare named Sleeve Stitch, who gave birth to a pristine-white unicorn filly. It is also interesting to note that this filly’s birth certificate is two months earlier than her parent’s wedding documents. And that’s because it’s a forced marriage when Diamond Dust knocked up his first wife. That white unicorn filly is unplanned; she is an accident."

I clear the lump from my throat.

"So, basically,” she continues, “what happened was when the filly’s biological mother died, the daddy remarried. And when daddy died, the foster mother remarried. Leaving the filly to be a mishap orphan to foster parents who dutifully and silently carried her around like the leftover baggage she is. Isn't that right, Lapis?"

"What of it?” I say, holding my chin up. "What of it!?"

"But then your foster parents had Sweetie Belle and you saw how they loved her like they never loved you; and more than your real parents loved you, I’d like to think. You were unwanted, after all. So you ran away at the age of eight, and there Miss Rarity first came into existence down the ledger of Canterlot Blue Stable hotel. But you were thrown out after three days as your meager stolen bits ran dry. And you can't return to San Franciscolt with your name and face on every milk bottle. So you secluded yourself in little ol' Ponyville, working as a seamstress until the storeowner died and you revised the will to give you Carousel Boutique."

"Lies! You have no proof! That doesn't prove anything. Miss Carousel wanted to give me her boutique; she just forgot to write down my name in her will, that's all!"

"Maybe, maybe not. But your past is insignificant so I didn’t bother to double-check. But what is significant and shocking... is that these events happened before any of us were even born–"

"No!" I scream. "That’s not true!"

"That's right: you're not twenty-four years old, you're thirty-five!"

I run, bursting myself through the door to my bedroom. I slam the door close. She pulls it open. I push myself against the very corner, seeing her trot in.

"How pathetic can you be, Lapis?” she says. “Having to hide your age like that beneath a thick layer of powders and perfumes and fake eyelashes, and pretending you don’t need glasses when in public. Is that why you spend so much time in the spa?"

"I'm not Lapis!” I shriek. “I'm Rarity."

"Not to me you're not. Why, it got me thinking, you probably gave your virginity to Shining Armor, didn't you? You were a virgin on your first night with him, weren’t you?”

“Don’t ask me that!”

“Ha! So you were. I knew it. A thirty-five year old virgin, past her prime, preserving her chastity as a last desperate stranglehold to cling on to some fairytale happy ending with a prince."

I throw myself on the bed, shutting my eyes against the sheets and covering my ears.

"But a noose around the neck isn’t enough. You’d have to have stepladders, like Cadance for one, or mountains of corpses to climb like the mangled remains of your friends. You kept Twilight in the dark, turning her to the outcast among the six of us where she’s concerned the most.”

“I was going to tell her,” I cry out, “I swear!”

“You bribed me with your dresses and parties.”

“That- that was never my intention!”

“And you blackmailed Fluttershy with–"

"That's not true!” My scream is muffled by the bed. “Fluttershy and I are best friends, I wouldn’t do that to her."

"I talked to Fluttershy! Like all introverts, she told more in what she didn't say. You manipulated her with maudlin acts of self-pity with the subliminal overtones of a threat. You took her sympathy and choked her with it. I never felt so sick in my stomach that I had to do something: Fluttershy didn't tell Rainbow Dash about you and Shining Armor; I did!"

A gasp breaks out of me. "You swore! You swore you wouldn't tell!"

"Yes! I swore that I wouldn't tell anypony that I saw you two in Manehattan. But not when I saw you in Fillydelphia, in Baltimare, in Mustangnia! Why, you probably fucked your way throughout Equestria. And though it was smart of you, Miss Glass Slippers, to hide under names, you were stupid enough to use the same name over and over again on every cheap hotel you can find that any hosteler, luggage boy or pulp-beaten bartenders can identify you from a mile away."

I cannot respond anymore, my tears drowning me. She twists my foreleg and yank on my mane, pulling my face close to her vicious grimace.

"But worst of all,” she says, her voice rising, “you tried to kill Cadance!"

"No! No! No!”–I try to pull my hoof away from her–“I'd never resort that far."

"Wrong!" She pulls on my mane again, and I feel the slash of her sharp hoof against my cheeks. "When Twilight mailed us about Cadance's chandelier accident, I didn't rush straight to the hospital. I knew I have to run back to her room! And, lo, there I found those broken plates and upturned table where a fight broke out. And the accident is starting to look less of an accident, especially when that chain looks more torn than worn out. You tried to get Cadance out of the way so you can steal Shining Armor from her. But she survived! And you know that the only way you can get Shining Armor now is if you trapped him into marriage before she wakes up. He doesn’t love you. He never did. There’s only one reason why he’d marry you. And that’s because he got you pregnant, isn’t it? Isn’t it!?"

"Yes!" I cry. “Yes! I admit it!”

"Wrong again, you lying bitch!"

She runs to the bathroom and tears through the medicine cabinet, producing a bottle of pills. She takes the case, opens the cap, and throws its contents all to my face.

Screaming, I frantically jerk away the pink maggot-sized pills from my diamond dress.

"You're not pregnant! You wouldn't dare get yourself pregnant because deep down in that rotting core of yours, you still have the shameless impetuosity to love Applejack!"

"I don’t love Applejack!” I shout, covering my ears. “Don't say her name. I love Shining Armor! I never loved Applejack! Why do say that!?"

"For the same reason that you don't, because it's true." Then she laughs. "And–oh!–I almost forgot. Your cutie mark, I just figured it out–"

I feel my eyes go wide. "No! Don't say it!"

"So you know, huh? Those shiny things on your flank, they're not really diamonds are they?"

"I said don't say it!" I beg, in a hysterical cry.

"It makes perfect sense now. No... They're not diamonds. They're rhinestones."

I shut my eyes. I bite my lip. I cover my ears. But it is too late, even before she says those words. The truth is in me, it is my very destiny, my soul given form.

"That's what you are, Lapis, and that's what you want–the nothing, the zero, the unreal, the lie. Beneath that dress of diamonds, all you really are is one big rhinestone. The day you figured you couldn't equal what Cadance earned, loved and created, you wanted her dead, gone and reduced, in body and in spirit. You didn't envy her, envy is an understatement. You don't want bits, bits are too innocent for that. You stole Shining Armor, the thing she loves the most, and used it against her. You never loved Shining Armor. You just wanted to destroy Cadance. You want destruction! Destruction for destruction's sake. Destruction of the great and beautiful you couldn't be. Like a punk destroying a statue to proclaim himself superior to its sculptor..."

"Enough..." I whisper, a last plea of mercy. "No more... I can't stand it anymore... Just... stop... Please stop..."

"You have nowhere hide to now–no tears or sugar-coating–I’ve torn all masks. You can’t hide from me no more than you can hide from your own aging skin. Why so afraid, Lapis? I’m not telling you anything you don’t already know.”

I lay weeping on the bed, for a span of time I cannot know. The images are all forced into my head, shrouding my consciousness of what is real and what are thoughts.

Then I feel her, on the bed beside me. "You asked who I am, Lapis?" she whispers to me, gently this time. "I'm Pinkie Pie. I'm Pinkamena Diane Pie. Like you, I played this game of masquerade. And I'm sick and tired of it, but I have to keep playing. But unlike you, I played honestly, without any illusion to my wrongdoing. Inasmuch as they couldn't see you, you can't see me; except in these brief exhausting moment where I am too tired of all these posturing and want some freedom of relief.

"What I want is the exact same thing you told Rainbow Dash and what she didn't believe in, but I do. I want all six of us to be friends together... and... be together. It doesn't matter what we're feeling on the inside as long as we're all smiling. We'd still be friends, no matter what. That's why I hid myself behind the curtains. I pulled my own strings in the same darkness where you pulled yours. I thought I had you, that you'd give up once I cut off your last connections with Canterlot gentry when I humiliated you in public. But I didn't think you were black enough on the inside that you'd try to kill Cadance for Shining Armor, just to get back on the game; on their game of masked puppets foxtrotting the dance macabre. When that happened, I knew I lost. We'll never be friends again, the six of us. But at least on the surface... on the surface of it all! We... we can still smile to each other. If I can manage that at least... then..."

I feel her hoof petting my mane. She shakes her head.

"We are not abnormal ponies, you and I. We are, in fact, the original displaced simulacrum of cognitive dissonance; and it is our friends: the honest, the kind, the trustworthy, and the loyal, who are the aberrant in this world. But there is one thing I can never understand about you, Lapis. There may be some self-defensive psychological excuse of a rationalization as to why somepony like myself would prefer a beautiful lie over an ugly truth. But you, Lapis, you chose an ugly lie over a beautiful truth. Why did you do it? What were you trying to prove? Is this your alibi against life, or your indictment against the world in which you live? To pursue as something as petty as being a princess...”

“I-I-It’s not... petty.” I slap her hoof away and scream, through the open space and through the years, to them: to Applejack, to Lapis Lazuli, to Rarity, to Miss Glass Slippers, to Cadance, to Shining Armor, to all my true friends, "It’s not petty! It was my dream! Mine! D-Do you know what it was like... spending nights after nights crying myself to sleep? How lonely... how dark... and disappointed those nights were? Wishing of a dream that will never come true? Of true love, of castles, and of... of... true love: Of a prince, any prince, that will come and sweep me off my hooves and... and show me that my life is... is much more than dark alleys, muddy farms and... and making dresses I’ll have no right to wear. That there’s a place of beauty, of elegance, and I belong there and no place else. T-That I... I deserve something better than being treated like baggage or... or... rhinestone... That I’m... wanted and... and loved... Should I have stayed there, in Ponyville, as my young life bled by, drop by drop, each day, slaving away before a sewing machine for a day's meal, waiting for some fairy godmother to wave her wand to do what I cannot? I had to do something! Anything! I’m supposed to be a princess, goddamnit! And you–all of you!–have no right to judge me, you commoners, servants, evil stepsisters and stepmothers. So what if I hurt others!? So what if I have to climb corpses!? So what if I have to reduce myself to a whore!? I had to pursue it, even at the cost of everything. ...And maybe–maybe!–after the Gala, I could have forgiven this world if my dream never came true, only it did! But not to me! But to Cadance! To Cadance! It was her fault! Suddenly, from nowhere, my grand royal wedding! What did she ever do to deserve it!? It was supposed to be my night! my prince! It was mine! I have the right to it, haven’t I? I dreamt of it! I wanted it! I begged and sacrificed for it! I’d sell my soul for it! I even gave up Applej–”

I stop, her face coming to my mind. There is a long silence.

“I... I even gave up the only one I ever truly loved...

"All... I really wanted was..." I mutter, "was somepony to tell me that... that… ‘I-It’s okay, Lapis. You don’t have to be a princess to be loved’… that… I don't need to be a princess to be happy. I don't need to wear a tiara to be special. That I don't need to be on a throne to be wanted and loved."

"And to the only pony in the world who gave you all that,” she said, “you stabbed her in the back."

The weight is lifted from the bed, and I hear her trotting out the door. As I look at her, she stops, turns around and stares down at me.

“Help me!” I scream unto her.

"Don't worry you pathetic little–” she catches the insult between her teeth, deciding against it. “When the judge asks if anypony opposes your union with Shining Armor, nopony will speak against you, not even me. But I'd advise you not to throw your bouquet to your bridesmaid because we'll avoid it like a plague.”

“No!” I scream again, leaping to my hooves and throwing away my tiara. “You don’t understand! This isn’t what I wanted!”–I dive down, my body to the ground, grabbing her hooves, begging–“Help me! Expose me! I… I’m begging you!”

“I understand all too well.” She shakes her head. "And no, I won’t help you. Nothing can help you now. This is your night, your dream, your happily-ever-after. You’ve fought for it. You’ve wished for it. And here it is. So brush your mane, retouch that make-up, fix your dress, and put on that mask. Your wedding is in a few minutes. And I have a best mare speech to get ready for."

“…Believe me when I say that a mare like that is one of a kind.

“So, on behalf of the Elements of Harmony, we welcome you as a part of our circle of pony friends forever! That’s why I believe this wedding is not an end, but a new beginning. Chocolate toasts for everypony! To Rarity and Shining Armor: forever and ever and happily ever after!”

Pinkie Pie grabs a glass of chocolate syrup seemingly from nowhere and downs the entire thing. As she finishes, the crowd once again erupts into a storm of applause and standing ovation, toasting in my honor with glasses of cognac and champagne.

Fluttershy is idly playing with her food, pretending not to listen. Rainbow Dash breathes deeply and painfully, as though the air stings her lungs. Applejack shakes her head and takes another swig of her bottle. Twilight Sparkle, still with that dazed expression, blinks once or twice.

But only I could see through and between the jokes and humor. The blood drains from my face and tears struggle to breach my eyes.

“And for the wedding’s closing speech,” Pinkamena was saying, “who better to give it than the bride herself!”

Two dozen photographers dart, sit and squat just below the stage. Flashbulbs from the cameras pop and sparkle from every direction. The brightness painfully shocks my eyes and my vision blurs.

As reality congeals itself again to a whole, I see Pinkamena standing in front of me.

“Take it away, Rarity!” she says.

The pink pony looks at me and winks. I look at the microphone, then to her, then to the microphone again. Her smile stiffens and it makes me clear my throat.

My whole body shaking, I take the microphone from her hooves to deliver the night’s closing toast.

“I... I am proud...” I say, clearing my throat, “and honored... that you are here with me tonight, on the night of my wedding. Ladies and gentlepony, my honored and esteemed guests, what is there for me to say? That you are here right now says it all. I cannot thank you enough, all of you, for coming here to celebrate with me in my union with my new beloved husband. In this gathering, this celebration, that is said to have existed only in childhood fairytales, stories of chivalry, and... and dreams, could not have been possible without each and everypony in this room. In good faith, I must give credit where credit is due. To my best friends, whom without them this night could not have been possible:

“To Twilight Sparkle,” I call. The lavender unicorn looks up, her attention summoned, blinking only once. “She who has always known of my love for her brother and who has always encouraged me with her continuous support.”

Stomps of clapping hooves flows from the crowds. Twilight Sparkle closes her eyes, as though to shut them is to shut the sound of lauding.

“To Rainbow Dash,” I say, once the applause dies down. The cyan pegasus heaves all the air contained in her chest out of her flaring nostrils. “She whose words never once stood in my path and whose actions kept reminding me that the pursuit of love, of true love, is the noblest undertaking of them all.”

The crowd breaks into another cheer. Rainbow Dash grits her teeth. She raises a hoof and almost, almost, crashes it against the table. She places her shaking forelimb down, safely back to her side.

“...For all her understanding,” I say, looking at the canary mare, “her compassion, her cooperation, her obedience and complete faith in me, how can I ever thank my best friend, Fluttershy?”

This time the crowd rises up, giving a standing ovation once more to the signal of flashing cameras. Fluttershy hides herself beneath the curtain of her long fringes, doodling on her plate of refuse.

“And to Miss Pinkie Pie,” I say, looking at the crowd, avoiding the look of the pink pony waving at me, “she who keeps–”

Then, just then, a loud metallic sound interrupts me, a screech of metal scratching against marble.

Applejack is standing up, having pulled away her chair. She is looking at me.

“She who keeps...” I try to continue, “who k-keeps a secret a-and...”

Applejack, mouths something. Something nopony is able to hear. She puts her hat back to her head and turns around, walking towards the door.

“...w-who keeps a secret... secret... a-and who...” I stutter, but it no longer matters. Nopony is looking at me. Nopony is listening to me, not even myself. All our attention is locked towards the single earth pony making her way down the aisle.

Passing through the long open alleyway between the wall of eyes, hanging jaws, fluid faces of make-up and gems, Applejack steadily walks, under the hot white light of chandeliers and amidst the sea of gold and jewels. Her head is slightly casts down, concealing her eyes beneath the brim of her hat, as she makes her way to the door.

“W-Wait...” I whisper. The word barely escaped by lips.

Applejack continues to march.

The lull hangs, prevailing over the grand hall that even the orchestra had muted its music. Sound cease to exists but for her light hoofsteps that rings throughout the high ceilings. At that moment I feel, as we all do, an overpowering awareness that is almost a sensation; a feeling of our own pliability, as though our hooves and bodies are all fluid and plastic against Applejack notwithstanding obstinance for the truth. My vision blurs, so that the wall bends and the crowd, with all their jewels and gems, dissipate underneath a sea of mist where they melted, and only Applejack, dear and dearest Applejack, in her intolerance for the fake, the unreal and the lie, remains solid, compact, real and visible. With each and every inch she takes away from me, I can see from the white veil how she carries with her, and her only, the brief instants of our memory. Then I see it too, in brief flashes that come and go, with each resounding step she makes: Our moments, for ours alone, of how we kissed–the sweet caress of her lips every waking morning and every sleepy night–, and embraced–her protective hold from where she shielded me from all else–, and loved–her everything–, to be lived again no more and to be locked away only in her nostalgia. At that moment, the hall stretches through finite eternity, narrowing to a tunnel to which the end point, the goal, the ending, is Applejack herself.

“A-A-Apple–...” I try to say. The lump of gems, jewels, bits, fame, and peers in my throat block out the word.

Applejack reaches the door. She stops. She raises a hoof and touches the knob.

“Appleja–...”

Applejack pulls the door open and–

With one loud and violent outcry, my voice shatters the silence as I scream my true loves name: “Applejack!”

Applejack stops. She turns around, and looks up to me. Her green eyes waiting.

“Applejack...” I say into the microphone, the sound screeched against the walls. “Applejack, I...”

Thousand of ponies shift on their seat, looking at the two sole standing figures on both ends of the grand hall: I, the princess, who stands trembling on the raised dais, and Applejack, steady and calm, who stands with one hoof on the knob and another already out the door; and when they figure that she will not say a word, that is when all eyes, with the small gradual drag of a cumbersome weight, turn to me.

And now, here–standing here in this grand pause–alone, finally on top of the world, the whole of Canterlot waits for me in total stillness and silence. The moment which I had dreamt all my youth for, the moment where I have struggled with all my life for, to be the object of everypony’s unflinching eyes. Not a word, not a sound from them, just the world of Canterlot–and myself–waiting for the ultimate conclusion.

The moment’s delusion overwhelms me in sudden ecstatic revelation. It is for a flash of a second, just a flash and just a second, where all of them look at me with an endearing and beloved smile. A smile they found, in reflection to mine, as though they are to say, “Congratulations, Rarity.” And I know, in this illustrious and illusory second, is the only place where I can have everything that I have always wanted. I turn to look behind me and stare into the eyes of my husband, my prince, my Shining Armor. He too, watches me, and I tell him only the final words I can speak for us: “Shining Armor,” I say, barely above a whisper. “This... this is enough...Thank you.”

And the last second pass, the enchantment–the delusion–wears off. The clock tower strikes midnight.

I turn to the crowd one final time, my smile gone, as I throw my mask away and unveil the wool from everypony’s eyes.

“Yes!” I shout into the microphone, to everypony and to everything. “I tried to kill Cadance!”

All of the sudden, as gasps of horror ripples throughout my audience, the crowd felt the life of a throbbing heart punch their chest.

“I, Rarity, to whom you offer your commendation, to whom you’ve sold your better judgment, is the failed murderess of the princess. It is I who wanted to kill her; who wants to kill her! It is I who stole Shining Armor. It is I who lied, and threatened, and blackmailed everypony to bring us to this very moment! It is I who–”

But Rainbow Dash is already in the air, and Twilight on her feet. Fluttershy is shocked, a second away from screaming. Pinkie Pie drops her masks, showing her true face grit her teeth.

“I am the witch of Canterlot!” I scream.

My horn glows and once again the chain above snaps. The chandelier falls, crashing down on the fountain. Its fires spill into the wine. The infernal combustion from the centerpiece shatters the windows and sends the burning chandelier reeling through the aisle and tables, leaving a trail of dancing flame in its wake. With another flick of my horn, the flame spell set the front row tables alight. Everypony is on their feet. The mares scream. The stallions jump out of the way. The pegasi who can manage is in the air. Everypony is racing to the door. The fires jump and crawl on the cloths and curtains, dispersing with each fabric they eat away. And the flames, having reached the bar and wallow on the intoxicant, erupt in a blind drunken rage. Whereas the flowing champagnes and cognacs spill liquid fire, it is the bottles of rum and gin that bursts to a fiery explosion like a Molotov cocktail.

Tongues of flame sprawl from the windows. The smoke fogs the ceiling, dimming the room.

“Twilight!” Shining Armor shouts, pushing me aside and jumping from the dais to her sister. “Help! Help!” another pony is screaming, “somepony help!” “No! No! Don’t say that, Shy! Wake up!” Another came from the center table. “Stop it, Rarity!”

The rest of the screaming is lost to me; I am already running, galloping, through the spiral staircase of my castle, laughing and bawling in delirious hysterics.

I neither know nor care if the flames followed me, or if I had set my room alight myself. Somewhere in the room, the gramophone made the cello sing a symphony in a solemn key, and the fire, entranced by the sound, dances to the melody as they bid their time nibbling on my curtains and carpets. The dresser is all consumed, as is the cabinets that house my dresses and shoes.

I stand, in front of the cheval glass, still in my full wedding gown and tiara, pressing my hoof against the clear transparent projection. But the mirror, which had been unforgiving all these years, feels pity for me one last time. For it did not reflect me nor where I am, but seem to open a portal to a long dreamy past of who I was, and where I had been. Behind the surface of that glass, I see, with vivid clarity, a small little filly. She is a very small and very gullible unicorn filly with pristine dove-white coat and lush violet mane. She is in a basement. She is wearing a crown made up of cardboard cutout and a cape of torn canopy. But most of all she is smiling gaily and superiorly happy; she dances, spinning in place, as though she in a ballroom, and she takes bows as though she presents herself to the most important ponies of the world.

“I-It’s alright now, isn’t it?” I tell her, kneeling on the floor. “It’s okay now... isn’t it? We were a princess... even for a... for a second... And we were... were great, weren’t we, Lapis? We were great, weren’t we? We were so important and... and famous and... popular and... everypony loved us... We were wanted... We were… we were... wanted… B-But I... I’m sorry... We have to be the witch now... P-Please, don’t look at me like that... It was worth it, wasn’t it... Even if... for a second... just a second... just... a... second... we were a rarity... And I’m glad to have given my life for that...”

Standing up, I wipe the tears from my eyes with a white napkin.

“It’s okay,” I say, chuckling so she wouldn’t have to worry. “I... won’t be a witch for long... Witches like me–no, not you, just me–we... we don’t get happily ever afters. I’ll… I’ll make it so that your friends will.”

The fires have swallowed most of the furniture and the bed is now a flinching color of orange and red. I look up, to see the ceiling is being devoured by the burning ivies.

I trot to the end of the room, the last place the fire has yet to reach, and open the two swinging glass doors to the wide alfresco balcony. I adjust the tiara on my mane and fix the creases of my dress before, overlooking the city of Canterlot, I stand on the balustrade’s ledge.

“Rarity!” A voice behind me boomed and a pair of hind legs crushed the lock of the door as it is blown open. “Rarity!” Applejack calls again.

I do not even turn my head, my eyes still on that lighted city of Canterlot. A small cool wind brushes against me, flapping my diamond gown’s white train to a long wavy flag in the breeze. If I am any more romantic, I would have spread my forelimbs wide like an eagle. But one hoof of mine remains on top my head, against the tiara, to shield it from the wind. If I am to die now, I will at least keep the tiara on.

“Rare, what are you–” She stops, abruptly, seeing me where I stand. She shouts, “Get the down from that ledge!”

“I’m sorry,” I say, “I can’t.”

“To hell with yer sorry!” she shouts. “If ya don’t get down from there ah swear ah won’t forgive ya. Now c’mere!”

Something crackles from behind as the fire whistles, and the sound of the bed frame giving way to the flames can be heard.

“I can’t,” I whisper. I turn to her and watch the dance of the wall of fire between us. “This is how it ends: with the witch dying by her own fault. Nopony feels guilty, nopony else get blood on their hooves, and everypony can tie their knots, right every wrongs, and close the curtains in a celebratory merrymaking… Yes… That ending is perhaps my last parting gift to all of you.”

“Goddarn it, hun,”–hun, to be able to hear that word again from her lips– “Don’t take the coward’s way out! Ah didn’t love ya for that. It don’t need to end like this. We’ll get ya yer happy ending too! Just... Just come back and we’ll fix everything! Like how we always fixed everything! Just–Goddamn it!–don’t ya dare jump!”

“I’m sorry. I can’t anymore,”–I raise my forehooves to my face, staring at the invisible blood in them–“I already… jumped. And I’ve been fallin… for quite some time now,”–then putting my hooves down–“ Goodbye, and I’m sorry for everything…”–I smile to Applejack one last time–“...Dearest.”

I hold my hooves against my chest. I lean back. I fall.

“No!” Applejack screams.

There is no sense of fear in me, even as I lift myself from the touch of ground and felt nothing but air on my hooves as I descend into the open mouth of the abyss below. I feel no sense of release. No redemption from penance. Only the awareness that, in a few eternal seconds, my life and all pain it has contained will be gone.

But then a speck of orange follows me from the ledge where I threw myself. And horror strikes me that she will share the same fate as I. Some of her coat is lightly scorched, having charged through the fire, and a small speck of flame burns bright from the edge of her hat that is whipped away by the wind.

I do not know what it is she wishes to accomplish. She races for me, against the air and current, both hooves outstretch in reach for mine. I do not know what, too, made me reach for her. Perhaps it is because, more than death itself, I regret to see those streaks of tears streaming from her emerald eyes. And more than anything, I want to wipe her tears away as a last assurance that it will be okay.

Stupid Applejack... You can’t fly, silly.

Our hoof inches closer, closer and closer still until, as we are about to touch, salvation pulls Applejack away. There, from behind my dearest, a cyan pegasus holds my love aloft with one desperate batting wing.

“Not me!” Applejack screams, struggling to free herself from the hooves saving her life. “Save her! Save Rarity!”

Thank you, Rainbow Dash.

...Take good care of my Jacqueline.

Contended that my love is safe, I lean my head back and throw my hooves about.

I see, through the tunnel of my racing vision, the stars, the colossal marble towers of Canterlot, and the last image of Applejack reaching out to save me. I close my eyes, feeling the whips of wind slash against my back in my descent, and submit the lasts of my dwindling consciousness to the repercussive echo of the past and the world of our dreams:

“Lapis, dear, are you still dreaming?” “Save the dreams for when you’re sleeping.” “Ah swear on mah grave, on mah parent’s grave, that ah won’t let anythin’ hurt ya.” “I want you, Shining Armor. In every way a mare could want a stallion.” “Ah want ya, Rare. Ah want ya more than anythin’ else in the world.” “Plastics. You know what plastics are, of course...” “I swear, by our friendship, that Shining Armor has only you.” “Have a good night, sir, and the charming mare who is not your wife.” “I–I don’t care if I’m your mistress out there but here... at least... on your bed... I’m your princess...” “Here we are, the faceless, wearing masks upon masks upon masks, playing charades, hide-and-seek and musical beds.” “Tell her! ...Tell AJ the truth!” “If I take you, right now, would you be willing to leave Applejack for me?” “Cadance... I should’ve told you this before but I’ve always hated you.” “...It wasn’t Rarity.” “I’m pregnant.” “Tomorrow night, I shall be a bride... A bride to Shining Armor!” “Beneath that dress of yours all you are is one big rhinestone.” “It was my dream! Mine!” “I am the witch of Canterlot!”

I do not fall with grace, as I have not lived with grace. Spiraling, tumbling, and turning, I fall.

And as I reach the end, fate and destiny prepared the the safety net below with an enveloping embrace of her large pink wings.

“Got you,” says Cadance.