(Scrubbing Bubble's submission for the June 2012 MLPG Friend-Off, based on this pic by Klondike http://kl0ndike.deviantart.com/gallery/#/d4nggw9)
 
 
Intro
 
Dawn breaks over the distant mountains, silhouetting Canterlot against the rising sun. Light washes over the village of Ponyville. Early birds flutter to branches and sing their little songs. At the Carousel Boutique, morning light climbs in through the windows. It runs along the plush carpet of the bedroom and comes to gently shine on the face of a particularly glamorous unicorn, causing her to stir and reluctantly opens her eyes.
 
Rarity sits up with a noisy stretch of her forelegs before gently hopping out of bed and immediately to her (that table mirror thing, need to look that shit up). With a professional eye, she magics the curlers out of her mane and styles it just right. After freshening up, Rarity descends to the boutique at large.
 
For the first time in weeks things are clean and orderly. As of yesterday, all of the various orders and commissions had been completed and sent to their respective clients. As Rarity looks at the calendar on the wall beside a pair of blanke mannequins, she realizes her schedule is completely free for the first time in what feels like forever. Pleased with herself, Rarity trots into the kitchen with a smile to make breakfast.
 
“Simply wonderful,” She says to herself, happily heating the stove and retrieving some eggs from the fridge with her magic. “A day off is exactly what I need right now. And since Sweetie is having a sleepover with her friends, I have the whole day to myself!”
 
“Hmm, perhaps I’ll go to the spa,” Rarity musses idly as she puts bread in the toaster. “I can’t even remember the last time I had a real massage. Maybe Fluttershy is free. And then we might swing by Pinkie’s and see what that new cake she’s been talking about lately. Oh, this is going to be such a great day!”
 
Rarity sets the table, pouring a healthy glass of juice and plating her perfectly done eggs. She’s just about dig in with her fork when she realizes something is missing. Toast. She turns to the toaster, but it still hasn't popped.
 
“Come on,” She grumbles, looking down the bread slots. The filaments are cold. Did the bread even cook? Rarity unplugs the toaster and gets a butter knife with magic.
 
“Get out already,” She tries to wedge the toast out with the knife, trying not to tear it up. But she simply cant get a hold of it. Rarity turns over the toaster and bops it hard and is rewarded with getting burnt crumbs all over the clean counter. The white unicorn lets out a frustrated angry grunt. She even tries to force the bread out with magic, but the bread is stuck or something, too much for Rarity’s rising temper to finesse.
 
“Ugh! This stupid thing!” Rarity shouts, losing it.
 
Everything was going to be perfect today, a wonderful day off and this piece of junk toaster is spoiling her perfect breakfast and ruining the whole tone for the day. Fed up, Rarity jams her hoof in. She’d going to get that toast even if it means tearing this stupid thing in half! The metal bends and protests as she shoves deeper, not even caring that the toast is long since ruined, only the mindless satisfaction of breaking something that’s been irking her. When her outburst subsides, Rarity leans against the counter panting hard. With her good hoof, she redoes her mane, mental chiding herself her getting mad over such a little thing. Very unlady like. Further composing herself, she goes to pull her hoof out.
 
Uh oh.
 
-Part 1: Denial
 
Rarity sits down, looking at the toaster fastened around the end of her leg. The metal slot has bent and shaped around it like a shoddy glove. She tries to shove it off with her free forehoof, then harder with all her hooves at once, then with her magic, becomingly increasingly more annoyed and desperate. Try as she might, the toaster holds fast, not even wiggling. Rarity falls on her back, exhausted.
 
‘Ok, just calm down,’ She thinks to herself, taking a deep breath. ‘I lost my temper and did something stupid and now I can’t fix it. I’m sure my friends can help me.”
 
Rarity composes herself once again, gets up and heads to her front door. As she walks, the toaster gives off tempo candace to her slightly off balanced trot. Clop. Clop. Clank. Clop. Clop. Clank. The electric plug swings around like a lazy snake, trailing her.
 
“I’m sure Twilight knows a spell to get it off. Maybe even fix it in the process,” Rarity says to herself. “Or maybe Applejack or Dash can just muscle it off. Yes, I’ll just go quickly across town and.....”
 
It dawns on Rarity. There’s no way she could reach any of her friends without some other ponies seeing her like this, stuck in a toaster like a silly foal. The embarrassment, the humiliation.She’d be a laughingstock, her image as well to do and fashionable unicorn would be ruined. No one can know. But if she can’t get her friends to help and she can’t get it off herself, she’s stuck. In more ways than one. Defeated, Rarity slinks back to the kitchen. Clop. Clop. Clink.
 
Rarity sulks next to the meal she’s made, now cold. This was supposed to be a fun day and she’s gone and spoiled it by having a uncouth temper tantrum. But then an idea dawns.
 
What if instead of ruining her day, this is merely an opportunity. Looking at the toaster in this light its kinda....stylish. Yes, it is! Like a post modern horseshoe. This could be the next big thing in fashion; appliance wear! Ideas streaming, Rarity abandons her breakfast and heads to work. Clop. Clop. Clink.
“This will be the next big thing!” Rarity says to herself, giddy with a new muse. “Nopony has ever done something like this! Its ingenious. Why by next season, I bet every pony who’s anypony will be wearing my designs in Canterlot.”
 
Rarity goes to her drawing board and makes some preliminary sketches. Toaster shoes are great, but why stop there? A dishwasher dress would go perfect with it! And a blender hat would be simply to die for. Her pencil scratches away furiously while Rarity grins, pleased with herself. This just might be her best work yet. Maybe even Celestia herself will commission one. Could you imagine!
 
Satisfied with her new innovative preliminary designs, Rarity turns to get some fabric, but her hoof tangles on the electric wire of the toaster. She flails wildly trying to catch herself, but goes tumbling, knocking down a dress mannequin on the way down. The mannequin falls over, knocking over another, which knocks over another, which flips over a table of fabrics and sewing needles, rolling them out and scattering them across the room.
 
-Part 2: Anger
 
“Arg! This stupid thing!” Rarity shouts loud enough to scar Opal from her hiding spot under her desk and sending her skittering out of the room.
 
The temper tantrum from earlier comes back with avengence, boiling up and sending Rarity into a fit. She viciously attacks the toaster, banging it against the floor, the wall, a table. The toaster sports some fresh dents, but all the violence only succeeds in dinging all of Rarity’s furniture and battering her leg. She fires up her horn, shoving every kind of magic and spell at the contraption in rapid succession, only to have them reflect off the polished, dented surface and refract wildly around the room. Her work area is suddenly bedazzled in sparkles, a window melts, forming a puddle on the floor, and a mannequin gets up and leaves after being struck with ricochet, probably getting the idea that the area isn’t very safe right now.
 
Rarity continues her rampage, leaving destruction in every corner of the room, sending sewing needles flying into walls and tearing up sections of carpeting out of sheer frustration. By the time she finally wears herself out, the room is all but in flames, her mane and tail are frayed and the toaster is stuck on as tight as ever. Rarity lays on her stomach, painting heavy as the rush of fury begins to subside.
 
As the exhaustion sets in, Rarity berates herself on what a dumb idea the appliance dress was.
 
-Part 3: Bargaining
 
Her mane a mess and her boutique on the better part of halfway destroyed, Rarity flicks away the dancing sparkles around her work desk, crumples up the awful dress design and starts writing a letter on fresh paper, dictating as she goes.
“Dear Princess Celestia, today I learned not to let anger get the best of you. It can drive you to act rash and do things you normally wouldn’t. I learned that lesson the hard way today. But I write to you, not just to report on the lesson I learned, but to ask for your aid. I’ve trapped myself in a most compromising and embarrassing fashion. It would simply ruin me for anypony to find out, but as the princess I know that you would not only be able to save me from this tragedy, but could easily fix it never happened.”
 
“Of course I would never dream of asking such a favor without giving something in return. If you would be so generous to come visit me in Ponyville I would be more then happy to tailor make you the most magnificent dress you have ever seen!”
 
Rarity looks at the last line she just wrote and scribbled it out. This is THE PRINCESS she’s talking about! She can’t just casually offer her some crummy little dress in order to get her to abandon her royal duties and come help her. Her offer need to be far more juicy to tempt her.
 
“I promise to completely redo your entire wardrobe. You’ll have a whole new style that positively screams CELESTIA!”
 
No, that will never work. Bigger. Much bigger!
 
“I’ll work as your private tailor, absolutely free for a year! And I’ll make you dresses, one for each day of the year. And one for every night!”
 
Rarity looks down at the letter, not mostly a series of lines scribbled out. Desperately she tries to think of what else she could possibly offer. Her house? Her business? Anything to save her from this predicament. Emotions welling, Rarity tries to hold back tears as the thought that absolutely nopony is going to come help her. A few tears drop down and make the letters run. Ponyville’s most fashionable pony crumples the letter and tosses it away. Even if she bothered to finish it, she’d still need to find Spike and she simply couldn’t bear for him to see her like this.
 
Rarity looks around her boutique in disarray, signs and heads up the stairs. Clop. Clop. Clunk.
 
-Part 4: Depression
 
Rarity flops back into bed despite it only being around noon, not even bothering to get under the sheets or rest her ragged head on a pillow. Her eyes dripping with tears, she lies on her back and fruitily tries to go back to sleep.
 
What has she gotten herself into? This was just supposed to be a nice day off and she ruined things for herself before it even began. It feels like everything she’s done has been one big mistake after another. She would be surprised if tomorrow all her dress orders were sent back with angry letters of dissatisfied customers. Everypony in town is going to find out. It’ll be worse than if they found out about her toaster incident. And they probably will anyway!
What will she do? She certainly can’t stay in Ponyville and be the town fool. Her business would be sunk. She’ll have to move away, somewhere far. Probably somewhere that doesn’t get news from the outside world. Can you actually live under a rock or is that only an expression?
 
And what about her friends? No doubt they’ll tell her not to go, that things will change. But they won’t be able to change what’s happened. It will only be a matter of time until they resent her for being a burden, no longer able to support herself and leeching off them. The shame of it all! The indignity!
 
And what of little Sweetie Belle, her precious little sister? Would she share in Rarity’s burden, being exiled to parts unknown, forever living with the knowledge her sister destroyed both their lives? Or would she be left behind, having to live with her friends and being forever ridiculed by the other fillies and colts for having such a failure for a sister. Oh poor Sweetie Belle, what has your sister done to you?
 
“Rarity!”
 
-Part 5: Acceptance
 
Rarity’s eyes snap open like a shot at Sweetie Belle calling her name. Its dark out the window. Was she sleeping all day?
 
“Rarity?! Where are you?” Sweetie cries from downstairs. “Are you ok?!”
 
“Y-yes, I’m up here Sweetie!”
 
Hurried little clops sound coming up the stairs and Sweetie Belle bursts into the room. She runs across the room and does a flying leap into the bed beside her sister and hugs her tight.
 
“I came home and I saw everything all busted up!” She snivels on Rarity’s shoulder. “I thought something happened to you! Are you ok?!”
 
“I’m fine Sweeite.” Rarity says, hugging her sister back, trying not to bop her with the toaster. “I just....had a little accident. No big deal.”
 
“Oh ok,” Sweetie Belle says, relieved. She lets go of Rarity and sits on the bed with her. “What happened? And what happened to your hoof?”
 
Rarity looks down at the toaster still stuck to her hoof. For some reason, it makes her laugh now. “Oh, I got stuck in the toaster ahaha.”
 
“What?!” Sweetie shouts, shocked and laughing herself. “Haha-ow did you manage that? Is that why everything is a mess downstairs?”
 
“It’s a long story,” Rarity says, holding in the laughter. “Suffice to say its been driving me crazy all day. Can you give me a hoof?”
 
“Sure!” Sweetie hopes down off the bed with Rarity and leads the way out the bedroom. “Did you try rubbing some butter around it to loosen it up? Lets try that!”
 
“Hold on!” Rarity calls after Sweetie Belle running the the stairs to the kitchen, not enjoying the prospect of having her leg all buttery. But, thinking about it, Rarity supposes there are worst things to have happen.