Hey. Well, my plans for the Arena got a bit... screwed, pardon the pun. I kept in what has been written and the rape scene for character development, continuity, laziness, lols, and to knock that gary stu-ish protagonist down a peg with a pretty solid defeat. The defeat being the rape. Anyway, I'm resuming the story from right after the Arena, assuming he beat it overall and is on his way out of the empire with his prize. You know, Gilda.

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I stepped out of the Arena finally, waiting for Gilda to show up and meet me like the King had said. It felt good to be back in my old armor with my old weapons, instead of chained to a wall in a leather skirt. After a long wait, Gilda finally met me at the edge of the Arena, right where the stone turned to clouds again.

"Sharky! You did it!" She cried happily, throwing herself at me for a hug. I sidestepped her hug neatly and allowed her to crash into the floor.

"I uhh... I'd like to not be touched for awhile." I mumbled numbly.

"Ow! You coulda caught me at least!"

"Sharky! You did it!" RD called from somewhere just outside of my sight.

"Don't try to hug me please." I asked cautiously.

"Yeah, sure she gets a warning..." Gilda grumbled. RD landed by my side and gave me a curious look.

"Why can't I hug you? I've been worried sick about you for two days!" She asked, sounding a bit upset.

"Look... just... something happened."

"What?" The two girls asked at the same time.

"I don't wanna talk about it."

"Why not?" They asked, still in sync.

"Because. Now, can I hold one of you to g--"

"Me!" Gilda interrupted.

"I haven't even told you what I wanted to hold you for yet..."

"Doesn't matter." Gilda flew over to me and fell into my arms.

"... Okaaaaay, but don't reach out and touch me or anything. Just keep still."

"Aww, that's no fun."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"Nothing."

"... Okaaaaay."

"Hey! That's not fair! You should hold me, I'm your marefriend!" RD protested bitterly. I gave her a little glare.

"Not this week. Also, don't even think I've forgotten about that little stunt where you basically stole one of Twilight's days. I'm not thrilled with you right now." I finished by cutting off my glare and looking off in a random direction. I heard RD gulp noisily. Suddenly it occurred to me that I had no ride off of this hunk of clouds. I balanced Gilda in one arm and whipped out my phone. I almost called Luna, but decided not to bother her and called Esmerelda instead.

"Sharky? You're calling?" Esmerelda asked startledly before her face even really finished coming into focus on my phone.

"Yeah, I'm calling."

"Really? I thought you were mad at me..."

"To be honest, I can't even remember why I would be mad at you. A lot has happened. Look, can you come here and fly my friends and I back to Ponyville?"

"O-of course! I'll be there in just a bit!"

"Ok, meet us at the Arena. I believe you know where it... Oh yeah, that's why I was mad." I suddenly realized. It didn't really matter anymore though. "Oh well, meet us at the Arena."

"You got it, bye!"

"Bye." I hung up and put my phone away again. "Well, now that I won't be having to walk on the clouds anywhere, I can stop this." I placed Gilda on the ground next to RD and stepped away from both of them.

"Alright, seriously Sharky, what happened?" RD asked, her voice heavy with concern.

"Nothing."

"Don't lie to me."

"Don't keep asking questions I'm not going to answer." I retorted back with a bit of venom. Without looking at her, I could almost feel her recoil and flatten her ears.

"Dude... chill." Gilda said cautiously, as though she were afraid I'd lash out at her too. Without even bothering to say anything, I sat down and cross my arms disinterestedly.

"He's a bit of a bitch right now. I'll be plenty happy to talk if you'd like." Steven offered.

"Steven? Why do you almost sound... nice?" RD asked. I ignored her, knowing she wasn't talking to me.

"Got to kill. Kill swag makes me happy."

"Do you know why he's acting like this?" Gilda asked.

"Tell them and you get to spend eternity as a block of ice in my head." I threatened. "... No, I'm required to say I don't." RD and Gilda sighed. We spent the rest of the time waiting for Esmerelda in tense silence. When Esmerelda arrived, the tension was so thick I was half wondering if Gilda and RD had choked on it. Her arrival was heralded by her massive wingbeats, and soon she was over the Arena.

"Sharkyyyyyy!" She called, presumably searching for me.

"Over here!" I boomed back as loudly as I could. Esmerelda's wingbeats grew louder as she approached, and soon her head came into view.

"Oh my gosh! How are you?"

"Look, I'd hate to talk, but we need to get to Ponyille now. Twilight's gonna kill me already as it is."

"Don't you mean you'd lo--"

"I know what I said." I interrupted. Esmerelda gave me a curious stare, but eventually just lowered her head and allowed us to get on her. The girls sat rather far from me, but I didn't really care. Esmerelda took off, and we started the flight in silence.

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After a few hours of agonizingly silent flight, we finally arrived in Esmerelda's cave. She leaned down to allow us to dismount, and we started to leave the cave immediately. Before I actually jumped over the ledge and started to climb down, Esmerelda piped up.

"S-Sharky?" She squeaked nervously. I turned towards her as RD and Gilda took off.

"Yes?"

"Umm... C-could you come see me sometime soon? I mean... I know you likely don't want to b--"

"Sure. Why not?"

"W-what?!"

"Yeah, I could use some time with a friendly dragon." I turned back to the ledge and lowered myself to the face of the mountain. Esmerelda shouted something after me, but by that time I was too far and disinterested to care what it was. After a few minutes of climbing and running, I found myself back in town. I was nearly instantaneously swarmed by newsponies asking me questions about my victory and what I planned to do now. After repressing an urge to say, 'I'm going to Disney World!', I ignored them and walked right through the crowd. After a few more seconds, I arrived at the door of the library, let myself in, and slammed the door in the faces of the reporters.

"Hello..." A voice, Twilight's, said behind me with quiet anger.

"Hi."

"So... How was abandoning me for two da--" I ran over to her and picked her up in a hug from her chair in the corner right after I tossed my weapons to the side hastily.

"It was horrible Twilight, absolutely horrible!" I started to sob into her shoulder. I had lifted her so high her shoulder as even with my head.

"W-wha--"

"I'm starting your week over, totally over! I'm so sorry I left!"

"Sharky... W-what happened?" Twilight whispered, all the anger gone from her voice.

"I-I don't want to talk about it... just let me hug you..." I pleaded, feeling broken. I had been forced to fight, humiliated, beaten, raped, and generally been treated like an animal for the past two days. Even I could only handle so much; in fact, I was surprised I had made it to my marefriend, Twilight, before breaking down. For some reason, my mind got stuck on the sudden realization that Twilight was my marefriend. We were officially dating. She had hugged me back, but I pushed her away slightly.

"S-Sharky?" She asked unsurely, thrown off by my sudden rejection. Then I pulled her forward into a kiss. A real kiss, not one she had to take, or a peck on the cheek. For the first time, I kissed her. For about half a moment, Twilight seemed surprised. Then she threw her legs around my neck and kissed me back furiously. She seemed eager and impatient with the kiss, her tounge invading my mouth almost right off the bat. I gratefully accepted her and kissed her back just as fiercely, almost as if I were trying to rid myself of all traces of the dragoness with Twilight's kiss. After what felt like mere moments, but was likely much longer, she pulled away from me.

"W-why'd you stop?" I whined. Twilight seemed a bit unsure herself.

"Sharky... I don't like feeling like you're hiding something. What happened to you? I know you were in the Arena, but other than that all I know is you left me alone during our time..."

"Twilight... I didn't want to leave you. Look, here's the story. While I was out with RD, we decided to stop by her house for a moment. Gilda wanted to talk to me. While I was there, some assassins tried to kill Gilda. Well, Gilda, RD, and I anyway. Mainly Gilda though." I started. Twilight smirked a little.

"Well, I already feel sorry for them." She joked.

"Heh heh, well I beat the tar out of them and learned who sent t- These are gryffins by the way. Just so you know.- Who sent them. All they were able to tell me was a first name: 'Byron'. You heard of him?"

"No, I don't think I've ever heard that name."

"Well shoot, still no leads. Anyway, I decided I'd go to the King of the Gryffin Empire and ask if I could officially declare that Gilda was under my protection."

"To scare off any more attempts on her life. I see."

"Yes. Well, the King decided he didn't think I was worthy--"

"Has he not seen your mission reports?!"

"I think he has, and he just doesn't like me. Anyway, he told me the only way to prove my worth to him was to enter the Arena and win."

"Oh, so that's why you were there! I knew you had to be doing it for somepony, I just couldn't imagine who."

"Well, not quite done with the story. I'm getting to what happened." My voice was quickly becoming shakier. "What he didn't tell me was that I'd be entering the Arena... as a prisoner."

"He took your armor and weapons then. You likely spent most of your time there chained up in a cell, right?" Twilight asked, starting to sound angry.

"Yes. Well, what he also didn't tell me, was that he was going to make me take part in the... more... Ah screw it, he was selling me off for sex each night." Twilight's face contorted into an expression of rage. "The first night, I fended the bidder off pretty easily. The second night... he split my night sixteen different ways." Twilight's breathing was becoming heavy. "I... I fought them all off... using mainly my thundraga... but then... a lightning dragon came and... and..." I found myself unable to speak, and instead I retched a bit.

"Sharky... put me down." Twilight hissed through her teeth. Deciding it was best to do as she said, I placed her on the ground. "Spike!" She screeched. There was some muffled thumps upstairs and the little dragon came running down in moments.

"T-Twilight? What's wrong?!" He sounded like he had just woken up. I felt the manly tears welling up in my eyes vanish. I didn't want Spike to see me like I had been.

"Get a quill and parchment, I need to send a letter." Twilight continued hissing.

"To Celestia right?"

"Yes, I have something to tell her about the Gryffin King."

"Oh nonononono, I don't want you to start anything!" I interrupted. Twilight whipped around to look at me and there were actually little flames in her eyes.

"Sharky, you're a high-ranking knight in the Equestrian Army, and he did that to you. I'm not starting this, I'm having it ended." She turned back to Spike, who was now holding a quill and parchment. He cowered a little under her enraged stare. I walked over and stepped between her and Spike.

"Twilight, calm down. This doesn't need to go like this, ok? Let's just forget about it." Twilight's anger seemed to waver a bit.

"F-forget? About something like that?! How can you even say that?"

"Because, it's in the past now." I knealt down and hugged her. "Right now, I'm here with you. I'm not stuck there, and I got what I wanted. Sure, I never wanted anything like that to happen. Sure, it'll take me a while to get over it completely. I'd rather just make new memories here with you and the others than dwell on that one though, ok?" I finished. Twilight shook her head and seemed to regain her senses.

"You're right... I don't know what came over me. Spike, you can go back. I'm sorry if I scared you." Spike, still a bit intimidated and confused, slowly left and went back upstairs. "Ugh... I still can't believe we're just letting him get away with that..." Twilight pouted. "*sigh* Well, new memories huh?"

"Uh-huh."

"What kind?"

"Just any good memories really. That kiss earlier... that was a good one."

"Oh... I'm glad you liked it." Twilight blushed a little.

"Heh heh, it was great. A few more things like that and I'll be just fine."

"Sooo... Making good memories will help you feel better?"

"Yeah, the better the memory, the better I get as far as I'm concerned."

"Really... Hmmm..." Twilight's face slowly forms a sly smile. "Well..." She frowned. "Wait... you're abstinent."

"Not any more. That got messed up for me." I corrected bitterly.

"Oh right... maybe now isn't the best time for that."

"Best time for what?"

"Nothing, nothing. Don't know why it even crossed my mind."

"... What crossed your mind?" I couldn't help but feel incredibly interested in what she had been thinking of.

"It's nothing important at all, really. Just forget I said anything, it was stupid."

"Ok... ok. Can we do that cuddling and kissing thing again?" I asked hopefully, sending out silent plea that she was still in the mood for it. I fell back on the floor as Twilight kissed me mid-tackle.