I watched his body drop until it finally collided with the ground. With a sigh I turned and flew back to the factory, making my way through the hole Breaker had made until I make it back to the room with Twilight and Starry Notes. Twilight has my sword and is trying to cut Starry free when she sees me fly back into the room. She points the sword at me and backs against the wall, shaking violently.

"Stay back. Don't come any closer or... or...I'll..." she says in total fear.

"Twilight, it's me, Storm Cloud. See, buzz cut" I say as I run a hoof through my mane. She just closes her eyes and starts to shake her head as she tries to hold up the blade.

"I don't believe you! Stay away!" She yells. I think for a moment before an idea comes to mind.

"Remember after the invasion on Canterlot? We had that.... moment. And you set your sound barrier to make things louder..." I say as I step closer to her, "or how about the time you and I had dinner together, only to have Big Mac literally drop in?" Twilight looks up to me and drops the sword, which somehow doesn't fall through the clouds. I walk up till I'm just a hoof reach away from her, where I lean down and say "what about all those time I told you I loved you?"

"St-Storm!" She cries out as she throws her hooves around me, hugging me tightly. I hold onto her as she breaks down, gently stroking her back as she cries into my neck. "I-I-I thought.... that he was going to.... and then..." she stutters as she cries.

"Shh... don't worry, he will never harm you again. I promise" I whisper into her ear as I hold on to her.

"Um... I know this is a touching moment and all, but could you at least slide me the sword?" Starry says from the ground. I kick it over so she can reach it and continue to hold Twilight.

"Storm..."

"Yeah Twi?"

"He never... I didn't let him..." she says as she shakes her head back and forth. I tighten my hold on her a bit and kiss the side of her head.

"That's my mare."

"So.... I don't know about you, but I'd like to leave" Starry says as she stands up.

"Are you OK to go now?" I ask Twilight. She takes a few deep breaths before she nods and slowly let’s go of me. I grab my sword and sheath it before we head out of the room. We make it to the stairs when we hear new voices coming in from the loading bay. I motion to the girls to stay low on the stairs and try to creep closer to the loading doors to hear better.

"... get this shipment to Ponyville by five hundred hours or she'll have our wings for being late." Says a griffin as he opens the cloud door and walks in with two other griffins. The first one is light grey with black under tones while the other two are tan with brown under tones. They each carry swords that are easily as long as me and curve at the end.

"Why does she have to be... whoa... what happened here?" The tan one on the right asks as the find the corpses. As they investigate the bodies I creep along the scaffolding until I'm on top of the three of them and wait.

"Looks like the cat's out of the bag... what now?" Asks one of the tan ones.

"Now we accelerate out plans. Take whatever clouds they made and move them to the rendezvous point, and be careful! That's acidic rain there, it's worth more than you feather brains combined!" Acidic rain, Ponyville, yeah I don't like this one bit. I motion to Twilight and Starry to stay down as I jump into the air, landing in front of them. I keeping a hoof on my sword as I stare them down, looking for any threatening movements.

"Care to explain what's going on here?" I ask as I look from griffin to griffin. They don't really seem all that surprised that I'm here.

"Look at that, a guard... what regiment are you with?" the grey one asks as they all draw their swords.

"I'm with the Spartan regiment, first battalion..."

"Night or day?" He asks in a bored manner. I pull out my sword and take a ready stance. They stare at me for a second before the grey one motions for one of the tan ones to attack. He takes a few steps forward and tries to bring his blade down on me. I step to the side and run up to him, thrusting my blade into his chest and send a back spray of blood. He staggers back and tries to swing at me, but I block his attack with my blade as I spin around and kick him in the chest, knocking him back. I back away and hold my sword in front of me, waiting for the other two to make their moves.

"Broad Wing!" The other tan one yells as he runs to his side. Tries to shake him awake, but it's too late for him. "You bastard! I'll kill you! I'll..." he yells as he starts to advance towards me, only to stop when the grey one puts a claw in front of him.

"We're leaving."

"You can't be serious! That bastard killed my-AAARRRGGHHH!" Before he could finish the grey one turns around and slashes his sword across his chest, making a large gash bleed out.

"If you really want to see him, I'll send you to him. Now, if it makes no difference to you, I'll be leaving now." He says as he sheaths his sword and begins to walk away, only to stop when I advance on him a bit. "Don't worry, we'll have our fight, but for now..." he spins around and throws a dark green ball at me. I swipe at it with my blade, making it explode in a ball of white smoke. I charge forward through the fog and try to find the grey griffin, but stop when I make it to the platform outside. I look around in all directions but can't see him anywhere. How did he disappear like that? I turn back and start to walk through the now fading fog. All of the green clouds are still here luckily, but that doesn't make me worry any less.

"Storm! Where did that griffin go?" Twilight asks as she and Starry run down the stairs towards me.

"I don't know. I lost sight of him. Starry, what do you know about what was going on here?"

"I just heard a rumor from a friend that there was something big going down here, so I came to do a little investigation. But, then the guards found me snooping around on the ground and brought me up here. I heard some talk about the acid clouds, but they never spoke of what they were for."

"Who gave you the lead?"

"A friend named Cheesus, why?"

"I wouldn't listen to him anymore; he may be..."

"He's not a spy! He tried to keep me from coming but I went anyway."

"Well, your both safe, that's what's important right now. Come on, let’s get out of here." They both nod and follow me out to the platform where I pick them both up and fly towards Ponyville. We have to get Celestia here as soon as possible, something was being planned here and I know there's more to this than just acid storms.

---

As I sit in my dark study, staring at my glass of wine, I can't help but sense something going astray. I twirl my glass around in my claw as I think about the possibilities that brute Steelwing could have done to make my plans fall apart. Usually he gets the job done, but I fear something has gone wrong this time. I lean back in my chair and sigh; I have too much riding in this for it to go wrong this early.

KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK

"Terribly sorry to interrupt, but you have a visitor" my butler says as he steps aside and lets Steelwing in. They both give a bow before the butler turns and walks out, closing the door behind him.

"Operation seedling was a complete success. What are my next orders?" I pull out an envelope and toss it towards him. He picks it up and starts to look it over a bit, a crooked smile growing on his face as he crumples up the note. "Understood, I will need new assistants though. The last one didn't work out at all." I nod to him and motion for the lecture on the stand next to the door. He walks up to it and starts looking through it, flipping from page to page. "So when do you plan on stage two?"

"..."

"Oh, right, not the talker. Heh, whatever. As long as I get paid I don't really care... this one. I want this one" he says as he points to a name in the book. I nod to him and take a sip from my glass. he starts to walk away but stops at the door. "Are you sure? Just watch? That is going to take a lot longer than if we were to just go in and use a memory toxin." I set my glass down and point to Steelwing. "Alright, you're the boss. It'll take longer, but if that's the way you want it, fine" he says before he leaves the room. I take my glass and swirl it around, taking in the aroma of my drink. I glance out the window and take in the view as I take another sip. Canterlot is so nice this time of year, I can't wait till it's mine. I just have to be patient... someone will make a mistake soon; I can just feel it. And Luna is the key to it all.

---

I drop Starry off in the red district before I start to take Twilight home. Why she's staying there, I don't know and don't want to. I land in front of her place and wait by the door.

"So... here we are..." I say as I set her down.

"Storm... would you spend the night; I don't want to be alone..."

"Of course" she gives me a small smile as she opens the door and heads inside. It's pretty dusty in here, I guess Spikes been away for a while now. "Hey Twilight, I'm going to take a shower..."

"Oh, thank Celestia! I didn't want to say anything but.... you kind of.... smell like a bag of sweat and rotting flowers."

"Well I did spend a month in the woods" I say as I approach her, only to get a hoof on my chest plate.

"Shower. Now." I sigh and trot up to her room. I remove my armor and head into her bathroom. I jump into her shower and start running the hot water. I wait till it’s a good temperature until I switch it to the shower head.

"AAAAAAAAAWWWWWWWYYYYYEEEAAAAHHHHH" I never thought I would miss a hot shower so much in all my life. I stand there for a moment, enjoying the hot water washing away all of the grime off from the past month. I look down too see that the water is coming off me dark brown. Wow... just wow. I've never been so dirty before. After i clean myself off I turn the water off and start drying myself off with a towel. When I finish I toss the towel on my back and exit the bathroom to find Twilight looking at my armor. She glances at me then does a double take.

"Storm..."

"Yeah?"

"When did you get so buff?" I look back to see that I've completely loss any fat that was on me. Every muscle on my body is now toned and shows with the slightest twist.

"Well... I did just go through military training." I say as she approaches me. She bites her hoof a bit before she pokes me a couple of times in various muscles. "Uh... Twilight?" She starts walking around me, examining every inch of my body. "Are you going to be okay?" I ask as she stops behind me. She reaches out and grabs my flank, making me jump a bit. "Twilight..."

"Dear Celestia...." she mutters as she walks back in front of me. "What did Miles do to you?"

"You know I can't tell you... basically he did what he said he'd do." She continues to stare wide eyed at me, mouth agape. "Is this... a good thing?"

"hawidjama," she stammers as she nods.

"Um... so is that a no or a..."

"It’s a yes. It's a next chance we get I'm going to rut your brains out yes" she says as she heads towards the bed. Well... OK then.

"Next chance?" I ask, making her look away.

"I'm sorry... but it would be too soon right now..."

"I completely understand. I only want it if you're ready for it. Well... it's getting late... I should let you get to bed..."

"You're not joining me?" Twilight asks as she heads to her bed.

FWOOSH

"Sorry, you'll have to put those away tonight" Twilight says with a giggle as she gets into bed. I ignore my wings and walk to the other side of the bed, slipping under the sheets as I climb onto the bed. AAAWWWW, beds.... how I've missed you. I pull Twilight against me so that she's laying with her back is against my stomach. I wrap my hoof around her and hold her as we let sleep take hold of us... hopefully I can go without another one of those nightmares.

Next Chapter: Chapter 64 A Day At The Spa Estimated time remaining: 74 Hours, 20 Minutes