The table creaked as Rainbow Dash’s mechanical claws dung into it, tearing at the cheap composite wood. She gasped in pain, but tried to stay as still as possible.

“Okay,” said Gell, showing Rainbow Dash the end of the arrow that she had just cut off. “That’s the pointy end.”

“Celestia’s- -neck beard,” swore Rainbow Dash, gasping and staring at the sharpened flint tip, still coated in her blood. “That thing went through me?”

“Well, the other end certainly didn’t.” Gell pointed to the metal tray that also held the tail of the arrow, a set of feather bound to a stick that had once been part of the arrow’s shaft. She turned Rainbow Dash slightly, and Rainbow Dash winced.

The arrow had hurt at first, but it had taken Proctor nearly forty five minutes to get back to the Pocket, and by then the swelling had started. Now the arrow hurt like a tremendous splinter, and any motion was exceedingly painful.

“Right,” said Gell, dropping the blood-soaked stone end. It clattered against the metal tray. “So…I’ve cut the back end and the front end. Now, here’s the fun part.”

“I would hardly call this fun,” snapped Rainbow Dash. Gell looked down, her eyes odd expressive for being demonic, and Rainbow Dash sighed. “Sorry,” she said.

“No, it’s okay,” said Gell. “That reaction to pain is normal…I think. And besides, as you already know, I’m not exactly a fan of being penetrated myself.”

A door creaked open on the far side of the room, and both Gell and Rainbow Dash paused and turned toward the opening in time to see a pair of large, slightly reflective blue eyes looking at them.

“Greetings,” said Five, entering the kitchen. She was covered in grease and slightly singed, and carrying something on her back. Rainbow Dash had no idea what it was, aside from being a vaguely cylindrical and seeming to have something floating in a peculiar yellow-green fluid within.

Five’s eyes momentarily drifted toward the blood on the floor and pile of expired first-aid supplies, and then to the stick in Rainbow dash’s shoulder. She then turned to the refrigerator and opened it.

“Who used all the dish soap?” she asked. “And where did we get this much milk?”

“I think that’s the least of our problems,” said Gell.

“Clearly,” said Five, taking out a bottle of a fluid curiously similar in color to that in the container that she was holding. She set the cylinder on the table and snapped open the bottle with one of her metal gauntlet claws. “I am assuming Rainbow Dash has been shot.”

“No,” said Rainbow Dash, sarcastically. “I was trying to be a tree.”

“But you are not Fluttershy,” said Five, taking a sip from the fluid in the bottle.

“It was deer,” said Gell. “Reindeer, specifically.”

“I detest deer,” said Five, pulling up a stool and leaning over the table. “Primitive fools. The horns sell well, though.”

“Antlers,” corrected Gell.

“Yes. They are called antlers,” said Rainbow Dash. She gestured toward her shoulder, a wide and false smile on her face. “And this is called an arrow! Get it out of me!”

“That’s what I was trying to explain,” said Gell, patiently. “You’re really lucky that it wasn’t poisoned, but they barbed the shaft. So…”

“So what?”

“So I’m going to have to push it through.”

Rainbow Dash felt cold and gulped audibly. Five took another sip from whatever she was drinking. She seemed to be enjoying this.

“Okay,” said Rainbow Dash. She took a deep breath. “I’m a Wonderbolt. I can take this. Do it, Gell.”

“Right,” said Gell. She what had been the rear of the arrow in the cleft of one of her front hooves, and Rainbow Dash had to resist the urge to cry out. Even the slightest touch to the shaft was excruciating. “So. On the count of three, then.”

“On the count of three,” said Rainbow Dash, bracing herself.

“One,” said Gell, gripping the arrow tightly. “TWO!”

Rainbow Dash screamed as the arrow was pushed through her body, tearing its way through her. She felt her flesh tearing, and even after the weight of the arrow vanished, the pain still continued, far worse than she had expected.

“Luna’s virgin plot!” shouted Rainbow Dash, collapsing and writhing on the floor, writhing in pain and continuing to spread blood- -which was now flowing quite readily out of her- -onto the concrete. “You said THREE!”

“I lied,” said Gell, holding the blood-covered stick. “What with being a demon and all.”

“At least she seems to be acting somewhat motherly,” said Five, now pouring the remainder of the bottle into the container beside her, causing the object inside to squirm slightly. “When I was about four I got my hoof stuck in a sheet metal press. She just laughed at me and made Pony Iommi jokes. For two hours. Then she severed my arm.”

“Yeah, and you still can’t play guitar worth a bless.”

“I can play guitar,” muttered Rainbow Dash.

Gell looked down, her yellow eyes wide. Then she looked up at Five. “Why does she just keep getting sexier? This just isn’t fair!” She reached down and picked Rainbow Dash up, placing her on chair where she was sitting. “Jacket, off,” she said. “Come on. I have to stop the bleeding.” She ran one of her hooves through the stream of blood that had ended up on the nearby table and put it in her mouth. “Mmm. Like spicy fruit.”

“That better not be a lespony joke,” said Rainbow Dash, removing her now blood-soaked jacket. She wondered if it could be cleaned; she had grown to rather like it.

“I hear unicorn blood makes you immortal,” said Five.

“Demons are already immortal,” said Gell. “Or at least immoral. And no, it doesn’t.”

Gell removed a canister from the supplies that she had assembled. It resembled a rusty paint can.

“Oh, no,” said Five, nearly leaping off her stool and jumping back. “You’re not going to use that are you?”

“Um, yes,” said Gell, snapping open the can.

“What is it?” asked Rainbow Dash.

“Extract from the intestine of a dlardolog,” said Gell, removing a scoop of the pale green fluid. “Restorative demon juice. I use it as a condiment.”

Rainbow Dash cought the smell of the substance and pulled her head back. “Wow,” she gasped. “It smells like manradish!”

“Well, because it is,” said Gell, “I mean, who even eats dlardolog without manradish?”

“I think- -I think I’m going to- -” on the far end of the table, Five retched loudly and several small topaz-like gems clattered against the table. “How could anypony ingest that?”

“They can’t,” said Gell. “It’s deadly poison to ponies.”

“Wait, what?” said Rainbow Dash- -right as Gell slathered it into the wound on her shoulder.

The sting was quite incredible, but this time Rainbow Dash jumped into the air instead of falling to the floor.

The pain quickly subsided, though. Rainbow Dash looked down at the wound, and saw that it had stopped bleeding and even started to overgrow with tissue. Hesitantly, she flexed her arm. Her shoulder hurt, but it was a kind of dull ache. Otherwise, it felt as strong as ever.

“Wow,” she said. “That stuff is great! You should sell that or something.”

“It’s actually illegal in eighty percent of cities.”

“I can see why,” gasped Five, now collapsed and unseen on the other side of the table. “Manradish should never be used. Extinction to the crop, I say!”

Gell ignored her. “You should probably take it easy on it for a while. It accelerates healing, but it isn’t like her,” she pointed at Five, who was now shakily rising back to a sitting position. “It won’t be perfect. Might be a scar, and you are definitely going to have arthritis there when you get older.”

Rainbow Dash landed back in her chair, still flexing her foreleg. The arthritis news was bad, but she had already known that- -years of high intensity flying would do that to a pony. She had just never assumed that she would grow old.

“Now,” said Gell, picking up the bloody pieces of her makeshift medical equipment. “It is time for me to find Brown.”

“Why?” asked Rainbow Dash. She actually did not know where Brown had gone. She assumed he was still at that village in the snow and darkness.

“Because his sole purpose is to protect you,” said Gell. “And he failed. That means punishment. Of the worst possible kind.”

“It wasn’t his fault!” said Rainbow Dash. Except, internally, she was knew that she did not believe that statement.

“Then he is incompetent,” said Gell. “Which I just said.”

“No! No way! We were in the woods, walking around, and then a bunch of deer showed up. At first, Brown…” Brown had tried, Rainbow Dash realized, to resolve the situation peacefully. She could not understand, though- -the discrepancy between that still, passive Brown and the one standing amongst the flames was too great. “He didn’t want to fight- -but then something happened.”

“One of them tried to harm you,” said Five, sounding bored and looking sick from the still lingering smell of manradish and worm extract ointment.

“How- -how did you know that?”

“Because my sister told me. But she didn’t even have to. I only ever gave Brown one order: to protect you, at any cost.”

“I know, but something went wrong! He didn’t just disarm them or whatever- -he attacked them! Went to their village…he…he killed them.”

“How many?” said Gell.

“All of them,” said Rainbow Dash, curling into a ball in her chair. She felt herself shaking- -the images of the flames and the bodies would not leave her mind. Having an arrow lodged in her shoulder had been distracting, but now she could not focus on anything except those horrors.

“Well, yes,” said Five. “That was the logical conclusion. Or at least the one he reached.”

“Conclusion?”

“According to Philomena, the deer in charge threatened you with action from his village. Brown therefore eliminated the threat. By eliminating them.”

“But- -but that’s ridiculous!” cried Rainbow Dash, leaping onto the table. “You weren’t there, you didn’t see it! The look in his eyes, how he changed! It was like- -like he wasn’t even Brown anymore. Not my friend, but…something else.”

Five sighed.

“What is it?” shouted Rainbow Dash, suddenly. “You know something!”

“Of course I do,” said Five. “Brown and I have a stronger than average mental connection. I saw something like this coming for some time.”

“Some time? What did you see?”

Five paused, as if collecting her thoughts. “Brown is not stable,” she said, slowly. “I am not sure why, but his mind is decaying.”

“Decaying?” said Rainbow Dash, her own mind filled with an image of a rotting, worm-infested brain. “How can it be decaying?”

“His mental state is tenuous at best, and, to be honest, he is more advanced than I had ever anticipated. But whatever is inside him, whatever makes him intelligent, it also makes him violent. The memory architecture he was born with is collapsing.”

“Why? Why would it do that? How can we stop it?”

“You cannot stop it. His violent tendencies are preprogrammed into his being. The continuous, endless desire to kill. I do not know why it is growing, or how to stop it. At the moment, my orders are absolute to him- -but they will not remain as such indefinitely.”

Rainbow Dash paused for a moment, trying to comprehend what Five was saying and finding it all too easy to understand. What she had seen in that forest matched Five’s description perfectly, and the strange fragment of a legend that the elder deer had said: a creature whose only nature was the endless annihilation of anything that stood in its path. That was the Brown she had seen in the light of those flames- -except that there was something else. What she had seen was not a creature of anger or wrath, but one of intense and profound confusion and sadness.

“And what happens when...if we lose him?”

“When we lose him,” said Five, “he will be no longer useful. He will be put down. Gell can have the corpse.”

The way Five said it caused Rainbow Dash to shiver. The delivery had been cold and perfectly serious, and Rainbow Dash knew it to be true. The worst part, though, was the tiny, almost imperceptible upward tilt of the corner of Five’s mouth: the fact that she was suppressing a smile.

The room was silent for a moment, and nopony moved. Then, finally, Rainbow Dash climbed down off the table and went to the door. “It’s been a long day,” she said. “I’m going to bed.”

“But we were going to play cards,” said Gell, sounding disappointed.

“Let her go,” said Five.

Rainbow Dash stepped through the door, and let it slowly close behind her.

The Pocket had several bedrooms, and one had been assigned to Rainbow Dash. Though spacious, it was not especially comforting. There was little furniture, and all of it was covered in thick dust. The walls, likewise, were empty, showing only after-images of places where paintings had once hung and where larger furniture had once been. The lack of windows made it feel claustrophobic and cramped despite its size, and Rainbow Dash missed her cloud bedroom back in Ponyville.

Still, in the several days that had passed since Shining Armor had departed so suddenly, this had been her home. Every night, she had slept in the large bed in the center, and always slept well in spite of the strange dreams of which she could remember nothing save for the glint of golden wings.

Every morning- -or what passed for morning in this dreary segment of pony history- -Rainbow Dash would awake to find Brown sleeping at the base of her bed. He had, of course, been given his own room, and Gell had made sure to place it as far as possible from Rainbow Dash’s. After a few days, however, he had taken up residence in her room. A small pile of blankets now rested at the foot of her bed.

The situation was strange, but not especially bad. Rainbow Dash had grown accustomed to Brown. He talked in his sleep, usually with bizarre, child-like grammar, but at least he did not snore- -although he would almost invariably comment in the mornings that Rainbow Dash did, something that Rainbow Dash knew to be a blatant lie.

On this night, however, Brown was not present. The digital clock on a water-stained nightstand indicated that it was far later than Rainbow Dash had expected, and somehow she felt heavy and disappointed that she had not found Brown curled in the blankets on the floor near her bed. She realized that she missed him.

She crossed the floor to the bed and pulled back the violet sheets, and then tucked herself in. Almost as soon as she did, however, she heard a low creak.

Rainbow Dash turned quickly, sitting up on the bed. The door across the room had opened, and the dim light from the outside hall illuminated a fluffy silhouette.

“Brown?” she said, squinting in the light. She flipped on one of the lights in the room. It was excessively dim, like a gas lamp- -which, for all Rainbow Dash knew, it probably was- -and climbed out of the bed.

“Ms. Dash,” said Brown. In the dim, warm light, he looked immensely tired.

“Where were you?” asked Rainbow Dash.

“I…I tried to bury them,” he said. “But…the ground was too hard, and there…were too many pieces. So I built a shrine, so that hopefully their forever-sleep may be at least somewhat restful.”

“Brown…” said Rainbow Dash, crossing the room. He looked up at her, and she instantly stopped. He had not been crying, but looked like he had been close to it for a long time.

“Ms. Dash,” he said. “I came here to apologize to you.”

“Appologize?”

Brown nodded, and pointed to the partially healed wound on her shoulder. “You were injured. I have only one purpose. I exist only to follow my orders. My order was to protect you, and I failed.”

“Don’t worry about it,” said Rainbow Dash.

“No, you don’t understand,” said Brown. “Or…perhaps you cannot. The weight of this failure, of my failure. Not just to my Commander, but to my comrade. My friend. I should have taken that arrow. It was not meant for you.”

“Brown, it’s okay,” said Rainbow Dash. She flexed her foreleg, smiling. “Look. Gell fixed it up. She says I might get arthritis later, but- -”

“Ms. Dash,” said Brown, his voice harsh but not cruel. “Please. Please, Rainbow. Do not lie to me. What part of this is ‘okay’?”

Rainbow Dash paused. She did not know what to say for several long moments. Then, finally: “Brown, come in.”

Brown obeyed, stepping forward and closing the door behind him. He did not pass far beyond it, though, and stood still nearby.

“What do you want me to say?” asked Rainbow Dash, pacing across the room. “What can I say? That you just went psycho and leveled a village? That you are a murderer?”

“I am Exmoori,” said Brown, coldly. “By definition, I am a murderer.”

“What happened out there, Brown? It was like, at first you were fine, and then you just snapped.”

“You were in danger,” he said. “I didn’t want to hurt them. I really didn’t. I was an idiotic and thought I could talk my way out of it.”

“Don’t you lie to me, Brown. I could take care of myself. You didn’t need to do what you did.”

“Do you think I don’t know that?!” shouted Brown, suddenly. “I- -I don’t know what happened! I was fine for one moment, and then…the world was filled with red, and I slipped into the void. I couldn’t stop myself. I exist only to kill- -to murder- -to exterminate- -”

“No, you don’t!”

“But I do,” said Brown. “Do you think I don’t know how I was born? I was generated expressly for the purpose of being a soldier, forced into existence by the Commander. And her orders…her orders are all I have…orders to kill…”

“You have me, Brown.”

“I know,” said Brown, now on the verge of tears. “But…when I was like that. When I really was me…”

“What?”

“I don’t know if there is a word for it. The instinct, the desire…it told me to kill you.”

Rainbow Dash stopped pacing. She looked at Brown, and saw that he could not look her in the eyes. He was truly ashamed, and now he was crying, slowly.

“That…that’s why you came to apologize,” she said. “The real reason.”

Brown shook his head. “No,” he said. “The apology was precursory.”

He moved forward faster than Rainbow Dash could react. In a fraction of a second, she was knocked backward onto the splintery wooden floor, a pair of brown colored hooves around her neck. Rainbow Dash instinctively reached to pull them away, but found that Brown was immensely strong.

“Brown,” she gasped, trying to kick him away. She looked up into his eyes, and saw that they were blank and dead. When she saw those eyes, she knew what was happening. He was going to kill her.

“The Pegasus enemy must die for the glory of the Exmoori race,” said Brown. He sounded distant and strange, as though he were reading something from a distant cue card.

“Brown, I can’t breathe,” wheezed Rainbow Dash. She was not able to breathe, but worse, she felt her mind starting to panic and fade. Pony hooves were not designed for strangling other ponies- -but Rainbow Dash knew that the bloodflow to her brain had been compromised.

“Orders are…to protect Rainbow Dash,” said Brown. “If fluffy terminates Rainbow Dash, fluffy fails. The Commander kills fluffy. Fluffy dies with honor at her hooves.”

Rainbow dash slammed her robotic hoof into Brown’s face. She felt part of his skull crack under the force, but he hardly seemed to notice. He just kept staring.

“Must kill,” he said, now in barely a whisper. “I exist only to kill.”

“Brown…” Rainbow Dash felt herself fading, and her vision was darkening in the edges. She knew that she was dying, and her struggling was growing weaker. A thought occurred to her, suddenly, one that crystalized in what remained of her conscious mind: that it might be better this way. That she was not meant to be alive anyway, that if she let Brown kill her, she might finally be free of the pain of knowing that she was the last of her friends.

Just before she lost consciousness, however, she heard a distant sigh followed by a strange mechanical voice that was neither hers nor Brown’s.

“I suppose this Rainbow Dash is a failure after all,” he said. “A quitter indeed, and a weakling. Can’t even fight off a fluffy brown thing. Such a failure…”

“I am not a failure!” screamed Rainbow Dash, if only in her mind.

One of her wings jerked forward, stretching under her body as she rolled. She felt Brown twitch, and then his hooves release. Her vision returned enough to see that he had been impaled through the chest by her golden feathers.

This was hardly enough to kill him, but it did seem to have shocked him back into his normal self. He now looked down at Rainbow Dash with a combination of shame and despair- -and relief.

Brown retreated quickly, and Rainbow Dash sat up gasping for air and coughing. She saw Brown race to one of the darker corners of the room, his body already sparking with Five’s magic as his wounds healed.

It took her several minutes to restore herself to her normal state, and she prepared to go on the offensive- -only to find that Brown was curled into a ball, sobbing quietly.

“Brown,” she said, standing, not sure how to react.

“I don’t deserve to be alive,” he whispered. “Look- -look what I’ve done. My only friend- -my only friend in all of Equestria, in the whole world, and I tried to…to…” The lump of brown fur quivered, unable to complete the sentence. Brown lifted his head, and Rainbow Dash could see that even though he had been sobbing, he was not crying. Perhaps he was not even able to.

“Like that…ehk…could kill me,” said Rainbow Dash, standing.

“Something is wrong,” said Brown, his eyes shifting. They looked distant, but no longer murderous. “I…I am alone.”

“No, you aren’t,” said Rainbow Dash.

Brown looked straight at her. “No. I am. Something has gone wrong. The sky is wrong, the land strange…something has happened. A genocide event. There are no others. I am alone.” He looked off into the distance. “That…that’s it,” he said. “The words in my head…I was built. I am a remnant…I was built for nothing except to bring death. ‘Freedom’? ‘Honor’? What point do they have…and worse.” He cried out and clutched his head.

“What’s wrong?” asked Rainbow Dash, although she was already developing her own headache.

“We…there were many of us. We…we fought for the others. Our mothers, our brothers, our sisters. But not anymore. I am the last. There is no love in this word…”

Rainbow Dash finally got up the courage to walk over to Brown. He recoiled, trying to move deeper into the corner.

“Don’t get near me!” he pleaded. “I- -I might hurt you!”

“No, you won’t.”

“But I just- -”

“Brown, if you wanted me dead, you would have just shot me.” She sat down near him. “I don’t think you really could kill me.”

“You don’t? Because of my orders?”

“Orders? No. Brown, it’s because you are you.” Rainbow Dash took a deep breath. “But I’m not going to lie. You almost had me there. And…for a moment, I almost wanted you to do it. To finish me right there.”

Brown sat up suddenly and leaned closer to her. Rainbow Dash could see that he was far more awake than before, his eyes now almost panicked. “Rainbow- -don’t say things like that. You can’t die! Why would you even…”

Rainbow Dash smiled, and looked into his confused blue eyes. “Because you and I, we’re not that different.” She leaned back against the wall and sighed. “There’s nothing left for me in this world.”

“Nothing left? But how? You are so strong, you have so much potential.”

“Because I’m old. Way older than any pony should be. I had friends once, you know. Great friends. I loved them, Brown. I truly did. I would have died for any of them.”

“What happened?”

“I failed them. I let them down. I was an idiot, and I left them too early. I left them, Brown. And now they’re all dead. Now I’m alone.”

Brown paused, as if thinking. Then, finally, he spoke. “At least you had friends. You had somepony to love, and ponies who loved you. Nopony has ever loved me. I’ve never even been hugged.” He paused again, as if finishing his thought. “No…I suppose that is not better. I have never felt love, but neither have I lost anything. Your fate is far worse than mine. I’m sorry, Rainb- -”

He was stopped as Rainbow Dash nearly knocked him over, taking him in a wide hug. Her legs sunk into his soft fur, and her tears ran down his shoulder.

“I miss them so much,” she sobbed quietly.

“I know,” said Brown. He moved his own relatively short front legs, and then took Rainbow Dash in his arms. “But you have me. And you are the only thing I have in this world that does not reek of death.”

They embraced for what seemed like an eternity, and Rainbow Dash cried. She knew that she was making a fool of herself, but she could not help herself. As soon as her tears had started, she found that she could not stop them. Every time she did, another image of one of her smiling friends would float to the surface of her mind, and she would start sobbing again- -and every time she did, she found herself holding Brown more tightly.

Then, at one point, and idea occurred in her mind. She tried to suppress it, but found that she could not. It kept boring into her mind, and as it did, she felt her heart pounding faster and faster.

Brown loosened his grip, and they both pulled their heads away from each other. Brown looked up into Rainbow Dash’s eyes. “Rainbow? Is something wrong?”

Rainbow Dash’s reply was to lean forward and plant her lips against his. Brown was momentarily surprised, but did not try to pull away. He did not seem to understand what was going on at first, but within several seconds he was kissing her in return. Rainbow Dash’s heart beat even faster; she could not believe that she was doing what she was doing- -and about to do what she was about to do.

She ran her hoof through his hair, and then stood. The motion was somewhat awkward, but both of them were surprisingly flexible and athletic. Brown was surprisingly heavy for his size, but with the help of her robotic limbs, Rainbow Dash was able to move him with relative ease to the bed in the center of the room.

They fell into it, with Rainbow Dash below facing upward. The violet sheets pressed hard against the space between her outstretched wings. For the longest time, she had always wondered why her wings would extend involuntarily whenever she was aroused. Now, for the first time, she understood because she knew what she wanted Brown to do with them. The thought of his hooves on the joints of her wings as he lifted himself over her made her breath more heavily, and she knew that she was blushing.

They stopped kissing, and Brown pulled away from her slightly. Rainbow Dash was still in his strong grasp, and could feel the weight of his body over her. He was so heavy and strong, and yet at the same time so warm and soft.

“It’s- -it’s my first time with a stallion,” she said. “Please be gentle.”

“Mine to,” said Brown. “Although I suppose you are not a stallion. But is that what you really want?”

“Yes, Brown, I want this.”

“Well, I can see that. I meant the gentle part.”

Rainbow Dash smiled. “You know me too well. Just be careful.”

Brown nodded, and Rainbow Dash spread her legs. She felt him push forward, and then they both moaned as they simultaneously lost their virginities.

With a smooth, efficient motion, Rainbow Dash tilted to one side, inverting their positions. In a flash, Brown was beneith her, his fluffy body pressed into the sheets. Although he was strong, he moved exactly as she wanted him to.

Brown looked up at her with his large, blue eyes, and Rainbow Dash was struck by how vulnerable he looked- -and how, for the first time, he looked happy.

Rainbow Dash smiled. “Alright, fluff-boy. Let’s see what you can do…”

Proctor looked carefully over his cards. “Got any…threes?” he asked slowly.

“For the last time,” snapped Gell. “We are playing poker, not go-fish.”

At approximately that moment, a repetitive squeaking sound came weakly through the floor above.

“Drat,” sighed Five. “I knew I should applied oil upon those bedsprings.”

“Wait, what?” said Gell. Her expression of concern was answered with another sound.

“Enf…enf…enf enf enf enf…”

Gell shot out of her reinforced chair so fast that Five had to throw herself on the table to keep it from being overturned.

“Sweet Satin!” she cried, glaring angrily at the ceiling where the dangling light fixture was starting to shake on its chain. “Are they- -”

“Harder!” called a muffled female voice through the door.

“I’m going to put a stop to this! He can’t do that to my Dashie!”

She started stomp away from the table when a hard-light clamp appeared on her shoulder. Proctor was still badly damaged and by no means strong enough to stop Gell, but she ceased moving and turned around.

“Gell,” said Twilight_Proctor. “Rainbow Dash has the right to choose who she has sex with, just as you do. Do you really think you have the right to take that away from her?”

“But…”

Proctor continued to stare up at her with his oddly blank, glass-like eyes. Gell groaned angrily. “No, I don’t.” She slammed her hoof against the table in anger. “But that was supposed to be me up there- -not some fluffy mercenary.”

“Love’s a darn fickle thing,” said Proctor_Jack.

“Yeah,” said Proctor_Dash, staring at the ceiling as the floor started to thump repetitively and a lamp was apparently knocked over. “But you know…to be honest, this is really weird for me. Hearing myself getting some and all. Especially since I was programmed as a lespony.”

“You should try being a telepath,” muttered Five.

The other ponies- -and Philomena, who was holding her cards in one claw- -all suddenly stared at her wide eyed.

“What?” she said, looking up.

“You mean…right now…you’re…”

“It is not precisely voluntary. I can’t not watch. This is actually extremely awkward. But in all honesty, for a virgin, Rainbow Dash has a significant level of talent in this regard.”

“Buck me,” said Gell, flopping her head against the table- -but still managing to hold her cards where Proctor could not see them. She reached to her side and picked up a pink frosted cupcake and shoved it into her mouth, wrapper and all, following it immediately with another six.

“Go easy on those,” said Five. “You can’t digest them.”

“These are demon safe,” she groaned, her face still against the table.

“They sure are!” replied Pinkie_Proctor excitedly. “I found a demon-safe recipe buried way deep in my Pinkie Pie recipes database!”

“But demons…so those cupkakes are…”

“Yup!”

It was somewhat clear that Proctor had taken some liberties in the frosting, however. Gell was beginning to show signs of sucrose drunkenness.

“Ah’ll trade you two ones for a six,” said Proctor_Jack to Gell.

“That isn’t even a move in any- -oh, forget it,” said Gell.

Suddenly, from above, a voice cut through the depressing poker game.

“Oh, Rainbow!” cried Brown, his voice wavering.

“Well, at least it was quick,” said Gell.

“Interesting fact about Exmoori,” said Five, taking another card. “They have no refractory period.”

“And how the There do you know that?!”

Five pointed at the black stain on her rump- -a stain that was actually rather enjoying flooding Five’s mind with visions of things that could not be unseen. “I was alive before Celestia wiped them out.”

“So that means!”

There was further thumping and squeaking from above, followed by the reemergence of the “enf” sound that they had heard before- -and a cry of domination from Rainbow Dash.

“I hope he at least remembers to hold her wings down,” said Gell. “If you don’t hold the wings down- -” There was a loud thump of something organic hitting wood, and then several more punctuated by various louder sounds of furniture falling over. “- -they can fly.”

“That’s what makes it fun!” said Pinkie_Proctor.

“An, come on!” said Gell, nearly flipping the table over again. “My precious Dashie! You’re just letting that fluffy- -thing defile her! Do something!”

“Trust me,” said Five. “What they are doing is far tamer than what you and my grandmother did in that room.”

“Oh, burn,” said Proctor_Dash, followed by Proctor_Rarity, “I really do rather like king cards better than these boring threes…do you have any I might borrow?” He made a motion that would be the equivalent of batting his eyelashes if he had eyelids.

“I fold,” said Five, dropping her cards. “The bird has exceeded me.”

Philomena chirped in the equivalent of a bird smile and lowered her cards, revealing that she had three of a kind.

“Ha!” said Gell, lowering her own cards. “Full house!” Proctor lowered his cards, and the color ran out of her face. “How- -straight flush?!- -You don’t even know what game we’re playing!”

“Equidroids have the best poker faces,” noted Twilight_Proctor, pulling in his winnings- -which consisted of several golden bits, scraps of armor, ponography magazines, and Gell’s cupcakes. As he did, another sound filled the Pocket, this one wordless and primal and origionating from Rainbow Dash.

“Well,” said Proctor_Dash. “It looks likes somepony else just won at a game of poker!”

Everyone at the table- -including Philomena- -groaned.

“I can’t take this anymore,” said Gell. “All seven of my ovaries are turning blue right now- -Proctor, do you have programming to buck?”

“For apples,” said Proctor_Jack. “Otherwise, not really. Although…” Twilight_Proctor continued: “Rarity and Rainbow Dash would both take you up on that offer. Well, not the real Rainbow Dash, but my Rainbow Dash. Applejack and Pinkie Pie were both straight, and I- -I mean Twilight Sparkle- -was a complete prude who died a virgin.”

“And Fluttershy?” asked Five as she shuffled the cards. She was actually rather curious.

“Absolute submissive,” said Proctor_Shy.

“I’ll take it,” said Gell.

“Really?” said Five, sarcastically. “Doing it with machines now? Why don’t you just go dwell outside Ms. Dash’s door and hoof yourself.”

“A proper succubus does not ‘hoof herself’!” cried Gell. “It defeats the whole point of sex! But at this poing…what am I saying?!” She turned toward Philomena. “How about it?”

Philomena’s feathers ruffled in embarrassment, and she shook her head quickly.

“Satin bless it,” said Gell, nearly on the verge of tears as Rainbow Dash and Brown continued their vigorous lovemaking above. She stood up. “I’m going outside. I need some air. And if there are any deer that Brown didn’t murder, I’m going to castrate them.”

“A castrated deer is called a havier,” said Five, beginning the game.

“Everypony knows that,” said Twilight_Proctor, lifting out a card with his hard-light.

A pentagram of light appeared around Gell, and with a puff of smoke and a foul electrical smell she disappeared into the church outside.

“Want to bet she ends up doing it with that statue?” whispered Proctor_Dash, who still sounded remarkably uncomfortable despite his attempts at humor.

Philomena made several angry squalking sounds.

“I don’t speak bahrd,” said Proctor_Jack, turning to Five.

“She says you shall lack anything with wich to bet when she is done with you.”

“Oh yeah? Well, we’ll see ‘bout that.”

“GUD FEEWS!” cried Brown from above, and Rainbow Dash burst out laughing as Brown tried almost inaudibly to apologize- -but the creaking of Rainbow Dash’s bed never once stopped

“This is going to be a long night,” sighed Five.

Rainbow Dash gently closed the door and stepped into the hall. She was not sure how long she had been in that room with Brown, but she knew that she was astoundingly tired. Her whole body, save for her robotic legs, was shaking, and she was drenched with sweat. Walking was somewhat difficult, and she could feel a mixture of her and Brown’s fluids dripping down her inner thigh as she walked, following a path directly past a thin line of dried blood that had run down her leg much earlier.

Her mouth tasted like him, and his no doubt tasted like hers. It was not a good taste by any means, but it was somehow satisfying. She had never realized that stallions tasted like that before, and she found herself craving more.

She shook her head and smiled, and started to make her way to the shower down the hall. Almost as soon as she did, though, she saw the shadows almost seem to materialize into a pony, and saw that she was being watched by Five.

“Sup,” said Rainbow Dash. In her current state, she was not at all surprised by Five’s sudden appearance- -and even if she had, she had neither the energy to jump in fright.

“How was it?” asked Five, sounding almost genuinely curious for once.

“How was what?” said Rainbow Dash, suddenly feeling oddly embarrassed. She suddenly realized that with all the noise they had been making, a bat pony like Five would almost certainly have heard them. At the same time, she wondered what Brown would look like with bat pony ears, and thinking about Brown made her wings start to shuffle into an erect position again- -which by this point was actually painful. “Did you…um…hear anything?”

“Of course not,” said Five. “But allow the question to be rephrased: did you kill my clone?”

“No,” said Rainbow Dash, smiling widely. Five knew, but somehow her knowing what Rainbow Dash had done was less embarrassing than she had expected. Five was, after all, another mare. “But he’s going to be very sore.” She picked up her right front hoof and looked at how badly it was shaking. “Actually…so will I…”

“You were…engaged…for over sixteen hours.”

“Sixteen hou- -is that a new record?”

“I think that would have killed most ponies. Hence my question.”

“I’ll have to break that record next time, then.” Thinking about the fact that there might be a next time made Rainbow Dash tingle inside.

“How did it feel?”

“It…it’s kind of hard to describe,” said Rainbow Dash, ruminating on what had just happened. It was, even if it was cliché, intimate. She had never been so close to another pony as she had just been with Brown. It was more than that, though. Brown was one of the few ponies she had ever met who came close to her in stamina, and that had made the process rather like a contest; not in the sense that there were any winners or losers, but that there was a continual struggle. Like a fight, except with sex.

It was not at all like the next closest thing that Rainbow Dash had ever done with a pony. She still distantly recalled being hoofed by Rarity in a half-drunken, semiconscious haze. She remembered the apprehension, and how it had felt wrong even as their bodies had rubbed together in Pinkie Pie’s bed, and how they had both awoken with horrible regret. With Brown, though, Rainbow Dash felt nothing but the same kind of satisfaction that she would feel from just winning a grueling but exciting race.

“I was once caught in a cyclone,” said Five. “In the process, I had a four-inch wide fencepost lodged through my flank.”

Rainbow Dash laughed. “That’s actually pretty close!”

“I hope you used protection.”

Rainbow Dash just stared at Five. “Protection from what?”

“Oh,” said Five. “Well, at least with the amount of Gloame radiation you have accumulated, anything that comes out of you will be quite stillborn.”

Rainbow Dash stiffened. She had forgotten that sex was how ponies got pregnant.

The door that Rainbow Dash had just emerged from creaked open.

“Rainbow?” said Brown. “I’m ready to go again, if you want to.”

Rainbow Dash looked down at Brown, and could tell that was indeed telling the truth.

“Brown!” cried Rainbow Dash, blushing heavily. “Get back in there! Five is out here!”

Brown looked Five in the eyes, completely unperturbed. Five looked at him, and then looked down at him, and then back up to his eyes.

“She’s my Commander,” said Brown. “It is perfectly normal for her to see me like this. It would be like a mother seeing it.”

“That is not a normal thing either!”

“The question still stands.”

Rainbow Dash sighed. “Maybe later, Brown,” she said. “I’m not saying I’m tired or anything, but I think I’m going to hit the showers for now.”

“I was actually hoping you would say that,” he said. “I actually need to be unconscious right now.”

As soon as he said it, he collapsed, flopping to one side and falling into a heap on the floor. Rainbow Dash knew the feeling.

“He is not especially well-endowed,” noted Five, almost sounding disappointed.

“Are you kidding me?!”

“For his size, perhaps, but for a stallion that is relatively normal.”

“How would you even know?”

“Because I have a chart.”

Rainbow Dash did not even want to consider where such a chart would come from, or why Five would have it. “Look,” she said. “I know you want to talk and all…but I’m really tired.”

“I only came up here to use the bathroom,” said Five. “Do you know what citrine is?”

“No.”

“Good. Now rest up. I have a task for you. Hopefully less strenuous than being dominated by my clone soldier.”

Rainbow Dash brushed past Five on the way to the shower. “I’m the dominant one,” she whispered.

She passed down the hall, perhaps even more satisfied than before. Perhaps later she would brag to Five some more. Before she turned the corner to the nearest shower, however, she looked back. Brown was still sleeping peacefully on the floor; when Rainbow Dash got back, she would have to pick him up and put him in the bed. After what they had done, there was no point in making him sleep on the floor anylonger.

Standing above Brown, however, was Five. Rainbow Dash watched her stare at Brown for several seconds. Before Five went on her way into the shadows of the opposite half of the corridor, Rainbow Dash caught a glimpse of the expression on her face.

The expression that Rainbow Dash thought she had seen was a malicious, toothy grin.