They all reacted differently when Greg entered the Common Room. Chitter coolly tracked him with a pair of baleful blue eyes. Greg knew the look; it was that almost reflexive assessment that "monster" types went through when meeting a strange creature: How strong is he? Is he hostile? Any obvious weak points? It was the equivalent of a friendly nod between strangers. Greg took it as a compliment.

Lisa went quiet, pulled her legs up, and hugged her knees to her chest while lowering her head. She stared up at him through a drift of hair that had fallen across her face. Obviously she had come to regard attention of any sort as a bad thing.

Luna took less than a second to realize that something was wrong. "Greg? Is she—"

"Awake, yes," he nodded as he sat on the couch opposite her.

Luna had shifted to make room on her couch for Greg, and his choice of seat made her even more concerned. "Did she... do something? Or—"

Greg barked out a laugh and shook his head. "It's weird. I've never admired anyone so much that I also wanted to kill so badly. That woman is dangerous."

"I..." Luna frowned. "I don't understand."

"It's alright, Luna," Greg said, staring down at the tabletop rather than looking at his partner. "One way or another, we won't have to worry about her for much longer."

"Are you..." Lisa began hesitantly. "Are you going to..." She trailed off and pulled in on herself even tighter, only her eyes visible above her knees.

"Kill her?" Greg said. "Yes. Not me personally... I promised Luna that she could do it. And I don't go back on my promises."

"I... I would have done it last night," Lisa said. "I was so mad at her for hurting Chitter that I... I..." She rested her forehead against her knees, and the rest of her words were muffled and barely audible. "But I don't want to anymore. I guess I'm a bad guy now but... but... please don't make me watch, okay?"

There was a long silence.

Greg got up and crossed to where Lisa sat on the floor and knelt down in front of her. Chitter lifted her lip at him in warning. Greg glared at the changeling, using his long experience with Equestrians to give a silent but clear message: I'm her friend.

Chitter blinked in surprise but relaxed, watching the two of them with curiosity.

Greg lifted Lisa's head from her knees, forcing her to look him in the face. "Geek, nerd, weirdo, creep," he said with slow deliberation.

Lisa gasped and her eyes went wide. Chitter’s eyes narrowed to angry, smoldering slits.

Greg went on, ignoring both of their reactions, "That's what you've been called, right? That and worse. Whoever said that about you chose those words because they would hurt you, not because they really meant anything. They should have said; Bright, intelligent, creative, sensitive... and a hundred other good things about you!"

Lisa tried to pull away from Greg but he held her still. "You are not a bad guy because there's no such thing! There are good deeds and bad deeds, and everybody does some of both. There are people who do mostly one or the other but that doesn't mean they can't do the opposite. You're not a label, you're the total sum of what you do. You left a group that shunned you and who even gave your friend over to people who tortured her with their experiments, people who wouldn't care if she died. They say that leaving is betraying them... I say that's just what any sane person would do!"

He let go of her head and stood up. She followed him with her gaze, and there were tears in her eyes but she didn't look away from him. "Do you think this changeling here would be friends with just anyone?" Greg asked her, indicating Chitter who was again blinking in puzzlement. "She tore apart half the Pentagon to rescue you! A person who commands that sort of loyalty from someone as powerful as she is... well, they must really be something exceptional... and that's you, in case you hadn't noticed."

"Then..." Lisa began hesitantly, "what...what do I do now? I thought I was doing good when Chitter and I were fighting wild Equestrians even though the rest of the team—"

"...were insensitive idiots," Greg finished for her.

That got a small smile out of her for a moment. "I just don't want to hurt people," she finished quietly.

"I never wanted to hurt anyone either," Greg said, "I just got... well, caught up in things I guess. No, I won't ask you to hurt anyone. In fact, I won't ask you to do anything you don't want to... or even stay here, for that matter. If you want to go back to your family—"

Lisa shook her head emphatically. Greg guessed that either she was an orphan or she had some serious problems at home. But he wasn't about to press her if she didn't want to talk about it. "Okay, then. Why don't you and your pal here go have some fun? There are some systems in the rec room with just about every videogame known to mankind.

Chitter's head came up with an immediate look of eager curiosity. Lisa smiled again. "Really? Could we?"

"Yup!" Greg returned her smile.

After they'd scrambled out of the room, Greg flopped down on the couch they'd vacated and idly pulled bits of stuffing out of the rents in the cushions left by Chitter’s sharp, perforated hooves. Luna watched him silently until a unicorn guard brought Gwen into the room.

Greg got up and faced her, saying nothing for a long moment. Gwen was silent, too, but that was mainly because she had been very effectively gagged. Finally, Greg sighed and made a gesture toward the bruise that was beginning to form on her left cheek. "I'm sorry about that." He paused again, then ordered the guard out of the room. "Turn off the cameras and recorders for this room and don't let anyone in."

The unicorn saluted, snapped, "Understood, Sir!" and left the room.

Greg forced himself to look Gwen in the face. "I'm so sorry for what's going to happen, but I made a promise I'm not willing to break. I..." He shook his head. "I know that... that there is something I should do or say now, but... I... I just can't think of what it should be." He turned and went to the door. He put his hand on the knob, opened the door, and said, "Remember, Luna, you promised to make it quick. I'll be in the Control Room when you're finished." He didn't move for a long moment and then said softly, "Goodbye Gwen." He shut the door behind him, leaving her alone with Luna.

Gwen was no fool. She knew exactly what was going to happen. Even though her arms were tied behind her, she crouched into a fighting stance.

"Don't be stupid," Luna sneered at her, "If you were untied and had a machine gun, you'd still be no match for me."

"Fufk few, few fufen ffuhk!"Gwen snarled through the gag.

Luna rose lazily from the couch and stood in front of the woman. "You never were a match for me and I was a fool to think so. Do you know why I made Greg promise your death to me? I was afraid of you! Afraid you could take him away from me!"

Luna looked her up and down. "They didn't choose you by accident, did they? They knew you were exactly the type of woman Greg preferred. That's why you were put in the cell next to his... lean, athletic, intelligent, blue-eyed, dark hair. He might have chosen you over any other human woman, but when he had the chance to create his ultimate fantasy, he made me!”

Luna grabbed Gwen in her magic with such blinding speed that the woman had no chance to react. She spun her around, placing her mouth right next to the woman's ear. "I win," she purred.

Gwen tried to kick out at her but found herself held helplessly in the air and propelled to the door. Luna thrust her through it and down the hallway. Around two corners they came upon an exit door and a unicorn guarding it.

"Turn off the alarm and open the door," Luna commanded him.

"Yes, Ma'am!" He saluted and did as ordered.

Luna shoved Gwen out the door and then used the sharp tip of her horn to cut away her gag and bonds. Gwen rubbed circulation back into her arms while frowning at Luna. "You're letting me go?"

"Oh no," Luna grinned, "I'm just giving you a head start. I've been anticipating this for a long time and I want to savor it."

Gwen quickly looked around. They were in some sort of business park. Beyond the next building there was a mass of trees... a park or greenbelt of some sort.

"A slow count of one hundred," Luna told her. "Then I'll come after you. No wings… just to make it a bit more fair. A slice, a stab, a slash," she continued in a dreamy, sing-song voice, waving her sharp horn in time to her words, "until you're covered in your own blood... tripping over your own entrails... yessss... and then my hooves crashing down on you, shattering your bones... oh how wonderful that will be!"

Gwen's eyes went wide in horror. "You... you promised Greg—"

"To make it quick? True," Luna said, pinning her with a merciless, inhuman gaze and shrugging. "But what he doesn't know won't hurt him. Now, run!"

Greg sat with both feet propped up on the control console, Luna’s control fob in one hand. He turned it over and over, with an economical squeeze and release of his fingers. It felt like he'd been sitting there forever. Why did I make this thing? he asked himself, still flipping the fob around and around. I probably could have worked out how to give her the ability to change levels all on her own. Was it a need for some connection, or was it control I wanted? She's not a videogame character, she's better than that... better than me, and maybe her love is something I'm not—

Then the door opened and Luna came silently into the room and stood beside him. Greg didn't look up.

"She's gone," Luna told him softly.

He nodded and kept turning over the little device.

"She must be miles away by now," Luna said.

Greg's hand froze. He looked up. "What?"

Luna told him what she'd done.

"And you were lying to her all along?" Greg gaped. "You never intended to go after her?"

"I am a warrior, not a butcher!" Luna huffed. "But it was so much fun pretending! You know, I think she peed herself a little bit. I'm sure I caught a whiff of—"

Greg burst into deep guffaws of relieved laughter. "Hahaha! Oh... my... ghod!" he gasped between laughs. You... haha... you evil bitch! I... hahaha... I... adore you!"

She gently kissed his tear-stained cheek with her velvety lips. "I know," she said.

He reached up and pulled her head around to where he could kiss her properly. "I think we should..." He stopped and looked at the bank of monitors. "Did you see that?"

Luna looked up. "What do you mean?"

"I thought I caught something out of the corner of my eye. A weird movement." They both continued staring at the monitors and Greg flipped on the cameras for the Common Room but nothing seemed out of place. "Maybe I was just... no, wait! There it is again. That camera looked like it moved! 'Storage Room 2'." he read off the panel. "That's upstairs, isn't it? Next to..." He pointed to the camera that covered the hallway outside of the room and they both saw it then, a sudden brief blur as if something had passed too close to the lens to be in focus and then the empty hallway again... but at a slightly different angle, leaving a narrow bit of wall out of range of the camera.

Greg looked at the diagram that indicated the status of all exterior doors, windows, and skylights in the facility. All were closed and locked... according to the sensors. But something definitely odd was going on, and Greg knew someone who went through locked and alarmed doors like they were turnstiles.

"Hi Gwen!" Greg said loudly and cheerfully from directly behind her as she leaned with one ear against a door, jimmying the lock with what looked like a strip of metal torn from a soda can.

"SHIT!" She screamed in shock as she dropped the improvised pick and spun to throw a flurry of kicks and punches at him.

He dodged by moving just enough to make her blows miss by less than an inch. "You are frickin' amazing, you know that? To come back in here where all the shaggy-nasties live? Girl, you've got more cojones than a regiment of Marines!"

Gwen gave up trying to hit him and stood there, still crouched and breathing quickly. "The last place she'd think to look, though, isn't it? What tripped me up?"

"Just bad luck. I happened to be looking at the screen when you placed your little device up there." He motioned to the room's camera that had a bit of broken mirror positioned just in front of the lens, held in place by a flattened soda can and a couple of pieces of chewing gum. "Nice bit of improvising, that."

Gwen did a sudden skip back and hit the door with a powerful back-kick. It flew open and she spun to leap through it,, only to find her way blocked by a tall, dark figure. Luna reared and wiggled her forehooves in a playful way. "Grr, argh," she said.

Gwen looked quickly back and forth between the two of them and then screamed in outraged indignation, "You assholes! You're screwing with me!"

"Yup." Greg nodded, "That's one of the benefits of being a bad guy. I can act like a total douche any time I want to. In fact, it's kind of expected of me."

Luna leaned over, pointed her nose at Gwen's lower body, and sniffed delicately. "Yes, I was correct... she wet 'em."

Gwen had gone so red in the face that Greg began to worry that she'd have a stroke. "Okay, okay! Calm down! You might not know it yet, but the war's over. No more enemies, okay?"

Gwen's breathing slowed. "You're not going to kill me?"

"Oh, hell no!" Greg laughed. "You're a masterpiece, Gwen! Kinda like a Hieronymus Bosch painting. Big ick factor, but not something I'd casually set fire to. C'mon downstairs and I'll get you some lunch... and a change of clothes."

Luna snickered.

Author's Notes:

Thanks, yet again, to the crew that keeps me from making too much of a fool of myself, Fana Farouche, Jordanis, and WrittenWord333!