"You shouldn't have done that."

Spike stirred from the nothingness, blearily sweeping his eyes of the shadows of his dreamscape.

They rested upon the star-riddled specter perched on a shelf of incoherent thought. On crossed legs and of displeased poise sat his mentor.

Princess Luna.

"Princess?" he said, mumbling as a result of his recent awakening. He felt the same feeling of fear, awe, and passive arousal that he always felt whenever he saw her.

"You really shouldn't have done that," she repeated, frowning. Creases marked her deceptively young face, even as the creases in her slim, dark nightgown waxed and waned according to her subtle movements.

The layman would say that she was pissed.

"I am beginning to think that you aspire to penetrate anything that walks," she said, scowling.

"That's not exactly fair," Spike huffed. "I'll have you know that I've seen some sexy paraplegics in my day."

The Princess was not amused. "Now is hardly a time for humor, Dearest."

Spike sighed, brushing back his stiff green hair. "What's the problem?"

The ruler of the night leapt from her seat, causing the inky black ground to ripple where she landed. "What's the problem? The problem is precisely what I just described!" she yelled, angrily swinging about her tiny fists. "Your inability to say 'no' to a pretty face is quite literally going to get you killed!"

Spike frowned, distractedly noting that the confines of his mind turned fuzzy and unfocused in reaction to his confusion. "If you're that worried, I've got some antibiotics in one of my-"

"That is not what I was referring to." Luna stalked up to her apprentice, barely meeting him eye to eye. A small, pale finger prodded him in the chest, eliciting a painful grunt. "Have you learned nothing from your prior failings?"

When he had no response, the Princess sighed heavily, cradling her nose between her fingers. "You're just rocking that extra chromosome, aren't you, Spike?"

Spike leapt from his spot on the treehouse floor, grumbling all the while.

Apple Bloom yawned, scratching her bare leg where her pants used to be. "What's got you in such a mood?"

He said nothing, only reaching for his shirt, pulling it from Sweetie Belle slept.

"Spike", she said, more seriously. Her voice carried the familiar authoritative tone that Applejack always used.

"I've got work to do," he muttered, donning his clothes and heading for the door. "See you around."

"Oh, come on!" Apple Bloom shouted. "We only did it once!"

Spike halted, sighed in irritation, and patted down his jeans, stopping once he touched upon something solid and rectangular. He yanked it out of his pockets, tossing it over his shoulder to his friend. "Here, this should keep you busy, or something." He opened the door, and left without another word.

Initially reaching to catch the book, Apple Bloom instead rubbed her forehead where the corner had pegged her. Mumbling something about 'green-haired jackasses', she picked up the pocket-sized manual and held it up to her face. "Five-Digit Diva: The Woman's Guide to Self-Touchery."

She hurled the book at the door, huffing. "Why, that no-good, egotistical son of a-"

Sweetie Belle raised a lazy eyebrow as she pulled her camisole back on. "That answers a few questions. Man's got so much talent with his hands, I thought he went to art school."

Apple Bloom rolled her eyes. "Oh, please, it wasn't nothing to write home about."

Scootaloo chuckled, her voice still husky from their last bout. "'Dear Princess Celestia, you won't believe who just fucked me like a porn star.'"

The three Crusaders snorted in amusement, imagining how their beloved ruler would react. Scootaloo was the first to recover.

"But seriously, toss me that book."

The wolf was advancing on them.

Evening was coming, bringing darkness and despair in its wake. Shadows danced over the rapidly darkening alleyway, and the beast was all that they saw.

Despite Applejack's strength, Pinkie Pie's cleverness, or however many bodies the rest of the townspeople threw at it, there seemed to be no way out.

The hulking beast was easily a head taller than the apple farmer, and at least four times as wide. Dark brown hair, coarse as bristles stuck out in fierce tufts.

Desperately, Applejack yelled at the behemoth, clutching her panting friend in her sore arms. "Leave us be, ya damned mutt! We ain't done nothin' to ya!"

But it advanced still, growling menacingly: "I'll huff, and I'll puff, and I'll tear your ass up!"

Their end was in sight...

The rapid padding of rubber on stone from in front of the forsaken corridor assailed the silence, causing five-and-twenty heads to swing in shared confusion.

A roaring battlecry, a crunch of bone against bone, and the lumbering pile of muscle flew through the evening sky, bellowing its indignant rage.

"Looks like I'm blasting off agaaaaain..." *twinkle*

Applejack blinked in surprise, loosening her grip around her similarly surprised friend. A spiky-haired young man leaned against the wall of the alleyway, still yelling, in spite of the fact that the danger had passed.

"Spike?" Applejack ventured, "is that y-"

"AAAAAAAAGH!" he screamed, heedless of her interrupted question. He bent over and clutched his thigh in rage.

The farmer flinched, letting go of Pinkie Pie and walking slowly toward their would-be savior. "What's gotten into you?"

"LEEEEG!"

Applejack glanced down to his leg, uncomprehending until she found oh God what are those sticking out of his

Her face blanched as she caught sight of the bristles embedded deeply into his shin.

"Turn your gaze upon the horizon," the night goddess murmured. "What do you see?"

The Princess's slender fingers, cool as moonlight, drifted across her student's neck, subtly shifting his view.

Spike's focus, however, was not on the superficial pressure on his neck, but rather on the burning sensation in his nostrils and the light dancing on the edge of the world.

He frowned and wrinkled his nose. "A fire. In the south."

The pair hovered above the clouds, their bodies iridescent in the makeup of their dreams. Below them, the whole of Equestria rested in its usual nighttime languor.

The Princess opened her mouth to speak, stopping only when her charge tensed, his hackles raised.

"You see it too," she said. It was a statement, not a question.

The hairs on the back of Spike's neck stood up. "I smell it." His eyes darted to and fro, trying to find purchase in the listless night. "But that's not a fire," he grumbled, working his jaw. "It's an active volcano."

A deep, primal feeling of unease settled upon him, setting his stomach to a cold boil.

"So who's that walking out of it?"

Twilight wiped the sweat from her brow, returning her hand to the space directly over Spike's leg. "You're incredibly lucky that your flesh is so dense." She grimaced, releasing the flow of magic as the skin finished sewing itself together, revealing it uncompromised and whole. "Hitting a monster of a wolf that size with that much force behind it? Anyone else and those bristles would've shattered the tibia."

Spike groaned his agreement, rubbing his sore muscles with one hand as the other reached to remove the gag that had kept him from crying out during the procedure. "Thanks, Twilight. Next time, though, could you just use a horse bit or something? I don't really feel comfortable with a ball gag that has teeth marks in it."

"Sorry," Fluttershy murmured, hiding behind her pink locks as she pocketed the accessory.

Spike stared blankly for a matter of seconds, before rubbing his temples to clear his head. "Yeah, whatever."

"I mean it," she insisted, looking out from behind her curtain of hair. "If I had been there to calm down that nasty wolf-"

"Stop right there, 'Shy," Applejack said, placing a rough hand on her friend's shoulder. "Y'can't be held responsible for somethin' you weren't a part of."

To his credit, Spike met her glare without shrinking.

"Applejack is right," he said, speaking without breaking their eye contact. He sat up on the couch, silently groaning with the effort. "I shouldn't have left without a warning. It was irresponsible of me, and—"

"Damn right it was irresponsible!" She yelled, indignant, shoving her tawny hands onto the couch to pin him. "I've got have a mind to tan your hide for what you did!"

Eyes narrowed and nostrils smoking, he responded, "And I take it the other half is telling you how that won't really work out for either of us."

She pressed against his forehead, so close that their noses were nearly touching. "It's tellin' me that you're damn lucky Twilight and Fluttershy are here."

He scoffed. "Why? Because otherwise, you'd beat me?" He pushed against Applejack's head, lifting himself off of the couch. "You'd have a better go at freezing Tartarus."

Before Applejack could retort, Twilight stepped between the two of them, acting as a buffer. "Simmer down, you two," she said, frowning. She placed a hand on on both of their chests, , gentle but firm. "There's no reason for anyone else to get hurt."

"Or maybe that's not the whole deal," Spike continued, ignoring her. He raised an eyebrow. "Are you still angry about last night?"

Applejack froze, eyes cutting to Twilight, whose eyes furrowed. "What do you mean? What happened last night?"

The farmer made to answer the question, but Spike beat her to it. "We slept together."

"What?!" The both of of them flinched from her outburst. Twilight whirled on her blonde friend. "I asked you to keep an eye on him!"

Spike's eyebrows rose even higher as a grin wormed its way across his face. Applejack seemed to be torn between angrily spouting at him and trying to babble out an excuse to Twilight.

When none was forthcoming, Spike smiled and started to speak—

Before Pinkie Pie slammed the door down.

"You guys," she said, and the conversation died.

Her face grim and foreboding, she spoke slowly, deliberately, as if her every word were an ordinance with all the authority of fate. "I'm pregnant."

"Whaaaa?!" the four of them shrieked.

"Now do you comprehend the consequences of your actions?"

Spike nodded but said nothing, instead continuing his pacing. "That...that thing in the volcano—

"Not a volcano, dear," she corrected, waiting for his head to swing up to hers in confusion, as she knew it would. "Extend your senses. Do you feel any magma underneath it?"

He paused, clacking his teeth together as his head swiveled back toward the landmark in question. His eyes narrowed.

Then, "How long has that mountain been hollow?"

The Princess walked beside him, arms crossed and eyes contemplative. "For many decades. Centuries, even." She spared him a glance before focusing her attention back on the mountain. "Even before I was so old, it was one of many dwelling places of a now obsolete race. There are few elsewhere in the world."

Her student frowned, fighting back an instinctive shiver. "What were they called? The...things that lived in them."

Luna's lips tightened into a firm line, as if to even consider her answer left a bad taste in her mouth. "They had many names, though many were nothing more than titles spoken in old ages and in popularized fiction.The 'scourges of fire'—both definitions of the word, mind you—as well as the 'torturous demons', 'flames of Tartarus, and," she coughed heavily, "hmmmdragon killers,"

"What?"

"What?"

The green-haired youth grit his teeth, eyes wide and cautious. "Those were just titles, right? They weren't any different from regular monsters?"

The Princess swung an eye to him, mildly skeptic. "What? No, they were most definitely demons."

"Figures."

"Their legendary ferocity was all but unrivaled," she continued. "Their mastery of fire could not exceed that of the dragons, but they could wield terrible magic and were nigh impossible to kill."

The cold fury in his stomach raged until he felt as if he would throw up, and for a moment, Spike wondered if a person could choke on their own vomit in their sleep.

"What the hell is wrong with you?"

And upon remembering who his mind was in contact with, ended the train of thought. "Nothing, nevermind!" He shouted, rubbing his fingers to his temples in order to focus. "Anyway, if they were so tough to kill, how come there aren't any more?"

The Princess blinked at him. "I never said they were extinct, Spike, only obsolete."

He sputtered, head bobbing between the disgruntled Princess and the frighteningly now-empty mountain.

"You mean they're still alive?" he nearly shrieked.

"Were you not paying attention when I mentioned that they are hard to kill?" she barked, causing him to flinch. "The remaining two Valaraukar are in deep hibernation, and any substantial effort to eliminate them would risk countless lives."

"But the Elements of Harmony—"

"Are not capable of killing creatures of darkness, only cleansing them. Even if there were something to restore, they weren't meant for beings of this size and caliber."

She turned away from him, seemingly hesitant to continue. "Furthermore, people of incredible strength were the only ones capable of meeting them in combat and prevailing. Celestia herself was the last to manage it, and barely that. As we are, neither she nor I are as powerful as we used to be."

Spike cocked an eyebrow, curious in spite of his inner turmoil. "Princess Celestia killed one of those things by herself?What kind of magic does that take?"

"No such magic," the goddess replied, not moving from her position on the night horizon. "She used her fire."

Now it was Spike's turn to look skeptical. "How do you kill creatures of fire...with fire?"

She finally turned to face him, a lazy smirk on her face. "You of all people should know, dear." She extended a pale finger to the hem of his shirt, pulling it upwards, halting when the scar that he made a point of not looking at showed its ugly, crusted face. She traced it with her finger lightly, before pressing on it hard enough to make him wince in pain.

"You out burn them."

Pinkie Pie couldn't stop laughing, despite the highly perturbed expressions on her friend's faces. When her fits finally subsided to pig-like snort or two, she managed to say, "Geeze, you guys, lighten up!" She chuckled, elbowing a surly Applejack in the side. "You act like you've never almost been an aunt before!"

Applejack was not amused.

"Hey Pinkie," Spike started, glaring. "Want to know how to not piss off your friends and nearly give them collective heart attacks? Here's a tip-"

"Just the tip?" She asked flirtatiously, sending a quick wink in his direction.

"Hnnnnnnng," He groaned, clutching a hand over his heart. "That's it," he announced, moving slowly toward the kitchen. "I'm limping out of this conversation before my dick implodes."

Applejack arched a scathing eyebrow as he retreated. "What, ya still sore from ruttin' the wolf?

He didn't even bother sparing her a grimace. "No, but being treated like a gimp by your sister and her friends will do that to a guy."

His response didn't have an immediate action on Applejack, as her face seemingly turned blank.

Twilight tweaked her head, puzzled. "The sexual definition, or the crippled one?"

Pinkie Pie scrunched her nose in confusion. "I wouldn't say you're our sex slave—yet—but Twilight isn't really your si—oh," she said, sucking in her lips and nodding. She sent a not-too-surreptitious glance at her blonde friend from the corner of her eye.

To her credit, Applejack kept her composure. Rather than lashing out and collapsing Spike's throat, as everyone present expected. Her teeth clamped together, gritting themselves violently. Her fingers clenched and unclenched, her knuckles turning an uneasy shade of off-white.

Finally, when it seemed that Applejack would immediately snap on her friend, she stopped, took a deep breath—

And plunked down on the couch.

She grumbled incoherently, crossing her arms. "It ain't the first time," she mumbled, letting her stetson tip slightly over her face. "Weren't worth gettin' worked up over then, weren't worth it now."

If Spike was surprised, he didn't show it. While his eyes were trained on Applejack, the same couldn't be said for the rest of the room.

Twilight watched as his face took on that of blank focus, the only sign of emotion being a slight crease of the eyebrows; the longer she stared, the more she was aware of his physical differences.

His hair was a verdant green as always, but more stiff and pale than it was when he was younger.

His ears were pointed; that was nothing knew, but the slight curve that they made in contrast to the angle of his head was.

His arms, which used to be so adorably fat and chubby, were powerful and hairless, when he chose to show them, but they were also noticeably longer than those of other young men his age.

Any who saw him when he was younger would have no issue recognizing him, even in a crowd, Twilight was sure. The longer she looked, though, the more it became apparent that he didn't look entirely human, if you knew what to look for.

She couldn't help but feel that, despite their mutual upbringing, there were some parts of him that she still didn't, and might never, understand.

He's still the same person, she said to herself, swallowing. He's still the little boy I raised.

She tried to move toward her once oldest friend, despite her reluctance to open her mouth and at least say something to him, reprimand him for sleeping with several of her best friend's sisters, instead of—

Instead of her? Twilight thought, grimacing.

Bitter as the truth was, she couldn't help but meet the glaring problem with her own two eyes: Applejack wasn't upset because of the tryst between her younger sister and Spike. She was upset because she hadn't gotten what she wanted.

Twilight grimaced inwardly. Granted, it was hardly the polite thing to do, but she and her friends weren't exactly spotless either.

So when Spike turned and trudged up the stairs, hobbling and favoring his good leg, she did nothing to stop him.

But she didn't help him, either.

"So, a centuries-old—"

"Aeons."

"An aeons-old demon has just woken up.

"Correct."

"And it's my fault?"

A frowning nod. "In a roundabout sort of way, yes."

Spike frowned. "Care to elaborate?"

Luna glanced over to him. "Did you think that dragons were the only ones that could sniff out their enemies?"

Spike flinched. "Well, no, but--"

"The one you called Garble only revealed his presence to you when you were but a few feet away." The Princess spoke without halting now, advancing toward her young charge with small angry steps. "Now, because of your carousing and canoodling, an aeons-old demon has woken from its slumber because a young member of its rival race halfway across the country couldn't stop his dick from dipping into the collective honeypots of his surrogate friends and family. Now something very powerful and very God-killing is searching for the one who is, by its reasoning, a priority target to be exterminated before it becomes too powerful to control. So, Spike Twilightsson, you can believe me when I say that you really, really shouldn't have done that."

Luna was at his neck now, standing eye to eye with her bewildered student.

After a long, uninterrupted silence, Luna blinked. "You may speak now, Spike."

Spike released a breath he hadn't realized he was holding. "So," he coughed, "so I'm supposed to fight that thing?"

Luna pointed her finger at him, just under his nose. Her face was wracked with lines, subtle lines that betrayed her frustration. "No," she finally admitted, frowning. "You will have to face the thing that ate it."

Spike's blood ran cold, colder than when he had first lost his fire. "And I'm supposed to win?" he asked, incredulous.

Luna's finger wavered. "You are not," she said, her voice lathered with what Spike belatedly realized as sorrow. "I am scared for you, Spike. You are not supposed to survive, and you will not." She shuddered, a motion that moved throughout her body. "Not unless I make you an offer."

Spike moved toward his mentor, who was visibly shaking, trying with no small amount of self-control to keep herself from breaking down. He realized that his predicament was the reason that she had been on edge for the past few nights.

"Princess?" he asked, beginning to shake as well, in spite of his will to comfort her.

"Princess, why are you crying?"