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The stallion’s legs and neck had been tightly secured in both chains and metal restraints; every step he took down the dungeon’s winding walkways, they clinked. The stallion truly had no idea what to expect once he’d reach his final destination. What he eventually discovered, though, elicited from him only a single word.

“Oh,” the new prisoner muttered to himself.

Celestia’s personal dungeon ended up being little more than a large rock room along with a set of double doors; inside sat dozens upon dozens of weary ponies, seated on the cool stone floor and bound to the walls behind them. Without word, the stallion’s two guards marched him to an empty spot, securing him in place.

When they left, it felt as if every eye in the place was looking at him.

He gulped dryly, waving a hoof. “Hi,” he greeted nervously.

“Hello!”

“How you doing?”

“First timer?” they responded openly.

Feeling less nervous than before, the new prisoner let out a sigh, as he plunked his head against the wall. Then came the first of that day’s many, many questions.

“So, is no one gonna ask him?” one of his fellow inmates said. “Fine. Okay, new guy. Just what got you banished to such a charming place? And let me just take a guess before you start: something to do with Celestia, perchance?”

The new prisoner glanced back up. “Sort of. A friend of hers, at least. Who here’s heard of Twilight Sparkle before?”

Nods all around the large dungeon room.

“Good, okay,” the new prisoner said. “Now who’s heard of Twilight Sparkle’s personal library before?”

Instead of nods, it was groans all around.

“Not another one of these stories!” lamented one of the inmates with a scruffy beard.

“Afraid so,” the new prisoner continued. “But I’ll save you some time and make this quick. You see, I was supposed to return a book I borrowed from her last week, but missed the deadline by just a few hours. I guess Twilight’s sort of stringent about things like that.”

“She sent you here because of that?” one of them asked, outraged.

“Not exactly. It was either come here or write her a ten-thousand-word essay on the ramifications of tardiness.”

Someone snorted. A rat squeaked close by. “And you chose this place over writing a simple essay? Really, new guy? Fear of paper?”

The new prisoner chuckled. “Actually, I did manage to finish the essay… only a day late. Now I’m forced to write a second essay on the same subject during my time here. As Twilight herself said, ‘An essay on tardiness while in Tartarus’.” He paused, pondering. “You know what? Upon reflection, I think she just wanted to use those two words together in the same sentence.”

Everyone jolted as the heavy set of doors to the dungeon crashed inward. A mound of fog filled the entrance. And following that—a rather mean looking griffin.

“Who’s that?” the new prisoner whispered to the chained pony to his left.

“Gilda,” he replied in a hushed tone. “She personally supervises all inmates. Trust me, it’s better if you keep your head down and stay quiet while she’s around. She loves picking on ponies. No matter what you say, she’ll turn it around on you. Anything.”

Gilda the griffin carefully marched along the cracked stone floor, tapping her claws as she did. Coldly, she glanced from one row of prisoners to the next. “Awful lot of chatter in this dungeon. Awful lot of losers, too. Just when I think they can’t possibly cram anymore waste into this place—”

“Looking very pretty today, Gilda!” a nearby stallion piped up abruptly.

All ponies in attendance sucked in air.

“Who said that!?” Gilda blurted, eyeing up those closest to her. She soon found the culprit; the only one meeting her eyes at the time. “Say I look ‘pretty’, eh?”

He nodded, smiling.

Gilda narrowed her eyes at him. “Then why did you sound so sarcastic when you said it?”

“Sarcastic?” The stallion’s good-natured smile dipped. “What? No. I wasn’t being sarcastic. I was only being honest. Honest!”

“So, you’re calling me a liar, then?” Gilda demanded. “Ol’ Gilda here can’t gauge levels of sarcasm correctly? Is that it?”

“No! That’s not—”

“So, if what you’re saying is true and I’m not lying, then that means you really were being sarcastic when you called me pretty. Correct?” Gilda smirked down at him like some cat with a cornered mouse.

The poor stallion turned in all directions. “Help! Someone! Anyone! I’m caught in a conversational loop with no way out!”

But it appeared as though help did not exist in such a dark pit of despair.

Roughly, Gilda undid the pony’s chains and lifted him to his hooves. “Looks like this troublemaker in for a fun afternoon of swirlies.”

“No!” he plead. “Anything but that! I have swimmer’s ear!”

That only made Gilda grin more. “Calling uncle already? I guess I can ease up a bit. How ‘bout Wednesday wedgies, instead?”

A drop of sweat dripped down his face. “But I’m not even wearing underwear!”

“That’s what makes it fun, you loser!” was the final thing Gilda said, before she dragged him out of the dungeon, slamming the door behind her.

The sense of dread in the room was short lived.

A mare spoke openly, “I’m starting to think he just has a thing for getting punished by Gilda. That’s gotta be the third time this week he’s done something like that, right?”

That was when the new prisoner jolted where he sat, holding out a hoof before him. “What’s that colt doing in here!?”

It was strange how he hadn’t noticed him before; chained up just like everyone else. Honestly, the colt might’ve been four years old at best.

The colt glanced around. “Who? Me?”

“Yes. Obviously.” The colt was undeniably the only child in the room. “There must’ve been some mistake. What could you have possibly done to wind up in here?”

“Well,” the colt began, staring at his shackled hooves as he spoke. “This is all my parents’ faults, really. They asked Princess Celestia personally if she’d lock me up for a weekend.”

“That’s terrible!” the new prisoner exclaimed. “Why would they even do such a thing?”

“Because I didn’t eat all my vegetables last time we had dinner together,” the colt admitted softly, not meeting anyone’s eyes. “It was just last week that they said if I didn’t clean my plate, they’d send me off to a deep, dark dungeon! But how was I to know they really meant it this time?” He exhaled miserably. “I can’t help it if I don’t like broccoli.”

“You poor, poor child,” the mare from before agreed.

The colt stuck his head up, brightening. “But at least I’m learning a whole bunch of cool new stuff while I’m here! Like how to sharpen a toothbrush into a knife! Or how to sharpen a knife into a toothbrush! Which is actually a whole lot more difficult than it sounds…” Another thought came to him. “But I think when I get out on Monday, I’m gonna try something new. I’m gonna start a criminal empire! Then, in that case, I can pay other kids to eat my broccoli for me! That’ll sure teach my parents!”

Then the little colt laughed and laughed and laughed. And those closest to him edged themselves as far away as they could. Which was about four inches max.

“You think you’ve got it bad?” a strange voice asked from some unseen corner of the room. All heads spun around to find a terrifyingly familiar creature seated on a stool with their back to them. It was clear it was Discord, seemingly focused on the blank wall ahead of him. “Try staring at a wall for six days straight!”

One of the doors to the room shoved inward. Everyone knew who it was straightaway; the hovering, flowing mane was quite the tell.

Most chained ponies began yelling to her at once.

“Princess Celestia! I’m not supposed to be here!”

“You got the wrong pony! Honest!”

“Just because I smelt it, doesn’t mean I dealt it! I was framed!”

“You’re much bigger in person. Anyone ever tell you that?”

With a single hoof to her lips, along with a faint “Shush”, all in the room fell silent.

Celestia asked Discord, “Have you thought long and hard about what you did, Discord?”

Discord didn’t turn to her. Instead, he irritably held both mismatched arms above his head. “How can I think about what I’ve done if I can’t even remember what I did! I do loads of bad stuff! All the time! Give us a hint, for pity’s sake! Something Fluttershy related, perhaps?”

“No,” was all Celestia said, before swiftly exiting the room.

And speaking of familiar faces…

The new prisoner whispered to the pony on his left again. “I think I’ve discovered the ‘rat’ in the group. She’s not supposed to be in here, is she? Isn’t she, like, super good friends with Twilight—”

“Sparkle?” the very same mare he’d been talking about finished bluntly, absently flicking her purple and turquoise mane out from her eyes. “Who said Starlight Glimmer’s incarceration had anything to do with her?”

“Because most of our incarcerations do,” the mare from before answered flatly.

Starlight Glimmer huffed out her nose. “Well, too bad! Mine doesn’t! You see… it all began once I officially started dating Trixie some months ago. Things were great; we spent all of our time together. But then I had to go and do something dumb.”

She stopped in the middle of her story to glance around the room.

“Isn’t anyone going to ask what I did!?” she shrieked.

“W-what ever d-did you do, Starlight Glimmer?” a trembling pony asked.

Starlight smiled at them. “Okay, but only because you asked so nicely. That stupid thing I did? Let’s just say I revealed the secrets to one of Trixie’s most miraculous magic tricks; which, as you may not know, is one of the worst things one can do to a magician.”

“Then what was the trick?” the new prisoner asked. “Since you’ve clearly already spilled the beans on it…”

Starlight’s face flushed red. “Oh, it’s a simple trick, but a good one; just how the one and only Trixie Lulamoon stole Starlight Glimmer’s heart without her realizing it.”

A large wave of Awwws poured out from the group; a lone stallion tried to clap his shackled hooves together. “I’d clap if these chains weren’t currently preventing me from doing so!”

Starlight continued, “As it turns out, wooing me wasn’t even all that difficult. All it took was vast amounts of cuddling and frequent fast food runs.”

Another gasp of appreciation from the crowd.

“I like doing nothing all day, too!” one of them erupted.

Starlight laughed to herself, as something else must’ve come to mind. “And, of course, the hours and hours of secret hypnosis didn’t hurt, either.”

“Hypnosis?” the new prisoner questioned. “Did you really say hypnosis?”

Starlight looked startled at that. “What? Oh, heavens no. I said hip-nose-kisses, is all. It’s very new and very comforting. Why would Trixie ever—”

But that was when a bright white glow filled both her eyes and she yelled out in a most robotic tone: “TRIXIE! THE GREAT AND POWERFUL! THE LOVE OF MY LIFE! BUY HER COLLECTABLE SHIRTS AND OTHER LOW-PRICED MERCHANDISE WHEREVER THEY ARE SOLD! REMEMBER: HER HAT AND CAPE ARE TOTALLY COOL AND TOTALLY NOT LAME! DOWN WITH TWILIGHT SPARKLE! DOWN WITH TWI—”

Starlight blinked once more and the glow in her eyes disappeared. “—need to hypnotise anyone? That’s just silly. Stop being so silly over there, you.”

Thankfully, no one dared question Starlight further; there were simply some rabbit holes too deep to safely explore. And, thankfully, some interruptions simply too grand to ignore.

“Where… is… he?”

The door to the room had been thrown inward for a third time that day, and, like a bolt of dark-blue lightning, Princess Luna had shot inside. She looked utterly pissed. Gritted teeth, narrowed eyes. “Found you!” she announced.

The pony in question was a normal looking, middle-aged stallion chained up to a section of wall all to his own. As far as the new prisoner could tell, he appeared no more or less dangerous than anyone currently being held there.

“Who’s that guy?” the new prisoner once again asked the pony to his left. “He must be in real trouble to have Princess Luna pissed at him.” He lowered his voice even more. “Murdered royalty?”

His dungeon mate gravely shook his head. “Worse. He incorrectly filled out his tax returns.”

That made the new prisoner wince. “Oh, boy. I thought they held public executions for stuff like that.”

“They still do,” his cellmate explained. “Only this time, Princess Luna took the crime personally. And now she’s made it her mission to make sure he suffers in here worse than anyone has ever suffered before. So that’s why she’s in here every hour or so, just to see how he’s doing.”

The new prisoner, along with everyone else in the dimly lit room, turned to watch Luna and the stallion in question. Standing overtop of him, she held a twisted smile.

“Tell us, prisoner scum,” she began coldly, “what does thou think of spiders? Nasty, ticklish, venomous spiders? Hundreds of them!”

Slowly, the stallion raised his head. “I love spiders.”

“Oh? Is that so.” Luna’s smirk only grew. “Then no spiders for you! I shall keep all spiders for myself to enjoy! What do you think of that?”

The stallion of personal interest mumbled something out of earshot.

Luna lowered herself to him. “What was that? Once more, if thou would be so kind?”

“Just… anything but iced tea…” he eventually whimpered out.

Elated, Luna happily stomped a hoof into the floor. “Iced tea? Does thou truly hate the refreshing beverage with such a fiery passion, prisoner?”

He nodded several times. “Yes! Especially the really cold kind! And especially on humid days like today! But… anything but that! Anything! I beg of you!”

Luna laughed triumphantly. “You know, I almost pity you. Those loose lips of yours shall prove your final undoing! Guards!” She whipped her head around to face the two guards that followed her in. “Get this rebel scum the tallest, coldest glass of iced tea right this instant!”

“No!” the stallion below her shrieked. “Anything but that! Please! Whatever you do… just don’t add a wedge of lemon to the rim, okay? Please!”

“You heard him, guards,” Luna decried merrily. “One terrifying lemon wedge for our prisoner. And make sure he drinks every last drop of it! No matter how much he screams! No punishment is too great for our nefarious tax thief.”

The begging stallion murmured out of earshot once again.

With clear glee, Luna looked back down at him. “What is that now? Some new fear of yours to exploit? I want to hear it, you swine! Let it be heard!”

He then whispered something into her ear, drawing a flat chuckle from her.

“Your greatest fear? Truly?” Luna asked, standing up again. “Hot and steamy alicorn threesomes?” She took a step back, narrowing her eyes at him. “You must consider myself a fool by saying such things! Some imbecile that could not even open a door without someone else’s help! I know what you are trying to accomplish here, lawbreaker! I know exactly what you are up to!”

The stallion retreated to his wall, gulping. “You do?”

Luna nodded sternly. “Yes. You must think that just because alicorns are rare in Equestria, I would have limited access to them, thus wasting all my time and effort in search of them! How foolish you must be… not realizing that an alicorn stands right before you… and another one waits just through those very doors!”

As if completely on cue, Celestia stuck her head inside the room again. “I thought someone might be talking about me in here. Was somebody talking about me in here?”

Without looking back, Luna told Celestia, “I need a favor of you, dear sister! Fetch us our very best barrel of oil and four pairs of our extra long socks!”

Celestia grimaced. “But we just had those put away in storage, Luna.”

“Then simply get them out of storage, dear sister!”

“But that’s like up… six flights of stairs…” Celestia said, mostly to herself.

“Then use thy wings!” Luna snapped. “It is not like they are connected to thy body or anything!”

It seemed as if Celestia had had enough, exiting the bizarre scene while slamming the door behind her. Not that it fazed Luna in the least, as she leaned toward the stallion she’d been verbally grilling, lifting his chin up to her with a hoof.

In a tone worthy of her very mightiest of foes, she whispered to him, “Tonight, right at eight, absolutely nothing will save you, tax evader. Your worst fears will become a reality; your punishment, the fuel of legends to come. Mark my words, pion; your cries of displeasure will echo throughout the land; your moans of un-joy will spark nightmares untold; your screams of opposite-happiness will make even the strongest of stallions quiver where they stand.”

Finally, she let go of his jaw to step away.

“Truly, thou should have thought better before misreading Yearly Tax Form 198, subsection B, part four. It was right in the directions. All you had to do was read them over carefully. Then you would have known full well to fill out all option boxes with an X and not a checkmark.”

The new prisoner playfully nudged his cellmate in the ribs. “Not the only box he’s gonna fill out tonight.”

His cellmate only stared at him. “Was that a joke? I must apologize. I lost my sense of humor in a traumatic childhood accident.”

“Clearly,” was the new prisoner’s reply.

As Luna stormed towards the doors again, she had only one question left for her tormented stallion. “Final question, miscreant: does thou enjoy the taste of wine while copulating?”

“Hate it,” he replied.

Luna snickered. “Then, tonight, the wine shall flow like…” She froze searching for a proper example. “A whole lot of wine!” Then she quickly screamed at a nearby guard. “You! Open this door for me!”

“Right away, Princess!”

And, just as oddly as she’d entered the scene, Luna left it; leaving dozens upon dozens of wide-eyed ponies staring at one particular stallion that had a very long night to look forward to.

“Huh,” he said. “You know what? I’m kinda glad I didn’t read the directions on that form.”

Author's Notes:

I would give ChappedPenguinLips an editing credit, but all he changed was "ice tea" to "iced tea". And here I've been drinking the wrong stuff all along...

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