Since my sister was forced to spend Christmas Day defeating Onyx Monarch, we ended up not holidaying with our family. I claimed to be sick and promised we would visit for the New Year instead. My sister was cleared of all crimes by Boxing Day.

I thought we wouldn't be needing to rush into the next confrontation anymore since Onyx Monarch couldn't share his humiliating defeat even if he wanted to. My sister had said nothing to us about immediate plans to move forward.

I was settling down in my room to read the latest issues of EARTH Magazine and Geological Magazine. I was just getting into an article about the effects of ancient megafloods in shaping canyons in Iceland when I heard my sister coming in. She went straight to her room. I wouldn't have thought anything of it except for a thud that caused the floor to tremble. Thuds and other noises aren't that uncommon when you live with her, and I've learnt over the years how to differentiate between them: The door slamming, her backing into the garage, the oven exploding, the latest dance craze taken too far, and loads of others. This was more like she had dropped something heavy. She didn't call for me, so I went back to reading.

That evening, after I finished both magazines, I went to brush my teeth and get ready for bed. As I passed by her door, I heard some grunts and moans coming from inside. That was new. I was worried she might be hurt and decided to check on her, so I knocked on her door.

A moment later, she asked, "Who is it?"

"It's Maud," I said. "Is everything alright?"

"Oh, we're just dandy in here," she said.

"Do you have a friend over?" I asked.

There was a brief pause. I heard rustling and what sounded like her whispering. She opened the door just enough to let me see her looking out at me. A few drops of sweat trickled down her forehead and her face was flushed.

"It's just me and Gummy here. Nobody else. Just a quiet evening in to catch up on my reading. I bought the latest Betty Crocker cookbook that I'm reading all by myself. Except for Gummy. I don't have any company over, no siree Bob." She giggled, but it was forced and she was starting to sweat more. "Have you ever wondered what Bob has to with it? I know I have. Maybe I should save my new cookbook for later and try to figure out what Bob has to do with anything since I definitely don't have anything else going on and no company."

A paper fluttered from her room and out her door to land on the hall floor. I picked it up to give back to her, but then I saw the words written at the top: TOP SECRET PLAN TO SEDUCE EMERALD MONARCH. There was a checklist underneath, and the first item was 'chloroform'. I stopped reading then and held it up for her to see. She started sweating even more and turned bright red.

"What's this?" I asked.

When she didn't say anything, I started to reach for the door. She tried to grab my hand, but that caused the shoulder of her loose tee-shirt to slip down her arm. Instead of her normal bra strap, I saw the top of what looked like a leather vest or something. I'm not sure what it was, since I'm not really into that type of thing. She saw that I had noticed it and quickly pulled her shirt back into place.

"Are you wearing leather?" I asked.

"No," she said, her voice stammering a bit. "Why would you think that, my poor sleep-deprived sister who is definitely having visual hallucinations? Besides, I wouldn't wear leather right now. Rarity says it's three seasons ago, and I'm pretty sure PETA would firebomb the house if they found out."

I gave her what she calls my 'big sister stare'. After a few seconds of that, she broke and started to cry.

"I'm going to die alone and unloved," she said through her tears.

I realised I had overshot getting her to confess what she doing and turned down the intensity of my stare. She started to calm down right away and opened her door to let me into her room.

Tied to her bed was a naked man. He had a gag in his mouth, and he looked at us with wide eyes. In the corner where my sister usually kept her stuffed animals was a collection of bondage equipment. There were several lit candles, a cat-o-nine-tails, and fuzzy handcuffs on her nightstand. She pulled off her shirt to show that she was wearing a full body leather outfit that was one size too small for her and probably chafed. Based on the note, I surmised the man was Emerald Monarch.

"My first question is: Are you using protection? My second question is: Have you established a safe word?" I asked.

"How is a whip supposed to hurt if you have protection?" she said. "And how can he say 'safe' when the gag's in his mouth?"

"Never mind," I said. "How will you keep anyone from noticing he's gone?"

"Oh, Ditto is taking care of that," she said. "She's a Mirrorskin, after all. Sugar Drop is going to tell everybody she's spent the last day with him because she'll think she has."

"That makes sense. What exactly is your plan here?" I asked.

She fidgeted for a moment before she said, "Well, I heard from Sugar Drop that Emerald Monarch likes it rough, so I've been trying to seduce him into agreeing to the Contract, but I must be doing it wrong because he just keeps crying and demanding I release him every time I take out the gag."

"Is the gag supposed to have that big hole in it?" I asked.

"I don't know. Some guy at the adult store recommended it. There wasn't an instruction book," she said. She gestured to the candles. "And these scented candles aren't very good. They only smell like hot wax."

"I think you're supposed pour the melted wax on him, not scent the room," I said.

She lit up at that and rushed over to the side of the bed. "So that's what I've been wrong," she said as she grabbed one of the candles and poured wax across his chest. He started screaming through the gag and crying.

She took out his gag and asked, "Are you starting to be seduced now?"

"When I am free, I will see to it you suffer one thousand times the pains and humiliations you've inflicted on me," he said.

She put his gag back and said, "Well, that's a bust. Now I'll try Plan B: Wait for him to try to escape again so we can re-enact that one scene from Misery."

"Which scene?" I asked. "The one where she breaks his legs?"

"That's the one," she said.

I turned toward her door and said, "As much as I appreciate your attempt to be authentic, substitution plans tend to fall apart if the mole has to spend too much time undercover. Let me get one of my sledgehammers. Do you want the ten pound one or the fifteen?"

"Might as well make it the twenty," she said. "Let's do this right." She moved to kneel next to her lamp and turned it on so she had a lightbulb over her head. "You know, if we're not worrying too much about authenticity, why stop at his legs?"

Emerald Monarch began thrashing about on the bed and squealing through the gag. My sister and I turned back to him.

"I take it you're ready to agree to the Contract now?" she asked.

He nodded vigorously. She removed his gag and made him swear to the exact same contracts she had given to Onyx Monarch the day before. Once he did, she let him go. He ran out of the house naked, even though she had his clothes right there.

That's how my sister took down the Court of Desire. I missed getting to see how she dealt with the Court of Wrath since I had to go see our family, so Ditto can take over.