Chapter 8: Exercise

Five days had passed since the grand time was had at the club. Luna has been considerably more relaxed as a result, albeit a few reservations here and there. All that was necessary was the couple weeks left to seal the deal. Over the course of those days, while Luna had been getting very close to all her friends, she had gotten considerably close to Fluttershy. Fluttershy had grown to look up to Luna, while Luna had grown very protective of her, much like Rainbow Dash. They thoroughly enjoyed each other’s company, being able to relate to each other in more ways than previously thought possible. It kicked off actually during the night at the club:

[FLASHBACK]

Luna had just finished her drink and was walking back into the crowd after her rest break to look for her friends when she caught sight of a Pink-haired bombshell of a girl to the right. Upon looking, she found the very timid and uncomfortable Fluttershy against a wall with a guy who seemed too close for comfort. By the look on her face she couldn’t really get away or muster the courage to do so. Investigating further, Luna saw the guy make a very unwanted form of contact towards her, and this irritated her. Fluttershy did not find the borderline inappropriate touch very nice, and she looked like she was about to lose it. Luna huffed once before stomping over to their position with conviction.

“What’s wrong, pretty girl? There’s no way I’m letting a hottie such as you be all by yourself. I can show you a really good time,” the overconfident male said as he slid his hand down her arm.

“O-o-o-h but I’m just f-f-fine here. Please l-leave me alone,” Fluttershy shuddered at the contact and attempted to move away again, only to be blocked once more, him getting even closer to her face. She started to very silently whimper to herself. She decided to try and get a refreshment on her own and of course she had to get harassed now while she was alone. Before the guy could touch or talk to her inappropriately again, the Luna Princess made her appearance known to the two of them.

“There you are, Fluttershy! I’m sorry to have to drag you away from your new… friend,” Luna added an aggressive inflection at the last word and glared daggers at the offending man. He did not seem to recognize her either, which made her job easier again. “But there is something we need to take care of with our friends,” Luna lied through her teeth. Fluttershy, although very timid and introverted, was by no means stupid. She caught on immediately.

“Oh yes! Thank you for reminding me!” she replied and they proceeded to walk away, Luna grasping Fluttershy’s arm. At that instant though, the man stopped the two of them, a bit too hasty for Luna’s liking.

“I believe I was having business with your sexy friend here,” the man said, unwilling to let his ‘catch’ escape. Luna immediately grabbed him and pressed him against the wall, pure hate in her eyes.

“Firstly, I don’t give a damn what ‘business’ you had with her and I’m most certain she wasn’t interested in the slightest. Secondly, you will never refer to a gorgeous girl such as herself with an objectifying word such as ‘sexy’ ever again. Thirdly, I will invert your cock if you do not ‘make like a tree’ and go fuck yourself at this very instant!” Luna whispered loudly, completely ripping the offending guy a new one with new slang and colorful language she picked up. Her eyes told him that she would most definitely make good on her threat and would probably enjoy it. He mumbled inaudibly and stuttered out of fear before nodding and slinking away to another part of the club. Luna mustered a satisfied smirk before she turned to Fluttershy who heard all her words.

“Thank you so much, Luna” Fluttershy said, hugging the Princess of the Night, who readily returned the embrace.

“No trouble at all, my dear,” she replied as she wrapped her arm around Fluttershy’s shoulder before escorting her back to their friends.

[/FLASHBACK]

Luna smiled at the memory of that incident as she was fixing herself something to eat. Her stay has already had a lasting effect on her. For example, her casual attire after waking up about half an hour ago was a blue tank top rather than a long sleeve shirt. It felt really nice to be more free-minded. Sitting down to eat, Twilight came into the kitchen to greet her:

“Hey Luna!” Twilight said with a tired but nice smile.

“Goodmorning, Twilight!” Luna replied back with enthusiasm.

“So, we have plans today!” Twilight said, prepared to discuss the day’s events. Nothing relatively major had happened since the club night.

“Oh? Pray tell. What shall we do today?” Luna asked while stuffing her face.

“Remaining in tip top shape and in good health requires exercise. Rainbow Dash, Fluttershy, You, and Myself are going to the gym today. Sound good?” Twilight asked. Luna was a bit apprehensive again. Hanging out and jesting in public are one thing, but working up a sweat in front of others was not the most appetizing thing on Luna’s mind right now. But, she supposed dancing was kind of the same idea. Not like she had much choice in the matter anyway, might as well attempt to enjoy it. Good thing she purchased suitable clothing.

“Ummm… sure! Sounds good I suppose. When are we to venture out?” Luna asked, finishing up her food.

“In about half an hour. We should be ready by then to head out,” Twilight said happily before she strode out of the kitchen. Luna put away her dishes after cleaning them and stretched her arms one more time to purge the rest of the sleepiness from her body. It was time to ready up. She ventured to her room and removed her clothing, substituting it for her exercising outfit that she had: Yoga shorts, blue sports bra with (who could have guessed?) a crescent moon adorning the chest, and a white cover-up shirt for walking out in public somewhat decent. She fixed her hair up a bit, not much, but just to have it look half-way decent before she met Twilight in the main room. She was dressing in a work-out tank with long yoga pants. The two set off and eventually met up with Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy at one of Ponyville’s expansive fitness centers. Luna was impressed. The castle’s center had only what she would care to use, but this one had almost everything imaginable. Still, she had her own ways of exercise, like the rest of the girls. Rainbow Dash quickly excused herself to the track for a warmup while Fluttershy decided on an elliptical. Fluttershy, as one could infer, did not do much ‘intense’ working out, but would spend hours on an elliptical, effectively shredding excess calories with ease. What would be seen as monotonous after the first half an hour was just as entertaining for her in the second. Dealing with unruly animals was her life, so she had grown to have a gargantuan amount of patience with almost everything in her life. It certainly showed, considering Fluttershy was able to keep her near perfect figure for the last few years, somehow managing to keep any extra amount of body fat in the ‘right’ places. No one knew how she did it.

Twilight opted for standard yoga exercises on a mat that she moved next to Fluttershy’s elliptical. Twilight was not into weight lifting or rigorous amounts of cardio, so she opted for the next best thing. She would do intense stretching and other muscle straining exercises that worked for her and enabled her to keep her slender physique nicely, not that she had anything about her that would prevent her from doing otherwise.

Luna would casually lift small amounts of weights here and there, but what really whet her appetite when exercising (usually alone at the castle or rarely, with Celestia) was fighting. She had a plethora of heavy bags, target bags, dummies, oscillating bags, etc. to help aid her. At a young age, Luna expressed adamant interest in learning how to fight and defend herself. She hated the idea (still does) of having her royal guards have the responsibility of protecting her. She was very independent, and thus, insisted on inserting herself into the rigorous training regiments of the royal guards immediately when she returned from the moon, even going as far as to reside in their barracks and ordering the drill instructors to show her no mercy. The approximately four years of outrageous military training from hand-to-hand and weaponry based combat transformed her into what was essentially Equestria’s first true ‘Warrior Princess.’ This showed, physically. If one was to compare Celestia and Luna side by side, Celestia had the edge in magic, but if stripped of their garments, one would notice that Luna was much more muscularly toned and defined than Celestia; especially on her back, her legs, and her shoulders. Most would conclude that Luna could have an edge on physical appearance over Celestia, but that opinion would be convoluted due to many of their subjects’ irrational fear of Luna after her return, on top of the fact that Luna rarely embraced her femininity to its full potential. Few people outside of those buried in royal matters knew of this.

Interestingly enough, the girls’ exercises of choice were relatively close to each other; enough where they could keep conversation going and not be isolated. Luna was practicing on a heavy bag while Twilight and Fluttershy watched with keen interest. Luna had shed her cover-up and was now clad only in her sports-bra and her work-out shorts. They were able to see the aforementioned definition in her body (albeit with wandering eyes) and were quite surprised at how well she was handling her fighting technique, but didn’t work up the courage to ask her about it. It took a while for her to realize that her friends were looking upon her with admiration and curiosity rather than disdain, so Luna deduced that she could let loose a bit more. She worked up a sweat with some simple fighting combinations of punches and kicks, nothing too fancy. A little while later, conversation was interrupted when Rainbow Dash returned from the track.

“Hey girls! How’s it hangin’?” Rainbow Dash asked, wiping her brow.

“It’s not, considering I don’t have one,” Twilight joked, getting a hefty chuckle out of Dash and Luna. Fluttershy merely blushed and shook her head, smiling. Dash then noticed where Luna was, and Dash loved to spar and fight as well, albeit without any actual training.

“Hey Luna I didn’t know you liked that stuff! Let’s fight!” Rainbow Dash said hastily, slipping on some gloves and getting into a fighting position on the mat.

“Umm, Rainbow Dash I don’t think-”

“Oh come on, Luna! I’ll go easy on you!” Dash interrupted Luna, overconfident as ever and with a determined smile. Luna merely sighed and conceded.

“Very well then,” Luna reluctantly stated, gazing past her and cocking her head slightly in concession as she tightened her blue fingered-gloves and stepped into the center of the mat. Dash was already ready to go in a very amateur stance. Luna rolled her arms at her shoulders to stretch them a bit before flailing them down towards the ground, loosening them up. Then she proceeded to get into her stance: her left arm down in front of her with her palm open and her right arm brought bent upward, her hand balled up into a fist and guarding her face. She positioned and spaced her legs accordingly and was ready for ‘battle.’ Twilight and Fluttershy only watched with enormous curiosity at the situation that was unfolding. Yes, it was a friendly fight, but Dash particularly loved to fight. Luna, however, appeared to know how to hold her own. Ironically, they feared for Luna.

The match began and Dash began to throw punches and kicks at her, only for Luna to deflect them and block them with ease. A minute had gone by and Rainbow had not made contact with Luna’s frame once; she was getting very frustrated that Luna was not even making an effort to retaliate.

“Come on Luna, fight! Are you scared? Try and hit me!” Dash almost commanded, having a knack for digging her own graves.

“Put her down, Lulu… hehehehehe,” a voice sounded off in Luna’s mind. She snuffed it out immediately to make room for her own thoughts.

“Your confidence supersedes you when you underestimate your opponents. You asked me to; let this be a lesson,” Luna mused to herself as she deflected one of Dash’s roundhouse kicks, forcing her to spin around again through her momentum. Luna then advanced her rear leg up in a step forward, using that momentum to bring a proper right hook into Rainbow Dash’s cheek.

Lights Out.

Dashie stumbled back from the blunt force before she fell on her back, blacking out for a few seconds.

“What the-?!” Twilight managed to say before rushing over. Fluttershy was completely shocked at the turn of events and rushed over as well to their fallen element. Luna also went over and helped prop up the disoriented Rainbow Dash.

“My lord… I don’t think I’ve ever been hit that cleanly,” Rainbow Dash said, applying pressure to her reddening cheek.

“You asked me to hit you,” Luna said stoically, defending herself while applying a cooling spell to her friend so her cheek wouldn’t bruise as horribly.

“I didn’t think it would be so easy… wait a minute… you know how to fight, don’t you?!” Rainbow Dash said, putting two and two together.

“You didn’t allow me to speak,” Luna retorted with a smirk. Twilight and Fluttershy looked to her for confirmation. With that, she told the two of her military martial arts training, completely flooring them over her capabilities. Rainbow Dash earned a brand new respect for the Lunar Princess. If they had a fairly good friendship, it was silently and mutually agreed that it was now stronger between them. After all, Dash took a proper hit from Luna’s fist and was conscious after a few seconds; few royal guards could even say that. After the incident, the girls went back to their own routines while Luna was teaching Dash some basic but proper technique in her form to help ensure that her arbitrary aggressiveness wouldn’t help repeat past mistakes. After another hour and a half the girls called it a day at the gym and proceeded to exit the gym en route back to Twilight’s place to clean themselves up. Before they left, Fluttershy approached Luna:

“H-Hey Luna,” Fluttershy approached her. Luna turned and was immediately happy to see her. She put an arm around her.

“Fluttershy, dear! What is up?” Luna asked, still getting used to some slang.

“I was wondering if… well, if you don’t mind… could you maybe… teach me a few things?” Fluttershy asked with a bit more confidence, albeit meekly. Luna was a bit taken aback by this… as someone who was very passive was inquiring about martial arts. Luna did not want to mold the innocent beauty into something she was not. But then again, Luna reasoned that a bit of learning could boost her confidence significantly!

“Are… are you sure, dear?” Luna asked again for confirmation. Fluttershy only nodded multiple times. Luna saw a look that showed itself clearly once in a while in her eyes: determination. That was all the reassurance she needed. Luna smirked in admiration for her close friend’s courage.

“We’ll see what we can do then,”