Chapter One-Agent Star

Sweetie Belle smiled as she crept along through the corridors of Cantalot Castle. It had been surprisingly easy with the help of her fellow blank flanks to get from the public area of the castle to Princess Celestia's private quarters, despite the two Unicorn guards on watch. One of the guards had left for a short time, perhaps to go to the toilet or to get something to eat, and then Apple Bloom and Scootaloo had come up supposedly in a panic to the guard with a wild tale of a missing friend. Adult ponies would most likely have been either disbelieved out of hand or passed on to somebody else, but as it was a pair of terrified blank flanks the guard felt that he had to personally help them find their friend and left his post. Allowing Sweetie Belle to sneak past the velvet rope and the "No Entry to the Public" sign and sneak into the Princess's royal suite. Her heart was thumping like one of the Ponyville trains as she walked along past portraits of famous ponies of the past.

Calm down, Sweetie, she does not know you're here. Nobody knows you're here, and even if you do bump into a guard he'll most likely believe your tale of getting horribly lost. It was then that she heard the sweet voice of the Princess Celestia speaking.

"Twilight, how long will it be until the Border Field is ready? I fear the Griffin Kingdom most of all at the moment. If they were to invade Equestria, we would lose a lot of good ponies repelling them. Much as it saddens me to have to erect a force field between our two lands, as it shows distrust and interferes with trade, it is the safest thing to do. After all, it can be lowered later when tensions fall."

"Two days, your Majesty, and that's working flat out."

Sweetie Belle used her horn to pull out a pen and paper from under her belly and write a letter to her Griffin paymasters. "The Princess is planning to block off your border with a force shield. Agent Star." That information will be worth enough bits to keep me in sweets and toys and pretty much whatever a blank flank can legally buy, and I will still have enough left over to keep me with enough bits to live on for a good part of the rest of our lives if I are careful with it. But how to get out of here safely? I can't teleport anything in or out of here without it being blocked, noticed or both. A door opened and she threw herself behind a red velvet curtain as Twilight Sparkle walked out and started walking in the direction Sweetie Belle had come. And it was then that Sweetie Belle got an idea and hid the pen and paper under her belly. Follow her just behind her and bluff it out when the door opens.

It worked. The guard, seeing her walk out boldly just behind Twilight Sparkle, thought that she must have been allowed in there for some reason and she was able to meet her friends. They think that I'm only doing this to try and earn a cutie mark, they have no idea that I'm really a spy. Nopony does, or ever will. Once they were out of there Apple Bloom and Scootaloo asked her all manner of questions and she answered them leaving out the bit about her spying. As soon as she got a moment alone that night she teleported the letter to the capital of the Griffin Kingdom, and not long afterwards, two sacks teleported into her bedroom. Sacks full of golden bits, and a letter. [b "Dear Agent Star, here is the payment for your information, two hundred thousand golden bits. Please destroy this letter after you have read it, and be careful not to spend the bits too quickly. Griffin H.Q.."]

Two hundred thousand bits! I get five bits a week pocket money so...that's a lot. Using her horn, she levitated one hundred and fifty thousand bits into various places...into her money box, into draws, into the pockets of her formal dress, under her bed, and under the floorboards, into a spare pillowcase and into her toy box. I must be the richest blank flank in Equestria, I'm as rich as my mother. As for the rest...time to get revenge on a certain pony that has been pissing me off for a long while...Diamond Tiara. She sneaked to her house, buried the money in the ground along with the note, and then wrote a little note of her own to the Ponyville Police. "The spy is Diamond Tiara, the proof is buried in the garden. A friend of Equestria." She grinned as she imagined the trouble Diamond Tiara would be in when the police found the bag full of bits buried in her garden, far more then even a year of Diamond's pocket money. She would be disgraced, hauled up before Celestia and no doubt heavily punished and her family would to a lesser extent share in the disgrace and see her as a traitor.

***
Silver Ball stared in amazement at the flight of griffins that soared overhead and over the border. Griffin border patrols were not uncommon although it was a rare pony who made a border crossing legally or otherwise. However, as one of only three police ponies in the whole village he thought that he ought to object. "Hey, you can't fly through here, not without showing your passports!" Half of them peeled off and dived down, but it clearly was not to present their passports, as they had talons raised and beaks agape. Being a unicorn, he levitated his baton and smacked the first griffin hard on the head, sending it tumbling to the ground. Another griffin grabbed the baton and snapped it like a twig in it's talons, before a third swooped in, tore Silver's back right open and ripped a hole in his neck. As he lay there dying he saw far up in the sky two luckless pegasui as the griffins tore the feathers with beak and talon from their wings until they could fly no more and plummeted to the ground, their bones cracking on impact. Then his sight greyed out and faded to black.

A handful of ponies...the two remaining police ponies, a border guard or two, an earth pony defending her foals, put up a fight, but most ponies fled for their lives into their homes. Until Swift Beak showed up. Griffins rarely wore anything, but he wore the epaulettes of a Griffin General. Whilst each griffin squadron knew it's non-comms and officers by sight once fully trained, senior officers they rarely saw so such officers needed command insignia to mark them out as griffins to be obeyed. "I am General Swift Beak. You will come out of your houses now, or we will set them on fire and burn them down around your ears. We want you as hostages, not as carcasses or as sex toys.If you behave you might see your homes again. Nopony who comes out now will be killed, mutilated or raped." One by one the stallions mares and foals came out and were formed into a herd and herded over the border into the Griffin Kingdom not knowing why they had been captured like this or when they would ever see their homes again, leaving a score of shredded pony bodies behind. Only three griffins had died and the griffins took their bodies so that they could be decently buried.
***
Field Marshal Golden One galloped straight into the Princess's royal suite of rooms without knocking, as he had the right to do in an emergency. "Your Majesty, the village of Downdale was attacked by griffins, it's ponies killed or dragged over the border as hostages. And a spy was found who we think must have passed on infomation to the griffins to make them act in such a way. Diamond Tiara was found to have fifty thousand gold bits buried in her garden! I know her family are rich, but there is no way she could have saved up or earned that amount of money. The griffins must have paid her for the secret of the planned shield, although we have no idea how she got that top secret infomation in the first place." Celestia stared at him for a few seconds, then said "Bring her to my royal courtroom. If I find she did what I thought she did I'll...send her to the moon for her treachery!"

Chapter Two-To the Moon

Diamond Tiara was taken by surprise when a couple of Ponyville unicorn police ponies cuffed her legs and placed a ring on her horn that blocked her magic. "You are under arrest on charges of gross treachery. Many ponies are either dead or in griffin hands because of your greed for griffin gold." She wailed her innocence as they dragged her away. Celestia decided that because of the seriousness of her offence she would be tried as an adult in open court, in accordance with Celestia's belief that justice where possible should not only be done, but should be seen to be done.

Diamond paced to and fro in the little horsebox below the court, her chains clinking loudly with every step. I didn't do this dreadful crime, I love my country and my Queen and my family is one of the oldest and the richest in all of Equestria. They love me, my parents love and cherish me and there is no way that they would abandon me in my hour of need. I'm their favourite daughter. Right now they are no doubt busy hiring the best and most expensive lawyers in all of Equestria to defend me and clear me of the spying charges...Her thoughts of rescue were interrupted by the sound of a letter sliding under her door. She picked it up and opened it with her horn.

Your family are sickened by your crime and have decided to disown you. Therefore you will get no help nor visits from your family and will be known as Diamond X. You are no longer part of the Tiara family. It was signed by Many Books, the Tiara family lawyer. Diamond burst into tears as she realised that there would be no help and that her family already considered her guilty and had abandoned her to her fate. She was still crying when they hauled her up into the packed courtroom to face Celestia. Amongst the many angry ponies glaring at her was Sweetie Belle.

"Order in the court. Diamond X, you are charged with spying for the Griffin Kingdom resulting in the death of twenty ponies and the kidnapping of hundreds more. If you plead guilty now I might well lessen your sentence. Do you plead guilty or not guilty?"

"Not Guilty."

The trial went badly for Diamond; she had her talents but a knowledge of the law was not one of them. She was unable to tell Celestia who, if not her, had placed the gold bits in her garden, and all too soon Celestia found her guilty. "Diamond X, I find you guilty of the charge of spying, and you are very lucky that I do not support the death penalty, which is a punishment that you richly deserve. My sister has been alone since she was banished to the moon a thousand or so years ago; I think after all that time she needs some company." Celestia's horn glowed green and then blue. "When there you will be magically protected from the baking heat of the two week long lunar day and the freezing chill of the lunar night, also from thirst and starvation. As I said earlier, I do not support the death penalty, but you will never be able to return home again and will age as normal. Farewell, traitor."

Once more Celestia's horn glowed and Diamond vanished from the dock and from Equestria.

***

Princess Luna was reviewing her army, or rather, the piles of stone lifted into place with her horn that she thought were her army. She walked up and down as if on a parade. In her first days on the moon she had been enraged with her sister and had tried to teleport and then to fly away without success. After that she had spent a year exploring every cave and plain and mountain on the moon, renaming them as she discovered them, telling herself stories from time to time, playing games in the dust with her hooves, wondering if she was missed down there. After the first year she had come across pony tracks and followed them all over the place wondering where their owner might be, when in fact the tracks were just those of her own hooves. After the first decade she had used her alicorn magic to erect piles of stones which in her mind became guards and party guests and the occasional subject asking for favours. She stopped at a particularly large rock which long ago she had promoted to the rank of general. "General, your stallions stood still as stones on parade today, I'm proud of them and of you. Each of them is awarded an extra bit and they can have the afternoon off."

There was a pop and Diamond Tiara appeared upon the moon. Luna stared at her, her light purple fur the first colour other then her own fur she had seen in a while. She rarely looked at the greens and browns of her home planet as it hung like a beach ball in the sky, as it made her feel homesick. The only colours of the moon were the grey of moondust, the black of shadows and rarely the white of ice in a crater that puffed into vapour at once if placed in the sunlight, and this was the first time she had seen purple in many centuries. The shock of a real live pony temporarily snapped Luna back to sanity and she trotted over and planted a big kiss on Diamond's cheek.

"Company! It is so long since I have had company, real company! How did you get here? Have you been sent to bring me home? What's your name." Luna was bouncing around as if she was Pinkie Pie, she was that happy at no longer being alone.

"I'm Diamond Tiara, and I will never see my home again, somepony framed me for spying for the Griffins and Princess Celestia sentenced me to life imprisonment on the moon," Diamond replied sadly.

Chapter Three-Luna's Lover

Luna smiled. "Well, you are my subject now. At last, I have a real living subject after so many centuries all alone. Nobody to talk to me, nobody to serve me,and now I have you." She joyfully cantered in little circles around Diamond Tiara, looking at her from every angle. Noticing her cutie mark of a coronet,she whinnied happily. "And you are a noble too! I appoint you here and now to the rank of General of my army." She moved her regal head close to the coronet cutie mark and planted a soft kiss upon it, much to Diamond's surprise. Whilst "kiss my cutie mark" was a common saying normally said when a pony really didn't want to do something and a pony that was sycophantic and servile to his or her boss was known as a "cutie mark kisser" kissing a cutie mark was something done only in the privacy of the bedroom between lovers. Diamond blushed. Even exiled as she was, she still respected rank, and this was an alicorn who had once ruled Equestria kissing her in an intimate place. What if Luna has turned bisexual or lesbian? What if she wants to make love to me? It must be so long since she made love to anypony.Even if she does...I'm straight, but if I have to make love with a mare...one could not do better then an alicorn, the rarest type of pony in the world. She shivered slightly as Princess Luna was now warmly licking her cutie mark as if it was a toffee apple.

"General of the army? Thank you but...where is it?"

"There it is, drawn up right in front of you." Luna pointed with a hoof at the piles of rocks that she had piled up centuries ago, slab by slab and stone by stone, into roughly pony-like shapes. "They are well trained, loyal, everything a general could want. If we could get them off this blasted moon, there would be enough of them to retake Equestria by force if need be. I could have done with them earlier."

Diamond counted twenty-one of them. Even if they had been real soldiers instead of mere piles of rock and dust, there were not enough to hold anything bigger then a farm or maybe a small hamlet or village. "How many...soldiers do you have in your army?" she asked. She sensed it might be dangerous to tell Luna that her army consisted of a few rock piles.

"Twenty-one thousand," Luna said. "And that's just the army, I have hundereds of thousands of loyal subjects here, and they all love me and worship me and are pleased to have me here. There are no dissidents here, no nasty Celestia-lovers, not one. If you are wondering where they all are, they sleep underground during the day for the most part, and come out at night where we party together, Except on Friday, that's law court day where I act as Chief Judge and also meet ponies asking for a royal favour."

She's gone totally insane, I'm all alone here with a babbling insane alicorn Princess for the rest of my life. But she won't kill me...if she does that she will be all alone with my body. I wonder if within a few years I will be as crazy as her? No, I'll never be like that. She stepped back in shock and almost fell into a crater as Luna had just run her tounge along her horn, one of the most sensitive parts of any unicorn. She must be sex crazy after having only herself to clop with for so many years. Hopefully she won't feel that way indefinatly....hey, this feels good, this feels really good...I want more of it...don't stop now... Luna pulled her tounge away and lightly tapped Diamond's horn, and Diamond almost fell over as a wave of sexual pleasure ran through her whole body.

"I also make you my consort and lover," Luna said with a smile. "Now, tell me, what has been going on in Equestria recently? I'm very interested in almost everything that has happened."

***
Sweetie Belle thought to herself of how she had become a spy. The injured griffin she found, it's side ripped open and still bleeding from pegasus lances and a big hole torn in a wing, looked harmless and near death and she felt sorry for him. Sorry enough to teleport him back across the border to the outskirts of the nearest Griffin city where he could escape death or capture and get his wounds tended to. A few hours later a letter had teleported to her asking if she would agree to help the Griffin nation for bits, and she had teleported back a reply saying yes. And the best thing about it was, that she had successfully framed that brat Diamond Tiara and as a result, was now in the clear. Then she noticed Apple Bloom and Scootaloo staring at her. "Is something wrong. Why are you staring at my...?" Her flank was no longer blank. Instead there was a cloak and dagger cutie mark upon it. Great, I've finally got my cutie mark, and if I'm not careful it could give me away as it is the cutie mark of a spy. She jumped for joy and galloped around in a circle for a few seconds,as her friends hugged her.

"So what does it mean?" Scootaloo asked.

"Oh it...it's a hide and seek cutie mark," Sweetie Belle lied. She was truelybhappy to get her cutie mark, but wished it was not something that could very well betray her as the spy who got an innocent pony sent on a one way Moon trip.

Chapter Four-Tell-Tale Cutie Mark

"I am so jealous of you," Scootaloo told her friend. "The first Cutie Mark Crusader to earn her cutie mark, and what a mark it is." She reached out with her hoof and lightly touched it. "Well, you know what this means, we need to get your cute-cenara organised, with baloons and loot bags and food and maybe Pinkie Pie will let us borrow her Party Cannon. And all of our friends will be there and your parents can come too and they'll be so proud of you, as proud as I am," Scootaloo said, excited now, hovering off the ground as her wings flapped frantically to keep her body aloft. "It's going to be the best cute-cenara ever." As they headed off towards Sugarcube Corner, they passed Twilight Sparkle who was going the other way. Twilight saw the new cutie mark and stared at it. Is that mark what I think it is? I need to get back home and look it up in my book of all known cutie marks to make sure it is what I think it is. She said nothing about it to Sweetie Belle; if she was innocent she didn't want to needlessly offend her, and if she was guilty, she didn't want her to teleport to somewhere where she could not be extradited from.

As soon as she got back home she reached for a book called The Heraldry of Cutie Marks-what they can tell you and looked up the mark she had clearly seen upon Sweetie Belle's flank. A cloak and dagger. Whilst many cutie marks represent not jobs but pony hopes, this one generally only forms upon the flank of a genuine and accomplished spy, a sure sign of treachery at a high level. As such the owners of this cutie mark normally hide it under clothing or disguise it when in public. Twilight sighed. She liked Sweetie Belle, but this meant that Diamond Tiara was innocent and wrongly sent to the moon. She wrote a letter to Celestia explaining what she had seen.

Dear Princess Celestia, Sweetie Belle got her cutie mark at last, and I looked it up and it is the cutie mark that represents a spy. That means there is a high chance that a mistake was made and Diamond Tiara was wrongly sent to the moon. Soon enough the reply came back.

Dear Twilight, I will send a team of Royal Guards over and take Sweetie Belle into custody. If they find clear evidence of spying, I will punish Sweetie Belle myself by royal decree, and yes, I will bring back Diamond Tiara, as even I make mistakes sometimes. If no evidence is found, then this matter is closed, Diamond Tiara stays on the moon, and you will say sorry to Sweetie Belle for trying to get her in trouble.

Sweetie Belle was loving being the center of attention at her cute-cenara, as her friends were almost queueing up to ogle at and lightly stroke her cutie mark, and the party, aided by Pinky Pie's party cannon was in full swing,with food, music and dancing-until the Royal Guards crashed it, and slapped a magic blocking ring on her horn and cuffs on her legs. A unicorn captain said "Sweetie Belle, we are arresting you for spying for the Griffins and high treason against Equestria. Search her bedroom." When her bedroom was searched they came across bits. A huge number of bits. A few bits would mean nothing, they could be explained away as pocket money, but there were many thousands of bits here,and since Sweetie Belle was jobless and no large robberies had happened recently, it could only mean she was a spy. Soon enough Princess Celestia turned up and glared at Sweetie Belle.

"Sweetie Belle, not only did your actions lead to the deaths or kiddnapping of many innocent ponies, not only did it mean that my forceshield plan was ruined and a large part of the Royal Equestriain Army has had to be stationed on the frontier instead, not only will it take many hours of diplomatic talks to get the hostages released. All that is bad enough, but you framed up an innocent pony and made my justice and by extension, my royal person, look bad in the process. You are an outlaw now, you will be banished to the heart of the Everfree Forest, anypony can do what they want with you should they see you again., and what you did will be publicised through all of Equestria. Last but not least, that horn of yours will be sawed off here and now."

"No, please...not my horn, I'll never be able tp pick anything up except in my mouth ever again..." Tears burst from Sweetie Belle's eyes as a unicorn used his magic to place a hacksaw blade against her horn and start sawing. All too soon for Sweetie Belle her horn came off and fell to the floor in front of her. The physical pain was no worse then that of getting one's nails cut, but the emotional pain was huge. She was nothing more then a weak earth pony now, unable to teleport or use telekinisis for the rest of her life. Then Celestia teleported her to the heart of the Everfree Forest, the most dangerous place in all of Equestria.

"And now, time to bring back Diamond Tiara..."

*****
Diamond Tiara was beginning to really like being with Princess Luna, whose sanity had almost fully returned now just by being with her. Luna was not only interested in everything that Diamond had to say, but she was a great kisser and sexy too. Diamond realized that she liked mares sexually as much as she liked stallions. And suddenly there was a pop and she was back on Equestria in front of the Princess and a large crowd of ponies. "I don't say this often but...I made a mistake, you were framed and now you are free and your framer, Sweetie Belle, had her horn sawn off. How can I make amends for your time on the moon, what can I do to make amends?" the Princess asked her.

"Luna, please bring Lunia back," Diamond Tiara replied.

Chapter Five-Brought Back

Celestia stared at her and said rather crossly "Do you really think I enjoy having my sister stuck up there on the moon? I have missed her so much and do want to bring her back, but....I fear that she may still be Nightmare Moon. What is she like up there?"

"Oh, she was crazy at first, talking to piles of rocks that she thought were living ponies, but she was overjoyed to see me, and appointed me to high office, not that it meant much up there on the moon. I think with me there, she snapped out of most of her crazyness, all she needed was somepony to talk to. And...it's awkward, but she and I are in love. I never thought that I would have a marefriend,my parents will be shocked when I let them know about it. It's not just because she's a Princess and an alicorn, it's because of her personality. We really got to know about each other up there, that's for sure." My parents will call me a fillyfooler, but I don't care. I can remind them that Princess Luna is Equestrian royalty, and you can't climb higher then that, can you? Diamond thought.

"In...love," Celestia said slowly. "You want me to possibility endanger Equestria because you are in love? Are you sure she was Luna up there and not Nightmare Moon?"

"Totally sure."

"I'll do it, but if she turns nasty I'll send you both back."

Celestia's horn glowed for a few seconds and Luna appeared next to Diamond Tiara, started around her and planted a big warm kiss on her nose. "You, you convinced Celestia to bring me back. Oh, and thank you Celestia."

"I suggest that you spend a little time in your bedroom, in your nice soft bed, and thank the filly that made me feel that it was safe to bring you back. And this evening I'll make things public so that everypony knows that you are back and behaving yourself and are not a threat to Equestria. Don't expect them to be friendly at least at first, generation after generation of ponies have grown up scared of you. Tonight you can raise the moon once more, I trust you with it. Go now,and take your marefriend with you."

***
Luna snuggled on her soft bed. For the first time in a thousand years I will be able to get a decent sleep instead of having to lie in moondust on hard moonrock. I have guards and servants and food and water again, and I owe all this to Diamond Tiara. "Diamond, come and lie here by me, I want to...thank you for all that you have done for me. I am a true Princess once more...oh, this bed feels sooooo nice...I'm sleepy allready."