Whoever would have scrutinized the steps to glory would have found them frayed and worn out by the regular stomping of all those who, by dint, name or wit, had succeeded in climbing them, engraving their name in the great peristyle of History, and, thus, had eventually achieved immortality. This was the meed of a most sedulous labor, of most meticulous researches and of a life of sacrifice, the privilege of a few great ponies.
Honeysun was nor great, nor rigorous, nor much in love with hardships, but he had figured out quite early in his life that collective memory was working both ways, and had always since strived to be a part of it, be it in the grisliest manner. Haunted by an oppressive obsession for celebrity and an unquenchable knack for unilateral flings, he indulged himself into more and more molestations, prowling forest paths or gloomy streets, unceasingly moving. His fame quickly overturned all the country, waxing as the infamous pony grew in boldness. Guarded, it seemed, by a lucky star whose salvaging interventions he often praised, he repeatedly escaped, sometimes by the skin of his teeth, the numerous shakedowns lead by the police to capture him.
Ponies everywhere double-locked their doors and shutters, balked at the prospect of walking alone, distrusted lone travelers; some unfortunate stonings were even reported, after which there was a letup in the series of misdeeds. But soon a new outbreak elicited, more than ever, terror in all minds. Nopony seemed able to bust Honeysun, who galloped each night from here to there, settled down in inhabited ruins or shanties to muster his forces in view of his next assault, masqueraded himself under blankets in order to blot his orange coat. He mimicked perfectly disgust and hate when, sneaking in the sheeple and visiting the inns, he cursed himself, roaring “What a monster!” before treating everypony around and become, for the span of a single evening, the best friend of both barflies and gullible barmaids.
Nopony could arrest him, because nopony knew where he would go next or what he was looking for, and, to be honest, he ignored it too. He raped, then read the newspapers, savoring his celebrity silently, then vanished, and nopony could foretell where he would reappear. Sometimes, the shocked victims found bouquets lying close to them, as if, after having taken, he had wished to give back. It wasn’t, of course, neither romantic nor symbolic, but it served as closing periods to each of the paragraphs the obnoxious pony was writing in History, raising from mere delinquent to wanted criminal, major scourge and finally legend. A legend whose conclusion was reached when, rending the clothes of his final victim, Honeysun discovered a full-fledged penis tucked between the dangling hind legs and, taken aback, was unexpectedly conked from behind.
⁂
Canterlot’s tribunal, though being the largest of all Equestria, was not big enough to shelter all the plaintiffs and their families, the witnesses and the lawyers, so it was decided first to instigate a turnover for the benches, and, next, that the key points of the future trial would be forwarded outside through repeater-pegasi posted at the various windows. When the cart carrying the defendant to the booth of the accused parted the throng, sundry abuses flew, and the royal guards had to recourse to truncheons in order to restrain the mob—although they could not stop the spittles. Honeysun answered those skirmishes by a cocky, overbearing smile, enjoying the nimbus of a glory nurtured by the hate and the grudge that his mere presence was eliciting. The countless flashes of the cameras did not stop until he went through the portal, closely watched by a detachment of guards. There, enjoying the gloom and the silence of the corridor, Honeysun stiffened himself to face his destiny. He would doubtlessly be jailed the rest of his life in some cage or maybe put to death, although such a punishment had become uncommon over unpopularity; in every aspect, though, he had already won the day, and would become a martyr. The world would remember him as one of the most terrible criminals of all time, he would be brandished as a bogeyman to prod the foals into eating their meals, and nopony would challenge him this deserved title for a long, long while; at least, that’s what he was surmising. His only regret was that he had forgotten to tally his deeds.
“Three hundred and seventy-seven victims,” announced the gray-coated, square-bespectacled judge-mare, closing her file with a deft, almost theatrical movement. She looked daggers at the accused, who withstood the blow with a feigned surprise.
“The noose!” yelled someone in the audience.
“Quiet!” snapped the judge-mare, smashing her mallet on the desk.
“Honeysun, you were subpoenaed to this court in order to account for your appalling crimes. Do you understand?”
“I do, your highness,” answered the orange pony.
“This trial is about to begin and a long series of people will relate what they have seen or been through–at least, for those who are still alive,” the judge-mare carried on. “Do you understand?”
“I do, your highness.”
“You were allowed the assistance of a lawyer, yet you waived this right. Do you intend to defend yourself by your own means?”
“I don’t intend to defend myself at all,” replied Honeysun, stifling a smirk that would have been ill-construed. The eyes of the judge-mare briefly ventured above the edge of her glasses, betraying a mite of dismay.
“This trial will last several days. During that period, there will be regular recesses, but you won’t be allowed to leave this tribunal and will sleep in a neighboring cell. Do you understand why?” she recited almost mechanically.
“I am afraid. There are so many criminals that would kill me if I egressed,” said the accused with a phony shiver of fright.
“Scumbag! Turd!” cried somebody in the plaintiffs’ section, immediately echoed by other ponies around.
“Silence! Quiet!” roared the judge-mare, rapping the desk with her hammer. She rubbed her eyes while the ruckus settled. He had been spot on, that was the very motive why he wouldn’t be allowed to leave the place; few knew it.
The jury would probably sentence him to death, a death that would be related and commented in all the country, engraving the name of Honeysun in the Equestrian myths. If he pleaded insanity, he would maybe end up in a pen for perpetuity, but no doubt that he would also become a legend and an epitome in the mind of young thieves of saddlebags or petty poultry bootleggers. No matter how this would end, it would be a victory for nopony, barring him, and this very dreary reality was sickening the judge-mare in her bones.
The trial begun and the plaintiffs, with a lump in their throat, narrated their story as quietly as possible, spreading tons of snot on the ground and using, regrettably, oodles of coarse words. With each gruesome detail, the audience, terrified, shuddered and gazed at Honeysun, who never concealed his elation, licking his lips self-consciously, snorting at the uncountable admonishments of the guard who held the hefty fetter entwined around his neck. Many incidents frequently interrupted the course of the trial, wherefore reinforcements had to be summoned to aid the regular platoon.
After some days, the defense had the floor.
“Honeysun,” begun the judge-mare, “why did you rape Glittering Eggplant?”
“She was a real dish!” exclaimed the orange pony. “I couldn’t miss such an opportunity!”
As mechanical as an automaton, the unicorn-clerk jotted down what the accused had replied, and beckoned the gray mare when it was done.
“Honeysun,” carried on the judge-mare in a neutral tone, “why did you rape Haybale?”
“She was so ugly–” explained Honeysun. He could not finish: hysterical wails and bleats in the crowd engulfed his voice. Hammer, silence, continue. “I had to punish her for sullying the scenery!” concluded Honeysun with an assertive nod. More mewling, hammer, silence, clerk, continue.
Suddenly, the big portal opened and, raising her head, the judge-mare, immediately followed by all the audience, beheld the Sun deity herself, Celestia, and her sister Luna, enter and politely beg for a seat. The alicorn of the night was carrying a full copy of the testimonies and procedure chits, neatly packed in a thick log of several hundreds sheets.
“A trial of such importance justifies the deputation of power in the hooves of the various ministers for a few hours,” said Celestia, breaking the hush.
Incredulous, Honeysun was gawping at both alicorns, who glanced quickly back at him before diving in the perusal of their notes. He couldn’t believe he was that lucky. Never, since an unfathomable past, had a trial be blessed with the presence of royalties.
“Honeysun,” resumed the judge-mare, “why did you rape Strandballoon?”
“She had cheated in the May Queen contest!” said Honeysun.
“She was chomping.”
“She was snoring.”
“She has crossed the road without looking around. That’s not an example for the youth.”
“She breathed my air away.”
“She merely existed.”
In Honeysun’s jargon, almost every action possible during a lifetime was a pretext for rape. For each of those purported reasons, the clerk scrawled a line; the judge-mare had given up any hope to understanding, and she was churning out questions, sticking strictly to the protocol.
“Honeysun, what do you have to say in defense?”
“It’s not me, I’ve done nothing!” replied Honeysun.
The judge-mare almost exploded in her armchair.
“It’s not–what? You just acknowledged all your crimes! Can’t you be serious? Do you realize you’ll be put to death?”
“Indeed.”
“And that’s the way you feel about it? How in Equestria could such a plague be born? Don’t you fear any punishment?” rasped the judge-mare almost hysterically, putting aside her hammer, lest she saw it flying inadvertently toward the head of the accused.
But the voice of Celestia cut abruptly in. “If by lewdness he has sinned, then by lewdness he should expiate”, said the alicorn, as she stood up and strode forth. “We heard the transcript of all the wicked acts he committed, and are well aware of all the distress he caused to innocents. If he desires doom, then doom he shall meet, since he has refused any defense. Thus, on the ground of the oldest laws of Equestria, and as granted by my rank, I sentence him to death. But not a mundane death; I call for the ultimate, the most ignominious one.”
Having reached the rostrum, she ascended the few steps and wheeled. “I call for the death by joissance et plasir sulfrueux!” she thundered. The crowd wavered, then began to whisper inquisitively.
“He shall be locked in the Eastern tower of the palace,” commanded the alicorn, as the scrivener was scrawling hurriedly, “in the Hall of the lofty windows, under the attic, where he shall loiter together with us during a full week. He shall eat the most toothsome and dainty gourmet meals, and drink the rarest and finest of all wines, until satiation, or even more. There shall be music, and lectures from old books. He shall wallow from dusk to dawn in precious and lush cushions, and no desire of his shall be unfulfilled, be they not of a prurient nature. May his eyes, whenever and wherever they should look, behold no other than luxury, marvels and wonders innumerable, until the end of this spell, when we will carry out the true sentence, a death administered in the midst of the highest voluptuousness, driven by delicacies uncounted and cravings unceasingly roused but never slaked.
“However, he shall not be allowed to reach his genitals with his legs, even though he shall hanker after it, and, to enforce this rule, we shall guard the key of a most stringent chastity belt.
“Now pronounce this sentence, judge-mare, and register it in the final acts of the trial. This court is now dismissed.”
The hush that had fallen on the hall went on a few seconds. But then, as a common conscience that would suddenly come back to its senses, unable to believe what it just had heard, the ponies in the plaintiffs’ pews started to hoot, to bellow their anger and their incomprehension, to curse the alicorn who, accompanied by her sister, was now ambling silently and sedately toward the exit of the high court. Stricken, the judge-mare reached for her hammer and smashed it frantically against the desk, bawling for calm and silence, commanding that the accused, who was watching the scrum with a conceited snigger, be lead back to his lockup, until further notice. When the hall was at last voided, after many difficulties, the gray mare drew a flask full of brandy out, swallowed a few gulps of it and let a tear drip from her eyes, asking herself what had Justice become.
The very next day, all the newspapers from Canterlot to Stalliongrad, from Fillydelphia to Ponyville headlined on the shameful provocation of the sovereign against the helpless victims of a such a terrible series of crimes of flesh, the unseemly whim of a princess whose behavior was less than unsavory, the scandal of the perverted leader who would share table and bed with the obnoxious one; to this general bashing and trashing, Celestia did not answer. Many a letter was sent to the postal service of the palace, expressing grudge, incomprehension, disappointment and rage; to these letters, Celestia did not answer. Defying the numerous guards posted to cordon off the place, some bold ponies demonstrated right under the windows of the royal castle, before being quickly and firmly shoved away by brawny stallions; to these desperate appeals, Celestia did not answer. Of course, in the span of a few days, everypony was aware of the strange aloofness of the alicorn, and the land fussed about it. But solid answers, nopony got.
Those who rushed to the various libraries hoping to find exactly what the verdict meant faced a real gap in the history of the kingdom. Very scant were the references to this sentence, as if the whole world had wished to rub it out of existence. It was then put forward that this was something wicked, a pretense, maybe a poisoning, but what kind of sentence would allow a criminal to relish during one week amidst the most delightful delicacies? Was death through ultimate pleasure an equitable sentence in view of all the suffering imposed on the victims of the rogue? The rumors were seething while Honeysun, although somewhat frightened by the ignorance he shared with all the other ponies, was jubilating. His fame was waxing, swelling and swelling up to a point he never dared imagine, and he was figuring himself living the last week of his existence in a magnificent paradise, his life ending in a climax of ecstasy.
The sheening oaken doors opened on a vast circular room suffused with light. Still fettered, accompanied by two royal guards, Honeysun trod in and whistled in admiration. White-coated, mimosa-maned fillies were sweeping off the dust from the furniture, singing, while others were waxing it. The floor had been covered with parti-colored, finely-woven rugs, representing glorious events from the history of the kingdom. There was no bed, but a profusion of lustrous silken hassocks straggled here and there, as the alicorn had promised. The fetter was removed, and, driven by an ancestral instinct, Honeysun gingerly sniffed at the ground and at the various items, before plopping himself down and sprawling on the back, his legs splayed out.
“Hurray! Yeah!” exulted the orange pony, slowly rolling head-over-heels; even the floor had been anointed with orange-blossom fragrance. The sudden clang of the metallic jaws tightened around his hind made him start and, rising the head, he faced the day goddess, winding a minute key in the chastity mechanism which was now clutching his haunches. When she was done, she handed the key over to one of the guards who, clapping his hooves on the floor, wheeled around and vanished.
“Honeysun,” cooed Celestia with tenderness, “is this place, where we will sojourn during one full week, at thy leisure?”
Luna was here, too, as demure as always.
“It’s swell!” answered Honeysun, “I’ve never known anything dandier; but is the chastity belt negotiable?”
“Come on!” the alicorn chid him gently, “You are aware of all the evil this part of our body can cause, aren’t you? In this place, where you will spend the last hours of your existence, suffering is banished. There will only be pleasure, delight, relishing and rejoicing.”
The alicorn was decked out in a white, light and airy, almost translucent dress which, although it was parting her from her usual nakedness, made her lean body still more desirable. Lying on a rug like a great dog, Luna was observing him silently; she was also clad in a thin, ultramarine attire. Her quiet eyes looked like two glimmering crescents.
“I mean, it’s nice, pretty and everything, but one had spoken of ecstasy, and—”
“The ecstasy is reached at the end,” cut Celestia in. “The purest, most unspoiled ecstasy, worked up by so many foreplays that one could not count them”, carried on the mare, sagging on the floor in bliss. Honeysun felt an itch. Celestia was ogling him atop the periscope that was her neck, and the awareness of her slender body lying so close was turning him on.
The white fillies finished their work, and they discreetly left through the open door. Celestia flopped down completely, closing her eyes and rubbing his face against a scarlet pillow, while Luna started to skitter around, scrutinizing the room absentmindedly. Honeysun bit his lips to blood, feeling his member crashing against the grating of the jail into which he had been confined; defeated, he resigned himself and waited.
Three knocks pealed against the heavy wood, before the magnificent wheel carts, pushed by humming fillies, brought in the brunt of the feast: roasted peacocks with honey icing aux légumes tendres, beef tartares with motes of truffle, farandoles de fruits caramélisés, bunches of grapes and bananas adorning gilt pitchers filled with nectars. Honeysun, gawping stupidly, ignored that cooking could be an art, he who had almost always had to put up with fodder during all his life, and, for a brief instant, the eagerness of his stomach surpassed the eagerness of his loins. Stumbling towards the food, he slumped in front of it, panting and drooling, bewitched by those divine preparations, ready to dunk his snout randomly and start a gobbling spree. The alicorns seated themselves around the plates and maids came to knot napkins around their necks.
“No! No! Stop!” yelled the orange pony, shoving the two white mares, who chirped in protest.
“What is it, Honeysun?” asked Celestia, curious.
“It’s poisoned, I know it! I won’t eat! You won’t fool me!”
“As you wish,” shrugged Celestia. She reached with her neck for a grape that she plucked out of the bunch. Luna imitated her: she grasped a sausage, gobbled it and licked her greasy lips in content. Two maids clenched the handle of a golden pitcher with their teeth, and, rearing up over the plates, offered its contents to the alicorns, who swallowed and opened their mouth, where the purple liquid was sluiced down. A third maid seized another pitcher, glanced at the grumpy pony who had retreated somewhat aside, put the pitcher back, then seized it again, unable to make up her mind; her face crumpled. Driven by an unbearable feeling of shame, since both alicorns were openly pecking at the buffet, Honeysun shuffled to a plate of salad and dropped his nose into it, leering at the magnificent roasted bird which smelled so droolworthy. Never had he tasted meat before, since, although it was sometimes served during traditional meals, many ponies weren’t used to eating it.
“Neither of us are wont to consume flesh,” declared Celestia, as if she had read his thoughts, “but the art of gastronomy could not overlook such delicate flavors in order to reach the excellence we enjoy at this table.”
Honeysun could not restrain himself anymore and bit a morsel. It was like a clash of supernal savors, a tidal wave of flavors he had never been acquainted with, but which engrossed all his mind, an arabesque of spices and daintiness which could not stand fading out, and, frantic, the pony tore morsels upon morsels, his eyes glistening with avidity, unable to stop or pay anymore attention to the other ponies of the room. He was pelting the food down into his gaping mouth, putting it away in his stomach until he choked, coughed, spat. Somepony patted him on the back to unwedge the rogue mote he had gulped down and, throwing his head back, the white lass–who was still singing, insomuch as her clenching of the golden handle of the pitcher allowed it–poured the wine in his puss. Honeysun chugged, chugged, letting the nectar gush on his face, on his chin, stream down his coat and mar the floor and, once the pitcher was emptied, he plundered the table again, gobbling random pieces of grub, toppling the saucers, under the tender look of the alicorns. His eyes were lost in the blue, sometimes focusing briefly on one of the maidens who were still crooning, and who eventually egressed, carrying away the plates, leaving the royalties and their guest who now snored noisily, sprawled on the floor amidst the various refuses of his binge.
The sun was slanting down, signaling the end of the first day. Soaking in a wide barrel of scalded water, the occupants of the pleasure room abandoned themselves to the caring of the bevy of white-coated, mimosa-maned fillies who soaped, scrubbed, rinsed, amidst the billows of water vapors and the subtle fragrances. A beaker tucked in his hooves, Honeysun, whose head was drooping over booziness, was mumbling balderdash, grumping when he was doused over the head or when the foamy rag was venturing too close to his eyes. Celestia, unheeding this rigmarole, was letting herself be groomed by her chamber maids with features that betrayed elation and delight, while her sister, silent as usual, was observing the orange pony who seemed to doze again.
“And that’s how Equestia was made!” Honeysun bumbled and, nudging away one more time the helpful leg that intended to rub his belly, he whirled toward its owner, who appeared to take notice of him for the first time. “Now squat on the floor and spread your hind legs, you poon!” he brayed, his face grimacing in rage.
The white mare, frozen, shook her head and hurried back to the bath cart to fetch a brush. Honeysun’s eyes followed her and, unexpectedly, he flung the beaker at her. The projectile smashed the maid over her head with a clang; she let out a scream of pain and scuttled off sobbing. Celestia and Luna rose abruptly, sloshing water over the barrel and, while Luna was running after the servant to comfort her, Celestia looked daggers at the orange pony who, all of sudden, felt an excruciating pang in his testicles, and slipped. The invisible vise remained tightened for unending seconds, while Honeysun was desperately wriggling in the water, drowning; eventually the spell was broken, and the pony surfaced, spitting and panting heavily. He stared at the alicorn in bewilderment.
“Never do that again!” thundered the glowering princess. “Never! Do you hear?”
Honeysun did not answer. His eyes were reddened with soap and tears, and he had retracted his hind legs around his crotch, that he could not reach anymore, because of the metal cage surrounding it.
⁂
The night has fallen and, lying on the floor between the two alicorns, Honeysun was remembering the day while Celestia, a book cradled betwixt her forelegs, spectacles on her muzzle, was diligently reading a history book of the kingdom, featuring heroes she had met in person a long time ago. The memory of his castigation was still fresh, but all he had eaten, drunk, seen or lived was like a dream and he wondered if he would awake to reality at dusk. When the book was over, and taken away, the candles were snuffed, and the only light that remained was that the Moon was casting through the frosted windows.
Honeysun could not slumber. With tingling eyes, he rose silently, leaving behind the warmness of the nest formed by the body of the two decumbent alicorns. Tiptoeing on his hooves, he succeeded in reaching the mechanism of the window and operated it, letting a gust of fresh air rush in.
Canterlot was asleep, and so was Equestria. Shimmering stars were interspersed with the clouds, a few remote windows were still alight, but it felt as if time was suspended. Peeking downward over the sill, the orange pony glimpsed the base of the giant and thin tower, noticing that it was not straight as a newel, but slightly aslant, like a large bole, and a sudden vertigo seized him. In sooth, he’d better go back lest he fell. Nevertheless, the point of view was gorgeous, even royal, one could have said. For an instant, Honeysun beheld Equestria from his high throne, imagining the conquests he could have lead, the territories he could have annexed, the buildings he could have fostered. And the queens with whom he’d have slept, of course. Lying on the floor, insensate, the two alicorns were sleeping peacefully, and, as stealthy as a cat, his belly squirming with lust, Honeysun crept toward Celestia, wondering if what was hidden under her tail was, as the legend had it, proportionate to the rest of her body.
His eyes aglow with a leer, listening to the slow breathing of the alicorn, the pony reached a shaking hoof toward the tail, pushing a cushion aside to clear the way, and reckoned suddenly that he had missed his target; he tried again, gazing steadily at the appendage, and strayed anew, as if his hoof was constantly going awry; another try fizzled miserably, as he found himself unable to touch either the tail or the body of the alicorn. As a last resort, he rose over the Sun goddess, spread his legs and dropped himself down–but alighted on pillows. With pent-up tears, Honeysun surrendered and, when he opened his eyes again, dusk had come.
“Hearken ye, hearken ye, breakfast time is nigh!” sung the mimosa-maned mares as they went through the gates of the room, bringing in plates crammed with milk and candies, bread, fruits and eggs. Stirring up nimbly, both alicorns stood up simultaneously and rallied themselves for the collation. Seating amongst the still tepid cushions, Honeysun brushed his face, his mind still drowsy, and admitted that what he was living was definitely not a dream.
After a breakfast that looked more like a feast for the sole male of the place, Celestia grasped a hassock and threw it toward the head of the orange pony, who flung it back peevishly, precisely when a big bolster, hold by Luna, knocked him down. More pillows flew, more bolsters crashed, there was a chase and fabric was torn in a spontaneous outset of laughter and gladness, which lasted until the entrance of musicians and dancers. The newcomers settled in a corner of the room and began their show before the two alicorns and the pony, lathered up and exhausted.
The carousing would not pause. The day was packed with entertainments and banquets, and the three ponies were fed almost up to cloying, drank unrestrainedly, while the white servants padded through the door to clean up the alimentary disasters or carry the splotched rugs away to the laundry, and the games went on. Wallowing in the most ostentatious depravation, Honeysun knocked innumerable bottles back, pigged out on the food, toppled plates and pitchers on the floor, talked dirty to the maids who did not heed him and carried on their ballet, humming, under the supervision of the alicorns who were taking part in the bout with the elegance and the restrain suited to their rank. The sustained drinking was regularly leading the guests to the potty, a simple pit situated next to the wall and capped with a simple slat, and, each time one of the alicorns had to piddle, Honeysun was enjoying the spectacle, coming closer, watching her sidelong and provoking her. Most of the time she was ignoring him, but infrequently she had to nudge him away if he proved too inquisitive.
Nights and days passed by, and Honeysun’s mind was increasingly obsessed by the irrepressible desire that itched his crotch, wringing his guts in frustration, and he pounced on food to forget his other hunger, boozed himself up, rolled on the floor, chucked pillows at the alicorns. But in vain: his randiness was growing, bloating, and all his thoughts converged to one single image, that of Celestia impaled over him, pinned like a butterfly, screaming in pain, smashed by the bruised monster which was waiting patiently in the cage where the alicorn had jailed it.
And it seemed to him that the alicorns were also slightly off. They acted feverishly, their gracious pace became ungainly, their eyes were ablaze as from an intimate fire, and soon they couldn’t sleep anymore, stamping around the room permanently, bawling, strewing things randomly, flopping on the ground from exhaustion, gobbling the dishes as they came, wolfing down pieces of meat drenched in fat and rich gravies, smearing the entremets, stumbling over inebriation at the end of each meal. And that madness was somehow mitigated by the daisy chain of white maids who replaced the rived cushions, discarded the shredded books, and washed, as best as they were able, the alicorns and the orange pony, trying to restore the natural composure of the formers, and to give back a minimal decency to the latter.
Amidst all these excesses, the last night arrived.
“I-I am the b-biggest c-criminal in the w-world,” stuttered Honeysun crouched on the ground, his mind flashing with images of thrashing, bashing, molesting, raping, and things he didn’t even envision when he was free.
“Indeed,” answered Celestia quietly. She glanced steadily at him and her body trembled.
“M-my legend will e-endure through the c-centuries…” Honeysun fell asleep.
Celestia didn’t answer. She leaned delicately her head against a pillow, sighed, and let the weariness overcome her.
⁂
In the middle of Canterlot’s largest place, a scaffold encircled by elevated stands had hastily been built. The effulgence of the morning sun flooded the place; a crush of people had come to witness the execution of the baleful condemned. Nopony knew exactly how he would be put to death, and the audience was simmering with expectation. All the week long, some scholars had thoroughly dredged in the oldest archives, hoping to find out what exactly meant joissance et plasir sulfrueux, and thus acquire a knowledge everypony in Equestria was craving after, but they had failed to collect anything significant. And so, the crowd was alive with questioning and suppositions. The judge-mare, slouched in her chair, was restlessly pondering over the way the trial would turn out; could it be that the rotten mind of the rapist had corrupted the alicorns, too?
All of a sudden, a clamor rose from the throng. Everypony wheeled around to gaze at the armored car, in which the condemned had been locked up, closely followed by the royal barouche, pulled by twelve guards clad in shining garbs. The hefty door of the armored car was opened and the orange pony, hobbled by strong shackles, was yanked out; he was hooted, miscellaneous curses resounded, everypony wanting to top the others. The barouche arrived next, and the crowd, who would usually have acclaimed the coming of the royalties, remained silent, waiting for the outcome of this oddity which had become the pith of all gossip. The prisoner was roped to a stake and the goddesses of the day and the night, clad in coutures dyed in the respective hue of their empire, ascended on the scaffold.
“Hearken to me, folk of Equestria!” bellowed Celestia, using this loud and clear voice that had forged the prestige of Equestria’s sovereigns.
“On this day, driven by exceptional circumstances, the pony Honeysun, who raped unrestrainedly and terrified the whole kingdom, will be justly sentenced.”
Honeysun, quietly bound to the stake, caught a glance at the crowd whose buzzing loudened.
“According to the most ancient laws of this kingdom, whoever had committed repeated assaults and molestations should be put to death, after experiencing the purest and strongest of all ecstasy, the ecstasy distilled from the sharpest, daintiest terrestrial pleasures!” Celestia carried on in a rasping voice, sweat dripping from her forehead.
The mob, scandalized by the wording, was becoming increasingly restive. The judge-mare felt like vomiting, disgusted by the way the things were winding up.
“Free the genitals of the condemned!” commanded the alicorn. Two guards walked to the stake and unlocked the metal belt, revealing Honeysun’s hurt and reddened penis, which, enjoying his liberty, hardened and rose like a sunflower.
The two alicorns stood on each side of the pony. “Honeysun, are you prepared to suffer the legitimate wrath your ignominious acts have kindled?” Celestia boomed.
“Most eagerly, your Highness!” claimed the pony, daring an ultimate provocation, and his stallionhood stiffened further. All his life had revolved around sex, and he was going to expire in a sexual apotheoses, flouting laws and rules until the very end, sentenced to the most subversive, most unusual, most mysterious death. Nopony would ever forget this day, his name would be cursed and abhorred–or adored–for uncountable years to come. His victory was total.
“Then let the execution begin!” declared Celestia and she whirled, exposing his plump hind to the entranced eyes of the condemned, immediately followed by Luna, who raised her shifting tail, unveiling the slit of her perfect marehood, so balanced with the rest of her body, and her tight anus. Both Moon and Sun crashed on the head of Honeysun, bathing his face in animal warmth, and the alicorns began to rub their butts against him. The crowd hissed in repulsion, outraged by such an indignity. The chubby and firm fannies of the royalties were squashing the puss of Honeysun, who was moaning, trying to lick whatever could be reached with his tongue, feeling the mare-bud of each alicorn slowly swell and smear a smidgen of goo on both sides of his face. He readied himself to roar, dazzled by pain and paroxysmal desire.
Until he caught a whiff of a strong reek.
“Eh!” he protested. “That’s loathsome!”
One of the alicorn had seemingly be victim of flatulences. But instead of diluting itself around, the foul odor, accompanied by the characteristic sound of its venting, came back, more intense than before.
“Stop it! Stop it now, please!” entreated the orange pony who felt his penis precipitately retract into his body, like a snail. He shook his head, trying to scramble for free air, but the bonds were all too tight for him to move.
The smell was fetid, resulting from the most horrific, most abject alchemy of digested fats and sauces and food, which had undergone further decay and intestinal fermentation. Wafts of rot and putrefaction were mingled in a proportion that varied according to the alicorn. It was the most mephitic mixture one could ever smell and, choking, terrified, his eyes moist and his head ready to explode, Honeysun suddenly reckoned that during this long week the alicorns had kept everything. He had snooped on them shamelessly, but they had never defecated, a fact that, he was now remembering, had deeply frustrated him at first, but that he had later wiped out of his mind. His execution had, in truth, begun from the first day on.
Honeysun wriggled desperately, coughed, tried to secure the paltry quantity of oxygen that was still around. A hush had fallen on the crowd. Nopony could believe was they were witnessing, and the most squeamish turned their faces away from the blatant suffering of the criminal who, eventually, voided his lungs, unable to withhold his respiration further.
Precisely at this moment, the alicorns decided to wield the final blow. Crawling up along the long queue of feces that were weighing the bowels of the sovereigns down, gathering by the way the purest and deadliest stenches, the last and most powerful gusts were blown in a mighty and noxious tempest, a climax of dense and damp farts that expanded all around the orange pony. Honeysun yelled in anguish before succumbing to a sudden heart failure, his face frozen in the utmost throes, his legs bleeding where the ropes had barked his soft skin.
Silence returned, and only the faint chirps of the birds betrayed that time was still flowing. Then, the alicorns surrendered.
Screaming like agonizing beasts, Celestia and Luna, who had been tortured by the twinges in their guts for several days now, ceased to resist and started to expel this filthy overload, squeezing it out in dusky lumps that whirled briefly in the air before crashing on the corpse of Honeysun. No living pony could ever have believed that the alicorns could retain so much in their insides. Now divested of several pounds, panting, the alicorns descended the steps of the scaffold and Celestia, her horn aglow, lit a vengeful fire whose raging flames quickly engulfed the body of the pony before extending to the whole structure. When the pyre was consumed at last, nothing remained but thin ashes that flurried away.
Wordlessly, the mob broke apart, not knowing exactly what to say, nor how to feel, and the uneasiness finally washed everypony over. The last week had been a victory for nopony and, for this reason, the only one who exulted openly was the judge-mare.
⁂
The reward for a dreadful crime had to be a dreadful sentence. The steps to glory were stomped and frayed by those who had succeeded in climbing them, and they could not be defiled by those who, instead of excellence, had chosen sleaziness. The morbid attraction that somepony could feel for fame was the same that spurred one to confess a misdeed, both for claiming responsibility and begging forgiveness. A punishment affected the punished as well as the punisher, and what had happened this day had perfectly vindicated that: having to solve the difficult quandary of preventing the criminal to let a perennial imprint in the collective memory and elicit fear as well as admiration, the alicorns had accepted to suffer in their most intimate selves, so as to administer the most shameful of all deaths.
The death by joissance et plasir sulfrueux was a sentence that derived its secrecy from its strength, and its strength was fostered by its secrecy. No epitaph would ever have fitted the cenotaph of the condemned, and time would have fuzzed the memory until everypony would have believed that it was a hoax. Therefore, nopony spoke of it anymore, and the name of Honeysun sunk forever in the depthless abyss of oblivion.
