Cold. All she felt was cold.
The Masked Matter-Horn shivered in her bonds, restrained by the hard steel clamped around each of her ankles. A brilliant yellow light overhead flooded her eyes and kept the rest of the room hidden from her sight. Her shallow breaths alone filled the void around her, while her nose could only detect the scent of metal.
Cold, cold metal.
She squirmed against the slab under her, its chill easily seeping into her through the thin material of her costume, stripped down to only her mask and magenta one-piece. Radiance had sworn up and down that, no matter how tight they looked, each suit was perfectly designed for each member of the team, and they would never even realize they were there. Not for the first time, she cursed Radiance for her skills. An extra layer of warmth would be most welcome, not to mention how tightly—
Matter-Horn sucked in a quick breath and sent that train of thought off course. A lab. The clean smell, the controlled temperature, all the signs pointed to her being in a lab of some sort, brought here after she lost consciousness.
The Mane-iac...
The crazed mare’s gang had been sighted up and down the coastline outside Maretropolis. The team had split up in three pairs to follow separate leads, with Matter-Horn and Zapp investigating the city docks. She had been careless, and separated from Zapp to chase after a lone henchman.
The snare had closed around her before she realized what was happening, tentacles pinning her limbs tightly together while pulling her face-to-face with the Mane-iac herself. The crazed gleam burning into her eyes was the last thing Matter-Horn remembered as one final tendril snaked around her muzzle, and its strange scent had lulled her to sleep.
She jerked her legs, but her bonds refused to yield. Not bound in a cocoon of hair, but no less free to move, her limbs were stretched to the four corners of what might as well have been a silver platter. She turned her eyes away from the harsh light and tried to peer through the shadows surrounding her to no avail.
Her imagination ran unbidden, filling the black gaps of the world with images of twisted machines and weaponry.
Worse, she couldn’t stop imagining the eyes.
Not only the crazed gleam in the Mane-iac’s eyes while her consciousness fled—though she could be watching her right now, planning some horrific experiment—but dozens of punks could be drinking in her helpless form, completely exposed under her spotlight, hind legs spread wide with her tail lashed down so she couldn’t give herself even the most basic modesty.
Cursed Radiance and her skin-tight costumes.
Dread spawned in her heart and spread throughout her with every passing moment. She had little frame of reference for an educated guess, but she had been awake long enough for someone to notice by now. They were only waiting for the order, studying her from a distance until it was time for... whatever their plan was.
“Oh, Zapp...”
She had been a fool. She had been the one to lecture her friend on the importance of teamwork and sticking together with the majority of the team gone, and then she had been the one to run after a red herring, leaving Zapp alone in a city of villains with nothing but her temper and loyalty.
The dread solidified in her stomach. That was their plan.
The room shook with a mighty crash of thunder from above.
“Zapp... don’t do this.” She closed her eyes. “Run. Find the others.”
Voices cried out, followed by more crackles of lightning and crashes of thunder. It was a fool’s challenge. Zapp was one pony against the full might of the Mane-iac’s gang. Every heartbeat broke Matter-Horn’s heart further and further, thinking how Zapp would suffer because of her.
There was no surrender in that mare. She would fight and endure as long as there was breath in her body, but she was alone.
She would be beaten.
No sooner had Matter-Horn come to that conclusion, the sounds of battle ceased. A single tear dripped down from her eye. Now, the Mane-iac had two of them to toy with.
Steady footsteps approached from the dark. Matter-Horn clenched her eyes to squeeze out her tears, twisting her neck to wipe them off on her sleeves. They wouldn’t see her cry.
A door flung open, and she lifted her head as high as she could to glare at the mare revealed in its light. Her voice caught on her first attempt to cry out. “Zapp! You came for me!”
Rainbow Dash sprang away from Twilight’s door. “What was—?” Her costume pulled tight around her legs sooner than she anticipated, and she nearly tumbled over.
Twilight sat up, pulling the ropes around her forelegs tight against the bed posts. “Rainbow, are you okay?”
“Yeah, just a little tangled.” Rainbow bit down on a patch of spandex near her chest and pulled it away, stretching it back into place. She looked back to Twilight, lying on the bed in a bare-bones version of the Masked Matter-Horn costume set, the white boots and other ornamentations tossed to the side. “What the hay did you scream at me for?”
“Should I not have screamed?”
“I don’t know! You caught me off guard.” Rainbow fidgeted in her boots and readjusted the lightning bolt pendant around her neck. “Why’d you do it?”
“I thought you were ready for the roleplaying tonight. I was just getting into character.”
“Character?” Rainbow paled. Twilight had asked for fifteen minutes alone before Rainbow followed her up, but she never said what for. Rainbow had just fiddled with some book stacks to kill the time.
Twilight tilted her head. “Is something wrong? We don’t have to do this if you don’t—”
“No, I’m good. Just, ah, didn’t know we were doing the whole thing, you know?” She grabbed the door and stepped out of the room. “Can I get a do-over?”
“Sure thing,” Twilight said with a smile. “Whenever you’re ready.”
Rainbow smiled back and shut the door.
The door flung open, and the light from the hallway spilled over her rescuer’s form. Matter-Horn gasped. “Zapp! You came for me!”
Zapp smirked. “I’d never leave you hangin’, babe!”
Her smirk faded as she watched Twilight deflate—her head dropping back down to the mattress with a heavy sigh. “What? What’d I say?”
“Rainbow, when has Zapp ever called a pony ‘Babe?’”
“Um... never?”
Twilight quirked an eyebrow. “You did read those issues Spike loaned you, right?”
“Y-yeah! Totally!” She coughed. “I just thought I’d be Zapp, you know? I thought that was the point. It worked pretty well inside the comic.”
“I told you that’s where I got this idea, right? There’s such a rich mythology in these characters’ universe! I mean, I know they’re comic books, but actually going inside their world made me want to take a second look at them. The characters have some really well thought out backgrounds, and they really help the team bond. Like Zapp and Matter-Horn! Not to mention that panel on page three in issue seven totally turned me into Zapper-Horner. That smoldering look they gave each other—”
“Yes! Totally! Rich history! Uh… Strong characters.” Rainbow stepped out again. “Third time’s the charm, right?” She shut the door and tried to recall the one issue she read through. Truth be told, she hadn’t been paying much attention to Zapp when she started reading Matter-Horn’s speech. The mare didn’t go a sentence without bringing up her flanks, and imagining Twilight offering herself up like that didn’t exactly let her focus. Rainbow shook her head clear and took a deep breath.
A breath that came out in a whispered question, “What in Equestria is a Zapper-Horner?”
Matter-Horn kept an uneasy watch on the darkness with bated breath. The battle was over, and all that was left was for the victor to come and claim their prize.
And so she waited.
And she waited.
Just as she started to clear her throat and call out, the door flung open, and her rescuer stood revealed by its light. “Zapp! You came for me!”
“Of course I did.” Zapp smirked. “Power Ponies stick together.”
“I know.” She smiled in spite of her own words getting thrown back at her. “I knew you would come, too. But it was too dangerous!”
Zapp’s hoof batted her pendant. “My lightning will strike down any evil, especially when it threatens the pony I care about.”
Matter-Horn’s cheeks grew hot. “S-still, what about the Mane-iac? Is she...?”
“She ran like a little filly after I took out her rapid fire hair band launcher.”
“You chased away the Mane-iac all by yourself?”
“Pfft, you make it sound like it was hard!” Zapp spread her wings and zipped forwards in a barrel roll. “All I had to do was spin, and that threw off her aim enough to tangle up all the henchmen behind me!” She hovered over Matter-Horn. “One bolt melted it into scrap, and then it was on to the rest of the no-good punks!”
Matter-Horn winced from the gust of wind as Zapp flapped her wings again. “Um, Zapp?”
“There were dozens of them! All of them with only one goal in mind: to try and take me down!” She thrust a hoof down at her. “But do you think they did it?”
“Zapp?”
“Of course not! And let me tell ya, they all learned that the hard way!” She threw her hooves in a quick flurry. “One by one!” Zapp landed next to her. “If Mane-iac had twice as many punks with her, I still would have come. Did you ever doubt it?”
Matter-Horn kept a wary eye on her—and her hooves—until she figured it was safe to speak. “I... I hoped against hope you wouldn’t. It was too risky! She could have had both of us—”
Zapp pressed a hoof to her lips, then moved it to caress her cheek. “But she doesn’t.”
“I don’t want you hurt because of me, Zapp.” She nuzzled the hoof as best she could. “Promise me. Promise you won’t throw yourself into danger like this.”
“While you do it for me? No way.” She leaned in close. “I’ve seen the way you look at me. I promise that I’ll always come back to you. Is that enough?”
Twilight blinked. “Very good, Rainbow Dash.”
It was Rainbow’s turn to sigh. “Seriously? We were on a roll. Why do you keep throwing us off?”
“Me? I’m not the one that started shadow boxing!”
“Could we just get on with this?”
“Fine by me!”
“Yes, Zapp.” Matter-Horn bared her teeth in a strained smile against the cold. Yes. Straining against the cold. “I promise, too.”
“Do you, now?” Zapp tugged one of her bonds tight. “How do you plan to come back to me when you can’t even move in the first place? I’ve already got you right where I want you!”
Matter-Horn blushed furiously. “Z-Zapp! What are you talking about? This isn’t—”
Zapp’s lips rushed in, stopping just shy as Matter-Horn parted hers in invitation. “We’ve got the night. The city will be there in the morning.”
Matter-Horn nodded dumbly, mouth dangling open. It was time to drop the charade.
“Good! And now that Mane-iac forfeited her lab and all her little toys to me, let’s see just what she’s got lying around.”
Her loins tingled in anticipation. The Mane-iac would have such devious— “Wait, that’s not right.”
“Sure it is! She’s a mad scientist, sort of like a bookworm cooped up in a library for most of her life. She’s bound to have a secret chamber of fun stuff.” Zapp opened a hidden compartment. “And what do you know?”
“Are you kidding me?”
Rainbow clenched her teeth and butted her head against the door of Twilight’s secret stash. “What now?”
“You didn’t do any preparation, did you? The Mane-iac’s technology is programmed to only respond to her control. If anyone else tries to use her weapons, they’d be vaporized, so the Power Ponies destroy them all on sight. This isn’t canon!”
Rainbow slammed the cupboard shut. “I’m about to fuck you up the ass with a strap-on, and you’re worried about canon?!”
“Yes I’m worried about canon! I know you’re not much of a reader, but I thought you could handle some comic books! What kind of—wait.” Twilight narrowed her eyes. “You’re about to fuck me where with a strap-on?”
“I—” Oh... shit.
“Rainbow, you know I’m not comfortable with that! Why would you even think it?!”
“Because you wanted to do the roleplaying!”
“That makes no sense!” The bonds disappeared in a flash of violet light. “I don’t care how crazy you think I am for trying this, but getting into character doesn’t mean I wouldn’t feel every last thing you wanted to try on me!”
“But—”
“I’ve said no every time it’s come up! And you were going to take advantage of me like that?!” Twilight flung her mask in Rainbow’s face. “I can’t believe you!”
Rainbow peeled the mask away. “Twi—”
“There are boundaries, Rainbow Dash! I trusted you!” Her one-piece vanished in a burst of magic, and her mane bounced back to its normal cut.
The door slammed open against the wall behind her before she could answer.
“I’m sure you remember the way out. Or you could sneak out like a crook if you’re so eager to use the back!” Twilight fell back to the bed, throwing herself over to show her back to Rainbow Dash.
Rainbow let out her breath as Hurricane Twilight died down. She eased the door shut and slowly stripped off her headdress and necklace. “I thought you were ready. I thought you wanted it.”
Twilight lay still as stone, and her voice was gravelly enough to match. “What could have possibly made you think that?”
“Because I did read. Sort of,” she said, slipping out of the spandex suit. “One issue. Matter-Horn never stopped talking about her butt! It was all ‘My fantastically firm flanks’ this and even when they cornered the Red Cannon Gang, she was all ‘Time to pound some plot!’ And then you… you wanted to be her.” Rainbow kicked away her costume. “I thought you were trying to tell me something.”
“Spike gave you the boner issue...”
Rainbow flushed. “Excuse me?”
“The boner issue. It’s... it’s a joke.” The statue resembling Twilight Sparkle shrugged. “There was an old issue of some other character, and the writer used the word boner as many times as he could in it. Boner like a mistake. It’s apparently a fad now for writers to take some double entendre and run it into the ground for one issue.”
“Oh.” Rainbow crept onto the bed, and Twilight made no move or sound to stop her. She lay on her back and stared at the ceiling. “So Matter-Horn isn’t fixated on that rockin’ booty of hers twenty-four/seven?”
Twilight snorted.
“I’ll take that as a no.” Rainbow hesitated, waiting for some kind of response. “I’m sorry, Twi.”
Twilight rolled over to Rainbow’s side, joining her in staring at the ceiling. “I’m sorry, too. I’ve read that the more enduring couples organize their romantic evenings, and I... just thought we could give that a shot.”
“They schedule sex?”
“In a word, yes. It gives them something to look forward to. They can plan for it.”
Rainbow cocked her head at Twilight, thinking it over, and nodded. “They prepare for it.”
“Exactly.” Twilight looked at her with a sheepish smile. “I kinda overdid it, huh?”
“Maybe a little,” Rainbow said, returning the smile. “Still, I can see the point. You can really put your best hoof forward when you plan for a routine ahead of time instead of always improvising it.”
“I knew you’d get it. So this was a bust, but you like the idea?”
“Sure! I’m down for a schedule.” She smirked. “So we’ll have Sixty-nining Saturdays?”
Twilight rolled her eyes, but failed to suppress a grin. “And Tribadism Tuesdays.”
“Er... what?”
“Fine... Scissoring Sundays. It’s basically the same thing,” she said, lifting her head a bit.
Rainbow accepted the invitation, stretching a foreleg under Twilight’s neck and wrapping it around her shoulders. She rolled over and ran her other hoof up Twilight’s hind leg. “How about Mutual Masturbation Mondays?”
“Mutual Masturbation?”
“Ooh, I think we have a winner. You’ve never done it before?”
“No,” Twilight said, rolling over and tucking herself closer to Rainbow. “So we... watch while we play with ourselves? Or do we play with each other?”
“The second. Let’s say... no oral, no toys. Hooves and wings only.”
“Hooves and wings? What about magic?”
“Magic, huh?” Rainbow kissed the base of her horn, and Twilight shivered against her. She ran her tongue up the entire length, swirling around the tip, making Twilight gasp. “No magic. Hooves and wings only.”
Twilight groaned. “You tease.”
“And I’ll be expecting some payback. You got a few days to think of something good for me. You want to get the lights?”
Twilight’s horn lit, and darkness closed in around them as it faded once more. Their lips found each other a moment later, and they settled down to sleep.
Beats the couch.
In the quiet, Rainbow asked, “Is there another issue that focuses on ‘horn’?”
