"Are you sure you're ready for this?" Spitfire asked.

"Yes, Ma'am! Ah'm ready." Applejack was in the middle of Spitfire's home, utterly naked but for her collar. Her body was hairless from the neck down but for her tail, and her skin gleamed with the liquid sheen of rubbed-in oil. Light slid and broke across her as she bobbed up and down, performing press-ups with the ease of industrial machinery.

"Stop, then. You can finish your daily exercises later. She'll be here any minute."

"Yes, Ma'am! Your slave obeys!" Applejack pushed off the ground, pulling her legs under her, then surged to her full height.

"Show-off," murmured Spitfire proudly.

"No, Ma'am! Ah'm jest obeying your orders with speed and efficiency, like the well-trained bitch Ah am!" teasingly replied Applejack.

"She's been driving me crazy with questions, you know. Ever since I told her that I was training another mare, but wouldn't tell her who, it's been driving her up the wall. Day after day, nagging me for hints. I had to order her not to try to find out who it was. It's about time I got to relax."

"...Ah wouldn't count on that, Ma'am."

Spitfire cocked her head, glancing up at Applejack, as Rainbow's voice called from the front hall, "Hello? 'fire, you in there?"

"I'm in here, Rainbow! Come in," Spitfire called, then added in a lower voice, "Why not?"

"Well, Ma'am, you know how competitive Rainbow and I are..."

Author's Note

Back in early December, I asked a few people to provide a couple of story prompts each, to see if they sparked anything. One of them came from Equimorto, which read 'Applejack asks Spitfire for a round of training like the ones she gives to Rainbow. It ends up going the same way as the sessions between Rainbow and Spitfire usually end.'

That sounded fun. I thought I'd put a couple of thousand words into it, maybe over a couple of days, and be done.

Six thousand words later, I hadn't gotten to the sex yet. This is not surprising, given my previous track record. All the same, I had a lot of fun with this; I really do like all of these characters a lot. It functions as a sort of spiritual sequel to Steam in the Shower, but with some key differences, primarily that in this set up, Spitfire hasn't had BDSM experience before she dated Rainbow, and it was Rainbow that made the first move.

The characters all make mistakes, but they trust each other enough to keep talking, and in the end, that's enough.

• Proofing by Equimorto and DbzOrDie