No Sweeter Innocence

A week passes, and Cozy Glow's world grows darker.

"Here," Flurry says, floating a circle of wood and metal over to Cozy as she steps into their love nest— Cozy started calling it that two days ago, and Flurry hasn't tried to stop her yet.

"Is that a carriage wheel?" Cozy asks, raising an eyebrow. "What, did you visit Carriages and Corsets on the way here?"

"No, this is from Lord Quill's carriage," Flurry replies. "He's going to be late for his soirée now. How unfortunate for him."

Cozy grins. "Good girl." She leans over to place a kiss on Flurry's lips, deep and possessive, to reward and reinforce her obedience.

After that guilt-inducing brush with death, Cozy had commanded Flurry to bring back something stolen to her every day after class, as a form of training. She's deliberately made sure to know as little as possible about the victims, cutting Flurry off whenever the young alicorn tried to explain the crime that had made her victims deserving of losing one of their possessions.

No, Cozy doesn't care, and makes sure Flurry knows that, knows that it is the princess herself making the choice to hurt somepony else. That's the point, of course.

And now Flurry finally understands, and is seeking to cause harm rather than just take something to give to Cozy.

That deserves a reward too.

"Go put on something nice," she instructs, "and come back in an hour."

Flurry frowns. "Are we tormenting the nobility again today?"

"Nah, we're going on a date." Cozy waits for that statement to sink in.

It doesn't take long— less than a second— before Flurry glares at her suspiciously. "We're not dating, though," she affirms, a slight hitch in her voice and a faint blush on her cheeks.

Cozy presses a hoof against her heart. "Aww, I'm hurt, little snowstorm!" she sighs dramatically, looking wistfully out the window. "What of all the nights of torrid passion we shared beneath the stars, or the secret meetings beneath the cover of night when we our feelings outpoured for one another?"

When Flurry looks unamused, Cozy giggles. "I just figured we'd do something fun since you've been so good at being bad this week," she says. "Also, pretending to like me for a whole evening will be good practice, too."

"I do have political training," Flurry mutters, cheeks still red.

"There's a big difference between being polite and actually pretending to be into someone someone you don't like," Cozy points out. "No way your parents would've made you do that."

Despite still looking sullen, Flurry replies, "Fine."

"Hey, chin up," Cozy tenderly brushes a hoof against Flurry's cheek. "We both know you think I'm hot, at least. So, it could be worse. Now go get changed." She punctuates that last command with a light smack against Flurry's rump.

Flurry rolls her eyes. "Yes, ma'am." And with that, she disappears, the afterimage of her teleport fading to leave Cozy in darkness once more.

Cozy wastes no time either, not having the benefits of magic to whisk her back to her own home. She takes to the skies, excitement brimming at what's to come.

That excitement dies the moment she enters her house.

The smell of staleness hits her first. There's nothing rotten or spoiled stinking up the place— she's still able to take care of that before it becomes a problem, at least— but she can't remember the last time she did more than a cursory cleaning of whatever surfaces were convenient. The dying sunlight highlights the dust disturbed by her arrival, framing the piles of books and knick-knacks strewn about.

In the corner, hanging slightly off the edge of a dented table, is a chess set, frozen in the final few moves before checkmate— Cozy vaguely recalled being stumped by that chess puzzle for a week before figuring it out.

The bed hasn't been made in, well, ever, to be honest, and the pile of clothing atop it— the ones not too dirty to still wear— are all far too rumpled and casual for a date.

Fortunately for Cozy, she still has one particularly nice dress that she's never worn before— from a time when she'd still had ambition. It's mostly red, bleeding into a black-and-white checkerboard pattern at the bottom. The sleeves are patterned after the design of the rook— her cutie mark.

Cozy pulls it out of the wardrobe, gives it a sniff, and decides it's good enough.

She also finds whatever makeup that isn't expired and hastily puts something together to pretty herself up as best she can.

The mare looking back at her in the mirror is still Cozy Glow, and that makes her sadder than she wants to think about right now. Turning away, she takes her leave, flying out the window and heading back for the safe house.

She arrives with ten minutes to spare and wonders how Flurry is faring right now.

It's laughable, really, how the teenage alicorn still tries to pretend like she hasn't fallen for Cozy. It's not love that she feels— heaven's above, what a silly idea!— but she's not sure if Flurry knows that, or if she thinks her crush is some deeper thing.

Then again, Cozy has never known love, so maybe all romantic feelings are as shallow as the fire burning in Flurry's heart right now.

Regardless, Cozy is absolutely taking advantage of those feelings, feeding them with sex to make Flurry even more reliant on her. Pleasure makes for such a good reward, and the more petty crimes— and some less petty, after the fire at the market had spread and consumed an entire fruit stall by accident— the more Flurry slides into the darkness where only Cozy will accept her.

As predicted, when Flurry appears a few minutes later, she's dressed to the nines. A diamond bracelet around one ankle, to match with the necklace and brooch she's also wearing. The dress is an exquisite mix of silk and lace, designed to look as elegant as possible while still being practical to go out in, dyed an intense, yet light blue that makes her coat and eyes shine.

Her makeup is flawless, as expected, and her hair has just a hint of product in it to make it look more sleek than usual. If Cozy had been a decade younger, she would have been poleaxed at how beautiful Flurry looked.

As it was, she simply sucks in a single, minuscule breath, which is still noticed by the garbed princess. "Careful," Flurry warns, a faint smile playing at her lips. "Wouldn't want you actually falling for me. Love is weakness, right?"

Cozy nods. "Lust, too, honestly, but we gotta have fun somehow, right?" She gives Flurry a knowing wink before drawing her in for a kiss. "Alright, let's get going."

"Should I cast the disguise spell now?" Flurry's horn is already lit, ready to obey.

"Nope!" Cozy declared cheerfully. "Even if it's a fake date, we're still going as our real selves."

Flurry's entire body locks down as panic shows itself clear on her face. "W-What?" Her eyes silently plead with Cozy to reconsider.

"What's wrong?" Cozy taunts. "Do you think you're too good for me? An alicorn princess can't be seen going out with a commoner, right?"

"It's not that." Flurry shakes her head violently. "But you— I—"

"You asked me to teach you, but you don't even want to be seen in public with me?" Cozy asks, outraged. "I should be really insulted right now, don't you think?"

It takes a few more seconds before Flurry finally comes up with a good excuse. "We don't want to raise any suspicions at this point," she argues. "Given your history, people might expect us to be working together on some sort of scheme, and that might result in increased scrutiny that negatively impacts our lessons."

Cozy calms down immediately, giving her an approving nod. "Good. Next time, figure it out faster. You won't always get to be all calm and collected when you need to make something up to get out of doing something you don't want to."

Flurry stares blankly at her. "Wait, that was a test?" There's an echo of hurt in her voice, and Cozy has to resist the urge to mock her for it.

"Meh, just wanted to see how you reacted," Cozy says flippantly. "Anyways, don't worry, little snowstorm, your dirty little secret'll be safe another day. Where we're going, we won't need disguises."

Flurry manages to hide her surprise and relief well. "We aren't going to some fancy restaurant or visiting an art gallery?"

"Even better." Cozy grins. "We're visiting a palace."

"Over there!"

In hindsight, Cozy should have remembered that the wasteland beyond the Empire's borders tended to be consumed in raging blizzards. Flurry's shield spells prevent them from freezing to death, but their visibility suffers heavily as a result and, even with the exact coordinates, it takes nearly an hour of searching before she sees the glowing red crystal jutting angrily out of the snow.

"What is that?" Flurry asks approaching the magical structure cautiously.

"A door," Cozy replies. She steps forward, walking into the crystal.

The world is consumed by a bright, pink light.

And then she steps out into a wasteland of stone and dried-out plants.

"Where are we?" Flurry asks, eyes alight in wonder and fear as she looks up at a ceiling of jagged rock. "Is this some kind of giant cave?"

"It's a prison." Cozy leads them around a jutting hill of grey, pockmarked stone, pointing at a structure in the near distance. "Or, it was one. Welcome to the former home of the Umbrum. Figured it'd be a nice place for a picnic."

"The Umbrum?" Flurry scratches her head in confusion. "They tried to take over the Empire before I was born, right? Radiant Hope and King Sombra were helping them, but eventually did the right thing and locked them back up before going on their quest to rescue Princess Amore."

"You mean before Sombra betrayed his own kind and left them all to die in here." Cozy continues to make her way towards what looks like an apartment building, but dotted with holes and spots of inky darkness. It almost reminds her of a bleached changeling hive. "The palace should be behind this one."

To her credit, Flurry disguises her fear well, her voice unwavering as she asks, "You've been here before?"

"Just a couple times after I got out of that statue," Cozy explains as they pass by the crumbled remains of a hut, rotting straw still covering the pile of rubble. "Chrysalis told me about her team-up with Radiant, and I put together some of the stuff she said with the public records and figured out where their prison was."

A stale wind blows in from... somewhere, and they both tense as a chunk of white rock topples from the top of a house, shattering into dust as lands behind them.

"I was hoping to make some friends to crush my enemies with— y'know, the usual— but..." Cozy gestures towards the ruins surrounding them. "Oh, look, there's the palace. Let's go!"

With a burst of energy, Cozy dashes across a barren field, towards a towering spire that melds into the jagged stone roof that bears down on them. Flurry quickly catches up and then overtakes her, waiting at the entrance as she looks up at the grand structure.

"I would expect a palace to be more... ostentatious," Flurry comments upon Cozy's arrival.

Cozy shrugs. "The Umbrum weren't really into art. Still, a palace is a palace. I know you can feel it."

Flurry nods. There's a weight to this building that comes from more than its height. Gravity itself seems to drag them towards the maw of this feted home, and Cozy needs to take Flurry's hoof and pull her inside to break her resistance to that magnetism.

The inside is as unadorned as the outside, but more claustrophobic, even when they're standing in a throne room with a ceiling tall enough to stack a hundred ponies above each other. The royal seat itself is crumbling apart, as if eroded over millions of years, and dead moss grows upon it. In the centre of the room is a table showing a crude facsimile of the Empire, with its palace toppled and shattered.

Cozy pats at the ground next to the war table. "Here's good. You still have all the stuff?"

Flurry's horn glows as she conjures up the picnic basket and blanket they packed before heading out. At Cozy's instruction, she lays the blanket down and places the simple basket on top. "Interesting choice for a date," she comments dryly. "But I can see why you wanted to dress up for it. It would feel even more weird being naked, huh?"

"Yup," Cozy agrees, taking a seat on the blanket and brushing the hem of her dress out of the way. "That's power for ya. At least, for those of us who won't live forever. Years after all the Umbrum are gone, when their kingdom is literally falling apart, we can still tell they were a great people."

Flurry snorts, settling gracefully into a sitting position as she picks up a cucumber sandwich with her magic. "They tried to turn my parents to stone."

Cozy shrugs. "They were trapped inside the prison for thousands of years, and knew they'd be hunted down even if they escaped unless they had a base to work out of. Not that it mattered in the end since the princesses wiped them out." She doesn't even bother to look at her date as picks up a bunch of crystal berries and begins snacking on them.

"That's not— they were just defending themselves!" Flurry exclaims, sandwich forgotten as it floats in front of her.

"Isn't it interesting how whenever someone attacks one of your alicorns, they're evil and bad and need to be 'fixed,' but when your family does it it's self-defence?" Cozy asks, plucking another berry and crushing it between her teeth, letting the cool, sweet juices flow down her throat. "What makes having a horn and wings so special, anyways?"

"Well—" Flurry stumbles over herself trying to get an answer out. "We're chosen by Harmony to rule. Either through some great feat or—"

"Or because you were just born better than everypony else," Cozy finishes for her. "If Harmony is some all-knowing power who only chooses the worthy, then why were you born an alicorn?"

Flurry sighs, but looks for more comfortable. "Yes, yes, that's the question everyone is asking, isn't it? You're just the only one willing to be that blunt about it."

"And if you had a good answer, we wouldn't be on a date right now," Cozy says smugly, pursing her lips seductively as she sips from a juice box.

"Pretty sure most dates don't involve one partner trying to tear down the philosophical foundations of the other." A gust of wind punctuates Flurry's retort, causing a few more pebbles to rain from above and clatter like bones against the ground.

"You haven't been on a date with me, then," Cozy quips. "So, you're not an alicorn by merit, but you have powers of one."

"My parents always told me I had a responsibility to use my powers for good," Flurry says.

Cozy makes a show of surveying the decaying ruins of their palace. "Yeah, I guess this place looks pretty good for a ruin. Very aesthetic."

Flurry looks troubled, keeping silent.

"Personally, I think it isn't fair that you have to hide your powers away and only use them the way other ponies tell you to, when you didn't even ask for them in the first place," Cozy says. "I mean, didn't it feel good to put Golden Wish in her place last week?"

"Not really," Flurry mutters. "But, it made her stop."

"See? Your parents wouldn't ever let you do the kind of thing they did." Cozy decides to go in for the kill. "Being an alicorn doesn't make you good. It just makes you powerful. And when you have enough power, you decide what's right and wrong."

Flurry stares at the ground, frowning. "I... I don't want to do that. It shouldn't be up to me to define good and evil."

"Well, in that case, I guess you can leave it to the other princesses to define that," Cozy says. "And then you can fall into whatever nice little box they want you to fit into. Is that what you want?"

"No." Flurry shakes her head slowly, hesitantly. "I just want to be—" She catches herself, corrects course, but not before Cozy notices. "I just want to use these powers I have without feeling bad."

"If anything, Harmony's the one who should be feeling bad for saddling you with these powers without a user manual on how she wanted you to use them," Cozy points out. "You don't have to be her slave just because she gave you a gift you didn't ask for."

"So I should be yours instead?" Flurry shoots back.

"You should be whatever you want to be," Cozy declares. "Tyrant or saint or just a normal pony who dies without doing anything that matters. Because nothing matters in the end anyway. The next powerful creature could come along and tear down everything you've been working towards tomorrow, so why bother doing anything except what you want?"

"I know you're right, but..." Flurry pauses, sighs again. "It sucks, not having some kind of guiding principle."

"Isn't that why you came to me, though?" Cozy pokes at her weaknesses, prodding the open wound in her soul. "Any old criminal or weird professor could teach you how to pick a lock or distract someone while you steal some pretty gems or talk a pony into betraying her best friend. But you came to me because you wanted to learn more than how to do these things. You want to learn how to be able to do them. This is what you asked for, little snowstorm. To tear you down and free you from the shackles of morality or whatever."

"I realized that too, I just..." And now shame burns Flurry's cheeks. "I thought it would feel good to be free. I wasn't expecting it to feel like... this."

For a moment, Cozy feels a pang in her heart, remembers when she too lost faith in Harmony. "You'll get over it," she lies. "I'll be there to help you push through those silly little mental blocks in your brain so that you can be the alicorn you want to be."

There's a moment of silence, and then—

"Can I kiss you?"

Cozy blinks, taken aback. It's the first time Flurry has ever made the first move. "Well." She takes a moment to pretend like she considering the question, waving her hoof back and forth under her chin. "You have been a great student this week. Honestly, I thought you'd back out when I told you to plant that evidence in Lord Ingot's bedroom, but you went through with it like a champ. That probably deserves another reward. C'mere."

Flurry leans in and Cozy captures her head with her hooves, pulling her even closer so they can kiss. For the next few minutes, their picnic is forgotten as their tongues battle for dominance beneath the broken remains of a foe that consumed itself.

Not that Cozy plans on telling Flurry the whole story, of course. It wouldn't do for her to know that the Umbrum had only been banished here after their second defeat, and turned on each other as a result. Those records that Cozy found on her first trip here just happen to be located in the library on the complete opposite side of this prison realm, where Flurry would have no reason to visit.

Their date continues on normally after that, as they eat and trade barbs and avoid revealing too much of their feelings to one another. The fire in Flurry's eyes is dimmed, though, and she often stares off into the distance, taking in the signs of collapse all around her. For some reason, Cozy stares as well, a lump in her chest that she brushes off as sympathy for another failed villain.

When the picnic is over, Flurry and Cozy have sex on the blanket without saying a single word to each other, quiet as the ghosts of the Umbrum haunting their final prison.

Cozy reaches her climax using Flurry's tongue as thoughts of doomed civilizations dance about in her mind's eye.