Deep in the Everfree Forest a lone zebra went about her daily tasks, collecting the herbs and plants she was low on at home. Though she usually wandered the forest alone, none of the deadly creatures who called the forest home dared to bother her; the first and last pack of timberwolves who dared to attack her were never seen again.

She stopped by the stream just a few minutes from her hut to wash off a collection of roots she had dug up. She took a mouthful to test the water’s purity but quickly spit it out.

“This water is all tainted now. I wonder why, I must find how.” she said.

Traveling upstream, Zecora found the source of the foul taste. Cautiously approaching, she saw a crumpled heap of a body partially washed up on the stream’s bank. Most ponies would have simply run away from the horrific find, but Zecora barely noticed some slight movement from it. She dragged the body out of the water and confirmed that the poor creature was in fact still alive, though barely. Abandoning her collection of plants, Zecora gingerly dragged the body back to her hut and began the laborious task of bandaging all the wounds and controlling the internal damage.

Rays of sunlight penetrated an open window, slowly waking Soarin from his deep slumber. Squinting, he once again saw the brightly colored mane of Rainbow Dash just past his muzzle, the female pegasus still sound asleep.

Soarin gently removed his body from against hers and slipped into the hallway, headed for the bathroom. On his way he passed by the owner of the apartment and exchanged greetings with him.

Soarin had been scared to death the first time he met Rainbow Dash’s mate. For the next few days after being released from the hospital he and Dash continued to sleep together. One morning they both awoke to somepony entering the bedroom. Soarin froze in place but Rainbow rushed over to the unknown pegasus, pulling him into a deep kiss and introducing him to Soarin as the owner of the apartment. Soarin almost died, having been caught in bed with this pony’s marefriend, but to his surprise the pegasus seemed unsurprised by this. He pulled Soarin aside and actually thanked him for keeping Dash company at night, explaining that she had horrendous nightmares if she ever fell asleep alone. He had also heard a bit about Soarin’s perils and gave full permission for him and Dash to continue sleeping in the same bed together as long as he stayed.

Washing his face with cold water to wake himself up, Soarin looked into the mirror, still disgusted by his own reflection. Each morning he despised looking at himself, ever since that fateful day where he witnessed innocent creatures being murdered all around him. Though he was injured and powerless he still felt that there was something he could have done to save at least one life. But he couldn’t…

Unable to look at his own reflection any more, he left the bathroom and sat down on one of the couches and stared out at the sky, deep in thought. Noticing him, the other pegasus came over and sat down across from him.

“There’s something heavy on your mind. Rainbow Dash had the same gaze when we first got back to Canterlot. Care to talk about it?” he asked.

Soarin had been hesitant to pull another pony into his problems, mostly out of fear that everypony he told would be happy that a large group of griffons were slaughtered. But this pony seemed different; he seemed very understanding of what he was going through. He had helped Rainbow Dash, maybe he could help him…

Soarin took a deep breath and released his pent up emotions. He told his host everything; finding Spitfire with the dead griffon, his close call with barely escaping Cloudsdale with Spitfire while his other teammates didn’t make it, being saved by the griffon refugees and then watching them be slaughtered mercilessly, and then trying to talk to Princess Luna before learning that she herself had led the attack.

By the end of his tale Soarin was once again choking back tears. The other pegasus seemed absolutely shocked that Princess Luna would order such an attack. Once Soarin calmed down the pegasus headed for the door, his heart filled with confusion and anger as he headed for Canterlot Castle.

Being no stranger to the castle guards the courier pegasus was allowed access to the castle, though he shocked the guards when he went through the doors leading to Luna’s quarters. Speaking with the final guard at her door he demanded to speak to Luna immediately, saying he had an urgent message. The princess must have still been awake as the guard returned almost immediately, ushering him in and securing the door behind him.

The princess looked happy to see him. “Well, this is a surprise. Welcome back. I trust your visit to the Crystal Empire went well?” she asked.

“It went fine.” he replied, wanting to get straight to the point of his visit. “Princess Luna, with all due respect, I came to talk to you about something else. I heard that there was a group of griffons near Canterlot that was attacked.”

“Ah, yes, my night guard was able to eliminate them all before they reached us.” she gloated. “Not a single one managed to escape.”

The courier’s hopes that Soarin had been wrong were beginning to crumble. “But… but were they part of the griffon army, or were they unarmed refugees?”

“Does it matter? The important thing is that they were all exterminated before they reached our city.” she said, beginning to wonder what the pegasus was trying to say.

“Doesn’t matter? Of course it matters! Are you saying that Soarin was right, that you really did authorize an attack on a camp of unarmed, defenseless refugees?” he asked completely shocked.

Luna’s brow furrowed. “Are you saying you do not approve of my decision? You, of all ponies, I would expect to be glad to hear such news. You saw firsthoof what those monsters are capable of. You saw what those monsters did to Rainbow Dash. You saw what they did to Spitfire. You went through torture yourself. Do not tell me that they deserved our mercy.”

“Maybe they all don’t, but the innocent ones do!” he said, beginning to become frustrated. “Soarin told me that they were the ones who rescued him after falling from Cloudsdale and that there wasn’t a single weapon at all in that camp. He also said you knew that they were refugees but you still ordered the attack. How… how could you?”

A dense fog began to build around Luna’s feet and her voice began to change, sounding more like Nightmare Moon than Princess Luna. “You foal, you don’t think that there may have been a spy or saboteur within that camp? Maybe an assassin sent to kill me or my sister? I told Soarin and I shall tell you, I did what had to be done! You of all ponies have no right to criticize my decisions. Remember, you wanted to go fly off to the Griffon Kingdom to commit murder!”

“Only to stop all this madness!” he shouted back. “I didn’t go off with the intent to start killing innocent victims who wanted to seek peace. I was going after the griffon responsible for all this suffering, not taking my anger out on other victims of Ray’s sick plans!”

Luna had had enough. The entire room began to darken even though it was almost midday. “You will never understand the size of the decision I had to make that night! I did it for everypony under my rule, for the greater good of all of Equestria! Do you not see that it had to be done? Do you not understand that it was the only choice I had?”

The pegasus shook his head. “No, I guess I wouldn’t see how somepony can make the same decision that Ray would.” he simply said.

“WHAT DID YOU SAY?!” Luna bellowed, completely enraged by what she heard. “YOU… HOW DARE YOU COMPARE ME TO THAT COWARD!”

She took a step towards the courier, her eyes ablaze with fury and her mane almost pitch black. “HOW CAN YOU BE SO BLIND? I AM NOTHING LIKE HIM! I DID WHAT I HAVE TO DO FOR MY CITIZENS, NO MATTER THE COST TO SOME LOWLY GRIFFONS! YOU’RE… YOU’RE…. you’re…

… you’re right.”

The room began to become brighter as Luna’s voice softened and her mane returned to its normal color. She took two steps back, her eyes wide with the shock of her revelation.

“You’re right.” she repeated softly. She buried her face into her hooves and began to cry. “Celestia, what have I done?” she softly said with tears falling from her face.

“Luna…” the pegasus says, moving towards her. He never reaches her, though, as her horn glows and pushes him away.

“Stay away from me. You’re right, I’m a monster. I’m no better than him.” she snapped. The doors to her room magically swung open and the pegasus felt himself finally released from her magic grip. “Go… please, go.” she said.

He walked to the door, looking back at the crying princess once more before leaving. As soon as he left the room the doors slammed shut behind him, but another surprise was waiting around the corner and he almost bumped into it…

“Princess Celestia!” he exclaimed in surprise.

“Hello, my faithful courier.” she said somewhat dryly.

“You… you heard everything, didn’t you?” he asked needlessly.

Celestia nodded. “Yes, but I had a strong feeling that she knew more about it than she let on.” she confirmed.

A dark thought crossed the courier’s mind. “You’re not… you’re not going to banish her back to the moon, are you?”

A grim look spread across Celestia’s face. “I don’t know. For now I shall limit her and her guard’s duties to the castle. I cannot afford to punish her with our current situation with the griffons. Once this matter is over I shall see that she understands her mistake and is punished appropriately. Though, from the sound of it, it seems like she’s beginning to realize her errors on her own.”

Celestia saw the still worried look on her messenger’s face. “Don’t worry, you did the right things. Soarin did, too. I promise that when this is all over, my little sister will thank you both for helping her.”

With a final nod and bow, the courier left the castle to return home. Princess Celestia slowly opened the door to her sister’s room, finding the Princess of the Night curled up on her bed, still crying from her epiphany. Celestia walked over and lay next to her sister and held her close, stroking her mane to calm her.

“C-Celestia, what have I done?” Luna said between sobs. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

Celestia remained silent, still somewhat in shock that her own sister would commit such an act.

Flying through the vast sky alone, Spitfire looked up as the once majestic city of Cloudsdale grew larger as she approached it. She had gotten word that the engineer ponies had finally been able to shut off the weather machines, so she was ordered to return to assess the damage and help rebuild and reorganize. As the clouds released their lightning they dissipated, and with no clouds being added to the massive lightning storm sunlight was finally beginning to break through the deadly layer. Once it was safe enough for the weatherponies to take to the skies once more, they made quick work of the remaining clouds, rounding them up and bucking them away.

Spitfire was surprised by the extent of the damage done to her home city. The majority of the buildings had lightning rods on the roofs, but the sheer number of lightning bolts going off during the storm proved to be too much. Many of the buildings had burn marks from where lightning struck them, and a few buildings had moderate fire damage done. A lot of the ponies were busy repairing their homes and businesses, but by far the building being paid attention to the most was the weather factory.

Now that the deadly cloud production had ceased, the staff now had to somehow repair everything as quickly as possible. Each day their machines were down meant that another day went by with no rain. The lack of rain since that fateful day when the griffons broke in had already taken its toll on all the farmers across Equestria, but now the farmers were reporting that their crops would all be dead if they didn’t get any rain very soon. The chief of the factory was a complete mess; she knew that it would be at least a month before they could produce enough rain to meet the needs of one small farm, let alone every farm out there. But even with every single pegasus working almost all day with repairing the factory and machines, there was little hope to meet that deadline.

With no engineering experience, there was no way for Spitfire to help with the machines. Instead she rounded up her remaining Wonderbolts and put them on heightened alert since the city was in such a vulnerable position. She dispatched a few squads to take to the skies and patrol the area and to report any suspicious activity to her immediately. With nothing else to do but wait, Spitfire returned to her quarters to catch up on her sleep.

Her sleep was once again darkened as she relived her memories. The haunting death cries of her three lost teammates echoed through her head again as bright flashes seemed to fill her unconscious vision. Her dreams switched over to her time spent as a captive, alone in a dark dungeon until she was summoned for her chance at freedom. She grimaced as she dreamt about the two timberwolves closing in on her, their cocks erect and ready to penetrate her body. She swore she could feel their cocks entering her body yet again, but no matter how hard she tried to struggle in her sleep they managed to still have their way with her.

Suddenly, her dream turned around as the timberwolves ceased their assault on her and ran away. Looking up, she saw a familiar pegasus walking towards her; the pegasus she traveled to the Griffon Kingdom with. He walked up to her and kissed her, Spitfire allowing herself to submit to her secret crush. He cuddled up to her, letting his cock slip between her legs and rub against her pussy.

Just as he was about to penetrate her, Spitfire awoke. She glanced behind her, revealing that yet again she was alone in her bed, just like every single time she had that dream. She let out a frustrated groan, a hoof slipping down to see if… yup, she was once again soaking wet from her dream.

With no other options for relief, she began to rub her crotch as she tried to think of a pony who she wanted. Though she knew plenty of stallions who would be more than glad to rut her if given the chance, there was only one stallion she wanted right now. The same stallion she thought of every single time she had this same dream. The same stallion who always saved her in her dream.

As his face appeared in her mind her already wet pussy suddenly became soaked in her juices. Unable to hold back any longer she began rubbing her crotch, trying to recall that night she spent with him camped out in the woods after they were released from the griffons. Though she was sore from her torture and his cock entering her had stung, it had begun to feel good after a short time. Feeling his hot cum shoot into her had felt like heaven after what she had been through, and since then he was the only stallion for her.

Moaning his name over and over, Spitfire’s orgasm hit her like a buffalo stampede. Her legs quivered slightly from her orgasm, and she lay panting on her bed for a few minutes as she caught her breath. Once her orgasm subsided completely, she pulled one of her pillows against her body, wishing that it was really her secret crush. She felt a slight feeling of jealousy in her heart, knowing very well that her love was sleeping with Rainbow Dash every night.

A dark cloud entered her mind as her feelings of jealousy began to slowly grow yet again. “Why does she get him all to herself? I suffered like she did, why don’t I have a special somepony to hold me every night?” she muttered to herself.

Something in Spitfire’s mind snapped, allowing the dark cloud of thoughts to explode and take over. “I invited her to be a Wonderbolt, I took her under my wing and even allowed her to be lead pony after she tried to quit. I helped her gain fame and respect, and what does she do in return? She steals my special somepony and hogs him all to herself. I deserve somepony like him… no, I deserve him.”

With her crazed thoughts now cemented in her mind, she drifted off to sleep, dreaming of her and her love together forever. Somehow, someway, she would make him hers.

Author's Note

And to think some people thought I forgot about Spitfire... nope.

Looks like things are taking an interesting turn, eh? It's a real shame that 'Molestia' isn't canon... so many ways she could punish Luna for her actions.