For Fluttershy, all kisses were unforgettable.
But there were some that were transcendent.
Fluttershy never knew exactly how it was that the Princess learned about her. Or when. After she became a bearer of the Element of Kindness, obviously, the Princess knew who she was, but Fluttershy had always gotten the impression that the Princess had known something about her beforehand.
And the way that the Princess had looked at her specifically after they'd purified Luna with the Elements of Harmony...
It had been a look Fluttershy recognized.
The first night had been terrifying. Fluttershy had been in her cottage, covered in blankets and just drifting off to sleep surrounded by the warm bodies of her dozing animal friends. If it had been a scratching on the windowpane, or the sound of claws scraping on the door downstairs she wouldn't have been scared. That would clearly have been an animal that needed some help, or maybe just wanted to come inside for the evening. But it was a knock on the cottage door. A very polite knock, but a knock, nonetheless.
Only ponies knock.
Fluttershy had slowly extracted herself from the bedding and crept across the floor with her belly almost touching the ground. She had pressed herself against the wall of the loft, next to the bay window, and slowly peeked into the moonlit night outside, trying to get an angle on her front door. She'd gasped, shoving the blade of her hoof in her mouth to muffle the sound. She could see the multicolored tail of the Princess rippling slowly in the still night air.
The Princess. At night. At her doorstep. The polite little taps on her door continued in groups of three. Fluttershy had been immobile. She couldn't ignore the Princess, but what could the Princess want with her?
She'd descended the stairs with shaking legs. The knocks continued, never becoming insistent, still quiet and polite. Just a reminder that somepony was standing just outside.
She almost hadn't been able to manage the doorknob.
As the door swung slowly open, white moonlight poured across the floor in a widening arc, interrupted only by Celestia's elegant body. The moonlight shone through her mane and tail, catching in it, sparkling with muted pastels that wavered on Fluttershy's floorboards like light through rippling water. Her coat seemed to gleam with captured light. Fluttershy couldn't be sure she wasn't glowing: Something white hot. A fragment of the sun that still retained its heat and glory. Even as she was, without her crown or armor, the sight of the Princess made Fluttershy fall down trembling.
It took a few moments for Fluttershy, pressed flat against the floor in supplication, to open her eyes and peek up through her hair, and to see that the Princess's eyes were kind. The Princess smiled a small smile and lowered her muzzle down to Fluttershy, using her nose to brush the hair from the terrified pony's eyes. Fluttershy could feel the warm breath from the Princess's nostrils. The velvet of her nose had brushed Fluttershy's forehead, then velvet of her lips.
Fluttershy's heartbeat slowed. Her small nose nuzzled instinctively against the underside of Celestia's chin, and Celestia's muzzle rubbed slowly back and forth down Fluttershy's cheek, nipping softly at the base of her mane. Celestia's mane, still shimmering with moonlight, was a drifting canopy of soft pastel light over both their heads. In the shifting, multicolored light, Celestia pressed her muzzle under Fluttershy's cheek, gently encouraging her to raise her head and neck. Fluttershy responded instinctively, lifting her chin, feeling the light pressure of Celestia's longer muzzle, her soft, full lips just touching the side of Fluttershy's throat. Fluttershy was aware of her own heartbeat. She could feel the curve of Celestia's mouth hot against the arteries close to the surface of her throat. Her face got hotter, almost as if Celestia's lips heated the blood that was moving past them, spreading the blush across her cheeks.
Her head was tilted back, looking up into Celestia's eyes as the Princess's muzzle slowly slid out from underneath hers. Her chin brushed the soft skin between Celestia's nostrils, and then the Princess's nose and lips brushed past Fluttershy's.
She half-stood, her forehooves clicking on the wooden floor, and rose up into the Princess's offered kiss.
Warm, full lips so much larger enveloped hers. She gasped. A thick tongue brushed against the narrow gap between her teeth.
Her own small tongue pressed against its wide, rounded edge as she opened her mouth more fully.
She heard her hooves clatter as she wrapped her forelimbs around the Princess's neck, the wet sound of their lips and tongues working against one another as a thin line of warm drool slid across the hot blush of Fluttershy's cheek. Warmth spread outward through her body as the Princess's tongue slowly displaced what empty space there was inside of Fluttershy's mouth.
Fluttershy let her tongue and lips respond to Celestia's without thought or reflection. She pressed her chest against the Princess's and felt a hoof slide up and down against her back. She felt hot tears drop softly onto her cheeks from up, up above as the Princess murmured wordlessly against Fluttershy's lips.
Comfort. Warmth.
Time and memory.
It wouldn't be the last time the Princess visited her.
She didn't tell her friends, of course. They thought that her encounter with Iron Will, or maybe their own private conversations and attempts to get Fluttershy to express herself had made the biggest difference in her demeanor, but in the mornings after the Princess's visits, with the memory of soft feathers curled around her back or gentle, tentative lips so much larger than hers, Fluttershy knew. When the Princess would sigh deeply, lying on her side and pulling Fluttershy against her, when the massive, almost-glowing body of the Princess would cling to her as Fluttershy made little kisses along her neck, or lie on her back and kiss gently the smooth white feathers at the base of her wings, Fluttershy knew.
When Discord had been given over to her care, it was because the Princess trusted Fluttershy. She was the living incarnation of Kindness, and her own gentle power did not conquer through violence. Her lips would brush the rough fur of Discord's cheek or the base of his horn, sometimes just on the curve of his forehead before he went to sleep. She knew, though, that her power must be tempered.
She had gently whispered "no," when he'd tried to kiss her. She thought of her school kisses in the secret closet, or the animal mouths in Ponyville when his lips had pressed against the leathery frog under her hoof. She'd interposed her foreleg when he'd leaned toward her own lips that night, and she had used her hoof to turn his head to the side, feeling the brush of his irregular fang against her pastern. She'd wrapped her other foreleg around his neck, pushing his face against her chest. Comfort, Friendship, Kindness. Discord did not need confusing feelings, unchecked emotions.
The Princess had trusted her. It was not her words, but silent comfort that transformed an enemy into a friend.
She flourished. She thrived. She took things at her own pace.
She remembered Pinkie's playful kisses, although they were much less frequent now that Fluttershy didn't appear to be in danger of friendlessness.
She remembered Rainbow Dash's now-much-more-platonic kisses as they'd transitioned into an easy friendship, comforting nuzzles and hugs generally taking the place of lip contact. Sometimes, a peck on the cheek from Fluttershy would still make Rainbow blush.
She remembered Rarity's kisses, perfunctory at first, one on each cheek. As they'd grown closer, Rarity's demure lips lingered longer. Fluttershy would give her a little nuzzle as she softly kissed her friend's jawline.
She remembered a nervous Twilight, first as a unicorn, who, you know, seeing as how Fluttershy was raising animals, was wondering, you know, if she could help explain to Twilight some of the, uh... She'd read some books, naturally, and was just wondering, purely out of academic curiosity...
Fluttershy had silenced her nervous rambling. She'd used the tip of her nose to raise up Twilight's chin, slowly, cautiously, brushing her lips against Twilight's. Fluttershy's hair didn't wave in the moonlight or cast undersea colors over the two of them, but it had shaded Twilight's blushing cheeks. Twilight had been blushing even more furiously when Fluttershy had to explain that they were still just friends, but if Twilight wanted to practice, she'd be more than happy to help.
It wasn't until after Twilight was a Princess that she'd come to see Fluttershy alone.
Twilight would try to explain her worries and concerns, but Fluttershy would quickly silence her. Lips and tongue, nuzzling, her hoof in Twilight's mane. Comfort. Kindness. Twilight would always be shocked at first, blush ferociously, and then relax.
That same sigh, a sigh that represented both weariness and comfort.
So many kisses, spiraling back through friendship and loneliness, meaning and sensation. Fluttershy remembered them all. In daylight, in moonlight, even in her dreams.
It had been in a dream that frightened her. The faces of her friends, their lips, teeth and tongues, had drifted through her consciousness before the dream had become something more concrete: shape, form and sensation solidifying into something recognizable.
Her cottage was wrecked. Pieces of broken windowpane, splinters from furniture and cages, stuffing and scraps of cloth littered the darkness, dim rays of moonlight shining through the empty doorway and splintered window frames. She was at the bottom of the stairs with the faint, fading sensation of lips having recently left hers. "WHORE" "SLUT" "FILTH" and similar phrases, or symbols that, to her dreaming brain, represented those concepts, slid and shifted on the walls. She walked cautiously across the floor, a tight, sick feeling in her chest. All of her animals were gone.
She took a step forward and found herself outside. Her fence had been torn down. Her chicken coops were in ruin. All of her birdhouses lay scattered across the ground. A Royal Guardspony stood in the dim moonlight, just faint slivers breaking through obscuring clouds that slid and shifted across the sky in an almost-solid blanket.
She tried to say something, but her mouth just opened and closed, saliva dripping onto the ground. The guardspony told her that Princess Celestia had found out what she'd been doing with the animals and had taken them away. Princess Celestia had told the Guardspony to tell Fluttershy personally that she, the Princess, regretted never being able to fully get the taste of Fluttershy's diseased saliva out of her mouth. That by Royal Decree, Fluttershy had to vacate the home immediately because a new pony would be appointed to care for the animals. She was clearly unfit.
Fluttershy ran down the moonlit pathway that lead to Ponyville. She hadn't gone far when she was bowled over by something, a hot tangle of hooves and feathers that resolved itself into Rainbow Dash straddling her. Dash's lips pressed against Fluttershy's before she could react, and Fluttershy felt something long, wet and hot pressing past her teeth, pushing her tongue down against the bottom of her mouth, and worming its way down into her throat. Fluttershy coughed and gagged, struggling as she felt the appendage worm closer to the tightness in her chest, felt it wrap around something inside of her. Rainbow braced her hooves on Fluttershy's outstretched wings and pulled, the muscles straining in her neck. Fluttershy could see Rainbow Dash's horrifyingly distended tongue stretching between them. With a sound like wet fabric tearing, she fell backwards, a spray of viscera staining Fluttershy's coat. Rainbow Dash held a lump of rhythmically-pulsing meat in her mouth.
Rainbow Dash swallowed it and laughed, flying away. Fluttershy could still feel the ghost of Rainbow's kiss on her lips and hear her mocking laughter.
She walked slowly toward town, the tightness in her chest gone. Her legs drifted as if she were carried along by a current. So much effort to lift them. She was in front of a tombstone. Three balloons were carved on it. She leaned down and pressed her lips against the smooth granite, feeling raindrops falling, making the headstone slick and reflective. Lightning flashed overhead and she noticed Rarity, wet with rain, makeup running down her face. Fluttershy tried to comfort her, but when Rarity saw her, her face contorted into a mask of pained rage. She cursed at Fluttershy. She explained that Fluttershy's constant spit-swapping had made Pinkie sick, but Pinkie would never believe that her friend would hurt her. That Fluttershy had spread an earth pony disease to Pinkie without even knowing about it because she would put her tongue in anypony's mouth. That if Fluttershy wasn't such a slut, Pinkie Pie would still be alive.
Fluttershy felt Rarity's unicorn magic grip her mane, and she tried to run, too scared to open her wings enough to fly. Her head jerked sideways and then she was free, long, pink strands of hair drifting down around her.
She was galloping through the rain, the buildings of ponyville slowly sliding past as her own hoofbeats drummed in her ears.
She was in front of Golden Oaks Library.
She was inside the library, hair limp and wet, draped across the floor and trailing out the door.
Princess Twilight Sparkle lay across a pile of books, peering up at Fluttershy through long lashes. She wore blue eye shadow and dark lipstick. She waved a hoof to Fluttershy, beckoning, explaining to Fluttershy how much she loved her, explaining how happy she was that Fluttershy finally realized they should be together as a couple, that Fluttershy would love being royalty.
Fluttershy's mouth dripped with drool that interfered with her words. She tried to explain to Twilight that she loved all her friends, and didn't love any one of them more than the others. She talked about how she'd been trying to comfort Twilight and be there for her, but that she didn't have romantic feelings, that she'd just been there as a friend and-
She could see Twilight's face fall, her seductive glances replaced with confusion, then cringing hurt, and finally unbridled rage. Sparks flew from her horn as her eyes began to fill with light. Thunder crashed outside, and Fluttershy could hear more hooves outside, a crowd of enraged ponies lead by Rarity charging toward the library, snarling and shouting.
I deserve this she thought. This is what I get for acting the way I do.
She cringed, trying to hide behind her hair, closing her eyes tightly. The light from Twilight's horn and the flashes of lightning outside let her see the veins in her eyelids on a red backdrop.
She waited.
The peal of thunder was cut off mid-echo. There was silence instead of hoofbeats. The brightness from the lightning flash did not dim.
She felt cool, dry lips pressed against the edge of her nostril, pushing slightly against her hide as they made their way lower, pressing tenderly against her own lips, the point of a tongue just barely moistening them. She instead let her face drift up with the retreating lips, maintaining a soft contact, her mouth slightly open, and let her eyelids relax, feeling the foreign tongue touch the edge of her teeth as she panted slightly, opening her eyes to see a glittering string of saliva connecting her mouth to the dark, full lips of the Princess of the Night.
Princess Luna stood in front of her, dark lips parted slightly, a hint of blush spreading across her cheeks. Fluttershy remembered the moment with utter, crystal clarity.
"I'm dreaming," she said.
"Yes," said the Princess, nuzzling Fluttershy. Her soft nose pressed against the bridge of Fluttershy's muzzle, her nostrils expanding as the Princess's warm breath spread across her face. The Princess's lips touched her own again, almost pulling Fluttershy's upper lip between both of hers, the Princess's full lower lip lightly pressing into Fluttershy's slightly open mouth.
She broke the kiss. Twilight was frozen mid-leap a short distance away. The angry mob outside was backlit by a bolt of lightning frozen in the sky. Drops of rain glittered with refracted light, but did not fall.
The Princess pressed her lips against Fluttershy's again, her tongue softly parting Fluttershy's lips, her mouth opening and turning slightly to the side. Fluttershy reciprocated, opening her mouth to the Princess, her smaller tongue pressing against and folding around the foreign tongue that found itself inside her mouth. The Princess's eyes were half closed, her wings partially open, her translucent mane waving slowly in the still air, glittering with thousands of stars.
Fluttershy felt warmth spreading through her chest, the warm saliva on her lips as the Princess pressed her body to Fluttershy's, wrapping her wings around her. Fluttershy's smaller wings brushed against the taut, dry hide of the Princess, reciprocating the gesture as their mouths and tongues engaged in a languid, steady joining, the wet sounds of their compressing cheeks and tongues filling up the silence.
The Princess's tongue withdrew from her mouth, and her own was in the Princess's mouth for only a brief moment before Luna broke the kiss.
"Are you real?" Fluttershy asked. She could not imagine that kiss being anything other than...
"Yes," said Luna. "I am Princess of the Night, and have a certain affinity for dreams." She nuzzled Fluttershy's forehead, lips compressing gently against the rim of her ear. "When one of my little ponies needs me, I am here for them."
Fluttershy began to cringe, but the feeling of Luna's lips, light kisses down her forehead and the bridge of her muzzle, kept her from pulling away. "I'm sorry," she murmured, "I didn't mean to bother you."
Luna laughed, a deep, rich, feminine sound that startled Fluttershy. Luna quickly wrapped her wings around the smaller pony, pressing Fluttershy against her chest and gently kissing the base of her mane. "No, no, my little pony, you need me, and I am here for you. Why do you think you had this dream?"
Fluttershy felt Luna's heartbeat though her chest, and heard and felt her feathers rustling against her back and sides in slow, gentle strokes. She felt warm, from the tip of her nose to the base of her tail, and nuzzled fiercely into the Princess's mane. She thought long and hard, surrounded by the slowly drifting stars, before she answered, muffled in the soft, gently waving hair.
"I- I know there's something wrong with me," she began. She cringed slightly as she said it, but the comforting presence of the Princess helped her to soldier onward, "I'm obsessed, and weird, and I can't get along with other ponies very well. And I know how badly I've messed things up in the past, for me and for other ponies, and for the first time in my life I feel like I have actual friends, ponies who really care about me, and I'm actually important and what if everypony secretly hates me and I mess it all up and I wouldn't blame them if they found out how creepy I was if they never wanted to," she sobbed, hot tears soaking into the Princess's mane, "again and ..." whatever else she was going to say dissipated into muffled, choking crying.
Fluttershy wrapped her forelegs around the Princess's neck, holding tight and feeling the other pony's body against hers. Princess Luna kissed her neck and shoulder, stroking Fluttershy's back with one of her forehooves.
They held one another in the strange, frozen moment, until Fluttershy's muffled wailing turned into wracking sobs, then quiet whimpers, then silence, just a heaving chest, shuddering breaths, the rustling of feathers against feathers. Her forelegs fell to the floor with a clatter as she looked up at Princess Luna.
Fluttershy felt the Princess's hoof under her chin, gently encouraging Fluttershy to meet her gaze. Luna kissed her softly on the nose.
"There is nothing wrong with you," Luna said. Fluttershy started to interrupt, but the Princess kissed her on the nose again. "You are a better pony than I," and another to stop the interruption, this kiss full on the lips, soft and slow. "I was consumed by anger and jealousy, letting what-ifs and suppositions poison my mind. You do not possess the capacity for real hatred," another kiss, "and are full to the brim with love and kindness. So full, in fact, that you cannot keep it all inside, and must share your kindness with the ponies and animals around you." Luna gave her another long, slow kiss, the tips of their tongues barely grazing one another.
"When you kiss another creature, they can feel your kindness flow into them. Calming them, centering them, bringing them comfort and peace. Your kisses are your true power, and you've grown into them, using your kindness to bring joy to everyone you meet." Shortly after their lips met again, their tongues intertwined, another thread of saliva twinkling in the light when the kiss broke. "You are truly selfless, and the comfort you've given to my sister is truly invaluable. I only wish I'd come to you sooner." Fluttershy could see blush spreading down the Princess's neck, her eyelids fluttering in the strange, frozen light, her lips still slightly parted.
"Be at peace with yourself, Fluttershy, and know that you are truly special and gifted in the most marvelous way." Fluttershy felt her lips compress beneath Luna's as the dream began to fade, and could still feel the lingering heat of the Princess, muttered, incomprehensible words spoken into her mouth fading with the last tatters of the remains of the nightmare.
The sun was barely kissing the horizon, knowing that whatever happened, she would be there for everypony who needed her, lips ready to bring comfort and kindness.