~ III ~
You Don't Need to Scheme for Me to Like You
I wasn't quite sure we became like this, the towering dragon hunched over me, panting his drunken, humid breaths. The glow of his eyes dimmed compared to flashing lights of the crystal club, the light of glow stick keeping lit through the moments of darkness. His tongue hung over his lips while he stared at me.
Thirsty.
His muzzle dipped underneath my jaw and pressed itself against my throat. He inhaled my scent. No perfume. It was all me—and he couldn't get enough of it. Then he nipped. Softly. Licking over my fur, tasting my skin, collecting the salt I'd sprinkled there.
And then his claws settled against my haunches, tightly but without any sharpness. Spike ensured I wouldn't be moving around at all. Not knocking my rump all over the wooden table. How he gained the courage to lay me down on it, I wasn't sure. The boy could be a party when the booze let him go.
Or maybe I saw more of a side to the dragon that he repressed.
The one hungry for the highs of life.
The kind I didn't mind to provide.
I must admit there's something sexy about having a dragon standing between my legs, forcing the very things wide apart, barely allowing my tail to cover a place I wouldn't give him access to just yet. Rolling my head right showed me the line of ponies cheering us own. Cups raised, liquid spilled, necklaces glowing, wrists illuminating.
Afar came the thundering of hooves. The flashing dance floor of many squares of different colours all changing to the rhythm of the beat. One of the new clubs to arrive within Ponyville. A more underground deal.
Not at all Twilight Sparkle's kind of place.
I gazed down my body to see the dragon working down it. With the daze he was in, I'm sure him nearly grabbing my flanks hadn't clicked in his mind. Such broad claws keeping down my hips. For such an evil mare, there was too much pleasure found then in being pinned down.
But the way he worshiped me giggle on my drunkenness. Such a good little boy, submerging his face in my chest fluff, inhaling the thicker strands, tickling me with his snout. Those kisses and nips, inexperience and ill-placed, still kicking out my legs in need.
And then he found it. His claws rose across the sides of my frame, now locking my lower back to the table to keep me from wiggling. Joy flushed my muzzle while disappointment froze my heart as his lips left to take to the rim of the drink. The shot delicately laid on my belly.
Taking it with the strength of his lips alone, he rose up and leaned back, downing the drink then turning to his side, spitting the plastic out. It clattered on the ground to the cheering of many. My cheeks blushed as his claws were made into fists shooting into the air.
Don't you get it, silly boy? I sat up on the table as I felt my smile. All the fun you can have when you let everything go?
But then his eyes settled on me again and, although there wasn't anymore more salt there, he lunged for my throat. He let my body be free as his muzzled buried itself against him. More sniffing, more licking and kissing, little lips and tiny sucks. The boy was getting himself drunk upon me.
The animal I've unleashed.
“Nuh-uh-ah!” I sang with a haughty expression upon placing my hoof on his snout, pushing the dragon inches away. His eyes locked onto mine. “Who's the girl that made your dreams come true? To do a shot off a mare's belly?”
Spike dropped his muzzle, chuckling. “Wanna do one-off mine then?”
“Don't tempt me, big guy.” Pushing myself up onto my forelegs, I tossed a glance at the booming crowd of dancing ponies. This excitement left me with tingly veins pumping with energy. “But you promise this lady a dance.” I then waved a hoof in the air. “And don't think of skipping me one! I've seen all the moves you've done in the bathroom.”
Spike raised his muzzle with narrowed eyes, faint glows of blue and white casting on the side of his face, the light above cutting and coming back, our world put into a dreamlike state. Perfect. Unlikely things happen during times like these. “Don't tell you've swapped a one-way mirror there!”
“Not at all!” I laughed. “Front roll seat from the crack of the door. Don't huff at me! Let's enjoy our night, alright?”
Spike only chuckled. He rose out from between my legs but offering a claw while he did so. With a smile, I took it, allowing him to hoist me up. There were a few wobbles once my hooves touched the floor.
But, thankfully, I had a big, strong dragon to lean against.
I had him. Everything told me he was mine. The planning, the books on psychology, every little effort now confirming I had made the male my own. It was tough to dance with the boy on only two legs, but we cut it our own pace.
And every time we separated... I got to see the goof for who he was. His dance moves were over the place, hard to match but fun to follow, the steady rise and drops of the beats always throwing us together. Sometimes I hopped in place like a filly. Being with the boy reminded me of being a kid.
Heart pumping, skin tingling, mind ecstatic.
But during our dance I made sure to follow the guide. Despite the joy of simply jumping around, it didn't accentuate any of my curves... didn't give the guy something to enjoy with his eyes. I wasn't a filly but a mare. And I needed to act more like one to be his mare.
The change of the song brought a slower rhythm it, a steadily rising high that would ruin the dance floor with stomping hooves once more. I needed to act quickly. While the dragon swam through the air with his claws, his eyes flickered over to me and, with my plan set—I engaged.
Few platforms were scattered across the dance floor, round with a curved them around them, allowing any mare, one that didn't immediately get knocked off could then climb up. The scaly boy was following me with his eyes. I did him a favour and swung my tail over the plumpness of my rump.
It drew him, without a doubt, but there was disappointment about his expression, that twitch of something done wrong. My heart stopped while I carried on. Did I swing too much and make it too easy to see? Or did the act make me appear a little too wanting? Did another guy see?
Doubts never helped a mare to succeed.
In the path my lithe body cleared, the flicking of my tail drew the boy forward and, although he did so slowly he still came. All the dancing ponies granted him the space, knowing of my intent, not minding the giving of the room so long as they could also enjoy the show.
Being enjoyed was another drug. My little body climbing onto the platform, flashes of lights streaming high from around my hooves, blues and greens and yellows, marking the sky, parts blocked by my frame, a shadow made the star of a ceiling.
And the eyes. How my neck rolled at the pleasure then endured. Of all the dancing ponies ceasing their moves all to gaze upon me. To look at my figure, to delight in my curves, drinking the suppleness of my flanks, everypony hoping for a peek at my privates.
My body was bound to the pole while the crashing melody swung my barrel and shook my flanks, everything jiggling and fuzz then puffing, that drunken and crazy look of a thirsty, hungry mare another selling point. I was a monster, a sexy one that that, here to show to all exactly how vulnerable I was.
I rose onto my hind legs with a stutter in my step, my view of the world twirling around and around, seeing all the masses, the shadowy faces feasting upon me. Their details blackened despite the glow of the sticks and necklaces. Who they were, what they were: irrelevant.
I had their attention; I had their desire.
All of them wanted me. Even though I knew nothing about them, what they were or who they, they all bore something the same, something connecting: the desire for me. It beat importance even while the warmth of my body pressed against the coolness of the poke. It was hard and chilly on the skin, frosting the fluff set upon my chest—not at all broad to hold me properly.
But that was the point, was it not, a pole wasn't meant to hold but to support, to allow me to flex and do more, to show and expose and do a little dance. It wasn't something to fall upon but dance upon. The striking of my moves earning me the cheers of the crowd, the riding of hooves, the slamming of drinks and the rising arousal scenting the air.
Even though the room was on me, and my hollow body was taken with life, the chill of the pole kept me from feeling warm, the aching in my legs, overdone by incessant dancing set nearly to collapse. The enjoyment of the act soon became work, the rolls of my rump outward no longer as smooth—my grip on the pole slipping.
And the ponies around me, those faceless faces, walking away, turning and leaving, all because I couldn't meet perfection. Pushing myself harder only to hate myself longer. To have something only for it to be drained away by my ineptitude. Why couldn't I be better?
Worst was when I looked back. The gap created by the swiping of my tail so the date I wanted to impress would be amazed by the drops of my ass. But even then... it wasn't good enough. Where his tall body was supposed to be standing was merely the floating darkness that came in-between the flashes of light.
My body gave. Vision blurring and my breathing deprived of any kind of oxygen. My belly sloshed with tainted and burning booze and drinks making my perfect body then feel unwell. Shaking my head had its weight nearly leading me off stage. If I couldn't win the boy over with my moves and my body... then what chance did I stand in getting him to love the unlovable mare beneath?
If I couldn't compensate for that... to make it worth his while, somehow... then how was I...
“What's this? The drop of the beat is starting to change?” the voice from the stage then called over the floor, the beating tempo to a sultry dance changing, slowing down to something more fun. “Let me see all of your hooves on the floor! Get yourself a partner for the coming shake.”
I blinked. I slumped. I died on the inside. The pull of the room gone from me back onto others. I mattered and did not. My chance in the light gone as the flooring below went dark. At least, when you're invisible to the world again—you can cry freely.
“Excuse me, miss,” came that dorky voice that always tried a little too hard with its impressions, “this floor is made for dancing and not sitting. Would you kindly rise and do a little shake with me?”
I gazed up at the dork. He was tall enough for me to lean back to look properly in his eyes. Even though the world around us was bright, ponies dancing in unison and illuminated by the light, we stood in the dark, elevated but also separated from the rest, our bodies here but undefined—both to ourselves and each other.
Despite this, however, the glow of green shone brilliant, two orbs to become lost within, intelligent and kind and fixated upon me. My mouth opened but only a breath escaped me. The boy couldn't see my body. The cuteness of my face or the curves of my form.
“I thought you left.”
“Only to talk with the DJ—she owed me a song.” The dragon sent down his claw, further than he normally would all to offer it to me. It opened. So long and so narrow. Polished with long digits. Sharp in every sense but dangerous. “Hope you don't mind that. I don't dance so well when the beat is faster than my heart. Though, being with you, guess I'll be sloppy regardless—hey?”
I dipped my muzzle, wanting to cry, but laughing instead. “Tease.”
“Only because you started it.”
“But at least I meant it.” Even if you don't think so.
“And who said I didn't?”
I gazed back up at him, his eyes and claw still there, waiting for me despite my hesitance. “But you left.”
“Only because there are so many moves you can force on a guy before he's going to need to use the washroom.” He chuckled and squatted in place, his eyes level with my own, claw still out. “Besides. It looked like you were having more fun impersonating Twilight's moves than anything else.”
I blushed, blinking, the name of my rival bringing me to hate. “They're not very good. I-I can do better than that!”
“I don't doubt you can... but we're not here to show off, right?” Spike wiggled his digits and smiled a toothy grin. “We're here to have some fun! I don't care if you swing around a pole or throw your hoof in every opposite direction from the other. So long as you're having fun, then I'm having fun.”
I exhaled. “You're not just saying that?”
“Look. I don't know what kind of game we're playing right now—you've actually got me a bit frizzled on everything as of late.” Spike lowered his head but kept his eyes mostly raised. “And while I enjoy our flirting and our teasing and our banter, that's just the icing on the cake, ya know? That's the stuff you do to impress everyone else. I already know what you're like beneath everything. But, for whatever reason... you've stopped being the Starlight that I know.”
“B-Because... because she isn't good enough...”
The words came suddenly out of me. I didn't mean to say them and I didn't want to feel the tears of something burning then coursing down my cheeks. Before I could sniffle and shuffle away, those claws grabbed my hooves, pulling them up, lightly, while another crossed around my lower back.
“Sorry, Starlight, but this isn't a debate you're going to win.” The dragon swept me close to his body, holding me up, my full weight despite my legs lagging behind. My head rested beneath his chest, its broad, curved surface creating the perfect crook to nuzzle myself upon. “We both get to decide who we're good and not good enough for and then the other way around. You'll always be worth it to me, Starlight... although I can't say the same in the reverse.”
“...Spike?”
“Yeah?”
“You know we're slow dancing to techno, right?”
“You enjoying yourself?”
“...y-yes.”
“Then so am I.” Spike laughed as he continued stepping forth and back, guiding my movements and holding me close. He hugged me. Unable to get enough of my softness. Like a warm contact he never knew he craved. “We're both invisible to the world, right? If that's the case, then why not do things our own way?”
It wasn't well composed but it was the heart behind it that mattered. Even though our steps, hugs and shifts didn't match the beat, we danced to the tune brewed within the heart of our moves. I giggled while snuggling deeper against him. Shifting sideways, shaking my hips, not because of how they wobbled my flanks, but rather, from the elation that came from the movement.
“You know I'm in love with you, right?” the words escaped me as my eyes closed, my body snug within his warmth and strength, feeling protected from even my own fears, my insecurities—even though he was behind some of them. “All that playing, those little games, all those were done so you wouldn't know what I feel. But I want to be closer to you, Spike.”
Spike's muzzle had dipped to nuzzle against the top of my head but, upon hearing my words, slowly drew away. Even though I laughed, taking a second to look up—the confusion of his face was beyond sweet.
“I want to be closer to you as a girl.”
~ Twilight ~
I was better than this, and yet, I did it anyway.
From the moment she took off with Spike... I knew that leaving those two alone wasn't an option. Spike wasn't the kind of dragon to leap onto any mare. But if it was Starlight. If she continued to make herself available, to open herself to him... she might have scored him another way.
I was thankful for the jacket and the glasses able to hide my wings and obscure my face, a princess returned into a nerd, one that could pass through easily enough. There were still eyes upon me. I suppose that should make me happy that I still wasn't invisible even without the wings.
But stalking those two depleted me of any good feelings.
I could hardly enter the club on my own. It simply wasn't me. Spike used to tell me stories from other girls at the time that entered such places. We both were too scared to come here alone. Maybe if Rainbow or Rarity led the way that we could give such a location a try.
But we always found more solace in front of a crackling fire, together, reading a book we both admired.
My heart clenched at the sudden pain. Eyes watering at what had been lost. Our childhood together, an intensity of closeness slowly dying, our bodies becoming further apart... our roles in the world located in opposite directions.
I didn't want that... I couldn't have that... but even as I changed... he kept the same. Always my assistant, always positive with bits of cynicism. Even though we weren't connected, we were still the greatest of friends. Though I miss when we were one, us being two was bearable at the very least.
Until I wouldn't even have that anymore.
I know becoming a princess put a wedge between us. Even as I tried walking through the floor, feeling the bodies of ponies crash into me... that how the world reacted to me, the very essence that I now gave could never be the same.
Except when I'm with Spike. In the nights where my crown is off and the wings cease to matter, where all the asking ponies and the towering paperwork has disappeared... once more we find ourselves in front of a fire, basking in the other, a dragon and a mare, Spike and Twilight.
Nothing more and nothing less.
I didn't know how desperately I needed that again. That I never required a stallion in my life for the perfect dragon already fulfilled me. I couldn't lose him. Not to a mare that considered it all some sort of game. She was slender and firm where I was plump and round. She strode while I walked.
She could use her body to get what she wanted.
And I was unsure of even my own attraction.
“I want to be close to you as a girl.”
I stopped. Her voice. Somewhere above. I stopped as an explosion of light blew across the platform. So appeared my dragon, hunched forward, holding a mare close to his form, all while she snuggled deeper into him.
And how I watched from the dancing crowd, deadly still, unable to look away.
“No foolin'?”
“Spike... I... I may be the kind of mare to scheme and force an entire town into submissions, b-but...” Starlight drew a deep inhale upon pulling away from him. She gazed into his eyes, the ones so brilliant and kind, ones I thought were only meant for me. “If you say you got to know me, t-the r-r-real me after a-all this time... do... d-do you think...”
“I'm... sorry.” Spike placed a thumb over her lips and pressed gently upon them. Seconds later, he smiled, raising to wipe beneath her eyes. “It's just. You're not the easiest mare to figure out. I can never know what's real or what's pretend with you.”
Starlight laughed and cried at the same time. “S-Sometimes, a mare has to play pretend.”
“Even for things that are real?”
“Better to be hurt in jest.”
“You know I wouldn't hurt you in either way.” Spike turned his muzzle aside and, for a second I thought he spotted me. My heart cracked more. To be looked at but not seen. At the very moment he would reject me for real. “Dunno what you'd see in a dragon like me anyway. After Rarity...”
“There's nothing wrong with you falling in love, Spike,” Starlight said upon lifting her muzzle, keeping it there through force of will. “Just expressed it to the wrong mare. B-But, n-now that you know all of this wasn't, well, p-pretend.”
“You want to know if I like you?”
“I... was hoping for better wording than that.”
“Now you're starting to see why Rarity didn't go for me.” Spike chuckled but, within a second, stepped back and took a breath. He looked down his side, his expression lost in thought. Why would it be? Starlight was the perfect mare for him. Able to show him things that were new, flirting in a way I never could, allowing him to enjoy... the things that made a mare a mare.
Nothing should be holding him back now.
Nothing but the cracking of my own heart.
“Of course I like you, Starlight.” Spike closed his eyes and tilted back his head, breathing through his mouth. “I feel more of a dragon around you. This flirting stuff, I... I don't do it well with anyone else. Going to places like this? Doing dates? You... you give me more of a life.”
How could such sweet words to another be so sinister to me?
“And I love the mare underneath it.” Spike continued as his head fell forward, his eyes opening, their glow concentrated, determined. “How fuzzy your coat is and everything that you have rocking. Seeing you dance like a filly back there took me back to being a kid again. There's just... so much to love about you that I would need to start composing a list.”
Starlight blinked and lost her breath, “D-Does that mean—”
Both of us were surprised when he lifted up a claw. “But I'm not saying yes.”
My eyes widened. Blood rushed to my heart again. One beat. Then two. Three and four. Warmth coursed through my frame. My hooves twitched against the floor. Steam escaped with my exhale. Life returned to me once more.
“And I'm not saying no either.” Spike dropped his claw to his side. It was hard to see but easy for me to pick up on. The shiver twitching at his sides, the weakening of his legs. His body dying outward from the inside from a sudden mortal dread. “I like you. And I like the idea of being with you even more.”
Starlight shook her head upon pulling back onto her own hooves. The warmth, the assurance she bore—all of it gone. Without calm she had found was now lost. Whatever she was before surfacing once more. Eyes beating with callous curiosity. “And what's keeping us from being together? Or did you not actually mean anything you said.”
Spike fell onto his knee, smiling at her, despite the air of anger rushing toward him. If I wasn't so frozen in place—I would have laughed. Bearing me at my worst of times had equipped him to take on a dangerous mare's rage. The only one to stick with me after seeing all of me.
“Of course I mean it.” Spike dropped his eyes not because he was lying... but because whatever he was going to say next was heavy—heavy enough to hurt him. My hoof rose despite my daze wanting to be placed upon his shoulder. “I love you, Starlight. From your face to your mane to your rump to your wit to your charm. The fact I can be with you, to experience more of you... I can't put it into words.”
But Starlight already shook her head. Too set off to see Spike being genuine. Poor boy. “But?”
“I... I just have to make sure of one last thing.” Spike nodded his head as if steeling himself, staring back into Starlight's eyes without fear. Even I would have shivered. How could a near shut-in bear so much will? My heart fluttered at wanting to throw myself at him here and now. “I don't want to risk what happened between Rarity and me again. And... as selfish as it may sound... I-I... I think there may be another who likes me as well.”
“So what!?” Starlight shouted at the drop of a beat and rise of the lights; any traces of their fight overshadowed by the night. “You're just going to see if she's available first before you go with me? Is that how you view me? How all guys view me? Second pick?”
But Spike shook his head while keeping himself composed. Although his chest hyperventilated, his face kept stern. None in the case for himself but for her. Did he do this with me too? Hurt himself, so I would be less in pain whenever I lashed out?
“I've never viewed mares or friends or anyone like that.” Spike exhaled, although this time, its shaky effects were seen even by me. “You're not better or worse than this other mare—just different. It's a cop-out just to say you're both great. But it's true. There's so much about the two of you that I love that I... I just can't pick one over the other.”
Starlight lost some of her rage, gazing down at their stage, looking afraid. “So why do you have to go after her then? Especially when you know it's going to hurt me?”
“Because I have to know if there's the faintest chance that she does love me back.” Spike placed a claw on her chin, lifting it up all so she could see his smile. “What if it was the other way around? You liked me and I suddenly went with another mare? I couldn't leave her feeling like that. Not if there was a chance she does feel something more for me.”
I blinked and stepped back. My heart raced, but my mind tried to keep it in check. But even as it went, the mares and friends Spike had gotten close with over the years... never matched the closeness he talked about.
Except for one.
Me.
“If she doesn't feel anything for me then I won't have to bear any guilt,” Spike said a final time as he lifted to his feet, looking over the crowd, over me, toward where he thought I would currently be. “But I have to make sure that's the case before we do anything, okay?”
That... that was it! Even as I stepped back with a mechanical smile on my lips... my dragon still loved me! More than as a friend or a best friend but of a lover wanting to become something more. To hold me close before the fire and to read and to kiss and to be so close as to make life horrible no more.
I still had a chance.
My dragon still loved me.
Enough to reject the mare that had everything I didn't.
All to ensure I wouldn't be left alone.
I still had a chance.
But now I needed to prepare to make it count. But before I went to leave, I glanced a final time at the stage, seeing Starlight still sitting there, scheming, no doubt taking none of what he said to heart. Our eyes locked without her knowing. Her point up in the game had just been removed.
And I hadn't yet played my turn.