With his first move, the man stepped heavily onto the downed unicorn, knocking the breath from its lungs, while also using it as a springboard to dive further into the crowd. Hands outstretched, Alfonz tackled the second unicorn just as its horn began to glow, slamming the mare against the wall opposite to the doorway while knocking many ponies aside in the process.
If nothing else, his decision to attack his pursuers benefited from the element of surprise. The ponies really did not expect him to open the door, let alone jump into their midst. It took them quite some time to recover from this, allowing Alfonz to briefly disrupt his most pressing adversaries. After his initial strike, however, the mob began to regain its composure and launched its own attack.
“Bring him down!” one of the mares cried as she tackled the man’s shoulders, wrapping her hooves around his neck to try and topple him over. He knew that, should they succeed in bringing him down to their level, he would stand little chance.
And this wasn’t a suicidal last stand. He had no intention of losing.
“Go for the legs!” another pony commanded, shortly before the man felt at least three bodies smash against his lower extremities.
“You know I can understand you, right?!” he growled, elbowing a nearby pegasus in the chest. With each passing second, his body was becoming bogged down with the weight of furious, horny mares. He could barely move his legs, but managed to keep himself upright by using the wall beside him as support. An earth pony and pegasus snatched desperately at his arms, which were currently trying to free his neck from the mare wrapped around it, but failed to get a hold on his limbs as they moved about.
As the mare around his neck struggled to resist his efforts, the man noticed one of her hooves around the side of his head, rather than his neck. With little hesitation, he brought the limb close and sunk his teeth into it; the mare released the limb with a shriek of pain before falling back into the crowd. Alfonz struck out against one of the ponies wrapped around his leg with his newly-freed arms, forcing the release of the limb with the force of the blow. For every pony he shook off, however, two more swiftly replaced it.
The man felt his body beginning to the give out. If his aggressors weren’t clinging to him, they were kicking and biting frantically to help their brethren. As he lined up another attack, one of the unicorns latched onto his arm, pulling him down from yet another angle. With a short yell of defiance, the man toppled over, bringing down many of his adversaries with him. Partially pressed up against the wall, the man thrashed about wildly in an attempt to throw off the ponies around him, which piled onto his legs, arms, and chest to try and overwhelm him.
Headbutting an earth pony mare trying to pin his arm with her backside, Alfonz swung his fist in a vicious uppercut against a pony on his chest, hurling her off and into the crowd. As the man struggled to get up, resisting the efforts of what seemed like innumerable enemies, two mares leapt onto his back, each hanging off his shoulders in a display of reckless determination. The man was partially on his feet now, supporting most of his weight in a lean against the wall. The furious equines screamed their displeasure and continued to pile on, but were deterred by a number of decisive kicks to the chest and neck. The ponies upon his back were swiftly getting familiar with the wall, as the man pushed harder and harder against it.
“Get off!” the man roared as he grabbed one of the mares’ hooves. Unable to resist his influence after the previous attack, the mare was swiftly hurled over his shoulder and into the crowd, bowling many of her allies over in the process. Despite his love for the ponies as a whole, and how bad he felt about hurting them, the fight was unbelievably therapeutic. Unlike his trek through Ponyville, he hadn’t a pressing objective that needed tending to.
This was purely for his benefit.
“Feel free to give up any time!” he yelled with a short laugh, punching another pegasus across the cheek, sending it sprawling down the hall. With an almost insane cackle, the man lifted a retreating earth pony over his head and hurled it into the crowd, causing a domino effect in their midst. He was getting lost in his own demented pleasure, but he didn’t care. This was his revenge, and he was going to enjoy it.
Because of this, Alfonz almost didn’t notice the sudden lack of fight in his foes. With a feral look upon his face, the man looked around wildly for more enemies, but found the tide of ponies receding instead. Looking around, he quickly found out why; standing in the center of the left hall was none other than the gleaming white form of Princess Celestia, looking quite confused and perhaps even frightened. The assemblage of ponies quickly skirted around him like frightened rodents, leaving nothing between him and the Princess of the Sun.
Still lost in his frenzied stupor, Alfonz marched confidently over to Celestia, pulled her close by her golden necklace, and kissed her. Initially, the Princess looked on with an expression mirrored by her subjects; complete surprise and a fair bit of horror. But as the gesture continued for quite some time, she slowly closed her eyes and, seemingly, enjoyed it. The two remained locked in this embrace for at least a minute before mutually pulling back.
Whatever fight Alfonz had left in him died in that moment.
“I’m…just ganna go…sit here…” he murmured, quietly seating himself against a nearby wall. The ponies around him just stared at each other in stunned silence, and it was at least another minute before Celestia spoke.
“Well, then,” she began with a cough, straightening up once more. “Just what is going on here?”
“The human attacked a guard!” a mare cried from the crowd.
“He said he was going to hurt us if we didn’t leave!”
Celestia looked down at Alfonz, whose eyes were closed and arms were folded.
“Eh,” was all he said, giving her a halfhearted shrug.
“I’m sure there is a logical explanation for all this,” Celestia insisted calmly, trying to soothe the raging emotions of the crowd.
“He still hasn’t paid for the damage he caused in Ponyville!”
Alfonz made a loud “pfft” sound at this, but did not stir.
“I will make sure he stands accountable for his actions,” Celestia replied quite sincerely; so much so that Alfonz opened his eyes.
“Say what?”
“Please, return to your homes. Everything will be taken of.”
After a few begrudging signs of acceptance, Celestia took up a position in front of Alfonz, and the two disappeared in a bright flash of light.
The next thing the man knew, they were back in the Princess’s quarters. He had somehow been sprawled out in the journey, as he found himself face down on the lavish carpet. By the time he righted himself, Celestia was already looming over him, frowning.
“Oh come on,” he growled, shifting into a sitting position. “You know I did all of that in self-defense.”
“You wake up after nearly a week-“
“A week?!”
“-in a coma, and the first thing you do is pick a fight with a bunch of mares?”
“The last thing I remembered was being attacked by a group of mares,” Alfonz retorted. “I didn’t know what the hell happened to me after that. I just wanted to get out of there and get back here.”
“Spike sent me a letter informing me of the situation from the train,” Celestia explained, though her words did lose their spitefulness. “I arrived a few minutes after your run-in with Ponyville’s mayor.”
“Good to know,” Alfonz said with a short exhale. Boy, was that a load off his shoulders. “Thanks for that.” Celestia was not amused.
“Do you know how much damage you’ve caused?”
“I warned them,” Alfonz replied with his own dose of venom. “I told them over, and over, and over to stay out of my way. Do you know what they did to Spike? They almost killed him in that basement!”
“You went on a rampage and nearly incited a riot!” Celestia retorted with a stamp of her hoof.
“They were going to kill me or worse! I had to defend myself, defend Spike!” Alfonz insisted, rising to his full height as the argument escalated. “If you have such a god damn problem with what happened, tell it to them!”
“You don’t understand how hard it is for them to stop themselves.”
“And you don’t understand how hard it is to deal with this shit day after day!”
The two remained silent for several moments. Both their words hit home, it seemed. Alfonz found it easy to fight against the horny bastards when they were just deviants. He didn’t like to think of them as victims of their own nature.
“What you did was beyond foolish,” Celestia said after a few minutes, shaking her head. “Not only did you seriously injure – directly or indirectly – at least ten different civilians, you almost got yourself killed.”
“Yeah well that’s my problem,” Alfonz growled in response, trying to ignore the first part. He really, really didn’t want to hurt a bunch of pastel ponies. It made his most recent actions all the more appalling…
“But it’s not, Alfonz,” Celestia murmured. “You need to understand that.”
“What the hell are you talking about?” he asked, some unknown horror dawning on him. He had a bad feeling about this.
“Alfonz…you are the only male we have seen in Equestria for the last 15 years,” Celestia explained lowly. “I don’t know about your kind, but us Equestrians cannot survive with just mares.”
Alfonz couldn’t believe what he was hearing. He had thought the same exact thing during his first talk with the Princess, and wondered why she didn’t seem to give a damn about the end of her race. Now he knew; she was grooming him to fill the role.
“And you were just going to keep this from me?” he asked with rising anger. “Just fill me in when the time came?”
“After I knew how you felt, I didn’t think it necessary,” Celestia explained. “But I can’t have you endangering my subjects and yourself in these reckless adventures of yours. It’s time you know what is at stake.”
“And what does your sister think about all this, hm?” he retorted, remembering Luna’s jealousy in the past.
“She understands what threatens to destroy her race,” Celestia replied with a deep frown. “As I’m sure you do too. Do you really wish to let our species die?”
“How dare you say that shit to me,” the man said lowly, glaring daggers at the alicorn.
“I’m sorry to ask this of you, Alfonz, I really am,” she insisted, bowing her head. “But I have no choice.”
And neither did he, really. He wanted to tell her off, but, supposing she would take no as an answer, it would mean the demise of their entire race. He also wanted to pass the buck; simply implicate Spike instead, and get off scot free. But he couldn’t bring himself to condemn Spike like that…Damn, did it suck to have morals.
“I don’t think you understand species very well,” Alfonz said at last, praying that he had found a flaw in this otherwise hopeless situation. “Humans and ponies are not compatible. It doesn’t matter what I do, you can’t conceive foals like this.”
“We have spells that will solve that for us,” the Princess explained.
“If that’s the case, just transform a squirrel or something,” he retorted. “I’m sure they won’t mind.”
“It’s not that simple, I’m afraid.”
“What about transforming some of the mares-“
Celestia shook her head.
“God damn it…” he cursed, covering his face with his palms.
“We will make sure the process is as safe as can be managed,” the brilliant white alicorn assured, placing a wing comfortingly over the man’s back. “I’m not sure when it will be necessary. It could be weeks, or it could be years. What I know for certain is: we will need your help, Alfonz.”
“Is this why you brought me here?” he said suddenly, looking up at her from behind his hands. “Find a human with a shitty life to be the solution to all your problems? I mean, who would miss him, right?”
“I’m not the reason you are here,” the Princess said with another shake of her head. “But I know that, had you not come here, there may have been no hope for us.”
The man sighed. Great. He was no closer to finding how he got there, no closer to finding a way back, and no closer to even finding a safe place to avoid all the shit. He was destined to become a slave to ensure the future of an entire species, and there wasn’t a god damn thing he could do about it.
And now he couldn’t even punch pastel ponies to feel better.
“What will you do now?”
“Make the best of it, I guess.”
And that is where his story ends, I’m afraid. I would like to tell you that Alfonz went out in a blaze of glory, fighting until the last breath like he had always envisioned, never compromising his morals, but it simply was not so. With the destruction of the Equestrian race looming over his head, the man was forced to stay his hand and remain in the Royal Palace, protected by the Royal Family like a treasure of inconceivable value.
Princess Luna, who had been unaware of Alfonz’s most recent adventures thanks to her sister’s meddling, was thrilled to have her love return to her. Opting to leave the mare in darkness concerning the events in Ponyville, the man explained to her his concern about his future, but, understanding the gravity of the situation as she did, she was unable to help him.
Knowing what they did about the man’s future, the Princesses ceased their efforts to get into Alfonz’s pants…more or less. Every so often, the two would test the man’s limits, but found that his fate had largely strengthened his resolve.
Spike, meanwhile, had been allowed to stay in the palace with Alfonz. Equipped with the pendant the man had lost during his battle in Ponyville, the dragon was free to come and go as he pleased, disguising himself as he had done in during his stay at the manor. As per the man’s request, Spike was never approached with the offer in place of Alfonz, and remained oblivious to his friend’s fate.
As for Alfonz, he could only wait. He knew what fate had in store for him, but could never know when his time would come. Although he searched for a solution in the months and years that followed, and although the lone human in Equestria never found an answer to his plight, the man would never stop searching. It just wasn’t him.
Some stories simply don’t have a happy ending.