Discord found himself in the odd position of laying beside Charis in the grass and staring up at the clouds. It was something he usually only did with Fluttershy. It left him feeling oddly vulnerable and exposed. It was also relaxing. He didn’t have to hide what he was. He was free to be himself.
“Incoming,” Discord said as he felt a chaotic itch.
“What?” Charis asked.
“You will see,” Discord said with a grin as he sat up.
A moment later there was a loud pop and the fizzling crackle of energy. And then there was another draconequus standing in the meadow with them. It looked remarkably like Discord, but different.
It was also female.
“I felt such an odd disturbance… oh hello,” the female draconequus greeted.
“Charis, this is Eris. Eris, this is Charis. Eris, Charis is my student,” Discord said as he introduced the two to one another. He looked excited as he rose to his feet and then hovered mid air ignoring gravity.
“You took a student?” Eris asked. She peered at the earth pony. “This one is weird,” she observed.
“Tell me about it,” Discord replied. “How are things in your reality? How is dearest Butterscotch?”
“Oh, he is still trying to reform me. And we have so much fun,” Eris replied.
“Butterscotch?” Charis inquired. “Reform?” she questioned.
“Butterscotch is Fluttershy, only male. He is quite shy. And sweet,” Discord said, his words punctuated with a snigger.
“And he is reforming me through loving bondage. I am such a naughty draconequus. I have to act as though my power has been nullified and let him try to reform me. Butterscotch is a soft spoken and very shy pony in public… but in the bedroom he is all about putting me in my place like the naughty little vixen I am. I am getting better I am pleased to report. Prince Solarus believes that in time I will be a productive member of society once I finally learn my place,” Eris explained.
“He hurts you?” Charis asked in disbelief.
“Only as much as I allow him to. We have a safe word. And he apologises the entire time he is doing it, which is adorable. Prince Solarus believed that Butterscotch had the best chance of reforming me because Butterscotch fell madly in love with me after I thawed out from the block of ice I had been captured in for a few hundred years,” Eris responded.
“I… I don’t even know how to feel about that,” Charis replied.
“You will never know how to feel about anything if you don’t experience something different once in a while,” Eris stated. She giggled and exchanged a glance with Discord. “You go through life as you are, trapped inside of your own perspectives. Even if you keep an open mind, you are still forced to be what you are and that seldom ever changes for most sapient beings,” Eris explained.
“I don’t understand,” Charis replied.
“Do you want to?” Eris asked solemnly.
There was a twinge of fear that coursed through Charis’ nerves. She nodded slowly. “Yes, I do want to understand,” she said in small timid voice.
Eris snapped her fingers and Charis suddenly felt very different. She wasn’t sure what was different, but something about her felt different. “I still don’t understand,” Charis said in confusion. “I thought I was supposed to understand,” Charis continued.
Eris hovered over and ran her paw down Charis’ back, causing Charis to shudder and tremble with sudden sensation. Charis gasped as Eris grasped her tail, gave it a tug, and then pulled it aside. Charis gave a startled cry as Eris gave a tug on something else.
Only Charis didn’t have anything else back there to tug on.
There was something back there to tug on.
Charis took a deep breath, tried to speak, but couldn’t. Discord and Eris began to chortle and smile at one another. There was something dangling between her legs back there. Charis lowered her head between her front legs and peered towards her own back end. Her eyes confirmed her suspicions.
“Those are testicles,” Charis announced.
“Yes they are,” Eris agreed.
“I have testicles,” Charis stated matter of factly.
“Yes you do,” Eris commented.
“And now my student, you finally get to experience being something other than what you are. You have spent your whole life being female. You have nothing but a feminine perspective, which isn’t your fault really. But now, now you get a chance to gain a different perspective in the only way that truly matters,” Discord said with a wry smile.
“Am I stuck like this?” Charis asked.
“No, it will wear off in time,” Eris replied.
“So… if I become aroused I guess other parts of me will become visible,” Charis said as she continued to stare back at her own testicles.
“Very visible,” Eris replied.
“Fascinating,” Charis said. “I have never been with a colt but here I am with colt bits,” Charis stated. “What do I do with them?” Charis asked.
“Whatever you want, they are yours,” Eris replied. “Gain an understanding of how they work. What they feel like. What it means to have them.”
“Okay,” Charis said in an embarrassed tone of voice. She wiggled her backside and her new scrotum rocked back and forth like a bell. She reached back there with a forehoof and gently prodded them. “This only leaves me with more questions,” she said as she touched herself again.
“What sort of questions?” Discord asked. He seemed totally unconcerned about his student playing with her new anatomy.
“Well, I was born female and now I have male parts. Should I be attracted to males or females? What if I am attracted to colts even though I have colt bits? Does that make me gay? What if I tried to do something with a filly, and discovered I liked fillies, and then go back to my filly form… will I still like fillies? What does gender mean anyway? If I have changed certain bits of flesh on my body, does it change who and what I really am on the inside?” mused Charis in a long winded fashion.
Discord stroked his chin but seemed to lack a reply.
“I have changed on the outside, how am I supposed to feel on the inside? That hasn’t changed. Colts just confuse me and I don’t know how I feel about fillies. I am not sure I want anything to do with either. So… now that I have this, what do I do with it? All it it does is cause questions. Why would anypony change their gender… I know that some do… I just don’t understand why,” Charis said as she lifted her head and looked at Eris and Discord.
“When a sapient being changes their gender it is usually so their outside matches how they feel on the inside,” Eris answered patiently.
“Gender confusion is one of the many forms of chaos,” Discord said in an alluring low voice as he looked at Eris.
“I am still not sure I understand any of this,” Charis said in a mystified voice.
“Maybe it would be better to simply enjoy it for what it is, and then when you are older, look back upon it and reflect upon it with the wisdom that comes from age,” Eris suggested.
“I’d like to go for a walk around Ponyville to see how ponies might react to me but Ponyville is kind of burning right now,” Charis said regretfully. “So in your reality, the genders are all reversed. What is Solaris like? Is he like Celestia?” Charis inquired.
“Prince Solarus is a chauvinistic pig. Mares are property under his rule. He is sorta benevolent all things considered, there are far worse monarchs to be female under, but mares do not have much in the way of rights. I was frozen in a block of ice when I led a revolt. I commanded a group of angry mares that wanted equal rights and I was subdued by the Elements of Traditional Values,” Eris explained.
“That’s awful,” Charis muttered.
“Indeed,” Discord said. “The Elements of Traditional Values are really horrible things.”
“Prince Dusk Shine mastered the hidden element of Masculinity and things have been a little worse lately,” Eris said.
“This is horrible!” Charis snapped.
“I don’t know. Butterscotch isn’t so bad. He is so kind and sweet. He isn’t quite like the others. He works to redeem me, and I work to corrupt him. He wants so badly to please me. It isn’t his fault that he was born into a society that expects him to play very different role,” Eris said.
“It all seems so overwhelming,” Charis said.
“What does?” Discord asked.
“You get born into the world. You end up either male or female and everything that goes with that. And then society expects you to be a certain way so that your behaviour matches some bit of flesh that is part of your body. And if the way that you behave doesn’t match with the bits of flesh you were born with, all manner of problems arise. And I don’t understand any of it,” Charis replied. “I feel sorry for Butterscotch,” she stated.
“Butterscotch was born into a society that subjugates females. I’ve actually helped him to do what his society expects him to do. I have in my own way let him know that is okay for him to dominate me. And he feels more like a stallion for having done so. He loves me a great deal. And now, he has value and worth for fitting in with some great societal ideal that he feels the need to conform to. But I have also perverted his society’s ideals. We use a safe word. Our encounters are done more in play. They feel real enough to Butterscotch and together we perpetuate the illusion of my redemption. He loves me. He holds onto an ideal of love that is almost completely alien to the culture that he lives in,” Eris elucidated.
Charis heaved a sigh. “I don’t understand,” she said. “I want to though,” she added. “I don’t see how being born with one type of fleshy bit or another somehow gives you an inherent right to have authority over another different fleshy bit. I don’t see how being born with two balls somehow makes you any better or any worse than being born with no balls,” Charis stated.
Discord grinned lewdly. “It is all about having those balls slap up against the right bits. Having needs. Finding a means to relieve those itches takes effort. But if you can subjugate another and keep them willing to serve you and relieve those itches, it becomes so much easier,” he quipped.
“Otherwise it means having to work to build a relationship. With love and trust. That takes effort. For many, it is far easier to dominate and force another to simply serve your needs,” Eris continued, picking up where Discord left off. “Females do it too. We need it just as bad as males do. In different parts of the world or different parts of reality, you will find that the balance of power shifts from side to side.”
“So by changing my genitals I could move myself into power. Is that why some people alter their fleshy bits? They get tired of being on the losing side?” Charis asked.
“I suppose that some might, but there are some difficulties in the transition. Sapient beings are bound to find out that somebody is changing their gender. Biases erupt. You end up with a transitioned gender that gets no respect from either side and they become disenfranchised,” Eris replied.
“So even if you change your gender, sometimes you still can’t win. Can it really be that simple? A simple bit of chance… luck at being born with the right fleshy bits?” Charis muttered. “So I have two testicles and a penis now. What good will they do me? Ponies who know me will know I was born female. Other than my outsides, what has really been changed about me?” Charis asked.
“Honestly, not much at all, at least on the outside,” Discord replied. “But on the inside, you’ve become aware of a number of new concepts.”
“If anything I just feel more confused,” Charis admitted. “Perhaps that is the enlightenment I am seeking. I suppose something has gone right now that I am asking questions. Nothing seems simple anymore. And everything seems terribly unfair.”
“That is because it is,” Eris and Discord said together in unison.