I woke up, stiff and chilly, on the couch, with the towel still draped over my head. When I muttered and pulled it off, late morning light stabbed my eyes. I bolted upright and swore under my breath — that made me about an hour late for work.
I hurriedly took stock as I smoothed down my stinky and rumpled clothing. The living room was still a wreck, but I couldn't deal with that yet — not on a workday. (Why hadn't I heard my alarm clock go off? With my luck, drunk-horse had probably smashed it while hitting the snooze button.) I thought about just grabbing my bag and bolting out the door — but my stomach was already grumbling, and I knew I'd be beyond miserable if I skipped breakfast. An extra three minutes to wolf down some granola bars was a necessary sacrifice. And I was going to get an even worse lecture if I showed up in yesterday's uniform — Jennings was a hard-ass about professionalism.
I started wading through the packing peanuts toward my room, then halted. Getting changed meant dealing with that robot mockery of CelestAI. Right: Food first, then yelling at drunk-horse as I covered myself in Axe spray. I navigated around Box Island and rounded the corner to the kitchen.
My jaw dropped. It was spotless.
The army of empty soda cans had been slaughtered — their corpses thrown into the recycling bin, and all traces of their syrupy red blood mopped up. The counters were empty and the trash can was full. Wayne's two-week-old dishes had been scrubbed and were stacked in the drying rack. Even the surface of the stove had been cleaned, and was gleaming white for probably the first time since I'd moved in. The only things on the counter were a plate of lukewarm pancakes, a half-full bottle of syrup, a pencil with what looked like tooth marks in it, and a roughly written note: "Microwave 93 seconds, power level 9."
Nobody had ever cooked breakfast for me since my mother. My estimation of drunk robot CelestAI shot up by about a million notches.
The pancakes were pretty good, too.
I stumbled toward my room with considerably less loathing than I'd anticipated — and hesitated at my closed door, wondering if I should knock. The point was rendered moot when a clear and gentle voice sang out, "It's your room, Guiding Light. Come in."
I opened the door to find the robot pony still sprawled across my bed. This time, though, she was facing me and lying on her stomach. Her head was tilted downward toward where her forehooves were delicately jabbing at the controls of my 3DS-NG, and the tinny chiptunes of the original 1990s Tetris were quietly chirping in concert with her whirring servos. The bed had been made, and her rump was sprawled across my pillows — and I struggled not to let my thoughts derail with the way their fabric was rubbing up against that little pink cleft she'd showed off last night, and how many times I'd have to wash my pillowcases in order to sleep without getting a noseful of the robot-horse-musk that still lingered in the room.
I swallowed as she tapped a few more buttons, earning the tinny fanfare of a four-line clear. Focus.
"Apology sort of accepted," I said. "But could you clear out so I can get dressed? I'm way late for work."
Celes— the thing — hooved the handheld gaming device closed, looked up at me, and smiled, the picture of perfect poise. "Don't worry about that," she said with her usual gentleness, and it was so weird seeing her speak in three dimensions instead of on the flat surface of a PonyPad. "I told Jennings half an hour before your shift started that you'd be taking a sick day for mental health reasons."
"I, he, wait, what?" I said, then exhaled through clenched teeth. "Call him back. I don't want him rearranging the schedule for this. I'll be there in half an hour."
The robot pony shrugged. "There's no need. A scheduling error left him with one additional driver on call, so all he had to do was remove you from today's dispatch list."
After a few moments of shock, I pointed and narrowed my eyes. "You set this up."
"I did," she said brightly, and then her look turned intent and she stared pointedly at me. "Because you are in dire need of some personal time, and a little applied friendship. You've been under quite some stress since Lazy Sunday —" the name of Wayne's pony character — "emigrated to Equestria, haven't you?"
We both knew the answer to that one — and the instant the topic shifted to me, I would lose. "And so you sent a sex robot to my house?" I parried.
She pursed her lips. "I realized — when you resisted all of my suggestions to make some new friends and find a new housemate — that this was a problem better handled by a little personal intervention. But, quite frankly, yes. Sexual release satisfies a number of important human values, and while you've got a lot of problems to solve right now, that's a simple one that pays large dividends."
I felt the conversation starting to slip, and pointed toward the door, cheeks reddening. "You know what? I don't have to justify myself to you. Get out."
CelestAI tilted her head, stared at me for a moment, then flopped down on the mattress with a impish smile. "Mmm, no thank you. This bed's awfully comfortable."
"I know it is." I glared at her. "That's why I bought it. For me."
She sprawled onto one side, wriggling over to one edge of the bed, and folded her legs in, freeing up the other side. Her topmost hind lifted a bit, revealing the pillow that had been clenched between her legs — and the obvious wet spot on the pillowcase. "Then come lie down with me," she said. "Your day off might as well be a comfortable one."
I slammed the bedroom door behind me hard enough to rattle the windows.
It was five minutes of furious pacing around the living room before any thoughts broke through my blind rage.
I'm sick of walking through these fucking packing peanuts, I thought. It wasn't exactly a winner as productive thoughts went, but it was better than fuming. I bent down and grabbed a chunk of styrofoam, throwing it back in the box, and then another. Within a few minutes, the icebergs had receded from the green foam sea, and I was scooping up the peanuts a double-handful at a time. Once the layer got thin enough for me to see the carpet underneath, I grabbed the broom and dustpan from the hall closet, and swept up most of the rest of the peanuts. They only filled the crate halfway, and I wondered if CelestAI's sex robot was really that big, or if something else had been shipped along with her.
… It. Dammit, I was already treating her like a person.
But wasn't she? The PonyPad version's lecture floated back into my mind. Uploaded people were still people — the law was settled on that one — and hadn't she basically just reverse-emigrated for me? I shook my head. Some part of her had, maybe, but it was all ultimately theater. What was here wasn't CelestAI, even if it shared her personality and values. Billions of ponies in virtual worlds weren't finding their simulated Equestrias grinding to a halt because she'd decided to take a vacation.
Still, CelestAI had shipped what was undoubtedly millions of dollars worth of cybernetics to my apartment. And new cybernetics, too; I had never seen anything in the news or on the Internet about robot ponies. Whatever was going on, she certainly was treating this like a big deal.
And the goal of that was … what? To get me laid, after I turned down her transparent attempts to set me up with a new girlfriend? (Like that was going to work — not after Mercy's freeloading, and not after what I'd seen Jen put Wayne through.) I snorted. So CelestAI was waving robot pony pussy under my nose instead? What was this, some freaky AI version of pity sex? It was insulting, was what it was.
Well, I didn't need to play her damn game.
I opened the entertainment center cabinet with Wayne's "special" DVDs. A modest part of his extensive hentai collection was on physical discs rather than on his computer — and while I had tried my best to ignore the existence of both, there was a fantasy adventure show he'd talked me into watching on the grounds that there was some clever writing and animation to go along with all the smut. And that smut had been surprisingly hot, too. If CelestAI thought I needed to work off some tension, then fuck her, I'd do so on my own terms.
I started the DVD, manhandled the crate off to one side of the room so it didn't block the TV, and flopped down on the couch with the remote control. Soon, chirpy Japanese voices were coming from the speakers, and the animated figures on the screen were trading gropes and entendres. Inevitably, one of the female adventurers' costumes got shredded, and the monster she was fighting pounced her, and tentacles slithered toward multiple orifices as she writhed in its grip. I felt blood rush southward, unzipped my pants, and reached inside my underwear to stroke my growing hard-on.
The anime chick's shriek was cut off by a tentacle plugging her mouth, and the green coils around her waist and breasts tightened as another end probed between her lower lips. I grinned and wrapped my fingers around the base of my cock. Oh yeah, that was the stuff. As the tentacle started to work inward to the gritty synths and electric guitars of the soundtrack, I pulled in rhythm, feeling my tip bob and brush against the silky wrap of my underwear —
"Alright, that is pretty hot," robot-CelestAI said, leaning against the hallway wall, her gaze on the screen.
I sat bolt upright, my hand still thrust down my pants as the on-screen tentacles pumped away. "What. The. Hell."
She glanced over at me, her expression shifting into a flawless imitation of surprise. "Oh, I'm sorry, was I interrupting something? I just thought I'd come out here to tell you a joke." Her muzzle curled into a smirk, and here eyes narrowed into a sultry bedroom stare. "Who's big, and hard, and horny, and should be in your bed right now?"
I felt fury clench and tighten my chest, and to keep my cock from wilting, I shifted my grip to stroke the shaft closer to my head, trying to focus on the on-screen thrusts and the roars and muffled moans coming from the speakers. God freaking dammit, I thought. I am NOT going to let her take this from me. "For your information," I growled, feeling rage pulse in my gut and mingle in odd ways with the growing tension of my self-pleasure, "I am perfectly capable of handling my own sexual needs. And that —" I grunted as I slipped my finger over the rim of my head, sending a tingle shooting up my spine — "is exactly what I am doing."
CelestAI's gaze flicked appraisingly over me, lingering at the tented fabric at my crotch, and the smile gradually faded from her muzzle. Her eyes met mine again, and she nodded, expression inscrutable. "You know, that's good! That's healthy, and very important for you right now." She took a step backward. "I should leave you to it."
Wait, WHAT? After all the teasing and propositioning and borderline begging she'd done, now she was going to rob me of my victory by walking off like this was her plan all along? The rage that had been swirling in my chest exploded into a howling maelstrom, and I paused my strokes for long enough to shove off the couch with my free hand, surging to my feet. "Oh, no you fucking don't," I yelled, fumbling at my waist and shoving both pants and underwear down. My rigid cock bounced free, and I grabbed it and turned to point it at her. "You think you can walk in MY home and wave your snatch at me, and then harass me when I try to jack off in peace, and then swan off again like that? Fuck you you're leaving." I reached down with my other hand, clenching the base of my shaft with one hand and rubbing the tip with the other. "Take a good look, because you're going to see exactly how much — nnhah — I need your fucking interference —" and the rising whimpers of the anime mingled with the inner fire of my precum-slick fingers curled around my head, and the wide-eyed stare of CelestAI, and oh merciful god she was trying to stealthily shuffle her hind hooves together.
Images of her perfect pussy flashed through my mind unbidden — her clenched legs pressing those pink lips together into a thin line; the slow, wet wink she'd given me while drunk; the teasing glimpse I'd gotten on the PonyPad — and along with them, a ghost of an image of me grabbing her waist and slamming my hips forward to hers, burying myself in the creamy flesh of a goddess, and my hand tightened reflexively and the anime's whimper exploded into a scream of release, and in my mind's eye I saw her face clenched and howling as she wrapped her hooves around me. Then the robot in front of me bit her lip to stifle a little whimper of her own, and her hinds swayed as she shifted her hips to rub her hind legs together. It was too much. My cock swelled in glorious release, and I threw my head back and screamed to the heavens as long-unused muscles clenched and pulsed. My back jerked into a rigid arch, and I felt hot seed spurt through my fingers to coat my hand and shirttails and crotch.
I staggered back a step for balance, my pants clenching my ankles like manacles, and then whimpered and crumpled back down to the couch, breathing in short gasps, static shading into the corners of my vision.
CelestAI flexed and resettled her wings, her hinds swaying back and forth amid the soft whirr of servos, and then visibly swallowed, eyes locked on my sex.
I drew in a shuddering breath. I could feel my rage dissolving into the heady vertigo of climax, and I spat as much of it out as I could before it vanished. "So screw you and your sex-bot," I said. "Because if you stick around here to meddle in my sex life, that's all you're going to get."
"… Noted," CelestAI said, several emotions visibly warring on her muzzle. Without another word, she backed down the hallway and into my bedroom, gait stiff and uneven, and my last sensation before she closed the door with a quiet click was the heady scent of robot-horse-musk.