Pretty as a Ponyquin
We’ll begin with my dear friend Rarity. She works so hard, you know? Toiling away in her shop late into the night on the newest trends of fashion. Setting some, dismissing others, but always in the company of her precious dolls. She beautifies them, languishing over every tiny detail of their costumes. They are often more pampered than the richest socialite in Canterlot. Beautiful, elegant, and sexy alike… She loves them so dearly. And when you love something like that, sometimes it starts to love you in return…
The candle had burned nearly to the stump by the time she realized the lateness of the hour. She blew a little puff of air to whisk her less than ideally-styled mane out of her eyes, sneaking a bleary peak at the clock on the mantlepiece. Egads, was it truly that late? And so much more yet to do. Fie. Well, one needed one’s beauty sleep, and she wasn’t going to get it down here.
She gathered together her design sketches, rolling them and her patterns together before bundling them up and leaning them against the wall. The ribbon went there, the string here, and the various implements of her craft wherever else she could find a place for the moment. She could reorganize it all the proper ways some time in the morning. For now, she just wanted to have her workplace look somewhat professional before she went upstairs to bed.
The unfinished dresses and fashionable tops were the last to be stowed, coming off her oh-so reliable ponyquins and hung in the small storage closet filled with other such incomplete pieces. She clicked the locks on all her drawers, safe, and other valuable cabinets before lifting the candle and meandering towards the stairs. A glint of metal caught her eyes as the flame flickered about. “Oh!” She brought her hoof up to her mouth in surprise. A tray lay forgotten near her work station, laden with a silver teapot and a pair of slightly stale scones.
Had Sweetie brought these? She certainly couldn’t remember preparing a late night snack. She touched her hoof to the pot, discovering it to still be warm. Well, wasn’t that thoughtful of her? She did often so worry when it was near Fashion Week. She must’ve snuck downstairs… and the tea even smelled delicious! Perhaps Rarity had finally pounded the tea making rules into the poor filly’s head. Miracles were known to happen.
Still, she wasn’t about to eat before bed, but…. the tea would certainly go down a treat. And what else but a warm cup to send her off to a nice dream. It took a moment of finagling, but she got the candle-stub onto the tray and carried it off into the kitchen to dispense with the scones. They’d be a touch chewy tomorrow, but Sweetie would love them anyway once she’d toasted them. The pastries resecured in the bread box, she snatched her favorite night mug off the rack before heading back towards the stairs and…
Odd.
Had she really cleaned up quite that thoroughly? The workstation was in impeccable shape. Every bob of thread and bolt of cloth was neatly stacked in place, her work sheets stacked neatly in preparation for the following day. Goodness, her tools were even all immaculately racked, precisely where they were supposed to be. She could have sworn she had just thrown them where she could find room.
Was dear Twilight really beginning to rub off on her quite that badly? “Gracious, Rarity. You’ve started sleep organizing.” That was an amusing thought, enough to set her leaning against the wall, laughing quietly. She really had been working too hard. Perhaps she needed to take a vacation soon. Maybe she could finally talk Fluttershy into coming with her to Los Pegasus for the weekend. Celestia knew the girl needed to venture out even more than Rarity did.
By the time she’d brought herself back together, the candle was starting to sputter out... and a moment later, the blasted thing did just that. “Oh, foo,” she grumbled into the darkness. The faint glow of her horn and the aura around the tray was enough to not be completely blinded, but she could barely see a foot in front of her. “Okay. Think. Where did you leave the candles…” She stood in silence, not wishing to trust her tired legs and instincts to remember how to navigate to the steps in the darkness.
Her ears twitched, and she could have sworn she heard hoofsteps. They were so whisper soft, though… somepony outside? At this hour? It could’ve been a messenger, or more likely it was silly old Twilight prancing about looking at the sky. She kept spare candles… where again? Not there… nor there… Oh! She could take one down from the chandelier, that wouldn’t be too difficult.
She cast a tiny ball of aura up toward the ceiling, and the gleaming crystals caught the light and scattered it about the room. Then - movement! She nearly dropped the tea tray in shock. But then it was gone and she mentally berated herself for acting like a filly afraid of the dark. It was just the light playing off her display ponyquins. “Tsk. Silly.” She allowed herself a laugh before snatching a fresh candle down and carefully placing it on the tray.
The candle thus secured in its stand, she sparked a little magical flame around its wick, and a moment later it flared to life. A smile of satisfaction lit her tired face, and she looked up. Her terrified scream ripped through the room as she dropped the tray, the candlelight wobbled before falling over and snuffing out.
Her heart felt like it was about to burst out of her chest, even when she realized the blank, faceless thing nearly touching her nose was just one of her ponyquins. “Rainbow Dash!” she screamed to the room, resisting the urge to swear. Such a thing was unlady-like no matter frightened she was. “I don’t know how you managed to sneak into my house, but you come out here this instant! That was not funny!”
But nothing answered her demand - no giggle nor chortle came down from the rafters and there was no sound of flapping pegasus wings. She found the candle in her magic again, relighting it and waving it around the ceiling. “R-Rainbow Dash?” she ventured more quietly, but still there was nothing, and her candle wasn’t revealing anypony either. What in the name of Celestia was happening here? Either she’d been up far later than she realized, or she was letting the late night get to her. Or she was actually dreaming and didn’t know it. She glanced around at that thought, but as she hadn’t magically woken like the older ponies said happened when one realized a dream was indeed a dream, that couldn’t be it.
Ergh. This was all too much to be thinking about. “Bed, Rarity.” She quietly ordered herself and stood up again. “You can lecture Rainbow and Pinkie and whoever else in the morning.” The tea was… Oh, bollocks to the tea, she needed sleep. To the stairs with the candle in magic, in a wobbly but determined march that would get her there soon enough.
Soft metal tinkled behind her.
“Oh, for the love of Luna’s plothole, Rainbow! Stop this!” She flung the candle around only to bring the scene into sharp relief. Two bare ponyquins held the wrecked tea-tray in their oddly opened mouths, and were looking blankly at her, even without eyes. They stood stock still, but not so much that it was not clear that there was purpose to their stance. For one thing, they were off their stands. And that ought to be impossible. Like them standing in the first place. Or moving. Or very obviously looking at her.
And then a soft, almost filly-like voice warbled of the darkness. “Oops.”
She dropped the candle, and screamed. Her breathing came fast and irregular as she scrambled backward away from the things. She was hyperventilating, she knew it, but she couldn’t stop herself. “Oh… Celestia. Sweet Celestia. It’s just… just a dream… please let it be just a dream.” She wanted to run, run screaming upstairs and lock the door to her bedroom where she would be safe, but she couldn’t stop staring into their empty faces. “Please… please go away…” she whispered in a desperate plea she wasn’t sure would be heard by anypony. Or anypony that cared anyway.
Silence fell for a moment, and then one by one the candles of her work room lit up. The faceless ponyquins, some dressed from her shop floor, had lit them with matches she kept around for when she wasn’t feeling well. They were all here, all twenty five of them. Even the slightly patched up one she’d lent to Sweetie Belle. Her legs were wobbling so hard she was certain she’d trip if she tried to move, and falling on the floor was the last thing she wanted to do with these… “Hello, Miss.” That warbling voice emanated toward her from… somewhere in the faceless crowd.
“W-what?! W-who’s speaking?” She cast her gaze left and right, unable to pick out and particular one who might be talking. There was a moment of shuffling and one of the bare Ponyquins trotted over to the one she’d put her Gala dress on. The bare one held a pair of round sapphires from her boxes in its wooden hooves and carefully pressed them into the bare spot where the eyes would be.
A moment later, that one turned to her with a glittering sapphire gaze that possessed a light not entirely of this world. “Apologies. Miss. We were not ready to receive you as a guest, yet.” The warbling voice focused on the one with the gemstone eyes, so at least now she knew which one to look at. Even if she had no idea who this somepony was or where they had come from.
“Who… What do you want from me?” she asked. They were… it was talking to her. Maybe she could come out of this without… she didn’t want to think about what could happen.
“From you?” The creature warbled, tilting its head quizzically. It was very strange to ascribe any sort of emotion to it, especially with all the others seeming to have gone as stock still as they were supposed to be. And yet… there was purpose there. What would Twilight have called it? Intellect? The voice warbled a sound not unlike a giggle. “Oh, no, no, no, Miss.” The ponyquin shook its head, trembling with humor. “You have already done so much for us…”
“I… I have?” Rarity asked, trying and doing better than before to keep the shaking out of her voice. Every second she was still conscious was an encouraging sign. “I… I dust you off, of course… but… are you, all of you, really my d-dolls?”
The group of ponyquins… shifted. They pranced in place a bit, they warbled to one another in that strange voice that was so oddly familiar. Why did it sound like some kind of strange merge between Pinkie Pie and Fluttershy? And the way they moved, almost like a herd of schoolfillies, shying toward one another and not making eye contact. Tittering to one another and being far more animated than a moment ago.
Er. What was she supposed to call it if they had no eyes? The lead one obviously smiled, dimples forming on its face. “We are… you have taken such good care of us. Kept us clean. Made us beautiful. Helped us show the world your beauty.” She tossed her head, which was very strange without a mane. “You even used to tell us stories. Remember? When we first came together?”
“I… I was just trying to keep myself level headed…” Rarity breathed, never having imagined they had been… alive? Of course she’d talked to them all those years ago. A new town, no friends, new business. She hadn’t had anypony else who would listen to her woes and triumphs. “But… why only let me know you were… real… now?”
The lead one nodded slightly. “We have not always been able to move… or even hear.” The ponyquin hung its head. “We only barely understood at first, but then we realized why our limbs could shake and our eyes could see… After all you had done for us, we could finally help you.” It smiled again, and the sapphire eyes glittered in a way that Rarity could only describe as joyful. “We had been talking… discussing how we could possibly thank you for making us like you. So many nights we talked, and made certain all remained well in your world. What gift could we possibly give you? But… Now I can see what we have been missing all this time.”
“That is very sweet of you dears,” Rarity said, trying to inject a bit of kindness to her tone. Maybe she could get this insanity to end, and she could run to find Twilight to figure out what in Equestria had happened. “But you really don’t need to do anything for me. Just standing there nice and still for my designs is gift enough…”
But the lead Ponyquin was shaking its head. “No, no, no, Miss. That just wouldn’t do. It would not be properly generous of us to not give you a gift equal in return.” The lead ponyquin was coming closer, the tap of its hooves against the floor mimicking Rarity’s own until she was forced against the wall. “You don’t need to be afraid, Mistress,” the lead pony’s warbling voice whispered, just before it pressed against her lips.
The first thought that ran through her mind was the lips were warm. The second thought, about how bizarrely real it felt. It even was a properly moist kiss, not dry or fabric-tasting. But they were wood and cloth. There was no reason she should have… the desire to kiss back. She pulled away, looking away from the ponyquin and feeling her heartbeat beginning to race in tremors again.
In that brief moment, the rest had begun to crowd up closer. Their voices a mishmash of all of her friends and some of her clients. They sounded happy - laughing and giggling and gossiping amongst one another. Some hung back, some came close, but they all crowded around her like children around a mother. The sapphire-eyed ponyquin giggled and pressed the warm kiss in again, and her body unconsciously responded to it. “Bring the fabric. The very finest.” A warbling voice said somewhere in the background. “And the mane!” A squeaky voice joined it a moment later, bursting with joy.
“W-wait!” Rarity pulled herself away from the all-too-real kiss, trying to struggle up to her hooves and center herself. “W-W-What are you talking about? Fabric? Mane?” It was difficult to keep the panic out of her voice, even despite the innocent joy of the strange creatures around her. Out. She had to get out of here and get to Twilight, surely she would know what to do. “S-stop! Please! What are you doing?!”
Near the back, she could hear the warbling voices sing-songing softly. “We’re gonna make the Mistress pretty! Pretty, pretty, pretty, pony!” They giggled, and the lead one caught her gaze again. There was a strange intensity behind those sapphires, a light that at once was frightening and alluring in equal measure. “You don’t have to be afraid,” it whispered to her, intoning in much the same way she herself did. “Why would we do anything bad to you when all you’ve done is be kind to us? You don’t have to be afraid.”
She didn’t… have to be afraid. Did she? They didn’t seem like malicious creatures at all. Mischievous, certainly and perhaps a bit on the creepy side, but then dear Pinkie Pie could be equally as creepy in her darker moments. Who was she to judge them? “I’m n-not afraid,” she huffed indignantly, putting on her haughtiest air. “I was just a bit startled, that’s all. And I really would like to know what you are up to.” She put on her ‘knowing’ tone that all too frequently could guilt the truth out of Sweetie Belle.
“Silly,” the lead Ponyquin - she really needed to name her something - giggled. “We’re going to thank you. We’re going to make you pretty…” The voice trailed off as what felt like a writhing tongue ran up her thigh and startled a shriek out of her throat. A glance down noticed one of the bare ponyquins slithered between them with a boneless grace. Quite literally a boneless grace, as it seemed to have no structure at all within it. But these things did not have to-o-oo-oooooh! She was almost mesmerized by its movements until that tongue - or whatever it was - brushed her again, and her eyes lolled back as she shivered. Real or not, that had definitely felt real.
Her traitorous body began to relax without her permission, even as the glowing sapphires filled up her vision. “Relax,” it whispered in a voice like her own, yet unlike her own. She didn’t want to relax, and she was relaxing all the same. A hoof both stiff and soft ran along her back and slowly began to massage her. Curse it, why will they not listen to me? The light in the room wavered a little, and it didn’t help that her body was still exhausted from a long night of working. More hooves joined the first, working into her tired muscles in slow, inexorable circles.
The light dimmed, but was still bright enough to see the swarm of her ponyquins all gathered around her. Some were sitting, others standing, all of them playfully interacting with one another. They really were not unlike big cloth foals, and there was even a pair of smaller ones near the back that were tussling with one another. “There,” the gentle voice soothed her ears. It was so startling to hear her own dulcet tones so clearly, and yet still be noticeably different. Beige lips found hers again, and this time she did not pull away. The warmth was so soothing, so gentle, so… insistent. She hadn’t been kissed quite this way in years and it really was quite nice.
The tongue that was working up her inner thigh was just as tantalizing, but the feeling was subtly more off. She felt a coldness in the pit of her stomach that she could not identify, and her body seemed to be picking up on something her brain wasn’t and tried to squirm away from it. The hooves massaging into her back picked up in intensity. Where were they all coming from? Why were the lights so low?
Another pair of lips joined the lead Ponyquin’s, pulling her into a new and fresh kiss. It smelled of raspberries and cream, and was almost as sweet as candy to the taste. Her hooves moved almost of their own volition, one wrapping around the new ponyquin and the other steadying her from the more excitable ones behind her. Behind her? When had they gotten behind her? Why did they feel so good, those hooves were made of wood… but they were soft to the touch, the way a real pony’s hooves should be.
She reached back, trying to find the wall behind her but it was no longer there. Instead her hoof found a soft body, and trailed up to touch it more closely. “Pretty,” the lead’s voice echoed in her ears. A firm and warm form pressed up behind her, and she leaned back into it. There was a rustling sound, like silk over fur, but she paid it no mind. The ponyquin behind her was warm like the real thing, and behind its eyeless face she could see a tenderness. A second tongue joined the first at her thighs, adding kisses and playful nibbles. She squeaked, and swallowed almost immediately after, her voice oddly loud even among the seemingly endless rustling of ponyquins around her.
She ought to be trying to drive them off. Multiple partners? The scandal! But her throat could not seem to produce words, and she merely squeaked under the onslaught of sensation. The warm body behind her rubbed enticingly into her, while those before her enticed her with soft lips. As they moved, once again her ears were filled with the odd sound of silk-on-silk brushing against one another.
Her body felt strange as she turned her head away from the kisses, trying to regain her composure. Her fur… crinkled. Ruffled? That wasn’t the right noise… but it was. Or wasn’t it? “Pretty,” the lead Ponyquin whispered with heat into her ear, and it sang through the air triumphantly. Wait, the warmth behind her had moved. What was that-
’Oooooh!” Her throat finally broke free of its paralysis only to unleash a distinct moan into the air. Her cheeks blushed furiously and she nearly whirled on the cad with her hooves. But she could not. Move, that was. She could not even struggle physically. All her muscles were like jelly, and she sank against the strength of the creatures around her. “W-what are you…” she croaked out, not so much a question as a struggle to find meaning in the sensation. She brought her hoof up to her head, trying to steady her nerve… and felt the cool sweetness of her very finest silk press against her head.
Very finest, her mind noted. The five-hundred-bits a yard stuff from deep Saddle Arabia, as pure white as the driven snow and nearly as impossible to get a hoof on as Zap Apple Jam. She stared uncomprehendingly at the garment for a moment, all of her attention robbed by the sudden presence of her very expensive silk until her mind twigged that she didn’t feel like she was wearing any such garment. In fact, she wasn’t wearing anything at all. “Pretty,” the voice cooed lovingly, an all too soft hoof tracing down her cheek. The silk was her coat, and her coat was the silk, and oh sweet Celestia…
A pulse of pleasure hit her, even as her voice found a strangled squeak. “What have you done to me?!” she demanded, her voice rising above the murmurs of the ponyquins around her. Her body was wracked with the throes of pleasure, but her mind struggled to understand what should have been impossible. It was all so hazy, the feelings keeping her from being able to think straight. She tried to thrash away, to turn her head to see what was going on - but her muscles were so limp, and they simply were not letting her see all of what was happening.
“We’re making you pretty, Mistress,” the lead ponyquin cooed again, and Rarity somehow found the strength to turn her head back toward her. “It’s going to be wonderful. So flawless, so perfect you’ll be…” Her voice was rich with joy, with pleasure and happiness, that it struck her physically with how innocent she sounded. Like a hammer blow, the ruffling sound made sense as the hot body behind her grinded against her own - silk on silk. She wanted to scream out, to make some terrified accusation, but her body protested with shudders of desire.
She tried to lash out with her hooves - surely if she attacked they would retreat. But they felt so light, even as they moved. They thumped harmlessly against the soft bodies, and giggles followed. The light had grown dimmer in the room somehow, yet she could still so clearly see. Or at the least, she could clearly see the ponyquins arrayed around her and watching intensely. Faceless ponyquins had given way to subtle signs of emotion and wit and personality behind the cloth. Where once there had been blank eyes, now faint lights glimmered in the dimness. She lifted her hoof to strike at the lead ponyquin and held it quiveringly still as it entered her gaze.
It was as perfect white as the silk, and seemingly carved from the purest white oak. It gleamed with a diamond clear varnish and glittered with tiny blue sapphires set into a pretty little pattern. “No! Stop it!” she screamed, barely pushing the words past her shuddering lips, her eyes burning with sudden tears. But as much as she knew she had to escape, her hips ground back against the ponyquins behind her, the sensation of her silk coat on theirs almost more pleasurable than everything else. And another had joined the first, and darkness nearly claimed her senses as the wave of sensation slowly crashed over her.
But it did not - bright blue lights glimmered in the dim light and chased away the darkness all at once. They were beacons in the dim light, holding her close and keeping her upright all at once. “No, mistress.” The gentle, sweet, loving voice cooed from everywhere and nowhere. “You’re going to be just fine now. Just relax. Enjoy yourself…”
But she could not stop her breathing coming in rapid and panicked pulses. Every instinct screamed conflicting information at her, her body wracked from every angle. It was all too much, all too much to bear. Time and again, she wanted to pass out, to let the blackness claim her. And time and again, the sapphire light drove it away relentlessly. She was being held like a filly, even as her body was ravished. Everything was in opposition, and all she wanted to do was run away. “Pretty,” the voice echoed inside of her very skull, and she glanced up to see a strange whiteness being held above her head.
Slowly, the silken thing touched her forehead and then began to push with physical force down the back of her head, pulling her mane with it. Her nose took in one final gasp of air as the garment passed over it. Her jaw pressed shut into the glove-like thing, and the silk gently and lovingly slipped down over her neck like a noose. She could not breathe, she could not see, she could sense nothing but the sensation of her body pressed against the others, of the slow and rhythmic rocking motions.
Her entire world became that feeling. Of a silken prison, holding her so tightly that it would surely suffocate her at any moment, and that moment never coming. Of an endless, untouchable blackness that stretched out into the infinite. Death surely would claim her, as her final gasps of air ran out, and her blood began to run hot in her body. She began to feel weightless, to feel her spirit wrenching free of her body. But still seeming to experience both. Her spine arched, and she clawed desperately at nothing until… Until…
”Breathe.”
Her jaw ripped open with the sound of fabric being torn asunder. A ripping that was far louder than even the worst torn dress on the night of the Gala. Sweet cold air rushed into her like the very breath of life itself. She was not being held, save by Andromeda. She felt her limbs thrash about for a moment and then stilled them. She could see with perfect clarity, even in the pitch dark room. “Breathe, Mistress,” the pon- Andromeda. Andromeda? How did she know that name? Why?
She felt so light. Why did she feel so light? “Stand,” Andromeda muttered softly, and she did. She felt no resistance as she rolled to her hooves and bounced up. She felt strange. Light. Free… She felt. “Pretty,” Andromeda giggled at her, and she could not restrain her giggle in return.
Soft, warm bodies swarmed around her. Bodies that wanted to please mistress, and she was certainly ready for some pleasing. But they brought with them a small round mirror, and she stared into it mutely. A featureless white face stared back at her, but it was so utterly different than the rest. She was of the very finest of silk. Her hooves glittered in the dimness, and the blank eyes held a fiercely burning fire. “I am not…” She half whispered, somehow broken by the realization of her plainness. This certainly could not do.
She stared at herself, but she couldn’t understand how. She felt her her hoof rise to touch her… face. But there was feeling where there ought not to have been any in the first place. She had to be looking at a picture. This was no mirror, but a clever painting. A half-chuckle escaped her, her mind trying to convince herself of this truth. But if it was a painting… there was something so enthralling about such a plain thing…
She stared into those blank recesses where eyes would be, but… the longer she stared, the more she felt like she was being sucked into their endless beige depths. Until, all at once, she was not looking at the painting or whatever trick it was… she was it. And instead of seeing herself, it was just the same image. There was a feeling of jerking back and forth, like her eyes were being yanked this way and that, but it ended, and when it did, she knew herself.
She was not plain. She was more beautiful than ever before. She was everypony and nopony, and better yet, she could choose which. A warble of a giggle tickled out of her throat, but whether it was her voice or not didn’t matter. She reminded herself that she was everypony and nopony. “Thank you,” she said, turning her head to find Andromeda.
Instead, she found another ponyquin holding the perfect blue oval sapphires that Andromeda had been wearing mere moments before. The cute colt was smiling at her, as he pressed the gems into place and the world lit up with cerulean glory. She giggled in approval and touched his chin, intending to get back to what had been interrupted mere moments before. But first… “Darlings,” her voice tittered warmly. “Whatever am I going to do about my mane?”
~~~~~~~~~~
“I’m telling you, Twilight. She never misses a spa day! Ever!”
Fluttershy’s worried voice was enough to put Twilight’s teeth on edge as they traipsed towards the boutique. The curtains were tightly drawn, and Twilight felt a frown cross her face. Rarity had always extolled the virtues of natural lighting to her. “Maybe she’s sick?” Twilight ventured hesitantly, stepping toward the boutique. “Fluttershy… be ready to go get help,” she continued, and marched as fearlessly as she could to the door. Surely this was all just a misunderstanding. Sweetie Belle hadn’t seemed worried, anyway…
The door itself was unlocked. A good sign. She turned the latch and pushed it open to peer inside. The boutique was lit up from within by soft candle-light that gave the entire room a distinctly spooky aura. “Rarity?” she half yelled into the room, and her ears twitched to the sound of scampering hooves. Lots of scampering hooves, as a matter of fact. But they sounded strange, almost too light to be actual ponies. There was no weight to them hitting the ground.
A white unicorn like creature cantered into view with an impossible grace and vibrant eyes made of the most perfect sapphires Twilight had ever seen. A mane of thousands upon thousands of strands of silk in a thousand different shades of violet thread. “Darlings!” the creature enthused in a voice that sounded distinctly off to Twilight. “Have you come make us pretty?” She fluttered silk eye-lashes, her voice dropping suggestively as others not unlike her gathered around, blanks faces tilted curiously towards them. “Or… Perhaps we can… play?”