> Purple Weed Cosmopolitan
>  by WishyWish
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

> 1 - Gym Shorts May Scald
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------


Ponyville. August, 2017.


The great nation of Equestria can be thought of as a microcosm of the world around it. Her citizens take it as a point of pride that a pony can find prime examples of nearly every conceivable climate, biosphere, or geographical feature fathomable to the mind therein, and some even beyond that which the average consciousness can perceive. A trip from sea to shining sea would therefore be certain to produce a lifetime’s worth of adventure to tourist and intrepid explorer alike - from frozen tundras, to scathing deserts, to the damp unknown of tropical rainforests.

In the middle of it all runs the most temperate latitude in the known world; a strip of general balance between seasons that consequently offers itself as the most popular place for ponies to make their homes. This lush greenery encompasses everything from the sleepy borough of Ponyville on up to the Canterlot peaks, and then sweeps eastward to Manehattan’s Horseshoe Bay. Without a doubt, it is the most likely quarter in which a pony can maintain an expectation of both fairly distributed weather patterns and a bountiful harvest.

But there are always exceptions.

On one such day, in the sweltering rays of a high August afternoon, Spike the dragon’s thoughts were consumed by two notions - one being that he should appreciate the ability to breathe ice water, and the other wondering what Ponyville did to invoke the punishment of Princess Celestia’s heavenly body above. Fanning himself with a first edition copy of Go Prance in the Three Kingdoms simply because it had a lot of pages, he lay prone upon the front steps of the Palace of Friendship, gazing up at her prismatic towers until he felt certain their colors were running in the heat. He had previously been lying on his stomach, but was persuaded to cook evenly on his other side when each grain of bleached white sand from the path before the palace had begun to resemble a book to him.

“Ugh...why did she have to compare the sum of all knowledge to grains of sand on a beach,” The young dragon whined. “We don’t even have a beach so that’s just a cruel joke...all I said was that we filed two-thousand three hundred and forty-one books since Thursday. So what if I was off by one? Of all the metaphors…”

Spike trailed off when he realized that working his jaw to talk to nopony would only generate more heat. He sighed, mumbling something about the unfairness of a fire-breathing creature felled by heat, until his field of view filled with the grinning visage of his mistress and surrogate mother, Princess Twilight Sparkle. Twilight stood over her assistant with an infuriatingly merry grin.

“Hey Spike!” Twilight sang. “What’re you up to for the rest of this fine day?”

Spike, spread-eagle on the step, raised a brow drolly. “I’m baking at three seventy-five for twenty minutes. I’m gonna be delicious.”

The sarcasm sailed clear over Twilight’s head; or perhaps it just crumbled ineffectively against the armor of her smile. “Hah! You’re so silly. Why don’t you go inside if you’re so hot?”

“Because it’s three degrees warmer in the shade and the castle feels like an oven,” Spike complained. He moved his hands over his face. “I’d rather be out here on the skillet. And could you please not breathe on me? I’m gonna end up ovulating!”

Twilight snorted out a laugh but obliged by pulling her head up first. “You mean you’re going to immolate. If you start ovulating I’m gonna have to ‘immolate’ every book on dragon lore we have and start over. Both of them.”

“Pleeeease don’t talk about burning things,” Spike whined again, rolling on his side to spare himself the tease of clouds that looked like ice cream. “Are you expecting any letters from Princess Celestia today? ‘Cause I’m not sure I can take it…”

“Nope!” Twilight replied simply. “I have one to send, but I guess it can wait until tonight.”

Spike felt as though he had been granted reprieve from the hangpony’s noose, temporary though it was. He exhaled and not-quite-melted into the stairs. “Whew, thanks. How come you’re so chipper though?”

“Me?” Twilight flapped her wings. “Chipper?”

Spike harumphed. “Somepony might hoof you in the face if you go around town like that, even if you are a princess. You’re practically glowing, and since light means more heat...do you see where I’m going with this?”

Twilight looked herself over as if checking for an actual glow. “Well...alright, maybe I am. But can you blame me? I mean we’ve sorted two-thousand three hundred and forty-one books since Thursday! That’s our best since...about two weeks ago!”

Spike spun one talon in the air. “Whoop-de-doo, I’m so excited I might die.” He paused. “No really, I might actually die.”

Twilight huffed out an unpleasantly hot breath. “Oh fine, Mister Grumpy Scales. Here.” She began to beat her wings in Spike’s direction, scaring up a breeze. “Better?”

“Ahhh…” Spike moaned nigh-orgasmically, rolling again to his back in order to catch the brunt of the breeze. “Oh sweet Celestia I can die happy now…”

“It’s not that hot out you know,” Twilight observed. She remained there for nearly two minutes - a princess fanning her assistant - until her wingspurs began to tire. “Maybe I’m not used to anything but basic flying, but for some reason flapping your wings without going anywhere is tiring. Short version - I’m not doing this all day. Why don’t you go get some ice cream?”

Spike was lounging, taking full advantage of royal attention with his talons laced together over his stomach. “You made me promise not to have any more this week after the, uh...thing at the market the other day.”

Twilight shivered as images of whipped cream, sprinkles, and Pinkie Pie danced through her head that she would sooner have opted to unsee. “I did, didn’t I.”

Spike brightened and sat up. “You forgot? Does that mean I can--”

“No!” Twilight held out a foreleg, eyes wide...and took a breath instead, placing the hoof over her chest. “I mean, no. Why don’t you, umm…” a lightbulb went off somewhere behind her eyes, “...swim! How about you go take a dip? We’re done for the afternoon and I bet everypony will be there!”

Spike blinked. As if on a timed delay, a grin slowly parted the horizon of his cheeks like the rising sun. “Hey...why didn’t I think of that!? It’s perfect!” He was up in a flash. “It’s really okay?”

Twilight folded her wings and smiled warmly. “Oh sure it is. I’ve still got a little sorting I want to do, but I can handle it on my own. Go have fun. You earned it.”

Spike didn’t spare a thought for any of this pool toys, lest he have to brave the ‘Broiler of Friendship’ in order to obtain them. Instead he chose to beat a quick retreat to the swimming hole, and was off in a flash.

“Hey!” Twilight called. “I mean it about the ice cream! Especially if Pinkie Pie is around!”

“Right, right,” Spiked waved back. “Have ice cream with Pinkie Pie! Gotcha!”

“No ice cream!” The easily riled by wordplay princess shouted. “No Pinkie Pie! I am not cleaning all that up again!”

Filled with renewed vigor, Spike scampered away with a mischievous giggle on his lips.


*   *   *   *   *


Cascading sunlight reflected from the clear waters of Ponyville’s public swimming hole. They glittered in the eyes of the fast approaching dragon, like a hoard of cool blue sapphires patiently awaiting him. Granted temporary immunity to the scorching afternoon by the promise of relief, Spike bellowed the name of an ancient Native-Equestrian war chief and launched himself from the shore into a proper cannonball, intent upon displacing as much water as his little body could manage in all directions upon hapless ponies.

With his proud draconic crest piercing the water like a prowling shark fin, Spike quickly resurfaced, striking a pose and gleefully spitting out a gout of water like a Canterlot fountain statue.

“Ha, ha, I got you all!” Spike squealed. “Bet you didn’t see that one com--”

The dragon paused when he realized that he was not, in fact, surrounded by the myriad ponies he spied while still on his sortie. The space around him was quite deserted, as though the waters had congealed into a defensive moat the moment they had accepted him. A quick review of his surroundings showed the many ponies had not been a mirage. Some were waving and offering him greeting, but none ventured within splashing distance. Spike returned the greetings, but his crest drooped slightly.

“Aw, dangit...how’d I miss ‘em all like that…”

He batted at the water again, this time with annoyance, and a yelp drew his attention. Before he could identify the source of the sound, he found himself uttering it, as a wall of water twice his height smashed into him, knocking him nearly prone. When he again resurfaced, his gags were met by a pair of high-pitched voices.

“Hah! This time I got you!”

“Geez Scootaloo, not so hard. You’re gonna drown poor Spike! He’s just a little thing y’know.”

“Aw, he can take it as well as he dishes it out.”

“Maybe so, but you’re a pony an’ he’s a dragon. You got a meaner buck than he does!”

“Wh-who’s little!” Spike sputtered, rubbing at his eyes. “I’m totally ferocious and I’m the best splasher around!”

“Yeah? Tell that to my sister,” one of the voices replied. “Buck enough apples for a livin’ and you’ll be bucking water like a pony polo champ, too!”

Spike blinked hard, and at length two ponies near to his own size came into view. He brightened in recognition. “Oh, Scootaloo. Apple Bloom. Heya.”

Scootaloo, who was submerged to her neck in the water, tilted her head and batted her amethyst eyes with concern. “Heya yourself. Sorry about that. Guess I got a little carried away.”

Spike puffed up his chest proudly and waved off the apology. “Nah, it’ll take more than that to stop a dragon! I just fell over to encourage you! It was a pretty good try, after all. Hate to ruin it.”

“Uh-huh,” Scootaloo muttered without conviction. “I’m gonna apologize anyway.”

“And how you got carried away!” Apple Bloom, floating in a small inner tube with goggles strapped to her forehead, interjected. “What got your dander up like that, Scoots?”

Scootaloo added her stubby wings to the work her legs were doing treading water. “It’s just that everypony moved all the sudden when Spike jumped in. I thought he wanted a good splash war so I tried to be like all of them.”

Apple Boom rotated her floaty enough to peer at the merriment of the other ponies. “Come to think of it, they sure did, didn’t they? You think they just didn’t wanna get splashed that bad? Kinda silly when you’re already swimmin’...”

Spike found a rock under the water, stood on it, and shrugged. “Eh, it’s not that. They’re just giving me a wide berth because it’s really hot out today and I breathe fire.”

The fillies paused, and an uneasy glance passed between them. Spike offered no explanation to break up the awkward moment, so Apple Bloom finally ventured to question him.

“...ain’t that kinda mean?”

“Psh, nah,” Spike insisted, “I get it. It’s hot out and they don’t want to be around a dragon that could just make it hotter.”

Scootaloo looked unconvinced. “Could being the keyword there. Do you breathe fire all the time?”

“Of course not,” Spike said, proudly fielding the easy question. “That would be silly!”

Apple Bloom pressed her friend’s point. “Do you breathe fire on ponies?”

“Huh?” Spike was taken aback. “No! I would never do that!”

Scootaloo didn’t let up. “Then why would anypony avoid you on a hot day?”

Spiked opened his mouth, closed it again, and stopped to think. “I...uh…” He let out another snort, “I-I’m sure they don’t mean anything by it. It’s not like they aren’t nice to me.” To prove his point, Spike sought out a group of youngsters and waved gregariously at them until they finally smiled and waved back. “There, see?”

Apple Bloom folded her forelegs and reclined in her inner tube like her old granny on a rocker. “Be that as it may, it still ain’t very nice. You ain’t sick or nothin’, and it’s not like there’s a hot aura brewin’ around you all the time.”

Scootaloo was still paddling with her wings. She reached a hoof up to scratch uncomfortably at the back of her neck. “Yeah, I mean, if they call themselves your friends, that’s...kinda awful.”

Finding himself with no reply, Spike allowed another tense silence to ensue. He broke it up only when he began to fear the fillies would catch on to the the true motivation behind his vehement dismissal of their points. He sought to change the subject.

“Hey, where’s Sweetie Belle? Isn’t she pretty much always with you guys?”

The fillies exchanged another uneasy glance, as the very water around them grew still. This time, Scootaloo broke the silence up.

“Oh...you know. She’s not really...big on swimming.”

“Yeah, uh,” Apple Bloom blundered, “it ain’t like she can’t swim, just...it ain’t so much her thing, yanno?”

Spike didn’t buy the new story any more than the fillies had bought his. “I’ve seen her swimming with you two before. She laughs louder than the both of you put together.”

“Uh, well, sure but, about that…” Scootaloo muttered, breaking eye contact. “Sh-she does like swimming but...she doesn’t, uh...like to go swimming...uh…”

“With other ponies!” Apple Bloom saved. “She doesn’t like swimmin’ around other ponies. Just us.”

“Why not?” Spike plodded on obliviously. “It’s not like the whole town is here. There’s plenty of room in the water if that’s what she’s worried about.”

“It’s...you know,” Scootaloo’s neck-scratching intensified. “She’s...uncomfortable. Embarrassed.”

“Embarrassed about what?”

Apple Bloom grunted, the indirect communication disagreeing with her Apple family nature. “Y’all know ‘about what’! She ain’t comfortable in big groups ‘cause of her...her thing she’s got! Especially in groups where y’might be touchin’ other ponies a lot, like in a pool!”

Curiously, Spike found himself rising to meet Apple Bloom’s outburst rather than shying away from it. “Wait, that again?” I thought we’d all been through that with her. Nopony cares about all that!”

“I don’t care,” Apple Bloom returned, “an’ you don’t care, and ain’t nopony else cares, but--”

“But Sweetie Belle cares,” Scootaloo finished the thought. “Everypony goes to school or trots down the street just like she does, and we’ve both talked to her about it, but she’s still the way she is about the whole thing. She doesn’t wanna come here today and we can’t make her, so...so…”

Apple Bloom fidgeted, birthing ripples in the water around her tube. “So that’s just how it is.”

Spike furrowed his brow. “Do you really think she doesn’t want to be here?”

A lack of response from either crusader softened Spike, who abandoned his interrogation. An uncomfortable question came to him, but he uttered it anyway.

“Don’t you three usually hang out together when one if you is blue?”

Guilt bloomed upon the faces of both crusaders until it threatened to wilt their coats. Apple Bloom completed an entire 360-degree, lazy spin in her tube before she dared to speak.

“We do, but well...there comes a time where y’know that nothing you’re sayin’ is changing a thing, and you just...don’t wanna keep sayin’ it.”

“When it comes to this,” Scootaloo added, “there’s just no getting through to Sweetie Belle. Of course we care about her, but you say things, and then you say more things, the same things over and over, and you just don’t get anywhere, and you don’t wanna feel all down and out anymore, and...uh…”

Apple Bloom ended her friend’s babbling. “It’s like this, Spike. If Twilight suddenly forgot how to read tomorrow, would you think any less of her?”

“Uh, no?” Spike replied as though the answer were obvious. “Of course not, why would I ever think that?”

“Right, a’course you wouldn’t. She’d still be Twilight to you an’ to everypony else who cares about her, so it wouldn’t be a big deal to you, right?”

“Right!”

“But how do you think she’d feel?”

Spike faltered. “It would be...rough, sure, but I’d totally support her and make sure she knows that it’s okay, and everypony understands.”

“An’ if she started acting afraid of being around ponies who were reading, and nothin’ you said could ever change her mind, and she kept insisting she’s weird...then what?”

“I…”

Scootaloo was looking away. “We love Sweetie Belle and we’d do anything for her. But never making any progress just...it gets frustrating.”

“An’ sometimes you gotta...do somethin’ else for awhile,” Apple Bloom added somberly.

Spike thought he understood that. The water was inviting, but he pulled himself up on the shore anyway and stood with purpose.

“I’m gonna talk to her.”

Apple Bloom held up a hoof. “I ain’t so sure that’s a good idea, Spike. We sat with her for an hour an’ it still didn’t do no good. She’s just gotta work this out for herself.”

Scootaloo was poking aimlessly at the water’s surface, looking as though the sun were an interrogation light. “Yeah, I mean, unless you can really say that you know what it’s like, everything comes off to her as ‘you wouldn’t understand’.”

Apple Bloom brightened. “Just take a load off an’ enjoy the water. When she works her head out she’ll come out from them bushes over there and everything will be comin’ up apples again.”

“Apple Bloom!” Scootaloo scolded. “Ix-nay on the atching-way from the, uh...line...sides...ay!”

“What?”

“Don’t tell anypony that Sweetie Belle is watching us all swim from the bushes!”

“...seriously?” Spike huffed. He squared his shoulders, and undaunted by the pussyhoofing of his companions, marched out of earshot.


*   *   *   *   *


There were only so many thick stands of flora around the Ponyville swimming hole sufficient to completely conceal a filly from view. Spike checked several of them without success, wagering that he either had horrible luck, or his quarry was avoiding him. He had never quite figured out how his ears stacked up to those of a pony, but the sound of rustling leaves during his sixth search told him that his problem wasn’t related to luck. The jig was up, and he called out his target’s name in order to bring it to an end.

There, at the center of a clearing in a particularly large thicket, sat Sweetie Belle. She was blowing pensively on a blossom from a lilac bush just to watch it flutter in place. Her appearance, however, was more of note to Spike than her activities. Her hips and cutie mark were completely obscured by a tight, uncomfortable looking pair of black gym shorts with a royal blue speed line running up either side.

Spike emerged from the brush and stood dumbly in the clearing, feeling like a dog who had caught the carriage he was chasing and now didn’t know what to do with it. “Uh...hi.”

“Hi.”

“How’s it...going?”

“Eh,” Sweetie Belle muttered without making eye contact.

“That flower looks...stuck there pretty good. Guess that’s a big job, huh.”

“Sure is,” Sweetie Belle replied between lazy puffs.

Spike was losing his patience, primarily because the filly was rubbing his sensitive work ethic the wrong way by not taking her task seriously, regardless of how inconsequential it was. He stepped further into the clearing and spread his arms at the scene before him.

“Come on, what are you doing in here? It’s like the whole town got magicked into a volcano today. Come take a dip with us and cool off.”

“I’m not hot,” Sweetie Belle replied dismissively.

“I can see you sweating. You are too hot.”

Sweetie Belle took to batting at the blossom with a hoof instead of blowing on it. She looked down and began to make a show out of examining the dry dirt. “I just don’t want to go swimming today, okay?”

Spike was not deterred. “But you’re wearing swim trunks.”

“They’re not swim trunks,” the young unicorn insisted. “They’re gym shorts.”

“Po-tay-toe, po-tah-toe,” Spike replied. “You’ve still got them on, and school’s out for summer. Plus those are cut for a colt.”

The wheels began turning in Sweetie Belle’s head. “Uh...didn’t you know? Colt gym shorts are the latest fashion trend!”

“...colt gym shorts.”

“Yes…?”

“...are a fashion trend.”

“Yes…!”

“...for filles.”

“A-absolutely!” Sweetie Belle sputtered, finally turning to meet the gaze of her verbal jousting partner. “I should know! With a big sister like mine, I totally have my hoof on the pulse of the fashion industry!”

Spike came closer. “You know, you’re my friend. And as my friend, I have an obligation to tell you that you’re a really bad liar.”

Sweetie Belle took a deep breath in preparation to argue further, but found that she couldn’t come up with any more excuses. She deflated, her ears drooping. “I told Apple Bloom and Scootaloo to stop wasting their afternoon and go have fun. You should too. It’s hot out.”

“Tell me something I don’t know,” Spike retorted sardonically. With a stubbornness borne of his species, Spike plopped down into a sitting position and folded his arms tighter. “Not going anywhere.”

“Wh-why not?”

“‘I don’t wanna go swimming’,” Spike recited.

“S-sure you do!”

“So do you.”

“No I don’t!”

“Well then neither do I,” Spike insisted. “If it’s okay for you it’s okay for me too, right?”

“I don’t wanna ruin your afternoon!” Sweetie Belle blurted.

“Then go swimming with me.”

“Ohh!” Sweetie Belle darkened with frustration and hopelessness for her cause. “Why do you always have to be so stubborn!”

Spike grinned and rolled his eyes skyward to appreciate the imaginary halo hovering above his crest. “Have you ever tried to move a sleeping dragon? Besides, you have to be stubborn when you’re a princess-assistant. Twilight would never come out of the library if it weren’t for me!”

Sweetie Belle did her best, but ultimately failed to stifle a giggle. “Is she really that bad?”

“Tch, are you kidding?” Spike puffed up proudly. “She’d never be on time for anything if it wasn’t for me. She wouldn’t even get out of bed on time!”

“I heard you sleep like you’re under a spell,” Sweetie Belle childed.

“Yeah well...fine maybe not that part, but you gotta be stubborn when your friends forget to eat or sleep because books.” He softened. “Or when they don’t do something they wanna do because they’re stuck inside their own heads.”

Sweetie Belle’s smile evaporated as quickly as it had come. Her cheeks flushed and she took her eyes off her friend. “It’s not in my head. It’s between my legs. I’ve seen the way some ponies look at me.”

“Ponies aren’t looking at you--”

“Yes they are!” Sweetie Belle snapped. “See? This is just what I mean when I tell Apple Bloom and Scootaloo that they don’t really get it!” She paused to take a calming breath. “And I’m not trying to be mean to them, it’s just...I’m the one who has this...thing...and so it’s natural that I’m gonna notice ponies staring more. They’re all nice to me in public, and I know my sister and my friends care about me, but...they don’t see the glances or hear the comments from ponies who don’t think I saw or heard them.”

“Well, so what if ponies are looking at you?” Spiked replied. “If anypony is going to be like that, what good is their opinion anyway? Just ignore it.”

Sweetie Belle shrank. “That’s easy to say when it’s not you they’re looking at and talking about.” She glanced down at her shorts. “I don’t even know if I’m a filly or a colt sometimes…”

“That’s just silly,” Spike rhymed. “You’re totally a filly!”

“Are you sure?”

“Sure I’m sure. You walk like a filly, sound like a filly, you’ve got, um...eyelashes like a filly…” ideas began to fail him, “...you have a filly name, uh…”

Sweetie Belle sighed and flopped onto her stomach, her chin in the dirt. She raised a foreleg and pointed behind her at her shorts. “Then how do you explain what’s under here, huh?”

Spike scratched the side of his head and searched for the right thing to say. “Everypony’s a little different…”

“But I don’t want to be different!” Sweetie Belle wailed. She smacked the dirt with a hoof and sent up a cloud of dry dust, which invaded her snout and made her sneeze so hard she sat back up. “It’s weird! Ponies don’t know what to make of me and I just wanna be normal!”

Spike didn’t know what to say. So he said the first thing that came to his mind.

“Welcome to my world.”

Sweetie Belle paused in the middle of a melodramatic gesture and glanced at the dragon out of the corner of her eye. “Huh?”

Spike shook his head. “There’s no such thing as normal. Scootaloo is a pegasus who can’t fly. Silver Spoon can’t see without her glasses. Apple Bloom talks kinda funny, and sometimes I wonder if Vinyl Scratch can even talk at all.”

Sweetie Belle began twiddling her hooves. “Those...that’s not the same thing…”

Spike threw his arms wide. “I’m a dragon.”

“So?”

Spike got to his feet and began pacing in a small circle as he spoke. “I’m the only dragon. The only one in Ponyville, Canterlot, Manehattan, Appleoosa, or just about anywhere else in Equestria. I walk on two legs, pick up stuff with claws, am covered in scales, and I can make fire come out of my mouth. Without magic. I also barf and it counts as a delivery service.”

Sweetie Belle let another tiny giggle fly. “But that’s not weird, Spike. All that is just who you are!”

Spike stopped, folded his arms, and fixed Sweetie Belle with a knowing stare. The unicorn faltered.

“I mean...but...y-you’re a dragon so all of that is normal for you...I’m a filly and I’m not supposed to have a...you know…”

“Dragons have wings,” Spiked replied. “I don’t have wings. Dragons are big and ferocious...well, most of them are. I’m not. But you know what I do have in common with other dragons?” He stepped to the edge of the thicket and brushed back the flora of another lilac bush to expose the score of ponies having fun at the swimming hole. “Dragons equal fire. In my case, that means ponies avoid me on hot days.”

“But you don’t breathe fire all the time,” Sweetie Belle pointed out, much as her friends had done earlier.

“Doesn’t matter,” Spike let go of the bush. “Dragon equals fire.”

Sweetie Belle touched a hoof to her chin. “I-I’m sure they don’t mean anything by it…”

“Of course they don’t,” Spike agreed. “But they’re gonna keep doing it anyway. They don’t even realize they’re doing it.”

“They still accept you for who you are though.”

“Yep,” Spike nodded. “So even if they do glance now and then, how many times do they need to actually tell you that same thing before you’ll believe it?”

“But...it’s...I…”

“Ponies look at stuff that’s a little different from what they’re used to, that’s all.” Spike pushed the thicket back again to expose the inviting waters, “It’s hot today. Let’s go swimming.”

Sweetie Belle wore a somber smile. “Can we just...talk for a little while first?”

“Sure!” Spike plopped down and patted the spot next to him, which Sweetie Belle occupied with a curling of her tail around her flank. “Whattaya wanna talk about?”

“It...doesn’t matter,” the young unicorn replied. She paused for a time to enjoy the sweet melody of afternoon locusts. “Hey.”

“Yeah?”

“Say all that again to me later if I look like I need it, okay?”

“You bet.”

“...hey.”

“Yeah?” Spike replied again.

“What do you think? Am I a filly or not?”

Spike picked one of the lilac sprigs and stood long enough to arrange it in Sweetie Belle’s mane, just behind her ear. “You’re totally a filly. Dragon’s honor on that. Always trust a dragon when he puts his honor on something. It’s a dragon code thing.”

On a scorching August afternoon, a young filly and an infantile dragon chose conversation over a refreshing dip. They sat together until Celestia’s grace had nearly disappeared beyond the horizon.
> 2 - Epiphanies and Yak Juice
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------


Manehattan. November, 2028.


Sometimes Spike wondered why he even bothered.

The gray hoodie that he was rarely without these days was a garment designed for a dragon, but constructed by pony hooves. It had never fit quite right, and though the wool was cozy and the front pocket ample enough for his claws, he felt an itch on his scales within it that fuzzy ponies simply could not understand. Wool also had a habit for attracting hair, and since he had none of his own, nobody was as sensitive as he to the feeling of carrying along with himself a piece of every pony he happened to bump into. Wearing the hoodie in the rain was nonsensical given that his bare scales were better protection from the drops, but the item had been a hoofmade gift from a special friend. Spike treasured every fiber -- right down to the ‘Rarity for You’ tag printed just above the washing instructions on the inside hem.

The cool drizzle of a wet, pre-winter Manehattan night was soaking Spike via his outfit, but it would take a colder day - in Tartarus perhaps - before he chanced to go out without his beloved hoodie. Eschewing an umbrella, he was subject to the occasional blow to the eye by a single drop. Each occurrence transformed every city light to a sparkling show of kaleidoscopic crystals, which he enjoyed until being obliged to pull one claw forth from his pocket to rub the water out of his face.

His destination was familiar enough that he could have taken ten minutes off the trip simply by leading, but the white unicorn at point was marching with purpose, and he was well used to willingly placing himself in her trail. The glow of Rarity’s magic upon the ensorcelled umbrella above her head cast a pleasing sapphire glow, which flowed into the dark corners of the winding labyrinth of city streets. She had said little in the hour since he had hastily offered to set out in the rain with her, and he hadn’t offered any consolation for the number of high-class clients she was forced to walk out on at the boutique.

Rarity was taking the long way to Manehattan South Side Community College - the only route known by those who were visitors of, but not themselves students. Spike could have suggested one of the many shortcuts he knew by heart, but he knew also that it was best not to disturb the fabulous matriarch when her chin was held at an angle beyond ninety degrees. Rarity’s tail was flicking like a whip, and the young-adult dragon was mesmerized by it as surely as when he had been only knee-high to it.

Spike closed his claw around the tiny box in his front pocket and finally found his voice, but Rarity beat him to forming actual words.

“This is the best way to the dorms, isn’t it Spike?”

Spike pointed weakly at the narrow path through a park that Rarity had already passed. “Well, actually when you’re here every day, you learn about the shortcu--”

“In there?” Rarity wrinkled her muzzle at the dark canopy of trees. “Darling, you simply cannot be serious. Why, Celestia only knows what manner of roughians a Venus in Furs such as myself could run afoul of in such a place on the quintessential dark and stormy night.”

“It’s just students who go through there to get to the dorms…”

“Indeed!” Rarity agreed. “All the more reason, I think.” Her neck wrapped in faux finery, she slowed her pace until she came up beside him, and then flashed Spike a lavish grim from behind the blue-lensed glasses on her muzzle that were just for show. “It pays to be safe dear, but if any misfortune were to befall us, certainly I would be well-protected, no?”

Rarity was only in her thirties, but the veritable fashion empire that had kept her on the front page was no small task to maintain; not to mention the regular travel it required all over the country. Years of friendship with Applejack had even inspired the fashionista to open up a ‘country chic’ boutique as far south as Appleoosa. Thus, at her behest, sales of rhinestone-encrusted cowfilly hats were teaming up with bohemian shawls to create a whole new generation of farmpony style. Rarity had a reasonable amount of trust in her managers, but she was simply not the type to sit back and keep her hooves out of the pot while the bits rolled in. She was as a result possibly the hardest-working pony Spike knew, and she tickled every fancy he had, right down to his appreciation for honest labor. The differences in their aging processes meant nothing to him. Her sapphire eyes blended with her shades and glowed beyond the slight age-lines around her muzzle; shining as brightly as the day he had met her.  The few strands of early gray in her mane were dustings of silver of fairydust above a purple midnight sky, all of which presided over the gleaming white perfection of her coat.

Spike had become a student at the encouragement of Twilight and he was happy with that choice, but he had been following Rarity for so long, she captured nearly all of his attention whenever she happened to be in town.

“O-of course!” Spike puffed up like his once-infantile self, though he was slightly taller than the average adult mare now. “It would take a hundred cities - a thousand cities full of thugs before a single one made it past me!”

Rarity lightly stroked a hoof just under Spike’s chin. It was a gesture more apropos to the dragon as a baby, but it elicited a shiver from him anyway. “I have no doubt that you will protect me come what may, my Dear.”

“I’m sure Sweetie Belle is just fine!” Spike blurted, caught up in the sunny moment. “We’ll just go and get her again, and everything will be great. You’ll see.”

The moment Spike uttered the word ‘again’, he realized he had said too much. Rarity’s expression eclipsed the sun faster than Luna could have done it from the heavens. She marched back to the front and continued on her roundabout path to the dorms, allowing a terse ‘hmph’ to pass for a reply.


*   *   *   *   *


While his ears remained in doubt, Spike had no doubts about the efficiency of his snout when compared to ponykind. His certainty was reaffirmed when he noticed Rarity’s muzzle wiggling in perfect time with his, the moment a certain odor that was permeating the quad invaded it. To him the scent was of minor concern, but he sighed when he observed the widened eyes of the adult unicorn, who had never experienced the world of undergraduate education.

Rarity looked shocked. “I-is that...??”

Spike brought down his damp hood and sheepishly scratched the back of his neck. “Um...yeah, but it’s not what you think--”

“H-how can the school possibly allow this sort of substance to be here??” Rarity’s voice rose beyond a personal level, such that Spike wondered just how much it would amplify in the ears of the young, smoke-enhanced ponies strewn about the large room.

“W-well, they don’t...really allow it officially, but you know, being a student is stressful and this is technically off-campus, and, uh...i-it’s just not a huge big deal…”

“Not a big deal?” Rarity repeated. She took another deep breath and coughed, as if giving her nostrils dramatic affront somehow proved her point. In a flourish she stuffed her umbrella in a basket, stowed her artsy glasses in her stole, and swept into the room, heedless of the students she was stepping over until she tripped on one and nearly fell. “M-mother f--” She quickly collected herself, “--of Pearl! Is this a student dormitory or merely where they stack the bodies!?”

Spike tried to make his ‘keep it down’ gesture with his claws as polite as possible. “It was a party and it’s over now, so everpony’s sleeping…”

“On the floor?” Rarity’s head darted around, “and the couch? And the back of the couch? And the dining room table? And the ottoman?”

“That’s not an ottoman, it’s just a stack of pizza boxes…”

“And the stack of pizza boxes?” Rarity appended without breaking stride, “and the kitchen sink?” She paused then, blinking towards the kitchen. “My word, how did that young gentlecolt even get himself into that position…”

“Th-they don’t all live here,” Spike attempted.

“And one another?” Rarity went on with her checklist tirade of strange sleeping habits.

Spike glanced in Rarity’s direction and erked. In the ratty, gray quad, with modest facilities that were in need of cleaning, Rarity was staring at a young couple who were too busy making out on the floor to even realize they were being watched. Strewn about them were spent cans of beverages they were likely only barely old enough to imbibe, though their silly giggles and clumsy kisses proved that they had. Spike watched helplessly as Rarity’s cheeks filled with color and her ear twitched. He knew that the dissonant music coming from a record player in another room was not her style, but he doubted that was what she was reacting to.

Rarity’s brow narrowed. She spoke through gritted teeth, her voice low enough that it was no more likely to get the couple’s attention than her previous shouting. She did not phrase her inquiry as a question.

“Where is she.”

Spike stepped in, pulling Rarity’s attention from the young lovers. “I-I dunno, but try not to worry too much, I’m sure she’s not--”

Rarity thrust out a hoof to silence her companion. She stepped away from the inebriated makeout session, made to sit down, found a snoring colt with powdered cheese stains in his coat taking up the entire couch, and paused to collect her breath.

“Spike, you’re a student at this university too, yes?”

“Uh, yeah?”

She fixed him with a look. “And you have been to this place before, have you not?”

Spike withered, feeling as short as he had been the first time he came to Ponyville. “...y-yeah.”

Having collected herself, Rarity did not lash out. She was in fact quite calm, which only unnerved the dragon even more. “This is the third time in as many months I have had to pick Sweetie Belle up from one of these places, but I have never been to this one in particular. You’ll be a dear and show me where I can likely find my little sister in this quaint establishment, won’t you?”

Spike felt the words lance him as surely as the icy breath of a windigo. He swallowed and made slowly for the stairs. “Sure...yeah…”

Rarity fell in this time, matching two hoofbeats for every one of Spike’s steps as the pair climbed a set of creaky stairs. Every door save one was carelessly left wide open, allowing the aftermath of each debaucherous scene to be easily inspected for the elimination of Rarity’s quarry. Eventually there were no portals left save for the closed one, which by mere process of elimination had to be their goal. Rarity wasted no time. Ensorcelling the knob, she twisted hard to yank the door open before Spike could so much as brush his talons against it.

The room beyond was cast in a haze by the filtering rays of the moon through a worn window blind. The furnishings labelled it a student’s bedchamber, though all manner of clutter was strewn about the carpet, desk, and dresser in sufficient quantities to upset the sensibilities of the compulsive. It was enough of an affront to Rarity to find that the clothes belonged to a lady, but the scene upon the bed stirred in her a gasp that pierced the air and froze it solid.

There sat Sweetie Belle with her back against the wall. She had her hind legs spread in the manner of a stallion, and between them rose the slate gray spire she had often hidden beneath gym shorts as a youth. It was twitching, a bead of moisture formed at the tip; the shaft was enveloped in a deep vermillion glow of magic that matched the gaudy crusting of eyeshadow upon her. Black eyeliner in a thick layer matched the ebony t-shirt she wore, while the six silver rings piercing her right ear caught the glow of the magical light. Her horn was alive with the sage green unicorn magic she had been born with, making it obvious that she was not lost in the throes of masturbation.

Rarity thrust a hoof towards Spike’s chest. The dragon glanced down, realizing the gesture had been meant for where his eyes had been years ago, and politely took to examining the posters of rock bands on the walls. Tucked between Sweetie Belle’s hind legs was another young mare around her age. Dressed and painted almost exactly like her partner, the unknown differed only in position, the rust color of her coat, and the glow from her horn, was was distinctly vermillion. Her magic was clearly at work on Rarity’s sister, and the green glow emanating from under her elevated tail suggested the attention was mutual. The smiled from both students burned away like parchment under Rarity’s gaze; two sets of eyes turning to meet her.

“R-Rarity!?” Sweetie Belle blurted. An accusatory glare fell in the mousey dragon’s direction. “Spike! What are you...why is she…??”

Spike could only shrug. “You, uh...said you needed to be picked up.”

“I’m kinda busy!” Sweetie Belle waved dramatically at herself.

Spike forced himself to continue staring at the posters. “Y-you said you needed help! How was I supposed to know what you needed help with??”

“I never said--!” Sweetie Belle paused, her light and that of her partner winking out. She glanced at the telephone. “Wait...did I?”

“You most certainly did say, young lady,” Rarity cut in, her gaze hewn from granite. “And judging by the fact that there are even more offensive odors up here than downstairs, I suspect you simply forgot.”

Sweetie Belle looked down at her marefriend. “Did I…?”

The young pony only shrugged obliviously, slowly lowering her tail until Rarity cleared her throat.

“Excuse me, young miss,” The fashionable visitor oozed with no small amount of sarcasm. “But that is my little sister whose lower torso you have become so fond of. Would you be so kind as to allow a pair of siblings a moment to confer. A private moment?”

The mare sat up, fumbled for her glasses from the nightstand, and glanced between the sisters, a stray curl falling over her eye. “But this is my room…”

Rarity merely cleared her throat again, louder this time. Sweetie Belle rolled her eyes and offered her friend the most reassuring, lopsided smile she could manage. “Moony, uh...do you mind? Just for a bit?”

The rusty unicorn could have sworn that Rarity was on the verge of breathing fire. She returned the weak smile to her friend, slunk off the bed, and gave Rarity a wide berth on her way to the door. “S-sure. I...prolly should check on the house anyways.” She nodded with familiarity to Spike, who returned the gesture before she disappeared into the hall.

Rarity narrowed her eyes at her sister. “I’m waiting.”

Sweetie Belle rocked her head back against the wall and let out a dreamy sigh, her erection still proud. “What for?”

Rarity pawed at the carpet, restraining herself from stamping her hoof. “For an explanation, as well you can imagine.”

“Huh?” Sweetie Belle seemed genuinely oblivious until a substance-addled lightbulb flickered to life in her brain. She glanced at the door. “Oh, Moony? Eh, it’s not what you’re thinking. We’re just friends. She spins records with me at the DJ gig on the campus radio station.”

“Friends?” Rarity repeated, pointing unabashedly at Sweetie Belle’s thick girth. “Is that what you do when you’re ‘just friends’ with a pony?”

“Sure I guess,” Sweetie Belle shrugged. “Aw, you know how it is. College experimentation and all. It’s totally no biggie!”

Rarity scowled. “I’m sure you’ll both still be saying that when she winds up pregnant.”

Spike meeped and took a step back as the already frigid air in the room was involuntarily sucked away. Sweetie Belle bapped her hoof against the mattress.

“Hey! That’s not fair!”

Rarity huffed. “Isn’t it? One thing leads to another, and before you know it--”

“You think I don’t know how the birds and the bees work?” Sweetie Belle interrupted.

“I think you’re young. And young ponies plus hormones and drugs equals--”

“Ugh!” Sweetie Belle countered. “There you go again, mother henning me! It’s not like that, and I wouldn’t just go and do that to her like it was nothing! That’s not even what we were doing!”

“Maybe not tonight it’s not…”

“I’m not a colt!” Sweetie Belle exclaimed. “I’m not just gonna breed whoever lets me get close to them!”

Spike made a face. “Hey, I resent--”

“Quiet Spike!” Two voices sent the dragon further into the corner of the room, which he quickly determined was the safest place to be.

“You’re right,” Rarity retorted. “You’re not a colt. But a certain something seems to cause you to think that way often enough.”

“Psh,” Sweetie Belle spat. “You’re just jealous because you don’t have one!”

Rarity sputtered. “M-me? With a…? Oh don’t be ridiculous dear. It wouldn’t suit my couture one bit!”

“But it does suit my...coat bore?” Sweetie Belle slapped her chest with a hoof. “What does that word even mean anyway?”

Rarity was nonchalantly examining one of her own hooves. “You might know, if you weren’t languishing away in a community college.”

Spike stiffened. “Hey wait a sec, that’s not fa--”

A spark of something ugly ignited behind Sweetie Belle’s eyes, casting their normal emerald luster in the murky green of a changeling hive. She gritted her teeth, and her words came in a hiss.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“You know very well that it’s ‘supposed’ to mean,” Rarity replied with infuriating calmness. “Sweetie Belle, you’re just…” She gestured to the entire room. “You’re so much better than this! You have so much potential, darling. You’re adorable, you’re chic, you have a fantastic runway swagger, poise, a projecting voice...we can afford the absolute best in education for your future, yet here you sit!”

“A runway swagger?” Sweetie Belle spat, “Really? Is that what you think I want for my life? To follow in my big sister’s hoofsteps?”

Rarity backpeddled, but only slightly. “Well...no of course not dear, but you could be anything you want to be. Why waste yourself in a place like this…?”

“It’s community college, Rarity,” Sweetie Belle snarled. “Not jail! Spike goes here, so Twilight must approve of it! My friends are here, I like the curriculum...I’m happy here!”

“But your future, dear…”

“Did you go to college?”

Rarity paused. “What?”

“Did you? Did you even go at all? We’re not all fashion-savants, Rarity. I wanna get into broadcasting, and I need to go to school for that!”

“And I’m certain what you’re doing right now is a regular part of your studies,” Rarity sighed. “All the things you could be, Sweetie Belle…”

Sweetie Belle lewdly grabbed her extra organ and presented it. “What are you planning to do about this if I get a job as a runway model, huh? What are you gonna do about my big, thick, veiny, bobbing stallionmeat, huh? You know, the one I’m clearly gonna use to get all my friends pregnant?”

Rarity actually smiled. “Oh psh, don’t even worry about that. We can make you a nice cozy for it! Why, I can match the style of any outfit fo well that nopony would ever even notice!”

“REALLY, Rarity??”

“B-but,” Rarity sputtered, “you just asked what we could do about it, isn’t that just inspired?”

“Ugh! Don’t you even know sarcasm when you hear it?” Sweetie Belle scooted to the edge of the bed and reared, presenting herself. “Does it bother you that your sister has a girl hole and a cock?”

“You know I don’t feel that way about it…”

“Yeah? Maybe it would bother you less if we glue it to my stomach so nopony will see it whenever you dress me with your eyes?”

Rarity’s eyes narrowed. “That’s uncalled for. You know I love you.”

“You have an awfully ‘couture’ way of showing it!”

“Don’t point that thing at me.”

“Think you’re gonna end up pregnant if you stare at it too long? Look at this!” In a flash of movement, Sweetie Belle slapped the side of her head and shoved her sweat-matted mane out of the way. Beneath the hanging palisades of her pastel tresses was a barren field of shaved stubble. Dyed blue, the weeds covered nearly the entire side of her head, like some sort of gothic fungus had latched on and begun to seep into her brain. That was the analogy Rarity formed anyway, as the fashionista gasped and staggered, a hoof over her heart.

“Wh-what did you do to yourself!?”

Sweetie Belle turned her head to the weak light so her sister could get a good look. “See? I knew you’d overreact.”

Rarity felt a sudden, dizzying desire for her fainting couch, “B-but...but your beautiful mane, you...you cut a Daring Do machete jungle path through it!”

Sweetie Belle repeated her big sister’s last few words in a nasaly tone and then added, “It’s not a big deal. Moony and I did it together. It’s a friendship thing.”

Rarity presented a hoof as if it held the skull of Yorick and announced “Forgive me dear, but I fail to understand how mutually-inflicted grooming wounds factor into the magic of friendship.”

Sweetie Belle folded her forelegs, turned away, and angled her chin in a way she learned, ironically, from her big sis. “Of course you don’t understand. You never do.”

Rarity’s deeply-furrowed brows rose slightly. “I’m trying to understand dear, I just don’t follow how shaving your head and becoming inebriated at frat parties until lewdness ensues equates to--”

“Just go.”

“Excuse me?”

“Leave,” Sweetie Belle didn’t move a muscle. “If that’s how you’re going to be about it, then just get out of here.”

“But you called me here, darling.”

The younger unicorn felt her voice cracking. “I-I know just...i-it was a false alarm...I’ll be fine, s-so since you’re probably here just to save face, you can save it better if we just pretend this never happened.”

Rarity grew dark. Spike mouthed Sweetie Belle’s name and cringed.

“I came here because I love you and I was worried about you!” Rarity cried. “Maybe you’re right, maybe I don’t understand you completely. But how dare you accuse me of not caring! I wouldn’t touch a sewing needle again ever in my life if I thought it would make you happy, s-so for you to say...something like th-that…”

Sweetie Belle said nothing. Spike, a hard glare on his face, finally took over her for her, interposing himself between the sisters.

“Rarity, she didn’t mean it. She’s been drinking. She loves you, she just doesn’t know what to feel right now. Let’s just go. She’s staying with a friend, she’ll be fine, and cooler heads will prevail in the morning.” Spike found himself puffing up a bit as he delivered a speech his surrogate mother would surely have been proud of.

Rarity’s mascara was running. She ensorcelled three small objects on the desk before realizing none of them were her umbrella, and finally spun on her heels towards the door. “Oh, I’m going alright! I can see where I’m not wanted, and clearly it won’t do for one such as I to grace this five-star establishment with my lowly presence any longer!”

“I-it’s not like that…” Spike started, as was his habit, to fall in with his unrequited paramour. “Your umbrella is downstairs, let me get it for you…”

“Not now, Spike!”

The dragon found himself accosted by one of the elegant snowy hooves he had long adored. “Wh-what? But I...I can help…”

Rarity was in hysterics, and her venom was spewing liberally in every direction. “I am not an invalid, Spike! I do not require constant assistance with every miniscule task I undertake!”

“I...no, that’s not what I--”

“Doesn’t Twilight have something for you to do your assistant-ing with? You spend so much time following me around that it’s any wonder you have a mind of your own at all. You’re a dragon, not a dog!”

Spike couldn’t believe what he was hearing. At a loss, he fumbled for the little box concealed in his hoodie. The abject terror of loss welled up inside, and it forced to the surface the confession he had kept bottled up for years, just to have a reply.

“B-but Rarity...I lo...I lov--”

“Hmph!”

With an unflattering snort, Rarity smacked the door so hard it snapped back and slammed shut as she crossed the threshold. In an instant, the room fell back into the cold embrace of a skipping record at its terminus and the patter of rain just beyond the thin window blinds. As for the dragon, the sounds were as much lost to his ears as the sensation of the carpet was to his knees when he sunk upon it.

For at time, there was nothing. Unicorn and dragon sat in silence, backs to one another, each stewing in a marinade of their own emotional juices. Sweetie Belle kept her attention on the blanched stucco in between two rock band posters until she was certain the silence indicated emptiness. The therefore gasped with surprise when she turned to find Spike still sitting on the floor, watching the entrance as though in worship. He stirred, but only to wiggle his ear-crests.

“Oh, uh, sorry. I’ll go.”

Sweetie Belle turned swiftly away. “She didn’t mean it Spike. She’s upset.”

“That’s what I was trying to tell her about you,” Spike replied. “What was all that just now?”

Sweetie Belle shrank. “I...I dunno. When she gets all high and mighty like that it just...drives me up a wall, and...well…”

“AND,” Spike made a puffing gesture with his lips. “You’ve been doing more than just drinking tonight.”

The unicorn’s eyes were on her lap. She began, of all things, to pensively bat around her own flaccid girth. “It calms me down. It’s not hurting anything and it’s not like you’ve never done it.”

Spike rose to his feet and pulled up his hood. He smiled, but the gesture was as empty as his countenance. “I should go. I’ve, uh...got school tomorrow.”

“She didn’t mean it Spike,” Sweetie Belle repeated.

Spike paused, one claw on the doorknob. “I know, but she’s still right. I’ve been following her for almost twenty years. It’s never gonna happen. She’s just not into me.”

Sweetie Belle managed a smile. “I’ve never heard you admit it so brazenly before. You were about to tell her everything, weren’t you.”

“Yep. I...didn’t know what else to say. I just...needed to say something.”

“Something to keep it from ending,” Sweetie Belle drew the conclusion on her own.

Spike’s grip tightened on the doorknob. “What...do I do now?”

Sweetie Belle shrugged and flicked her weighted ear, her six rings tinkling. “You’re asking the wrong pony. According to my sister I don’t have it together either.”

“She didn’t mean--”

“I know, I know,” Sweetie Belle waved a hoof. “She didn’t mean it. I didn’t mean it. You didn’t mean it. Nopony meant it. Tomorrow we’ll talk again, make up, and everything will...just be the same again…”

Spike stepped back into the room until the sepia glow from the blinds cast his face in relief. With a great sigh, he deflated onto the bed, and his claw shot out to nab the bottle of spirits on the nightstand. He thought to sniff it before sending its contents down the hatch, and wrinkled his snout in confusion.

“What...is this stuff?”

“Oh, that’s, ummm…” Sweetie Belle leaned over to grab a whiff of her own. “It’s, well it’s…” she scooted to the edge of the bed next to her companion and tilted her head, scrutinizing the half-consumed concoction. “It’s...blue!”

Spike turned the bottle’s label toward the weak light and squinted. “This reads like something Twilight would disappear into her study and spend a week deciphering. And by that I mean, I have no idea what it says.”

Sweetie Belle looked sheepish. “Well, it has a picture of a yak on it and the clerk said only one in every ten bottles make it out of Yakyakistan, because the quality control yaks smash anything that’s not perfect. Real top shelf stuff! Moony and I wanted...you know...” she spun her hoof in the air, “the good stuff.”

Spike made a face at the bottle. “What does it taste like?”

“Turpentine,” Sweetie Belle observed. “The clerk at the liquor store down the street has a silver muzzle on his flank. Now we know why I guess, eh heh...”

“But you drank half of it.”

Sweetie Belle shrugged. “It was expensive. Can’t let it just go to waste, right? It’s so potent that it didn’t really matter what it tasted like, but that was hours ago and I’m totally fine nowwwhoa!”

The unicorn’s attempt to downplay her inebriation by standing up on the bed resulted in dismal failure. She pitched forward and might have smacked her chin against the bed frame onn her way down, had Spike not tossed the bottle aside and swept the hapless equine youth into his lap. In an instant they were muzzle-to-snout, each pair of eyes gaping at the other. Spike spoke first, his draconic irises occasionally making a futile attempt to dart away.

“I, uh...think I spilled yak juice all over your carpet. Sorry.”

“It’s Moony’s carpet. And that wouldn’t be the worst thing that ever got spilled on it.” Sweetie Belle blushed slightly. “Thanks by the way.”

Spike cleared his throat and broke up the moment by returning his companion to a sitting position on the bed. “S-sure. Uh...where is Moony anyway?”

“Moony? Psh,” Sweetie Belle snerked. “She probably got tired and shut herself up in the broom closet again. She’s bigtime agoraphobic. We always find her in the broom closet after a party. It’s safe and cozy for her in there.”

Spike pondered. The he grabbed a pillow and threw it on the floor.

“What are you doing?”

“Making a place to sleep.”

“Uh, okay...why?”

“Because even though you’re talking coherently to me, that yak junk did something weird to you. You can’t walk in a straight line and I bet you don’t remember what you did with your keys. Plus, there’s only one broom closet in this whole place and there are like seventeen drunk colts all over the building.”

Sweetie Belle couldn’t argue with the comment about her keys, but she found a retort all the same. “I know every one of them. They’re cool.”

“They’re all either drunk, high, or both,” Spike insisted. “I get that you’re not a colt, but...you must have some idea what it’s like when you’re feeling good and there are cute fillies around.”

Sweetie Belle rolled her eyes. “Now you’re starting to sound like my sister. I can take care of myself.”

“And you’re still being stubborn,” Spike shot back. “But have it your way. I guess I’m just staying because I don’t want to walk home in the rain.”

Sweetie Belle thought to defend her point again, but Spike was planted solidly in his place and didn’t look like he planned to be moved. His eyes were focused firmly on the door, as if he planned to leap into action to protect her honor at any moment. It was the thought that counted, after all.

“...well...thanks for, uh...not getting yourself wet walking home, then.”

“Eeyup.”

The two sat in silence until the patter of raindrops became deafening. Sweetie Belle slunk off the bed and reset the record player. She then flopped back down onto the mattress behind Spike to the cadence of smooth, jazz fusion rock. She exhaled and gazed up at the ceiling.

“I’m not wasting my life,” She justified aloud. “I’m happy with what I have. Rarity just says stuff like that when she’s trying to push my buttons.”

Spike still hadn’t moved from sentinel duty at the edge of the bed, but he changed the subject abruptly. “Bet you don’t know what my major is.”

Sweetie Belle’s eyes didn’t come off the ceiling. “Huh...actually no, I don’t. What is it?”

“Interior design.”

“...you’re kidding.”

“I’m not.”

“Why did you pick that? Do you like interior design?”

“Not really.”

“Then why--”

“Because I thought it would go well with Rarity’s fashion sense. My counselor told me majoring in that is a bad idea unless I back it up with a business minor or something. But I did it anyway, because Rarity. Because I’m an idiot, I guess.”

“You’re not an--”

“Sure I am,” Spike scoffed. “Rarity’s my friend, and I know she cares about me. But that’s all. She doesn’t love me, she never did love me, and hanging around her all the time is just me trying to make her love me, which is even worse. I follow her around anyway though, because I don’t want to admit to any of that, and...that’s all I know to do with myself.”

Sweetie Belle crossed her forelegs behind her head and reclined, her eyes on Spike’s back. In no more mood to pussyhoof around the issue than was the dragon, she spoke directly. “Why are you telling me this?”

Spike was taken off-guard. “I...can’t?”

“Sure you can, but why now? And why to me?”

“...because I’ve told myself all that stuff I just said a thousand times, but I can’t get it through to me anyway. I thought...maybe you could. I need somepony to talk some sense into me, and we’ve been doing that for each other since I got you to stop wearing those dumb gym shorts everywhere way back when.” Spike paused. “You wanna know a secret?”

“Sure…?”

“Remember that love poison you girls cooked up for Miss Cheerliee years ago?”

Sweetie Belle shuddered. “How could I forget? We didn’t think it would do all the stuff it did.”

“Yeah well, when I first heard about it, neither did I. And the first thing I wanted to do was give it to Rarity.”

“That’s...not so weird. You changed your mind when you found out it was really a poison, right?”

“Of course I did,” Spike admitted. “But...a tiny part of me still wanted to give it to her anyway.”

Sweetie Belle rose to her haunches. She closed from behind, until Spike caught her scent in the displaced air. “My sister is a good pony. But she doesn’t know what she’s missing.”

Spike harumphed. Sweetie Belle’s hoof found his shoulder, and she went on.

“My friends mean a lot to me. Back then my life was all about Apple Bloom and Scootaloo, but even they couldn’t get me to really come out of my shell. You did that. I love them both like sisters, but Scoots went to Cloudsdale University, and Apple Bloom stayed on the farm. You came with me. You’ve been around every time I needed you, even when I didn’t know I needed you.”

“I...uh...I did it for Rarity,” Spike dodged. Sweetie Belle was suddenly beside him, shaking her head.

“Bull,” she said simply. “You did it because you care. Tell me I’m wrong.”

Spike receded into his hoofcrafted hoodie. From it he produced the little box, which took the shape of a diminutive cylinder, clumsily wrapped in rumpled paper from a previous Hearth’s Warming. Sweetie Belle eyed it.

“Is that for Rarity?”

“It was supposed to be,” Spike admitted. A soft, curiously content smile crossed his lips, and he held the box out to her. “But you reminded me of a certain special day, and now I want you to have it. It’ll...keep either one of us from ever forgetting.”

The dragon watched as the tiny package began to glow with sage green light in his open claw. It took to floating, and under the influence of unicorn magic unwrapped itself. Beneath was a case not unlike those intended to store reading glasses, but as it clicked apart, it revealed contents that were anything but. Therein lay a hair clip in the shape of a three-dimensional sprig of lilac. Composed from masterfully-crafted transparent acrylic, each tiny, individual leaf and blossom from the little work of art caught the soft glow around it and reflected the light in all directions, like pure crystal from the empire in the north. The pinpoints of light dotted the walls such that the room began to look like a disco hall.

Sweetie Belle cast aside the container and held the ornament before her, turning it slowly as the spinning disco lights passed over everything in the room. Her expression was so analytical that Spike became worried.

“Don’t you like it?”

“...you’re as bad a liar as I am, Spike,” Sweetie Belle whispered.

“What?” Spike cringed. “I-if you don’t like it, I can--”

“You didn’t get this for Rarity.”

“S-sure I did,” Spike muttered.

Sweetie Belle shook her head insistently. “Rarity hasn’t been interested in lilac since that spread in Manehattan Cosmopolitan years ago called it a ‘purple weed’. There’s no way you wouldn’t know that.”

Spike fell silent. The green and purple pinpricks of light floating around the room matched his scales so perfectly that they mottled the blush on his cheeks and gave him away. Sweetie Belle held the faux sprig before her face and kept her eyes on it as she continued her sleuthing.

“The truth is, you didn’t need to be ‘reminded’ of anything. You were gonna give this to Rarity, I believe that. But you said it yourself - you know she’s married to her career. The reason you bought this particular thing is that you figured you could give it to me...if you couldn’t give it to her.”

Spike dipped his head low and stared at his twiddling talons.

“It’s all part of a master plan to appeal to one sister if you can’t get the other,” Sweetie Belle concluded.

The dragon looked mortified. “N-no! I wouldn’t--”

The moment Spike turned his head to reply, Sweetie Belle’s hoof shot out and covered his lips. “...which you did because you’re lonely.”

Spike didn’t move.

“Because when you were little all you needed were your friends and Twilight, who’s basically your mom. Now you want more, but you’ve been chasing my big sis for so long that you don’t know how to get it.”

The unicorn removed her hoof, and Spike found he couldn’t meet her eyes. “You...make it sound like I’m just settling for you...that’s awful…”

“Maybe you are,” Sweetie Belle said softly. “But that’s only a problem if it bothers me. Do you like me, Spike?”

“Well duh, of course,” Spike deflected. “We’ve been friends like forever.”

Sweetie Belle called upon her natural talent for voice, sweetening her words with a resonance that made them seem to be everywhere at once. “You know what I mean. Do you like me, Spike?”

“...yeah.”

The lilac sprig was suddenly floating before Spike’s eyes. Enthralled by it, he couldn’t help but follow it on its journey. Sweetie Belle brushed back the wisp of mane covering her blue stubble and gave the clip a home there, tasking it with holding her mane in such a way that both her pastel locks and the statement beneath could be seen in equal measure.

“What do you think?” She asked, turning her head and neck to him.

Spike inspected the side of Sweetie Belle’s head longer than was necessary, swallowing when his eyes strayed down to the gentle throb of her snowy jugular. “Very, uh...handsome.”

Sweetie Belle, black tee and all, scooted closer and batted the vermillion paint on her eyelids. “You know...I never forgot the confidence you instilled in me. I never would have stopped wearing those shorts if not for you. When I got a little older I thought...Rarity doesn’t know what she’s got, with someone like you around.”

Spike found a white muzzle drawing close to his snout. “Wh-what about Moony?”

“Moony’s my friend,” Sweetie Belle replied. “Just my friend. I can do stuff like that with my friends and we can both be cool about it, whether Rarity understands that or not. I’m...lonely too, Spike. Not in friendship though. I have plenty of friends, and I value that. But the truth is, well...I like guys. Stallions, drakes, dragons...do you have any idea how hard it is to attract one though, when you’ve got their equipment installed?”

Spike felt breath on his cheek. He was going cross-eyed trying to keep his friend in focus, and his vision was filled with the image of his old friend in bloom. Her lips brushed his.

“I...I can’t do this, you’re drunk. It...you might hate yourself in the morning, or me…”

Amid the din of pattering rain and soft jazz, Spike heard the unicorn’s voice emanating from somewhere under his nose. Her emerald eyes were the size of a lush green continent, and he found himself yearning to run free over her rolling, lush hills.

“I’m not drunk. I’m just a little tipsy. I know what I’m doing, and I know a good thing when I have it, even if Rarity doesn’t. I don’t care if I’m your second pick. You’re here...I’m here...she’s not.”

Spike slipped back from the edge of the bed. He tried in vain to escape the sticky web of equine emotion that pursued him, until his back came in contact with the headboard. Sweetie Belle fitted her body between his legs, and soon enough her face was close enough to feel her breath again.

“Sw-Sweetie Belle…”

The named unicorn drew close enough to release her warm breath on the dragon’s neck. Her lips were quickly at his ear. They were alone, but her voice was soft enough that only he could hear.

“Say no,” Sweetie Belle whispered. “Tell me to stop, and I promise I will. I also promise we’ll still be friends, and it won’t get weird. How many years did you spend never really telling Rarity how you feel? I bet you never did because you knew in your heart how she’d reply, and you couldn’t bear hearing it. So either say no, or say what you always wanted to say...and say it to me.”

Spiked opened his mouth, but a hoof to his snout again stayed his speech.

“Not with words,” Sweetie Belle whispered. “Say it with your heart. Show me all the passion inside a young dragon. I want to feel it.”

In his life, Spike had the opportunity to be many things. In the Crystal Empire, he would have lived as a hero. In the dragon lands, he would have been their lord. Yet he traveled neither road, nor had he ever looked back to what might have been. His small life, surrounded by his friends, had always been his contentment. He was happy, but at the same time he was incomplete, for he had never stood up to grab for the things he wanted most. One of those things was gone to him, but perhaps it had never been obtainable in the first place.

The other was but a heartbeat away.

Sweetie Belle felt claws close around her forelegs. Her hooves were pulled away, and she did not struggle as scaly cheek met fuzzy one, prying her lips from the vicinity of his ear and nudging her back. He claimed her lips, angling his snout in order to lock in with her muzzle. She murmured something incoherent as his reptilian tongue entered her - wrapping around her own and bonding with it in ways that no pony could ever match. She whimpered, held in thrall, but Spike knew his lifelong friend well enough to tell the difference between an unpleasant grunt and a squeal of excitement. Encouraged by the latter, he began to push out from the wall, tipping the balance and easing her onto her back. Each partner felt a stiffening swell against the softness of their stomachs, and they ground together, offering an affectionate squeeze to each engorging spire.

Spike ended the merging of their tongues to facilitate breathing, and Sweetie Belle rested her chin on his shoulder, her forelegs slipping around his neck as his talons linked at the small of her back.

“Mmhmm,” She cooed, giggling slightly. “That’s it...take it. Take me.”

At length Sweetie Belle lay prone on her back, the position most difficult for a pony to recover from. Her tail was pinned under her, and her soft paleness was in turn locked beneath the dragon, who planted his claws on the mattress to either side of her head. With her hind legs spread wide, she stroked his thighs with her shins, painting him with pre-release as he painted her in return.

There was no more hesitation in Spike’s eyes. He met hers, and they became lost in one another; his spire slipping down towards her slick blossom.

“Y-you...you got condoms...right…?” Spike laboriously inquired.

Sweetie Belle shushed her mate and took his lips again. He did not protest.

A chill rain pattered the windows of the dormitory, falling in time with the sighs from within.
> 3 - Sharing the Gift
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------


Manehattan. November, 2028. Morning.


Spike sneezed.

In his dreams the action manifested as a challenge from a horde of diamond dog guards, whose rusty speaks and ragged claws had fallen upon a hapless Equestrian city. Spike the Brave; caped, muscled, and adorned in the matter of Excalibur, rose to answer them. He cleft a mighty track through their numbers, battling his way as a savior towards the lord that he found he could not match. The strange dog was excessively fuzzy, and dangled from invisible strings as it swiped relentlessly. It resisted all attempts to beat it back, until the odd creature was at the scaly hero’s nose. This assault finally caused Spike the Brave to sneeze himself awake.

Thoroughly confused, Spike the Prone found himself flat on his back in a comfortable place, trying to bring an image into focus. Four emerald eyes became two, and one solitary Sweetie Belle hovered over him, the very tip of her elegant hoof teasing at his nostrils.

“Wake uuuuuup…”

Spike snorted again. Other senses managed to get messages through to his brain, and he perceived not only the weight of a mare straddling him, but the sensation of dull sunlight as it filtered through the threadbare blinds, passed into the acrylic lilac sprig, and thoroughly powdered his face.

“Whuh…” he muttered, “...whuhs goin’ on? Whut time’s it?”

“Seven or eight,” Sweetie Belle replied. “House is empty.”

Spike shook his head, trying to banish the gritty sand from his countenance. “You got class?”

Sweetie Belle’s grin came into focus. “Not till one. Moony did though. She thinks you snore like a dragon, by the way.”

Spike made a face, “Well yeah, duh.” Rubbing his face with a claw, he blinked several times, recent events coming back to him. “What did we...do last night?”

“Don’t give me that,” Sweetie Belle cooed. She touched his claw with a hoof and guided it to her tummy, where she laid it to rest. “You weren’t drunk. You know what happened.”

Spike’s eyes trailed down the unicorn’s form. She was shirtless now, her makeup wiped away, and the dragon perceived a fascinating amalgamation of the pierced DJ of today, and the bright-eyed filly of yesterday. Even the look in her eye was bright and childish - so much so that he wondered if she was doing it on purpose.

Down by Spike’s planted claw stood a proud, slightly curved, light gray equine erection, which twitched periodically as it pointed up to him.

“Like what you see?”

Spike said nothing. Nor was it necessary to. Sweetie Belle touched her penis and angled it until it nuzzled Spike’s tummy, leaving a tiny dollup of clear lubrication upon his scales.

“You do like it, don’t you,” Sweetie Belle led. “You were all boy last night when you left a present in me. But you’re not thinking that way now, are you?”

“Uh, yeah...I mean, no…”

“I’m not the only one who plays with their friends, I bet. And when you were doing it, you found out that you like cocks.”

Spike swallowed, his eyes solely on the prize. “Yeah…”

“And I bet it turns you on to no end to be with somepony you can push down one night, who can push you down the next morning.”

“I...I didn’t push you down…”

“Sure you did. But I wanted you to.”

Spike removed his claw from above the mare’s womb and drew a talon up her foreskin once, eliciting a deep intake of breath. “There’s a difference,” he said softly, his claw expanding until a grip was established.

Sweetie Belle felt two talons curl lightly around her shaft. She sighed and bit her lip as they moved. “Y-yeah…?”

Spike kept his eyes averted, but he spoke from the heart. “You’re right. I already knew I had no chance with Rarity. But I didn’t know how to tell you...how else I feel, because I didn’t want you to think you were just a consolation priz--”

Once again, Spike found a hoof on his lips. Sweetie Belle drew nearer.

“We’ve been over that already. Tell me what the difference is.”

The mysteries of the fairer sex befuddled Spike as much as any stallion. But his claw was wrapped around something he understood well, and he pumped it, applying just the right amount of pressure in all the right places. His gray hoodie long discarded, he felt like the morning sun itself after the passing of last night’s rain.

“The difference is that all you can do with friends is have sex. You and me...we can make love.”

Sweetie Belle pressed her muzzle to that of her lover. It was a kiss, and though the mechanics were little different from any other, Spike sensed the emotion behind it on another level entirely. It was slow, but it was like no such act he had experienced before. He tilted his snout to the sounds of smacking lips, and again welcomed her tongue with the prehensile grip of his own. He might have held her there all morning, save that she disentangled herself, and to his chagrin the kiss faded as quickly as it had bloomed. Bewildered and bewitched by her enchanting smile, he obeyed the press of her hooves on his shoulders and slipped down into his pillow, his grip on her spire lost.

The unicorn mare’s hind hooves found purchase on the mattress just above Spike’s hips. With the leverage from his shoulders, Sweetie Belle arched her body until her tip was painting Spike’s lips with pre-seed, her effeminate musk filling his nostrils.

“You have no idea how much I want to feel that tongue of yours on me,” Sweetie Belle whispered from above. “Now open wide...this time you’re the one who’s getting the gift…”

Spike could feel his jugular throbbing in time with the pounds of his heart. A softness rose in him, and her words tingled in his ear, soothing and quieting the fire within. He felt young again, the magic of the blissful ignorance returning as his masculine guard came down and his muzzle accommodatingly parted.

Tugging again upon her lower lip with her blunt equine teeth, Sweetie Belle slowly sunk herself into place, rooting Spike to the spot. The dragon’s maw surprised her twofold, for his tongue was only as amazing as his gag reflex, or rather, his complete lack of one. Even Moony had her limits, but Sweetie Belle encountered no resistance whatsoever as her medial ring vanished into a firebreath-warmed wet place. Spike straightened his neck, and when she could press into him no further, his tongue began to slowly coil her like a python with it’s prey, the tightness increasing all the while.

“Ahh...nnn…”

Sweetie Belle’s hooves quitted Spike’s shoulders, and soon found themselves pressed hard against the wall. Her hips did the work, rolling in slow pistons as they sought to pull her throbbing girth out again and then back in. He wouldn’t allow her to retreat all the way, his lips locking behind her flare and his coils slipping over every veiny contour, capturing her such that she could not extract herself. Escape, however, was the last thing she wanted.

“Ngh...g-geez…” The unicorn whimpered. “B-been...wondering what this would f-feel like...e-ever since I started rubbing m-myself…”

Spike grunted cooly. Somehow his words reached her, and she replied with a terse nod as her eyes shut tightly.

“S-so what if I thought about y-you a c-couple times,” she managed through deep sighs. “Nnn...hahh...n-never imagined it would be so...ohh…”

Sweetie Belle was not known for her great endurance, but few ponies had ever experienced the dance of a dragon’s tongue. She knew in an instant that this was not the first phallus to grace Spike’s maw, but if he kept it up, her’s might be the quickest to release. Desire came to a rolling boil inside her, but she denied it, reaching one hoof down to caress Spike’s crests.

“Nnh...n-not yet…” she whispered, swallowing hard against the slithering wetness that was milking her. “I w-wanna give it to you...th-the other way…”

The vice grip from Spike’s coils made it obvious he had intended to finish her, but he relented at her words, his eyes rolling up to meet hers. Had she been a mere friend, he might have simply let go. For her he made an adventure out of it - uncoiling her bonds one by one, holding her lovingly with each one as they retreated. Her moans were his opus, and his claw found its way automatically to his own organ as he stroked it the rest of the way to full attention. Just before allowing her egress he swirled about her tip, collecting her bulb of pre-seed to make it disappear down his throat. Two inches from his lips, her slick girth pulsed with appreciation.

“Hahh...hahh…”

Spike flicked his tongue over the flare before him one final time and grinned with a touch of pride. “My roommates say I’m awesome at that.”

“N-no kidding,” Sweetie Belle nodded weakly. She peered down, surveying the scene. Her old friend and brand new lover sported both a sly eye and a contented smile. Poised before him was the organ she was born with. It had caused her so much stress in the past, but never had she been so happy to have it. “...that looks so hot.”

Spike’s tongue lashed out again, just enough to make the pony penis bounce. “I’m a dragon. Hot is what I do.”

The sly look on Spike’s face gave his partner unexpected affront. While she enjoyed seeing Spike in command of his faculties, Sweetie Belle had promised her paramour the reverse of the previous night’s revelry - and she wasn’t about to allow him to stem the tide. Without warning she fell into a straddle and pressed her body to his, fur grinding scales as she took his lips thrice before fixing him with her boundless eyes.

“I bet you I can be hotter.”

Without giving him a chance to respond, Sweetie Belle claimed his lips one more time, rolling her hips over his pinned shaft as she ground into him with her own. She undulated, keeping the pressure hot until she could feel the pulsing from his neck that kept time with his racing heartbeat whenever her tongue passed over his nape. When she finally pulled back, the puppydog look on his face sent titillating shivers down her spine. She cupped his cheek in her hooves and batted her lashes at him in a fashion she learned from her big sister, timing her words with more grinds against his helpless organ.

“You’re a good dragon, aren’t you,” she cooed.

“Y-yeah…” Spike swallowed.

“And you wanna be my dragon now, huh?”

“...y-yeah…”

“Have you ever had one of your roommates inside you before?”

Spike opened his mouth, but she covered it with a slip of one hoof from his cheek. What he had intended to say was obvious.

“Not your mouth. Inside you.”

With some hesitation, Spike shook his head. Sweetie Belle’s smile was both honest and cunning.

“I was hoping you’d be a virgin back there. Now I get to be your first.” She came up on all fours, standing over him and never allowing eye contact to break. “Roll over.”

If Twilight Sparkle herself had demanded it, Spike couldn’t have shown greater deference. With syrupy commands his lover guided him, until his uniqueness was stripped away and he found himself on his fours like any other pony. From behind and above she placed a hoof on his head and pushed firmly, bending him until his chin came to a soft rest upon the pillow. She spoke before removing her hoof.

“Keep this here. Raise your tail.”

With his rump now firmly pointed at her, Spike again did as he was told. “B-be gentle…” he muttered, as her hooves slipped back to grip the places where his cutie marks would be, if he had any. He felt a presence at his backside, but the melody of her perfect voice preceded the inevitable.

“You can still say no if you want to.”

Spike shook his head as best he could, his chin grinding into the pillow. “I...want you to be my first. I love you.”

Sweetie Belle’s cool expression broke, and her brows peaked. The words had a whole new meaning now, and though he could not see it on her face, she warmth of his affection coursed through her with an intensity beyond any gout of flame he could summon. Her horn came to life, and he watched from the corner of his eye as the nightstand drawer opened, and a tube of lubricant floated from his vision. He heard it being manipulated, and jumped slightly as a cool salve was applied between his legs, which warmed quickly on contact.

“I love you, too.”

Slowly she thrust, and he winced as his opening began to stretch. She hushed him, a wave of magic stroking across his scales.

“Shh. Just relax. Don’t fight it.”

He took a breath and tried again, abandoning the reflex to clench with the same centering exercise he used to make his muzzle such a reputable cockhome. It was new and it felt a little strange, but it was something he wanted to explore, and he knew his own curiosity would cause it to happen sooner or later. With all the diligence his pony-mother had instilled in him growing up, he wanted the exploration to be with his first true lover. He relaxed, and she began to take him.

“Ohh…”

Neither partner was certain which of them had uttered the first cry, but they were in chorus by the time her medial ring again passed into him. She hilted until her tummy was gracing his rump, and paused to let him catch up.

“I’m all the way inside you, Spike.”

“Nnh...uh-huh…”

“Do you like it?”

“...yes,” he sighed deliciously.

She smirked audibly and began to move. “I’m gonna fuck you until there’s more seed in you than what you put into me last night. Hope you don’t have any classes to walk to later.”

“...nope.”

With a spell she picked up through the student grapevine, Sweetie Belle ensorcelled the lubricant around her organ and warmed it further, altering its viscosity long enough for it to spread and form a perfect layer of slickness between them. Free now to penetrate her lover, she began to build a rhythm of slow strokes in and out; soft squishing noises making both sets of ears twitch.

“Mnh…” Spike breathed hard into his pillow, taking care not to singe it. “...nnh...w-wanna...hear a secret…?”

Sweetie Belle lidded her eyes by half, filling her vision with the sight of her own gray girth disappearing into a young dragon over and over. “I don’t...nnh...want there to be a-anymore secrets...ahh…”

Spike’s tail twitched, wiggling in time with the flagging pastel one that belonged to the pony making love to him. “Was always a little...nnh...j-jealous of mares...w-wanted to know what h-having somepony inside you feels liiiiikenngh…”

“Now you know,” Sweetie Belle grinned, her magic caressing Spike’s sides. “You can be my mare aaaaanytime you want...t-truth is, this thing used to embarrass me, b-but…” she hilted him again, “...but I kinda love it now…”

Spike managed a ridiculous grin. He angled his rump up and ground into his partner, caressing her with his tail; the movement teasing his own spire against the mattress. “Sh-shush...j-just...m-make me yours a-already...R-Rarity’s loss...mmm…”

Sweetie Belle obliged. Twilight’s personal assistant was a quick study, and in no time he caught up to his lover’s thrusts - clenching on her withdrawal and relaxing with her thrusts. The unicorn forgot herself, and plowing the scaly purple field before her became the only thing in her world. With the need to both plant seed and accept it crossing wires in her brain, she rammed her partner with abandon, determined to send him to his classes with as much of her essence inside him as she had of his. Her invading member pulsed wildly within; the silky vice grip provided by the enhanced lubricant and his rolling muscles soon became more than the hung young mare could handle.

“G-gonna...mmrg...gonna…”

Spike shamelessly mashed himself into her, arching his back as the swelling in his own tip began to boil over. Feeling that he could well get used to the reversal of roles, he spoke with words wetted by passion.

“D-do it...f-fill me up...b-be my f-first...ngahh...ohh…”

With a shrill cry that only a diva of Bridleway could match, Sweetie Belle pierced her lover one final time, answering nature’s call to hold herself at the deepest place she could reach. The orgasm that stiffened her limbs burnt along her nerves with the lust of a stallion, and the ensuing pause was followed immediately by the reflexive pumping of rope after rope of thick, sticky semen as she poured her fertility deep into the dragon’s core. Spike, overwhelmed by the newness of prostate stimulation, followed suit; ruining Moony’s pillow with his fangs as he stained her sheets with his own gooey mark.

Spike stiffened, his feral growls subsiding with his orgasm, and collapsed on the mattress as his limbs gave up on him. He was followed by the feathery lightness of the budding broadcaster pony, who slipped from his rump just prior to smacking into the scales of his back. He thought to inquire after her comfort, but before he could manage it she was nuzzling the back of his neck with her fuzzy cheek.

“Mmm…”

“S-see?” Spike panted. “Told you...making love is different…”

“Mmm…” Sweetie Belle repeated, grinding with both cheek and one more pump into the small of Spike’s back. “You’re so warm…”

“Dragon afterglow,” Spike explained. “You should see how much play I get in about a month.”

Sweetie Belle propped her chin up on one hoof and drew tiny circles between Spike’s shoulder blades with the other. “Aww, you’re still gonna play?”

“I dunno, are you?” Spike teased with a chuckle. “What about Moony?

“Seems I’m being asked that a lot lately,” Sweetie Belle mused, her circles continuing. “We did steal her room, after all. I probably owe her.”

“Owe her...what do you think?”

“Welllll…” Sweetie Belle grinned, “I could fuck her rotten. But I’m thinking maybe I’ll do her laundry and bake her a black bottom cake. Trust me though, she won’t mind. If anything she’ll want details.”

With little warning, Spike summoned his draconic strength and rolled out from under his conqueror, unable to help a giggle when Sweetie Belle let out a squeal and plummeted towards the mattress. He softened the blow by gathering her in his arms and settling her into place beside him. Their erections, both still a little stiff, touched for an instant before each mashed up against the yielding tummy of the other. Both partners let out a sigh that differed only in pitch.

“Keep teasing me and I’m just gonna have to make you mine again,” Sweetie Belle commented.

Spike blushed through his scales. “Like I said, I...think I could get used to that.”

Sweetie Belle grinned and pecked Spike’s muzzle. “You’re the luckiest student on campus. You get the best of both worlds, provided you’re not so drunk on my cock that you won’t pay any attention to my mareparts anymore.”

Spike chuckled along with the comment but didn’t sustain it. His eye was drawn by the acrylic lilac sprig, which was still pattering the pillows with a few pinpoints of light. He reached up a claw to run it through Sweetie Belle’s mane, even favoring the blue stubble patch on the side of her head that said mane would have completely obscured, had the ornament not held it at bay. His eyes trailed down towards hers, and by the time he was gazing into them his cheeks had grown red.

“Wh-what?”

“It’s just…” Spike considered himself, “it really suits you. Better than it would have suited Rari--”

Yet again she touched his lips, and yet again he fell silent. “We fight, but I’ll always love my sister. I’ll make it up to her later, but for now...let’s just be you and me.”

Spike smiled an honest smile, with warmth that outdid even the fire in his belly. “I love you.”

“I know,” She returned the expression. “I love you too, and waiting to hear that from you was worth spending some time as mare number two in your head.”

Spike blushed deeper. “You don’t pull any bucks, do you.”

“You think I’m tough?” Sweetie Belle giggled. “Just wait until I bring you home to meet my big sister, or you bring me home to meet your mom! The whole dynamic has changed now!”

The pair laughed together until they each melted into the lips of the other. Their dance began again, and a certain young unicorn was late for her classes anyway. The acrylic lilac sprig in her hair became her favorite accessory, and was with her always from that day on.