> Anon vs RGRE > by B_25 > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- > Prologue | Anon VS In Medias Res > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Anon VS RGRE B_25 What. Theeee fuck!? I'd shake my head—if I wasn't afraid of it falling off. Opening my eyes was a pain in the ass. The few blinks consciousness afforded me revealed jack shit about my surroundings. Grass. Trees. Sky. I tried getting up only to realize my body enjoyed lying down more. My back was fucked—sore, in pain, jets of fire sweeping the surface of my muscles. Something felt different about me; something felt different about everything. But I couldn't think. Thinking never did me any good anyway. My mind caught inside a haze. The woods... forest... bullshit place with grass and leaves and trees blurred beyond any recognition beyond that. Something crunched. Grass flattened nearby. A stick snapped into two from next to my head.   I could see the sun, though it became eclipsed by a softer and smaller circle of yellow. Someone... something hovered over me, standing... staying... staring... “Who... the fuck...” I coughed blood, had my vision darken, and passed the fuck out.   Beyond the abyss, I heard the soft voice, sweet words, of a cute sounding girl.   “Oh no...” I woke up again, which meant that I wasn't dead, and, by default, that meant that I was, too, was still alive... fuck me sideways, can't I catch a fuckin' break? I decided not to open my eyes cause fuck you life, I deserved the tiniest break from you. But a certain excitement coursed through my veins, either from the mystery of my situation, or the secret relief of being alive, and I couldn't fall the fuck back to sleep.   I tried focusing on any other feeling from my body... only for there to be nothing. The fuck? What I thought passed for excitement was actually anything but. Something was actually coursing through my veins, and I had no idea what the fuck it was.   Fuck it. Eye-opening mode engaged.   My eyes opened. A ceiling greeted me. There was nothing special about the ceiling—it was a fuckin' ceiling made out of wood. Brown wood. Maybe not brown wood. A colour close to brown. Would now be a bad time to say I might be partially color blind?   After a few inhale and exhales, my eyes set themselves down on my body. Three things gave me a heart attack on the spot: one, the fact I'd somehow turned green; two, the fact that there was a horse... pony... mare fucking thing on my crotch; third, the fuckin’ pony was currently sucking my cock.   “What. Theee fuck!” And with that, I was back at square one. “You! Yes, you, horse thing. Stop sucking my cock!” The mare shivered at my shout, the head of my cock slipping out of her mouth. My erection arched over my stomach. “You get down from the bed right now! Don't make me get my belt... er... just get down!” The fuckin' horse kept staring at me like I was the weird fuck. I'd never even seen a real fucking horse before, much less a pony, unless late-night strange internet searches counted. It was a small thing, the pony, yellow coat with pink hair, teal eyes above a tiny muzzle.   “U-Um!” It said. The fuckin' pony said. The fuck? “P-Please... d-d-don't be mad! I'm trying to help!” She dipped her muzzle to my crotch, licking the underside of my cock, from my base to my head, smiling all the while. “S-See? Helping!” “You! You stay the fuck away from my cock.” I shook my head, blinking, wondering how my anger blinded me to how a pony was fucking talking to me. “Wait a fuck. Who are you?” “Me?” The mare came down on her heavy rear, sitting between my muscular thighs, and pressing a hoof against her fluffy chest. “I'm F-Fluttershy!” “Fluttershy?” I asked. “You're literally sucking a stranger's cock. What the hell do you have to be shy about?” “...o-other mares.” “There's more of you?” Fluttershy hid behind her mane, but for whatever reason, she had one of her eyes peeking through the waterfall of pink that was her hair. “No, not me. But there are other mares that are kind of like me! We don’t look the same. Our coats are sometimes different colors. B-But we share some traits!” I wanted to give her more shit, but really, I was too much in shit to work out whatever the fuck was happening right now. As ponies went, she seemed nice and, well, being a dick without a place to hide it seemed like a bad fuckin' idea at the time. “Alright, so more strange speaking mares then.” I shook my head, my vision lagging behind my eyes by a second. A thick fog still clogged my head, preventing me from thinking clearly. The rest of my body was pretty much dead in terms of feeling anything. “Any guy mares around here? Like, you know, dude ponies... horses... what's the word for them?” “Oh, stallions?” I wanted to snap my fingers, but found I couldn't. “Yeah, those fucks.” I coughed while trying to lift my arm, but I wasn’t able to get it up… it had felt heavier than usual. “Are they, you know, kinda like you and shit?” “What's... shit?” “You don't know what...” I quickly realized who I was talking to, what kind of situation I was in and, for once in my life, to stop being such a dick. “It's, uh, a synonym for 'stuff' where I'm from. Please never use it though.” “O-Okay...” “... so, those stallions?” Fluttershy stared down at me, her eyes wide and glinting, both completely set on me. My heart throbbed. My throat clenched. Things suddenly became harder to see. For a mare, she was pretty, well, pretty... and self-delusion was a helluva a thing for me. Did she like me? Not sure why I cared. But to be fair, she already had my cock in her mouth, so really, I couldn't be blamed for making an assumption or two. Maybe a bit more. Okay, loading all the fucking assumptions I could fucking fit inside my tiny brain. “Um, mister...” Oh shit. Did she want my name? Fuck. Should I give it to her? Was that even a good fucking idea? She had me in her home, a cottage of some sorts, and the first thing she thought to do, with me in this crippled state, was to suck my cock while I was asleep. And that, of course, was the warning for Rule Number Four in life: never give a crazy chick your real name. Did that extend to mares? Fuck it. Crazy be crazy regardless of the form. Fuck. She was still staring at me. I was being awkward as fuck.   “Anon.” I narrowed my eyes while saying the word. “Yeah. Call me that. For everything.” “And your special talent?” “Pissing others off.” I blinked as I tilted my head. “Wait, no. Pissing others off and something else. Something more important than that.” I blinked again, trying to think—only for my skull to impress against my brain. “But... I... don't remember... whatever the fuck...” Fluttershy, to her credit, didn't start to look anymore confused than she already was. To be fair, we were both weird, so I felt some leeway in being myself. She spoke again, “What does 'pissing' mean?” Note self: stop teaching cute, innocent (sorta) mares bad words to say. Swallowing, I tried again, “Another outdated word where I'm from. Don't use it. Ever.” I shook my head barely. “Now, those other stallions?” “Um, Anon? I understand a stallion's mind is a fragile thing, but surely, you've lived with other stallions before?” Fuck that. I lived alone.   “Honey, I've never seen another stallion in my life.” I coughed as my throat clenched, and for a moment, I was expecting blood again. “Lone wolf is the way for me. So, other talking stallions then?” “You're so strange, Mr. Anon.” “You ain't the first to say that.” Fluttershy smiled at me for whatever reason. Her gaze flicked down to my cock, and so did I, when two things pricked at my mind—one more than the other. It occurred to me my cock looked different from usual. It was bigger... longer... thicker.   What kind of pills had this bitch used to drug me in my sleep? Even worse was that despite being sucked off by a girl—and for the first time I might add—I didn't feel a fucking thing from it. And that, of course, I called bullshit on. There was no way my first blowy was coming from a horse... and I refused to cum without being able to feel it. “Oh... I'm sorry, Anon!”   Fluttershy's muzzle flew down at my cock, taking my full length into her tight muzzle, letting the tip of my dick poke against the back of her throat. Wanna know how I knew that? It wasn't because I felt it. No. It was because Fluttershy choked when she swallowed my length into her throat. “Don't you dare!” I shook my head and flicked my arm at her muzzle. “Don't you dare suck me off. I'm not losing my first blowjob to a horse. No... no!” Fluttershy started bobbing her head to and from my crotch, swirling her tongue around my girth from how her cheeks puffed out. “I can't feel it! No... fuck! I'm not going to fucking cum from a girl when I can't even fuckin' feel—“ Then, when my eyes focused on my arms, the blurriness cleared away, and because of that, I could see the cylinder that was my arm... and the hoof, rather than the hand, that ended it. At once, my mind went blank, my eyes couldn't see, and I was vaguely aware of my cock shooting something.   My head, arms, and cock fell back.   “I...” Consciousness fading again... “...fuck....”   “And you found him alone?” “...fuck...you...” The words left me before my eyes opened. Same place, same bed, same body. Glancing over to my left, the pillow took the weight of my head as I saw, for better or worse, another mare standing next to a blurry Fluttershy, this one purple and slightly taller, radiating a prescience even I felt in my dazed state.    “You're awake?” The purple pony came over to me, and when she did, she lowered herself to her knees. Her face became clear in my gaze. Cute muzzle with violet eyes. Bangs that covered most of her forehead. A... fuckin' horn? “I'm sorry. I'm so sorry you've had to go through something like this.” The fuck? Compassion instead of a blowjob? Talk about an upgrade.   “Been through worse shit,” I grunted back as sensations slowly synergized with my consciousnesses. “I think? I... dunno. The fuck even happened to me?” “Silly stallion, don't worry about big things like that.” She leaned forward and kissed my cheek, warmth flooding up my head. “That's what mares are for. You've been through so much. Rest.” The thing was, the mare wasn't fuckin' wrong, but at the same time, being treated like a kid, well... made me want to act like a fuckin' kid. I couldn't be blamed for it. Just who I was. Now was the time to show some shit up to this strange situation.   “Actually, I'm feeling pretty alright.” Plot twist: I wasn't feeling alright, but this mare didn't need to know that. Treat me like a kid? Well, I'll treat her like a kid. “Going to try standing now. Can you back off for a sec?” But the mare blinked at me. Like, not a quick blink, but the slow kind of blink, one usually followed by someone whispering what the fuck? In response. She stood a little taller, keeping in place. “No way! From what happened to a poor stallion like you... that bed will be your home for a week.” I titled my head. “The hell it will!” “D-Don't be scared!” At once, her muzzle dropped over my face, which felt kind of strange, more so when she rubbed my cheek. “I promise to have as many mares in here as I can manage. Some of them are my friends.” She gasped as her head shot back. “They're going to be so excited to see you! Aren't you excited to seem them?” Did I somehow end up on a children's show without anyone telling me? Fuck this shit. Time to get out of dodge.   “Honestly, shit here is kinda whack, so I'm gonna dipski before anything gets worse.” I slid my body over from underneath the covers, feeling my joints ache and my muscles cry out, which I told all to shut up, as I put my legs over the bed. “Now then, if you'll...” I blinked. I blinked twice. I blinked three fucking times like the trope I was so used to seeing, because really, I was hoping that one of the blinks had fed me the wrong information. But it hadn't. The whackness in front of me was, indeed, very real. “Oh no.” Finally, despite not wanting to, I lifted an arm to my face. With a gulp, I tilted my hoof, tracing its curves with my eyes. “You were supposed to be a fuckin' nightmare.” I glanced around the interior of the cottage. “All of this was supposed to be a fucking nightmare.” The purple unicorn looked over at Fluttershy. “What's fucking?” Fluttershy shrugged cutely. “Whatever it means, Anon, all of this has been a terrible nightmare for you.” The purple unicorn placed a hoof on my chest, and I could hear her gasp when I flexed out of reflex. “I could hardly imagine a mare going through what you did. But a s-stallion...” Her voice choked and her eyes became watery. “...please rest. I p-promise to sleep with you.” “Oh hell no!” I exclaimed, and, with the helpful blinding of my anger, I ignored my problems, pain, and confusion, all to place my hind hooves on the wooden floor. “I already lost my first blowjob to a mare.” I peeked over at Fluttershy from the unicorn's shoulder. “And I didn't even get to feel that. So, thanks for that!” Fluttershy giggled and, holding a hoof against her mouth and flicking another at me in a demure manner.   “Oh no!' The unicorn pressed harder on my chest, causing me to flex all the more. “That's terrible! That's an injustice that I, Princess Twilight Sparkle, will resolve herself!” She quickly threw her hooves over my neck, letting her ass fall on top of my thighs, draping herself over me. “Such a handsome stallion forced to endure so much, and with so little aid from a mare, oh... what is the world coming to?” “What are you...” I found myself unable to speak while Twilight's muzzle hovered in front of me. Her breath was on my lips. Her slender weight was against my own. She was soft but filled out in all the right spots. Each cheek of her ass spilled over into my crotch, causing a lump to form in my throat. “No... don't you...” Twilight giggled cutely, in a way that, really, broke my heart in two different ways: one for how pretty a mare could be, and the other, for this crazy chick forcing herself on me. Was that the way how things were here? Were mares, back on Earth, always like this? “Don't you t-touch... mmhmm...” I couldn't take it, I couldn't fight back, I couldn't do a thing about it. Twilight Sparkle closed her eyes while she brought her lips to mine, flicking herself over them, teasing me only for a second. She pulled away only to inch forward, taking me in a kiss. “Hmm... mhmmm.... hnnng...” Was that it? The softness of her lips stealing and zapping any and all energy still coursing within me. I'd never kissed anyone before. My first time... and I was bewildered for all the wrong reasons. Intense. The contact was intense. I almost kissed back.   But fuck that. I had pride. “Hmm... Twilight, was it?” I'd pulled back from her lips and brought my muzzle to her fluffy ears. “Can you do me a favor?” She giggled. “Anything.” “Can you kindly fuck off?” I pushed her off my body and I heard her hooves scrape against the floor. She shook her head, staring at me as I, like the little kid I was, struggled to stand on my four new legs. “I've got shit to do and things to figure out. Y'all are whack.” “We're whack?” Twilight gazed at me, watching, like she was fighting between helping me or letting me fall. “You're like any stallion I've ever met! How do you expect to take care of yourself without the aid of the mare?” “Because I don't need one?” Were all these mares whack? They seemed nice enough, in their crazed, sensitive ways. But something about all of this was setting me off. I couldn't rely too heavily on these two. Most of all, I needed to figure some stuff out for myself. “Look. I don't how I got here, why I'm here, or why the fuck I'm a... fuckin' stallion of all things.” “You mean you weren't a proper stallion before?” Fluttershy asked. “That would explain why you're so different from the rest. Maybe, if we got a few more mares to help, we could help you through social norms...” “Sorry, but that's what a fuckin' normie would do.” I walked forward. My knees buckled with every step, but I kept myself up, learning to work on four legs opposed to the regular two. Seemed like all the bullshit in the world decided to strike me all at once, leaving me too tired and too confused to question even a fraction of it all. “I'm gonna fuck off and do my own thing.” “But you can't!” Twilight's hoofsteps clopped alongside me until she blurred in front of me. “I won't allow it! The world's too big and scary for such a scared little stallion. Just look at yourself! You're in pain, hurt, and you haven't had a mare shave you in a few days.” Oh fuck. Were my younger years showing itself? I lifted a hoof to my muzzle, feeling a certain scruffiness against my sole. Five o'clock shadow. No signs of a neckbeard setting in yet. Saved for the moment. Wait... how the fuck did horses grow facial hair? “And if you were offering you help more politely, then I wouldn't have an issue with any of this.” I stumbled past her, refraining from grunting and keeping myself moving. “But I'm not going to be babied by some crazy chicks. Don't care what happens to me.” I came to the door of the cottage, using my forehooves with the handle, though I had trouble gripping it.   Man, hands were a helluva thing.   “Whatever happens, happens because I made it happen.” I finally clicked in the lock, throwing my hip against the door, which opened to the strange world that had somehow taken me. “And I don't care what mare... stallion... thing gets in my way. I'll face 'em all!” I stepped outside into the afternoon. I could hear my name being called from over my shoulder, but I could not care less, deciding to walk forward. I traveled across a small bridge, catching my reflection in the stream below: a green horse with a black mane, soft and spiky, disheveled but neat in its own way. I couldn't help myself. There was a smile on my muzzle, something I didn't wear often back home, where and when I still had my face. As much as I hated to admit it, the new body was a step up from what I had before—if becoming a horse could ever be considered an improvement. Speaks wonders to what I was before. With a shake of my head, there was no sense in delaying my journey, continuing over the bridge and down a dirt trail. I had no idea where I was going and nowhere for me to go. But I needed to wonder, to think and reflect, processing everything that had happened. But that wasn't easy with some of the shit that I saw.   The further along the trail I went, the closer to civilization I came. Some houses and cabins were scattered away from the trail, and really, some of the shit I saw had me blinking my eyes. One example was some stallion, at least it looked like a stallion, watering a fucking garden of all things. His coat was brown and his eyes were blue. The color of his mane was like caramel. It was long, longer than the mares I'd seen, looking thin and brushed, its femininity contrasting sharply with the solid pecs he was working with. On his side, a mare was helping him lift the watering can, kissing his cheek and whispering into his ear all the while.   “What the fuck?” I said to myself. The fresh air cleared the stuffiness out from my lungs. It felt great to be free. Free, and set into a world of absurdity. “I need to figure this shit out.” I sighed. “How the fuck did I wind up here? What the hell was I doing before everything went black?” “I was hoping you could tell me the same thing.” “Ack!” I jumped to my right, which really, was a bad idea—placing all my weight on my right legs sent my balance out of whack. With a hollow feeling in my stomach, I fell onto my side, feeling the dust fly up while my down slammed down. “Oooaw... fuck...” “S-Sorry about that!” One of my eyes opened to the rays of sunlight raining over Twilight Sparkle. Once again, she'd found a way to hover over me, causing a groan to escape me. “I-I really didn't m-mean to startle you.” “Congratulations,” I replied. “You managed to go above and beyond what you intended. This your way of forcing me back to bed?” “What? N-No!” Twilight took a step back. “I-I mean, I would much p-prefer it if you came back, you know, for your own health and all that.” She then unleashed a heavy sigh. “But... I won't force you to do something against your will.” She dipped her muzzle, her bangs drooping over her eyes. “Y-You're the f-first stallion to ever have s-sent me away. I've... never had that happen before.” “Get used to it, honey.” I flipped onto my stomach, pushing my forehooves against the ground. “Because I'm going to start doing that to you a whole lot more. Like right now.” I glanced up at her, smiling. “Kindly fuck off again?” “...I still don't know what that word means.” “It means to go off somewhere far away. " “N-No.” Well fuck. I hadn't exactly thought that shit out. She was still hovering over me like in the way a parent hovered over a kid, only this time, I didn't feel any malice from her presence. Firm, but kind. Wings on her sides, a horn on her head, all with the presence of someone who mattered—could I really fuck with her and get away with it? “A-At least, not until after you've heard what I have to say.” Twilight rubbed a foreleg against another, glancing away while she talked. “So maybe, Fluttershy and I... treated you in a way you're not used to. And that was wrong... at least to you.” I gave her a glare that she could feel.   “And to us as well!” Twilight sighed heavily. “You're different from any other stallion I've met. There's something about you not from here!” She shook her head and gazed down at me again. “So, for the moment, I'll treat you like how I would treat any other mare.” She sucked her cheek in, visibly nibbling on it from the inside. “Not that I'll like it, though. You really can be a rude one, Mr. Anon.” “It's my special talent,” I joked back. “But... you mean it though? You'll knock this child play crap off?” “It's not like I want to...” “Twilight.” “Fine!” She whined in a way unlike a princess, and that, caused a warm to flush from my chest. “I'll treat you like your own...” She swallowed. “...your own stallion.” And then, with a nod, she offered me her own hoof. My first instinct was to slap it away, struggle on my own hooves to stand up, then walk myself into whatever town laid ahead. But I didn't. I kept still and stared at her gesture of help. “You won't get far without my help,” Twilight said. Despite her words, there was no edge to her voice—like she was stating a fact. “Trust me. If our behavior seemed weird to you, then that town? You're... there's going to be a lot of weird things for you to see.” I kept looking up at her, keeping silent, still listening. “There'll be a lot worse mares than I trying to pounce on you.” Twilight giggled while nudging her hoof closer. “If they saw you without a mare… who knows what some of them would do for you.” She smirked, the sudden smugness oddly attractive on her. “Face it. Without me? You've got no clue how things work.” “You may have me there,” I replied with a smirk of equal length, “but don't forget, I'm petty enough to figure all that stuff out for myself. I don't need to be owing anyone anything.” My smirk grew. “Much less a crazy chick like yourself.” “I'm not crazy!” “This counts as borderline stalking.” “I'm a princess. I'll exempt myself.” “Crazy enough to change the law to fit your needs? Just a step from being a tyrant there, Twilight Sparkle.” Twilight pouted. She had yet to take her hoof back. “Look. Regardless of how you may feel toward me, just know that me helping you... doesn't mean you'll owe me anything. Mare or stallion, the magic of friendship is still strong within us all.” Twilight smiled. “You need help and I'm able to give it. I tell you a few things, you tell me a few things. Maybe we'll figure this mess out.” “And if I refuse?” “The perks of being a princess would be beneficial to a strange stallion like yourself, no?” I sighed. She did make a point. As much as I didn't want to admit it, facing this world all on my own, weak and confused... the odds weren't exactly stacked in my favor. But I still had my pride. Bowing over like that girly stallion was some weird shit even for me. Like hell I'd let any mare transform me into something like that.   “You pull any weird shit,” I replied as I wrapped my hoof around her own, “and I'll kill ya. Deal?” “I don't know what that word means,” Twilight said, “but I'll agree to it for your sake.” I let her pick me up. No, seriously. I thought the gesture was mostly symbolic, but Twilight must curl weights or something in her free time because she lifted my whole body up without visible strain. Once I was on my four legs, she circled around me, using her wings to brush the dirt from my coat. “My, you're dirty!” She came to my muzzle. Turning her head, she licked the tip of her wing and, bringing to my cheek, wiped away a smudge. I glared at her all the while, and she backed up with a giggle, curling her wings. “Sorry about that. Old habits are hard to lose?” “It's fine.” I walked up next to her, staring off into the town in the distance. There was a weak feeling in my stomach. “So, there a bar or something we could go to? I need to drink something while we talk.” “You drink? Aren't you so cool!” Twilight turned around, stumbling closer against my side than I would have liked. “How about it? Do you like Sex on the Beach? A piña colada? A—“ “Whisky.” I swore, I felt her tail flick.    “You are...” Twilight's voice became quieter as she lowered her head. Looking over, I couldn't tell if her cheeks were more purple than usual. “...such a strange stallion. Has anyone told you that?” “Always been strange,” I said. “But never a stallion.” > Act 1 | I | Anon VS A Stallion Bar > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- ~ I ~ Anon VS A Stallion Bar “That poor stallion!” a voice cried from afar. “Look at all that dirt and dust all over his coat! Someone wash him!” The fuck? “Forget his coat!” I glanced my head to the left, seeing a trio of mares standing together just off the trail. “Look at his mane! Why, it hasn't been washed or braided!” Alright. This shit was getting weird even for me. “Is he a victim of abuse?” “What kind of mare would put such a beautiful and delicate thing through such an ordeal?” Okay. Fuck this. Just... keep walking forward and don't make eye contact with anybody... anypony... who gives a fuck?  “Somepony needs to get a wagon for him at once! Look! His legs are trembling with every step!” “Fuuuck off!” I exclaimed while tilting my head back, an edge to my voice I did not intend. “I can walk just fine? See?” I continue my stride along the grass trail, past the buildings and the structures, feeling eyes everywhere on me. And no, that wasn't narcissism talking. “Toddlers don't have shit on me.” “Poor stallion!”   “Don't put on a show for us! Twilight, do something?” “Listen to his made up words! He's so hurt. Why hasn't been taken straight to the hospital?” Something happened to me. I recognized the feelings and sensation at once, but for whatever reason, I wanted to try to ignore them. But I couldn't. My anger left my body in a second. Stomach hollow and breaths shallow. Everything was becoming hazy.   “...A-An...non...” I blinked. Why couldn't I hear? Doing my best to keep a straight face, I gulped the pooling saliva in my mouth, letting my eyes gaze around my surroundings. I heard nothing but I saw everything. Everywhere, there they were, crazy mares staring at me.   I blinked. My heart hurt. We were in the center of the town. There was a water fountain. I could see the liquid crashing into the pool in hyper detail, but I heard no sound of water smacking. Spinning in a circle, I saw the mares, some on the trail, others around it, some peeking through their windows, other calling from atop their porches and balconies.   Everyone was looking at me. There was no place for me to hide.   With every beat of my heart, it pounded venom through my veins, clogging my lungs. I couldn't breathe. In a distant building that looked like city hall, a mare glared at me from beyond a pane of glass, her violet eyes growing brighter and her gaze more intense as she focused on me. The venom froze my limbs. I couldn't move, couldn't speak, couldn't do anything to repress this awful feeling. I tried to squeeze my hands only to find I had none. There was nothing I could do to exercise this terribleness inside me.   The gazes of the mares grew closer all around me, and I tried to stare back at them all—only to release I was hopefully outnumbered. I couldn't keep an eye on what was both ahead and behind me. Fuck fuck fuck fuck. What the fuck was I going to do?   Wait. Stop. No no no. Stop thinking right now. Thinking doesn't do anything. It doesn't help. You can't think yourself out of this. Stop thinking. Please. Focus. Don't focus on them. Breathe. Try to breathe. Don't think about thinking.   What do they want from me? They all want me. They're all snickering about me. Giggling. Those mares on the porch were giggling. They hid their mouths beneath their hooves. I can't hear it, but I can feel them laughing... laughing at me. It's awful. Awful awful awful. Stop stop stop. Clear your mind. Clear... clear.... fuck fuck fuck. Something touched me. It took everything within me not to scream. I turned my head, seeing Twilight's muzzle, eyes narrowed and muzzle up, and she was looking... d-d-down at me. Fuck. Don't give yourself away. Clear your mind. She's speaking.   “...” Twilight said. Or did she say? Fuck. Watch her mouth. Read her lips. “...?...?...?...” “Afno,” I replied, or I said, or did I do anything at all? Behind Twilight, two mares are drawing near, each looking concerned and mocking at the same time. Go away! F-F-Fuck off! “Fine. Need... w-water.” Time froze. So did I. It froze when Twilight's eyes lit up. The world was frozen beside her. There was a glint to her horn, one that was purple. Her eyes looked sad. Could eyes look sad? They held sadness. They had something familiar to them. How could eyes have something familiar to them? All eyes were the same. All eyes had something familiar to them.   Fuck! Stop... thinking... Anon! Twilight tried putting her hoof over my neck, but it only made my body tremble in response, and I flicked her away. The fountain! Fuck! Yes! Fucking finally! Taking another breath, I started toward the distant fountain, seeming miles away, but feeling very near.   But I was worried I couldn't make it. Every step was like an earthquake. Every sway made my vision go for a spin. Mind empty and stomach hollow and eyes fading out from the life around me. No... fuck... don't pass out near these weird fucks... My hooves felt stone instead of grass. I blinked as I arched myself on the step. My reflection stared back at me. I saw a face instead of a muzzle. I saw eyes a different color than mine. I couldn't focus on it. I threw myself into that which I had seen, shattering it. Coolness. The assault of cold water cooled the heat that radiated from my cheeks. My muzzle floated in the water, free from the intensity, floating without anxiety, submerging me in a world of my own. Slowly, my heart slowed, my body cooled, and with a slow exhale, my eyes opened to the bubbles of air floating up from my mouth. But the venom still lurked in my veins. My hearing returned and, with it, I heard the thunderous hoofsteps of someone coming behind me. The attack had yet to cease. I wasn't ready to face anyone. I pulled my head up from the water, losing my breath while I did so, and I stared up at the face of Twilight Sparkle.   “P-Please... k-k-keep them... a-a-a-away...” I couldn't bear have said any more. Turning my muzzle to the fountain, I inhaled sharply through my snout, plunging my head into the pool of water. “... ... ...” I sighed. I paid no more attention to the outside world. I could feel my heart starting to slow down, retracting its venom. My body no longer burned at its ends. The crystal effect of the water became clearer to my eyes.   I exhaled. The breath carried a weight out from my chest. My tensed muscles finally relaxed. Something soft was rubbing at my back. Feeling myself return to normal, I finally brought my head above the water, hearing the water crash against itself once again.   “You okay?”   I was unable to see anything at first. Wet strands of hair covered my eyes. When I flicked some off my right eye, the first thing I saw was Twilight Sparkle, sitting on the rim of the fountain next to me, gently rubbing a hoof along my back.   “Heat stroke is a helluva thing.” I blinked a few times. Twilight's gaze fell on my muzzle, and she blushed at whatever she saw, quickly gazing back at my back. “Think you can write an instruction manual on how to be a stallion?” Though she giggled, Twilight Sparkle didn't smile. “Never had to write a book for one before. But in your case, I'll... be glad to make an exception.” She glanced at me again, but this time, she brought her hoof down to my muzzle, and with a soft stroke, push my mane back over my head. “You feeling better now?” “Cooled off.” I couldn't stop myself from gulping, as now, I had nothing hiding myself from the outside world. “You tell those mares to...” I blinked a few times, glancing around the fountain. The streets were empty and Twilight and I were left alone. “What the hell?” “Hmm?” Twilight glanced over her shoulder, and in a second, her mind seemed to click. “Oh, them. They sent you for quite a scare, didn't they?” “You wish.” Ah, fuck. Twilight seemed like a smart mare. Smart enough to work out what had happened and why. If she found out any of my weakness, especially in a place where mares seemed to rule the world... I couldn't let her figure me out. “Try being knocked out in the woods, drugged and sucked off, then sent off into a new world without any water. You can give me shit after that.” Twilight tilted her head. She was working her hooves through my mane, sweeping it back and pressing down on it, like she was trying to keep it in place. “That was all? Dehydration and heat stroke?” “No shit,” I replied. I was tempted to push her hooves away—I didn't like being babied. But the feeling of her hooves pressing down on my head... it helped bring feeling back to my body, and as much as I hated to admit it, it comforted me from my sudden attack. “What, you thought I'd be scared of a bunch of mares wanting to pamper me to death?” Twilight kept stroking at my mane. Water still dripped off my muzzle and into the fountain below. Everything was peaceful. It felt wrong of me to enjoy the peace, which was why a part of me rebelled, and at the same time, another part needed that peace from all the recent chaos—if only for a moment.   “I suppose you are a strange stallion.” Twilight finally stopped with my mane, taking her rump off the fountain. She stood up next to me, smiling. “Hope you don't mind, but with your mane slightly cleaner, fewer mares will give us a problem.” I opened my mouth to fling an insult, only for none to come. “I... thanks.” I slowly returned to my own hooves, and when I stood on all fours, I stumbled a bit in place. There was no denying I was fighting a losing battle with my body.   If I didn't sit down and drink something soon, I was going to pass out again... and I wouldn't like where I would wake up. No matter what, these mares couldn't get one over me, even if that meant fighting myself.   “Speaking of mares,” I began, “is there any place near here with fewer of them?” Twilight stared at me. She looked like she wanted to say something—and her mouth did open a few times—but she kept her thoughts to herself. Instead, she shook her head and smiled. “Sorry to break it to you, but mares pretty much run this town.” She blinked, lowering her head in thought, pressing a hoof against her chin. “But, I do suppose there's one place we could go.” “No mares?” I said. “Count me in.” “I don't think you'll like it there.” “Try me.” “Oh, you've got to be fucking KIDDING me!”   “Hey! Don't blame me.” Twilight walked up next to me, and together, we stood before the building. “You wanted a place without mares? Then somewhere like this was the only alternative.” I wasn't sure about that shit. The place was covered in neon lights. Bright colors. Mostly pink and red and that kind of shit. There was a line of stallions along the building, all waiting to get in, some bunched together with... their manes done, curled, or flaked. Ah fuck.   “I guess this place will do.” I lifted a hoof before my eyes, watching it intensely, though not a tremble came out of it. Even when the stallions glanced over at me, and I could see them whispering about them... my hoof still kept still. “You able to cover for me? Because I have no fucking clue what horses do for currency.” Twilight smiled. “Don't worry about it, Anon. Stallions are never supposed to pay for anything here.” “What? No.” I shook my head, turning to face her. “I'll find a way to pay you back. I just don't have a clue about how things work here.” “They work by mares covering whatever the stallions want to do.” Twilight gestured a hoof at the distant line of stallions, all standing on a red carpet... and none daring to step off it. “Those stallions there? They've had such a hard time being home... alone while the mares are off at work... no one to take care of them and—“ “Twilight?” “—suck their... y-yes?” “Knock that shit off.”   “S-Sorry.” She cleared her throat. “S-Still have to get used to treating you like a mare.” “The fuck?” Twilight's cheeks went pink immediately. She stepped back, her wings flaring slightly, and she held up her forehooves in defense. “I-I mean a s-stallion who acts like a mare! Hehehe, you... get what I mean, right?” I sighed. “I don't want to, but I do.” I shook my head, pointing at the line. “So what? Stallions drink for free on Saturdays?” “Don't be absurd!” Twilight flung the words back while dropping her hooves. “Stallions can drink every day of the week. We wouldn't dare force them to be sober all the time.” She shook her head. “Too cruel for them. They're too fragile to be constantly aware of their surroundings.” “That so?” “A-Aside from you, of course.” “I appreciate the compliment.” I was tempted to give some shit to the stallions, but really, who was I to talk? After that scene back in the town square, I needed something to cool the nerves. Though, I still had a better reason for drinking, so fuck them all slightly. “But you don't have to worry about saving your ass anymore. When you talk about stallions, I'll just take it to mean...” I gestured toward the line. “...them.” We joined the line after that. Didn't make sense to stand around all day to whine. The afternoon was giving way to evening. At least I hoped it was—I don't think I could take any more surprises this world could throw at me.   “So,” I began, rousing Twilight's interest, “all these stallions don't have to pay for jack shit? Just drink whatever they want, have someone else pay for it, then fuck off home?” “What? Oh, no!” Twilight dipped her muzzle and giggled. For such a crazy mare, she could be cute sometimes. “We'd never trust a stallion walking home alone, especially late at night. We never let them out of our sights if we have to.” She swallowed, shaking her head. “The thought of them getting lost on their way home...” “Alright, alright!” I sighed. “Skip the tear fest. I get the idea.” Twilight glared at me from the side. “You can be very rude for a stallion.” “You should see me when I'm drunk.” Fuck. Was I being too much of a dick? She seemed to have cooled off from whatever shit she tried to pull in the morning, but not only that, she saved my ass back at the water fountain. C'mon, Anon, show some kindness for once in your fuckin' life. “So... you care a lot about stallions, huh?” “What mare doesn't?” Twilight lifted her muzzle again, staring straight at me. Her eyes were wide with a light shining from inside her pupils. “They're so cute and defenseless. Tying their manes is such a stress-reliever. Have you ever tried to see one sleep before? They're adorable!” “Tried watching myself sleep before,” I replied. “Put a mirror next to my bed. Tried watching myself sleep, but for whatever reason, I couldn't see anything when my eyes closed. Even harder when I actually fell asleep.” “You silly stallion!” Twilight lifted a hoof and bopped it against my muzzle. “You can't watch yourself sleep! Such cute things for you to tr—“ “Twilight?” “H-Huh?” “I was fuckin' joking.” Twilight looked away. “Oh.” What the fuck man? “Forget it. What do you say about skipping this line?” “Skipping the line!” Twilight exclaimed, looking at me again—and so did a few stallions ahead. 'Anon, you really have to be careful about some of the stuff you say! Skipping the line while these poor stallions have already been waiting so long. You'd... you'd hurt their feelings!” “So what? Fuck 'em.”   There came a voice from ahead of the line, “Where and when, baby?” I lifted my head slightly above the crowd. “Not that kind of fuck, you fuckin' creep.” “A-Anon!” Twilight threw her hoof around my neck, pulling me down and closer toward her. “You can't just say things like that to a stallion! Unlike you, they're sensitive. You could really hurt them with the stuff you say.” “Who gives a fuck?” I tried to reason with Twilight, her muzzle filling my vision. “They should grow a thicker skin if words can hurt them.” “But that's the whole point of being a stallion,” Twilight replied. “Anything and everything can hurt them. It's... it's up to the mares to protect them! To save them. To comfort them. To—“ “You better not try pulling this shit on me later into the night.” Twilight sighed. “Look, if I make a case of you being ill to get us inside, will you promise to try watching your mouth?” Aw fuck. That wasn't a bad offer. The queue to get in looked pretty long. And all the pretty stallions ahead were glaring back at me. Fuck. Even in a brand new fuckin' world, it didn't seem like I belonged anywhere.   “Alright, you got a deal.” I let myself lean against Twilight's body, feeling her coat rub against mine, her softness pressing into me. I lowered my muzzle, feeling a strand of mane drape over my forehead. “Get us in there, princess.” I felt her wing flick at my side. “I've... never done something so naughty with a stallion before!” Twilight giggled to herself, though her laughter seemed partly out of breath. “Alright. Hold on tightly to me. We're going to need to sell this well.” “You just using that as an excuse to—“ “Oh, just be quiet and hug me, Anon.” Her eyes flew all the way open. “Talking back to a stallion! Oh, what has come over me!” She giggled as her right-wing unfurled, coming over my back and sliding under my barrel, hugging me close to her body. “Quick, let's get inside!” Eh, fuck it. It was hard to be mad at Twilight when she came off as excited. Throwing my left foreleg over her shoulder, I relied some of my weight on her body, and in a second, I realized how exhausted I really was. I practically let her carry me through the line while my joints started to relax. “Excuse me! Coming through!” Twilight used the glow of her horn to draw attention to us. Stallions gazed and glared at me, some confused and some angered, but all looking slightly envious. “Sick stallion here! Needs a drink... stat!” Twilight giggled so softly that only I heard it.   Eventually, we reached the front of the line. Risking a lift of my muzzle, the first thing I saw was two mares in suits, both with straight and spiky manes, each wearing black shades over their eyes. For girls, even they startled me.   “Miss Twilight Sparkle,” one of the guards said. “A pleasure to see you. How may we assist?” “I'm afraid I have a sick stallion here.” Twilight held me up for a second, and taking the cue, I let my body go limp. “He's been in my care for the past few weeks, and only today have I gotten him on his widdle hooves.” She then gulped, lowering her head. “He hasn't had anything to drink... in over a month!” I don't think I've heard so many gasps happening at once.   “H-How terrible!” One of the mares took off her shades. She gazed down at me and, without warning, lifted my muzzle with her hooves, holding me up. She had a sharp blond muzzle with glowing blue eyes. At once, her lips assaulted my face, kissing every inch of fur that I had there. “He.. mmhmm.. needs to be filled... mmmm... with love and booze at once!” “A-And I agree!” Twilight tugged me back more forcefully than I would have liked. When she spoke again, I could swear there was a slight growl in her voice. “Which is why I need to get him inside now! Do you think you could do that for us?” “Certainly for him, Twilight Sparkle,” the second mare said, stepping forward. She towered over not only Twilight but me as well. “A stallion should never be forced to endure such terribleness. But you know the rules.” She flicked a hoof to a sign on the double, wooden doors. “A stallion's bar is a stallion's bar. No mares.” “I understand that,” Twilight tried, though she sunk slightly into herself, “but look at him. He's too shy and weak to do much for himself. He needs me.” I glared at her for only a second.   “Which is why we can escort him inside.” Oh fuck. The towering bitch was going to make a grab at me. If I couldn't almost handle being around Twilight, then how the fuck was I going to work out with a near towering giant? This mare looked like she curled buildings for warm up... and the way she looked at me... fuck me I felt like a fucking snack. “B-B-But I love Twilight Sparkle!” I said in my best mock voice, feeling myself squeak at her name. “She cares for me... comforts me... l-loves me...” I swallowed, doing my best to not want to kill myself. “I don't wanna go in there alone! Please! Let her come with me! I promise not to cause any trouble.” “Fret not, child!” Both mares, this time, came down and kissed each of my cheeks. “Please do not have an attack—“ I blinked. “The fuck you mean attac—“ “He's very testy when another mare tries to touch him,” Twilight intervened, pulling us both toward the doors. “He's the victim of an abusive mare. I was his first anchoring point. Anything more than that...” Twilight stopped when she saw the mares were crying. They were crying for me. The fuck? Were mares around here really that sensitive, that some bad acting, a few lies, and a weak looking stallion could throw them for a roller coaster of emotions?   “Go on, Princess Twilight Sparkle,” said the one. “Take good care of that poor stallion,” said the other. Twilight nodded to them both. “Trust me. I'm going to get him happy like the rest soon enough.” She turned us around to the door, still holding me close to her body, using a hoof to wave back to the guards. “Thanks again! We'll try to keep this our little secret.” Twilight carried me to the bar, the double doors soon approaching, their glass sporadically lit up by flashing, neon lights. Heavy music of electric tunes were muffled by the wood. I couldn't help but gulp as her hoof came forward to open the door.   Oh, Twilight Sparkle, just where the fuck were you taking me? > II | Anon VS Memory > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- ~ II ~ Anon VS Memory "Never thought I'd find myself in a gay bar.” “What does the word 'gay' mean?” I decided not to answer that. “Another outdated word where I'm from.” To be honest, I wasn't even sure this place could be considered... excessively happy. “I'll explain it once we've found a seat. Er, are there even seats available?”   I turned to look over at Twilight. She was standing next to me, with her eyes closed and horn glowing. She reopened them a second later, smiling. “There's a free booth on the second floor. Follow me!” She took the charge through the crowd... which left me to ogle at her backside for a while. I'd made mention of it before, but Twilight had an ass that, well... fuck, it was just a good ass, alright? Every step was a sway to her hips. Her tail would flick and drape over her firm, supple flanks, tantalizing me before I could realize exactly what I was feeling. Me? Being into horses? No fucking way.   “You coming or what?” Twilight asked. When I looked up, her head was slightly turned and she looked at me from the corner of her eye. Be it the neon lights or something else entirely, but her eye glinted when it saw me. “That seat won't be available for long. Do I... have to carry you?” I shook my head, exhaling as quietly as I could. “You wish!” I quickly followed after her. Twilight made sure to keep herself ahead, clearing a way through the thick crowd of stallions, or... horses appearing to be stallions. More than once, one of them would bump into me, giggling as they did so, the gel from their slick manes splattering onto my coat.   I mostly kept silent, nodded, and walked forward the best I could. Starting shit in a world I knew close to nothing about seemed like a bad idea. And... to be honest, it made me sorta, I guess, happy to see so many people... ponies having fun.   It was girly and weird, but out of everyone here, only I was wearing a frown.   That didn't stop me from wanting to knock out the stallions that flicked their asses against my own, though. That took some biting down on my lips for. To calm myself down, though, all I had to do was look at the ass in front of me. “Like what you see, stallion?” Somehow... without me fucking knowing a fucking stallion put himself in front of me! If that wasn't bad enough already, he had his blue-coated ass nearly in my face, with his groomed tail flicked aside, and I had to do my best to not beat the fuck out of what I saw! “You beanie motherfuc—“ “Whoa whoa whoa!” Princess Twilight Sparkle appeared in front of me before I could so much lift a hoof, quickly throwing her leg around my neck and pulling me against her chest. “I see you caught my stallion! I'm afraid he's not feeling well at the moment. Do you think you could forgive him for—” “M-M-Mare!” The beanie stallion took off running in a cloud of smoke. “Mare! Mare! Mare!” My anger was swept away by confusion. “Are all stallions this desperate to protect their virginity around here?” A groan. “Be quiet. I'm not letting go of you until we're upstairs.” First girl to say that to me. “And what will you have to drink, sweet stuff?” “Whiskey.” “But that's not sweet at all!” The stallion had a pinkish coat clashing against a black, frilly maid outfit. His eyes were brighter and softer than any mare I'd seen—the brightest shade of brown the color spectrum could manage. “For a pretty newbie like yourself, I've got a... hehe... few drinks off the menu I'm willing to share.” “Unless those drinks are whiskey, whiskey, or whiskey, fuck—“ “Hey!” Twilight drew my gaze for a second. She was pouting with her lips out. “Stop using that word!” “The fuck?” I shook my head. “You don't even know what it means! Why are you complaining?” “Because of the way you're using it.” Twilight crossed her slender legs, holding them against her fluffy stomach. She turned her head aside, refusing to make eye contact with me. “It always sounds like something bad or wrong, or else you wouldn't be so hesitant to say it. Drop it.” “Or what?” “Or...” Her violet eyes flicked over at me. “...I won't pay for your drinks.” “Princess Twilight Sparkle!” The waitress... waiter... stallion exclaimed. “Such language!” “My language!” Twilight replied, turning her muzzle forward. “He started it!” “But he's a stallion, Twilight.” The waiter closed his eyes, shook his head, and sucked his lips. A stallion that had my back? This guy was alright. “And he's not the only one in here, for your information. If you're going to force yourself into our bar, you can at the very least be respectful to the sensitive ears in here.” “Now this?” I leaned back into my seat, letting my arms rest along the back of my booth. “This I could get used to.” I glanced at the stallion. “Say, what's your name, friend?” “Chadsworth.” The fuck? This was this world's Chad? Fuck it.   First Chad I could get along with.   “Alright then, Chad.” I beat a hoof against my chest, trying to appear more like hot shit. “Give me a drink off the menu then. Just... try to make it as dry as you can manage, alright?” I swear to fuck I've never made another guy so happy before. It was actually weird to see another stallion get happy and excited because of something that I did. Fuck me. My memories before waking up in those damned woods were nothing but blurs to me now, but even then, they all screamed at me for being a lonely and unpopular fuck. “Dry!” The stallion giggled as he threw up his forelegs. “And with tons of sugar!” “What? No!” The stallion turned around, sticking out his tongue out from the side, happily walking off to go fuck up my drink. “Stop that right now! Don't you dare... oh, fuck it.” Twilight giggled. “What are you laughing at?” “Just you, sweet stallion.” “Never call me that again.” “Then stop saying... fuck.” Fuck! Why did it sound super sexy when she fucking said it. She slurred the word like she was tasting it in her mouth, swirling the letters along her tongue, exhaling softly at the last syllable with her eyelids coming together ever so slightly.   “I'd watch your tone there, missy.” I reclined fully into my seat, cracking my neck. “You heard that stallion. Pushing me around will only give you a bad reputation.” “Oh, is that so?” Twilight also cracked her neck, tilting her head slowly, smiling at me gently... until it shrunk into a smirk. “If that's the case, then maybe I should start treating you like all the other stallions, sweety.” There was a jolt from my heart, a twitch from my thighs, and an aching from my cock. I blinked quickly and breathed slowly. Now was a really bad fuckin' time to fall in love with the horse lady. Doesn't matter if she's pretty and purple—fuck off potential boner.   “If I go fuck myself,” I began, “will you chill it with the names?” “Oh? But I quite enjoyed calling you them.” “C'mon.” Twilight glanced left and then right. She placed her forehooves on the table, leaning over it slowly, flicking her snout up. She wanted me to draw closer and, without much choice, I did as I was told. We were nearly muzzle to muzzle, her soft lips close to my own again, and the glow of her violet eyes was unreal. My heart stopped.   “That meanie stallion didn't take my order,” she whispered. Giggling, she drew closer to my right ear, which perked up by her breath warming the fur on my cheek. “And I'm quite thirsty as well. So... hmm... when that stallion gets back...” It may have been a trick of the mind, or the blaring of the techno music, maybe even fantasy itself unleashed, but I swore her lips tilted, came over and down on the outline of my ear, nibbling it nearly imperceptibility.   Before my eyes could glance up to check, she was already pulling back, a smirk reaching her snout. Her eyes seemed to glow with the same intensity of the nearby neon nights. Be it a trick of the mind or a spell of her magic, I found myself almost unable to look away. Mares here were fuckin' crazy. Or was it I who was crazy? “You're a sneaky mare.” “And you're a sweet stallion.” I took my hooves off from the booth as I looked down in defeat. “You win. I'll go fuck myself.” “All right!” Twilight fell back into her seat, bringing her forelegs together. “You're the best, Anon.” “But I get to drink the first half!” “That's certainly fine by me!” It took me a second to figure out what she meant.   “You're a cheeky one.” That was all I could get out of me. This mare was smarter and more clever than what I gave her more credit for. I didn't even consider how attractive she was—Twilight had struck me somewhat as a nerd at first—but she had a charm about her that was borderline irresistible. “All mares like you in this world?” “Most mares are,” Twilight replied. “Though I must say, you've certainly twisted my idea on what most stallions are like.” She giggled playfully and glanced down at her hooves. “There's never been quite a stallion like you before. It's changed the way I think, at least a tiny bit.” “I suppose that makes sense.” I shook my head, feeling my gaze drop. “I'm not even of this world.” “You've made mention of that several times before.” The slur left Twilight's voice. When I sat up, she was sitting up straight as well. “I just took that to mean you didn't originally come from Ponyville. But from how the way you speak... and your behavior, well...” Twilight's expression darkened as she dipped her head in thought. “You act like you're not from here. Like, at all.” “That's because you've hit the nail on the head, princess.” Did that expression still work here? Fuck, I had a lot of retooling to do the longer I stayed here. “I'm not from here. Hell, yesterday, I wasn't even a fucking horse.” Twilight looked back up at me, an expression serious instead of sultry, and she gazed at me with the expression expected of a friend. The change in behavior was... refreshing and comforting to say the least.   “What were you then?” “I was a...” I blinked my eyes, doing my best to try and think, but nothing came to mind. What the fuck? Nothing was coming to mind but... that couldn't be right? There was something there. I tried closing my eyes and visualizing the past... only to see nothing but blurs. “I was a being... I was... a someone.” “Some...one?” Twilight shook her head, her mane swaying in the air. “I don't think I've ever heard that expression before. I doubt it means anything rude... is it... synonymous with somepony by chance?” “Y-Yeah?” I lost my breath and struggled to get it back. “I-I-I think?” Twilight squinted at me. “You're just not making things up, are you?” I blinked. “H-Huh?” Twilight shook her head. “I should have known better.” “What...” I clenched my eyes closed while light lit up behind my eyes. Fuck... another attack? No no no. It didn't feel like one. But my head—my mind... something was enshrouding it in a painful fog. “...do you mean?” “I've heard of stallions acting different to draw attention,” I could see her face, but I could hear Twilight’s disappointment. “But you didn't strike me as the type. To think, that all this was...” “That's not it!” I fought against an immense weight just to lift my muzzle, feeling it sink up and down. Fuck... it was a losing battle. “I-I'm not an a-a-attention whore.” Or was I? What was I? How could I be so certain about something that I was certainly uncertain of? “At least, I wasn't. I don't think I wasn't. I... I... I d-don't remember!” > III | Anon VS Sexy Job Interviews > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- ~ III ~ Anon VS Sexy Job Interviews What the fuck... My mind was in a haze and I hadn't even had any champagne. I racked my brain for anything. Clenching my eyes shut, I tried to see into the past, but blurs and white lights were all that I saw—everything against the backdrop of techno music blasting around the club. Something soft caressed my hoof. “Anon, open your eyes.” It was Twilight. She sounded so far away, yet she felt so close to me. “Can you do that for me, please?” What other choice did I have? I opened my eyes, blinking once or twice for them to adjust to the flashing lights. In a second, they focused on her lavender muzzle, which hovered inches away from my own. “Follow my hoof real quick, okay?” Using her other hoof, she lifted it up and down, left then right. There was some lag in following her direction; something was slowing me down internally. “Okay. Next, lay your head on the table.” I wanted to fight her, but she already thought I was a fraud and a freak, and giving her shit wouldn't play in my favor. Gently, I laid my forehead against the table, feeling her hoof press down on my mane. What the fuck was she trying to do? “I'm not feeling anything along your neck.” Twilight's hoof traveled up the back of my head, gliding through and into my mane. Sometimes, she'd pause over a spot that would elicit a sigh of curiosity from her lips. One place where her hoof pressed down on almost made me scream. “Whoa! Did that hurt?” “Twilight?” My voice came out muffled. “Y-Yes?” “Did you impale your horn into the back of my fucking head?” I could hear her mane sway as she shook her head. “I didn't... but something else might have.” Her hooves pulled away, and for a moment, I missed the way how they felt against my mane. It was a sensation I'd never been aware of before—soft hooves stroking through my long, silk strands. “You can lift your head now.” “I'm not sure about that one.” “Why not?” “If I lift my head,” I said, “I'm worried my brain will pour out.” “Stop being such a stallion.” I heard the clopping of hooves from the left stop, followed by a distressed neigh, before the hoofsteps resumed. They clip-clopped off quickly into the distance, the sound overtaken by the base drop of the blaring speakers. Even with my eyes closed, I could still see the tired, sad expression on Twilight's muzzle. So I decided to stop being such an asshole and cut her some slack. Bringing my hooves to the back of my head, I held them there while I lifted my muzzle, half expecting brain matter to splash against my fur. To my surprise, but not my delight, my brain kept inside my skull, continuing to cry like a little bitch. “Am I safe to take my hooves away?” “I'll slap them if you don't.” Reason. Fucking. Enough. I pulled my hooves back and laid on the table. I tried making eye contact with Twilight, but every time I did, I only ended up looking at my hooves. Again and again, our dynamic had fucking changed. She'd gone from wanting to fuck me, to wanting to help me, back to wanting to fuck, though with a dash of wanting to help me—and then now, wanting to kill me for being a fraud. What the fuck was I supposed to say to all that? “You know I'm not lying to you, right?” It was the only thing to come out of my mouth, and fuck it, I followed it. “I really don't know how I got here. But this place? This world? I've never seen this shit before. There was something before this.” I shook my head, regretting the stabbing in my noggin that came with it, though I persisted enough to look up at her again. “It sounds crazy especially when I can't remember what I was. But something was there, or else, I... wouldn't be recalling everything feeling a tad familiar.” Twilight wasn't even looking at me when I looked up. She had her muzzle tilted down, her mind lost to whatever was before her eyes, and she seemed to be thinking about something rather intensely. Suddenly, her violet eyes took on a subtle glow, and she stared up at me once more. “Your memories... you're unable to recall them, but you feel like they're there, right?” I nodded. “But you also have all these small details and feelings that feel familiar fading back in, right?” “Congratulations, Twilight,” I said. “You managed to sum up everything that I've just said. How you do it is beyond—“ “Will you cut that out for a second!” Twilight shook her head. “For whatever reason, something has impacted your ability to recall details and memories before Fluttershy found you.” She crossed her forelegs over her chest, sitting back in her seat. “Tell me, Anon. Do you know how passive memory works?” “I'm sure you're about to fuckin' enlightenment me.” And then I remembered our deal about not swearing, shaking my head and—ow! Why. The. Fuck! Do I keep doing that? Geeze! I thought I'd fucking learn by now. “Sorry. You were saying?” “Listen closely,” Twilight started, “you may not know this, but our minds are able to store books upon books of information we're not conscious of.” It was at this very moment I was hoping that Chad would show up with my fucking drink. It'd make the speech a bit more bearable. “If we were aware of everything, well, our bodies would shut down! It's as simple as that.” “Uh-huh.” “So our minds developed a neat mechanic to allow us to retain potentially useful information, while at the same time, not overloading our senses.” Twilight seemed to be forgetting herself the further she went on. Her voice quickened the closer she got to her point. She tittered in place. “So our minds catalog experiences and items, so that, when we see something that evokes the same stimulus to when we originally saw that thing, we are more bound to remember it!” I blinked. “So basically, you see something now that reminds you of something you'd seen before. And then you remember it for that moment?” Twilight huffed. “I liked my explanation more.” “I'm sure you do,” I replied. “What I fail to see is how all this relates back to me.” “That's what I'm still trying to figure out for myself,” Twilight replied. “I'm not sure how much I believed you at the moment, but at the very least, your story holds up for now. You have a couple of bruises and such to the back of your head.” Well, fucking thank you Captain Obvious. “That could explain your issue in recalling your memories,” she continued, “but something still feels off about it. Something that I can't get my hoof—“ “Your drink!” I was so happy to see another guy in my life. “Chad!” I turned in my seat, seeing him standing at the side of the booth. With a smile, he tilted his back toward the table, letting the drink he had on his back slide onto the surface. “Geeze that's a big fucking drink. Did you make it dry?” “As dry as my sweetness would allow!” Chad dipped his muzzle into his vest, pulling out two bendy straws with his teeth: one pink and one purple. Fucking of course. “I went for the biggest size I could find—“ he giggled, “—downstairs.” He then faced Twilight Sparkle. The joy dropped from his expression, and he stood up on two legs, holding his hips with his forehooves. “And you, missy, are lucky I went for the biggest size for your sake.” Twilight wanted to say something, but even with her mouth closed, I could sense her tongue being bit. “You two enjoy now!” Chad started to trot away from the table, giggling. “And you take good care of that stallion for me, Twilight Sparkle!” Ah, fuck. Was that how we looked? A fucking date? I looked back at Twilight to find her staring at the fountain of a drink before us, which had a thin base and a wide rim, looking like it took several bottles to fill the fucking thing. And Twilight did not hesitate for a fucking second. She levitated both of the straws and dipped them into a drink. Leaning over the table, some mane draped over her eyes, but with a swipe of her hoof, she swept the strands behind her ear. She offered me a smile. “Are you going to have a drink?” she asked. “Or are you feeling unwell now?” “Even if I was, I'd need a drink to take my mind off it.” I leaned forward as well, hesitant to take the straw leaning toward me. “But isn't something like this a bit whack? I mean, the horses around here may think we're dating or some shit.” Twilight flicked her eyes up when I swore, but she decided to drop it. “They'll think that I do what I normally do: take special care of my subjects.” “So I'm not special then?” “You're special in your special way.” I don't know why, but the voice of a teacher flashed through my mind, someone long ago having said the same thing. Was that the flash of passive memory she had been talking about? “You're so special... that I don't know what to do with you.” “I'll be fucking off after this, if that helps.” “Oh? Where will you go?” “Don't know and don't care.” I brought my lips to the straw, feeling her watch my every inch of movement, feeling her almost smile when I took the tip between my lips. “But if I'm better than most of the stallions in this world, then I shouldn't have any trouble finding my own way.” Twilight smiled at me. She let her lips sit over her own straw, gently drinking back the booze. Her eyes were closed and her expression was calm. It was aggravating how cute she could look at times—like she was silently challenging me to a fight. And a fight she would fucking have. I drew back the liquid with a loud slurp. My eyes drifted shut from the taste—it was the sweetest and driest thing I'd ever tasted! Like a combination that was never meant to be, and yet, was the greatest thing to have ever existed. I got two gulps in when Twilight pulled away from her straw. “And what about mares? What's your plan for the ones that’ll try to force you into a herd?” “Tell them to fuck off?” “Anon~” “I... don't know!” I shrugged. “I still know jack about this world.” I went for another sip; three to four, Twilight Sparkle. “I imagine if a mare gave me too much trouble, I would tell her to buzz off though. Probably find some place to hire me to—“ “You'd never find work,” Twilight said without even looking at me, stealing two sips from our drink with ease, not even coughing at how much the sweetness burned when it reached the belly. “Not many mares are willing to take a stallion in for work. Unless it was... the work that stallions like to do.” “You've got to be fucking kidding me?” “How do you feel about gardening?” “Fuck off.” I went for another sip, and so did she, both of us staring at the other. She was drinking faster than me with ease—while I suffered the irritation of pure, burning slush sliding down my throat. Five to eight... what the fuck? “Can't I just steal a job from a mare? Give me some actual fucking work here.” “Unless that mare was understanding of your situation, you would be hard pressed to find a few mares like that.” Twilight went in for another sip, but did not swallow. Looking up at me with her muzzle low, she parted her lips, sticking out her tongue. There was a trail of slush across it. Gazing up at me still, she smiled, flicking the slush to the back of her maw. She tilted her head back, swallowing somehow seductively. Once done, she lowered her muzzle, opening her mouth and letting me see an empty maw. “You are so fuckin' weird.” Twilight closed her mouth. “That's not a nice thing to say.” She shook her head. “Especially to your potential boss.” She crossed her forelegs over her chest. “Why should I ever hire such a stallion with such a filthy mouth?” “Hire me?” I laughed, taking another sip of the drink... only to stop halfway. I coughed to myself when the liquid hit my tongue. No fucking way. There was no fucking way I was a fucking lightweight in horsey land. “Why would I ever wanna work with you... much less for you...” “That's because, Mr. Anon, you don't have many options.” Twilight let her hoof trace along the rim of the glass, stopping only when it had bumped into my straw. With a smirk, she flicked it over to her side, dropping her lips to its tip. “It's either you find a job with all the other stallions.” I'd never been so angry, so horny, and so fucking confused in all my life—which wasn't much considering my recent news. The fucking sexy Twilight kept sipping from my drink, using my straw, and to top it all off, I couldn't even fucking yell at her to knock that shit off! I could see her plush and firm lips working against the plastic, the rest of her slender and fluffy body arching over the table. “Mmhmm... or you become part of a herd.” Twilight's pulled an inch away from the straw, leaving her tongue underneath it. She slowly licked up, saliva becoming slick to its surface. “That's the route most stallions go, but then again, you're unlike most stallions.” Her muzzle flew forward to kiss the tip of the straw. She pulled away completely a second later, staring me down from the side of her booth, smirking in a way that claimed victory. “I've got you trapped in such a unique situation,” Twilight Sparkle said. She let the tip of her tongue swipe across the surface of her lips, taking and licking away any lingering slush. “I could do this with no other stallion. Stay with me, and I'll have work for you to do, a place for you to stay, and I'll be able to keep my eye on you for the next little while.” She shot a hoof forward, flicking my straw back toward me. “What is it going to be, Anon? Become my personal assistant?” She drew back her hoof, giggling into it. “Or be like every stallion else?” The bitch fucking had me. > IV | Anon VS Oh Fuck > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- ~ IV ~ Anon VS Oh Fuck Or, at least, the sexy mare thought she had me. I sat straight in my seat. Glancing to my right, through the golden railings, the dance floor loomed below, its every tile glowing a different color, and in a blink, the tiles shifted in color, all illuminating together in a sequence that changed constantly to the beat of the music. I slowly turned my muzzle back to Twilight. She was still leaning back in her seat, forehooves crossed and muzzle held low, a smirk occupying her lips. Her eyes glowed, declaring easy victory. We made eye contact; I wasn't the one to break it. Twilight's eyes slowly started to blink in response to my silence. She was losing the will to support her smirk. Staring. She was staring at me now. I could see the gears turning in her head—she'd delivered a devastating blow, but here I was, not having flinched.   “So how about it, Anon?” Nice try, Twilight. I kept looking at her as I lowered my head, taking the straw she'd drunk from between my lips. I never looked away. I took two sips of the strong drink. There was a twitch that shook her body every so often. She was losing faith in herself.   Bullshit. I was heavily bullshitting right now. Twilight had been the toughest challenge this world had to throw at me. She was clever... but was she also gullible? “Mmhmm.” I pulled away from the straw, watching her squirm in place. “Not a bad offer, Twilight. You almost got me.” I brought a hoof to my mane, slicking it further back. I'd seen it done in some cartoons or some shit like that. There was a fifty percent chance of it making me look cool; there was also a fifty percent chance I'd look like a fucking dumbass. I hoped for the former and prepared a comeback if it was the latter. “I work for you, and what, you lock me in your basement for a little while?” “I... don't really have a basement in my castle.” The fuck? She had a fucking castle of all things? Fuck. Why was I turning her down again? “Dungeon?” “Don't really have a dungeon either.” Twilight blinked. “I mean, Spike likes to call his room a dungeon.” She tilted her head and gave a confused smile. “Stallions don't really get locked up here. Most of the time, they get a slap on the wrist, and that's... kinda it.” She then shrugged. “'Equestria hasn't had that many stallions dare to be dangerous before.” Wait? I could fuck up how many times I wanted and get away with it? I seriously had to think about that for a second. Before I could make any decent discoveries, I realized I was supposed to be fucking over Twilight. I quickly got back to that. “What do I get if I work for you?” “Oh, you know, nothing major.” Twilight slipped back into smugness, waving a hoof dismissively. “Just food, shelter, bits, and companionship. Just things you can go without in life!” “Hold a fuck... what's a bit?” “Bits are used in exchange for items and services, as well as—“ “So money then?” “What's a money?” “You know! Like, currency or something?” “We have currency!”   “I know you do. You just explained what bits are.” Twilight shook her head. “No, no. I mean currency is a word we use to describe our bits!” “Huh, well wouldn't you know it.” I shrugged my shoulders. How could a mare go from confused, flirtatious, and then excited so seamlessly?” “Sounds like a decent offer. Why the fuck... I mean, why am I getting it?” “What do you mean?” “You're a princess and stuff.” I pointed a hoof at our drink, less than half of it remaining, two plastic straws set on the rim at opposing ends. “That means you've got important stuff to do—at least I would hope so. Why waste your time on me?” “That,” Twilight began, leaning forward, “is a reason I don't have to tell you yet.” She leaned down and took another sip from the drink. Her body swayed slightly in place. “So how about it? Will you stay with me?” Twilight was hiding something. I knew she was. She was a mixed bag that I just couldn't figure out. I couldn't lie to myself about it anymore: the mares here could be scary as fuck. They held the power. They seemed to lord over stallions. Clever, cunning, conniving.   Could I really be blamed for always being on guard? Waking up in a strange world to have my cock sucked against my will—okay, there wasn't too much I could complain about that, but still, it sent me for a fucking loop.   And Twilight. Twilight! I couldn't fuck with her! She was smarter than me by a landslide. A mare that knew her shit. Every interaction with her, no matter the context, always felt like she was planning something, playing at something, or just having a go at me. For such a cute girl, she had the absolute ability to annihilate me.   But, by the same token, she had shown me kindness at the fountain. Twilight never made mention of it again. There was a vibe that she was nice—that she was looking out for me for the time being. I... wanted to believe she also wanted help. But, at the same time, I knew that wasn't her only goal. And that was the scariest part about Twilight, besides being a fluffy, slender, sexy mare—I knew what she was about, and she had the ability to do anything she please. Brilliant. Sexy. Magical. A powerful princess. Staying around her would always put me at a disadvantage.   Even if I did like her, she was too dangerous for me.   “Decent deal.” I broke the silence after a few moments of thinking, reclaiming eye contact with her. “Sounds like you're counting on me to succeed. But I've got a question for you.” “Name it.” “What happens if I say no?” I asked. “What happens if I decide to leave this town, decline every mare I see, and try my luck at living in some forest or some shit? Would you do anything about that? Would you try to stop me?” “I...” Twilight shook her head. “No, but that's crazy! You'd never make it alive out there! The Everfree is filled with creatures you could never conceive of.” She slammed her hooves against the table, causing our drink to shuffle over an inch. “You'd get eaten alive! Or starve! You're not even used to using your hooves.” “Exactly my point,” I said. “I'd get killed out there. The question is... would you let that happen?” “I...” There was no stopping the shit eating grin from overtaking my muzzle. Twilight sat still, her mind unable to invent a workaround—answering a personal question I had about her. No matter what overall goal she had, because of her reaction, a part of her did genuinely care for my well being.   Time to play at that part.   “You'd do something to help—” I kept trying at my luck “—maybe bring food or bits and stuff like that. After all, what's a poor, weak, recently turned stallion going to do to survive all on his own?” My voice was a whiny tone and a hoof pressed against my chest.   I dropped my head dramatically, shutting my eyes. “Could you imagine the rumors? The nightmares stallions would have of maybe this happening to them? The mares… they would worry endlessly for the safety their herds.” I smirked. “It would be one hell of a story.” I opened my eyes slyly. “One brought a hundred times over to a princess, of course.” Twilight swallowed. Her left eye twitched. It hadn't occurred to her that I could be this clever—it was a fluke, of course. Sometimes I was clever and sometimes I was an idiot. I only hoped that, if I talked enough, then I could fool others, especially myself. If I got this impression through her correctly on the first time, I wouldn't have to worry much about Princess Twilight Sparkle after this night. “So, to save us the trouble of those possible scenarios... how about we play a game of chance?” Twilight pulled back into her seat, pointing her muzzle down, having her eyes gaze at me from slightly underneath her bangs. “What are you proposing, A-Anon?” Her stutter sent her eyes looking straight down. For the first time, she sounded weak and beaten, and that gave me one hell of an ego boost.   Play it safe, Anon. “Shot for shot.” I laid my forelegs on the table, using them so I could lean over the table, smirking all the while. “First drink is my choice. Thirty seconds between rounds. Loser submits to the winner, of course.” Twilight lifted her head. She sat straight and proud, like a princess and unlike a loser, which was one hell of a transition. She had her muzzle tilted up, looking down at me from over her snout. “What are your terms?” “All offered perks for no work.” Even in this life, it seemed, my laziness was ripping others off. “Just enough to get me back on my fe... fe... fe...” I blinked as a memory tried to play, but it was too bulky to fit within my gaze. “...get me back on my h-hooves, I mean.” Twilight ignored my pause. “And if I win?” “I work for you.” “Not good enough.” Twilight crossed her forelegs, shaking her head. She pointed a hoof up into the air afterward. “I'd be getting the same deal anyway. It's not fair unless I get something for myself.” She threw up her other hoof. “Why gamble if only I take the risk?” Twilight was a fighter. I was hoping my blow to her ego would have lasted all night. In under five minutes, she bounced back, already scheming again. In a battle of the minds, I was set to lose, unless my bullshit was on point.   “Fair enough.” I inched my muzzle up. “What does a princess want, that a stallion with nothing, would have?” “Easy.” Twilight crossed her forelegs on the table as well, leaning her head into them as she slid across the table, coming up before the rim of our drink. “You have to sleep with me.” I blinked. “I beg your pardon?” Twilight closed an eye, gave a smirk, then playfully stuck her tongue out at me. “You heard me. You're the first stallion that's ever rejected me before.” Her chin sunk into the fur of her leg. “A princess turned down by a stallion? That's a perfect track record broken by you.” She shook her head, giggling. “The girls would never let me live it down!” Girls? What girls? “Of course, we could play this little game of yours later, when you've gotten some proper rest.” Twilight stared up at me from the small field of her purple fur. “No matter where we played, I would win anyway.” I don't doubt it. Being a princess, or unicorn with wings, or whatever the fuck—it granted her liver of fucking steel. If there was any chance of winning, it would be now, when we were both fucked. Who backs down because their head hurts? “Now works.” I also leaned forward and into my hooves, staring at her from the same level, the rivalry between us getting me excited. “You did me the flavor of downing most of our own drink. Shouldn't have taken so many gulps, Twilight.” She tried to hide it, but I saw her eyes gloss over for a second. “So, thanks for that.” I smiled. “Even with my head, that puts us on equal ground.” I came up from my hooves, feeling like I'd won. Confidence flooded through me just as I was going to need it most. “So how about it, princess? Feel like you can face me?” Twilight glanced down for a second, thought about something, and then quickly, faster than a second, sat straight. She still swayed slightly in place, but kept herself mostly still, smiling and staring at me.   “You're on then, Anon.” She pressed a hoof against her bottom lip, lightly pressing it up. “See these here? You better get ready to start kissing them again.” Her gaze then drew to along her back, settling on her supple flanks. “Among... other things.” One second and I'm feeling like a genius; another second, and I'm wondering if I've fucked myself badly. I blinked. There was no getting out of this, not after all my shit talking. She had me and I had her.   I promised to face this strange world and come out the victor.   Even if that meant out drinking a pony princess. “Chad!” I yelled over my shoulder. “Get me the biggest bottle of whiskey you have.” Twilight blinked at my choice of drink. If she didn't mess with the strong stuff, then maybe, just maybe, she would bow out by the second shot. “And after you've done that, Chadsworth!” Twilight called out as she leaned over into the walkway, “Get us the bottle of the sweetest drink you have! The more stallion-ly, the better!” Twilight saw my shoulders drop. “What's the matter, Anon?” she said. “Did you not expect me to play fair?” > V | Anon Vs Virginity > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- ~ V ~ Anon VS Virginity “W-What's  the matter, Twilight?!” I took the rim of the shot between my teeth, tilting back my head as I downed the drink. With a spit, the shot fell onto the table, rolling in a small circle. “Never had anything bitter in your life? Can't handle the challenge of a real drink?” “Oooooooh!” “Pfft! You wish!” Twilight's lavender magic surrounded the shot, lifting both it, and the bottle in the middle of the table, toward her muzzle. She poured herself another drink, which she swirled about in the air for all to see. “This stuff here? I was only hesitant because it tasted like root beer.” She hovered the shot over her muzzle, and throwing back her head, tilted the drink. Magic guided the drink down into her open mouth, which she swallowed in a fluid movement, catching the shot itself between her lips. Twilight then looked down at me, and with a wink, spat the shot at me. It hit my chest before falling between my legs, and for the moment, I was the one to be stunned. Twilight wasn't pulling any punches. “Ooooooh!” “Will you all shut up!” I yelled at the crowd without looking at them. I couldn't look at them. The constant drinking had cooled my nerves enough that I didn't have to worry about all the staring eyes—just had to keep my mind and my own eyes off of them. “This is a private drinking completion. Everyone get lost!” The stallions surrounded the side of our table. They blocked the damn walkway as well. I could feel their presence, their exhales sporadically blowing the fur on my shoulder—I shook my head, inhaled deeply, and did my best to forget.   “What's the matter, Anon?” Twilight's muzzle was swaying in the air, her lips constantly splitting in non-stop giggles, her eyes doing their best to stay locked on me. “Don't want a crowd to see you lose? Isn't that so cute? Should I shoo them away for you?” “I... can take care of myself, thank you very much!” I learned to pick up the shot between my legs—a loud thud resounding when my forehead slammed against the table. I jerked up right away, cursing under my breath. “Someone fill my shot!”   “Anything for you, sweety!” Twilight levitated the bottle up and over to me, sticking only the tip of her tongue over her lips. She was gesturing the things to come: fuck that. “Should I only give you a half-shot because of—“ I yanked the bottle out of her magical grip. Holding it awkwardly, I brought its opening to my lips, chugging back three solid gulps of the vile liquid. It burned and tasted awful; my face made no show of it.   “I can't believe! A stallion going against a mare?” some stallion screamed. “Can some handsome stallion stroke my cheek? I don't think I can handle much more of this!” There was a shuffling of hoofsteps. “I... I think I may faint!” You and me both, buddy. Most of the feeling in my body had disappeared after the fifth shot of the second bottle. The world swayed, my head hurt, and my stomach churned. Twilight didn't look much better than me, but somehow, she managed to keep looking adorable through it all. She was trying too hard to be sultry and sexy, and for whatever reason, that only made her more sultry and sexy.   Twilight took back the bottle and shot wordlessly. She poured herself a drink, downed it, poured a second, down it, poured a third... but kept the shot at her lips, but brought it no further. An invisible, stone wall had constructed itself in her mouth. She had hit the block. “What's this? Is Anon going to get to live an easy life after all?” I beat a hoof against my chest, pointing it at her afterward. I laughed. “See? This is what you s-stallions need... pride! You have some pride in your life, and it'll do you wonders.” I then crossed my forelegs over my chest. “Even beat a mare, a princess, in her own kingdom? Who's the best stallion to have ever lived?” I tilted my muzzle up. “I am. No mare is getting this piece, aw yeah!” I was acting like an idiot and couldn't give a flying fuck about it. “Wait... but you have slept with a mare before, right?” I blinked. What the fuck.   “Of course he has!” another voice replied. “Every stallion has been laid before! It's, like, impossible for any stallion to be virgin.” The voice went quiet for a moment. “Right?” I didn't want to, but my eyes were drawn to the crowd, to all the sensitive stallions staring down at me. I was able to brave their gazes a little easier than the mare—for whatever reason, knowing that I was slightly better than them all... it made facing them all little easier. Did that make me a prick?   “I've... uh, haven't fucked a horse before?” I blinked, watching the faces sway about in a circle, in a speed faster than I would have liked. “Don't think I've ever s-stuck my cock in anything before. At least, I don't recall.” My head fell to the left, causing my body to lean after it. “Fuck me! I'm a fucking virgin!” I slammed my hoof against the table. “Come on, brain! Of all the things to remember, you decide to slip that fact back in.” I sighed, doing my best to make sure only a sigh came out of my mouth. “What a fuckin' bummer.”   When I finally did look up from my disappointment, the first thing I saw was the bright, glowing eyes of Twilight Sparkle. They were wider and brighter than anytime I'd seen them before. In a second, it was like all her drunkenness had disintegrated, burned in the heatwave of a burning realization.   “Anon...” Twilight nearly whispered. “...you're...a...v-virgin?” “And s-so what if I fucking am?” I said with my voice raising, and in a second, I did not like how weak I felt and sounded. “N-Nothing wrong with that! It's you mares who are crazy! I... I don't trust any of you near my d—“ It was like a stampede that I was too fucked to properly see or hear. The crowd of stallions, all at once, turned to the side, each running in a gallop away from the table. Some yelled, some cried, all their eyes going wide. They couldn't handle it; they all promptly fucked off. “What the fuck?” I couldn't stop my swearing, not when I was both drunk and confused. When I looked back at Twilight, she had lowered her glass, and instead, raised the bottle to her lips. “Yo, Twilight, what gives? Why the fuck is everyone freaking out over me being, y'know, a fucking virgin.” Twilight stared at me. “Twilight?” I tried again with a more desperate voice. “Come on, don't be like that. Surely, there are other virgin stallions around here...” I found myself gulping utter fear down my throat. “...right?” Twilight, in response to all of this, put the bottle to her lips and tilted her head back. With eyes closed, she didn't gulp, but rather, chugged the bottle down. She kept drinking even as alcohol flooded over her lips and down her chin. Somehow, in my stupidity, I'd given her a second wind.   Watching the alcohol drain down the glass of the bottle, I thought of that as a good metaphor for the confidence draining down through my body. In just a few seconds, she emptied the bottle, and with puffed cheek, Twilight Sparkle threw herself at me.   I wasn't expecting her to fly at me—this beauty of soft and slender purple shooting straight at me. Her chest crashed against my own, her firm flanks slammed against my thighs, and without hesitation, she crossed her forelegs over my neck—locking them together, pinning me in a hug.   I went to yell at her, but in a blur of movement, found my lips already occupied. Twilight had pushed her muzzle against my own, her lips pressing against my own, the layer of her fur brushing against my own. I tried fighting back, but for whatever reason, my body did not give in to my demands.   It only took a few seconds for me to realize why. I was drunk, tired, and sore. I'd been in pain, I'd been wearing a mask, I'd been waiting for a moment of bliss—even for a moment to escape my torment. And now, for this one time only, I had this purple, perfect, princess in my lap.   My forelegs raised to her back on their own. Her back was slightly arched, the layer of her coat pleasant to touch, the toned muscles underneath shifting to her movement, to her kissing, to how she rocked her hips over my crotch. The tip of her tongue prodded in-between my lips. My mind went blank for a second; I'd only been kissed once before, and now, I was having to pick up the cues as I went along. I had no idea what I was doing and cared not for how much I might have been fucking up—Twilight didn't seem to care: all she was focused on was having more of me against and upon her.   So I tilted my muzzle slightly, parted my lips, and the torrent of alcohol streaming into my mouth. Clever girl. The game was still on even though we both were so fucked. I wanted to cough back the liquid, but I didn't dare, and instead, swallowed whatever shots I was supposed to take in response. It only caused my hooves to travel further down her back. As our lips pressed, our lips meshed, and I felt her giggles echo into my mouth, the exhales of her nose brushing across my cheek. Her tail flicked repeatedly against the cushion of the booth, resounding sporadically.   Finally, after a final gulp, my hooves and tongue became daring.  My tongue pressed forward into her mouth, slipping past her tongue and exploring everything inside that warm, soft, fleshy cavern that I was allowed to feel. My hooves slipped down her lower back, and taking their chance, dropped directly down to her flanks. Each cheek of ass was bigger than I expected, firmer than I ever hoped, and I pressed my hooves into her rump, its softness flattening and filling over the edges of my hoof. Twilight let out a high pitched moan, jumping up against my body. She giggled in the air, kissing me from above, though she slowly lowered herself on me again, pinning my forehooves underneath her ass—forcing me to hold her up, even ever so slightly.   Every wet smack of our lips pushed my body to its limit. Her every moan elicited one of my own. There was an aching from my loins, a stirring I was glad to feel again, but the thought of my cock popping up sent me for a gulp.   “Mhmm... T-Twi...Twilight...” I pulled back from our kiss, seeing the rope of saliva bridging our parted lips. Twilight had yet to pull away, but instead, rubbed her nose against my own, her eyes still closed. “I... you...” I exhaled softly, knowing that this was too much. “The game... it's not over yet...” Twilight giggled. “We're going to need another bottle then, aren't we?” Her eyes reopened. The proximity of her violet eyes caused my heart to stop. She was beautiful, adorable, and so utterly pretty that I could never hope to put it into words. I don't know how, I don’t know why, but I was no longer scared. There wasn’t a need to swear, not when she was so close, so warm, so slender and soft, wanting only more of whatever I was.   There was something sweet and sinister about it all that I couldn't hope to comprehend. > VI | Anon VS Bouncer > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- ~ VI ~ Anon VS Bouncer We went back to making out. I couldn't get enough of her. It didn't disgust me for a second the anatomy of her body. She was a pony. She was a mare. What did scare me more than anything was the fact that she was a princess, but I was too drunk to consider the connotations behind it. Eventually, though, I inched left. Twilight took the hint, giggling as she left my lips. She was still on me, and before getting off my lap, she proceeded to come sideways to me. Then, with her forehooves on the bench, she arched her back, head low and ass high. Her tail flicked against my cheek. What happened next came to me as a blur. We'd both went to leave the booth, and in our drunken stumbling, crashed into each other. We toppled off the bench, falling together onto the black and neon lit floor, holding her close to my chest as I took the brunt of the impact. It was the most heroic thing I'd done in my short life. Laughing. We laughed as we fell. We laughed as we hit the floor. We laughed as we laid there. After a second, Twilight rolled herself on top of my body, pinning her heavy flank against my stomach, keeping me locked in place. “You're a silly mare,” I said to her as I felt the slur in my voice. “Why are you being so mean to me? You're heavy, you know.” Twilight gasped. “Heavy! Are you... calling me fat, Anon?!” She couldn't stop herself from laughing. “A bit,” I replied, snaking my forehooves an inch before either side of her rump, “but in all the right places.” I grabbed her ass, feeling her supple flanks fill out against my hooves. “Like here, for instance.” “Naughty boy!” It was addicting to be this way with a girl. That's what she had gone to as the night became all the more drunk: a mysterious mare, power princess, conniving cunt turned into a flirty and pretty girl. Twilight couldn't be trusted, but for the time being, she could be enjoyed. “W-We... better get those drinks” She'd kissed me after I'd said that. It lasted a few seconds. With a giggle, she slowly pulled away, coming off my body. “You're... hehe... not gonna win this.” Twilight quickly got to her hooves. She looked over at me from a foot away, a hoof against her mouth, her eyes set on me. “Is that so? Say that again later. You know, when you'll be in bed with me, Anon?” I rolled over onto my side. Getting to my hooves, which was a struggle because I was drunk and not used to four legs, I quickly caught up to her. She didn't say anything at first. She choose to lean against me, and I leaned against her, in fear that I may fall over without her. We walked a bit through the second level. It was hard to see anything at first, with how dark the walkway was and how bright the distant, flashing lights were. The heavy drops, clops, and gallops of hoofsteps had faded from my ears. The packed club suddenly felt barren, and I didn't know why. It put me on edge. “So,” I started to say, “you... going to tell me what just happened?” “Hmm?” “The whole virgin thing? Everyone flipped shit.” “Oh, that.” Twilight leaned her head into my own, softly rubbing our cheeks together. The warmth and contact was pleasant, but I couldn't fully enjoy the sensation all things considering. Fear had woken me slightly from my stupor. “Something like that is very rare around here. You should have been more careful.” “Didn't know that was something to be careful about,” I replied, and in the distance, I could see a constant, white light staying on, illuminating the staircase that led down to the first floor. Drunk, new on hooves, staircase. Ho boy. “Back from... wherever the fuck I'm from, being a virgin... it was a bit of a shame card, sure.” I shook my head, saw the world blur left and right, and regretted some decisions in life. “But it was never a reason to get me jumped. Or cleared a club.” I gulped, looking down at Twilight. She had her muzzle against my neck, looking sweetly up at me with her violet, glowing eyes. “Or score me a girl, if I'm being honest.” “That's because... virginity in a stallion... isn't really a possibility around here.” Twilight slurred her words, giggled inside her pauses, and nuzzled me at the word stallion. The connotations of what she meant slightly scared the shit out of me. “In Ponyville... or Equestria in general... the mare to stallion ratio... is well...” There was one thing I had yet to see in this world, and that was seeing Twilight Sparkle speak slowly and sounding somewhat dumb. She ditched intelligence and found comfort solely in the sensation of our coats brushing together. It was sweet, in a way, to feel only something that was pleasant, and for the moment, not have to think about something that was unpleasant. “What the hell happens to the stallions, then?” I couldn't stop my mind from focusing on the unpleasant. If it didn't, then I may be forced to go through unpleasant things myself. “You... this place doesn't have some breeding pit, does it?” “Of course n-not!” Twilight gasped at the idea, then promptly giggled, snuggling into me as we hit the staircase. Step by step, our shaky hooves went down the stairs, my heart pounding for a myriad of reasons. “B-But s-stallions are s-so unlike you. So many willing mares around them.” I gulped, wondering how this placed sounded like heaven and hell simultaneously. We made it to the halfway platform. Don't know how we made it alive, but here we were, still very much drunk. Coming to the last set of steps, I gulped, leading the way downward. “So when a stallion's ready to... you know... it just... happens?” “Pretty much, stallion.” She that word in a way I'd never heard her say before. Instead of sounding weak, the word became strong by her tongue, almost... masculine? “It's very rare that such a handsome stallion... like yourself... makes it to your age...” She giggled. “...without giving it up.” I gulped. “That so?” “Yup.” Our hooves touched the ground floor at the same time. We looked at each other, our bodies still pressed together. “In a way, it almost makes you a legend.” We walked silently to the bar. I was left to think that shit over, and at every pass at the idea, I didn't like the sound of it. I mean, being able to lose your virginity at the nod of the head sounded kinda badass, but at the same time, something felt very wrong about it—like it was too easy, rendering the experience cheap. Or maybe I was just thinking too much like a wimp. No matter the reason, the result of this would remain the same: all these mares, if they found this out, would have a similar reaction to Twilight. At least, from what I saw of them, it felt that way. Looking over at Twilight, her eyes were nearly closed as we walked to the bar. I didn't trust her. I wanted to trust her, but something about her was off... as was the rest of this world. Everything felt like it was against me; I felt like I had to face off against everything here. But that didn't stop me from leaning closer into Twilight Sparkle. “Halt!” I blinked. “Oh shit.” The yell caught me, and I spun around, catching sight of the bouncer. Same one from before the doors to the club: tall as fuck, expression impassive, eyes fuckin' dim. But they were set on me, staring at me, so much that I felt the pounding of my heart again. “Anon, is it?” The mare stepped toward me, and even though I dipped my head, I stepped forward as well. She was glaring at Twilight while she was talking to me. With a gulp, I stepped between her and the princess. “You have been instructed to come by with me.” “Then deconstruct that order,” I replied. “Because I'm not doing shit.” I blinked. “Besides getting drunk off my ass, of course.” The bouncer blinked as I spoke. She took a step back when I finished. It was like she never had anyone, a stallion much less, talk back to her in all of her life. For a second, I thought she was going to press a hoof against her chest, but instead, she shook her head. “You are responsible for making most of the patrons leave the club.” The bouncer continued to stare down at me, but I kept standing tall. I was fueled by a little more than my pride, which was like a fickle flame now. “My partner has been forced to give every stallion the delicate care they deserve after such a trauma. The janitor will not be pleased.” “Wait, being scared is cause for a blowjob?” I glanced over my shoulder at Twilight, who looked scared for whatever reason. “Stallions must never get scared thinking about their life at night. Not when you can just get your cock sucked.” I looked forward again. “I guess blowjobs do make life less scary after all.” “Do you require one?” What the fuck? “What the fuck?” What I said, and what I thought, tended to be the same things. “The stallions have reported you... as a virgin.” Fuck me! Even here, where that word was prone to get me more laid, still stung like a bitch. “This would imply improper care of you. Even the princess, for as long as she has had you, has yet to properly service you.” She then glared over me and at Twilight. “You should be ashamed of yourself, Princess Twilight Sparkle.” “But... it's not what you think!” Twilight tried firing back. She stepped forward, only to stumble back two steps. The alcohol had a delayed effect on her, but now, it was fucking her shit up. “He... eghh... d-doesn't want it!” Well, there went my physical support. “That's so weird,” I still ended up muttering to myself. “Princesses get in shit when they don't sleep around?” I sighed heavily and let my head hang. “This world is seriously going to take some getting used to.” I then raised my head, holding up even in the bouncer's gaze. “And you seriously need to fuck off.” “I'm afraid I cannot leave you with the likes of her.” “Sorry honey, but Twilight Sparkle is already my guide in this crazy world.” I cracked my neck. “Until I can figure out how to face all this shit on my own, I'm rather fond of keeping her at my side.” I have no idea what the fuck I was saying, only they were lines I'd heard from some action hero. Hopefully, the bravado would save my ass. “You don't have to act so tough, little stallion.” The FUCK did she just say to me? “This mare simply hasn't shown you the comfort all stallions deserve. You are not in the proper state of mind to take care of yourself. In this scenario, it’s the responsibility of the nearest to care for you.” Alright, fuck the bravado. This anger was for real. “And you're not taking me.” “I promise to be gentle... and to take good care of you behind closed doors.” Fuck. This. Shit. “Like fuck you're doing that.” I struggled to raise up on my rear legs, but when I did, I held my forehooves up like they were fists. Of course, I had no clue what the fuck I was doing, but the bouncer—and Twilight—both gasped. “I can take you in a fight! Come at it!” “A stallion trying to fight a mare!” the bouncer cheered as she ran straight at me. “That's adorable! I'm going to eat you right up!” Fuck fuck fuck! She charged at me and picked me up by my chest, running us straight into the counter of the bar. “Come here, lover boy!” “Ack!” My back slammed into the counter, which luckily, had its edge cushioned by something. Didn't help the cunt was constantly bending my spine against it, though. “Get the fuck off me! Ack... T-Twilight? A little help!?” I went to throw a punch, but as I stared up at the muzzle before me, I found that I couldn't. Mares were still girls, and I'd never punched a girl in my life! Fuck me, was I about to start now? What the fuck was I thinking? “Those lips of yours are perfect, little stallion.” The mare pinned me, lowering her muzzle to my own. “Let this big mare make them feel better for you, okay?” “Fucking, Twilight!” “Helping! H-Helping!” Twilight stumbled in place, lit the tip of her horn, then had a flash blind the room. A second later, the bottle we'd been drinking from, the one upstairs, appeared before us—I tried not to think too hard about seeing a new aspect of her magic, and instead, how she was gonna knock the chick out with a blow to the back of the head. “Thatta a girl, Twilight!” The bottle fell straight into my face, causing my snout to flare up in pain, and a second later, go numb. One of my raised hooves lowered to rub the end of my muzzle. “What the fuck, Twilight! Who's fucking side are you on?!” “I didn't mean to!” Twilight tried walking toward us, and somehow, started walking backward. She was fucked and beyond being able to help me. “Don't swear at me! It's not nice.” “For fuck's sake.” “Move your hoof, little stallion.” The bouncer giggled at my pain, bringing her chest closer against my crotch. “I'll kiss your boo-boo alllll better.” “The fuck you will!” The bouncer puckered her lips. “Anon, don't let her kiss you!” “Why the fuck do you care?” She ignored me. “Punch her!” “You punch her!” I replied. With my other hoof, I did my best to push away the oncoming kiss. “I can't punch a mare. It... wouldn't be right!” “Things are different here, remember?!” Twilight screamed. “The mares here... are like the stallions where you’re from! Punching one is totally okay!” Twilight fell onto her ass, and threw her forelegs up in a cheer, shouting, “You can do it, Anon!” That was right! Chicks here were pretty much guys! Beating the ever living shit out of one would bring no shame whatsoever! I looked over to the bottle, and quickly snatched it with the hoof that was on my snout. With my leg wrapped around the neck of the bottle, I brought it high before smacking the side of the bouncer’s head. Her eyes rolled up, and with a smile, she fell back. I dropped to the ground, the bottle falling out of grip. It shattered to the side of me—it didn't matter anymore. I'd done some cool and fucked shit, and now, it was time to get out of here. Picking myself up quickly, I walked over to Twilight, who had a blush that stretched across her muzzle. “I... don't think I've seen a stallion do something so cool in my life.” “Yeah? Well, get fucking used to it.” I put my head under her left foreleg, helping Twilight to her hooves. “No way something like that shit's going to happen again. Not when I can fight back and get away with it.” I put my right foreleg over her neck, each of us using the other to walk straight to the door. “Where are we doing?” “Getting the fuck outta dodge.” Twilight's eyes closed and her horn glowed. In a flash, another bottle appeared in front of her, sinking and raising in the air, her magic failing. “The fuck is that for? I already knocked the mare out.” “For our challenge, of course!” I shook my head. We made it to the door, and with the smack of my hips, I got it open. Together, we made it down the steps, and after that, we fled the fucking scene. “Listen. You're going to have to lead the way to wherever the fuck home is.” I sighed. “We may need to lay low for a few days.” “I'll lay low with you anytime, Anon.” “For fuck's sake.” My snout caught a whiff of something. I blinked, the scent was strong and sweet, strong and overpowering. When I glanced over at Twilight, I smelled a musk... a musk that was coming from her. “Twilight? What the fuck is that smell?” Twilight dipped her muzzle, blushing madly. > VII | Anon VS Twilight > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- ~ VII ~ Anon Vs Twilight We walked together at midnight.   I was too far drunk to care about much. This entire morning, afternoon, evening and night had been filled with the absurd—it came to a point where my mind could no longer care about all those threads.   Sleep. I needed to sleep. Maybe then, when I was feeling refreshed, I could figure out what I needed to do next. Twilight Sparkle walked next to me, leaned against me, and kissed and nipped at my neck whenever she could. We'd drunk more from the bottle. We'd dropped it some time ago. We'd had enough booze for the night.   “No mare is gonna get you,” Twilight slurred from my side, giggling. “You're mine. Twilight Sparkle's stallion.” Her giggle echoed into the sky above. “I called you a stallion! Are you mad? Well are ya, are ya?” “I will be mad if we don't find your home.” The sound of distant, crashing water pricked at my heart with familiarity. This was the center of the town. I was thankful it was empty. “Where to from here, princess? I'd rather not stick around.” “Are you afraid of the wranglers?” “What wranglers?” Twilight shook her head, brushing her mane against my neck. “Never mind. Take us... past the... bridge...” Her silence gave way to giggles, then laughter, then giggles again. Twilight was both a delight and a pain in the ass, all at the same time.   She was just lucky she had a nice ass to begin with. A pony ass. Fuck... why was I such a fuckin' creep and freak? I ignored myself. Taking us over the bridge, I focused on getting us home, myself in a bed, where I could finally sleep. The calm of night, free of mares and stallions, had given me some time to think.   And all I could think about was how much I still needed to recover.   “A-Anon?” “Yeah?” “I really like you.” “And I sorta like you to.” “Why did you freak out today?” I blinked. “W-What?”   I looked over at Twilight. She had retreated behind her mane, hiding her eyes from my sight. Her head was turned slightly away. “Back at the fountain today. You looked so... scared. Not afraid. Not spooked.” She gulped. “But terrified.” I looked straight ahead. I didn't have to bother about having to worry about her gaze—Twilight hid it from me. My heart leaped in my chest all the same. My ears burned slightly. The softness of her body rubbing against mine was a welcome delight, but at the same time, it made me burn up all the more.   “That's probably because I was,” I replied, slowly. “What you saw happen? That... that wasn't sunstroke.” “I f-figured as much.” Twilight pulled her head off from my neck. “D-Do you mind... if I ask...” I closed my eyes. “I don't think I'm ready to give you a proper answer to that.” “Why not?” The breeze was welcomed on my fur. It's freshness cleared out the fog in my lungs. When my eyes opened, they felt slightly cool, but not at all glowing like Twilight's eyes could. “I think you already know the reason to that, Twilight.” “Because you don't trust me?” “Because I don't trust anyone!” The words had started calm but snowballed into a shout. “D-Don't... don't you get it? I'm a nobody!” I exhaled, feeling steam rise from my lips. “I... I don't know who I am? I don't know how I got to this place! Everywhere, there are mares, looking, gazing, staring at me with their... with their glowing eyes!”   Twilight was silent for a second. “But... our eyes don't glow.” “They do... for me, anyway.” I tried breathing slowly, a hoof against my chest, repressing the beatings of my heart. “There's something about that glow that slices right through me. That attracts me. It's like you're putting me under a hypnosis.” Nothing happened in the following seconds. And then I felt her body pull away from mine. “I-I'm sorry, Anon, I didn't—“ “Please don't leave me.” The words escaped me faster than I could close my lips. They made me stop. They made her stop. We stood at the apex of the bridge, a stallion before a mare, girl before a guy, together at night, stuck in the absurd world.   “I... don't think I've ever said that before in my life.” The words kept on coming, and I... was powerless to stop them. “You know, the life that I know nothing about? What I used to be... who I once was?” I shook my head, feeling a burn in the corner of my eyes. “I've done my best to keep it to myself...” My breath left me. For the moment, I was still in everything. Would this be my crime? Would I say what I felt? There was no coming back from this. How could I protect myself, when underneath it all, Twilight Sparkle knew that I was... afraid? But that was the thing. I was tired of being tough. “But I'm scared, Twilight.” I inhaled deeply, held it gently, then exhaled sharply. “I don't know what's going to happen to me. All you mares do is scare me. I... don't think I hate you all, but something about you causes me fear.” I gulped. “And when there's too many of you, I... I... shut down.” I dropped my muzzle. I couldn't stand to look into her eyes anymore. They were wide, confused, and almost as scared as I. She looked to be debated with herself. I'd revealed myself to her, and now, she could do as she wished with me.   “I don't think I can face this world alone,” I said while the tears came. “Please don't leave me, Twilight. Not now and not never. I can't do this all alone.” I cried some more and clenched my eyes in response. “Please help me. Never leave me.” And that was that. My fear exposed and my bravado torn down. Everything until now had been a fluke. The calm of the night had allowed me to consider what kind of spot I was in, how overly fucked everything was going to be. The fear... it always cut through me at midnight. And then Twilight Sparkle made her move. I raised my head at the sound of her hoofsteps. By the time my eyes opened, she was already against me, her forelegs wrapped around my neck, pulling me close to her. Gently, she lowered me to the ground, stroking the back of my head, saying nothing. I cried.   Twilight did nothing to stop it. Carefully, she brought my face before her chest, letting me wet her coat with all my tears. She did not mind even as my snout became wet. All she did was stroke my head, letting me cry and cry before she sang and sang. My sadness consumed me. The words of her song were only sounds to my ears—but I heard nothing sweeter in all of my life. Soft and sweet, angelic and melancholic, reminding me... strangely of my mother.   Even if her face was clear in my memory, my tears were sure to have blinded my vision of her. Seconds, minutes, moments, perhaps hours—time was lost to my drunk self. My tears were spent, my sobs now went, and some deep weight had been lifted from inside of me. Shame took its place as I held this mare tighter than I should, but I wouldn't let that get in the way of giving my thanks. So when I rose my head to thank Twilight Sparkle, I found that her eyes had been closed as well. Tears streamed down her cheeks. I didn't question why—only that I lifted a hoof, and made her fur dry again. Her eyes reopened at the touch. She stared at me in a way unlike anytime before. Glowing violet but no longer violent with lust. They glowed for a reason the haze of my mind could not work out, but something that my heart deeply felt. We hugged. I threw my forelegs around her neck, and Twilight did the same with mine. Our muzzles rested on each other's shoulders. Our chests pressed together, our coats rubbed against another. I inhaled and she exhaled. Warmth was about us. The strands of our tails became mixed. This wasn't a mare taking a stallion for herself, but rather, a girl and a boy finding comfort in one another. The feeling and sensation were new and fresh and, I knew, that this... was something I had not found in the world before this one. “Trust me, Anon.” Twilight lifted her muzzle to my ears, whispering. “I... haven't been the nicest mare to you. When we met, I didn't know how different you were from the rest.” She rubbed her cheek down my neck. “No matter what, I want to help you. There's so much about this world you don't know.” I pulled back an inch. “Trust me, I know. Just... didn't want to admit it is all.” Twilight pulled back, smiling. “You have a right to be scared, Anon. The reason why you swear so much... I think I understand it now.” She shook her head. “There's just so much to you that I wasn't expecting, and I'm... sorry if I treated you wrong.” I let my eyes drop. “I think that blame is on us both.” I gulped, lifting my gaze to hers again. “You seem like... a nice girl, Twilight. If... if our communication was clear between us... if we could trust each other.” I let my shoulders drop with an exhale. “Then maybe we'll both make it through this alive.” Twilight blinked. “Y-You'll trust me then.” I smiled. “Only if you trust me.” I wasn't about to tell her that she was the only one I could trust in this crazy, crazy world. Twilight did something I also wasn't expecting. She leaned forward, taking me by the lips, pressing only gently. Her eyes were closed and her cheeks were warm. Chance. She had taken a chance and was now waiting for a response.   I couldn't deny the pleasant feeling anymore. I kissed her back. Unlike the lust before, this was soft and gentle, an exchange that kept my heart steady. It was a feeling of safety, a sensation of warmth, and a confirmation of good things yet to come.   Wordlessly, we stood up, our lips still locked. Twilight led the way, taking charge, and I was glad to follow. Everything blurred around me and I still felt myself in a haze. For a second, I swore there was a flash, and maybe there was one, because the next thing I knew, I was staring at glass. It'd gotten dark. The place was made dim only by the trickle of moonlight flooding in by a window. I was standing before some dresser. It had a mirror, and in it, I saw my reflection. A dark green stallion with an unruly mane swept back, no horn and no wings, a question mark on my flank. I didn't have time to reflect on that, only what else I saw on the glass. Twilight was on the long, circular bed behind me, dressed in frilly stocking and fuzzy socks that covered her legs. She was rolling a hoof in the air, beckoning me towards her.   And I followed her request. I climbed onto the bed, moaning as the cushion took some of my weight. I came over Twilight, and with a smirk, she crawled backward underneath me, a little game of chase we were playing. Finally, her head hit the pillows, and she had herself propped up under me.   I went for a kiss. And then I went for another. The wet smacks of our kissing resounded off the walls. Slowly, I laid my body on top of her, relishing in how her soft, purple fur caressed against my own. How her body pressed under mine. She was perfect and she was mine. Twilight giggled. “I can feel something hard growing, Anon.” I didn't respond.   “Tell me, do I get you hard, Anon?” I didn't respond.   “You know that I like you, right?” Twilight went on. “You're the first stallion to make me feel this way. All the rest, although I love them, simply require too much care. But you? You're the first equal I've gone face to face with.” I didn't respond.   “And I'm glad you choose me,” she continued to speak, but she was getting harder to hear. “Out of all the mares... to trust your first time with, you trusted me. Listen, Anon, I hope I'm not getting ahead of myself... but I think I may love you.” I didn't respond. “Anon, did you hear what I said?” I didn't respond. “Anon, do you feel the same way?” I responded with a snore and promptly fell asleep.   “What the fuck, Anon!” I smiled in my sleep. > Act 2 | I | Anon VS A New Morning > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- ~ I ~ Anon VS A New Morning It was hard for me to remember much about the night before.   I was awake while my eyes remained closed. There was too much comfort in keeping still, warm, and happy for me to start moving around. My body was now relaxed, my mind refreshed by sleep. Warmth hovered over me while softness brushed against me. My eyes started to blink open at the feeling of another coat rubbing against mine. My eyes opened to the sight of a bed, one bigger than it needed to be, and I was tucked underneath its covers, held against the rising and falling chest of Twilight Sparkle. My first response was to yell “What the fuck?!” but I held myself. Slowly, the fucked events of the night before flashed into my night. I recalled giving her my trust, wanting to give her some of my cock... all before passing out. That last part made me chuckle more than it should have.   My stirring didn't go noticed by Twilight. Her forelegs wrapped around my neck, pulling me closer against her chest, moaning as she snuggled into my mane. She seemed quiet and peaceful, happy and little, like a girl and unlike a princess. I went to open my mouth, to say something, but someone else had beaten me to it.   “Twilight! Yo Twilight!” The slam of the door echoed off the wall. Fluttering wings buzzed into my ear. So much was happening at once. “You won't believe it! A virgin stallion is being talked about in town! We gotta...” “R-Rainbow!” Another voice shortly followed in after the first. “W-What have I... you know... t-told you about...” “Spike! I'll suck you off later, but for now, buzz off!” There was a scampering of... f-feet after that. Feet. f-ee-t. Things were hooves were except narrower and with... toes? Clear your mind, Anon. Something is happening outside of it. “You awake yet, Twi? We gotta catch this guy before some mare...” I lurched up on the bed, sitting straight while the covers fell to my waist. Looking over at my side, Twilight's eyes were opening as well, struggling to do so at first, because they clenched at the sound of words, but soon loosened when I spoke up. “Twilight? I... think we may have some company.” Twilight's eyes soon opened, though I could only see the one, half of her face pressed against a pillow. Her mane was sprawled across her face, and I could not help but flick a few strands out from her eyes. We both smiled when we saw one another. “Morning, Anon.” “Morning, Twilight.” It wasn't me who said that. We both looked over at the blue pegasus. Her mane was in the fashion of a rainbow. Her eyes were pink and slightly aglow, and though there was a presence about her, she had a strange aura of... chillness around her. “Gah! R-Rainbow Dash!” Twilight leaned up, and having done so, levitated the pillow she'd been sleeping on. She fired it at the blue pegasus—like an arrow from a bow—knocking her off the bed. “What have I told you about breaking and entering?! Get out of here!” “But you said I could break in if I had a good reason!” Rainbow was lying on the ground, rubbing a hoof against her snout. “And a virgin stallion? C'mon! That's bound to raise the whole town into action!” Rainbow flipped onto her hooves, shaking her head, then blinking, the glancing at me. “No offense to you... Anon, was it?” I nodded. “That's my name, and... no offense taken?” “Huh.” I didn't like how she said that, but she didn't linger on the thought for much longer, looking over at the frustrated princess. Twilight leaned against me, her head on my shoulder, and even I could feel her glare. “Your intentions were in the right place, Rainbow, but the problem has already been taken care of.” Rainbow's eyes went wide. “Oh no. You didn't find him and lock him up with Fluttershy, did you?” Another mare who knew how fuckin' crazy Fluttershy was? This pony was a bit abrasive, but from all the other ponies I'd met, she seemed pretty alright. Even after been woken in a bit from Twilight, I wasn't at all... mad.   “The stallion you are referring to,” Twilight started, “is the one right here.” Rainbow looked back at me, licked her lips before her wings flared up. “Dibs!” I screamed as she shot toward me. > II | Anon VS Her > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- ~ II ~ Anon VS Her The chick flew at me in a brilliant blue blur. What else was I supposed do, but shriek in response? I cocked my hoof back out of instinct; after all, in this world, beating a mare was like beating a guy, and no matter if I won or lost, I wouldn't have to bear any guilt after the fight. A free 'get out of jail' card if there ever was one.   But she was too quick. I was too slow. The blur was on me at once, her body pinning me to the bed. Sitting on my chest, Rainbow smiled above me, lording over her sudden victory.   “I don't think I've caught you around town, Mr. Virgin.” Rainbow lifted a hoof to her mouth, giggling into it. “And I can't believe no other mare in town has caught you either. Virgin, really? And what age?” “I'd rather not say.” I turned my head and looked away. “Didn't know it was a big deal in this world.” “This world? You another dimension traveling dude?” “...something like that.” “Whatever the case,” Rainbow went on to say, sitting a bit heavier on my chest, to the point it made me look up—up into her falling lips. I struggled and stirred for a second at the most, that was, until her lips met my cheek. “Keep yourself safe.” Rainbow pulled back, on seeing the blush on my face, and rolled off my body. She promptly stood on all fours, glancing back at me. “The mares in this town will eat you alive. But that doesn't mean you shouldn't enjoy yourself... Anon, was it?” I could only nod.   “Trust in my girl Twilight, will ya?” Rainbow walked to the door without another word, only muttering under her breath, “Great. Now I gotta go deal with Spike.” With a squeak of the door, Rainbow was out of the room, leaving Twilight and me alone. When I rolled my head over, I saw Twilight sitting back against the headboard of the bed. She breathed slowly and seemed just as confused.   “I think every mare in this world is trying to rape me,” I said in a low voice, not liking my choice of words, but having them be the only ones at my disposal. “Am I wrong to think that? Because I feel like I barely got away with my life after that kiss.” Twilight giggled.   “What's so funny?” “R-Rainbow's... an interesting pony for sure.” Twilight looked over at me, smiling at me. My mane was sprawled over my head and across the bed. “She's one of the girls you have to worry the least about. Well, in t-terms of being a stallion, that is.” I went to chuckle only to groan instead. “Your head?” I pressed a hoof against my temple, hoping to quell the throbbing pain beating beneath my skull. “Something like that. Think it's getting tired of being short-circuited.”   “Come here for a second?”   I was frozen for a second. The command was polite and her face was so pretty, but still, the words came across more like an order, an understanding that she was to have her way. Or maybe I was overthinking everything—my mind hurt whenever I started to think.   So I crawled up to her and, feeling her magic surround my body, felt her guide me to her lap. My head was set in-between her thighs, and I sunk a bit into her softness. My cheek rubbed against her stomach, the warmth of her body soothing my soreness. “Let me try this.” Twilight lowered her muzzle down to my head, taking the moment to stare into my eyes, her violet ones slightly glowing. My heart pumped and my hooves shook. With a single breath, I calmed myself and trusted her. “Close your eyes. I promise this will help!” My eyes swept shut. Darkness with the orange twinge of light hovering somewhere above. Something soft touched against my forehead, staying there for only a second, until I felt the strands of my mane being brushed back. Seconds later, something warm and wet occupied my temple, a caring kiss.   Then my darkness was banished by lavender. Silence replaced by incessant chatter; nothing forming into silhouettes of others. My breath was lost but my past was found. In a flash, the pain was gone, the past had returned, and I was seeing into what I once was. A field. It was green. Tall spades of grass blowing with the breeze. Two trees on either side of me. I was on a hill and I wasn't alone. Laying back on my ass, there was a book between my legs, and when I looked to my left, I saw... her. Her. Her. Her. What was her name? Why was she a part of me? Everything. She was my everything. My mind, my heart, my body and my soul belonged to only her. She was of great importance... I loved her... and I here I was, unable to remember her fucking name! All I saw was her long hair and the glint of her wheelchair. She waved a hand at me, and when I went to do the same, I watched as her hair fell back and landed on the grass: circling into a pile, a beauty removed. Where was I? Who was she? How was I so blind, when in my mind, everything was so clear? “Hand... hand... hand...” “Hand?” The magic faded, and so too, did my past.   “N-No!” My eyes shot open, and at once, I was staring at Twilight Sparkle. “Put me back! I need to see her hand! I need to know her name! I need to—ack!” I convulsed at once at the needle pricking my heart, shivering as blood leaked out. “I... I... her...” “A-Anon!” Darkness again. I stood in an abyss. The first thing I noticed was the way I was standing. With a gulp, I looked down, seeing not four legs and four hooves, but rather, two legs and two feet—all five toes attached to each. The sight sent me back a few steps, and with a slip of my heel, I'd fallen onto my ass. My hands crashed first against the nothingness that supported me. Glancing down to my side, it was like there was an invisible glass, some ultra-thin surface that spanned across the vistas. Dark clouds tinged with purple surrounded me, but they too were blurry, or perhaps, too unreal for me to focus on. “Do you recognize yourself, stranger to this realm?” “The fuck?!” At once, I was on my feet, raising my... fists into the air. “Who are you? Where the fuck are you? G-Get the fuck down here!” I swallowed, feeling... nothing of my heart. “I’m not afraid! I'll fuck your shit up!” “Spoken like a kid.” The world rumbled from the broad, indescribable voice, shaking the ground in tune to its every syllable. “Have you not outgrown the profanity by now, young one?” I couldn't help but shake my head. “The fuck are you? My mother?” “That is something you desire to know, is it not?” From the depths of the clouds, floated out two spheres, each glowing teal, their brightness almost blinding. They set themselves along the surface of the clouds, space separating them. “You stand tall without knowing your place. Bravery or stupidity? Therein lies my interest in you.” I didn't hold my fists up for much longer. Whatever the fuck this thing was, it didn't seem like something that could be taken out by a punch. And, though its voice was dark and deep, a feminine touch was still about it. But this wasn't a place where my 'get out of jail free' card would come in handy. “What... are you?” I said, feeling my hands drop against my sides. “And... where is this?” “Few questions are you allowed to ask,” the voice shook the world once more. “Ask yourself: are those the true questions you want to say?” “I... have too many questions to ask.” I lifted my right hand and let it drape across my face. My fingers clenched against my features, my palm pressing down on my nose, my fingers digging in behind my ears. Human. I was a human. “I'm... me, again.” “You are yourself, in a body not your own, but in a form familiar.” Brilliant blue flashed before me. The glow cut into the air itself, tearing a fabric open downward, and within its aura was a reflective surface that was somehow organic. “Look upon yourself and state the familiarity!” I saw my reflection, yet saw nothing of me. “The fuck?” My hand slipped from my face, and I blinked, even though my eyes were unseen. Stepping forward, I looked at myself closely, wondering how I was able to breathe. “What is that on my face!?” Bringing my fingers to the green stuff that covered my face. But when I pinched at it, the surface of the greenness felt akin to skin—like it had merged itself to whatever was once there before. Doing my best to ignore that fact, I looked to the center of my face, seeing a question mark there, no eyes but the outline of my mouth, the latter which I wanted to scream out of.   “Anonymous. That’s what you are. To both this world and yourself.” The glowing spheres blinked, and at that, the mirror winked out of existence. “Your body is whatever lingers from your memories of your past. Be wary, young and green, for you have lost more than you can know.” “Well, no fuckin’ shit!” I exclaimed, shaking my head. “ You’re very fucking useful, miss great and mysterious!” Frustration overcame me, causing me to take each of my cheeks into each of my palms, letting my fingers dig into the surface, and I started to pull as hard as I could—not minding the pain, but at the same time, still too weak to rip my skin off. “What the fuck is this place!?” “Currently, we are lurking within your subconscious; a level below your dreamscape.” The spheres of teal narrowed, their glow becoming less intense. “As for my identity? Know me as the Princess of the Night, the watcher of dreams, set to observe this world’s only human.” “You're not some crazy chick, are ya?” I replied with a nervous tone. “Like, no fucking me in my dreams, right?” “I'm afraid that’s not the kind of mare I am, Anon,” the voice rumbled softly underneath my feet. “My feelings for the stallions of this world, well over a thousand years ago, was what led to an altercation between my sister and me.” The teal spheres floated slightly back into the clouds. “You shall meet my sister soon. Prepare, and bring good friends.” I blinked. What the fuck was even going on! “And you? Do you know me? What I was before all this?” I shook my head, throwing a fist backward.“You! How do you know what a human is? What even changed me to begin with? How do I… how can I get back to Earth?” “Return to your world? That is not your dream, Anon.” “M-My dream?” “Your wish, Anon.” “Fuck off!” I yelled at the eyes as they became obscured by mists and wisps of blackness. “You wanna know what my wish is? To go the fuck back home! You wanna know what my second wish is? To know what the fuck is going on… so fucking tell me everything!” When I went to yell again, something struck the back of my head, sending me falling to my knees. Everything blurred and dizziness stole me. Bringing a hand to the back of my head, I felt something wet, and bringing it before my eyes, I saw blood mix with my new skin. “Quell the pain that lurks within your head: the answer unclogs once the blockage is gone.” The voice, despite fading, still thundered with its words. “Know yourself. It’s a task that cannot be done alone. Acquire this knowledge and your wish shall come true.” “What fucking wish are you going on about!?” Blackness again.   Nothing came of me. I was floating in nothing. My mind, already fragile and confused, had burned out from the constant revelations. I’d been forced to act tough, even when I was fucking terrified, and in this moment of defeat, I couldn’t stop myself from crying. I hated myself for how weak I was underneath it all. Was it any wonder why I swore so much? This world took my body. Even when it was given back, it wore a suit and hid my skin underneath a layer of thick green. This world fucking stole me away! From the ponies to their magic and wings, to enduring being a gender that was without respect or equality, to then having who I was, what I was, being locked deep inside of me, my memories as a human fading every moment I remained a stallion. If I did not curse this world, I would be like all the other stallions… ...and they fucking blow.    > III | Anon VS Recovery > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- ~ III ~ Anon VS Recovery “Huh? Oh.” The voice was squeaky. “You're finally awake. Hanging in there?” “Feels like someone blew my mind.” My vision swam back into focus. I was on a bed, my back propped against some pillows. Someone was sitting to my left. “And not in a good way either. I seriously feel like shit.” “What's 'shit'?” “I feel very bad.” “Anything I can do to help with that?”   “Some... water would be nice.” I looked to my left. It wasn't Twilight sitting there—it was Rainbow Dash. The mare from before. She already had her blue wing wrapped around a glass of water, bringing it toward my muzzle. “Uh, thanks?” “Figured you'd need the stuff when you came to.” She brought it closer to my lips. “I'm going to press this against your mouth now, alright? Tilt your head back.” I wanted to give her some more resistance, but I was too weak to do anything, and instead nodded my head. “Alright. Now wave your hoof if I'm going too fast or anything.” She placed the glass and against my mouth. I tilted my head back and started to drink. The water was cool and soothe the aching of my throat. The more I drank, the more my body came back to life, and the more my mind became clear. “Annnnnd done!” Rainbow gave a small cheer as she pulled the glass away, turning to place it on the bedside table. “You wanna rest up some more? Or do you wanna try getting back on your hooves.” She flicked her mane to the left, getting the multi-colored strands away from her eyes. “No shame in which one you choose.”   “I think... I've wasted enough time in bed.” Everything about me still felt sore, but not enough to demand any more rest. Slowly, I turned in my bed, groaning as I did so, throwing the sheets off my body. “Got shit that still needs to be done.” Rainbow tilted her head from the stool she sat on. “Wait, you wanna get back to doing bad things?” “Different meaning this time.” I sat up on the side of the bed, coughing. “Hey, is... Twilight around at all? My head still kinda hurts.” There was a lot more going on in my head than pain, but for now, I wasn't sure how much I could trust Rainbow Dash. “Kinda weird to see a...” “Another mare at your bed? Geeze, you are weird.” Rainbow tilted her muzzle up. She came down from the stool, coming to lower herself next to me. “Here. Toss your leg around my neck. Let's get you fed up in the kitchen.” “I... you... is that a good idea?” “What? You worried I'm gonna do something dirty to you?” “Wouldn't be the first mare to try it.” “Listen. Have I given you cause yet to distrust me?” “You threw yourself at me.” “That was a joke!” she replied, puffing her cheeks. “Look dude. You wanna know the reason why I didn't do anything more to ya?” “Because Twilight was there to stop you?” “Twilight doesn't scare me.” Rainbow smirked. “In fact, I would have rather had Twilight in this bed than you.” She winked an eye. “Catch my drift?”   “Why would you... oh.” “Hey! You ain't so dumb after all.” “Shut up.” “Stop being a pansy and I'll think about it.” Rainbow snuggled her muzzle under my right foreleg. “Now then. Try putting some weight on your hooves. If you're not strong enough, then you can  lean on me if you have to.” Something about that statement touched me.   I slid down onto my hooves. My legs buckled from the weight. At once, I leaned into her, the softness of her blue barrel keeping me straight. She laughed at the pressure, but kept ridgid next to me, keeping me standing straight. “See! There ya go.” Rainbow led the way along the bed, her muzzle pointed forward below me. “One step after the other. Keep at it. You're doing alright.”   We slowly walked across the room. “You're... different from most mares.” I couldn't help but glance at her, notching how her eyes were set on the hallway—she seemed like the girl to always be looking where she wanted to go. “I'm sure anyone else would have spoon fed me.” “Not my style.” “Not mine either.” We were made to become fast friends. “Where's Twilight?” I don't think I was set to become friends with the dragon, though. “Spike. Calm down. Twilight's alright.” “I already know she's alright!” Spike was seated on the other side of the table. He was slim for a dragon, and his purple scales seemed glossed over with polished. Whiny brat. But he was concerned for Twilight, which got a small pass. “I wanna know where she is. It's not like her to leave me all alone. I hate being alone!” I squinted my eyes at that statement.   “Twilight just had some business in Canterlot.” Rainbow turned away from the oven, her mane flicking over her shoulder. “It's no big deal. She was just getting advice on what to do with Anon over there.” Spike shot his gaze onto me, crossing his arms, his eyes glaring. “So you're the reason why I'm alone?” “I... think you did that to yourself.” “E-Excuse me?!” “Anon.” I glanced over at Rainbow. “Little dude is sensitive right now. Heck, most guys are sensitive.” She sighed and her shoulders dropped. “I dunno what your deal is right now, but for the moment, can you take it a bit easier on the dude?” She tucked her bottom lip inside her mouth. “He's been through some stuff.” “R-Rainbow!” Spike went back to glaring at her. “You promised not to tell any strangers.” “And I'm not. Calm down.” Rainbow scratched the back of her neck with a hoof, looking up. “Say, Spike?” She glanced back at him. “How about chilling out in your room for a little while? Anon and I have some stuff to talk about.” “You're going to talk about me behind my back?” “No, we're not.” Rainbow closed her eyes, audibly inhaling through her snout. “We're... going to talk about how much of a good boy you've been. Y'know, so we can tell Twilight and all that?” Looking back over at Spike, I saw his head was still down. “That, and I'll bring some food to your room. Your fav.” Spike's eyes blinked. “Y-You really mean it?” “I'll ask Rarity to come over later if you promise to keep to yourself for a bit.” “Well okay!”   I almost didn't see him leave. Spike stood up on the chair like a child. I suppose he was one, to be fair. He leaped down and took off in a dash, becoming a purple blur that came around a corner. His distant, fading footsteps were the last I heard of him.   I looked back at Rainbow. “What the fuck was that?” “Spike's been through some... 'shit', as you like to say.” Rainbow stepped back from the stove. Her wing turned a dial, and the sound fire stopped. The tip of her wing raised to the pan, lifting it over the two plates next to it, letting an omelet slide down onto each.   “We're low on groceries, so I hope you like eggs.” Rainbow slid a wing underneath each plate, which she balanced up into the air as she turned to me. Walking over, she placed a plate at each side of the table. She sat where Spike had. “Real talk, though. Can you take it easier on the little guy?” I blinked. “Why should I?” “C'mon. Your eyes work, don't they?” Rainbow pointed a hoof over her shoulder. “A dragon living among ponies and stuff? Very uptight around strangers?” She let her wing sweep over a fork, using it to dive into her food. “You want the short story? Spike doesn't do well around others. Hasn't left the castle in over a year 'cause of it.” I chuckled. “Really? What a fuckin' wimp.” “Dude, really?” Rainbow Dash narrowed her eyes on me. I shifted in my chair. “Little guy got mocked from the whole town. It was so bad that he ran into the castle and refused to leave again.” Rainbow leaned back into her chair, the bottom front legs inching off the floor. “Look. I didn't have much respect for him at the start either.” Her eyes wandered to her eggs. She cut a slice, but didn't take a bite.   “The hell changed, then?” “Dude's an outsider,” Rainbow said without emotion. “None of the mares want him. All the stallions think he's disgusting. He's whiny because he's alone, but he doesn't know how to stop being whiny.” She shrugged. “I'm a mare who likes other mares. That doesn't fly so well around here.” “That's... interesting.” I shook my head, feeling like, per usual, a dick. Rainbow was kind enough to not include me along the list of outsiders, but she made her point known all the same. “Figured stallions would get off to seeing a mare, y'know, do another mare.” “Well yeah, they're doing it for the sake of stallions.” Rainbow still hadn't raised her eyes. “But when it comes to a mare wanting something? That stuff doesn't get you much credit.” Finally, she raised her eyes—if only to roll them. “Stallions are lucky in that way.” “Unless they're me.”   She met my eyes. “Unless they're you, I guess.” I went back to looking at my eggs after that. I blinked. Twilight had taken much better to my wit and bullshit, but here, Rainbow Dash was being straight up with me. It was refreshing, in a way. Out interactions cut my skin, and most of the time, I had nothing to defend myself with.   I guess all mares in this world weren't the same.   “I'll... talk to Spike later,” I said without looking up. “Hash things out. Maybe find a way to help him out or... something.” “Sounds like the right thing to do.” I could feel Rainbow's eyes on me. “Now then, you gonna eat? Or do I have to feed it to ya?” > IV | Anon VS Theories > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- ~ IV ~ Anon VS Theories “So... where the hell is Twilight anyway?” It was the only question on my mind—aside from my guilt. Since yesterday morning, my life had been sling-shot through multiple, flaming rings of absurd events and revelations. That nightmare plagued me worst of all.   But that was something I wanted to discuss with Twilight.   “Her? Already told you. Canterlot." Rainbow Dash waved a hoof downward as stuffed her eggs into her mouth. “Was worried about what happened with you. Y'know, the whole screamin' and not wakin' up part.” She tilted her head back and swallowed. Seconds later, her eyes went wide, a cough escaped her maw, and she started to furiously beat a hoof against her chest. “W-Wrong pipe! Wrong pipe!”   I sighed and shook my head. Not dumb, but rather brash, were my thoughts on Rainbow Dash. I did my best to curl my hoof around a cup of water, leaning over the table to offer it to her. Her wing swiped it out of the air, and with a nod to me, she started to drink.   “So Twilight left you to watch over me?” I hunched over my eggs, and in-between them, I could my green face reflected in the silver plate. Black bags were underneath my eyes, which themselves were bright blue, while my bangs mostly covered them in their spiky, disheveled state. “Can't say I'm a fan of that. Considering last time.” “That had somethin' to do with Fluttershy, right?” “It was somethin' that Fluttershy did to me.” “Sucked your cock?” “How'd you know?” “Lucky guess.” I looked back up at Rainbow. She was sitting on the opposite of the table, leaning into her seat, the backrest taller than her small body. She was cute, in a way. Her rainbow mane draped over her left eye, almost matching me in look, only her rose eyes were so much brighter. “Can I ask another favor of ya?” I shook my head. “I wouldn't. Did I agree to the first one yet?” “You have. Now listen to the second one.” Rainbow crossed her hooves over her blue, fluffy chest, while her gaze was sent downward. “Fluttershy... she's a close friend of mine, got it? We're really tight since flight school. She cares. She cares a lot about everything.” Rainbow glanced up at me. “It's why the girls love and hate her so much. Really, she's too good for us all.” “Do you know if she's also good at blowjobs?” I asked. “Because I didn't feel it when she gave me one.” “Okay. I'm not even gonna ask about that one.” Rainbow shook her head. “Now look. I'm not tellin' you to make nice with anypony.” She sighed. “Do you... whatever that appears to be. But this land you're a part of now? These mares? They're my friends.” I held back on the wisecracks. Give me another mare, and I assure you, it would have been a verbal battle to the death. But there was something drawing about Rainbow Dash. She seemed cool and chill, and although you could fuck around with her, she wasn't someone you fucked with.   And... if that became a mutual exchange, then maybe I would be game for it.   “And I'm loyal to my friends.” Rainbow Dash tilted her head slightly, smirked widely, then struck her hoof toward me as well. “And that includes you!” Her lips parted slightly, her teeth glinting in the light. “So, while I won't force you to make friends with them, it would be nice to see my all my friends become alright with each other.” I was blown away from the scene, and not for a second, did I fall for it. “You and I friends? Bullshit.”   “Hey, now you're tacking on words I don't know.” Rainbow let her hoof fall onto the table—and her other hoof, leaning on them both to stand up on her chair. “Don't do that. You play fair with me, alright? Use normal words. Use... pony words!” I suppressed rolling my eyes. “Look. Friendship doesn't work that way.”   “Maybe where you're from,” Rainbow replied as she narrowed her eyes. “But here? Making friends is easy. Ponies can become friends under a minute if they really wanted to.”   “Those are ponies who want to become friends, but let me tell you, wanting and becoming are two different things.” I looked away from her gaze, feeling my head throb as I remembered the past. “You've got a lot of peo... ponies who want to be friends, but none many of them become so. They'll say you're their friend, or that they want to hang out—they'll keep on... saying things, but never, ever, ever do!”   Something pricked at my heart; something that made my blood boil.   “But friendship is a rare thing,” I said quietly. “It exists. I don't doubt it. But friendship only works when the right ponies are around at the right times... when they truly, for whatever reason, want to be your friend.” I exhaled a long breath, letting my eyes slip shut. “They've got to have a reason for it, and the proper mindset to make it work.” Where the hell were these thoughts coming from? A mare tried to defend her friend, and now, I'm arguing about the nature of a friend itself? There was something wrong with me; something was wrong with my head. These sudden memories and feelings of the past struck so suddenly. And usually, out of context.   “It's just like... love here.” I opened my eyes to the sight of the ground below. Rainbow had been silent, unmoving, allowing me to speak my piece for whatever reason. Why would anyone listen to a lunatic? Were my thoughts and words interesting, or was this what others called sympathy?   “What about love?” “It's not genuine here.” I worked the courage to look back over at Rainbow. She was still leaning back in her seat, only her forelegs were no longer crossed, and her expression was impassive. “Mares are just... willing to suck and kiss and fuck any stallion who asks politely. Or fuck it. Someone could be a dick and still have their cock sucked.” Rainbow blinked. “Wait? You're complaining about getting to feel good all the time?” She shifted in her seat. “And to get it for free? Like, free pussy whenever you want it?” “And that's my issue with it,” I said with force in my voice. “These mares hop on a stallion for the sake that he's a stallion. No characteristics to fall in love with, no great event or act to happen between them—eyes meet and fucking begins.” I shook my head at my poor excuse of an explanation. “Where I'm from, a... girl has to have a decent reason to love you. It's how you know it's for real.” “That really how it is?” “For the most part, yeah.” I watched as Rainbow kept staring at me, saying nothing. She didn't seem mad or sad or anything like that. More than anything, she was confused. It felt like she was on the edge of crossing some line with me, but fought to keep herself in check. “The way how mares treat stallions here? It's more like... mothers and sons.” Rainbow's snout scrunched up. “Mothers and sons?” “Mothers don't have a choice but to love their sons. At least, where I'm from.” My logic was loose, but hopefully, Rainbow would get the general point. “They’re something mothers made. And mothers can’t just give away their kids because of stress or boredom.” I shook my head, feeling my mane sway in the air. “They may find reasons to love their kids as they grow up… but when those sons were just babies?” Rainbow kept staring at me.   “It's horrible at the start.” I was reaching with all of this, but I kept going all the same. “Dirty diapers and sleepless nights. The bad outweighs the good at the beginning. Our babies are cute. That’s the only reason we love them then.” I lowered my head. “Plus, they become our responsibility. You can’t pin that one someone else.” “You saying mares are like… whatever all that was here?” “They love like mothers... if all mothers were perverted.” I scratched the side of my head, looking down at my now cold eggs. “Treating stallions like they were kids. Or, something slightly worse than kids. This world, really, is just run by a bunch of perverted mothers.” “Dude?” “Yeah?” “How hard did ya whack your head anyway?” I glanced up at her, seeing confusion on her muzzle again. It was… a typical sight to see on others when, y’know, when I had gone talking about stuff important to me. Of course, whenever I went on talking, what was the expression I got the most? Confusion. Not care or concern, understanding or comfort—confusion. Every. Single. Time. Was it any wonder why I swore or acted like a dick? That got me attention from others, that made everyone have something to say to me, and while being a dick didn’t make me, well, normal, it did make me more interesting. We’re all self-interested, at the end of the day. And I’ll take a look of disgust than a look of confusion, any day. “Pretty hard, I guess.” I rubbed the back of my mane for emphasis. “Look. I'm gonna go... take a shower or something.” Turning from my seat, I came down onto the ground, hearing the clop of my hooves against the floor. “Leave the eggs on the table. I don’t mind them cold, and I’ll eat ‘em when I’m done.” “Fair enough.” When I walked passed the sitting Rainbow Dash, I did my best not to make eye contact with her, and she kept her eyes on her plate. She continued to eat, not troubled by my leaving. “Bathroom is straight down the hall. Second last door to the left.” She swallowed something. “Also, knock first: Spike likes to lock himself in there from time to time.” “Right.”   “Oh, and Anon?” “Yeah?” “What's the plan after the shower?” I shrugged. “Find Twilight.” “You don't wanna catch some more shut-eye?” I left the room.   “I'll rest once this crazy world is behind me.” > V | Anon Vs Dragon > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- ~ V ~   Anon VS Dragon I showered and I showered, for a time that felt like years, unable to care about that fact or any fact at all—mind relaxed after spending so much time dirty. There'd been some bullshit I recalled hearing in whatever place was before this.   Cleanse the body to clear the spirit. It sounded like bullshit at first. The kind of crap someone says with the hope to be wise. Yet maybe that passage was wise. Dirt and filth washed with the warmed currents across and down and off my body. Coat becoming drenched and strands becoming clean and skin burned lightly across from the temperature.   The rising steam cleared all the gunk from inside my head.   It's been way too fucking long since I've had a wash. Makes me wonder how Twilight even put being an inch close to me. Twilight... Twilight... Tears across the brain forced me to wince down as a crack fractured my skull. High-pitch whining vibrated in the stall. Enough for me to turn on my back legs, a hoof shooting into my closed eye and the other into an ear.   As the water poured from overhead.   Twilight... you weren't there when I woke up... why weren't you there? My other eye opened to the steam becoming dense like a fog, the surroundings consumed into its depths, the space becoming nothing but precisely that. I shook my head to a thunderbolt of pain. Soon the water stopped. It's pelting ceasing to be a sound. I stood only in fog. It took me a few seconds to breathe. To bloody get my head in the game. Even then I couldn't. It was like some curse had stolen me awake. Was it that crazy bitch from my dreams? Doubtful the slut had power here. Yet I knew I was in a place both real and not.   The fog spread before me, a divide in its sea, one going forward, inching up, to a silhouette of a distant mound. Groaning of earth rocketed in my ears as the hill erected from the density. Once more I was shaking my head and struggling, down on my knees and forced to look up, seeing, with terrible familiarity... ...something I could not remember.   I gazed up at it to see the hill with its grass dressed in memory. Eyes drawn to missing spots and little rocks that I somehow knew would be there. It was crazy because I was mad. Yet what killed me was the tree. Great and large and in the middle of the hill. Thick branches and dense foliage, both gently bobbed to the wind, promise of paradise to those underneath it.   Someone else was there. Small and black and without features. Lying forward with a hint of a book. Legs kicking like a child as the pages flipped. I couldn't do shit as everything started to fade—an illusion: imploding. Then a voice cracked me from the dream of a memory.   "Anoooon! Anon! It's time to get out of there—you've been in the shower for way too long!" I huffed and puffed and spat the batch of water on my lips. Miniature waterfalls streamed down my face as the feeling of them being chilly caused me to shiver. My head whizzed around for the tap. It was behind me. I slammed that bitch to the squeak of a cease.   "About time you listened to me! I've been banging on this door for a couple of minutes now!"   I panted steam and looked beyond the glass to the door. Knocks still rocked it in place. I shook my head in having to deal with a twerp of all things. Was there a reason for Twilight to keep him around? Surely adoption would have been possible.   "Name's... Spike, right?" "It's Spike the DRAGON to you." You're making it way too fuckin' easy to be hated kiddo. "What's the longest you've knocked on the door for Twilight to come out of the shower." A satisfied huff. "Only a few seconds—unlike you.” "Well congratulations! You just set a world record for longest knock in this castle to get someone out of the shower!" I spat on the ground and shook my head. Lying back in the tub, I curved to its slope, eyes closing on their own. "Now go celebrate in your room. I need a few moments to... rest up." I expected him to leave. In fact I hoped he would. My mouth opened a bit at the thought of that. I don't have a memory of who I was before coming to this world. Entry wasn't exactly kind. Well. Nearly being sucked off by the element of kindness itself wasn't kind. Well. I mean. Maybe anyone else would have seen that as a good thing.   My eyes squint. The girl was hot for a horse. And she wanted to suck my dick free of charge. I wonder why I rebelled so hard at that. Shaking my head brushed my ebony mane across the smooth counter. My eyes squint as I'd been afforded the first moment to think. I'd always been with Twilight. Forced to put up and answer her. I hadn't been by myself ever since coming here. No time to think, to process whatever the fuck I felt, or some other third thing. Even if everything had gone swell on me coming here... I... I still would have been a dick... wouldn't I? Was that who I was before? Some fucking asshole? They allow me to get away with it more here. Or, at least, it feels that way. Mares love stallions no matter what. Treat them like kids that they then proceed to suck off like lollipops—w-wait, I don't like the imagery on that one at all. "How are you like that?" I blinked from my thoughts as, even in the bathroom, I couldn't get a fucking moment to myself. I huffed and I puffed as I realized the little scaly bastard wasn't fucking off for a bit. His back smacked into the door as he slid down it. Sitting there. Lil fuck had me trapped.   I rolled my eyes and laid my head back on the counter. "How do you mean little jackass?" "Jackass?" Fuck. Profanity still isn't a thing. Need Twilight to let me spread the unholy words to the masses when she gets back. "It's the lightest form of insult you can call someone from wherever the fuck I'm from." Why was I explaining this? Following these tangents led me back into the past and helped me remember a bit about it. Cues to unlock stuff from my passive memory. Twilight had explained it better. "Basically you asked me a dickish question—although, to be fair, I was being the dick first—and are refusing to leave and blocking my way out." "So I'm a jackass for it?" "Yeah." I nodded. "But... it sounds like you're doing it somewhat for a good reason. So you don't deserve a harder delivery." I groaned and rubbed the side of my head, in the place where my skull had cracked, feeling, beneath the skin... nothing of the kind. Yet it felt so real. "Plus I was a dickhead first and all that. But I still need to call you something. So jackass is the term for that." Silence for a second.   "Does it ever bother you that you talk funny?" I'll fucking skin you alive as a coat and ask Twilight how I look. I winced at that. Where had that aggression come from? Did I really mean that? "Little bit. But... it's who I am at this point. Least in this current state." My chuckles blossomed into laughter. "Dropped into a strange ass fucking world where horses rule the world and the guys submit while the girls dominate." Out of all the things to latch onto from that previous statement.   "You mean you come from a place where mares don't run the world?" I closed my eyes and forced a smile for, as it was unseen, still affected one's speech and mood. "Not that I remember fuckall about it—but yes. It was more so the reverse in that. Well, actually. Not quite. It was getting closer to equal or... something like that." Anger flared and my hoof slammed into the tub. "How the fuck am I supposed to know anymore?" Silence for a few more seconds.   Then another statement that settled the character of the dragon.   "Are you sure you're not really a dragon underneath it all?" There are some statements in life that cause you to shut down. To wonder what the fuck everything is about. How someone could ever come to such a position in life to say the stupidest shit you'd ever hear in your life. Anger flourished. Then as quickly.   A strange kind of pity.   "Maybe I am... maybe I ain't... but I'm definitely something different inside for sure." I guess it was harder to discount his theory when I was not even a pony to begin with. Maybe it was wrong to harp on him for a possible misunderstanding. "Why the question kiddo?" "Because that's how dragons are like around here." I blinked as my head rose from the tub and looked to the door. "No shit?" "I think I know this one... Rainbow was telling me about it." Intense mathematical equations roared through Spike's head in the attempt to understand my bullshitery. "That's you asking if I'm over-exaggerating what I just said. Then no! Dragons are actually a bit like you." I closed an eye. "And how would you know?" Hard huff from him. "Because that's exactly what a dragon would ask." "So dragons are dicks?" "Does dicks mean not nice?" "Yeah." "They are very dicks." I clenched an eye. "You're getting closer with the language." "And their things are huge too!" "Their dicks?" "No their things! Y'know that thingy between our legs?" “Yeah a dick.” "That's what you call them? You don't think they're nice then?" One wrong word. Phrase took out of place. And all of this could go awful. Possibility ran through my head in the kid thinking I was gay or that I hated dicks. Well. I hated dicks but I liked my dick. Not that kind of like. Preferably in how it sometimes made me feel good.   When the hell did I become such a confused retard? "Listen. This one's going to be a little bit hard to explain." "Hard like a dick?" Do not lose your shit. Do not lose your shit. Do NOT lose your shit. "We call the things between our legs a dick. It soon became an insult because of what those who had dicks did." It amazed me the shit I could pull out without having to think about it. I never thought before where the term 'dick' came from in the form of an insult.   Yet I pretended that I did. Maybe because it was so easy to work out when you gave it a second's thought. "Banging someone for the sake of banging them or acting only in a way to get you laid. Kind of behaviour you get in thinking only with your dick. It's a bit of a power play too. Everyone wants to have the biggest dick in the room." The curtains rattled on the pole above as I pulled them to the side. Stepping out of the shower, I pulled a towel and draped it over my waist—not bothering to attempt an impossible gambit with hooves. I stopped before the mirror and honestly looked at myself.   "That's so different from how it is here." I turned my face before the mirror. Coat of emerald in a hue seeming like creamy and minty ice cream. Black mane draped over my face with my eyes peeking through the strands. I turned my muzzle to catch it at different angles. It was a protruding thing. So strange to actually see. "How so?" "Stallions tend to brag about whoever has the smallest dick." I stopped and I froze and my head spun again. Too much layered on at once that I needed a second to breathe. In through my snout and out through my muzzle. Something about those two seemed wrong as they were not things I had throughout my life.   I feared I was going to need a blowjob or something soon. "And how long has that been a thing?" "Hmm." Spike's head rubbed into the frame of the door. "Ever since Princess Celestia's been princess." "How long has that been?" "You kidding? She's always been princess! She was an alicorn before even Twilight was one!" "And she's kept the world like this ever since?" "Hmm... she doesn't tend to do much in that regard." The dragon still sounded so much like a kid, yet he was apparently of age with the rest of the girls. Those most guys here either seem regressed in either age or attitude. Is that what happens when sex and everything else were guaranteed supplied to you? "She lets the world be as it is and steps in if there's an issue. Every mare tries to be like her. She's like the image for them all!" But every mare tends to do everything and leave the stallions at home to be sucked off later... is that the moral she embodies? I coughed and moved on. "And what about dragons? You said they're like me?" "Yeah! Though, like you, there's... not too many of them left." I finished looking myself off over in my new body. I wasn't fat or skinny. Seemed like I had a bit of muscle but nothing that caught the eye. I was different from the rest of the pack at least. Their colours were light, whereas mine was strong.  No wonder I stood out so much.   Should I change my appearance to fit in? Get less attention and less hassle.   Fuck a makeover. "Who the hell wiped out the dragons then? They're proper dragons, right? Not little ones like you?" Silence came and, this time, it wasn't because of anything else but pain. It wasn't even my intent to hurt him this time—but I had. It was merely my way of being. It didn't feel like much of a problem in my previous life. But here. Males were overly sensitive.   Does that mean I have to be more careful with my words? Fuck... that? "...they were proper dragons." Spike's tone was low and it felt like the confidence built in our conversation vanished. He forgot to be afraid in being a dumb kid, though now, he went back to being a scamp. "And a little bit like you. Princess Celestia used to tell me stories about them when I was younger. They used to scare me a lot." Just who were these ponies? I always thought it was weird I ran into a princess in coming here. Did others have connections like her or did I stumble into something unique? Your head is fogging again. Cool it with the questions. You're going to overload yourself at this point. "So you personally know this Princess Celestia?" Spike seemed to think about it for a while. It appeared my questions were as strange to him as they were to me. Did ponies know his tales as commonly as they did Twilight's? Why the fear of going out or dealing with mares? Or maybe it was because of that he was so afraid.  Or maybe it was due to how the public came to see him.   "Well... yeah." His spines slid on the frame of the door as he nodded. I took a moment to stare at myself in the mirror. Turning my muzzle and pulling down on an eye. Dim eyes, emerald layered in filth, unable to be vibrant. "She practically raised me and tutored Twilight. Princess Celesta's the one that told me all those scary stories about dragons—and made me promise to never become one!" "Or what?" Spike chose not to answer that question. My gaze dropped into the immaculately clean sink. It poked me a little. This castle was perfect down to even cleanliness. Yet here was a wimp of a dragon, regressed from becoming one, the scars established from fucking childhood.   "There many dragons around now?" That zapped him from the previous silence.   "N-Not too many," he choked on the first syllable but, in coming to clear his throat, had to do so again. His tone, sensitive and coarse, weak though keeping on. "Nothing really came and took them out. But there was a great magical incident a long time ago. Celestia told me about it. Dragons can't have kids anymore." I brought my face closer to the glass with the intent of staring at my eyes. I saw the filth dense over it. It darkened them, though, in the dots through the grime, miniature spotlights shining of green: glowing through. Another effect of my transformation? "How the hell is that possible?" "Dunno." He sighed. "Celestia didn't tell me more about it. Only that I would probably end up being the last dragon." He blew a long breath. "But she said if I was a good dragon, maybe, she would find a way for me to have an egg. I would have to make sure it would be a good dragon like me as well. Then ensure that if it had a kid, that it would have to be a good kid too!" My reflection arched his eyebrow sky-high.   And Twilight went to go see this crazy bitch about me? Explains why Twilight is crazy in some places. And why she's a bitch in others. Hehehe. I don't really mean that last part! Wait. I cracked that joke to get a rise out of someone... inside of my head. What the fuck is wrong with me? Would it be wrong to ask Rainbow for a blowjob? Nah. She doesn't even like guys. She offered one to Spike. Cause she feels bad. She feel bad enough for me to give me a blowjob? Doesn't thinking that make me a bad stallion? Someone's talking. Listen retard. "So how come you're not more worried about that? About being a good kid or stallion or whatever you said you were supposed to be?" Can I bullshit this? I think I can bullshit this. "I... can't really give you an honest answer to that one kiddo." I breathed and blinked and wondered why I wasn't passing this off to the usual bullshit the idiots of this world spawned on me. Even the verbal fight I had with previous stallions wasn't enough to actually scare them—maybe because I wasn't trying hard enough. "Truth is I don't know myself. Just a matter of different senses. Getting attacked by mares and stuffed through bullshit. I dunno. My first sense is to speak up about it." I turned to the door. "You don't have any sense like that?" His head shook against the wood. "N-Not really. I'm too scared to speak up to anyone about anything." He breathed heavily again. "Mares don't take an interest in me because I'm a dragon. Stallions think I'm a wimp. A-And to d-dragons? They... o-oh..." All I could imagine was the twerp walking to a full-on beast, arms behind his back and a bow on his head, looking cutely—before a torrent of flames blasted him clean. Dragons always seemed like the 'fight and kill and fuck and wave our dicks around' sort of creatures. For a twink like Spike to step into the middle of all that.   Maybe I was too tough on the little fuck. Or maybe being tough on him will make him less of a little fuck? But isn't that what scarred him into never leaving this castle? Why the fuck should I care? Because I may need to deal with him in dealing with Twilight? No... that doesn't feel right. Feeling right? Nothing about this world feels right. I. I. I really need to stop thinking. My lazy ass walked itself to the door but, instead of opening, as I wanted to do, the idea of him rolling through, shocked and scared, further proving the clumsy fuck that he was... I fought such temptation. Instead I turned and rested my back into it as well. My aching muscles soon found their rest. "Anon?" "...yeah kiddo?" "How... how do you get that sense you were talking about?" I blinked and thought about it for a second. Then I rolled my head on the frame, attempting to look through it, seeing mane drape over an eye. "Think you already got it or you wouldn't have asked that question in the first place. Something can't feel wrong unless it's going against some sense." Silence.   "Everybody makes fun of me." "Kinda easy to do." "Ponies make fun of me for being a dragon and dragons make fun of me for being a pony." His breathing was coarse. "S-So which one am I supposed to be more like? I-It feels like I can't win no matter what." Another exhale composed of heft. "No matter how hard I try, I can't be a pony and, j-just the same, I can't be a dragon either. Plus. I-If I'm a bad dragon... then that... that means..." “That means you're focusing too much on the what than the who.” I suddenly became tired in looking down at my body. Nothing special about it. No different from another stallion. Yet it was who I claimed to be sparking the popularity. "It's a losing gambit no way you play it. There's one thing I've noticed in dealing with you." "T-That is?" "You don't give a fuck about yourself." I swear I could hear him blink. "I-I thought 'fuck' was a bad thing?" I squinted an eye. "Sometimes it can be used in a good context as well. But you don't care about yourself. You've done nothing but yap about what other ponies think or expect from you or all the shit they say. When the fuck are you going to confess your own opinion?" Spike's breathing slowed as the submersion into thought began. Looking to my left, I leaned toward the sink's cabinet, pulling back its door—no hidden whiskey to be found. Dunno why I thought that would be the case. Still. Worth the search.   "But guys... they... they don't really have those." I could tell he was inside the heft of some though as some backwards-ass-lock had caught him in some mental trap. Knew there was some bullshit with this world. But never had a chance to think too deeply about it. "Maybe on manes and mares and gardens but... nothing more than that. It's too much to think beyond that. M-Mares always have the answer after all." I pissed myself laughing. "Do they now?" "Y-Yeah! If stallions ever get into a debate about something, a mare will come in and give them the absolute answer! Sometimes the guys are a little upset though." Was he pulling from memory on this? "So usually a group of mares will come in. They tend to stroke everyone's head before doing... you know what." Laughter slowed to a chuckle. "One hell of a consolation prize... so what if a mare doesn't have an answer?" "Unlikely! B-But, if that were to happen then, I-I guess, they would go and see Princess Celestia about it." One controlling bitch to rule them all. I wonder if I'll get to fuck her. Why am I so suddenly set on getting fucked? Damn head. And you. Just as big other head. "Yet mares are the ones treating you like shit aren't they? What kind of answer did they give you?" "To... stay in the castle... and never come out again." "See! Now fuck that! Fuck that to infinity and the plus fucking one!” Fire blazed through me at the injustice. It wasn't anger for my sake, though; that usual rage flared anyway. "How could you let a bitch say something like that to you? Are you happy like this? Stuck in your room and afraid to go out or deal with shit?" Mumbles and stutters before the dragon could string them into words. "B-But that's what they said was best. I-It doesn't matter what I t-think or feel. They know better! So that's why... why.." "And what about that Rainbow chick? What she say about all this?" "T-That I shouldn't have listened... but she's not a proper mare! Or, at least, other—" "Other what? Other cunts? She's your friend—isn't she? You're goin' to listen to mares that treat you like shit and don't even like you and, not only that, but let them talk shit about your friend on top of it?" "B-But... I... it's how..." "How it is is a bunch of shit! Rainbow's your friend! Doesn't matter that she's not a usual mare in wanting to sleep with a guy—if the selections were the pussies you call stallions here... then no shit you'd think pussy itself was more masculine!" I always knew I had a way with words. "I mean I ain't much better in that regard." Anger deflated in a breath as it reversed its course. "I'm still a bit scared shitless about what these mares can do or if too many of them look at me in public. Bloody near had a panic attack yesterday were it not for Twilight caring for me instead of comforting me like a child. H-Had she pulled that stallion shit there... ho oh... it would have been some absurdist nightmare for me." Spike leaned off the door and the clack of his feet was on the crystal floor. "Y-You mean you're... actually scared underneath all that? But you act so bravely! Telling mares off and getting into fights! Just the way you are! It's not normal and no mare would approve of it. Y-Yet you do it anyway!" Not for a reason that's good... but I guess it's better than being a slave. "It comes from thinking for yourself and choosing to take whatever the fuck comes from that." I also leaned from the door and turned to face it. Heart rattling in my chest even though it was a pussy dragon on the other side. Looking around the bathroom, I was alone in here, safe, without having to be anything more. "Maybe it's easier to have a mare telling you what to do and what not. You don't have to face the consequences or endure blame for messing up. But that also means someone else is leading your life—and it can't very well be your fucking life at that point." I shook my head and began toward the door, first step wobbly, the second, shivering, though, on the third, more stable than the first two. In dealing with the little coward's problems, I faced a bit of my own. "You have to decide those mares don't have it in the best for you. Rainbow Dash is your friend because of all that shit she does for you. In being there. You should care about that. You shouldn't care for all the bad-mouth shit other jealous bitches have to say about her." "But... but they're right... aren't they?" "Fuck 'em even if they're right! That rightness isn't what you spend your life with—isn't what makes you happy or any of that." Why was I standing up more so for someone that wasn't here? Is it because I cared for them? Hardly knew the cunt. Because what she was going through wasn't fair? Maybe I hated general wrongness. "Doesn't matter how Rainbow fits into the world or how others see her. What matters is how you see her and what you do for her. You two are the only ones who care for each other—that's especially important if the world is out to get you." I laid my hoof on the knob and, in turning it, pulled it back.   It opened to the hallway of the dragon who, before, had been sitting and standing in shadow but, in the opening of the door, came bathed in light. Yet he was in my shadow and was shorter than my chest. That didn't feel right. So I stepped out of the way and gave him more light.   "Worrying about being more of a dragon is pointless bullshit that's swept you into nothing." My shoulders relaxed at my sides, no anxiety in facing another, no world becoming fog. The little dragon wrapped his tail to his front, hugging it, his green eyes a brighter glow than my own. "Focus on being a better Spike. Try to whine less and think for yourself more. Rainbow helps you a lot. Find a way to help her back. Then figure out what it is you want—even if that means to be a bad dragon." His claws tightened on his tail. "But Princess Celestia..." "Don't live in fear." I shook my head to the summoning of zero phantoms. In being with someone else, I was more in this world. Couldn't be zapped or taken or stolen. I was bound to reality so long as another was here. "I'm always worried about when I say or do something that takes it too far. But I... I'd rather have that... then be like ever stallion else." I exhaled. "That princess isn't someone worth impressing if you have to be a certain way for it. Gotta impress yourself before you can impress the chicks. Don't worry about becoming a bad dragon because the wicked bitch of the west will not like you for it. Worry about the crap that causes you not to like yourself now." My eyes jumped left and right in thought. "Like bitching less. And doing more. Being less of a tool. Y'know. Character shit. Be better than me in that right." I shrugged. "In fact you already are. I'm too much of a bitch to show how much of a scared bitch I am underneath it all. Yet I act like I'm great and shit. You? You have no fear in showing how much of a pussy you are—and that takes balls." The dragon looked up to me, hopeful because of my words, despite not understanding a single one. "You've certainly got a way of speaking." I shivered. "What the fuck?" I looked over the dragon to the other side of the hall where, in the darkness, I could see a hint of a blue form. Vibrant pink burned to life in the dark with an allure dangerous on the heart. Rainbow's eyes looked to me as a crunch from an apple sounded below.   "Mhmm! Ah! Knew you had another angle to you." I growled. "You ears-dropping bitch." "Y'know." Another bite of an apple to a loud and satisfying hum. "Mhmm! Really good apples.” One bite. Then two. Putting me at a pause to piss me off. Fucking mare knew how to work me. So much for all that nice shit about her. “I quite like that word. Bitch. So many variants too! I wanna rock them all." I leaned into the door frame with a roll of my head. "Keep being you and you'll get them soon." "Here's hoping! If you're going to be something then might as well be the greatest at it." The last crunch of the apple sounded to the whiz of it being tossed. Did she just litter inside a fucking castle? WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH THIS PLACE? "But I appreciate all that other stuff you said. Think you caught on to why I hang with the twerp so much." I dropped my head and let it hang. "Bloody worse threesome of loners I've ever heard." "Oh?" I stuck a hoof to each of us. "We've got the lesbian, the dragon, and the alien." Spike blew up in mirth as he started hopping up and down. "Oh oh! Is this some kind of pact! Us against the world and all that?" Bloody fuck. Rainbow shot up from the darkness as well, trotting over, both of them standing together outside the door. Her prismatic mane had a sheen and she was beautiful in an athletic way. Enough to steal the heart. She looked at me with a raised eye of relaxed confidence. "I don't see why not! You said it yourself—it's us weird three against the world." I knew I was making a mistake in doing this. Yet I did it anyway. Spike laid out his claw in the middle with Rainbow's hoof over top of it and mine on top of hers. Thrust down that pulled me from the light of the bathroom and into the darkness of the hall, the glow of their eyes, pink and green, allowing me to see.   Our limbs went up and I even gave a muffled cheer.   And their brightness burning pinpricks into the filth of my irises, allowing a bit of a glow from my own, our terrible alliance of outsiders, formed, either for a purpose or to make us feel good. Maybe feeling good was a good enough purpose in of itself.   Even among my friends, I couldn't help but wonder.   Where the fuck are you Twilight? > VI | Dealing with a Crowd > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- ~ VI ~ Dealing with a Crowd "You mean Twilight went to go see the crazy bitch?" "Hey! That 'crazy bitch' is our princess!" "Princess Crazy Bitch?" "Princess Crazy Bitch Celestia at least!"  I rolled my head as we headed for the door, the footsteps behind, stopping, as I turned to look over my shoulder at the dragon. He stood in the darkness of the hall, claws held together, looking scared to look on.  "What now?" Spike chuckled and breathed and nearly hyperventilated. "I, um, I'm afraid of going outside." I turned my head down. "Shit." "W-What?"  "You reminded me that I'm the exact fuckin' same." I shook my head and dashed out a heavy exhale. I looked over to Dash who, although darkened in the hallway, the hue of her blue stuck out. "Nearly had a panic attack at having so many damn eyes on me. Twilight barely coxed me out of it. W-Wouldn't... have done half the shit..." "Wouldn't have been able to be like you are without someone else around?" Rainbow smiled because the white of her teeth had glinted in the dark. She brushed close, fur rubbing fur, without the meaning of something more. "Trust me. We've been there. Sometimes other ponies allow us to be something more in simply being there." Sometimes the bitch can have a point. "Got me there." I turned back around to the little dragon. "Alright. Here's the deal. You're scared: so you'll keep close to me." I cleared my throat. "I'm anxious as fuck: so I'll keep to Dash." I then looked to the mare. "And her feeling like a guardian will help her to deal with any mares throwing some bullshit." Rainbow blinked. "That... might actually work." Her head fell to the side. "Dunno why." "Because we're all messed up."  I walked to the dragon and threw a foreleg over his shoulder,  pulling him in close to my side. At once... I felt stronger. Not because of how the twerp had snuggled into me. But rather. The knowledge of needing to... protect him?  Then we turned to the door.  The sun. The damn sun. I could feel its heat as though it were layered bricks of heat crushing into my back. I felt watched. Like eyes floated above me. We were in the center of the town as I came to pass by the fountain.  We'd been watched. There was no denying that. Passing mares with their flocks of stallions, looking at us, some stopping and other glaring, most confused as to exactly what we were. The weak dragon. The stallion who had knocked out a mare. And the girl who loved other girls.  My heart raced in waiting for the first pebble. I stopped the gang to gather around the fountain. All it would take was for one shout, one strike, one anything those held back—to give in. Swarming around us... drowning me into a crowd... those two... left... left to... Get out of your head. Twilight's been gone for a few days. You need to carry this. All that shit-talking about her, yet, without her, you fall apart. Useless piece of shit. Those ponies weren't the cause for the racing heart. Even as they gathered and circled around us, the stomps of grass, louder and closer, the buzzing of the sun. That caught a hitched breath. Looking into the water, over my reflection, there... was the golden fire of light.  How it seemed to watch me.  Cracks of glass erupted across the water's surface. Everything stopped. Heat waning and sounds fading. I couldn't break from the lock holding me in place. In the still waters. The moon replaced the sun. It's calm rays filtered through the water—transforming it. Midnight consumed the afternoon in that split-second of life. Water morphing to a different texture as it travelled across my reflection. Where had once been a pony... came an alien creature. My heart raced faster to the point of explosion or collapse.  There was a prismatic beam terraforming down my reflection and, in its wake, were the changes I could barely comprehend. Puffed mane, becoming hair, that weight down over my face. That also thinned in its roundness as it narrowed down. Skin replaced fur. Hooves on the rim of the fountain, now, these... things! I couldn't comprehend the shape or the four things that protruded from their ends. There was another such thing that came from their sides. It felt like each could be moved, flexed, like they were something better than hooves.  My heart raced in following the arms that led into my shoulders. Broader, now, without a barrel attached. The view was cut off by the stone, and I could not see whatever was the rest of me. I tried to wiggle out of the freeze. "A... n... o... n..." I blinked from the voices behind me, no doubt my friends, as they were now forced to deal with the approaching crowd because of my breakdown. Stallion losing it in the middle of the town would draw on everyone to intervene. Fuck! Fucking break out of it already! But there was a dense fucking wall! Some mental and impenetrable bullshit that I couldn't will myself against! I fought and wiggled, the efforts, slowing, in another glint from the water. I looked over to see that emerald hill again—the one with the great oak tree. And, next to it, the wheelchair that glinted in the moonlight.  I clenched my eyes as the fury of buzzing sounds and sirens exploded in my head.  W-WHY THE FUUA....AACCK AM I FOCUSED ON A WHEELCHAIR!? "Anon!" I snapped out of it at feeling the pair of soft lips on my own, the blurs of blue, before me, morphing into the annoyed muzzle of the girl. Pink eyes, more brilliant than the sunlight, shone into mine. Around us was a mass of circling ponies, though, at the kiss, they all backed away. I blinked and looked down at the feeling. Soft and small were Rainbow's lips. Working against mine, little by little, as there was more for her to claim. I couldn't kiss back—or maybe I wouldn't—as the ponies around us started to weigh in.  Spike was below us, caught between our chest, sandwiched in softness and fur. Voices and words were hard to pick out from the constant chatter.  "Isn't she a dyke?" "That's the stallion—oooooohhh—who took down a mare!" "Virgin too." "Not for much longer if she rides him there." "Do it Dash!" "Makes sense she would need a most unstallion of stallions to sway to the proper side." It occurred to me, then, that this was my fault.  Quickly I swung my foreleg around her barrel, turning her around to the fountain, laying her back on it, leaning her in, diving for a kiss at her ear. We were free from their hearing—even if for a couple of moments.  "I'm sorry," I whispered into her ear. "You shouldn't have to do that." I looked over my shoulder to see the mares stepping back from my advance. The stallions, though, either ran behind them... or watched on in amazement. "I promise you as many passes between Twilight's legs as you like." Rainbow pushed on my chest as we both returned to standing. "Fuck off." I winked. "Thatta girl." I then looked around to the crowd of ponies as though they'd never seen a stallion take charge before. Rainbow had felt the need to do so to stop mares from taking control over me. Even though the weight of the sun was still on my shoulders—I had to do right by her.  "Listen up! You crazed, degenerate, sex-starved beasts!" I smacked my hoof onto the ground, it no longer being that other thing. I shook my head and then struck it to the sky. "Have you no restraint? No remorse at all? You! Yes! You at the back!" My hoof dropped from the heavens and, in its direction, the crowd split until revealing the orgy in question. Stallion laid back onto a building, three mares, prone in the spread between his legs—one on his dick and two for his balls.  The stallion squeaked as his head whipped up, as the countless eyes were on him, not scorn but attention—but even that bit at him. I blinked. Everypony went under my command. Even the mares below stopped, a foreleg wiping their lips before looking back at me.  "How are you going to have your dick sucked in the middle of town." I shook my head. "By three mares no less!" He blinked. "I-I... uh..." The mares looked to each other, confused, then back at me. "A-Are we hurting him? D-Does he need more?" They looked out to the crowd. "Would anypony like to brush his hair, or caresses his coat, or make out with him as we—" "There will be no such thing!" My hoof slammed on the ground, and in doing so, the crowd wobbled as though a vibration was across it. "What if colts and fillies are running by? Surely you don't want them seeing this.” That struck a shiver through the four as, at the very least, some level of shame tore through them. "You do have some standards! Now that's it! Off his dick! None of you get to finish for this." "But—" "NO FINISHING!" The four jumped away from each other as my voice cracked the clouds in the sky. Everypony stepped away from us now. This gives you a few seconds to catch your breath. Think! They've never seen a stallion take charge. Never call anypony out. Never defeat a mare. It's completely warping what they think of you. You need to play into this more. One of the mares, however, walked through the divide of ponies, apparently, daring to challenge me. A glint in her eye to a lick at her lips with eyes narrowed like a mother before a troubled son. And I'd read too many stories to know how such a fable went.  "What's the matter, big stallion? Name's Rose, by the way." Rose was the hottest shade of pink, and that hottest also applied to every other description of her. Distance diminished her appearance. Now, however, her saunter toward him was a ten out of ten. "Have I been too much of a bad mare for you? Is a stallion jealous at seeing his brother being blown silly?" She came up to me and, although I was frozen, I could feel my dick, of all times, thinking about burying itself in soft real estate. Rose blew a warm breath on my cheek before nuzzling the spot. "Getting upset and throwing a hissy fit about it. Why... I can certainly understand it." I tried to close my eyes and ignore this, though the problem was, my mind was still thinking of her being a naughty mother.  "Being with a mare that's only touched mares... the sex... hoofjobs and blowjobs... not having much of her flanks to stick your dick between..." My eyes cracked open to see Rose heaving the heft of her backside before letting it drop into its tremendous bounces. "But I'm more than... pleasured to catch you up on certain affairs." Naughty fucking mare. I then blinked into a wink. Wait a fuck—naughty fucking mare! There'd been something the ponies had never encountered in this world.  Push back and denial.  The harder to get, the more it's enjoyed. "Get the fuck away from you crazy girl!" I pushed the only thing hotter than the sun away from me as I stepped back, turning away my head, shaking as though I were a disappointed father. “You naughty, naughty mare. Is this how you get off? Wanting to fuck anything you can." The girl blinked in curling into herself, like a filly, one enduring cognitive dissonance. Such a reality had never occurred to her before.  "Such a naughty girl—aren't you? Naughty naughty mare." Rose seized at the degrading tone and even hugged into herself. She tried looking up at me and, although on the inside, I was dying—I pushed through all the same. "Showing off your ass like anybody would take it. Think you're so special because of it." And then I heard pelting.  "No way.. you're getting wet by this!" "W-What! No! I..." "Oh yes yes! You want to be punished like the little filly that you are." In truth, I was reciting text from some kind of book I read in my last life. I don't know if it was good or bad, real or fake, but had no choice but to go along with it. "Waiting in your room after having jumped the neighbour's boy. Unable to stop touching yourself as you wait for daddy to come upstairs." Rose endured multiple heart attacks. "D-Daddy? But daddy would never punish me! That would be mommy because—" "But there IS no because! Because DADDY is coming up those steps: and you can hear him." I snarled and stepped forward, stomping my hooves, pushing afar the gathered crowd. "Hear the mass of his dick slapping the walls." Okay. That was a fucking stretch. But the crowd bought it. "And it's coming for you." I chuckled as darkly as I could. "The thunder of his hooves on the floor. Creaking the door open to find his naughty little filly on the bed, spread and rubbing herself. Such a naughty little girl. Rubbing yourself because daddy's coming." Rose only squeaked with a lowered muzzle. Tail flared, and a hoof dug back there. Forced to rub and keep on scratching. The mood was the same with more than a few in the crowd. I kept on as I raised myself a little. "How he's going to fall on you. Smother you beneath him. His dick slapped over your crotch and across your belly—how deeply it weighs down on it." I laughed a little more, and she rubbed a little faster. "And then daddy starts to grind back and forth, punishing the little girl so hungry for cock, one the size of her body, rubbing over it... until." I stood in silence and, seconds later, Rose stopped. She threw herself at me, to hold around my neck. "And then what? What!? Tell me!? I only grinned. "Suffer." "W-What? N-No! You can't leave it there!" Rose backed away a few steps and shook her head, her back legs, leaping from one to another, to bear the heat at their junction. 'My dad—no stallion, rather—would ever do that! They aren't capable of it! They would... would..." I smiled. "Have you ever met a stallion like me?" Rose squeaked. "Now go running, little filly, because it's not going to be you jumping me." I licked my lips and dove for her ear, whispering, loud enough, for others to hear. "It's going to be you, waiting with a tail pinned over your rump, for me to strike." Rose broke up in a yell and turned and left, being sure, in her dash, to grab that stallion in whatever route to her home. Many mares did the same with their choices. But those submissive stallions wouldn't give them the change of fantasy teased at.  I looked back to the remaining ponies. "Don't think you can take me because you think I'm like any other stallion! I haven't even shown you a quarter of what I'm really like! And I want to show off another reveal." I stepped aside to show the little dragon and the prismatic mare. Both of them looked at me. Either scared or amazed. Their expression was hard to tell at the moment. "These two are my friends. Not lovers—especially in the case of Spike—but friends.” Silence was the return.  As, no doubt, mares and stallions, being friends without being more, was unheard of.  "The next stallion I find treating this little guy like shit," I held up my hoof, unable to clench it, unlike that other thing, "is going to get the same treatment I gave to that mare! I don't think I won't be the crap out of you because I'm a stallion." Many cowered at that. "And mares!" I stepped to the other side to show off Rainbow behind me. "This is my other friend. She loves you more than any stallion could—because her love is out of choice! I will take zero shit-talking about her decision in this." I shook my head. "Bloody hell! Can any of you blame her? No wonder she went to mares if all stallions act the same level of pathetic." Then I slammed my hoof down again. "I've already beaten a mare before! Much less dealt with your Rose." This would be edgy as fuck.  But I had to go for it. I grinned. "So don't make me send you all to your bedroom." The crowd, at that point, turned and scattered. Freeing the center of the town in a matter of seconds from others. Looking around, all ways were clear and, once they were, I probably faltered. My legs gave out, dropping in every step, unable to support me.  I walked over to the fountain and tipped myself over. Dropping into the coolness of the water and falling onto my rump. I laid my back onto the statue. Keeping there. Needing the cold to calm the boiling hotness within.  And then my friends appeared over the rim of stone.  Rainbow crossed her forehooves and kept there, while the dragon, in hopping, hung from its side.  "I... I think that took everything out of me." Rainbow blinked. She looked lost for words. Confused about feelings. "Anon? What the heck was that?" I closed my eyes as the dragon struggled to pull himself onto the edge. "I don't know. I'm a stranger here. Not even of this world!" My forehooves crashed beneath the water as a stream poured over and before me. "My head keeps fuzzing up with these memories. The ones before I came here. Twilight said my memories are locked in my passive memory." I sighed and sunk my head to the side. "In living for a while, I should experience enough cues to unlock everything." I closed my eyes. "But every time it happens, it knocks me out of commission. I get... locked into myself. There's nothing I can do about it." Silence from her for a while.  "A-And what of all that stuff you said to those mares!?" I opened my eyes to see Spike, now hooked onto the fountain, sitting on its side—feet dipped in the water. "I've never heard of a stallion acting like that. Much less telling a mare no! It's crazy! I thought she would have hated you after that." Rainbow nodded with a roll of her eyes. "Right. Yet she seemed like she wanted you even more after that." I shrugged. "Wasn't sure how that would go. Learned from Twilight that mares never have to try hard to get what they want—and go crazy, then, to do so." Rainbow blew out through her lips. "Celestia... you're nuts!" I smiled. "I really am." Without words, the two offered a hoof and a claw forward and, though I was confused, I remembered what I had said in their favour. Rainbow had kissed me, and that had caused me to be scared—as though my feelings for Twilight were simply feelings I would have for any available girl.  But Rainbow appeared to me still as a friend, without any feelings beyond that, other than being my first friend in this crazy world. It's because she chooses her mates that such a kiss could mean nothing more than a cover.  And Spike, that little twerp, could have run back to the castle at any point... yet stayed because we were there. Even in my breakdown: he remained.  I chuckled and took their hoof and claw and, on being lifted out of the cold, I was brought into the warmth. > VII | The Mare City of Canterlot > --------------------------------------------------------------------------  ~ VII ~   The Mare City of Canterlot "How did you learn to do all of that anyway?" Rainbow Dash said from next to me, our coats touching, hers sun-soaked—mine still chilled from the water. The dragon brushed at my left. More so hanging on like a pirate from a mast. "One second has you like a scaredy-cat. The next, and you're laying down the law." I coughed in being sandwiched between the friends, warmed by the duo, aiding the recovery from my impromptu bath. I dipped and shook my head with a shrug. "Dunno. It's bullshit, really. Just used to talking out of stuff." "Pretty alright at it." My right eye narrowed. "Could be better. Don't think I acted much like that in my previous life—or had the balls to." I exhaled. "It's all talk at the end of the day; we're fucked the second they stop buying it." Rainbow giggled. Where the fuck was she leading us? I'd let her set the direction as I warmed up. "Was going to say! You're a different breed of guy." Another laugh. "But not the kind to be swinging with your dick. Still. You blew enough mares minds with that." "Think they'll blow me in return?" "Not so loud—or else you'll get your wish." "Shit." We all came to a stop as the dragon kicked a foot into my barrel, leaping from it, pelting the ground with his feet. Rainbow rounded with him as they both sauntered in-front of me. Looking... like they were looking at some goddamn leader.  "So what do we do next?" Spike squeaked up as he was wrapped in himself; arms hugged around his torso as though in the cold. He peered around for shadows. "You managed to get us outside just fine! But now..." "Now we've gotta hit this from a new angle with you," Rainbow added with a lowered head. Eyes peered in thought. "I mean. Your grand goal is to get to Canterlot right? Forget about it!" I shrugged both of my forelegs as though they were arms and, in so doing, fell forward onto my chest. Crashing with an 'oof,' I looked up in contempt. "Why the hell not? That's where Twilight and Celestia and all the crazy princess bitches are at, right?" "Yeah... but that's your problem right there!" Rainbow said. "In what way?" "Because it's nothing but crazy bitches there!" Spike said especially. There was something about the excitement in his innocent tone that would forever stick that phrase in my head. "Only powerful mares are there. No stallion! Few have the privilege of going, but..." I pushed hard into the ground, so my front jumped up, forehooves crashing into the ground. “But what, dickhead?” “But stallions get used and abused up there!" My face imploded into itself and a new one came out in its place. "How the fuck is that? Sucking them quicker than their refractory period?" Rainbow placed her foreleg on my shoulder. "No no. This is one you'd better take seriously." She turned with a sway of mane, the gleam of rainbows, followed by a raft of raspberry. Despite her coolness, she was also gorgeous, taken to moments of pensiveness in staring far off to the distance. "Up there. The city on the mountain. Can you catch it?" I looked beyond the city and over the emerald planes, to the base of the mountain and the might of the waterfall before it. That plateau of land it poured from, a gorgeous city, like one in a crystal ball—set with a tease of a castle in the back. "See it." "The mares who run the world are the ones who live there." Rainbow extended a foreleg toward it as incoming winds threw back her mane. Her leg dropped, and the winds did not stop. "Stallions are not permitted there. Even the visiting few have to be approved by royals—and properly leashed during their stay." I wanted to throw a joke or an insult but the damn girl's voice was sincere... and I didn't want to ruin that. "I'm guessing it's not the kind where you would walk a stallion like a dog." Rainbow tried to smile. "You're kinda close." And then she stopped trying. "But it's the unauthorized stallions you would fear being. See it's powerful gals up there. Not the kind wanting to suck off stallion to make him feel better." Shit clicked when I wished it didn't. "So they have a bunch of stallions working on them?" Rainbow rolled her eyes and mumbled. "Putin' it lightly. Consider yourself lucky if all you have to do is keep between a mare's legs, eating her out as she cooks dinner. Most of them are sicker than that. Stallions are toys for their amusement up there. Things to stroke their ego. All that power over 'em. What they make 'em do. Can make 'em do.” I chuckled as there was a white flash from my previous world. Although nothing could be seen inside of it. Feelings contained within it were felt once more. Vague and bubbling knowledge washed across the curves of the brain. "Stallions are weak no matter what." I said as I stared at that distant city of despair. Where powerful mares would crush a guy like me. Where the ancient bitch controlled the land from—the same place that produced, and now currently has, Twilight Sparkle. "Some mares want to protect and serve them because of that. Others wish to dominate. But no matter the case..." I looked down at myself. "Their fate is always in the hooves of someone else." Rainbow shrugged. "Always been like that... until..." I blinked in looking up. "Until when?" She didn't have to try to smile this time. “Until you.” > VIII | Knock On Her Door > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- ~ VIII ~ Knock On Her Door I couldn't explain the feeling of 'all the haunted shit that's about to go down in this bitch' as we pulled before the boutique; it was tall enough to tilt the head back to see the top of its imposing height. Colourful and exquisite. Like a building from the fabled Canterlot. There was nothing off about it. Nothing sinister about the building itself. Yet I couldn't fight the sensation of a haunted mansion. Well. Something became hunted because someone haunted it. Maybe it wasn't so much the building I feared, but rather, how it reflected the one who lived inside.  "You telling me those stallion horror stories on the way here isn't helping with this shit." I'd turned to my side to find it empty of companions. Over my shoulder and far back was where they stood. I turned. "What the fuck?" Rainbow smiled as lazy mane covered her face. "W-What?" "What?" I reeled back. "The fuck you doing back there? Isn't this the place?" "Yup! This is... Rarity's place! Her alright.” Blushes stole her cheeks. "If we're going to sell the image of you better... then she's the one to design an outfit for it. You'll probably knock her out with it." Her eye twitched with a fall of her head. "She's always about breaking the mould. You going a contrary stallion fashion will be a dream for her." "Sounds like a swell lady." Rainbow deflated into a warm goo of blue. “Oh yeah she is.” Eyebrows dropped at that. "The fuck? You got a crush?" Her muzzle struck up. "'Course not!" And then it dropped. “Had one. Only half of one now." She sighed longingly. "Quarter if I see her again. Or maybe three quarters." Her teeth tugged her bottom lip in. "Depends on how well and how unwell it went." My eyes flicked over to Spike, cowering behind Rainbow's back leg—barely peeking out to see me. "And how about you? Why are you keeping a safe distance from a dropped bomb?" Spike swallowed. "You said it yourself." I blinked. "What? That's she's a swell lady?" "That!" "That she's swell?" "No!" "That... she's a lady?" He squealed and tucked into himself. "That! That!" "Rainbow's a lady!" "No she's not!" "... there's proof if you look up!" Her tail was pinned into her muscular plot. "Do not!" "Gah!" Spike looked down and hugged the leg, something I wish I could do, not minding all that would hang above me. Like a true kid, though, he seemed too terrified—and too innocent—to know of his luck. "Rainbow's a mare! Rarity's a lady! Lady!" "A lady?" Rainbow shivered as the fluff on her chest puffed. "Proper princess, that one." What the fuck is this bullshit? "You're afraid of a princess?" "She's a dashing princess!" squeaked Spike's voice. Don't lash out. Kid's still a fucking kid. Cool yourself. Don't let the heat of that DAMN sun get to you. Think. This world is the reverse of all that you know. It's like SHE said. She she she. Who is she? What did she say? 'In confusion or righteousness, to avoid a mistake or to hurt another, instead, ask a lot of questions.' Twilight? Did Twilight say that? Sounds like something she'd say... or someone like her at least. "Alright." I cleared my throat and my head as I looked to my distant duo. "So what is a prince like in this world?" Spike looked up at Rainbow, and she back and down at him and, in a matter of seconds: blew up in laughter. Striking the ground with hooves and claws as they chuckled. "Prince oh prince—get out of that dress! Prince oh prince, she'll have you home in a pinch!" Seems like... as I expected. Fucking ponies can't give a straight answer to shit... but all this bickering... fuck... what good does it even fucking do? Shit shouldn't be this way. Fuck complication. And yet that's the way it is. Fucking hell Twilight. For a bitch I hated then came to like on the same day. Why does it feel like it's been a lifetime of missing you? I exhaled.  What the fuck is wrong with me? "Enough messing around then." I nodded toward the door. "If this Rarity can whip me up an outfit to strike fear into the hearts of mares: then she's our gal. Let's get in. Get out. Then figure out what the fuck is needed next." Rainbow and Spike, standing side by side, smiled at me. "Good luck with that." Then they started waving happily.  "Why the fuck are y'all waving? I'm not going into that possible psycho-bitch's lair alone!"  Rainbow lowered her head. "Sorry but—" Spike jumped in the air. "Can't do it!" My mouth dropped. "Wha... why not?" "May or may not trust in telling you." "You can tell me." "So ya can whack me where it counts? No thanks." "Now hold the fuck on! Didn't I just stand up for you in a crowd?" "And I respect that... but that doesn't mean you won't knock this. I know you." Rainbow's voice cracked and caught on itself. She swallowed a bit to wet her throat. "How you'll react and stuff." Part of my boiled in this roundabout of bullshitery but, in tearing her apart, I would be doing exactly what she thought I'd do. With a roll of my eyes and a sigh, I collected myself, to... whatever this moment needed me to be. "Listen," I started. "You and I are friends. Or as close as we can to becoming friends. I'm going to throw shit at you—at everyone. Just the kind of... whatever the fuck I am. Ain't saying that pony shit." I swallowed as well and stepped forward. "But if this is something you're serious about. I won't knock you for it—no matter how badly I'd want to." My eyes passed over to the dragon. "Same applies to you. And I'll even withhold from calling you dickhead." He smiled. Then frown. Trying to smile again. Not sure if to frown either.  Then my eyes passed back to the mare. "So? How about it?" Rainbow pressed her lips together, looking to the side, blushing, stepping in place. With a heavy exhale, her shoulders dropped, and she looked up at me. "Rarity... last time. B-Broke... my heart." My eyes and mouth closed for, if they did not, I would have cried, laughing, at such a phrase. Dunno why it would even be funny. Something about it was hilarious on the instinct. Yet, on breaking it down, a sensitive mare was expressing something hurting her... and it made me want to laugh.  Fuuuuuck meeeee. "Go on." Rainbow groaned. "I know you've got a wisecrack about it." That reality check deflated any such thing. My eyes opened to my hoof waving. "No no. No jokes—as promised." I set my hoof on the ground. "Guess it makes sense. You want yourself a proper mare." I turned to the boutique. "And they don't get more proper than Canterlot girls." I stepped toward the door before stopping. "But... all that malicious stuff they do—" "She's different." Rainbow wrapped her foreleg around the dragon, a pull to keep him next to her chest. "Not in every way. But the ones that count. At least for most ponies." She looked aside in shame. "It ended on bad terms with us last time." "Say no more, coach." I glanced at the dragon. "And you?" He smiled with a bashful expression. "There's only so much prince that I can play." "Roleplay! Nice." I shook my head and turned back for the door. Didn't like having to go into this dungeon alone. Yet I couldn't blame either for not coming. I wanted them to. Kinda needed them to. "Well. You guys find me in an hour." I shrugged. "Give or take." Spike choked. "A-And if we don't see you?" I pondered that question by looking at the grass. "Guess I'll get to see the hype behind being a doll." I sniffed loudly. "Nothing destroys masculinity like playing dress-up." I stepped forward and, curving a foreleg before the door, came to rap on it. "Hello! Anyone home? Told I could find a Miss Rarity here?"  Poised hoofsteps were muffled behind the door.  And scampering ones were loud behind me. Am I fucked? > IX | A... Normal Mare? > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- ~ IX ~ A... Normal Mare I knocked on the door no more times than needed, with the hope I could get out of this, the fleeing of my crew not doing wonders for my anxiety. Yet I stood my ground and played my act as the uncaring stallion. One who swore, without a fuck to give, seeking to cause some shit.   Though even my heart bought none of that. Who the fuck am I? Have I even taken a second to think about this? Came out swearing and screaming without thinking if that's all who I am. T-Thought so at first. Then I surprise myself in being finer at points. Was I actually decent before this? Or am I more decent now because of the state I'm in? Fuck! Not this! Not fucking now! You're about to meet the wicked lady of the north, able to crush Rainbow in a way the town couldn't—and scare the shit out of the dragon with the little games she likes to play. Now is not the time for insecurity. I breathed a few stabilizing breaths.   Bitch can probably smell that shit and use it against me. The door pulled back to a shackling of dull chimes. Rarity stood at its side, pulling it around with a foreleg, her head, tilted ever so, one piercing eye set on me—the other hidden beneath the violet curl of her luxurious mane.   And in those moments of stunned silence, she looked at me, like a creature from another world, as though I was someone she never met before. Her lips opened for a breath and nothing more. Hushed. Refined. Delicate little breathing.   It quickly occurred to me that I was looking at perfection. "Yes darling?" That voice. Soft with touches of elegance on its corners. It reminded me of the sophistication of Twilight—except more exuded. Melted snow was her coat and eyes like a glimmering pond of blue. "Perhaps you are lost? Is your mare nearby? I can put out a word for—" I held out a foreleg and shook my head. "U-Uh. No. None of that." Seconds passed with my hoof's mental occurrence still out; I saved the exposure of my stupidity in inching the hoof to her. "I heard talks of you being a fantastic designer." Her quizzical muzzle tilted at my hoof as though it were a trap—but shook it nonetheless. "And as you can maybe tell: I need an outfit." Her head kept at that adorable tilt with a muzzle inched back. Peering at me in confusion and looking around as though for some sort of aid. Did I come across as a creep? I blinked and held back a cough.   This whole time I'd been fighting crazy mare.   But now.   It felt as though I had to prove myself to this one.   Couldn't swear or curse or do my usual bits.   Even though... I should be doing that? When the hell did I get so formal?   Focus.   "I was about to make mention of that, yes." Rarity urged my hoof to the ground as to retreat her own. I'd kept the hold for too long. She backed a step from the door and, when I looked to cover it, she twitched. I froze in my tracks. "I don't mean to be so rude as to assume dastardly and improper of you... but you don't come to me possessing malicious intent, do you?" I retreat my hoof into the cushion of grass. "W-Wha?" "Sorry darling! It's just I've done this little waste of a dance far too many times." Her head shook and she 'tut tut tut' in doing so. "Poor stallion wishes to have me in arriving naked. Needs clothing, immediately, despite lacking an appointment made by his mare." Rarity patted a hoof to her chest and bent her head backward for dramatics. "Then it's an impromptu fitting with hooves unable to be kept to themselves! I swear you stallions take advantage of us mares." My mouth hung open and my heart faltered in perhaps finding the one bitch... n-no, the one lady that wasn't crazy in this world. Suddenly I felt like the asshole in all of this. Hadn't even done or said anything yet. Though I felt as though I reflected on all the problems even I had with the stallions.   The shit they said, did, and got away with. "Always trying to get intimate and recruit me to their herd! Three times this week already! Hoping that our little fitting sessions can allow them to fit something in various parts of me!" I blinked in how I could see that. Mare would give you a blowjob on the streets here. Not hard to expect stallions starting to demand that treatment from everyone—no matter what. "They say mares run the world, and yet! Yet stallions get away with such behaviour all the time!" It was true. Stallions were weak and mares picked up the slack—a reverse of old gender norms and all that. Yet a stallion could still demand anything of a mare and have it done. Sometimes, even though it's reversed, some things keep the same.   "And now you! You come here—" "Easy, easy! I'm not one of them! I promise you." I held up my foreleg to surrender it, slowly bringing it down. It helped to ease the pant that approached her breathing. The sudden exhaust of heat from her frame. "I'm not going to try to touch you or kiss you or anything like that." Rarity nodded with a self-satisfied smile. "Because I won't let you." I chuckled. "I don't doubt that one bit." I exhaled my tension. Even though Rarity was strong, aggressive, and control taking—I didn't fear her like I did other mares. They attacked me as a stallion. She, however, attacked the pony underneath that. "But I wasn't lying about the other stallions things. Just take a look at me real quick. Ever see a stallion like me before?" Rarity rose on her back legs and leaned on the frame of the door, and in this, I realized something I hadn't before. This girl was twice my size. She towered from high on the frame as her pricing eyes swept across me. I shivered from the heat burning into my skin.   "No." Rarity pushed her lips to the side with an amused expression. "Can't say I've ever seen someone like you before. Messy mane. Coat unbrushed for who knows how long. And your demeanour." Her lips parted in thought—before the next breath put it to words. "Just who are you, darling?" "A-Anon. No last name." My right eye closed as my shoulder shrugged. "Still need to make something up. Haven't had the inspiration for it. Should probably change my first name to something—" "More befitting the common names of ponies? Alas anon stands for anonymous—does it not?" Rarity's tongue licked the corner of her smirk. She fell forward to the ground. Even the smack of her hooves on the ground was delicate. "Anon is quite crude—although I do like it. No need to change to simply fit in." She turned around to a wisp of mane floating over her eye. Rarity glanced back at me through it. Creamy purple to the low, intense glow of sapphire irises. Blowing a giggle out through her lips, she produced a hint of steam with it. "After all the brand of names should not all be cliches. How tiring it would be if everyone's title had to be 'Pinkie Pie' and 'Rainbow Dash.'" That caught me. Rainbow Dash. Warned me of how dangerous this girl could be—the one that'd broken her heart. Yet as far as I could tell... it didn't seem like that. She seemed normal. Normal to someone like me. Although would be anything else to anyone else.   "You and I are unique individuals in that regard, aren't we?" Rarity strolled from the door in a full turn and, in the frame, the mass of her ass was captured in its view. Voluptuous. Her rump was a touch larger than the rest of her frame. "Most know me fully as Rarity and you as Anon. First name creatures we seem to be. No 'Twilight Sparkle' for us." I blinked and broke my tushy-trance. I looked across the side of her frame to see the mare looking back. Smiling. Catching me in something I shouldn't have been doing. Yet her lips stretched further for it as she nodded to behind her.   "Are you not coming in dear? You said you needed an outfit? Hopefully, you don't plan to bore me with the usual." I chuckled as I stepped forward. "Only if you put a U and an N before it." She snickered and disappeared into the darkness inside the boutique. "Wonderful. Maybe you are what I need to make a splash in my new line." White sunk into the night, yet the form floated, somewhere, in the dark mist. "Come on inside now. Close and lock the door behind you. We don't need anyone bothering this." Back at the door... I couldn't shake it. That gnawing feeling at the back of the head. This girl seemed perfect. Tall and large, thick in dough of collapsed white, everything about her: powerful. Her ass hung a little higher than I could reach. Impossibility thick without reaching the size of being too much.   Her steps cracked on the floor, like snaps throughout the air, delicate one, pronounced, though still as crushing. This life before... I must have been a creep. Seeing a lady so lovely, so... thinged about guys. I felt like I was trying something. That I was disgusting in even being there.   It felt weird after throwing shade and shit at mares, accusing them of everything horrible that, in the presence of this one, now, I suddenly felt like I was in their place. Even then... I felt different around this one. More... refined. Professional. More like my own stallion.   No swearing or cursing or being a jerk as that wouldn't fly here. Was that all an image too? Pretending to be a high-talking jerk until someone denied me of it? Would I deflate at the first legitimate opposition? I hadn't really had any due to the nature of this world. Mares so amazed at a stallion that could talk back... that they never challenged him on it.   I'm going to be found out soon. Rainbow and Spike and all of them. They'll see that imposter that I am. What... what happened to my curses? Why aren't I fucking swearing anymore? Wasn't that who I am? Or... Am I someone different around different ponies? > X | The Snow Devil > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- ~ X ~ The Snowy Devil I walked into the boutique with the mistake of thinking it was a lair. It looked like one. Around me was darkness with windows covered in dense black fabric. In the darkness there had been candles. Scattered all around. Sometimes patches of light shone from above. Where it would still be dimmed on reaching the ground floor.   "You wouldn't happen to have more than a few fangs, would you?" I'd been staring around the void till my gaze settled on the one in front. The snow of her coat, bright in the night, exuding a heavenly, frozen glow. "Coffin for a bed? Dislike of water touched by some old guy?" Rarity slowed ahead to a turn of her head. Side of her face revealed with a raised lip and shown fang. It rolled on her bottom lip, the eye above, half-lidded, an expression not quite of wanting... but teasing me. "Careful hon. Discover my secret and I'll have to devour that neck of yours." There'd been a twitch in me. That this massive mare could turn around in a prowl and, in a second, jump me. Crashing me to the floor with her immense weight of plushness atop me. How she could have her way with my neck and I would be powerless to stop it.   It felt... strange. I was a little fearful too. Even as Rarity turned around, even if she would never do it—this mare could pounce on me, drag a limp body to her bed, all from his leg. Couldn't say what I was in my previous life. But going into a dark, secluded room with a girl... I couldn't see myself being scared like this.   "Darling, you ought to lower those shoulders of yours." I snapped from my thoughts as the mare is within the frame of the hallway. Gaps of space are at her sides as the boutique seems to be crafted for her size. "Wouldn't be a right of mine to assume the state of that soft head of yours. Rest assured. My pastime doesn't revolve around preying on helpless stallions." I chuckled at that. And she did the same. Although Rarity's had a larger boom to it. "And what would you do to a stallion that's not so helpless?" "Certainly would be an interesting find." Rarity turned to the side with a muzzle raised high. "Tell me! Have you been able to find one yet?" I couldn't help but smirk. "No... but maybe you can help me make one." And her smirk was bigger than mine. "Too bad such a creature is not made." She turned and strode to the hallway. "Merely the image of one is embellished onto an individual. I will endure the risk of presupposing that is the reason for you being here?" Had she sniffed that from the start? Or was that the next leap of logic after working out I wasn't another stallion? Rarity didn't come to me straight with this. Rather keeping a step ahead, revealing what she knew, little by little, to the greatest advantage.   What you'd expect from a Canterlot fuckin' mare. My thoughts surprised me with a curse. Been a while since... I was looser. Seemed like I was tighter now. In all regards. Twilight caused me to feel tighter as well. In a way where I could still be myself... but she allowed the room to be something more on top of it.  "No matter! We can discuss all of this in a few moments." Her hooves whipped onto the floor from afar, deeper into the hall, as I stayed in the central area. To my right was a little set-up: two fancy chairs and a table between them. "Allow yourself to unwind. Facing my accusations earlier couldn't be easy on any stallion. I'll soon return with tea!" I made no reply while looking around the place. Something gnawed at my heart to find an advantage here. Not because the mare didn't mean well or that I was against trusting her—but if she ever tried anything... I was screwed.   Rainbow loved this mare. They still kept friends after... whatever happened. Yet what does that tell me about her? Not as evil or crazy as normal Canterlot mares but, at the same time, enough of a problem to sever a genuine pony like Dash.  I walked over to the chair and saw behind a couch more like a bed. It was a mattress with oversized cushions behind it. It deems to be just vast enough to encompass the lady's form. Although seeing as how something so large could be devoured beneath her mass with ease... was as intimidating as it was a turn on.  I jumped onto the chair to feel like a colt in a movie-theatre seat. Sitting at its back, I could barely reach the armrests as my sides. I could nearly lay down, curled into myself, and fall to sleep if I wanted to. Everything was large here.   Have you realized your plan yet? That voice spoke inside my head. Jarring the black mist around and whistling to a deafening frequency. It took a few shakes of the head to clear it. Pinched eyes to settle to... whatever the heck this was.  P-Plan? Course I got one—somewhat. Baller outfit. Train ride to Canterlot. Stroll in and... My voice fell apart before I even heard the rebuttal.   Is that it? Hope a mere shirt and jacket will hold back the law and mares? Magic and wings ineffective to swagger? Or the most powerful being—dismantled, to the curses and swears of a no one? I shook my head harder to clear the static in my brain.   "Darling? Your tea." The fluttering of eyes had revealed the massive face before me. With a twitch, I sprung to life, holding out my hooves to accept the plate and cup. Rarity smiled and turned around. "I went with a unique blend widely beloved by stallion clients. It should be perfect for those who are sensitive to everything." I chuckled and went for a sip. It burned the tongue with a splash of vanilla. It was sweet and comforting—the kinds of things I was supposed to reject. "Mmhmm. Not... bad. In fact—" "It's excellent?" "Sure! Why not? Compliments are always worth the free drink." I blew on it a bit to let the steaming cup settle. Turning, I placed the tray on the armrest. "And I'm probably going to need a whole lot more for this next favour. I'm told you're the best." Rarity settled into her seat and the wood groaned from her weight. Not in a way that was unpleasant or strained. Rather the sound in taking all that there was to her. She sat with her forelegs down and a cup floating at her side. "And whoever leaked this secret." "Rainbow Dash," I replied to Rarity's wince. "She had a lot of good to say about you." "Hmm." Rarity bunched her lips and looked aside. "No doubt the cyan pest spoke of other matters." "Even those she spoke good on. Or well on. One of those two is right." I scratched the side of my mane. "How'd you figure she said anything else?" "Canterlot raises a different breed of pony you see." Okay. There was that touch of posh I'd been waiting for. "It's elementary. You heard about me from Rainbow—and yet she's not here herself?" I shrugged. "Maybe something came up?" "So important that she would allow a stallion to come here alone—and that you would believe it?" Rarity gave a toss to her mane. "Unlikely. She must have told. Sending a poor stallion instead of having the guts to—" "Hey hey! Hold on now." I tapped my chest as though that would do anything to someone with one twice my size. "Get it. Most stallions need to be drunk to handle stuff like doing the laundry or crossing the road by themselves. Coddled like a twelve-year-old given their every wish." Then I shook my head and swiped my forelegs in the air. "But I'm not like that. I've already ripped my dick from a mare's mouth, outdrank and verbally fought with a princess, got into a hoof fight and knocked out a mare bouncer—and stirred a crowd of mares and stallions into leaving us alone." Rarity fell back into her seat with forelegs draped on the armrests. Her form consumed the seat. Assuming a position of power just in reclining. Everything in my head screamed danger. Yet she'd given me no cause to yell just yet.   "Trust me," she licked at the words on their way out, "I know." I took a sip from my drink. "Do you now?" "One does not survive higher society without knowing the words of the street—to phrase it rather simply." Rarity leaned back enough to rest more on her rump, the globes of white, squishing, as her legs swung close to conceal herself. "Once I deduced you were no normal stallion, I placed you with the newcomer in town."   I set the drink back down. "But if you knew all that... then why the dig at Rainbow?" "Like it or not," Rarity cleared her throat, "she still risked you into my care." Her head turned away. "I'm sure you can tell I am unlike other mares? There's a lot I could do right now... that you wouldn't be able to fight back against." "Says you." "You may have crude words for stallions and a strong hoof for mares." Rarity's eyes shone a little brighter in the darkness. "But do you seriously think either will be effective on me?" I looked down my barrel. "Guess not. Like a fly in a spiderweb right now." "At least the spider is lovely?" "The most attractive predator around." "Mhm." Rarity smirked. The genuine kind. Not done for effect or a part of a play. It could have been the first honest reaction I'd seen of her. "Not quite the empty mouth that I thought you were. Very well. I'll strive to treat you more like an equal." I coughed as my eyes shot up. "You mean you already don't?" "Pish-posh, darling." Rarity swatted the allegation down with a hoof. "I treat ponies at the level they deserve to be treated. I do not endure the hissy-fit of stallions as you do with the arrogance of mares. Would you say any of that is unfair?"   "Guess... not." I really couldn't say shit about any of this. There was that tickle of something not being right. Yet I couldn't pinpoint exactly what was wrong. "But Rainbow deserves to be treated better than some stallion. She really only had good things to say about you. Even with the bad stuff." Rarity looked down at the terrific fluff of her chest. Once more the flush of genuine came through. I was dealing with two mares right now. The lady and the mare. One of them toyed with me. The other... maybe there could be something more with.   "I am not a good mare and I will not try to be one." Rarity's muzzle flashed back up with an aggressive narrowing of the eyes. "I enjoyed my... fun with that girl. She's unlike me. Free and easy to read." I chuckled and looked at my arm. "Certainly wears her feelings on her sleeve." I glanced back at her. "Isn't that what you'd want, though? Opposites attract and all that? Doubt I could see you being with a clone of yourself." "And just who do you see me with?" I clenched my eye. "Maybe I misspoke. Don't know you well enough to say for sure. On the surface, you seem like a mare looking for a challenge." I sighed. "Though I think an easy to read girl is something that would do you better underneath it all." Rarity hummed. "Rainbow was fun to tease... but a little too easy with it." "All the different reactions you could have gotten out of her must have been worth it, though." "Maybe..." Rarity sipped the final bout from her drink and set it on the table. She crossed her forelegs over her chest and laid back. "And you? How is your love-life in all of this? Average stallion with a list of mares for different purposes?" I raised my shoulders. "Is that how it is around here? Grab whoever you want for a certain need? One blows better and the other jerks like no other?" 'Course a stallion would go for the sexual first." Rarity huffed and, at once, I felt like I had said the wrong thing. Is that what this was? No longer expressing myself, but rather, saying whatever would net the best response from her? Had this been the next level of being a stallion in this world? "Sometimes there is a bit of a more romantic angle to it. Hollow romance. The wanting of a nice and shy mare to take care of you. The next day's desire of wanting a more rocker-born personality." I was blown back as my vision fizzled all around. Ink pulsated at the corners of my vision as it, itself, narrowed. Rarity looked at me quizzically as my foreleg raised before my muzzle. There it transformed. Fuzz to skin. Hoof to hand. Fingers at the end that flexed in place. "Fuuucck," I exhaled the word. "No fucking better than a fantasy back home. Go online and date whatever digital brod struck your fancy." My head lowered. "This world is no better than some damn dating sim—come to life." "Darling?" that voice floated from beyond my world. "Him? You're certain about him? Swears and curses and can barely read!" "He got into this school!" That... v-voice. Sweet and kind and all the amount of adorable surrounding it. Could... could that be? "I've known him ever since we were young! So what if now..." “He only got in because you helped him with the entrance exam!” "Doesn't that mean, then, he's had terrible teachers until now?" "He doesn't belong with us!" "What does that even mean?" "Us sophisticated sort! He doesn't belong to our kind! Much less you falling for him!" What. The. Fuck?   I squeezed my eyes shut as sounds whipped inside my head. Screeches of time rewinding and fast-forwarding simultaneously. I exited the abyss with a gasp and breathed my first breath into the ordinary world.   Rarity, still, sat on the other end of the table.   "Hmm? Have you returned?" Returned? What the fuck was this bitch about? What the fuck even happened to me? "What... was I..." "You spaced out for a few moments and started to break into hyperventilation." Rarity pushed her lips to the side and looked away as though the subject was too boring to even focus on. Was that disinterest meant to be insulting or for my sake? "It was rumoured you suffered an attack on first coming here. Needed Twilight to stroke your back out from it." Those damn eyes glanced back. "Funny that such a strong stallion is brought to be weak like all the rest." She giggled into a large hoof. "Not of any fault of your own, though. Though maybe not other stallion's faults for being the way they are either." She returned to looking away. "How interesting." Couldn't let that shit slide. "Difference is one of them is actively doing something about it." Her lips pursed. "Truth." Now it felt like I lost any kind of power to her—not that I had much to begin with. The thing that killed me was how I couldn't figure her out. Sitting over there, both here and not, sometimes interested and sometimes not. She could be genuine and then return to playing a role. Was she good or was she bad? New friend or foe in the making? Rainbow and Spike were easy to figure out. Knew what they wanted. As I did with the average pony of this town. But Rarity? She was the first legitimate character I'd met here.   Just what was it she was after? No to fuck some other stallion.   But what? "Pretty sure I've laid all my cards before you now." I turned and cracked my neck, back in the game. "I'm a stallion that's all talk with little action to back it up. You wanted to know something about my love-life? Twilight Sparkle seems like the only girl to mean something to me here." Rarity's eyes fluttered as her muzzle turned back. "You mean you only have interest in one? But have you not already have her read?" "Got her beat in a few areas and she has me just the same in others." I gave a shrug to the matter. "She's a bit above me and others: below. Closest to having an equal here so far. There's... something about her I can't knock." Rarity smiled. Started to grin actually. Now I had her full attention.   “Now isn't that special? Mares will have many stallions and stallions will have many mares." Rarity's head lightly shook to the flounce of her mane. "But notions of one and one aren't popular in this world. You're weaker the fewer you have. Why have one when you can have them all?" Was that how it was? Was there anything wrong with being able to date around? Maybe it wasn't much of a problem and I was the only one throwing a fuss about it.   And yet. "It's because... you get something more from it." I coughed with a shake of the head. "Or, at least, I do." I clasped my hooves together and dropped into thought. Choosing to be honest and speak the truth—no matter how this girl could use it against me. "Didn't feel much for Twilight at the start. Well, that's not totally the case." "Oh?" "Thought she was adorable and pretty for as far as being a horse goes." Memories of waking up to yellow lips on my dick and a blur of purple chasing me over a hill. As did the feeling of coat brushing into mine. Warmer and feminine. "The idea of her... the idea of any of these girls... being into me..." Rarity nodded with a raise of her muzzle.   "I mean I would have taken it! What poor bastard wouldn't? Y'know.” My head bounced around with the thought. "I mean who wouldn't? Lovely girls in every capacity possible." I sighed. "Just even one of them being into you is enough." Rarity leaned forward from her seat with an extended hoof. "Funny you should speak of exclusivity like it's common." She nearly spat. "Indeed the rarest gem is far more common than that. All of this, of course, is no more than a game—both sides included." I shook my head and shrugged as a discharge of rejection flooded me. "But what good is a numbers game? It's cool if others float like that—but not me." I chuckled as my forehooves pressed together and I leaned into them. "It's funny. Never really given much thought to crap like this. Least... never had the company that allowed me to." "Not even your lonesome?" "Sometimes you need a spark before thought." "Touche." Rarity was leaning forward as well. To the point it was unnatural. Weight on her forelegs as the mass of her body draped forward. "But do go on. You have me curious now. Why the rejection of a herd now?" "Because what the hell would it mean? Twilight and Fluttershy and whoever the hell else? Having them being into me... feels like a dream coming true." I spoke next without breath to the grain on vocal cords. "But if they would then show that same love to other stallions. That we were all ranked the same. Then... then what does that interest in me even mean?" Rarity blinked as her head broke out from a trance. "You mean to say there is thought deeper than that? You have a mare before you, willing to tend in every regard, without any effort more. Isn't that enough?" What the hell was I preaching here? Had no idea of it—but the sensitive beats of the heart led me in the right direction. Wasn't like me to trust shit like to. Or to speak on matters... gay like this. Yet. I followed through. "Maybe that's enough for some stallions," I offered as my muzzle dropped in defeat. Why did I feel defeated in admitting my feelings? Why did I feel shame and like a loser in so doing? Wrong wiring of the way things were meant to be? "Wake up in a house paid for. Cooked food on a table and mare to blow you underneath it. Get everything you need in it." "But not you?" I exhaled the contents of my chest in that. "But none of that means anything. Everything is just handed down for the sake of being a stallion. Not because you're anything more than that." I choked on nothing. "What makes me different from any other guy on the street? More or less than him? Even different?" Rarity wrinkled her snout. "I'm sure mares see stallions as different. Ones they prefer and ones they don't." Her hoof supported her chin as it dipped in thought. "Though that margin isn't great, I suppose. No mare would outright say one is special over the other. Most of them default to loving any that are needing them." I nodded and whipped myself back in the chair. Looking up to the hollow spire to the few windows lined inside of it. Where a faint amount of light came in. You couldn't see outside. However it allowed you to know, at least, that it was there. "That's why I fought Twilight at first. Or any mare for that matter. I wasn't interested in their lust." I could hear the wrinkling of a cushion from afar.   "I was... i-interested... in their... lo... love." My heart cracked. There were dull sounds beyond my ears. Everything in me froze before the pieces shattered into bits. I was dead after a confession like that. Laughter roared around me. Not from the mare but from beyond. In another world, another place, the same me, the same words, to outrageous laughter. "Love?" I blinked and looked at the mare across from me. Rarity consumed her seat and rested her great elbow on the rest. Chin on a hoof and head looking at the floor. She was blinking like a search engine was happening behind her eyes. That. Or she was fighting off some kind of feeling.   "Love? Love." Rarity inhaled slowly and exhaled sharply. Her muzzle turned with an eye shutting. "Such a thing... does not mean that which you've assigned to it. Such a quality is to give it to as many as you can." The cup sat on the armrest still. I leaned a hoof over it, tracing the rim, developing a balance for not tipping it over. "It means various things back home too. You can love a lot and too many. But in my case. You find someone... and they looked at you diffidently from everyone else... and it's only you they want to be with." I exhaled and went on. "I didn't let Twilight jump me at first. Tried every way I could to get rid of her." My hoof stopped rolling on the cup and pressed into the top of it. "But then she saved my ass at the fountain. Then we played some games at the bar. It was through all of that. Doing stuff together and talking that... at little times... I felt like I earned something from her... as she did me." Rarity took this in the best she could. Keeping that expression of confusion bordering on the world being understood in a click. Part of her didn't want to buy it. Like a third force was a part of the game. But she went along with all of this the best she could.   "Did you come to love Twilight Sparkle in the end?" "Loved her near the start of it all," I threw out the truth. "Hence why I wanted her to think otherwise the whole time. Not as good on the surface as I appear." I pushed forward on the chair as my hooves hit the floor. "But it was a tough time. And speaking of which. We keep this any longer..." "And your friends will worry." Rarity lowered to the ground to the clink of glasses from her entry steps. She came to my side, towering, a smile, coy, on the side of her muzzle. "Wouldn't want dear Rainbow to worry now. You require an outfit to further sell your illusion. I am the mare to help you." I smirked in returned as I stood in her shadow—tall. "Just no dresses or skirts. Trench coat and vest and clothing that's tighter than tight." I should have been worried and scared and developing into anxiety. Yet, at this moment, I felt relaxed in expressing the truth. "Need something that will sell an otherworldly image of me." Rarity smirked as her hoof came behind my back, a push to get me started forward, as she began behind me. "Walk. Need to see you in action. Have some designs for stallions that... have been collecting dust before you came along." I stepped forward.   "No no! Walk not! Strut! Even footing and a subtle sway of the hips! Demonstrate power—or what little of it you have!" For the moment, in needing to become more, I trusted in Rarity.