New York Life Chief Editor’s Note:

The middle of December, and all’s well. Holiday bonuses are going out, and money continues to flow in. As we finally reach the end of these articles along with the end of the year, I feel a little reflection is in order as we look back on everything that happened and all we’ve been through since January.

When I was first approached by Platinum Corona in publishing these articles, I’m sure my initial reaction was much like that of many of Five Stars’ coworkers and future Gentlemen had when the subject was first broached: no way. Never mind how exploitive and repulsive it seemed to me at first; I feared it would be the end of our magazine if we ran articles defending such a thing.

But Platinum was persistent, saying that they really wanted their story told, and she’d initially come to me because I’d shown a willingness to broach difficult subjects in our pages before and attempt to be evenhanded about it. In the end, she sent me letters encouraging me to do this from several Gentlemen and their clients, including the one that’s going to be described here. They all uniformly said that they weren’t being exploited but in the end had volunteered, that they were well-paid escorts doing work they loved, that they cared deeply for each other and the mares they served, and that for many of them, Equestria had allowed them to, quite simply, “be a man and be appreciated for it.”

It was the last part that got me the most interested. I mean, as a journalist, the question had to be asked: why would a man willingly volunteer for something like this? Why would a mare willingly resort to this? What was it all about, and how did such an organization even come to be? As the proposed articles would consist of Five Stars telling G4M’s story by telling her own, explaining why the business worked in the context of her own less-than-happy experiences with Equestrian herd life, I began to get more interested and realized that just like G4M, there was a real need being answered here, and as such, there could be an actual market for these articles.

Still, I had to get past the idea of including sexually explicit content in our pages. I’m no prude, and I knew we’d hardly be breaking new ground given the preponderance of adult stores and materials available in our city or the fact that our tabloid rivals have no qualms about pushing the boundaries of lurid content as far as they can… but that didn’t mean I wanted to stoop to their level. And yet, in an odd way, that’s what finally swayed me—I ultimately decided that the story of G4M did deserve to be told, and I’d much rather take the risk of having it told here than in the hands of those who would only seek to exploit it for shock value. By running it in our pages, I knew we’d be giving it far more credence and consideration than it would have been at some of our cross-city rivals.

And the rest, as they say, is history. I’d be lying if I said I didn’t have some severe moments of doubt over our decision to publish the articles given the many enemies we made and the hard times we faced. But the friends we made, and I daresay the good it has done, more than make up for it. No regrets, and no apologies, least of all to the hateful folks on both fringes who claimed they were acting in the name of morality or tolerance. Believe me, you weren’t, folks. And you can consider this final article a middle finger to all of you. You didn’t stop us. You didn’t shut us down. If anything, in the end you drew more attention to us and G4M, and now we both reap the rewards. So thanks for your unintended help, stick that up your collective craws, and go collectively buck yourselves.

Wow. I guess more of Hot Topic rubbed off on me than I realized. Oh well! Before I sign off, I would like to thank all our loyal readers and everyone who offered both moral and monetary support for us over this past year. You really did make a difference, and we dedicate these final chapters to you. Oh yes, and for what is hard to believe is the final time… this article contains sexually explicit material describing an interspecies affair courtesy of the great mistress of men and founding member of G4M, Five Stars herself. If, after twenty-five chapters you’re still shocked and triggered by this, my sympathy level for you is zero.

—Kalido Tenna, Chief Editor, New York Life Magazine

Manehattan Post’s Owner’s Note:

And I, for one, am very glad you did so, Kalido. There were no such qualms on this side as far as publishing the articles goes, given that I was already a Gentlemen for Mares client and as a rule couldn’t care less about what anyone thought of me for it. I’ve never been afraid to buck protocol or convention, so why would I do so now over something I already quite willingly avail myself of? My motivations were far more direct—I wanted more mares to experience what I had, and decided this was the way to get the word out… though I didn’t anticipate the intensity of reaction we’d garner for it.

I’ll admit there were times I thought my magazine was going to have to shut down as me and my workers ended up under threat, but much like you, it was the equally strong support we received and the revulsion that attacks on Gentlemen generated that sustained us. In the end, I’m too stubborn of a mare to surrender, in particular with regards to a magazine I founded nearly thirty years ago and have devoted much of my life to. I also knew that to give into such tactics would have been to encourage more of them, and to that end, I would have kept this magazine running all alone if I had to, even if that meant writing each article, operating the printing presses, and hawking the issues on street corners myself.

It didn’t come to that, thankfully. In the end, all the threats and anger only drew me and my staff closer together, just like it did our New York Life counterparts. In the end, we closed ranks and swore an unspoken oath that we would see these articles through no matter what, and if that meant going down with the ship, so be it. Maybe I’m too old-fashioned, or maybe I’m just too ornery for my own good sometimes, but some things are worth taking a stand for. Freedom of speech and press are two of them, and I fear both have taken a beating in recent years.

It was an ordeal, but it all seems to have turned out well in the end. I keep my paper, get my Gentleman, and G4M itself is now doing roaring business, opening new branch offices everywhere. As we reach the end of these articles, I consider my mission accomplished, and to the victor goes the spoils—David and I have decided we will marry during the Summer Sun Celebration in the Crystal Empire by the Crystal Heart itself, and then honeymoon there.

—Hot Topic, Manehattan Post Magazine

And I can’t wait to be there, Hot Topic! Lady Rarity has already demanded the right to make the bridesmaid uniforms, and I was in for measurements not long ago. She promised to make me ‘stunning’ and the ‘envy of all’ along with my fellow trainers and handlers—second only to the bride herself, of course!—and given her reputation, to say nothing of all she’s done to dress our Gentlemen, I have little doubt she’ll keep her promise!

In fairness, I wouldn’t say that we’re opening new branch offices ‘everywhere’, but we do have four now, with two more planned for next year. We’ve come a long way from the small operation we initially were two years and change ago, when we were struggling to get our hooves under us and just hire our first Gentleman. And for the final tale of my story, I would like to tell how I recruited my first Gentleman, an individual who’s still with us to this day. His story, I’ve found, is very typical of many Gentleman; a down-on-his-luck man fleeing a difficult situation at home and looking for a new start… one he eventually found in the most unlikely field! He has given me his permission to tell the story to follow, and he’ll have plenty to say in a letter at the end.

What makes him so special? The fact that he was my first hire, certainly, but more in terms of how much he taught me about how to go about recruiting… and more to the point, how not to. In the course of recruiting him, I daresay I hit every mental hurdle, every argument against it, every visceral and negative reaction the initial thought of Gentlemen or sleeping with mares garnered…

And I learned from him what it took to break through all of them and help a prospective Gentleman see that I wasn’t asking that he demean himself, but to help mares know a male’s love and company like so few rarely got to. He was a struggle, but in the end, I won him over, and he’s now nearing the end of his contract, a much richer, more confident and determined man ready to reclaim his former life…

But that I’ll leave for him to tell at the end. As this is a grand finale of sorts, it requires a double-length article just like the story of me and Shaun did… for just like him, it can’t all fit in one regular article!

The First Gentleman

Before I begin, let’s set the stage one last time. To this point, we had our new headquarters building about three-quarters renovated, security guards on standby for when we opened our nightclub, and a group of five mares, including myself, who were willing to function as initial staff and Gentleman trainers. It’d taken a couple weeks of occasionally heated debate to hash out just how we were going to go about recruiting and training Gentlemen, and it was now time to put our plan to the test…

And hope it didn’t blow up in our collective faces. Platinum had taken an airship back home to Saddle Arabia for a few weeks to spend some time with her stallion, but once she’d arrived I’d kept in touch with her via dragonfire scroll from the Saddle Arabian consulate, presenting the outlines of our plan. She’d returned it with some commentary and a few minor suggestions, but for the most part left it unchanged, telling us all to ‘have fun and enjoy the recruiting process!’ We all looked at each other oddly at that, given we’d set the rule that there would be no bedding of prospective recruits until and unless they entered training…

In the end, not one of us followed it, and I’m sure Platinum damn well knew it. I still don’t know how, but she really seemed to have an instinctive knowledge of how things would happen and what form it would take… but was equally content to let us all discover it for ourselves.

And discover it we did. As much as I’d like to say I was the first again, as it turned out, I ended up being dead last among the five of us to score a Gentleman. The first, for the record and perhaps fittingly, actually came from First Flight, as she found and bedded a human thrillseeker who had done it all on his side of the portal—skydiving, ‘bungee jumping’, and other dangerous activities I can’t even begin to comprehend—and now wanted to know what thrills this new world offered, considering the idea of sleeping with mares and later being a Gentleman a part of that. In reflection of his favorite thrill activity, he took the call sign ‘Freefall’ and would later specialize in mares in heat. He liked things wild, and even now I can’t say he’s fully settled down.

Nevertheless, she scored him after a week and we got our first commitment—“I get to screw mares and get paid for it? Sign me up!” he said—and First Flight ended up being his handler as she rather sheepishly admitted that she’d won him by laying him. But she’d very much enjoyed it; she confirmed that despite his inexperience, he was far more fun than the few stallions she’d been with, if a bit clumsy and full of himself. We did have some problems with him at first, as it took him a while to understand the job was less about him than the mares he was serving, though in fairness, that’s less of an issue when you’re talking about mares in heat.

Yeah, sorry about that, Five Stars. I admit I was a bit of an idiot back then, though it was more due to suddenly being allowed as much sex as I wanted (I thought) and not yet being mature enough to handle it. So after all that, let me just say here and now to all of you… thanks for sticking with me and putting up with all my idiocy. I know I was—and still am—a pain in the flank at times…

—Freefall

I won’t lie—that you are! But you’re also endearing and you’ve made a niche for yourself taking jobs that other Gentlemen won’t. I know you drive First Flight crazy at times, but she loves you… and yes, when it comes down to it, so do I.

With the ink on our first hire’s improvised contract barely dry, I continued canvassing the city for my first real candidate, but so far I’d been coming up empty, seeing only a few human couples and some older men. The former were off-limits because we’d resolved we would NOT poach men from existing relationships, the latter because we wanted strapping young bucks, as it were. Yes, we were practicing age discrimination, but we didn’t yet know that there would be mares like Rising Star who would prefer older Gentlemen.

Regardless, the pickings were slim, as there just weren’t many humans in Manehattan yet. I was actively considering heading for Neighagra to scope out the tourist crowd there when I saw a single human sitting all alone at our favorite coffee shop down the street.

A Counselor Candidate

I think what first drew me to him was his appearance. He presented a slightly odd picture, far more slovenly than most humans I’d seen, who were usually wearing business suits for job interviews; even the tourists tended to dress nicely. But not him. He was wearing a human ‘hoodie’ and a blue toboggan cap like it was winter with ‘PAPA’ stitched in red yarn on the side. He wasn’t having anything except water, and his eyes were fixed on a second human, this one a young girl, who appeared to be putting on some kind of performance in the nearby park for a few foals.

I considered him for the better part of two minutes before finally deciding to approach him. He seemed physically fit, though it was hard to tell under those baggy clothes. He was also roughly the age we were looking for… but his attire and entire slouching manner struck me as belonging to someone who just didn’t care much about anything anymore.

I tried to write him off as a candidate, but something inside me kept insisting I should go to him. So in the end I did, going to the counter and buying myself some zebrican tea before approaching him with it. “Pardon me… is this seat taken?” I pointed at the open chair beside him.

His gaze turned on me and appraised me for a moment, taking in my appearance and even flickering to my cutie mark for a moment; I can only describe his eyes as being too old and tired for a face so young. “Not right now,” he said with a shrug, turning back to watch the human girl across the street.

“Thanks,” I replied, quickly accepting the implied invitation and sitting down. “I’m Five Stars,” I introduced myself while offering my hoof in greeting, just trying to elicit some kind of reaction from him.

He glanced at me again, but returned the gesture, curling his hand into a fist and bumping his knuckles to my hoof. “Nicholas Carpenter,” he told me (this is not his name, but is HIS suggestion for his alias!). “My daughter and I only arrived in the city yesterday,” he explained, nodding at the girl across the street.

My heart sunk a bit at that—if he already had a mare and foals, then he was off-limits along with the rest. But, my long experience in the hospitality industry kicked in and I started to make some conversation with him, genuinely curious about this odd human who was looking and acting different than most others I’d seen to that point. “Oh. Well, welcome to Manehattan! Have to say, I don’t see too many human tourists here yet. Usually, they head for Neighagra or Canterlot, not here. Those who do come here tend to be looking for jobs…” I probed hopefully.

“We came here from Neighagra. It’s quite pretty,” he granted, though there didn’t seem to be much warmth in his voice at the memory. “My daughter wanted to see the coast and visit your Stallion of Sovereignty, so… here we are.” He shrugged again, like it didn’t matter to him one way or another.

“I see…” I replied, trying to get a read on him. He seemed very… subdued, was the only word I could immediately come up with. Was he tired, or was this just the way he was? “You know, drinking water is a waste in a place like this. Could I get you something stronger? Everything’s good here,” I suggested, suddenly wondering and worrying about how he’d take the idea of a female offering to treat him, given how insistent Shaun had been of the reverse.

He glanced at me again, a sudden look in his eyes like he was trying to figure out why I was being so friendly to him, and then deciding once more that it didn’t matter. “Sure, if you’re buying.”

“Why not?” I told him. “This place has excellent tea and coffee. Or even cider if you’re interested. What’s your pleasure?”

“Coffee. Black,” he said simply.

I gave him an odd look. “With nothing in it?”

“No. I take it straight now,” he told me. “No milk, no cream, no sugar.”

This human definitely had my interest now. “Sounds very bitter. Are you sure?”

“That’s the way I like it now,” he confirmed. “Someone I knew taught me to take it that way. ‘Give it to me blacker than a moonless night, hotter and more bitter than hell itself… that is coffee’,” he added in an air like he was quoting someone.

I blinked, but obeyed. “Okay…” I said, getting him his order and bringing it to him. I was having a very hard time reading him, but if nothing else, I could tell he wasn’t just putting on airs. I sensed a great sadness within him, even a hopelessness, like nothing he did mattered any longer. And for that reason alone, I needed to know more about him. He was nothing like Shaun, and perhaps that made it easier for me to pursue him, as there was no sense I was trying to replace him simply because their personalities were so distinct.

“So what brings you to Equestria, Mister Carpenter?” I asked when he’d had his first sip, looking genuinely surprised at the flavor, but he had no chance to answer before his daughter came up, as bouncy and bubbly as any filly her age.

“Hi, Daddy! So who’s your new pony friend?” she asked, turning her eyes on me with keen interest.

His eyes lit up at her approach; the first time I’d seen some genuine elation in them. “Hi, sweetheart. This is Miss…?” he gave me the chance to introduce myself, and I took it.

“Five Stars,” I offered the young human girl my hoof, which she shook in the human manner instead of bumping it. I still found it a bit perturbing when humans did that—ponies don’t generally like being grabbed, particularly by predatory creatures—but her youth and eagerness made up for it. “And you are?” Near as I could tell, she was a young teenager by human standards, but it was hard to say—I wasn’t that good at judging human ages yet.

She told me her name then, and as I’m writing this, she suggests I give her the alias ‘Judy’. “Very pleased to meet you, Miss Five Stars! I absolutely love Equestria!” she told me and looked very much like she meant it. “I’m a budding magician back home, but you have real magic here! It’s so amazing, Daddy!” she said, giving him a hug and again I saw genuine warmth and affection in his eyes, even if just for a moment. I remember watching and wondering if she was the only thing that gained any sort of emotional reaction from him any more.

“A magician?” I blinked in surprise. As far as I knew, humans didn’t have magic, so how could she be…?

“That she is. Why don’t you show her what you can do, honey?” he suggested with a coy grin.

This time, her eyes lit up. “Oh, I’d love to!” she said, and immediately launched into a very practiced routine of card and other tricks. It wasn’t real magic, but it was showponyship involving very clever sleight-of-hoof tricks which long human limbs and fingers made easy. In truth, I’ve only ever known one pony who was as good as her, and even she had some excellent illusion magic to help with her performances.

“I’m impressed!” I said, and meant it. “You could make it as a street performer in Las Pegasus!”

“You mean it?” she beamed. “Can we go there next, Daddy?”

He chuckled and smiled. “If you want to, sweetheart,” he said easily, and she gave him another hug before heading back out into the park looking for another audience.

“She’s quite talented,” I told him, looking after her.

“She really is,” he agreed. “Runs in her family.”

“Ah! So you’re a magician too?” I assumed, and immediately regretted it as he closed his eyes and shook his head slowly beneath his toboggan cap.

“No magic here. I was an attorney.” He shrugged as if it didn’t matter, giving me a weary smile that looked equal parts sad and tired.

I was genuinely surprised by that. “An attorney? Where?” I asked, thinking he looked like anything but the buttoned-up lawyers I’d had to deal with recently.

He named the city he worked in. I recognized it as one of the larger human cities; one that did not seem to have an Equestrian equivalent. “So you’re not an attorney anymore?” I prompted, to which he shook his head again and went downcast.

“No. And you’ll forgive me, but I don’t really want to talk about it,” he told me, taking a long draw of his coffee and staring down at it like he wasn’t sure if he liked it or not.

“Okay.” Long experience with patrons at various posts in Las Pegasus left me unconvinced that was true. My time as a barmare in particular had taught me that ponies who said that often did want to open up and have a friendly ear for them to vent a bit, and often just needed a little encouragement, alcoholic or otherwise, to do so. “So what brings you to Equestria, then?”

He gave me another odd look, perhaps wondering why I was taking an interest in him, but in the end I think he just answered out of apathy. “I don’t know. An escape? A change of scene?” He mused as he took another languid sip of his coffee. “If Judy’s happy, that’s all I really care about now. Heaven knows she’s had a hard enough time after losing her real father.”

Real father? “Then she is…?”

“The daughter of a former client who disappeared,” he explained somewhat tersely, and for the first time I hear some genuine emotion in his voice. “Long story, but the short of it is… I felt responsible and adopted her. She wanted to see Equestria, and I didn’t have anything better to do, so… here we are.” He shrugged and gave his sad smile again while gesturing with a wave of his hand to the scenery before us.

It clicked in my head that meant he wasn’t taken and was therefore fair game, but I didn’t care about that Just then. What I did care about was that I knew the look he’d just given me. I’d seen it on other ponies best described as beaten down by life and putting up a brave front for it, trying to see good and beauty in the world, both his and ours—but no longer able to. “So you’re out of work?” I probed gently.

“You could say that,” was his only reply as he downed the remaining half of his coffee. “All I do nowadays is run a small talent agency for my daughter and play a few poker games.”

Okay. Now my interest was definitely piqued, wanting to know what his story was and what had laid him so low as I was sensing. Reading between the lines, I realized then that whatever had happened to him, he really didn’t care about himself any longer, and I had to know why. It wasn’t even about recruiting a Gentleman at that point; it was the simple fact I hated seeing somepony so unhappy—especially a male. It was another byproduct of my Las Pegasus days, where I often gravitated towards down-on-their-luck stallions who weren’t enjoying themselves… and saw to it they then ended up having a very good time, even if that meant sleeping with them. “Then how did you afford the trip?”

He actually chuckled at that. “Same way I support Judy. By playing cards,” he explained like it was no big deal. “I’m good enough at poker to keep us afloat. Being an ex-lawyer, guess I’ve got a talent for reading people if nothing else.” He seemed to finger something in his hoodie pocket as he spoke.

I have to say, my opinion of him darkened a bit given the last card-playing stallions I’d known. I then kicked myself mentally for trying to associate him with them, reminding myself that whatever his story, he was no Aces Up or Double Down. How he doted on his adopted daughter was evidence of that, I thought!

“You don’t say…” I told him once my brooding thoughts of the pair had been expunged. “You know, I was a casino dealer in Las Pegasus once. Dealt poker for a while. Didn’t play much, though. I wasn’t much good at it and I knew better than to wager my tips away.”

He looked genuinely surprised at that, glancing down at my hooves; in hindsight he was trying to figure out how I could shuffle and deal with them. “Was it good work?” he asked, showing at least a modicum of curiosity for the first time.

“It paid the bills,” I confirmed. “Had some decent side benefits, too…” I wistfully remembered Braeburn and my dentist friend.

My reaction was not lost on him. “If you liked it, then why aren’t you still there?” he wanted to know.

My eyes went distant, suddenly awash in bad memories of my own. “That’s something I’d rather not talk about,” I said very quietly, going downcast.

He considered me, then smiled sadly in return, offering his coffee cup up for a toast. “To former lives?”

“To new beginnings,” I rejoined, tapping my cup to his.

An Attorney’s Offer

That seemed to finally break the ice. Slowly, he opened up to me over the next hour or so as we sat at that table, and I eventually pried the answer out of him as to why he was no longer an attorney—he’d been disbarred for illegal courtroom conduct, and very unfairly if he could be believed.

“Even now, I still don’t get it,” he told me, and I could hear the emotion in his voice. “I did everything right. I tried to do right by everyone, whether they were my clients or my friends. I defended those in need, even prosecutors who once opposed me,” he told me, anger and sorrow in his voice present in equal measure. “Didn’t even get paid for the most part; did a lot of my work pro bono. I was good, I was generous, I helped people and did everything I was supposed to. And my reward?” He gave a brief but bitter laugh, pain flashing through his eyes. “I lost everything. I got framed for falsifying evidence, and that was that.” He slammed his coffee cup down with a little more force than necessary, turning heads at other tables.

He noticed the reaction and grimaced. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to unload on you like this…” he offered with some embarrassment in his voice, reaching over to pat my hoof. “Guess I just needed to.”

“It’s fine, really,” I assured him, returning the gesture by patting his hand with my other hoof. “Believe me, I know how unfair life can be at times.”

“And how do you deal with it?” he asked me earnestly.

“Not always well,” I admitted, shaking my head at my past bouts with drink and depression. “In the end, you need friends. Friends who can pick you up and help you move forward; let you know that there are still those who care for you even when you think you’ve fallen as low as you can possibly go. But whether they’re there or not, they can’t make you do it. In the end, you need to pick yourself up and move forward, because in the end… that’s the only direction there is to go.”

He considered that, then nodded slowly. “I guess there’s some truth to that. I just wish I could still help people like I used to,” he told me as Judy returned again, preventing me from telling him that I might have such a way. She’d just about made a run of the entire park by then and had bought herself some roasted nuts from a cart vendor, their aroma quite strong and appetizing.

“You look like you’re having a really good time, Judy,” I noted with approval. No matter how long it had been since my Las Pegasus days, I still enjoyed seeing others enjoy themselves, doubly so when I was helping them to.

“I really am, Ms. Five Stars! I absolutely love Equestria! Oh, Daddy, I wish we could stay here more than a couple weeks!” she gave him another big hug, turning her best impression of big, dewy eyes on him.

He returned her embrace, but his smile grew a little more wan. “Honey, you know we—”

“Would you like to?” I spotted an immediate opportunity and spoke up, waiting until their attention was on me, then addressed him by name. “You see, Mister Carpenter, I’m starting a new business venture, and it occurs to me I don’t have a legal assistant yet. I could use somepony—er, somebody with your talents. We… uh, also have a need for human men.” As hard as I tried I couldn’t quite keep the uncertain note from my voice.

“Really?” Her face lit up even as her adoptive father gave me an odd look; I have no doubt he recognized my change of tone.

“A need for human men.” He repeated my statement verbatim, a sudden note of suspicion in his voice.

“Indeed,” I nodded, putting on my best poker face, which admittedly wasn’t that good. Like I told him, I dealt cards, but I rarely played them, and this was why. “For our initial crew, we’re trying to hire five men. Would you like to be one? The pay and benefits are excellent.”

“And it means we could stay? Oh, of course he would!” Judy tried to answer for him, but ‘Nick’, as I’ll call him, put a restraining hand on her arm.

“Hold on, honey,” he said placatingly to his daughter before turning to me. “What’s the business?” he asked as he watched me closely, and I realized then that he sensed there was something I wasn’t telling him. However long it had been since he’d been an attorney, his ability to detect lies, even those of omission, clearly hadn’t diminished.

At that point, I realized I’d best answer honestly. “I’m putting together a firm to promote human/Equestrian cultural exchanges, including a human-friendly bar and nightclub. The building we’re using is being renovated just down the street. It’ll still be a while before we open for business, but that doesn’t mean you can’t start helping us now,” I answered carefully.

“A human-friendly nightclub? Wow, that sounds like fun!” Judy answered brightly.

“I hope it will be! And you know, we’ll have a need for stage performers, too!” I told her to sweeten the offer further, thinking her magic act might be good to entertain guests.

“Oh! Can I, Daddy? Can we?” she asked hopefully, but Nicholas looked far more wary now. He considered me for a moment, slipping a hand into his pocket and seemingly fingering something again.

I didn’t know what he was doing, but there was a sudden suspicion in his eyes. “Honey? I need to make sure this offer’s on the level. Would you please leave us alone for a bit so I could discuss it with her privately?” he asked Judy politely.

“Oh, sure, Daddy! Good to meet you, Miss Five Stars! Hope you can convince him to stay!” she said brightly, hugging him and then heading back out into the plaza.

After she departed, his entire manner changed. His face hardened as his gaze turned steely; I had to suppress a sudden cringe at the look he was giving me, wondering if this was how he’d appeared before witnesses in court.

I got my answer quickly as he crossed his arms and his eyes bored into mine. “Miss Five Stars, I don’t like being lied to. Even less when I think someone’s trying to take advantage of me and my daughter.”

My blush gave me away, and I realized instantly that if I didn’t come clean quickly, he’d leave and not look back. “Very well, you got me,” I admitted. “I was hoping to bring you in for an interview before explaining, but… in simple terms, I’m looking to hire what we call ‘Gentlemen’.”

“Gentlemen?” he echoed the word uncomprehendingly.

I closed my eyes and took the plunge. “Male human escorts… for mares.” I didn’t say more, but I didn’t have to. He figured it out from my reluctance to elaborate and sudden nervous manner alone, putting together the pieces like he was unraveling a conspiracy in court.

“You’re asking me… to sell myself… to mares?” he recited the damning facts slowly, staring at me in disbelief, his face slowly approaching outright revulsion.

My deepened blush and involuntary cringe confirmed he was right. “I know how it must sound…”

“Do you?” his lips had gone tight and there was anger in his eyes. “I think we’re done here, Miss Five Stars. I’ve been taken advantage of quite enough in the past by clients and ex-girlfriends alike. I never dreamed pastel ponies might try it too, but I guess bad people exist everywhere,” he decided in disgust, and then got up to leave.

I realized then if I didn’t say something immediately, I’d lose him. “What I’m offering is an opportunity, Mister Carpenter. A way to make good money and support your daughter. A way to allow her to stay in Equestria and maybe even pursue her magician career!” I called after him quickly, my tongue loosened by the simple fact that the truth was out in the open now, and I didn’t have to beat around the bush any longer.

I was relieved when he stopped short at that; if I’d learned nothing else about him in that brief time I’d known him, it was that he didn’t care about himself so much as her. “You like to help others? Well, this is a way to help Judy and many mares alike. A chance to help bring our two races closer together,” I told him fervently, finally being able to speak from the heart. “I swear I’m not trying to trick you, I was just… afraid of your initial reaction and didn’t want to say it out loud in front of your daughter. Believe me, I had my reservations too when this idea was first proposed to me. You can walk away at any time, Mister Carpenter, all I ask is that you please hear me out.”

“Fine,” he said, sitting back down at an isolated park table away from his daughter and any other patrons, crossing his arms and staring at me in a manner that suggested he was in court again, preparing to tear my testimony to pieces. “State your case.”

Though I couldn’t help but cringe at the look he was giving me, I started with our standard pitch, deciding if nothing else, he was a good foil for it. “Let’s start with where this idea came from. In Equestria, mares outnumber stallions nearly five to one. This means that many mares never get to experience a male’s love or attention, or can only share it in the confines of a herd. For this reason, there was once an industry called ‘comfort horses’ where stallions sold themselves to lonely mares, providing them a night of company.”

“And that’s what you want me to be?” he asked in no small amount of contempt. “Sell myself for a few bits like a cheap dock whore?”

I’d never heard that word, but it sounded close enough to another word I knew. Horse is a derogatory term to most ponies simply because it implies you’re no better than animals or beasts of burden… which, in the broadest sense, is what a comfort horse was, and why they were named that. Regardless, I didn’t get a chance to answer before he went on. “Tell me, if I didn’t look down-and-out and in need of money, would you have been interested in me?” he added, his expression all but a sneer.

Here, I could answer honestly, at least. “I’d be lying if I said those weren’t factors, Mister Carpenter, but they’re not the main ones. What we look for are unattached and unemployed young men.”

His sneer only deepened at that. “Why? Because you think we’re so desperate we won’t say no?”

“Because we don’t poach people from existing relationships or jobs,” I replied with some exasperation, already getting sick of the cross-examination I was being subjected to.

He leaned forward to pin me with a glare. “In case you didn’t notice, Ms. Five Stars, I have a daughter! Doesn’t that qualify as an ‘existing relationship’?” He pointed a finger in my face, which, let it be said here and now, ponies do not find to be a friendly gesture.

Nevertheless, I did not flinch back from it, determined to fight and win this battle of wits on his terms. “Don’t twist my words, Counselor! She’s your daughter, not your lover!” I pointed a hoof right back at him. I figured I’d read enough legal dramas and dealt with enough lawyers over the years to give a good account of myself in a courtroom. “If I’d seen you with a woman I thought was your wife or ‘girlfriend’, I’d’ve left you alone! What, would you have preferred it if I approached married men and tried to poach them?” I challenged.

“I’d prefer you not approach any men for such a sick scheme!” He crossed his arms. “I mean, the very idea is—”

“Is what?” I dared him to finish his sentence as I leaned back and duplicated his gesture with my forelegs, making clear I was taking equal offense to his claims. “If other men take the offer, how does that hurt you? What business is it of yours what consenting adults do, whether humans or ponies?”

He looked at me like I’d gone mad. “Because it isn’t consensual!”

“What?” The vehemence of my reaction seemed to catch him off-guard, making him falter a bit, but he plowed ahead anyway.

“Well… how can it be? You’re animals!” He pointed a finger at me again. “I mean, the very idea is…”

“Animals?” I cut him off hard as my strained patience instantly turned to livid anger. It was the first time I’d heard that argument—Shaun never used it, though I’d read that some humans looked upon us that way. Was he seriously saying we were no better than beasts to him? Or was he just so desperate to pick holes in my logic that he resorted to something so ridiculous and wrong? “And your evidence for that is… what? That we walk on all fours and don’t usually dress?” I guessed from other articles I’d read, letting some contempt drip into my voice. “That’s absurd and insulting on its face, Counselor!” I pointed a hoof right back in his face to let him know how it felt.

His expression dropped as he realized my offense was real, so I pressed my advantage. “You want evidence of the contrary? Just look all around you. Tell me, Mister Carpenter—is this the work of animals?” I motioned to the midtown area around us and all the hustle and bustle that came with it. “Can you truly compare a race that’s raised cities, carved civilizations from wilderness, can control the weather, fought wars and wielded magic to mere animals just because they have a superficial resemblance to your earth horses? And why, by your own logic, then, would we not consider you animals and therefore beneath us? After all, you somewhat resemble the apes of our world, who aren’t intelligent, so why shouldn’t we apply the same rationale to you?” I slammed my hooves down on the table as I spoke, causing heads to turn elsewhere.

I don’t know how often he’d had an argument so thoroughly dismantled in the courtroom, but after I was through with him here he looked like he’d been kicked in the gut.

“Objection withdrawn,” he barely whispered, rubbing his capped head. “I’m sorry, this is just really hard for me to get past.”

I felt some of my anger ebb at that. “Because in your world, you’re the only intelligent species, therefore the idea of having sex with a different one would mean having sex with animals.” I think it was only just then I made that connection. “But that’s not the case here, Mister Carpenter. We ponies are every bit the sapient beings you are. So why shouldn’t sex be allowed between us? If both parties want it, what does it matter if they’re of different races? Or even different worlds?” I posed the questions to him, considering and then deciding against mentioning all the interspecies action I’d seen in places like Las Pegasus or that I myself had been with a griffon once.

To his credit, he did seem to recognize the logic of my statement. “There’s still a huge leap between accepting that conceptually and asking me to sell myself to them!” He clutched his head in his hands. “Even if I concede your points, that doesn’t change the fact you’re trying to make me a prostitute!”

I knew that word, and its connotations were scarcely less ugly to me.“I’m trying to get you to see there are mares you can help and a need here you can fill!” I countered, though I think I was starting to get a better idea of where his reluctance was coming from. “I get that there’s a strong stigma in your culture against comfort horses, and there it makes sense—there shouldn’t be any need for such things when you’re talking about societies and cultures with even gender ratios, like your own,” I reasoned. “But to use your own argument, Mister Carpenter—this is a different culture, with different rules. The stigma you speak of doesn’t exist here. Comfort horses are frowned upon, yes, but not because of simply selling sex. It’s frowned upon because in ancient times the industry was used to oppress males, impressing them into such service against their will!”

He looked up sharply at that; I had the distinct impression he wanted to make a courtroom-style objection. “I’m sorry. And that’s not what you’re trying to do to me?”

I stared at him for a moment before replying, attitude for attitude. “I’m sorry. Am I blackmailing you or coercing you somehow, Mister Carpenter?” I challenged. “I am neither keeping you nor forcing you to do anything. You are free to get up and leave not just this table but all of Equestria at any time.”

“Except for the fact you’re trying to pressure me to stay and do this by dangling money for my daughter in front of my nose,” he grumbled.

I felt my anger starting to rise again as I sensed him trying to ascribe to me motives I did not have. I don’t know if that was a function of his defense attorney past, when that was presumably more or less his job, but I definitely didn’t appreciate it. “I am offering you well-paying work providing a service to Equestrian mares. No more and no less. And if it’s being exploited you’re worried about, Equestrian law provides very broad protections for stallions, especially in terms of health benefits and working conditions. And before you ask, the law applies to males, not just stallions. So even as a human, you’re covered.” I knew because I’d already checked. “At most, as things stand, you’d be seeing just one or two clients a week.”

He didn’t immediately respond to that, perhaps because he knew he couldn’t refute what he was unfamiliar with. Still, I couldn’t help but wonder why I was engaging in this back-and-forth with him when it was pretty clear to me he wasn’t going to accede. I later decided that, on some level, I was enjoying getting to match wits with an actual (or at least former) defense attorney, but on another, he was also cycling through all the arguments I’d have to meet and counter during the recruiting process…

Arguments that even I had sometimes made to myself. In an odd way, by justifying G4M to him, I was also justifying it to myself, which in the end I still wasn’t fully sold on, either. But again, such things were only obvious in hindsight, and I had little time to dwell on it before he moved on.

“It’s all well and good to say you’re just ‘offering a service’ and what happens between consenting adults is their business. But that assumes facts not in evidence!” he pulled out an actual courtroom argument next.

I wasn’t sure where he was going with this. “Such as?”

He hesitated, perhaps realizing how his next words would sound, but offered them anyway. “Such as, mares can’t consent to being with a man…”

“What?” Initially, I thought he was bringing back the same point he'd made before, but then realized he'd narrowed its focus from ponies and humans to mares and men.

“I mean… not because you’re animals,” he clarified quickly, remembering our earlier exchange, “but because you’re smaller and physically weaker than us! So any relationship between us by definition isn’t among equals and would be exploitive!” he finished with visible uncertainty; I think he sensed the obvious counter-arguments even before I made them.

And indeed this one was easy, refutable on two levels. “Oh, come on, Mister Carpenter. Human females are smaller and weaker then human males too! So by that logic, how can they consent?”

That caught him short, and I saw him fumbling for his next response. “Well… they’re still human! I mean, they could say no and back it up by running away or using a weapon! But you? You don’t have hands, you can’t wield tools, you’re smaller than me and you’re female…” he trailed off as he saw the incredulous look I was giving him.

I stared at him for several seconds before replying. “So, due to the fact that I’m a smaller female who weighs less than you, who can’t grasp or walk upright like you… I’m weak and helpless and couldn’t say no?” I recited slowly, letting some outright contempt seep into my voice. Sometimes there was a time for words, but other times, more direct action was called for. So I leaned forward and propped my foreleg on the table, my elbow against its surface. “Let’s test that theory, shall we, Counselor?” I offered him a hoof-wrestling match. “Try to overpower me.”

He got the idea easily enough, though he seemed to find it amusing at first. “If you say so…” he grasped my hoof with his hand, then called start.

I let him struggle to even budge me for a few seconds before I applied a fraction of my real strength, though I still ended up slamming his hand down with a little more force than necessary, leaving him stunned at how easily I bested him. “Still think we’re weak and couldn’t defend ourselves, Mister Carpenter?” I couldn’t quite keep the smug grin off my face as I overcame his latest argument. “And that’s just a hoof. I’m an earth pony. That means I’m very strong and have great stamina. It means I can lift many times my own weight, I can run forty miles in an hour, that I’m magically resistant, and very hard to injure or kill as well. Yes, we work the land, but my race was built for manual labor and fighting. Historically, we’ve been the backbone of Equestrian society, serving not just as farmers but as soldiers.

“And this is to say nothing of the other pony races,” I headed off his next argument before he could even speak it. “Unicorns have magic. Never mind their more dangerous spells; they could simply lift you up high in the air and then drop you. And pegasi? They could not only pick you up and drop you, but they could just fry you with a lightning bolt from a nearby cloud,” I recited. “So I’m sorry to say, Mister Carpenter... that it’s in fact humans who are the weaker ones here. And thus you’re asking the wrong question. It should be: why wouldn’t we force you?”

“Okay. And why wouldn’t you?” he rubbed his hands, looking surprised and even more wary—he tells me now as he's reading over my shoulder that he suddenly understood at that moment that ponies weren't just cute and cuddly, and it genuinely perturbed him.

“Because in Equestrian society, it is anathema to harm males simply because we have so few. Protection of stallions is paramount to us for simple preservation of the species.”

He looked up sharply like he’d just spotted an obvious contradiction in my statement, and in fairness, on the face of it he was correct. “Most of the police and soldiers I’ve seen in Equestria are stallions! If that’s true, why do you put them in dangerous occupations like that?”

But I had an answer for that as well. “Because males make excellent peacekeepers by virtue of the fact that they are males and ponies don’t want to hurt them. Thus, their presence makes trouble less likely, not more,” I quickly countered. “You know the easiest way stallions have to halt a fight between mares? Simply step between them, and they’ll stop immediately,” I told him, remembering Cruise Control doing just that when I got into a fight with my sister a few Hearth’s Warmings back. My thoughts went to him for just a moment, and I wondered where he was and what he’d think of what I was now doing. “Because no matter how angry they are, mares don’t ever want to endanger stallions.”

“But I’m not a stallion!” he protested.

“You are to me!” I replied fervently. “I and most other Equestrian mares see you as a male first, human second, and that means our protective instincts apply. That means, in turn, I would never wish to hurt you…” I leaned in close before I said my next words, allowing my eyes to go hooded and a sly smile to break my lips, sensing I was starting to get through to him. “And that means I can also appraise you as a prospective partner.”

He flinched at that. “And… what makes you think me or any human guy would be willing to sleep with a pony?”

In response, I took on my smug look again. “I don’t know. Why don’t you ask the last one I slept with, Counselor?”

He looked at me in great surprise. “You mean you’ve already…?” he trailed off as he saw me unable to restrain an eyeroll.

“Of course I have! Do you really think I would be promoting this if I hadn’t?” I said with a note of exasperation, wondering why he kept fingering something in his hoodie pocket. “Yes, I’ve already slept with a human man. His name was Shaun, and he was one of the first humans who came through the portal a year and half ago. I ended up spending the better part of a week with him. He was the best lover I’ve ever had…” I let my face go wistful, closing my eyes at the memory. “I wasn’t the only one either; I now know of at least two other mares who have been with men, and both told me they enjoyed it greatly. And that is why we think this will work!” I raised my eyes back to his.

“But why would mares pay for humans when they could have their own kind?” he asked in far more earnestness than he’d been using before.

“Because a lot of the time... they can’t. Because in simple terms… stallions are few, and few stallions are able to divide their attention equally between numerous mares. So, far too many mares go wanting, even ones in marriages. I speak from direct experience there,” I told him, going downcast for a moment as I remembered all my failed herds. “But men are many, and as no less than three mares I know have now confirmed, make excellent lovers. So why do I think Gentleman for Mares will work? Because, put simply, Mister Carpenter—” I pointed to him, and then myself “—Supply, meet demand.”

He visibly deflated at that. He seemed to be have run out of arguments to make, his eyes flitting every which way as he searched for—but failed to find—another way to poke a hole in my logic. Though unable to do so, it remained clear he was still strongly resisting the idea, so I came up with another tack.

“Okay, if you’re not ready to be a Gentleman, let’s try this…” I pulled out my business card and Shaun’s pen from my saddlebags, clicking it open and holding it in my mouth. “I still need a legal assistant to help settle our licenses with the city and draw up our first Gentlemen contracts. Never mind being a Gentleman; I’ll hire you as a legal assistant, and pay well for the service. You can use your legal skills again, and you can even name your own rate. It’ll keep your daughter here a couple weeks, at least?” I pointed out, scribbling a quick note on the back of the card. “And afterwards, you can collect your fee, and then either walk away or stay, whether it’s as a full Gentleman or simply remaining on as a legal consultant. What you do is entirely up to you, Mister Carpenter.”

Despite having all his concerns answered, his suspicions hadn’t diminished much. “And what’s the catch…?”

“No catch,” I assured him. “It’s just my hope that as you interact with me and the other mares of our new business, and maybe even talk to the other men we’re hiring, that you’ll see we’re not evil or exploitive and that providing companionship to mares is a worthy cause.”

“And maybe wear me down and convince me over time to become a… ‘Gentleman’?” he asked a bit bitterly.

“Maybe,” I admitted with a shrug. “But, either way… the choice is all yours.”

Though he was no longer openly hostile, his manner was still quite wary as he fingered the card, glancing between it, me, and his daughter still giving performances in the park. “I’ll have to think about this…” he told me.

“I understand,” I answered him with a nod. “It’s a lot to take in, I know. For the record, it took me months to figure out if I wanted to do this after it was first proposed. But if you decide to accept, just come to our new headquarters and present yourself. Trust me, we’ll have plenty of work for you to do…” I grimaced as I remembered the sheath of documents waiting back in my office.

“Understood. But before we part… may I ask you one final question?” he said almost politely.

“You may.”

He stared at me for a few seconds before asking: “Just… why me?” he watched my reaction carefully.

Knowing he was looking for any hint of deceit, I made a show of looking him over, and answered honestly. “Because as I said earlier, you fit the profile we’re looking for, Mister Carpenter. Because you’re the right age, because you look physically fit, because you’re unattached, because I’m pretty sure you’ll look good in a suit, and well… this is more myself than anything else, but because you looked down on your luck.”

He frowned at that. “And thus thought I was an easy mark?”

I waited a beat before answering. “And thus thought you could use a hoof up.”

He stared at me a moment more, then thanked me for the coffee and left.

An Offer Accepted

At the time, I give him a 50% chance of showing up, knowing that if he didn’t appear at our offices in the next day or two, he wouldn’t. As it turned out, he appeared at our door the very next morning, all but dragged in by his adopted daughter, whose eyes lit up upon seeing me again.

“Hi there, Ms. Five Stars! Daddy says you offered him legal work! Of course he’ll take it if it means we can stay here!” she told me eagerly.

“Seems like my mind has been made up for me,” he admitted somewhat wanly, rubbing his hand behind his capped head and giving a grin I can only describe as goofy.

I couldn’t help but chuckle at that even as I knew he probably hadn’t told Judy everything. In truth, I wasn’t sure how to break it to her myself and decided the best option was not to. “I see. Well then, welcome to our humble and still-unfinished headquarters, Mister Carpenter.” I got up and offered him my hoof again, then proceeded to show him around and introduce him and his daughter to the rest of our staff. I’d told them about him, and warned them not to press him or say anything about Gentlemen to his daughter, but that didn’t stop them from taking an immediate interest in him. I think he found their attention quite disconcerting at first, though he much later told me that after we’d spoken he’d been stunned to discover he started thinking of mares sexually himself—that he couldn’t ‘stop noticing them’ now and it was driving him ‘a bit batty’; that seeing mares interested in him in return was only making it worse.

That knowledge came later, however. The rest of the staff also took more than a little interest in his daughter—she was a bit of a novelty given we’d seen few human children before and she was undeniably endearing—who put on another performance for them, even surprising a unicorn like Double Entry with what she could do without magic. They took her out for lunch while Nick stayed initially behind with me, saying he wanted to speak with me privately before following.

“Let me make something quite clear, Miss Five Stars,” he told me sternly in private after Judy was gone and my office door was closed. “I’m still far from sold on this. I’m not doing this for you, and I’m not doing it for the money. I’m only doing it for Judy, so she can stay in Equestria longer. So I’ll thank you and the other mares not to reveal the true purpose of this company to her.”

“Deal,” I told him, keeping to myself the thought that as smart as she clearly was, Judy might well figure it out on her own. “Welcome to G4M, Mister Carpenter. And I’m afraid I have a lot of what you call red tape to help me untangle…”

Legal Aide

After a slightly awkward lunch where Nick looked more than a little uncomfortable at times, not offering up much information about himself—again, I’d advised my fellow mares that he’d had an unhappy past, but that didn’t stop them from probing him a bit—we returned to our new building to get started. I began by showing him a sheath of documents and law books, inviting him to write up his own contract for the work.

Once he had done so—and his rate was surprisingly cheap, I thought—I asked him to first familiarize himself with the various Equestrian and city laws regarding clubs and escort services, and then gave him Platinum’s outlines of how Gentleman would be paid and compensated.

By the end of the day he was already buried. He seemed honestly surprised by how involved the work would be; I suspect he initially thought it was just a pretense to get him inside and there wouldn’t actually be much for him to do other than try to be convinced to be a Gentleman. But all the work I had for him kept him quite busy for the next month, as it turned out, as it took that long to get all our licenses and various legal issues settled.

In that time, two more prospective Gentleman were discovered and hired, one by Vanilla Mocha and the other by Double Entry. The one the former hired will be familiar—a struggling writer and budding journalist who was touring Equestria ‘on a shoestring’ budget, hoping to market the journal entries he wrote about his experiences as magazine entries afterwards. He would take the call sign ‘Scoop’ and later both specialize in and prefer older mares. The other was an out-of-work banker found by our company accountant who’d been laid off and recently divorced.

He came to Manehattan looking for a new start and hoping to land a banking position in Equestria, wanting to be as far from the pain of his failed marriage as possible. In the end, he ended up finding a new profession entirely and was delighted to find a female that appreciated him, doubly so to discover that many did. He took the call sign “Broker,” and is a favorite of professional mares like Double Entry, who became his handler and marefriend.

He was the one that I think really drew Nick out of his shell, as they shared some surprising things in common—both were coming off lost jobs and broken relationships; both had children to support. Our then-fourth prospective member kept mostly to himself at first, perhaps trying to insulate himself from the insanity he still felt was all around him, but he did his job well enough, even dealing quite effectively with a couple city attorneys who were trying to deny us our liquor licence, trapping them with their own logic and laws.

He’d also written up the Gentleman contracts to be very generous in terms of pay and benefits, as well as offer prospective Gentlemen an out in the form of a six-month trial period during which they could quit at any time. Platinum approved that on the sole condition that pay would only be partial during that period, but would go full when a two-year contract was signed.

As the weeks passed, he slowly started to get more comfortable, though the genuine happiness his daughter expressed at getting to stay longer was certainly helping on that score. She’d become a favorite of the construction crew and security guards, and our dragon bouncer doted on her, even taking her for a flight on his back a few times, to the great consternation of Nicholas.

As he spoke with the other men and gradually got to know me and the other mares, he seemed to open up a bit more, realizing we weren’t the monsters he initially thought us to be and his fellow humans hadn’t been coerced into accepting the job. I wasn’t privy to the discussions he had with them, but I do remember an evening when they all went out together for drinks and he came back looking a lot more thoughtful, giving me what I swore was an appraising look the next morning.

Still, as renovations neared completion and the work I’d hired him for ran out, it was time for him to decide what to do. Judy certainly knew—she wanted to stay with all her new friends in a place she loved!—but he was far less certain. I didn’t press him, and warned the others again not to do so. For him far more than the others, whatever decision he made, it had to be his own…

One Away

About five weeks after my first meeting with Nick and Judy, we were barely a month from opening the nightclub and were already starting to informally train the new Gentleman… both outside the bedroom and in. Our promise to not bed them right away had gone out the window and then some by then, but it was keeping them and our new staff happy while we waited for Platinum’s return with the end of renovations and the ribbon-cutting ceremony she wanted to perform.

We had even picked up a fourth Gentleman by then, a very tall and well-built former collegiate ‘basketball’ player who’d blown his knees out and had come to Equestria looking for a magical solution to fix them so he could play again. He initially took the call sign “Rebound” but later switched it to reflect the mascot of the school he once played for: “Cavalier.” He was Amber Ale’s first catch, and she adored him; the other mares and previously hired Gentlemen took a great liking to him too.

So, at that point… four of the five Gentlemen we initially sought were hired and had signed their two-and-a half year contracts that Nick had drawn up. At that point, all the other mares had found a Gentleman and a lover… except me. I’d told the other girls to keep looking, but I’m pretty sure they hadn’t, still holding their breath waiting for me to bag Nicholas. They wanted him, and so did I, but I’d kept my distance from him, afraid of spooking him. He seemed to get along well enough with everyone now, and made a habit of cleaning up at the weekly poker games we played, but he could not seem to get past the idea of what we were doing, enough that I was certain he was going to take Judy and leave.

And indeed, he’d promised her that they would use the money he’d made to take her to see more of Equestria first, but in the end, no matter how much she wanted to stay permanently or how much the other men tried to encourage him to become a Gentlemen like them, he was adamant that they go home and I was willing to let him go…

Until, that was, I got a surprising plea from an equally surprising source.

A Daughter’s Plea

There was a knock at my door one afternoon after we’d done our daily classroom and physical training for our new Gentlemen. Double Entry and I did the former to start, Amber Ale and First Flight the latter. I’d barely had time to look up before the door opened up and in peeked…

“Judy!” I recognized and called to her, inviting her inside. “What can I do for you?” I asked, frowning at the uncertain expression she was wearing.

She seemed unusually subdued, in fact. “Hi, Miss Five Stars. Um… can I talk to you privately for a bit?”

“Sure,” I motioned her to the seat in front of my desk, wondering what was up. “Can I offer you some tea or hot chocolate or…”

She waved me off and sat down, wringing her hands in her lap. “I’d like to talk to you… about Daddy,” she said somewhat hesitantly. “He says we’re leaving in a couple days. But I don’t want to go back to Earth! I want to stay here!” she told me.

My expression softened at that. “I don’t want to see you two go back either, but I can’t force him to stay, honey,” I told her gently, having picked up his nickname for her over the past few weeks they had been with us.

“I know, but…” she seemed to be gathering herself to make a request of me, finally closing her eyes and spitting it out. “Couldn’t you just… well... make him your boyfriend and a… ‘Gentleman’ like the rest?” She turned her eyes on me as she spoke.

I don’t know if my jaw has ever fallen so far open before or since. Those were about the last words I ever thought I’d hear come out of her mouth! “How did you…” I barely croaked. We’d been very careful around her, taking great pains to not give away what we were doing; as far as she knew we were opening a mixed human/pony nightclub and that required some human ‘eye candy’ for what we expected to be our mostly mare clientele.

“I figured it out quick, Miss Five Stars. Like, within three days?” she told me with a wry but shy grin. “I may be young, but I’m not stupid. I’m thirteen; I know what sex is! I knew something was up from the way Daddy was acting and how he was reacting to you and the other mares. I know when he’s trying to hide stuff from me, so… I snuck in here one afternoon while you were out and, well… picked the lock on your filing cabinet and saw your business plan,” she admitted, embarrassed. “That’s when I knew.”

I was stunned at that. “How did you pick a magical seal?”

“With this,” she held up what she called a ‘skeleton key’. “It’s one of my regular lock picks, but I had it enchanted by that ‘Great and Powerful’ pony magician who’s been hanging out in the park giving shows and teaching me some tricks of her own. She said it would get me past most simple spells. She wanted to know what you were doing here, too. And after I told her, I think she really wants to take advantage of it…”

I made one mental note to put more powerful seals on my private papers, and another to consider that more-than-slightly obnoxious street magician as one of our first clients. “And you’re… okay with this?”

Her expression went a bit uncertain. “Well, I admit I was a bit shocked at first but… yeah, I think so. I mean, I see how happy the other mares are with the guys, and they don’t seem to mind this one bit. So… well, why haven’t you done the same with Daddy?” She asked me in perfect earnestness.

“Judy!” I was shocked that she’d so casually ask that.

“I want to stay in Equestria, Miss Five Stars. In the worst possible way. There’s nothing for me back home…” She went on to tell her story of what happened with her real and adoptive fathers and I was shocked enough that I had to get up and give her a huge hug. I had no idea how she stayed so happy and upbeat in the face of all that, but I did know one thing at that point—she lived for her new ‘Daddy’ just as much as he did for her, and I couldn’t but love them both for it.

“I want him to be happy, Miss Five Stars. He hides it well, but he’s so sad inside. He lives to help people and except for me… he really can’t now.” Tears welled in her eyes as she spoke. “But if he hooks up with you? Then maybe he’ll see it’s okay to enjoy life again. And if he becomes a Gentlemen… then maybe he’ll have clients again. Maybe he can help others again! And maybe then he’ll be happy!” she looked up at me hopefully, sniffling as she spoke.

To say I was taken aback would be an enormous understatement. Was she actually… asking me to bed him? “Judy, I know he’s hurting…” I said carefully. “He already told me a little about his past. But I can’t force him into this. I can’t make him open up if he’s not ready to. And I’m not sure I can help him if he doesn’t want to be helped…”

“I want him to be helped!” she said vehemently, grasping my hoof and clutching it. “Please, Miss Five Stars. I’m not naive. I’ve seen the way he looks at you. I don’t know if it’s the other guys talking with him, but he is interested in you; he just can’t get past the idea of it… or maybe he just thinks he’s not allowed to enjoy himself. But you can show him that he can!”

So, what in the name of Celestia and Luna was I supposed to say to that? My heart said one thing, my head another… and my suddenly aroused marehood didn’t care either way. Certainly, I’d been interested in Nicholas as well, simply because he was so different than the other humans I’d met; so different from Shaun and other Gentleman.

At first he’d struck me as merely interesting and a bit of an oddity, but over time I’d been attracted to his obvious intelligence and the fact that he was an unhappy male I might be able to help, much as I did for more than a few stallions in Las Pegasus. But in the end, no matter how tempted I was, I’d made no move towards him, simply because I didn’t want to spook him… or perhaps part of me was still clinging to memories of Shaun, who I hadn’t seen in nearly two years now and was slowly but surely losing touch with.

“Please, Miss Five Stars,” she said again when I didn’t reply immediately, squeezing my hoof. “He needs this. He needs to be happy. He needs to see he’s allowed to enjoy life and see to his own needs, not just mine! And if that means he becomes a ‘Gentleman’ who helps other mares by bedding them… then I’m fine with it. As long as I can stay in Equestria and I can see him smile again, that’s all I care about!” she said very fervently.

I chose my next words very carefully. “I understand, Judy, but… I’m not sure you realize what you’re asking me to do. You want him to heal; I get that. So do I, but what you’re suggesting might end up hurting him if he’s not ready for it!” Memories of Juniper and Sweet Tea were suddenly prominent in my mind.

To my frustration, she only shook her head. “It’s been five years, Miss Five Stars, since he lost his law license and adopted me. He’s been like this for long enough. He’s never going to be anything more than what he is now unless he moves past it, and every day he doesn’t is just another day of pain for me. Please try to help him, and I swear to you that whatever happens, I won’t hold it against you…”

I’d like to think my prereading crew for getting to this quickly and following my instructions to go over this thing with a fine-toothed comb; to scrutinize everything and really take a magnifying glass to it. They did so, especially Denim_Blue, who I have to say was in rare form in the google doc comments. Thanks to him, AJ_Aficionado and SIlentwoodfire, for help turning this into what you see.