Chapter 40: The Incredibly Overly Concerned Friends

Tia woke up a bit earlier than usual, which left me plenty of time to let my own thoughts stew on the subject of…everything. All in all, it really sucked. Mostly because being alone with your own thoughts is never a good thing. Negative thoughts anyway.

Especially when you can’t really work them out. Confusion leads to anger, which… leads to something else and ends with the Dark Side.

I mean, I had the whole stupid princess thing that would probably be putting me in more public appearances while wearing whatever nightmare Rarity could concoct. Then there was the Relationship of Doom that involved the three ponies I cared most about in the world and the inevitability of its failure thanks to its impossibility. And then there was everything else that weighed on my mind, all the ponies and ponies-turned-people that would be counting on me for help, if they weren’t already that is.

So, yeah. Dreaded duties, worries, and future responsibilities churned inside my gut as I laid in the room alone.

But the time before that was well spent. None of which was put aside for going on about how there was no way in hell Celestia was ever going to fit well in a relationship that might not last anyway, or my growing discomfort about that fucking coronation thing. Something that I was starting to dislike more and more the closer it got.

I might have been able to stomach a dress or two, and the idea of walking around without a pair of balls between my legs was at least manageable when stacked up against the whole pony thing, but...the princess stuff. I couldn’t really work it out.

Sure, it was just a title, but...it seemed to just bring back everything I hated about my current situation. I didn’t mind having ponies expect things from me, but when those expectations were to be princessy...it just put an uneasy feeling in my gut the likes of which rivaled that of the ones that came up whenever I thought about the inevitable end of the romance that was destined to go south.

But even so, there were some good things.

After my little rant, we watched some movies, I listened to the rest of how Celestia’s day went, and she did the same with mine. Of course I didn’t bring up the other stuff that was bothering me, like the relationship or my gender identity crises. Tia also decided to share the news about Sunset’s little sketchbook again, and explained things to me as only a proud parent could. She also went on for a few hours about what the girl had done to help coordinate everyone’s return to Canterlot.

That did manage to cheer me up a little. Sunset...she needed to be acknowledged by Celestia in more than just an unconditional love kind of way.

And we kissed a few times, although Celestia seemed to lose her enthusiasm about the fifth liplock in. Apparently, pony tongues and mouths were superior to human ones. Her words, not mine.

I was just glad she stopped with the kissing. Being pinned on the couch by the most beautiful woman in existence as she explores the makeup of your teeth with her tongue was not a way to keep things PG for long. Especially considering the fact she was naked, and her hands had an odd need to feel every inch of my body.

When morning came, and I opened my eyes to the colorful sight of Rainbow’s mane. As usual, she continued to snore away with her mouth under a silencing enchantment. Just looking at her, I couldn’t help but wonder if her troubles sleeping the other night really were a side effect of not getting a love siphon, or something more…mundane.

Part of me thought it was stupid, but I also couldn’t help but wonder if she thought that me and Twilight might ditch her, and the lack of our presence by the pegasus just played on those fears.

Then an even worse thought came to mind, one that I had been considering for a few days. What if Rainbow was only doing the relationship thing to keep us on friendly terms? She could have guilted herself into saying yes on our first date!

Although, that had mostly been because of me egging her on. If I had just kept my mouth shut, half of the crap I was dealing with at the moment wouldn’t have been a problem.

And I would never have slept with Rainbow.

That little thought made me...a little sick with myself.

Dash wasn’t just a notch on my belt or conquest. I cared about her like no one else. But...well...there I was. I banged Rainbow Dash, and more than once.

Then there was the fact that Celestia would have been taking up the middle of the bed instead of Rainbow if things had gone a bit differently. I was a little grateful that hadn’t happened yet. Even with the little step forward the two of us had made in the dream house, I was still plenty nervous about trying to date a creature twice my size and at least fifty times my life experience under her belt, not to mention more magic than anyone had a right to.

As the image of the pegasus was replaced with the giant alicorn in my mind, I couldn’t help but wonder how in the hell was a relationship between the four of us could work for about the millionth time. But attempting to back out of things now that the ball was rolling was impossible without causing a pair of ponies some major heartache.

Twilight stirred, and I shoved all my worries onto the back burner as I looked over to the purple goddess to smile at her. “Morning beautiful. You have a nice night?”

She smiled back. “I had a weird dream, I was eating ice cream.”

“That’s not exactly-”

“It was on top of your vagina,” she went on, which shut me the hell up while her face took on a perplexed expression. “It was cold, but when I sucked the ice cream into my mouth, it was warm. How can something be cold and warm at the same time?”

My face went blank as I tried to process what she had just said. “You dreamed my pussy was some kind of ice cream dispenser, and the thing you found weird was how you could feel hot and cold at the same time?” How Twilight’s mind worked still confused me so much it wasn’t even funny.

“Well it’s contradictory,” she complained. A second later, Twilight must have picked something up from my body language, or just wanted to get away from her less than nonsensical dream, because she changed topics on me. “So how was your night? Did you and Celestia have fun?”

All of a sudden, I wanted to keep talking about Twilight’s dreams. But...delaying things would only make her worry something went wrong between us. “We talked about stuff and relaxed like always,” I said while the alicorn’s horn was wrapped in a little purple glow. “She did get up a few hours earlier than usual though.” Which was pretty weird considering how she nearly always woke up at the same time every morning as far as I could tell.

“Well, considering what happened at Canterlot, she probably wanted to get an early start,” she replied before dropping her head back onto her side of the pegasus a few seconds before the blue pony’s snoring reached my ears along with a loud smack of a kiss. “Rainbow, it’s time to wake up.”

“Muuuuh, don‘t wanna.”

Twilight let out a little sigh, and then rolled over onto Rainbow’s stomach all the way, getting a groan from the pegasus. “Come on Rainbow, time to get up.”

Then, she kissed her. Or to be more precise, covered Rainbow’s major air hole with her mouth. A few seconds later, and Rainbow’s eyes shot open before she struggled around for a bit and Twilight removed her mouth to let the pegasus breathe.

The sudden decrease in oxygen, which might have been a complete lack considering how pony noses were positioned, did its job of speeding up Rainbow’s heart in a mild panic, or at least made her body react with a surge of energy that had her pushing Twilight’s shoulders up and her lips off of Rainbow’s mouth. “Gah! Twilight!”

Twilight giggled. “Well you’re awake now, right?” she asked before moving Rainbow’s hooves away and falling back on top of the pegasus. Then the horny little alicorn went to work on Rainbow’s neck, and I could hear the loud smack of every kiss as she worked her way up to the Dash’s mouth.

“Somepony want to tell me what’s going on?” Rainbow asked before Twilight smacked her on the nose again.

I did my best to shrug while in bed. “She gets like this sometimes…or a lot of times really.” In fact, I think Twilight had been repressing her sexual desires a little bit since Rainbow had joined our little group.

Twilight kissed Rainbow on the lips again. “Well I just had a nice little dream, and now I’m hungry.”

While Rainbow was subjected to the attentions of an aroused alicorn that continued to cover her in wet kisses, I found myself in need of an old morning ritual that I hadn’t performed since…it actually took me a few seconds of thinking to remember the last time I had taken a shower in Equestria. It had been awhile. “I’m going to go get cleaned up.”

Twilight looked up and took her mouth off of Rainbow’s ear. “Okay just transform, and give me a second to concentrate on the spell.”

“I meant I’m taking a shower!” I snapped a second before I rolled out of bed.

And noticed the harshness in my words when my hooves touched the ground.

Both Rainbow and Twilight were giving me wide-eyed looks, and I sunk in on myself a little bit for losing my cool over something so stupid. Spending a couple of hours by myself hadn’t done me any good, but I didn’t need to dump my problems on the girls. “Sorry, I had a…rough night.”

That proved to be the wrong thing to say too.

“Did something happen between you and Celestia?” Twilight asked with hesitation in her tone.

I groaned at the question and my own stupidity. I had known Twilight would take any news about last night in the bad kind of way, and yet there was my mouth letting slip the information.

In all honesty, I didn’t think anything in the way of bad could happen between me and Celestia if I tried. Two times I had really yelled at her, and during the first time she ended up agreeing with me, while the second time last night she had just…let me vent my frustrations and held me afterwards while I got everything under control.

Since ending up with Celestia in my dreams, I had come to appreciate the feeling of that close contact with another person in its non-sexual way. It was reassuring, warm, protective, and bracing all in one simple motion. It was probably what I loved about the goddess the most. She could somehow be a sexy as hell, and yet manage to to change from alluring to comforting at the drop of a hat when I needed it.

I kind of wanted to stay in that memory longer, but with the girls waiting on an answer, I had to give them one. “No.”

Then Rainbow spoke up in her usual Rainbow-way. “Uh…did you want something to happen?”

I gave the pegasus a confused frown. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Did the two of you make out?” Twilight clarified.

The question made me cringe for a second before I straightened back up and glared at the two of them. “NO! She kissed me a few times and we talked about stuff, then we watched a movie and talked about more stuff like we always do before I helped her relax with a massage! We don’t...”

Once again, I found myself regretting my tone. Especially since both of the girls had pulled back their ears and I kind of did just tell them me and Tia had...experimented; on her part at least. “Sorry. I just…need a shower,” I grumbled before heading into the bathroom.

The hot water would help me clear my head.

Sometimes it really sucked being a selfish prick.

Especially when said selfish desires went hand and hand with not wanting to upset ponies. Yeah, there was the argument of how that was an altruistic desire, but when disappointing ponies made you more angry at yourself than sad at their disappointment, it was more of a selfish selflessness than it should have been.

Plus, it kind of made me angry at other things.

Like the fact they didn’t come into the bathroom and check on me. Sure, I had given them every ‘FUCK OFF’ signal possible and probably let a few slip with my pony body language, but it still would have been nice if Twilight or Dash had walked into the room and talked to me. Even if I would have also found it annoying as hell and probably gotten even more pissy.

Basically, I was just in one of those moods that wouldn’t let me be anything but angry. The hot water helped though, if just a little.

A few seconds after I got in the shower, muffled cries from the bedroom told me what Twilight and Dash were up to. I could tell by the voice it was Rainbow doing down on the alicorn instead of Twilight doing the pegasus.

That, and how the talker was shouting out both instructions and encouragement while using very scientific terms. A few more weeks, and I was pretty sure Rainbow would be able to name every single part of the pony sex organ there was.

The bath was something out of a motel room, just constructed from crystal instead of the usual materials. There was even a shower head and everything else that should have been there. Although the tub looked a little wider than usual and had more box shape at the bottom that the rounded sides that curved upwards like a human tub. Obviously, the whole thing had been built for ponies rather than something with two legs. It gave my quadruped body better footing as the water fell down from above.

As my level of dampness increased, I felt a bit of the tension melt away.

I had forgotten how good a hot shower felt. Not that I had been missing them, or maybe I had. But after my time at the hive, I got used to not having a lot of things. Then when I got reintroduced to ponies, well...didn’t really see the need to start some of them again.

But it still felt good.

And made me a little uneasy for some reason.

I mean, back when I was a human, hot water was one of the ways I relaxed back in the day, and I had forgotten what it felt like. Despite the warmth hugging to my body, I couldn’t help but shiver.

Of course, it wasn’t quite the same as when I was a biped. My coat made things feel a bit different, and I looked at the shampoo in confusion. Just how in the hell was I supposed to really work that kind of stuff into my scalp with hooves? Even washing horses with hands required a few tools to scrape off water and work with their manes.

So I just stood there, letting the water run over me and help me wash out the anger while I listened to Twilight and Rainbow go at it for nearly half an hour. From the sound of things, Twilight got her release fifteen minutes in, and worked on Rainbow for ten before the pegasus reached her limit. As for me, I found myself needing to readjust the temperature knob.

I took the three minute silence that followed as my cue to finish my shower, shook myself off like a dog, and then came out into the bedroom where both of the ponies were laying on the bed in each others pony-arms while the smell of what they had just finished doing lingered in the air.

With my indignation burnt out and the cries from minutes ago kind of making me horny, I walked up and slumped my head. “Hey girls.”

Twilight was the first to look up. “Hello Fae, you…feeling better?”

That, I honestly didn’t know.

But, I wasn’t about to dump my problems on their backs. So I gave them both a little smile and did my best to push what was on my mind to the dark recesses like usual. “I’m…okay,” I assured them. “Just…one of those mornings, you know?”

“Eh, I used to get those all the time,” Rainbow said before scooting away from Twilight a little bit and motioning me towards her with a hoof. “Now come here.”

I looked back at my still slightly damp fur and mane that was still pretty wet. “Rainbow, I just got out of the shower. We’ll get the bed all wet.”

“Yeah, like we didn’t do that the night before, or just ten seconds ago,” she replied before giving me a lecherous grin. “Now get your plot over here. You’ll feel better when we’re done, promise.”

Rainbow was right of course, spending the morning in bed with the girls did cheer me up. Or help me relax or…whatever. The end result was enough happy chemicals got generated to suppress the other forces at work in my brain trying to bring me down. Then we all had the brilliant idea of taking a shower together in the square tub only built for one pony before we got the whole place all kinds of wet.

I did get a good wash of my mane though. There was a special brush that ponies used which Rainbow had left near the sink the night before, so I hadn’t seen it while in the shower.

By the time we were done washing, brushing, and watching Rainbow properly preen Twilight since my wings fixed themselves and the alicorn took forever when she did it alone, I was feeling kind of refreshed. Rainbow even left the shower looking marginally pretty when it came to her mane, which usually just had the appearance of something the wind had murdered thanks to all the flying she did.

Don’t get me wrong, thanks to Celestia I still thought she was sexy as hell. But...well...even if I hadn’t spent all that time with Rarity, I still would have thought it looked like a rat’s nest.

Then I had the misfortune of looking at myself in the mirror on the way out. My hair was still a little damp, but Twilight managed to comb it into something approaching its usual level of Fluttershy-ish primness that nearly touched the ground and framed both sides of my neck at different points. My black coat was also gleaming, and there wasn’t a feather out of place on my wings. The later was more to be not being a real pony than anything else, but still…

I sighed at the mirror, and remembered one of the two bigger things dragging me down.

“Something wrong?”

Twilight’s voice coming from behind me made my whole body tense. But I managed to get myself back under control easily enough before she noticed anything beyond me just looking at the mirror. “No, I’m good,” I mumbled before looking away from the reflection and heading out the door.

Not even a second into the hallway, Twilight was back beside me with a worried look on her face. “There really is something bothering you, isn’t there?” she asked.

I remained silent.

“Do you want to talk about it?” she went on.

That made me a little angry. Why people…or ponies thought the best thing to do was talk about problems never made sense to me. Talking about stuff just brought everything to the surface where it didn’t belong. “No. I’m fine. There’s nothing wrong.” Nothing they could help with anyway.

Rainbow came totting up from behind to match pace with the two of us, and Twilight continued to look at me with her God damned concerned eyes. The kind it hurt to look at because they showed Twilight was in pain, and I was the cause.

The whole thing just made me angry.

Not at Twilight.

At least, not all of the anger was directed at Twilight. Maybe five percent of it because she didn’t feel like dropping the subject. The rest of my anger was directed at the situation, and me for not being able to deal with it better. Which I should have been able to. I mean, I had worn dresses before when acted like a living mannequin for Rarity, and even gone out in public with them on a few times. One more day shouldn’t have made that much of a difference, but…

For some reason, it was determined to.

“You okay?”

I had to stop myself from screaming at Twilight when I heard the question. Which turned out to be a good idea, as it was the pegasus who had asked it.

I’ll admit, I didn’t react as harshly as I did when Twilight asked. Mostly because I knew I really must have been showing the strain if Rainbow Dash had noticed something wrong with me. Twilight had been with me for months and learned to read me like a book, but Rainbow was...well, if something wasn’t right in front of her, jumping up and down while screaming its head off, then she wasn’t going to see it.

“I’m. Great,” I told the pegasus firmly before throwing open the doors to Cadence’s private dinning hall with my horn. I didn’t even need to drudge up the anger to use my magic. I had plenty on hand.

Despite our morning activities, the three of us weren’t hideously late to breakfast. The food hadn’t even been set out, and the other royal trio was nowhere to be seen. The rest of the gang was present though. Applejack making small talk with Fluttershy, and Pinkie apparently getting Trixie to do magic for her as the unicorn used magic to rearrange the shape of a balloon animal in a flash of light instead of the slower method. As to where the balloon animal came from…well, I had seen Pinkie pull weirder stuff out of her mane.

Of course, being the queen of tact, Rainbow delicately asked the other question on my mind. “What the hay is Trixie still doing here?”

The unicorn looked back to Dash with a frown on her face. Then her expression lightened considerably and became a bit more hesitant when she noticed me and Twilight standing next to the pegasus. “Um, Trixie was-urk!”

Cut off by the pink pony-arms that dragged her over in a hug that cut off her windpipe and had her turning a darker shade of blue, Trixie only managed a minor struggle against Pinkie’s friendly strangulation. “I invited her silly! We’re all over that amulet thing and friends now, right?” Pinkie asked before immediately going on. “So that means she has to stay for the big party tomorrow!”

As Pinkie released her choke hug and Trixie was able to breathe again, Twilight let out a little giggle. “Of course you can stay Trixie. It’ll be good to see another friendly face.”

Equestria seemed to take that as a cue, and my ears twitched as I heard the telltale sound of hooves connecting with crystal before the doors on the other side of the table opened via magic and two more mares walked into the room. Cadence looked as hot as ever with her supermodel body and perfectly combed mane topped by her little crown that rested on top of it. Rarity had a bit of a limp in her hind legs as she spared a glance at Cadence and I concentrated on her Scent.

Lust and a bit of guilt along with some embarrassment assaulted my psychic senses. Going by that and the fact Cadence was an alicorn and they were coming to breakfast as late as we were… I smirked at the marshmallow unicorn. “So Rarity, you and Cadence have a fun morning?” I asked before making a show of looking around. “And where’s Shining Armor? Already wear him out?”

Rarity blushed and looked away. “Omnifarious,” she mumbled.

“Shiny had to get an early start with the coronation preparations and told me to leave everything to him so we could all spend some time together this morning,” Cadence explained before she leaned over to kiss Rarity on the cheek. “But he should be done in time for lunch.”

That little reminder made me wince. “Oh right, um…about that lunch date thing,” said. Then, I told them that Celestia had other plans for me when she was due to show up in the empire later this afternoon.

Cadence got a little curious at that, but since I had no idea what Celestia was planning, I couldn’t give her anything more.

As our little conversation ended, Twilight walked up to her in-law and cleared her throat. “Oh Cadence, there’s something...um…” she made a little motion with her hoof, and the pink pony princess’s face lit up in recognition right as I backed away to give them room.

“Oh! It has been awhile,” she said before assuming the position.

“Sunshine sunshine ladybugs awake! Clap your hooves and do a little shake!” they both said before going through the motions that ended with the two of them spinning around and shaking their rears at each other.

I simply watched the long awaited performance from the front row seating that I was given. Seeing the whole thing in person, it was way more...erotic than I remembered. I mean, Cadence and Twilight were shaking their pussies around for crying out loud!

With the ritual complete, Cadence let out a joyful giggle and turned around to sit on the sparkly floor. “It’s been awhile since we did that. What brought it on?”

Twilight smiled back. “Oh, just a bit of nostalgia,” she said before turning and walking towards me. When she got to where I was, the alicorn’s smile turned predatory, and she leaned to whisper in my ear. “Okay, you owe me a horn-job.”

The mention of the little deal I made with Twilight the night before didn’t even make me flinch. I mean, sure I was kind of...well...the idea of me doing the human equivalent was kind of terrifying, but it was for the lady bug dance. In comparison to what I got, it was a small price to pay.

And...Twilight had kind of been wanting me to expand my bag of bedroom tricks.

Despite the bad news about lunch, breakfast was a mostly refreshing affair. Cadence spent most of her time talking to Rainbow Dash about everything from what the three of us did for our first date, to asking her what she liked most about Twilight. The answer kind of surprised me.

“Well she’s an egghead, but not the kind that makes you feel stupid or anything and…I kind of get her,” the pegasus explained with a little blush. “I mean, the first real date kind of date we went on, she wanted to go to this traveling museum and she was…well, she got all excited and tried to share what she liked with me in a way I could get it. Plus, she was…kind of like me if it had been a Wonderbolt museum, ya know? I thought it was…pretty…cute.”

After the chorus of dawwws which I joined in on got Rainbow to blush and look away, Cadence thankfully left the pegasus alone for the remainder of the meal. At least when it came to conversation, I did notice her giving Dash some pretty measuring looks though. It didn’t take a genius to see what the Alicorn of Love was doing. From what I knew about how everything worked in Equestria, Cadence was able to tell if ponies would mesh well at a glance. It didn't take long to see she was seeing how Rainbow would fit with Twilight.

I just sat back and enjoyed the company. Focusing on everyone else, it helped me get my head back to where it needed to be and forget my troubles.

Then breakfast ended, and Rarity told me she needed to put the finishing touches on my dress.

With me inside it.

And I remembered why I had been in a bad mood just a few minutes ago.

“So Rarity, what’s up with the uh...weird walk,” I asked the unicorn as I followed her down the sparkling hallway towards some room she had set up to do her magic. And what she did with clothes really was magic. Rarity could put stuff on and take it off with a flash. Not super speed, but an actual magical flash of light that was like some kind of super short-range teleportation with incredible accuracy.

As soon as the words were out of my mouth I started to regret them a little as the marshmallow's facial fur went bright red. “Well um...remember what you said earlier?” Rarity asked before we came to a door and she opened it with her magic. “She really did, ahem...wear Shining Armor out before the two of us could...enjoy the morning together.”

I stumbled. A Lot. It was only my wings that kept me from getting my horn stuck in the floor from the sudden offset of my balance. Then, after my recovery, I mangled a few words like, “Guh ge bu...huh?”

Rarity cleared her throat and looked away. “Well, you asked darling.”

In the ensuing silence I noticed our surroundings. As far as rooms granted to royal consorts, the thing was...pretty dinky. The entirety of the space was maybe ten paces across, with nothing but a mirror, my dress set up on a pony mannequin, and a box of materials that I was pretty sure Rarity brought with her from Ponyville. Considering just who Rarity was, and the ponies she was sleeping with, I had been expecting something much more grand. Like her own personal design studio or something.

Once I had recovered fully, I gave Rarity a worried look. “Why the hay are you even telling me something like that?” I sorted of demanded in one of those pleading tones that really doesn’t get the level of authority I needed across.

“It’s not as if I have any other friends I can talk to about this,” she replied, a little confused. “Cadence and Shining are Twilight’s family, so it would just be a bit too weird. Pinkie Pie is...well, Pinkie. Applejack is just as squeamish as Fluttershy when it comes to physical relations, and Rainbow Dash...ahem… You’re pretty much the only pony I can talk about these things with. Plus, you asked.”

I lifted a disbelieving eyebrow. “You want to...swap sex stories now? Or just brag?”

Ponyville’s gossip queen rolled her eyes. “You make it sound so vulgar,” she said before clearing her throat and looking away. “And...well, I need some advice. You see, Cadence is… well...she...”

The only thing that moved for a few seconds were my eyes while I put everything in order in my head. From the sound of things… “You mean...Cadence is the one that’s got you...um...limping?”

Rarity cleared her throat and looked away for a few seconds. “I’ll spare you the details but...let’s just say Cadence’s love magic includes spells that um...allow her horn to...well...it was better than anything Shining Armor has managed since we began seeing each other,” she said before looking back at me. “Not that I’m meaning to pry but...it Twilight um...just as...um, active?”

“I thought you heard all the noises coming from the treehouse back when we started dating,” I replied. Not that the little purple monster had toned it down in the following weeks when it came to the getting part of our bedroom relationship.

Although, looking back on things, Twilight had seemed a bit less happy about the whole bedroom thing until I spread my legs.

The blush increased, and I sighed. “Look, from what I understand, alicorns get hungrier than normal ponies, and I mean that in every possible explanation of the word,” I told her while keeping my own voice level. “They eat more food, and they have a much higher libido. Although, Twilight seems to like giving it just as much as getting it so...I guess Cadence is the same way.” And Celestia as well, but I didn’t need to let Rarity know that.

Rarity nodded. “Yes, Cadence was very...” She cleared her throat and looked at me. “Thank you I...well, with the way she acted towards me last night and this morning, I was afraid Cadence was trying to overcompensate for a lack of...real feelings. If Twilight is just as...enthusiastic. I...thank you.”

A few seconds of silence followed, and then Rarity apparently remembered why we were in the room. She looked over to the dress and quickly got to work taking it off the fake pony while the two of us talked about things that had nothing to do with what alicorns did in bed. It actually helped me not think about what was going on around me until she finished with the last minute adjustments and did a few extra things using a kit that had nothing to do with sewing. So when the talk about what everyone had been doing in Ponyville during the time me and Twilight had been gone ended, Rarity shoved the horror of my situation right in my face.

I stared at the mare looking back at me with unease. My discerning eye told me the light green gown she wore was…just as gorgeous as she was. And that’s what bothered me. I knew she was gorgeous, on an academic level at least. She had a perfectly plump plot that gave her dress plenty of back, long hair that had been done up in a nice braid to make her seem a bit more regal, a slightly longer than average horn with a point at the end sharp enough to pop balloons, a pair of wings that were preened to perfection, and she was covered in a dark coat that went perfectly with her green eyes.

And then there was the makeup. The awful makeup that accented everything perfectly and made the air around her eyes just seem to sparkle. It turned what had been a naturally beautiful mare into something on the level of three real alicorns that stood with their heads above most other ponies, one of which I was sort of forming a relationship with.

Of course, this was all academic. I wasn’t so far gone that I could find myself getting hot about my own reflection.

But the fact that I was looking at myself, looking like I did, it made me more than a bit disturbed. I wasn’t just hot, I was…pretty. Not just someone a guy would want to bend over a table and stick his thing in, but someone that elected a stammering ‘gawish’ kind of response that made someone go ‘she’s too beautiful to bang’. Kind of like how Celestia was when I first saw her.

“Oh, and I decided to go with the silver horseshoes,” my personal fashion designer, as in the only pony I ever let put me in a dress, said as the objects in question floated over in front of me. “I know Twilight had gold, but silver goes much better with your coloration. Now, do you think we should add something distinct to the outfit? Make it really you?”

The words ‘cutie mark’ went unsaid, but...that was all that it could really mean when it came to ponies.

I ignored the question. Instead, I just continued to look at the mare staring back at me on the other side of the mirror.

Have you ever had one of those moments where you looked at yourself and asked, how in the hell did I end up here? And then you look back, and it doesn’t seem to be anything too big. A favor here. A little playcation there. Some residual wearing down of one’s hesitation as the unnatural becomes more commonplace.

All I did was say yes to a dress and sex, and maybe some more dresses in the privacy of Rarity’s shop because she told me that ‘I must’ in her over the top Rarity fashion. And well...she needed my help. Helping the girls...it was what I did in Equestria.

Next thing I know, I’m standing in front of Rarity, wearing a pretty pony princess dress, getting ready for my induction in the hall of aforementioned royalty. In one day I would walk into the crystal throne room, Princess Celestia would give some big speech, welcome the newest Princess of Equestria. Then I was supposed to address the crowd about how I was going to fulfill my role of a princess or something.

Tia actually wanted me to think of what to say on the spot. Speak from the heart and all that crap. Considering Twilight’s little speech was a mirror to a certain human that need not be named, I was expecting the stuff that made everyone in Equestria go Broadway on command to kick in.

The weirdest thing about it was, as I looked into the mirror and asked myself, is this my life now?

I didn’t feel all that creeped out about it.

But I didn’t feel comfortable about it either.

I felt…nothing.

Apathy.

Empty.

It was like finally getting the title of princess cemented me in the role I had railed against for over a month, and…slowly learned to tolerate the months after that.

But…a crying baby on a plane was tolerated.

A rank odor was tolerated.

It was disliked, but dealt with it. Endured until it was over.

There might have been no pleasure at seeing myself decked out in full gown with lace and everything else Rarity could put on my dress to make it princess-worthy, but there wasn’t any revulsion or hesitation either. I felt no need to compromise with my thoughts to say it looked like German military wear, tell myself it was all for the ponies of Equestria, or something else. I simply didn’t care.

I didn’t care that I was wearing a dress.

“Is something wrong darling?” my all too observant dressmaker of a friend spoke up. It really made we wish she was as oblivious to a pony’s body language as I was. The damn girl knew me better than I knew myself sometimes.

It was the worry in her Scent that got me to answer. “It’s just…is this my life now?” I asked in response with a bit of a whine.

I may have shoved the question off when Twilight was asking, but decked out as I was and dealing with a different pony, I might have let my resolve slip a bit. Plus, I was in a dress. The dress helped chip away at my resolve too.

Chip away a lot.

Rarity looked at me with an expression that said she was lost, but trying to figure something out with that raised eyebrow of hers. “Pardon?”

I sighed. “I don’t hate being in this dress.”

Instantly, the concern changed to annoyance and the expression to a frown. “Yes, well I’m glad the dress I slaved over for days to make perfect for one of my dearest friends on her special day managed to not be thought of as some kind of rag,” she grumbled.

That made me wince. Even if I couldn’t resist Rarity’s question, it didn’t mean I could hurt her. “No!” I replied quickly, almost pleading for forgiveness with that single word. “I mean, I don’t feel bad wearing a dress. That…well, it kind of…scares me.”

The frown disappeared, and concern reappeared. “What do you mean?”

I tensed, unsure of if I should proceed or not. My stupid gender crisis wasn’t Rarity’s problem, it wasn’t anybody’s but mine. A little part of me even wondered if it was a problem at all. I had already switched species, not counting the changeling magic. And it wasn’t even to something resembling a human. I became a fucking horse! What was gender after a loss of species, combined with a complete change in the manner of motion?

But on the other hand, my guy-ness was one of the few things from my old life I had managed to hold onto, mentally at least. I had turned into the worst male pony in existence, but I was still male. I might have been a kind of sexless bug that would lay eggs one day, but I was a guy where it counted.

Then I started giving it to Twilight as a girl. That was when it really started I think. After that, she got all excited at the prospect of going down on me and…sex as a girl. I’ll admit, it felt good. Then we started going at it more and more until it was a nightly thing. Then I started wearing a few dresses for special occasions like my date with Celestia…and now I was being crowned as a pretty pony princess.

And…I wasn’t freaking out about it.

At least not like I should have been.

I should have been angry, disgusted and distraught. I should have been raving about the idiocy of making me of all people a princess. I should have been doing something other than just standing there like nothing was going on!

It made me uncomfortable, but not in and of itself.

“I’m…not sure,” I admitted with a droop of my head.

Rarity looked me over again. “Is it the dress?” she asked before sighing at my lack of response. “It’s not the dress, is it?”

The unicorn’s concerns sealed the deal for me about talking to her about it. “Look, Rarity. It’s nothing you need to be worried about. It’s not the dress, it’s not you, it’s nothing you did. It’s just me being…” I looked for the right word to say, and came up confused.

I was a guy. Guys didn’t worry about emotional ‘who am I’ crap. But not worrying about it had apparently let all the girly stuff creep up on me until I was un-guy-like enough to worry about it. So I could either be more like a guy and not worry about something until I woke up one morning to find I was having my period, or be less like a guy and worry about how less and less of a human male I was becoming in my mind.

“…stupid,” I finished rather lamely.

It was an un-guy like finish, but I at least held to the spirit of the thing. Rarity...I didn’t want to bring her in on my problems either. Especially since she was the one who made most of the dresses I wore.

“But you’re worried about it?” she went on.

With no way to get out of it, I had to agree on that with a nod.

And then the angry frown came back to dominate the unicorn’s features, with a glare accompanying it as Rarity stuck her face in mine. “Then I’m worried about it too!” she exclaimed right in my face hard enough to make me take a step back.

Not letting up a bit, Rarity let out a disgruntled groan. “This is just like with that stupid amulet! Here you are with a problem, and you just up and decide to put everything on yourself!” she went on. “How did that work out for you by the way?”

I gave Rarity an even look. “That and this are completely different.”

“Yes,” she agreed. “You’re not fighting some kind of insect alicorn bent on turning all of us into food! Which means it’s something I can help deal with. Now talk!”

Another step back didn’t give me much room, as Rarity was up on me a moment later. With no escape that didn’t involve teleporting, I sighed and hung my head again. “Look Rarity, can we just…not?”

She gave me another look over and straightened up a bit. As I still had my head hung low, it made her look pretty imposing. “Do you know what it means to be a friend?” she asked me.

The rather childish question got a frown out of me. A confused frown, with maybe a hint of insulted anger.

But Rarity was off again before I could talk. “Princess Celestia may have sent Twilight to Ponyville to study friendship, but I’ve learned quite a bit about it as well,” she went on. “It’s more than just doing favors for your friends and being there for them. It’s sharing in their joys, their triumphs, and their pain. And so when I see one of my best friends, a friend who has spent hours and hours in my shop to help me with my work when she could have just sent a changeling to do the job for her, the one I can share things with that I can’t with anypony else …I worry, and I hurt.”

Her expression changed, to a pleading one, and Rarity backed off a bit. “So please, tell me what’s wrong,” she finished. “Let me help you.”

And…hell, even if Rarity hadn’t been a pony, I probably would have caved at that.

So I picked myself up and looked at her in the eyes. That kind of killed the last of my resistance.

“Ever since I came here, I’ve found myself wrestling with…well…being here, like I am I mean,” I explained. “It’s not some evil tendencies junk that I’m having to deal with, or anything like that. It’s just…I just...I...”

I looked at myself in the mirror. “When I see…that,” I said while gesturing towards the mirror. “Part of me says that I should be angry at having to wear a dress at all, or put on makeup, or braid my hair and get ready for some stupid little crown and be called a princess. But I’m not! At least, not in the way I should be.”

I sighed. “I see a beautiful mare, in an amazing dress with a gorgeous mane, and…and there’s this little voice in my head that says I should feel good about it,” my soft voice said as it filled the room with a slightly depressed tone. “But I don’t. And I don’t want to either! I don’t care either way, and it’s weird, and I can just shove that to the side when Twilight needs me for something, or when I’m with Celestia at night, but then there’s times like this when I’m just stand here looking at myself and…” I couldn’t finish the verbal thought. Mostly because I didn’t know how to.

Rarity sat down on the floor doggie style. “Have you talked to Twilight about this?” she asked.

I shook my head. “She’ll just get freaked out and think it’s her fault for not being able to figure out the stallion gender transformation thing.” Something I was starting to suspect was impossible.

“Princess Celestia?” Rarity asked hesitantly. It was probably still weird to her that the goddess that had been around before her grandfather was in diapers was basically having dinner with them once a week.

“She’s all, learn to accept the new you,” I said in a mocking imitation of her voice. “Like that’s a lot of help! Even if there is some new me, then I don’t even know who the hay that is! I don’t even want there to be a new me! I liked the old me just fine!”

The old me kept me from thinking of ponies as food and just replacing Twilight after I got to Ponyville. Without that strong sense of identity, I sincerely doubted I would have bothered to throw my lot in with Princess Celestia way back during my first visit to the Crystal Empire, and Chrysalis would be the one moving the sun around in return for the loving worship of everything on the planet.

So, I was a little attached to the old me, thank you very much.

Rarity nodded, and then stood back up on all fours to get a little closer. “You know, when I first went to Canterlot, I found myself wanting to be a Canterlot pony more than anything. It was the center of art and Equestrian culture. I spent months training myself to get rid of my normal…metropolitan accent and pick up what I needed to fit in there,” she said before sighing and shaking her head. “But despite my accent, my looks, my sense of fashion, I am still me. I am still the mare that my parents raised, that lives in Ponyville, and everything else.”

“Yeah I know,” I said, a little uncomfortable at having to bring up the show. “You had that big party the same day as Twilight’s birthday and then told Tia how you should never forget where you came from or something.”

My rundown of Sweet and Elite had Rarity wide-eyed for a moment, and then she shook her head. “Right, you’ve seen…never mind. And that wasn’t what I was talking about,” she added at the end. “Look, I can’t just make this go away for you. But… I can change the style of my mane, and I’ll still be me. I can change the way I talk, but the pony speaking would still be the same pony I am now, and I can change what I wear, but I’d still be the same pony I am underneath.”

The simplification of my problem made me want to shout in the damn girl’s face that it was nowhere near the same, that my problems weren’t just a stupid change of style, but…that wouldn’t have gotten me anywhere and just make Rarity upset. She was just trying to help. Just because the help sucked didn’t give me any right to be angry at her.

So I kept my damn mouth shut, and just smiled a little. “Thanks Rarity.”

Thankfully, I didn’t have to add some BS words to the fake smile on top of the two I had because fate decided to throw me a bone and have the door slam open to admit the best princess in Equestria, surprising the hell out of both me and the marshmallow.

And that was before she spoke.

“GREETING COMPATRIOTS!” Luna said in what was a pretty low voice for being excited as she was. The ancient alicorn had a bad habit of using a voice enrichment spell from time to time when it was the most inopportune times. Sometimes I had to wonder if she even knew she flipped the thing on. “Tell me Dame Rarity, how fares our newest princess-to-be?”

And thus the little bit of excitement I had upon seeing Luna, which was still a pretty rare sight for someone who hung out with Celestia on a nightly basis, died.

The unicorn managed a hasty bow, and I saw Luna’s expression become a little strained. “We are in private my friend, no need for that,” she said in a normal tone before waving off the bow. “I have come to agree with Twilight Sparkle’s disdain for seeing those dear to me lower themselves when public ediqute does not require it. Now, let me get a look at your work.”

“Hello Luna,” I said as the dark alicorn finished checking out my ass and came around to look at my face. “Is it lunch time already?” That was the time Tia had said she would be showing up, if not later. And why I had to cancel my lunch with Cadence.

A few more seconds of examination passed before Luna finally spoke. “The hour is halfway past ten in the morning, but Celestia decided to push us thanks to Sunset’s growing discomfort,” she replied. “Despite the body of my adopted niece’s apparent design, it was not meant for prolonged placement upon her mother’s back. She is currently um…walking it off, she said.”

It took me a few seconds to work out just what Luna had said. When I did, I might have forgotten all about my discomfort. “Wait a second, you mean…Sunset...rode Celestia here? The two of you just…flew?” I didn’t whether to laugh, or wince in sympathy for my tenant.

Luna’s confusion was apparent, even without my ability to Smell her emotions. “Of course. The rail line going from the Empire to Canterlot has been disrupted thanks to the other day’s events. We would have teleported, but measure of the damage needed to be taken once Canterlot was set to task of returning families to their proper place. And it gave time for Celestia and Sunset to talk.

“Now come, you are to be presented to her at the earliest opportunity,” the alicorn added after looking me up and down. “And you seem more than presentable. I take by the makeup, Rarity is finished with her fitting, correct?”

I groaned and looked away. Sure Tia was going to see me in the damn thing at the coronation, but more than once would be…annoying.

No, it would be worse than annoying. At least in a public place, I wouldn’t be subjected to any stupid complements or anything else Tia had in mind. Like teasing, which I know she would do.

And if she didn’t, I knew Rainbow Dash definitely would.

“Is something amiss?” Luna asked before she completely demolished my personal space with a worried look that filled my vision.

As I stepped back, Rarity answered. “I am afraid Omnifarious is…having difficulties.” Then she gave me a sympathetic look.

Luna nodded and looked over to Rarity. “Yes, I suspected as much from my sister’s conversation with young Sunset,” she said before turning to me before I could ask just why the hell she would be suspecting about anything. “But you seem more than presentable. Now come along.”

With little other choice, I sighed and did just that.

We walked out of the small room that had been set aside for my fitting and into the crystal hallway. All the glittering lights coming from the walls and way the place just kind of lit up from everywhere all at once made me glad we didn’t spend too much time in the Crystal Empire. The novelty of crystal castles grew old real fast.

“Give voice to your worries,” Luna told me.

I focused on the alicorn that was walking just a little bit ahead of me, and quickened my pace to keep up. “It’s…nothing beyond the usual,” I mumbled before looking away from the larger pony.

The wing she threw across my back in a comforting gesture was…unexpected.

“If your troubles have become what you usually experience, perhaps my sister is right to be concerned,” Luna said, which made me look up at her instead of the wing. “Tell me, what ails you?”

I didn’t know if it was just that easy for some ponies to read me, or if Equestrian coincidence was working overtime to make everybody talk about the same damn thing when I was having a bad day. With the fact they wanted to talk about it being the cause of the bad day of course.

So, I did the usual and focused on something else. Something dark and evil that was better left unknown. One of the great mysteries of Equestria, to which the creature in front of me had an answer to. “Hey Luna I’ve been wondering, just how do you bring out the stars at night?” I figures if someone took an interest it her work, it would easily get her sidetracked.

That got a bit of a head tilt out of the horse. “Pardon?”

“It’s just something that’s been bugging me. I’ve watched the sun set and the moon rise a lot since I got to Equestria,” I told her while not bothering to mention the horror I felt every time I saw such a sight. “And they’re just up there so fast. How do you do it?”

The confusion I was picking up fro Luna didn’t clear up. “I am not sure of what you speak.”

Feeling a bit nervous, I took a second to try and reword my question. “The stars. They’re up the second Celestia lowers the sun and I’m kind of curious how you put them up there so fast.”

Luna blinked. “You…think that I…place the stars up in the sky?”

And then, she laughed at me. It wasn’t quite as musical as Tia’s, but…was still pleasant enough that I didn’t want to shove a hoof in her face hard enough to break bone. Not that I would ever do anything like that to Luna of all ponies. I think the lack of any meaningful contact between the two of us allowed me to keep my fan boy infatuation with the Princess of the Night.

“Celestia did say you have an odd idea of how the world works but…oh heavens above,” she got out before another fit of giggles stopped her.

Then she turned to me, and must have noticed my frown, because the alicorn’s face became a warm smile I was used to seeing on Celestia’s face. “I do not place the stars in the sky every night Omnifarious,” the alicorn assured me. “They are always there, it is simply that my sister’s sun is so bright they cannot be seen when it is out.”

I…blinked. The normal laws of the universe reasserting themselves caught me a bit off guard, and it took me a moment to process. It was a reassuring fact actually. And I had to smirk at the whole thing.

I mean, stars were basically giant balls of burning gas, billions of miles away. There was no way Luna could simply create the damn things. The thought of such a thing, even for Equestria, was pretty ridiculous. The movement of the sun and moon I could accept, but the nightly creation of stars? That strained credulity quite a bit.

“No, I simply move them as to better decorate the night sky,” she went on in that same happy tone before looking away from me.

For a few second I found myself unable to walk as a pony, and stumbled forward thanks to the disconnect that bit of information caused between my brain and my legs.

With hooves on the ground being easily heard, Luna obvious picked up something was wrong and turned her head back at me. “Is something amiss?”

I regained my footing, and looked up at the alicorn’s face. “You…move the stars?”

“Yes,” Luna replied.

“The stars, the stars at night?” Which were a lot further off and had several among their number a good deal bigger than the one star that existed during the day according to my rather meager knowledge of astronomy. And that wasn’t even starting to take into account the stars that had burned out but were so far away they could still be seen. “Those stars?”

Luna gave me a blank look for a few more seconds. “Yes. I was taught the spell when I was much younger by Starswirl. Although I know not where he learned it, such magic is beyond the abilities of unicorns. He couldn’t even cast it.”

That was…much more confusing.

Not the Starswirl thing. I was more concerned with the fact Luna could apparently move light particles and God only knew what else that was billions of miles away with her horn. It made Celestia’s throwing the sun around look like nothing.

Unless...that wasn’t how Equestria worked…

You know what? Fuck it. I give up, Equestria will never make sense, I told myself. It was a completely different reality with its own little set of rules that did whatever the hell it wanted.

After I had gotten over the revelation of Luna’s other nightly duty, the night princess was actually a pretty pleasant conversationalist. For all of the ten minutes I had to talk to her anyway.

“So uh…you’re not angry at me for kind of giving Celestia this whole herding idea?” I asked as we rounded a corner in the crystal hallway. “Accidentally I mean. Because, it was totally an accident.” Which it was.

As I remembered, Luna hadn’t been too keen on the idea.

Luna turned to look at me for a moment with an even expression, and then she let out a sigh before giving me a smirk. “In truth, I still find the idea of more than one special somepony a bit odd, but…I have seen this change’s effect in the world of dreams, and…I have not seen any ill effects with all the ideas it has created in the dreams of my ponies.

“Ponies naturally seek harmony after all. A generation or two and a…herd of three to four ponies will probably be the norm,” she said before clearing her throat. “And to be honest, I have not seen Celly this interested in a relationship since before we began raising the sun and moon.”

I didn’t have a chance to ask Luna just what made her so interested before she opened the door, and my spider sense began to tingle as I was greeted with the most horrifying sight of all time.

Now, I had seen some pretty frightening things during my time in Equestria. In fact, my natural form was easily in the top three, with Chrysalis being number one. Sure the Celestia-sized bitch might have been shaped like a pony, but she looked more like someone had taken one of those monsters from Aliens and ponified it without getting rid of the exoskeleton.

But when I went into that sitting room and saw Celestia, Twilight, and Rainbow standing there on the tail end of a conversation, with Sunset sitting on the a couch not too far away… It was like one of those horrific moments when your old girlfriend meets up with your new girlfriend before the girlfriend of Christmas future appears with her really long horn and sparkling aurora hair. Plus there was also Sunset, who was like…well…some kid I was helping to take care of while she just happened to live at the same address I was just happening to be staying at.

So...yeah, all the major girls in my life...in one room...with no Pinkie Pie to distract them.

Luna wasn’t any help of course. By the time I turned to look for her, the door had already shut.

“-s why I think we just need to be supportive of whatever-oh, Omnifarious,” Tia said in a way that just let me know whatever they were talking about probably didn’t have anything to do with something that was not me.

Three girls, or possibly four, talking about me.

And what made the whole thing even scarier was that if everything worked out perfectly and I got the happy rainbows and sunshine ending to whatever hellish dating sim I had stumbled into, my future was going to be me in a constant three against one scenario that was now standing before me.

Yeah, apart from the threesomes, or whatever the hell was supposed to happen with four ponies in bed, polygamy really sucked. And hell, I didn’t even know how a four pony orgy was supposed to work! Nevermind Twilight’s diagrams that she showed me.

And I use that term loosely, as the pictures my pretty purple pony princess pinned up to facilitate her lectures was practically pony porn that came with instructions.

I took a look around as I walked into the room. Both Twilight and Rainbow Smelled worried. So did Celestia, but she didn’t reek of it as badly as they did. If I had to guess, she was…apprehensive, that was the word. Not quite worried, but...a long way from happy.

And of course, I couldn’t help but offer the perfect baiting question. “So girls, what’s going on?” I asked as I looked around the room.

“Wow,” Rainbow said, making me focus on her for a second while she dropped onto her hooves. “Fae you look…wow.”

It was a simple comment that made my mind erupt into a civil war. On one hand, Dash had…complimented my attractiveness. On top of which, she wasn’t laughing at me. It felt nice to be noticed by one of the special ladies in my life. On the other hand, she was noticing me for being a pretty little pony in a princess gown with glitter on my face. In other words, for all the wrong reasons.

But before I could blush, or maybe freak-out, the little purple alicorn took center stage in my attention with a stomp of her hoof. “Why didn’t you tell me?” Twilight demanded in a voice that required the descriptive of hurt.

Which in turn made me completely lost, and worried, and maybe a bit hesitant. “T-Tell you what?”

Before Twilight could go on in a voice that might as well of been a hammer to my glass heart, Celestia stepped forward and put her wing on the smaller alicorn’s back. “Twilight,” she said before the little alicorn backed off while the giant one looked over to me. “I spoke with Twilight about some of the things we discussed last night.”

The myriad of possibilities that particular sentence created ran through my mind at a million miles an hour. Feelings of anger, betrayal and all that good stuff mixed with fear of just how badly Twilight was going to feel for not noticing anything and…well, I latched on to all those dark side emotions so I could shoot Celestia a good death glare. “You what?”

“I don’t see what the problem is,” Rainbow spoke up with an annoyed voice as she hopped up into the air. “So you’re a girl, what’s so bad about it? Especially when you look like that. Ponies would sell their right wing for a body like yours.”

I pulled my head back as Rainbow zoomed in close, and glanced over to Tia for help. In the face of Rainbow checking me out again, my anger at the alicorn for spilling the beans on my whole gender crises kind of just got pushed to the side.

“Rainbow,” Celestia spoke in a less than perfect tone that I had heard her use when slightly annoyed before a light golden glow surrounded the pegasus and pulled her back.

With a breather and a pony to focus on, I glared at Celestia. “What the hay Tia? I…what’re you doing telling them that junk?” Once again, Twilight was freaking out about something and Rainbow… Okay, Rainbow not giving a shit, or maybe being put off about the whole thing, actually kind of hurt a little bit.

“She told us because she’s worried about you!” Twilight snapped at me. “I thought you were adjusting, what with your growing comfort with having sex and the way you didn’t put up much of a fuss the last time we went on a date, but Princess Celestia said you broke down last night and had a freak out on top of everything else!” Then, before I could try and get all indignant at Twilight’s attitude, she hit me with the big shimmering purple eyes of hurt pony feelings. “Why didn’t you tell me you were still having problems Fairy? I could have been working on my gender spell all this time.”

It was hard, but I managed to stay angry. I had to remind myself that they were getting mad at me for shit that really wasn’t their business, but I still did it.

“Because I knew you’d do this!” I fired back.

To which Twilight countered with her own angry words. “What’s this?”

I reared up and waved my hooves around a little to help emphasize my point. “Because you’d get all freaked out and worried about nothing!” I nearly shouted before throwing my hooves wide a second before the ache in my hind legs made me drop back down onto all fours. “I don’t know what the hay Tia’s been telling you, but this isn’t a problem!” I raised my tail and pointed towards my mare parts to emphasize the fact.

And of course, Celestia had to chose that moment to cut in. “It is if it’s causing you stress, Omnifarious.”

“No. You want to know what a real problem is Tia?” I pointed my hoof at the human in the room. “THAT’S a problem.”

For the first time since the whole pony intervention began, Sunset sat up and acted like she was paying attention. “Excuse me?”

I looked up and let out a groan while asking whatever pony powers that be to give me strength. Then I looked back at Tia. “Sunset is still human, she can’t use magic, and hay, I still know she goes to bed depressed and practically cries her eyes out because of the way things are, and that’s after all the improvements she’s made!”

It was a bit underhanded of me to kind of just out Sunset’s private problems like that, but everyone already knew about Twilight and Dash’s personal problems and Celestia…I wasn’t really sure she had any. Plus, it worked a lot better than just pointing my hoof and shouting ‘Look! A distraction!’.

But, as I was dealing with a being that predated America, Celestia didn’t even look over to her daughter in concern the way the other ponies in the room did before speaking to me. “I am well aware of Sunset’s problems in dealing with her handicap and will give her all the love and support she requires while we fix it.”

“You…cry yourself to sleep?” Twilight asked in concern I could both Smell and hear.

Sunset groaned at looked away from the little alicorn with a hint of a blush on her cheeks. “Not for awhile,” she said before turning her attention to Celestia. “And what the hell do you mean you’re well aware?”

That question, or maybe the slightly angry tone in Sunset’s voice got a reaction from Celestia. The goddess turned her head and frowned at Sunset out of the corner of her eye. “Do you honestly think that the last thing I do every night isn’t to check up on you? To look into your room and see how you’re doing?”

For a second I wondered just how the hell Tia managed something like that, but then I remembered that magic telescope of hers. In that light, I honestly didn’t know if I didn’t find her actions incredibly sweet, or just really creepy. The human must have been feeling the same way, because it took the remaining wind out of her sails. “Umm…I…thanks for caring…Mom,” Sunset said as she looked away.

And thus did their little family moment end, and the monstrously huge horse that was twice my size was back on my case with an even expression. “Now if you’re done trying to sidetrack us, perhaps you’re ready to have a serious discussion about your issue before we have a repeat performance of the last two times you let something like this get out of hoof?”

“I…wait, what do you mean two times?” I asked, completely confused. I knew there was that one little incident not but a few weeks back, but I couldn’t think of a second one.

Celestia raised an eyebrow to give me an ‘are you kidding me look’ before she let out a sigh. “When your guilt override your sense of reason and had you facing Chrysalis alone in a battle you knew was a death sentence, and then there was that little breakdown you suffered that had you denying reality for the better part of a week,” she said before her expression hardened. “This time, I have no intention of standing by until you practically destroy yourself.”

A second later, the goddess walked up to loom over me. “So we are not leaving this room until you tell everypony what is going on,” she said sternly before her expression changed to something much more benign. The whole thing was really Gandalf from Fellowship of the Ring when he talked Bilbo into giving up the ring. Which really made me regret ever showing her that movie. “And you let us help you through this.”

Surrounded on most sides and with my back to the wall, I let out a sigh and looked away from the caring goddess. Mostly out of embarrassment that this was even a problem for me when Sunset was in the same damn room. Poor distraction it might have been, I really meant it when I said her problems were far more worthy of being focused on than mine.

But with two alicorns, a pegasus, and a human looking at me, plus the stuff I had talked about with Rarity just a few minutes ago…I gave up. Hell, with the timing of everything, it was like Fate, Faust, or Equestria itself had up and decided that I needed to get everything out in the open.

Stupid Equestria.

“Okay you win,” I said before letting out a sigh. “But…can I sit down first…and maybe get some water?” I did have some physical dietary needs after all.

A few minutes after I agreed to talk and Celestia had a servant bring everyone some snacks, I found myself laying on the couch with my head in Sunset’s lap, with my ears being scratched by the girl while Rainbow and Twilight munched on some Crystal Empire cuisine.

I had tried to dissuade the redhead from kind of treating me like a dog but...it felt good, almost ridiculously so. The tension that was building in my body for God only knew how long lessened to the point of nothing, and when she sunk her claws into this one spot on my back that was just an inch away from my tail, I was nearly paralyzed with pleasure. A good ten seconds of that girl’s hands on me, and my ability to resist anything had gone right out the window.

Human hands were truly a terrifying thing.

We had also taken the time to undress me. So I was naked, with my head resting in my…tenet’s lap. I didn’t know if the fact I wasn’t a little creeped out by that meant I was adjusting to my life in Equestria, or if Sunset’s touch was just that relaxing.

So, what with me being relaxed and all, I just went and started talking. “Look, I know it may not seem that big a deal but…after I became…what I am…well…”

“You changed species,” Sunset spoke up. “And not some alicorn change where you got some extra limbs. You went from two legs to four. It’s a big deal. I know from personal experience.”

All of a sudden, I had a feeling that Celestia had brought Sunset along for more than just her magic fingers. And probably what they had been talking about on the flight over from Canterlot too.

I cleared my throat and moved my head while flicking my ear to get Sunset off my head. Unfortunately, she moved to my back and…well, back scratching feels much better as a pony than it ever did as a human. It also made me wonder if Equestrian ponies were part dog.

“Okay fine, I changed species,” I said as I managed to rally my resistance to the others. “It’s a big upheaval and all, but I’m dealing with it.”

Then of course, Tia just had to speak up to contradict me. “No your not.”

Her words made me flinch, even with Sunset trying to distract me with her hands.

“Well it’s not like something bad is going to happen if I’m a little uncomfortable…” I stopped myself before I said anything about wearing a dress. “…doing...pony stuff,” I finished lamely.

Twilight raised an eyebrow. “You mean bad like going crazy and mind-controlling a town?” she asked before continuing on before I could tell her I wasn’t going to go all Lesson Zero on everyone. “Or bad like locking yourself up in a room for days while all the ponies who love you are so worried they start losing sleep, can’t eat, and have to deal with a bunch of bratty nobles to keep Equestria running?”

Then Celestia stepped in to add even more fuel to paint an even worse picture. “And there is the fact that retreating into your own mind really is an option for you,” she told me.

“I’d never do something like that!” I insisted angrily. The thought of it was just…disgusting. I had responsibilities in Equestria. They might have really been Twilight’s responsibilities, but they were still…also mine. “Not when other ponies need me.”

The goddess nodded. “And so we come to one of your other problems,” she said. She also knocked my train of thought off the tracks with her statement.

“Huh?”

Celestia sighed. “Wanting to help ponies is very admirable Omnifarious, but…I think you’re using it to distract yourself from your own problems, and that worries,” she told me.

I rolled my eyes. “Oh please that’s just-”

“I spend at least six hours with you every night,” she told me. “And while some of your humanity is still foreign to me, I know what goes on in your head.”

If Sunset hadn’t been putting her hands on me, I probably would have tensed up at that. As it was, I was just…defensively curious. “Oh yeah? Like what?”

For a moment Celestia looked over at Twilight, then to Rainbow Dash. By the time she got back to me, I had the distinct feeling I should have kept my mouth shut. “Aside from your need to help ponies,” she said, stressing the word to the point I could hear the term ‘obsession’ instead. “You ignore and avoid personal issues like the plague, your anger is deep rooted and your entire species seems to view violence as the answer to the majority of its problems. Put those three things together, and…” Celestia’s face shifted to one of tension. “What it creates is something very…worrisome.”

For most of her little speech, I had plenty of counters that I had to repress.

What was I supposed to do when my friends were needing help? If it took my mind of the fact the majority of the past couple of weeks were spent with a pussy between my legs, all the better.

And of course I avoided personal issues. That was how the human race survived! Be it by hobbies, alcohol, sex, ponies or…you know, the illegal stuff. As a former biped, not dealing with my problems until they either went away or beat me down into a haze of permanent ‘meh’ was what we humans did when we couldn’t just get rid of them.

And how did humans get rid of problems?

Violence of course!

Violence was the solution to all problems. You just had to use enough of it.

But the umbrella solution that was violence didn’t work very well when it was something about me that was the problem. Or ponies. So I had to focus on more important things.

And it wasn’t like my problems were...that...big...a...deal…

At least in comparison to the stuff that Sunset was going through. She had been a magicless human for years. If she could do that, then me griping about being a pretty pony princess seemed petty.

Which I wasn’t!

“Hey, avoiding stuff is how humans deal with problems,” I told Tia with a frown before turning my head to my backup. “Right Sunset?” She had been a biped long enough to understand that.

Once Celestia got properly told off, this whole mess would be over with and I could go back to…whatever the hell I was supposed to be doing. To be honest, I really wasn’t sure since Tia had Twilight cancel our lunch date. Although since we still had a bit of time before noon, we could probably work it back into the schedule.

Speaking of which, the purple alicorn got a little frown on her face, and nodded. “Hmm, you know…now that I think about it…that’s how everyponies counterparts tried to solve their problems too.”

“Huh?” Rainbow said, speaking up for just about the first time since I found myself trapped in this little ambush.

“The girls on the other side of the mirror,” Twilight explained. “Back when um…” she paused and looked over to Sunset.

The redhead sighed and reached over to absently scratch my ear. “Short version? I saw Rarity and her clique as a potential rival and split them up.”

“And they never got back together,” Twilight added. “As far as I can tell, they never even tried. One little petty thing got between all of them, and that was it.”

Rainbow frowned. “Well that’s stupid! What the hay kind of friends break up after just one little petty fight?”

For a moment I thought about pointing out the whole Gilda thing, but…that really wasn’t a fight, more like the griffon had been caught being a douche, and refused to tone it down or try to make amends. But then I remembered the focus had kind of got off me, and didn’t want to spoil it. There was the chance that Twilight would get everyone side tracked, and I’d be able to slink away.

Then Celestia looked at me so hard that I could almost feel the temperature of the room rise, proving my chance of this whole thing blowing over was just about as fat as her ass. “So we’re going to be dealing with these things the pony way,” the goddess announced sternly before her face went back to its normal compassionate self. “And that means letting the ponies who care about you in to help.”

Of course with the giant pony cheating by being all nice again, and with both of Rainbow and Twilight in the room, and Sunset doing her hand thing to my ear, my resistance just kind of crumbled.

“And how the hay is that supposed to work Tia?” I grumbled before sighing. “It’s not like I can change back into a human. I’m not even sure I want to.” Living as a pony in a land of ponies, I could do. It was the gender thing that was the issue.

“And I’m already mixing two transformation magics just to look like this. I don’t want to know what adding a third spell would do.” That wasn’t even accounting for the side effects of mixing changeling and gender swapping magic. Not to mention it had only been a little over a month since those few changelings were exposed. Any long-term side effects were still in question.

Celestia was silent for a moment, and then shook her head as she spoke. “You misunderstand,” she said before looking at me. “I do not give some kind of instant solution. But I offer my support. And if it helps, I will rescind my decree that forces changelings to use unicorn transformation magic to appear as ponies.”

It didn’t. I had tried the whole natural look with Twilight in private, and insect chitin didn’t lend itself well to being all touchy feely with ponies. Something that I had kind of grown to like since becoming a pony.

“Still don’t see what the big deal is.”

I looked up and glared at Rainbow. Along with Twilight, and even Celestia seemed a little miffed. Sunset...well, I couldn’t see her face, but the tension in her legs spoke volumes. As for me, I had one of those moments where it took a few seconds to process just what I was feeling.

And then it came out in a rush.

A big, angry, rush.

“I’M NOT A GIRL RAINBOW!” I shouted in the pegasus’s face, causing her to back up before I noticed I was floating in the air and flew back to plant my butt on the couch. “I...I’m not supposed to wear dresses, or makeup, or...look pretty.” By the time my tirade had ended, the fire had gone out of my statement and my head hung low. And that was just the start of it.

And I kind of felt like crying, which only made me feel worse.

But instead of letting the water run, I went and used my mouth.

I jumped back up into the air and threw my hooves out at the giant pony that was an inadvertent cause of my problems. “And then there’s Celestia!”

“What about me?” she asked with a raised eyebrow.

“There’s you, and me, and all of...this!” I shouted as I waved my hooves around to vaguely indicate Rainbow and Twilight. “I mean, seriously? How in the hay is all of this supposed to work out? You and Twilight, maybe. You and Rainbow, you and me? That’s just not...it’s not...I can’t…”

Hell, I couldn’t even verbalize how everything I knew about Pony said this whole thing was going to end badly. It was going to turn out that Rainbow had only agreed to go along with me and Twilight because we pressured her. Then, Celestia was going to figure out I wasn’t worth being with, and Twilight...well...in a choice between me and Celestia, I didn’t stand a chance. Not to mention the fact that Rainbow and Twilight’s relationship would never be the same. I didn’t know if Rainbow would hate herself for lying to Twilight, or Twilight would be the one with the self-loathing for forcing Rainbow into the relationship, but either way it would be bad.

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Twilight move, and that brought up another problem in my mind as I stopped flying and made contact with the ground. “And then there’s this whole princess thing shoving it all in my face!” I went on. “And when I looked into the mirror just a few minutes ago when I had my dress on I didn’t even feel bad and-and I’m supposed to feel bad about wearing a dress! I’m supposed to not like sex as a girl, or be scared of it or...or something! I-I’m supposed to...to just...I don’t...it’s like I don’t even know who I am anymore! AND I HATE IT!”

Out of breath, I panted after finishing my outburst. The ponies just stood and stared at me for a moment, and then the entire world lurched when Celestia picked me up in her forelegs for a hug. Then some purple blob came in from my right side, a blue one from the left, and...I think it was the crippled unicorn-turned-human that made me snap.

Twilight, Rainbow and Celestia feeling bad for me was one thing, but Sunset Shimmer? That was so many kinds of wrong that I couldn’t help but feel completely disgusted with myself. And with that feeling the last of my dignity went out the window and I really did let the tears flow before I buried my face in Celestia’s shoulder to let the big pony’s coat soak up my tears.