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Chrysalis

A feather duvet was underneath me, I couldn’t believe it. I rubbed my face against the blanket marveling at the feel of a proper bed, it had been months since I had been in one.

I looked around the room, it was a elegantly decorated bedroom like I had seen at the palace. Large ornate windows showed a full moon surrounded by millions of stars. The four poster bed was illuminated in the moon’s glow and I couldn’t help but sigh. This was perfect.

A shadow grew across the floor, looking up I saw a black Alicorn descending into my room. Opening the windows it touched down, it was Ari. He was looking at me with his cool blue eyes; they stayed with me as he approached my bed. I could feel my heart almost beat out of my chest, the air felt too hot, too humid. My stomach was in knots, I was having trouble focusing on his approach so I took a deep breath.

It didn’t settle my nerves, it drove them insane.

A strong spicy smell flooded my nose, it was amazing, my senses went in overdrive. My chitin was burning, my wing went rigid, and I started panting as the temperature in the room skyrocketed. Focusing my eyes on Ari I saw him take in my scent, that sent my blood wild, I wanted him to smell more of me.

Flagging my tail I looked at him, practically whimpering as he scented the air again. My eyes wandered lower taking in his length, dropping rapidly from his sheath. Yes, that was what I needed.

I turned my plot to him and flagged my tail. Come on, just a little closer. Ari approached putting his muzzle to my lips, I winked and my tail twitched as he breathed in my scent. Wetness was beginning to form as I wiggled my rump a little in anticipation, I was burning up. I needed – My head exploded in pain and I scrunched my eyes.

Opening my eyes I found myself looking at trees, a Magoo fruit rolling to a stop in front of me. My bed was a black wing and the matching wing was wrapped around my barrel like a blanket. I blinked in shock, it had felt soo real. The burning, the smell, and the…Wetness dripped from my lips and my tail twitched.

I needed a moment.

My hooves were impossible to get underneath myself, looking at my barrel it made sense. Ari had wrapped his hooves around me, holding me an iron grip. My magic was out of the question, I had overused it already yesterday. Not to mention he would surely wake up and smell my situation. Not that I didn’t like him. No, Ari was a perfect gentlestallion and I liked him a lot more than I’m comfortable admitting. I didn’t want to ruin this friendship we just started. If he wanted more than a friendship he would have indicated already, stallions are pretty straightforward that way.

I could still drop hints though.

But back to the matter at hoof, I needed some private time. Shimmiing in his hold I made my way down his barrel. This went well until something poked my back; I flicked my tail more as I felt the arousal from his fur. It’s okay, I could still get out of this. Taking a deep breath I prepared to move again, then the spicy musk from my dream flooded my nose, exactly what I needed.

Ari’s grip tightened, my ears went back. I had no choice now.

“Ari get up.” He continued to sleep, a grin on his muzzle.

“ARI!” I yelled in a voice that rivalled the Royal Canterlot voice, his ear twitched before he nuzzled into my neck. Was it getting hotter?

Apparently he was a heavy sleeper. Sighing I looked around where he landed us. It looked to be around two acres of trees, a mix of Magoo trees and Tronana trees, and a small pond. Through the sagging trees I could see the yellow desert; it still appeared to go on forever. I guess the Arabians haven’t expanded much in the last hundred years.

I had been to Saddle Arabia before, not that they knew it was me. Then I was favoring a sienna furred unicorn as my disguise. It was a nice disguise, her cutie mark was the desert with heat waves coming off and I appropriately named her Desert Heat. She caught every stallion’s eye and I was always well fed as her. But times changed, now I favored the grey Pegasus I have given the moniker of ‘Silver Stream’, which is not a strange name as Ari insisted. ‘Ari’ is a far exotic sounding name.

My last visit had been all too easy; the Saddle Arabians were incredibly open minded about sex and still practiced herding. Saddle Arabia is the last remaining country to do so if I recall correctly, it was done on the premise of not having enough stallions. Which I could see some logic to, finding a free stallion was hard last time. There was no such thing as a single mare in the country, as soon as they were old enough they had either already joined a herd or were drafted into a herd. I still got a lot of love on that trip, the stallion may have been a little soft but his love was very tasty. Though I don’t think he minded when I left the herd; there were many eager mares on his wait list. He had been a well respected guard, the type every herd wanted their filly to be associated with.

Which brings up another issue, with Ari’s size he could easily come off as a tall local, but he would attract a lot of mares. Like I said tall stallions always get swarmed, and those wings… He would need a thobe to hide them, which wouldn’t stand out as they are very practical in this country. If a Arabian wasn’t wearing a thobe he would at least be wearing the hat portion of their kanturas to block out the sweltering heat. But coming across a thobe before we reached a city was very hard.

A yawn brought me back from my planning, Ari was waking up.

“Good mmmmoorningg.” He said when another yawn escaped him. It would have been cute except he started shifting in his half awake state, rubbing his arousal all over my back, sending my tail twitching again. That dream was still affecting my body, which annoyed me to no end. Everything had been going out of my control lately. I had had a emotional breakdown with a practical stranger, then I was taken by surprise and captured, and today it was my own body. I swear I was acting like a mare in heat.

My blood froze as I realized the truth in that. I had never been in heat myself but I knew the symptoms very well, after counseling many young nymphs on the subject before it should have been second nature. The vivid dreams, followed by the physical changes like fevers, and finally the instincts take over. Many stallions feared the last stage. For a good reason, I have witnessed mobs of crazed mares literally chase down stallions for their fulfillment, which would usually never come for them. For some reason ponies had a harder time conceiving and being that successful fertilization stops the heat, most ponies were out of luck.

I shouldn’t jump to conclusions; I might just be picking up on his good dream through my chitin. Perhaps my dreams can be influenced by the emotions I absorb overnight and I just never noticed before. Dear Faust I hope so.

“Good morning to you too, as much as I enjoy the breakfast I need to get a drink-“ An alcoholic drink preferably. “-and you need to address a morning visitor.” Before I address it and solve both our problems.

That seemed to wake him up as he released his hold on me and tried to sputter out an apology, it was kind of cute with how he was blushing.

“Don’t worry about it.” I waved a hoof in the air. “I could help you with that.” I purred at the second half, I couldn’t help it but I remembered how delicious his lust tasted. It was what made a lover’s love all the more delicious, the added lust and desire. On their own, they were candy but paired with love it became a three course meal.

Ari being the gentlestallion that he was, replied, “No need for that Chrissy. Not that you wouldn’t be a help, but I couldn’t ask that of you.”

Horseapples, he was too oblivious sometimes. Couldn’t he smell exactly how sincere my help was?

What I mean is, now I could finally get up and get that drink. It had been several days since I got a good drink and love could only get me soo far. With Ari wandering off into the grove I made my way over to the pond. Clear water lapped at the edges reflecting the blue sky, it tasted fresh, and looking at the edges I knew I wasn’t the only one that had thought so.

“Isn’t the water wonderful?” I yelled out to Ari, I couldn’t see him anymore.

Ari came galloping through the trees, “WATER!” He immediately started drinking, cock still in the process of retracting. Nononono, Focus! He obviously didn’t make those hoof prints, that means someone was here recently.

While he drank I had time to take stock of our situation. He was a mess, I was a weak mess as well , we had to stop the princesses from moving the sun and moon, and now I had a bounty on my head. First problem first, I needed to feed the black hole that was a Alicorn, then he could feed me.

Then we could clean up. I don’t even want to know how bad I look if Ari was the standard. He had feathers sticking out in all directions, leaves, dirt, and blood stained his coat, and he had something shiny lodged in his muzzle.

What was that?

I walked up to his muzzle and squinted, it was glass. He must have got it when they smashed the knock out gas orb in his face. Thank goodness I didn’t have such weak chitin.

Ari blinked at me, having just noticed me staring at him. “Chrissy?”

“Hold still.” He cocked his head at me.

“Tccchhh! I said hold still!” I didn’t wait for his response this time, I gripped the biggest shard in my mouth and yanked it.

“AHHHHHHHH!” My ears were ringing, that stallion has a killer Royal Canterlot voice.

Ari stopped and licked his muzzle before looking at the shard in my mouth.

“I thought my face hurt. That was huge! Thanks Chrissy, I guess I owe you again. Is there anymore glass there?” Yes, a whole sphere’s worth.

“Don’t move till I tell you and you don’t owe me…You said we’re friends, right?” I held back the nervous shake that threatened to enter my voice. It was another first, a friend that wasn’t family.

He nodded, “of course!”

“Then HOLD STILL! I can’t help you if you keep nodding.” I couldn’t help but grin, this was fun.

He didn’t respond.

“Are you ok?” His eyes went from me to his nose. “You can talk, just don’t nod.okay?”

“Okay!”

I started pulling more out with my mouth; my magic was being saved for special occasions.

“Buck.”

Another big shard, “cocksucker”, Ari had a colourful vocabulary and I almost couldn’t wait for him to meet the princesses.

With the last one out I started cleaning his muzzle. I licked over the freshly opened wounds, mixing my plasma over them as a sort of bandage, and adding my scent to his.

“Chrissy?” What was I doing? I stopped mid-lick and looked at him.

“What was that about?” He sounded nervous.

“Nothing. I was just cleaning your wounds. Any friend would do that.”, any marefriend more like.

“Oh I’m sorry then. I don’t know all the culture on Equis yet.” Thank goodness, I didn’t have any other excuse.

“Hold still.” I indulged myself a little more and re-licked his wounds, if he didn’t know what it meant it wasn’t wrong really. Not to mention it would tell the other mares exactly what they are up against.

“All done. But we are preening later, your wings are atrocious.”

“Okay, can you-“His stomach gurgled and we both looked at it.

“Breakfast time it is then. You landed us in the right oasis; there are lots of Magoo and Tronana trees.”

“What?”

Right, different planet, “Edible fruit on the trees.” I was surprised at how fast he moved, one moment I’m looking at a black stallion the next second a black blur. Alicorn metabolism, I once watched Celestia consume twelve cakes in one day when I was disguised, TWELVE THREE TIERED CAKES! I don’t know where it goes.

Ari was flitting between trees, not even bothering to peel the red Tronana fruit. He must have an iron stomach, I had heard the peel was extremely sour.

After decimating half the grove’s fruit trees he landed beside me, touching his fur to my chitin. I trilled at the sensation, his happiness added a refreshing zing to the usual love.

Time for a thank you, “In the pond, now.” He shrugged and we entered the water, I was horrified at the result. Small waves of brown and red floated away from us making the water murkier. I started paddling to the center and he followed.

“So what I was going to ask was how do you preen wings? If I knew how I could preen your wing for you.” Such a sweetheart, if only it needed preening, like I said I’m low maintenance.

“I could show you but it is hard to preen yourself, most have friends and family preen them. It can be quite a sight when pegasi form a preening circle. As for myself, all I have to do is give my wing a quick buzz to remove the dirt.” I demonstrated and splashed Ari in the face.

A grin grew across his face before he raised his wings to their full span.

“Don’t-“ I was too late in my warning, he brought his wings down on the water, sending me a small wave to the face. Two can play that game. I swam away till touched ground again, turning I reared up and brought my own splash down on him. Ari seemed to come to life and he reared up, splashing me back. What a foal.

I loved it though.

I started chasing him through the water; he wasn’t going to get away with this. His tail finally in my mouth after several feints I gave him a triumphant look, but he didn’t accept my win. Turning around he reared over me, his forelegs pushing on my back. My balance was lost and I let go, he turned his head to my rump and grabbed my tail. I whinnied in surprise, wing stiffening in arousal. I had picked the wrong game.

“Fine, you win! Just let go already…” Before I do something that could ruin our friendship.

Letting my tail go and removing his forelegs from my back he grinned, “Okay, I haven’t done that in forever. It is nice after everything, ya know?”

“Yah yah, come on, I still need to preen your wings.” I started for shore and before I knew it we were lying barrel to barrel again. His wing in front of me, I started on his second primaries, explaining how important it was to use the tongue to get between these tightly packed and small feathers. I'm not sure he got it all between his moans but I still continued anyway. it kept my mind off of sweat forming on my fur. When I used my muzzle to remove some of the dead feathers I demonstrated on his wing the difference in a askew feather and a dead feather. Then it was plucking, his primaries, and the wing tip. All the while I was trying to control my tail, which was determined to flag and twitch whenever he moaned.

Both wings done I stood and cracked my back, letting the warm breeze waft over me.

“Ready to ‘hit the road’?”

He stood beside me, “Yup! I feel soo much better now with the diamond dog stink off me. Which way should we go?”

I looked out at the dunes, “it doesn’t really matter. We will run across a city eventually.”

“Gottcha.” We started walking out of the cool oasis and the reality of this being a desert hit me. I don’t remember it being this hot last time. Sweat was beading from my mane within ten minutes.

Our walk wasn’t an exciting one, the dunes went up and down. Some held evidence of packs of Hinns, phantom dogs that were attracted to evil emotions and intent, but they weren’t any threat to the average traveler.

We both were full of questions though.

“So how do you plan to stop the princesses?” This had been bugging me for a while now, even with my help i'm not sure how we could overpower them.

“I actually was just thinking about this. Do they have any weaknesses?”

“Does cake count? I did beat Celestia when I invaded but I was beaten by the elements of harmony. If you went after the princesses they would try to stop you. Not to mention Lovebutt and Shiny would try and stop us. They really hate me.”

“Lovebutt? Shiny?” Oh boy, here we go.

“Princess Cadence and her husband Shining Armour are a little angry that I ruined their wedding by using their love to launch my invasion. I also may have locked her in a cavern and pretended to be her…” I bowed my head, ready for the outrage, the disgust at my actions.

But it never came.

“Wow! You really did put a lot of thought into the invasion. I'm actually impressed, I don’t think I could pretend to be a whole other person, not to mention the timing was perfect. No one would suspect a bride of acting odd when her wedding is coming up!” I blinked at that, he just got it and he wasn’t disgusted by my actions?

“Really?!”

“Yup, I don’t think we could do that for this plan though, seeing as there is two of them and only one of us is a master of disguise. Perhaps if we bound their magic like those shackles that were put on our horns we could stop them from raising the sun and the moon?”

Maybe, the idea had potential.

“That might work. But there isn’t any magical inhibator strong enough for a Alicorn at full strength. Also once they got them off what’s to stop them from going back to raising the sun and the moon?”

Ari mulled over my questions before his face lit up ad he trotted in place.

“What?!”

He looked at me with a huge smile, “We MAKE a magical inhibitor strong enough to hold a Alicorn, i'm willing to bet we can. I'm willing to bet no one has tried to capture them with one before with one and you can even test it on me to make sure it works! As to the problem of them reverting, I say we drag them out of the castle and show them the results of messing with nature!”

I blinked and thought it over, it could work, but…

“How do you plan to capture two princesses, evade their guards, and drag the reluctant princesses away from their kingdom? I for one don’t want to have to listen to their whining the whole time.”

“Umm, a surprise attack… and is there any transportation that we could take them in? Like a car,a plane, even a blimp would do?!”

I didn’t know what those were but there was something that might work. I didn’t like the idea, we would have to go to what I heard was a place full of savages, a dangerous part of the world. I really didn’t want to lose him before our mission even starts.

“Yes…A airship might work. But I have only heard rumors of them, on the Zebrican coast. They were developed to explore the Endless Sea. But I haven’t heard nice things about Zebrica, they are supposed to be pony eating savages. Even if we made it, airships are ridiculously expensive…”

“That’s perfect! Don’t worry, I’m sure we can earn some money. Maybe we could rent one?”

I felt a grin crept up my face, maybe we could do this. At least it was a start, I started humming at the thought.

My humming was interrupted by a shrill scream, Charging at us was a certain turquoise unicorn, a mare that was just a little too friendly last time she was around Ari.

My eye twitched.

Why was Azure Heights here?!