Jason was in the mood to brood. Simply put, he felt like absolute shit, and no quantity of alcohol was helping.

Anger and vindication had made way for an acute state of upset. One that led to hiccups that burned of vodka and damp patches on the fur of his cheeks. Wasn't manly to cry? Fuck it, he wasn't manly then. It'd been so long since he'd met someone with even a psuedo-realistic perception of gender norms that he was starting to wonder why he even gave a shit about preserving his own.

Well, apart from her. She recognised things for how they were. But now she was gone, and there was little chance she was coming back. The more he turned over the whole thing in his mind—tipped the bottle and poured—the more he began to wonder just how responsible he was for Rarity's departure.

Maybe... maybe if he had been a little more firm? If he'd never entertained the idea of ascribing to herd mentality in the first place? Maybe he wouldn't be in this mess.

They all irritated him so much, the others, even worried him on occasion, but Jason couldn't deny his passive nature, how easily he'd succumbed on more than one occasion. Thinking with his cock. Perpetuating the notion that these mares could get what they wanted no matter how lecherous or insistent their desires simply on account of the fact that they were attractive.

And he'd been treated with no respect for it. How could he be? He'd made no real effort to resist. Sex might have been a more casual thing here, sure, but Rarity didn't sign up to be in a herd with him. Jason knew that. The rest of the girls? They might not have cared, so long as they were all getting a piece of him, but her? There was no question that she saw things differently. Rarity had been something special and unique, and he'd squandered that.

He couldn't spend all of his time blaming everyone else. Not when he was there to take his share.

Another red hot shot down his gullet. Specks of white danced in his peripherals. Everything was blurred and confusing. Jason pondered his home life. He wondered if he'd ever treated a woman in the way that he was being treated now. He wondered if they'd felt guilty for leading him on too, or for not saying more to curb his advances in the moment.

He wondered if he, too, had ever projected his wrongdoings onto the conscience of another. Matters of love, of want, of lust... they were nebulous and difficult to dissect, often impossible to truly understand. But no matter how he tried to twist this in his head, to tell himself that the mares that had treated him in this manner were evil, were horrible? He knew that he too had agency. This... mentality, it was culturally ingrained in a lot of them, surely, but not everyone. It would be wrong and stupid to think that.

Rarity had been proof of that, and while he internally begged that somehow, she'd give him another chance?

He realised that he needed to give mares another chance. Perhaps, maybe, if he could find a way to empathise with them, to better understand their world rather than expecting it to conform to what he was used to, he could find a way to foster better relationships with all of them. Sure, they seemed to have warped opinions of men, but Jason had scarcely taken the time to meet the stallions of this world. He could use as much of a perspective boost as the mares around him could, if he wanted all of them to understand their differences and truly get along.

He didn't know about Twilight, though. Pinkie was maniacal. Rainbow Dash was insistent. Fluttershy was horny, but Twilight? She was... jealous, vindictive, possessive. She came across as a true misogynist, or whatever the Equestrian equivalent was. Figuring things out with her was going to take time and effort, and Jason had neither to spare for her right then. He might have calmed down some, but not that much.

A thought that kept drifting back to him is the way he'd judged all of them on the actions of so few. Mares. They were what he saw of them, all of them, the various sex pests and socially backwards members of their species. But in having this opinion, was he simply doing as they were? Judging an entire gender based upon a holistic overview, rather than looking at ponies as individuals?

Jason didn't even know if this was an ingrained thought process for mares, or if some of their opinions on stallions were demonstrable through observation of stallion behaviour. He concluded to find out.

After a slightly burning piss. Homemade vodka's strong shit. Well, the reason was that or the alternative, but masculinity being forgotten or not, Jason would rather die than sit around drinking cranberry juice.

Walking to the bathroom with a slight stumble, the same one he'd irrigated himself when building the place, Jason started to feel as if he'd found the perfect clarity he'd been missing for a while now.

And then the flood gates opened, and he lost it just as soon as it had came to him.

He drank more. No splash of water or chaser at this point, he just carried on slamming back the vodka. It was drinking beyond enjoyment or taking off the edge at this point, just an attempt to fill a voracious hole. His vision was continuing to downgrade, and thoughts were coming out in short, stabbing, fragmented sentences.

Twilight: bitch. Rarity: miss her. Mares: fucking babied him. Drink: good.

Jason had a fair tolerance, but it didn't last forever. Maybe it was his situation that drove him to such excess, or maybe he was weak willed. He could barely ponder it at this point—brain was too muddled, everything swayed in some direction or another.

Door knocked. When did anything good ever come of Jason's door knocking? "Fuck off!" he slurred, damning whoever had chosen to try and interrupt him from his self-induced, temporary but very real impairment. "Ffffuck off, twathammer." There, eloquently put. They should get the message now.

Three more bangs on the door answered that question. Jason lurched to standing, feeling equal parts zombified and livid. "I thought I told you to do one?" He put a hoof on the ground, pivoted around to the side, and had to remind himself he indeed had four legs. "Sling your fucking hook you stupid, man hating... horsething."

The door knocker wasn't so easily deterred by his mumbles, but neither was Jason. He was determined to have his fucking space for once. He reached the door, the centre of the noise, and rather than open it, he banged back. He leaned on one side, lifting up his heavy forehoof and knock, knock, knocking against the inside of the door, barely managing not to fall over in the process.

The knocking stopped, thank fuck. But instead, he received a voice. "Open it! I need to talk to you!"

Usually, Jason avoided hysterics. Usually, he was more sober. "No! Every time I open the door to one of you, you try to hurt me or lay me or insult me and I'm sick of it! Nothing's going to change my mind, so turn around and go!"

There was a pause this time, and Jason thought he might've finally won, as shallow as the victory might've been, but the mare didn't seem to be done yet. "Please let me in! It's about Rarity!"

That gave Jason pause. He stood there in his stupor, body leaning him left and right like an inebriated pendulum, trying to process, to think of a good way to tell her 'no'. "What about Rarity?" Of course he'd caved. Stupid lovesick cunt.

"She's really upset, is what!" The voice on the other side of the door was emotive, and it was beginning to cross Jason's mind that he wasn't entirely sure he recognised its owner. "She won't talk to me about it, either."

He should've asked her why she thought that was anything to do with him. He should've exercised some caution. Jason wasn't in a state for clear thinking. "Of course she's upset," he drawled, finally slumping down onto his haunches. "My fault 'n' all..."

"Why's it your fault?" Jason didn't answer, he'd internalised in an instant, thinking back over all that had happened earlier. His mind was trapped in that same, depressive cycle until the second repetition of the question snapped him out of it.

"My fault because I should've treated her better..." Jason leaned against the door with a sigh, world weary. "She was so white, and fluffy, and purple..."

"...yes, that's Rarity," the voice answered, unimpressed.

A hiccup. "And she listened to me, and treated me like a proper pony, not like a stupid, confused stallion... She was nice, patient and fluffy and..." Suddenly, a brainwave. "And purple!" Jason's eyes hit the floor. "I like purple..."

"I'm sorry, are you drinking right now?" the mysterious voice asked. Jason couldn't remember where it was coming from. It might have been in his head.

"N-no!" he said with incredulity. "Don't be silly. I stopped drinking about... ten minutes ago."

"Right, that's it. Open the door."

Jason honestly couldn't think of a reason to argue anymore. His mind was filled with Rarity. "Alright. But I've gotta ask the door first." Jason blocked out the confused voice as he asked the door permission to pull it open, and took its silence for an affirmative. With all of his strength, he managed to pull the door inwards...

...and collapse onto his back in the process. He closed his eyes, somehow even finding the darkness to be spinning, as he felt a warm presence over him. "Gods, you reek. How did you let yourself get in this state?"

Jason pointed in a random direction. In his mind, he was pointing to a bottle. "I drank... all of that. I'd shag my own sister for an aspirin and some water right now..." That was paralytic, not in his right mind Jason talking. At least, he hoped it was.

The abstract pony of his thoughts seemed to ignore his blithering, but somehow, water materialised in his hooves shortly after. He spilled half of it over his chest, not daring to open his eyes, but eventually managed to bring it to his lips.

"Mmmthank you, sis..."

Before he could slip further into whatever ridiculous fantasy his mind had concocted, he felt a slapping around his face. He tried to ignore it at first, like the pattering of rain or a text from the sexual health clinic, but eventually, his mind succumbed to good old Chinese water repetition and forced his eyes open. There was a pony standing over him, and she didn't look impressed. He could barely make her out, but she must have been responsible for the water that found its way into his hooves. That meant she was a good pony.

"Sit up," his saviour said from where she stood, obscured by dimming candlelight. "I don't want you choking on that."

"I'll choke on whatever I wanna..." Jason assured her, though he managed to move back to his haunches with a helping hoof. A surprisingly strong mare pulled him to his hooves. "Wh-where are we going?"

"We're going to get you into bed," came a stern reply. "You've had quite enough to drink, I think."

"N-no!" Jason tried to launch himself back onto the floor, a pathetic, drunken mess, but the mare's grip was too strong. "I don't want to fucking sleep with you! Why can't any of you take no for an answer?!" Jason felt cheap. Miserable. "I don't..." his words cut off, he tried to think about what he was saying. "I don't want you. I don't know you. Please let go of me."

A sigh, and the mare paused in her tracks. She didn't, however, relinquish her grip, likely because Jason was teetering on his hooves. "I don't want you like that, I promise. I just want to get you in bed before you hurt yourself. I—"

"Don't baby me!" Jason resisted with every ounce of will left to him. "I'm sick of being treated like a child, like I can't do things for myself... I can do things! I can do everything! I don't need a mare to do the things for me! I..." he was losing his train of thought, he knew, but he carried on talking in spite of it. There was something clawing at him, it had been for a while, and it was finally finding a means to unload. "I came here to get away from... from other people. I didn't like the way they treated each other, treated me. I was a mistranspope. I just wanted some peace and—" a sniffle, "—all I get is you. You, trying to touch me, trying to take advantage of me... it's dehumanising, it's horrible, and..."

Jason stumbled over his words. His thoughts were repeating and mashing together, and he wasn't sure where to take them next. Every combination of words led him to another disparate, saddening conclusion, and all of them led back to the utter lack of Rarity in his life. He'd fucked it all up. He'd fucked it up, and now he was letting himself be taken advantage of again. Stupid. Stupid, weak, inept, selfish assholish—

"Are you done?" the mare spat, likely tired of his whinging and just wanting to get to the action. Mares didn't care what he had to say. "I'm taking you to bed because you've managed to drink yourself into oblivion. Do you understand what I'm saying to you?" She carried on pulling him along, then eventually turned, narrowed her eyes, and spoke directly towards him. "I'll break it down: you. are. smashed. You need sleep. I'm going to lay you down, and I'm not going to try anything funny with you. I promise."

Her words finally rang in Jason's head. Nothing funny. She promised. She would just lay him down and talk to him. "Okay... my bed is in the house."

"Thanks for the directions," the mare chuckled at poor, drunk, emotional Jason. In honesty, he couldn't tell if it was pity. She walked him through the house until they'd finally reached his bed, and carefully, she laid him down on top of it. She sat beside him, waiting for him to adjust, for the vertigo and tinnitus to stop. "I'm Coco Pommel. I work with Rarity."

Jason looked at her through half-closed vodka goggles. "You're with Rarity?" he asked, feeling excitement growing in his chest. If she was here, he could talk to her and! ...if she was here, he'd have to talk to her about all of this. That was more scary than anything else. "Can... can you tell her that I'm not like this because of her? I know I'm a little tipsy right now."

"I promise I won't tell her. She's back at the boutique, not here with me. Do you understand?"

Jason slowly nodded. "I was a bad boyfriend to her. Really bad."

Coco raised an eyebrow at him. "You were her boyfriend?"

"N-not really..." Jason bit his lip as he thought his words over. "But we went on a date, and it was... it was magical. And we were going to kiss and then Twilight came."

Coco's eyes narrowed at that. "Twilight Sparkle?"

Jason only nodded.

"I don't know if I should be telling you this, but Twilight's got a bit of a history regarding Rarity and stallions. She's a little infamous around Ponyville, really." Coco shrugged, fighting off a laugh. "Hell, look at you. I'll bet this is going in one ear and out the other right now. We'll talk in the morning."

"Why would we talk in the morning?" Jason's eyes drifted shut for a moment—he shook his head to remember where he was. "You're Rarity's friend and I hurt her. Why would you want to talk to me?"

"Because, Rarity won't tell me what happened, and I want to get to the bottom of this." Coco lost the harsh look for a moment, leaning back on the other side of the bed. "Besides, look what a state you got in over her. You obviously care. Once I know what happened, if I think you honestly deserve it, I'll even help you fix things. I want to see Rarity happy, after all, and that means knowing whether you're just another nasty stallion, or if this is all just the result of a bad situation."

"All situations are bad." Jason had resorted to simple nihilistic phrases now.

"Jeez, are you this much of a charm when you're sober?"

"Only half," Jason grunted.

"You'd better hope for your sake that that isn't true, or I'll be forgetting how pretty you are and telling Rarity she can do better."

Jason blinked at that. "I'm not pretty."

Coco actually laughed pretty loudly at that. "Look, no offence, Jason, but if it wasn't for how insanely attractive you are, I'd be struggling to see any of what Rarity does in you right now. And I know she doesn't just go for looks, either."

A few seconds passed, and it clicked in Jason's head. Well, something did. "That's it!" He nodded to himself a few times, head rather limp. "That's it, isn't it? You think I'm hot too. You all think I'm hot..." He leaned on his side, taking her in. "You want me to have sex with you, don't you?"

"Jason, I thought we'd already been over this."

"N-no, you... you said you wouldn't try anything on with me, and you're not." Jason nodded to himself, one more time. "But you want me. You want me in exchange for helping with Rarity. All you mares want sex. That's it, isn't it?"

"That's not it, Jason, I promise. I—"

He wasn't listening. "I'll do it, you know?" He bit his lip, perhaps too hard. "I know how it works here. I know what I have to do. If it helps me with seeing Rarity again, I'll do it."

"Jason, you—mff!" And it was there, sudden, electric. It'd been Jason that'd made the first move, a spastic lurch that had been more effort than it was worth. There was barely allure in the kiss for him in the first millisecond, but enough mental lubricant to kill a baby panda was making this ten times the erotic feeling it really was, forcing each sensation to register as a shuddering pleasure that resonated throughout his entire body. He was determined to kiss her, to feel her, to hold her, to do whatever he needed to in order to ensure that he left her satisfied.

He was assertive with it, too. He could be if he wanted to. He was sure mares would like that too. He parted her lips further, pushed her down, pressed his tongue against hers. He heard a little whine from beneath him. He closed his eyes and tried to imagine he didn't know who it came from. Truthfully, he barely did. His arousal was beginning to creep in, not all centralised in his growing semi but shooting all through him, crawling up his spine and making him shudder, building in his core which radiated with heat, sliding across his tongue as it made contact with another mare...

And there was that earth pony strength he'd heard so much about, but it was doing something other than what he'd expected. It wasn't pulling him deeper in, or trying to pin him down in turn and wrestle for dominance. No... it was?

Coco was pushing him off of her. Did she want to be on top? No, this wasn't a control thing, this was more desperation. It had taken Jason too long to notice, or it had taken Coco too long to react, but something was wrong with this. All at once, he pulled away, and both of them thought to regain their breaths.

He was sure she'd kissed back. He'd felt it. She'd definitely returned the gesture at least a little before breaking away. Then why?...

"Sorry," they both said in unison, and found themselves awkwardly turning to one another in the process.

"I didn't want that," Coco said, and Jason wasn't sure whether to be relieved or annoyed. "...I mean, I did, in a kind of primal way, but it's not what I want. I don't want to do that with you just so you think I'll help. I think it's horrible that you've ever had to feel that way, honestly. I'm really sorry for that."

"I..." Jason wasn't sure what to say. He'd acted on impulse, not out of attraction, or want, or lust—that had came after. It was desperation. Pathetic desperation. "I shouldn't have assumed. I'm sorry too."

"Let's forget about it and try to sleep," Coco said, sliding beneath the covers and giving Jason space as best she could, though there was little to separate them. "It was a mistake, and it's my fault. Tomorrow, you'll feel better, and we'll fix things, I promise. For now, though? Goodnight, Jason."

"...goodnight." He'd thought for a few seconds before that, but he couldn't land on anything to say. What repaired a situation like that? The poor mare had come here to help him, and he'd... had he really convinced himself he was doing something selfless? Jason hated all of this.

The thing that hurt most was something that dawned on him as he attempted to sleep next to this kind, forgiving mare, long after his arousal had faded and he didn't have to worry about poking her with something stiff in the night. It was a very simple thing, one that he hadn't even considered in the moment, but now it was as plain as day to him.

He'd never kissed another pony before. Rainbow, Pinkie? They'd both blown him. Rarity, he'd almost kissed. Twilight, he'd teased with the prospect with his anger. He'd just committed arguably the most intimate act possible with another pony for the first time, and it wasn't Rarity. She could never be his first now, whether he was sure he'd done it for her or not.

And that stung. And it made it even more apparent to him that even in this difficult world, where everything was so topsy turvy and strange, that the mares like Twilight weren't the only ones who could stand to change.

He was just glad that he had Coco with him. He was only slightly ashamed to admit that he ended up cuddling into her during the night, and she didn't complain. Right then, he needed a companion, someone to weather the storm in his mind.

Hopefully, come morning, he'd be able to deal with the aftermath.

Well, that and the hangover.

Author's Note

Whelp, largest update to date. A lot happens in this one, and I'd love to hear your thoughts!

I'm in the midst of releasing a new Discord server I own filled with pony, porn, and memes. Feel free to join here and get involved in the discussions and activity, as well as see updates of my work early!