In Canterlot, the lights shine brightly, even at night.
They shine brightly, casting the fingers of their glow out over the sleeping houses. They glimmer brilliantly, in shades of every colour, lighting the windows ot the citizens and their homes, bringing daytime to the steps of ponies passing by on empty streets, and in all ways, bathing the royal city in a perpetual shimmer.
But in some corners of Canterlot, the lights don’t shine.
In one corner, one bar refused to let the light in. It allowed the dingy, drab flickering of a compulsory sign on its front-entrance, a lazy sort of neon that threatened to burst into magical sparks at any moment. The Underhoof. It sounded the way it looked: the walls ached to be scraped of an invisible slime or grease, the front steps attended to intermittently by a surly looking bouncer with too many pounds and a chip out of his hind-right hoof. When he was on-shift, which was whenever he felt like putting away his cigarette and crawling out of the back room of the bar, he spent his time on post leering at passerby but not making any fuss if they stopped and decided to come in. Anypony who knew The Underhoof was there in the first place probably knew that it was open, and that they were free to go inside if they wanted to.
There was one pony who seemed a little lost though. He seemed like the lack of light overhead was something to be worried about, while everypony else who’d passed by had welcomed the darkness like it was a warm soup waiting for them in their parents’ kitchen. The pony who stepped up to the entrance of The Underhoof was the first one of the night to shift his eyes in either direction. He was the only one to stop before he pushed open the poorly-painted wooden door.
“Uh,” he said. “I was wondering if—”
“Door’s open.” The pony leaning against the wall grunted an answer before the question and punctuated it with a thick gob of spit aimed from his mouth to the dirty ground he was standing on. His coat was the same shade of off-brown that was peeling from the bar’s outside walls, and his sunglasses were the same shade of black as the light-absent sky overhead.
The pony at the door coughed. He had a bright yellow coat, blue hair, and an inability to keep his smile from looking perpetually in danger of shattering. No wings, and no horn.
“Uh,” he said again. And “Thanks,” after a moment.
He pushed the door open and stepped inside.
The lighting in the bar was barely better than outside. The scant illumination oozed from the low-hanging lamps on the ceiling like it was struggling through air-shaped molasses. A pool-table with ripped felt was the bar’s only colour, the rest making room for plain stools and a bar lined with bottles that looked as though they’d had the labels polished off. There was a contingent of ponies in various degrees of animation seated along the bar, never at a table. Every one of them looked like their drink was more interesting than anything else that might bear mentioning.
The nervous yellow pony cleared his throat to no one in particular. It was just as well, because nopony seemed to notice.
The noise of a stool being shoved back turned a head or two at the far right end of the bar.
“That’s it, I’ve had enough of this. You havin’ the nerve to walk in here bein’ backed up on payments is one thing, but askin’ for another favor on top of it? You’ve got some nerve, you multicoloured bitch.”
“Come on! Please, I’m not asking for a favor. I’ve got a ton of bits coming, like, this week, I’ll pay off my whole tab—”
That voice sounded familiar. The yellow pony turned his head too. The scene was hard to make out in the low lighting, but somepony was standing with their forelegs on the bar. The bartender seemed to be staring them down.
“Don’t gimme that shit. It was the end of the week last week, and I gave you a pass because I thought your ass wasn’t all used up yet.”
The pony at the counter slumped back from the bar, but raised her head after a few seconds.
“Come on,” she said again. “I know I’ve been... short. But you know me. You know I wouldn’t leave you guys hangin’, right? Just cut me some slack this one more time. Please?”
The yellow pony, whose name was Comet, thought he could make out a wide set of eyes pleading at the bartender.
The bartender’s glare was unmoving.
“Out,” he said.
The blue pony (Comet realized she was blue, and a pegasus besides) threw herself forward, landing sprawled out on the bar-counter. She reached her forelegs towards the bartender and caught just a hoofful of his shirt before he pulled away. Comet, who had been stepping closer the whole time, could see the sneer curling on the bartender’s face.
“For Celestia’s sake,” he said, “don’t make me get Grubby in here. At least have some fucking dignity for once.”
The blue pegasus shook noticeably for a few seconds before pulling her forehooves to her face. She removed herself from the bar after a few seconds and walked across the roughly-carpeted floor to a door at the back of the bar. The old metal creaked as she pushed it open, head sunken against her chest, and stepped outside.
In the far corner of the bar, somepony finished their drink and set the glass on the table. It clinked lightly with the ice still left inside.
Comet swallowed and closed the distance between himself and the counter.
“Excuse me,” he said. His voice sounded an octave above anything that had ever been let out in the bar, save the occasional fluctuations of the blue pegasus that had just made her way outside.
The bartender looked up at Comet with a modified version of the same sour glare he’d been wearing for the past few minutes. It occurred to Comet that might be because it was his default expression. It stayed firmly in place as the bartender brushed a hoof over his chest and walked the several feet down the counter to where Comet was standing.
“What’ll it be?”
Comet opened his mouth for a ‘hello’, but stopped himself.
He had been hoping things would move at a more even pace. Maybe The Underhoof just didn’t have the patience for subtlety.
“I, uh... sorry... I heard from a friend that you guys, uh...”
The bartender’s stare was almost petrifying. His eyes were yellow, Comet noticed. They were perhaps the brightest glowing thing in the entire establishment, save now the fluorescent shade of Comet’s coat. He felt his tongue drying up as he looked back into those eyes, and tried to think damp, easy-to-say thoughts.
“I heard from a friend you guys could... uh... that you’d be the ones to talk about buying... something.”
The bartender’s expression didn’t change, save the almost imperceptible shift of his jaw, just a millimeter to the right. His scowl stayed a scowl.
“What kind of ‘something’?” he asked. He sounded ready to throw Comet out if he said word one of something that didn’t tickle his fancy.
Comet swallowed again.
“Something... like, you know, uh. Not, uh, alcohol.”
The bartender stared.
The blue pegasus thrown on the bar flashed across Comet’s recollection.
“Something like, maybe what that pony earlier was... trying to buy.”
He could have waited for his usual to be in town. But he didn’t feel like waiting.
Surely it couldn’t be this easy?
The bartender scowled. Still scowling, Comet watched him kneel below the counter. His forelegs moved somewhere Comet couldn’t see. When he stood up, he didn’t appear to be holding anything.
“Who told you?”
“Black Tar,” he said.
The barkeeper’s eyes went wide for a second, but settled after not too long. He nodded.
“I know Black.” The bartender paused and tilted his head to the right. “What’s the magic word?”
“‘Nopony flies high without a little help.’”
Another nod.
Where there was nothing but the stains of coasterless drinks a minute ago, a small pouch appeared on the worn, filthy wood. Comet reached for it, but the bartender was quicker, and pulled it towards himself.
“Bits upfront. We’ve had a bad experience with... loans, lately.”
Comet nodded. He fiddled for a moment before finding his sack of coins, which he upended onto the counter. He didn’t care how many were in there; there would always be more, if he needed. Money wasn’t what he wanted.
The bartender flung the pouch he was holding forward. Comet caught it awkwardly against his chest as the bartender swept his foreleg across the counter, gathering up the coins with a soft clink and scraping them somewhere out of sight.
“Just get out of here before you get into it. The guards like to pop by unexpectedly.”
Comet nodded. He felt very light all of a sudden.
Just like that, the bartender seemed to go back to pretending he didn’t exist. He didn’t care if he did or not. Whatever part of him was real had what he’d come for, and already felt better for it.
He didn’t feel like walking all the way across the bar. There was a perfectly good door right there. With a small nod in the barkeep’s direction, Comet walked quicker than usual to the back door. The metal felt grimy on his hooves as he pushed the door-release. It squealed at him as he pushed past. The relative heat of the bar, old-breath and uneasy stares washed way from him as he stepped into the cold night air. There was, to his relief, a small, flickering light overhead before the alley vanished into darkness in either direction.
He sighed and raised the bag, pulling it open at the same time.
A rough shuffling sound on his left almost made him jump straight into the air. He settled for a repressed panic instead, closing the bag and tucking it away, praying his hooves wouldn’t fumble and cause him to drop it. Luckily, the pouch was sealed before he put it away. His instincts screamed at him to run before his eyes asked questions—but when he turned to the left, he only saw shadows.
One of them moved. It grew bigger as it came closer.
“Hey,” it said.
It was that familiar voice again. He couldn’t pin down where he knew it from. It was one he’d heard before, maybe more than once. Around town, maybe. That pegasus in the bar a minute ago...
“Hey,” it said again. “Is that... did you get something while you were inside?”
This wasn’t a question he wanted to answer.
“I, uh... no, I didn’t have anything to drink,” Comet said. As quickly as he could manage without seeming conspicuous, he tried to begin moving backwards, but the sound of his hoof on stone gave him away, so he stopped.
“I didn’t say a drink,” the voice said again. The shadow it was coming from stepped closer, finally into the light enough that Comet could make out it’s shape. It was that blue pegasus from before. He hadn’t noticed her mane in the bar. It was quite unusual, a mix of colours, all seven of them from the looks of it—
“How much did you pay for it?” the voice asked. It sounded so familiar, but just a little bit off, like a record that had been scratched after it was shipped. Comet shifted his hind leg, but froze as he realized he couldn’t see far enough in the darkness that a run-away would make sense.
“Just... I don’t remember. I mean, I didn’t... what do you want?” he asked finally. He sounded more steadfast than his awkward meandering in the bar had managed.
“Well, I was hoping to barter some of what you have out of our friend Broken Glass, but he wasn’t feeling very generous. But you seem like a nice pony.” The blue pegasus stepped closer. Comet could see, under the soft, faltering light overhead, that her mane was indeed every colour of the rainbow... but it was a dull prism, that looked as though it hadn’t been washed in months. The ends were frayed, and the colours blurred together. It was the same shade as her tail, he noticed. Both of them looked well below full volume, which matched the rest of her, probably a good twenty percent too thin.
“You’d be willing to help a filly out, wouldn’t you? Do your good deed of the day?”
Comet noticed the proximity of the blue pony suddenly. He hadn’t realized how fast she was walking forward. Her hooves were on the back-porch with him now. He could see her face clearly. The deep, dark blackness in her eyes that struggled against the supposedly friendly tone of her voice.
“Uh, I don’t know—”
Then there was a hoof on his chest. He moved to back up, but his body froze.
“Come on. I’m not asking for a lot. Just enough to get me through the night. I know a big, tough colt like you can get by on a little less than a full bag if it means helping out a girl down on her luck...” The blue pegasus ran her hoof along his chest as she spoke. The sensation was an oddly enjoyable one, though every movement came coloured with atmosphere. Besides all that, Comet could feel a shake in the foreleg against his coat, like a dull shiver as the blue pegasus moved. He could see the shiver in her eyes, if he looked close enough.
“Do I know you from somewhere?” Comet asked.
The blue pegasus pulled her hoof away. Her playful smiled turned into a flat-line that Comet couldn’t quite read.
“Probably not.” The pegasus chewed her bottom lip for a minute and a smile returned, as well as the playful shake in her voice. “Jeez, does that line work on anypony?”
Comet shook his head slowly.
“I definitely know you from somewhere.”
“Okay, maybe we had a class together in school. You wouldn’t abandon an old school pal’ in her time of need, would you?”
The blue pegasus pressed herself forward against Comet’s chest and reached her forelegs out, but Comet pulled away.
“You’re somepony famous, aren’t you? From a show, or somewhere here in town—”
“Do I look like anypony famous to you?”
Comet tilted his head and ran his eyes over the pony in front of him. The mane was something distinct, for sure, maybe that was what was tipping him off. But the voice, too, he knew he’d heard it somewhere before. Nothing else about the pony looked familiar. Her coat was a nondescript periwinkle, and her cutie mark was as meaningless as any one he might pass in the street. But something about those colours, and that voice...
“Are you in the Wonderbolts?” Comet asked.
The blue pony rolled her eyes and huffed out a breath of air.
“Sure, fine, I’m in the Wonderbolts. I’m Princess Celestia, if it’ll get you to play nice. Just gimme already—” the pegasus reached a hoof out, but Comet interrupted her, pushing her back with one of his own.
A curious look crept across his face.
“Spitfire?” he asked.
The pegasus sank against his hoof, like her body had deflated.
“Sure,” she said. “Whatever.” Her voice was dull.
No sound passed for several seconds but the soft breathing of both ponies in the otherwise silent night.
“So are you gonna help me out, or what?” The pegasus said.
“Listen,” Comet said. “You can’t just ask me to give you some when I just spent a whole week’s worth of bits—”
“You don’t just have to give it to me.” The pegasus was forward again before Comet could stop her. He could feel her hair against his cheek as she pressed against him. Her chest on his chest. A scent like sour-whiskey wafted from her multi-coloured mane into his nose. “I’m not just gonna ask for a favour and leave you hangin’. What kind of pony would Rai—would I be if I did something like that?”
Comet pulled himself away again and squinted.
“Oh?” he said.
“Yeah,” the pegasus said. “I’ll play ball. Whatta you feel like? You look like a colt who know what he wants. I’ll help you out if you’ll help me.”
Comet sured himself up against the wall. He could probably bolt in the other direction if he was quick about it.
His hooves wouldn’t move. He felt for the pouch tucked away to make sure it was still there.
“How much do you want?” he asked.
“Just a quarter off the top and I’ll do whatever you want,” the pegasus said. She stepped towards him, but Comet held up a hoof to signal her to stop. With his other foreleg, he grabbed the bag from behind his back and pulled it into view. The pegasus’s eyes lit up like there was gold underneath her nose.
“A fifth,” Comet said. His voice sounded the surest it had all night. “For whatever I want.”
“Come on, you can’t just—”
“Fifth. Take it or leave it.”
This was his element now. Money wasn’t what he needed, but he could make due with a skim for something else.
The pegasus’s face fell. Her eyes were wet, and bright. She looked in either direction, as though she expected somepony to jump out of the shadows and take over her negotiation.
Only the dim light overhead flickered at her.
“Deal,” she said, her voice heavy.
Comet nodded. He stepped forward, and the pegasus reached out her hooves with a hungry look on her face. Comet reached an inch away before he tucked the bag away again.
“Hey, what gives?! You said deal, don’t—”
“After,” Comet said. “I’m not dumb.”
“Don’t you trust me?”
Comet shook his head.
“No.”
The pegasus’s lip trembled for a moment before she let her head sink to her chest.
“Fine,” she said.
“Mouth first,” Comet said.
The pegasus sank to half-height like it was a practiced motion. Comet stepped over her with a similar ease. His hooves made a soft shuffling sound on the stone.
The pegasus’s face bumped against Comet’s hind-legs for a second before she found him, in the darkness.
She didn’t say anything. She opened her mouth and took him inside.
Comet groaned as he felt the pegasus’s lips wrap around him. He was already half-hard, but the softness of tongue and a feminine mouth taking his cock inside got him the rest of the way in no time. He bucked his hips forward a bit as he stiffened, and grunted when he heard a soft choke from the pegasus underneath him. She pulled her head back in short order though, and after a few seconds they both seemed to find a comfortable position.
The pegasus began to suck. The slurping noises echoed in the long stretch of alley. Spit dribbled out of her mouth onto Comet’s cock, and some onto his balls.
Every few bobs, Comet would push his hips forward, feeling the pegasus’s mouth pressed into the base of his dick. He could hear her wings flutter when he did that, tiny little pats as she pulled her head back to avoid choking again. He picked up the frequency of his movement, and groaned low when, after the third or fourth time, the pegasus simply held still and let him move. He took over from there, savouring the way her lips slid over him as he bucked. Closing his eyes and breathing with a slight wheeze into the night air as he fucked the face underneath him with the multi-colored mane.
After a few minutes, his forehooves jittered a bit on the ground. He picked them up and placed on the back of the pegasus’s head. She went to back away, but the force of her movement was like a paper-doll caught in the wind. Comet held her in place easily as he thrust again, and this time he could feel his cockhead pressing against the back of her throat. He could feel the twitch and spasms that came with the gagging noise, and the extra loud flutter of wings now as he swivelled his hips back and forth, grinding his head into every bit of the pegasus’s throat that he could fit himself inside. He heard the gagging begin to turn into panicked crying and pulled himself out.
The pegasus gasped as her air came back. She coughed and sputtered, wiping a hoof across her mouth. Her voice sounded familiar even when she was coughing. It made Comet twitch underneath his stomach.
“Up against the wall,” he said.
The pegasus spat against the ground and took a deep breath before standing up. She stood and, with shaky footing, placed her forehooves against the wall, arching her back and pointing her back end out.
Comet placed his hooves on her flank as he lined himself up.
“Wait.”
Comet stopped and looked down. The pegasus tilted her head back towards him. He couldn’t make out the expression on her face. The tears from her earlier coughing sparkled on her cheeks.
“Do you have any protection?” she asked.
Comet shook his head. For a moment, his expression faltered.
Fuck it. He had a unicorn friend who could clean up after if he needed it.
“No,” he said.
The pegasus turned her head back to the wall. Comet pressed down harder with his forehooves and moved his hips forward. He found what he was looking for after the third try. Just a little wet. He bit his lip as he slid forward.
The pegasus braced one of her hooves hard against the wall. It scraped against it as Comet pushed until he bottomed out. The pegasus flapped her wings, once, and let out a small grunt.
“Good stuff?” she asked, her voice strained.
Comet didn’t respond. He pulled himself back and slammed forward again with only a second between.
Alright, but not very tight.
The pegasus grunted as Comet began pounding her. She held herself up against the wall like she was clinging to it for support. She shook with each thrust, though sometimes she still shook even when he was pulling back. Every time Comet slammed home, his genitals made a loud, wet-sounding smack against hers.
“Hnnnh,” she said. She said it through her lower lip, which she bit down on.
“Can you make yourself any tighter?” Comet asked. He held himself inside as he spoke, moving his hips from side to side, looking for the walls of the pegasus’s cunt the way he’d felt her throat. The pegasus looked back at him with a glazed expression.
“Huh? Oh, yeah, sorry...” she looked forward again and braced herself harder against the wall. Comet could feel her muscles tensing as she seized herself up, clenching hard. He could feel the twitch around his dick, and the hint of a spot inside that his cockhead might be able to hit. He pulled himself back out, and groaned approvingly as he felt the soft rake of the pegasus’s insides around his shaft.
“Nice,” he said.
The pegasus smiled at him before returning her attention to the wall.
Comet began to fuck her harder. Each thrust jostled her body, enough that she started to lose her already uneasy footing on the stone. Everytime Comet’s crotch smacked into her ass, her wings flapped softly on her back. Her mouth parted slightly as the thrusting went on.
“Mhmm,” she said.
Comet grunted in response.
“Say something,” he said.
The pegasus turned her head back to him. Her face bobbled as her whole body shook with Comet’s thrusting.
“Say something?” She paused, giving a moment for a few thrust to pass. “Like... what?”
“Dunno. Just... something.” Comet sounded out of breath. A few beads of sweat began to brim on his brow, dripping down the side of his face as he kept pounding.
The pegasus pressed her forehead against the wall, her frazzled mane falling over her eyes as each movement drove her closer to the alley wall.
“Ohh,” she said.
Comet paused for a moment.
“Better than that,” he said, wiggling himself around inside the pegasus’s pussy.
The pegasus drew a deep breath before turning her head back towards him.
“Ohhhh,” she said, her voice low and husky, but still cracked with the high-pitched timber it had carried in her begging. “Fuck, that feels so good. You’re so big inside me...”
“Yeah,” Comet said. He picked up his thrusting with renewed vigor, pressing his hooves down extra hard into the pegasus’s backside. Kneading and rubbing her ass as he fucked her. “Like that.”
“You’re fucking me really good,” the pegasus said, curving her back a bit more, pressing her ass further up, which Comet responded to with an even faster pounding. “I can’t wait to... feel you cum...”
“Oh, shit,” Comet said with an earnest surprise in his voice. His next few thrusts came uneasily, jittering, and the pegasus froze as the thrusting behind her paused. She felt warm inside.
After a few seconds, the warmth was on her back—a single strip at the base of her wings leading down to her ass, the rest clumsily spurted on the back of her legs and butt.
Comet held himself up on the pegasus for balance as he finished cumming. He squeezed clumsily at his dick with his hooves as he milked out the last few drops, letting a river of white run down the pegasus’s hindlegs and ass-cheeks, in addition to the sizable deposit he’d left inside her pussy. “Shit,” he said as his body shook with the last remnants of his orgasm. He twitched as he shook out the final drip of cum. “Shit.”
The pegasus waited until she was sure he was done, as signalled by moving of his weight off her back, followed by the clop of his hooves on the stone, before she turned around. She smiled wide at him.
“Totally worth it, right?” she asked with a laugh that cracked at the end.
Comet didn’t answer. He drew out the pouch he’d tucked away and, with infinitely more care than the bits he’d thrown onto the bar counter, measured out one fifth of the bag’s contents. He held them out on his hoof.
The pegasus could barely contain herself as she reached forward. She scooped up the light, almost colourless powder with both forelegs, and cradled it to her chest like a mother holding a newborn foal.
A glob of semen dripped slowly out from between her legs and landed on the ground with a thick-sounding pap.
“Oh, thank you. Thank you thank you thank you, thank you so much. Really, thank you—”
“It’s fine.” Comet shook his head as he replaced the bag. He turned to what he guessed was the end of the alley as the pegasus let her eyes run over her payment.
Comet opened his mouth as though he might say something, but he closed it after a moment. As he stood, and watched, the pegasus turned from him, only half-way towards the wall, and shoved her face snout-first into the powder. Some of it puffed up into dust. The rest went into her mouth, where she swallowed it hungrily, or her nose, where she huffed and sniffed and sucked in every bit of it. The noises that came from her mouth were more animalistic and debased than any sound she’d made while he was fucking her.
After a few more seconds, Comet turned and walked down the alley.
Though the lights were bright elsewhere in Canterlot, they were dim in the back alley of The Underhoof. So dim that Comet didn’t see the peeling poster on the far wall to his right as he circled around the corner. A faded, sun-washed print on a blue background, advertising an amazing local show. Come one, come all, it said, to see the amazing Wonderbolts!
With brand new star member, Rainbow Dash!
The bottom of the poster was almost completely worn off—but, had the lighting been better, somepony squinting could have made out a date from over two years ago, if they had looked very hard.
In some parts of Canterlot, the light doesn’t shine.
