Wants Become Needs

Dusk Shine came to on his floor, feeling like he’d slept for an eternity. He hated how his left wing felt under him. He’d slept on it, so it was on pins and needles as he sat up and stretched them, a few sinewy pops sounding off as his stiff limbs extended to their full length. He looked at the grandfather clock across from his bed and saw that it was half-past eleven in the morning. He’s gotten a solid six hours of sleep, even with the help of self-medicating. He struggled to get to his hooves, wobbling this way and that as he felt his center of gravity sway underneath him. He managed to grab his desk for stability, sighing and slowly standing up. His entire body felt weak, like he hadn’t moved since yesterday. Which he didn’t doubt. The stallion walked in an unsteady wobble to his bathroom door, already late to his study session with Lune.

A few minutes later he gasped as the cold water ran over him, not having the time to wait for the shower to warm up. He began scrubbing his mane as soon as possible, until he noticed a most unfamiliar sensation. It came from his loins, but he ignored it. Not just his stallionhood, but there was a new sensitivity in between his legs, right under the base of his tail that was calling for his attention. He continued bathing, electing to wash that area of him with magic when he came to it. Solar Flare had been right; this was getting worse as time wore on. Now he truly felt like a mare during estrous. Every bump of his rear against the sides of the shower sent waves of heat down his back legs, making him weak in the knees. The water running over his tail made him want to bite his lip, every rivulet of the warm water like a steady, persistent hoof against his marehood. His eyes flew wide as he reversed in the shower, unable to accept what he’d just thought.

“I am not a mare. I am a stallion, I like mares, and I do not have anything resembling what a mare has.” He told himself, still in shock that he’d thought of that area as something even vaguely resembling a mare’s organelles. “I’m not a mare… I’m a stallion. And I like mares. I do not have anything that could even possibly be used like a marehood would.” He began to repeat the phrase over, praying that he would begin to believe it if he said it enough.

The area beneath his tail told him otherwise.

Dusk Shine wore his typical crown and horseshoes, his head hung low as he trudged to his next meeting with Lune. He had humiliated himself in the shower, without even being around anypony. What could possibly happen to him next? It was as if there was no punishment, no blow to his pride that wasn’t going to go unused by this sickness of thought. He swore his flanks were working harder than usual, swinging for no more reason than to make him appear more effeminate. He cursed his body miserably, thinking of what else he’d be put through before this was all over. This… illness that was festering in his psyche, in his subconscious, was tearing him apart. His perception of himself was changing. He wasn’t the stalwart stallion he knew himself to be, he was becoming a vulnerable, defenseless filly as he was lapsing into the terminal phases of his infection. If luck would shine on him for once, he’d be put down before he recovered and found himself to be a sad, pathetic stallion with the mind of a mare in the throes of heat, thinking of satisfying himself at all hours of the day.

“Dusk Shine!” Lune called from down the hall, striding towards his student. “What the hay are you doing out here? You were supposed to meet me in the observatory an hour ago for astronomy.”

The stallion winced as the older prince cursed, however much his teacher hadn’t meant it. “I’m sorry Lune, I slept in and I’ve been dealing with a bit of a personal problem. I’m here now though, so can we get to the lesson?”

The prince looked taken aback by Dusk’s solemn tone. “Oh… well, I’m sorry to hear that. What sort of problem is it? Could I help in some way?”

“No.” Dusk Shine said quickly, not wanting to have to explain himself. He’d die of embarrassment and shame before the day was over. “Let’s just head to the astronomy tower.”

It took them both a half an hour to reach the astronomy tower, but once they were there Dusk Shine began to set up his things with renewed energy. The silence while they’d been walking was enough to let him clear his head of all this nonsense. He had to focus on his work now, and Lune of all ponies wasn’t the type to make concessions just because he was having trouble with his identity, or so he assumed. He couldn’t help but wonder what would happen if he actually told the stallion of his problems. Something about that thought intrigued him, of him actually coming out to the older stallion. The thought was struck down as soon as it popped into his head, shot like a starling in the sights of a practiced skeet shooter.

His teacher had to go back and make over six adjustments to his telescope before it was tuned properly, and even then Lune was shaking his head at how sloppily Dusk Shine was doing. They were trying to catch a glimpse at the Venus transit, the celestial event of the century due to its rarity. The planet Venus would be passing in front of the sun and, with the right filters and calculations, one could see its cloud structure, and even its surface at one point.

The observatory was a massive construction of metal and wood, each one used where it was suited best. The wood made for the insulation between the large steel beams that held the tower together, and the steel itself made up most of the inside. A light blue carpet lined the floor and great number of bookshelves were in place, all with books relating to the subjects of astrology and astronomy. There were windows lining the whole circumference of the tower, and a large telescope up on a balcony that made for the main observation deck. Despite the sunny room and pleasant view, Dusk Shine still couldn’t get into the spirit of things. He kept blundering about, making mistakes and knocking things over when his thoughts would consume his attention for too long.

“Is there something wrong? I know you mentioned a personal problem, but if this is going to be affecting your work, I think I need to know about it.” Lune pried, his voice slightly insensitive. “You’ve done several calculations wrong at this point, and if I hadn’t fixed them, we would have been staring right into the sun and been blinded. What has been going on with you?”

“It’s… very private.” Dusk Shine defended. “I don’t feel very comfortable talking about it.”

“Is there a mare giving you trouble?” Lune asked, curious. “Because if so I’m sure that it can be resolved if you’d just talk about it to her.”

Dusk Shine chuckled grimly at the thought of him in an actual relationship. “I only wish it was that simple.” He sighed. “What I’m going through it much more between me and myself. I’m not trying to be strong by pushing you out, but I honestly don’t know how you’d respond to me if I told you the truth.”

“What do you mean, Dusk?” Lune asked, walking over to him. “You act like you’re ill.”

“I am ill.”

The dungeons always made Dusk Shine’s skin crawl. It was just one of those places he went to feel scared, as if to forget his situation for only a second. Lune hadn’t pried any further into his business, and they’d been able to record the Venus transit with relative ease. Now Dusk Shine was wandering alone the dark alcoves of the catacombs, thinking of what he could do next. His suffering grades with both Lune and Solar Flare were causing them to ask questions. Soon they would force the answers from him, whether he liked it or not. What would he tell them? That he felt like he was slowly becoming a mare trapped in the body of a stallion? They’d throw him into his room and send in psychologists like there was no tomorrow. They’d think he’d dove off the deep end. He had no history of curiosity towards the same gender, and repeating dreams and sudden hypersensitivity of certain parts of is anatomy definitely fit the definition of psychological illness. Maybe manic depression, with bouts of schizophrenia due to his spontaneous, lucid hallucinations.

He would have to keep his symptoms bottled up, and learn to cope with his lot in life. Just as he thought he was truly alone in the world, with nothing but the mold growing in between the bricks to keep him company, he saw somepony moving towards him. He nearly fainted as he saw who it was. Flash Sentry, the one guard that he’d been avoiding since his first time in the castle. He knew that Flash Sentry was promiscuous, and meeting him alone in a dark place like this might just break his self-control, which was in short enough supply. The stallion was everything he wanted in a pony and more. Not to mention the guard’s overwhelming presence and reputation as a real smooth-talker towards the mares. He could just think of him trying to push Flash Sentry into attacking him. It would be almost easy for him to convince the stallion into mounting him.

‘Do it.’ A voice in Dusk Shine’s head whispered. ‘You need it.’

Dusk Shine watched the guard trot down the corridor, armorless, with his feathery wings to his sides. The expression on his face was so happy; maybe he’d just gotten a raise. The prince bit his bottom lip in an effort to contain himself. The other stallion just looked so… eager. Like he wouldn’t hesitate to push him to the ground and make him feel like a mare if he could only ask Flash Sentry. All he had to do was lure him over here and ask him using some of his feminine charm. The deal would be sealed, he’d have satisfied the burning that even now he could feel singing his loins, and he could get on with his life. It could have been so easy for him to just call out. All Flash Sentry had to do was notice him, and it would be enough. The prince could feel the sensation already, being pushed into like in his dreams, panting, gasping like a mare in heat as he pushed back on his master’s base, having sensual things whispered into his ears while the guard performed for him, using him like he was more a slave than royalty.

Dusk Shine had to exercise all of his control to push against the wall, letting the guard pass him at the other end of the hall. He wasn’t that kind of stallion, he kept telling himself. But this beast inside him, the thing that kept feeding him these carnal ideas, was getting louder. The sickness was taking control. How long would it be until he would be unable to resist it? To just lift his tail towards any stallion he set his eyes on, no matter who it was? Tears stained his vision at the thought. He’d come so close to losing control, to breaking composure and leaving his pride behind. He almost forgot who he was in the wake of the urges from his heart. What did this thing inside him want? Companionship? Or did it just want the sexual satisfaction and sensation of infinite shame that came with being dominated by a pony he didn’t even know? Either way one question remained. Why did he feel this way? And why did it all come back to Butterscotch? It had all started there, but why was he being affected in such a way? The two were only friends… so he kept telling himself.

Dusk Shine arrived to his study session with Solar Flare three minutes late and got an earful. His teacher was becoming less than amused by his truancy. The young scholar had to exercise all his will just to get to his normal chair in front of his teacher’s podium without bursting into tears. He was under enough emotional stress as it was, but Solar’s furious rebuke was enough to make him want to curl into a ball and disappear.

“I’ll have you know that Lune told me about how you could barely adjust your telescope today.” Solar Flare grated, unaware of his student’s distress. “If you do so badly in my lesson then I’m going to turn your room upside down and figure out just what has you so bothered myself. I wish that you showed as much enthusiasm for my lessons as you do for changeling reproductive habits.”

Dusk Shine looked at his teacher, confused. “How’d you know about me looking that up? I didn’t even check that book out.”

“The librarian came to me with the book you were reading, saying that you’ve been showing up in the library in the middle of the night and reading about the most heinous subjects possible. Is this what you’re so enamored with? Is this some sort of new fetish of yours?”

Upon hearing the word ‘fetish’ the stallion buried his head in his wing, shaking his head. “That’s not it.” He said, face on fire and the pressure behind his eyes building, tears at the floodgates.

“Then what? Do you plan on starting a breeding program between species?” Solar Flare continued, pulling over ten thick tomes from his shelf and throwing them down on his student’s desk. “I can count off the individual races here! Changelings, hippocampi, pegasi, earth ponies, unicorns, and as if to spit in my own face, draconequi, of all the senseless things. Are you curious about how Discord would couple with you if she ever escaped again? Because I can give you a firsthand account with sketches if you’d like!”

Dusk Shine got up, pushing his chair across the room, falling on its back into the carpet. That was too far. He stared up at the leader, feeling like he’d been kicked in the gut. What he’d just said was completely unfair and they both knew it. Nothing justified such a low blow. The student turned and left the room, unable to look at his teacher any longer. All he wanted now was a pony who would understand, who would tell him that this was alright. A phase that he was going through. But nopony was, so all he could do is think of it how it felt to him. A full-blown psychological affliction, one that would fester in his head until it consumed his personality and left him a husk of a pony, driven only by his needs.

“Dusk Shine-” Solar Flare started, but stopped, seeing that his student was gone.

Dusk Shine looked at his hooves, unable to see how much things were changing. How fast they were becoming a nightmare. He was beginning to wonder if he’d actually died during that terrible accident with the spell Solar had sent him, and that he’d been sentenced here as a sort of personal hell. Nothing here was fair, and nothing he did seemed to help him, only wade deeper into the viscous pool of madness that was becoming his imagination. He couldn’t think of anything to write as he sat in the back of Canterlot Library, nothing except the terrible lusts that kept shifting at the edges of his consciousness. He swore he heard whispering from behind him, promising rewards if he sought Cadenza out and seduced him before his wife returned home. Dusk Shine shook his head like a cat trying to whip at insects buzzing in its ears. These thoughts just wouldn’t go away.

Then there was the worst of them all. The thought of Butterscotch and him back at the library in Ponyville. He’d had seven dreams in a row that week that focused on just that moment. He’d relived that same span of time a thousand times and each time it had been the same, with him being a foal and turning away to go to bed without him. They had been an inch from one another and he hadn’t even bothered to ask if he was interested. He could have just… reached out with his magic and given him a signal, maybe put his hoof on his, or maybe even leaned over and given him a kiss on the cheek. He slammed his head down on the desk so hard the bookshelf in front of him rattled, the books shifting slightly. He knew his forehead was red as he leaned backwards, looking around to see if anypony had seen his immature display of pent-up stress.

There the mare that was the librarian, shaking her head at him again. He didn’t even bother; he just got up, pushed the chair in with a loud crack as the wood hit the desk, and walked in the opposite direction, further into the library. She looked stunned by his display, and stood for a long while watching him walk away. She knew that he was a disturbed young stallion, at least she could see that much. She watched him go, wondering what was so awful that such a lover of books would ever be upset in a place with so many.

Dusk Shine shook himself inside, deciding that he knew what he’d be looking up next. He would go to the medical handbooks and look up castration methods. Maybe then this would finally stop, if he threatened himself with eternal inadequacy towards every gender. For all he knew it might work, but he knew one thing that wasn’t changing. Everything came back to Butterscotch, and his inability to face him. He could fee this terrible vortex of nightmares now, and his shy friend was at the center of it all, driving him to seek out things from other stallions that he only wanted from him. The young pegasus was the real cause of his distress, and now that was fairly clear. In his dreams he always saw the eyes of Butterscotch staring back at him. In his hallucinations the pony that was looming over him in the depths of his passion always had wings, or flew. It made sense now. But it didn’t help him much. He still didn’t want to confront his feathered friend about his thoughts.

“Honestly, what am I going to say to him?” Dusk Shine asked himself. “’Hey Butterscotch, I just wondered if you’d use me like a personal sex slave for a few days so I can release a little stress. Is that okay with you? Okay, great, let’s go to my room where nopony can hear us screaming like animals.’”

“It might help.” The librarian said, looking down at him from a high shelf.

Dusk Shine nearly jumped out of his skin, looking up to see her perusing the shelves for a particular book on sexual psychology and how it affected one’s physiology. She clicked her tongue loudly as she found it, pulling it off the shelf and sliding down the ladder she was standing on, keeping her balance perfectly from years of experience.

“You should read this.” She said, pushing the book towards him with a hoof. “Your friend Butterscotch will understand, just try not to make it so straightforward as that… charming recital. And for the love of Solar Flare’s flank you’re just heartsick.” She rolled her eyes, turning away as he gave her a questioning look.

“That’s all it was the whole time?” He asked curiously, looking towards the librarian turned wise-mare. “That was why I was acting like a mare in heat? And having crazy daydreams?”

The librarian turned around and walked back to him, sighing like he was taking up too much of her time. “Look, unicorns in particular are very in tune to their emotions, and if they are emotionally distraught, the tiny amount of magic that’s constantly inside of you will make you begin to see things, based on the level of stress. Since you’re an alicorn, this is doubled. Plus, you really, really do like Butterscotch. He makes you feel like you belong, and that you’re important, a feeling you’ve hardly ever felt. Avoiding him just caused a great deal of tension for you, physically and psychologically. That… and you can’t deny you want him, in a way that only a mare does. There’s no shame in that.”

“So this whole time my emotions were making me see things…” Dusk Shine said to himself. “So wait, who are you again?”

When he looked up the librarian was gone. After looking around, he shook his head and turned to leave, thinking of how odd his life had become. He was taking advice from figments of his own imagination after all. He couldn’t help but think of what she’d said, thought. Maybe he should just come to terms with himself and let things play out… Butterscotch would probably understand.

With his mind set, he made his way towards the exit. He’d invite Butterscotch back to his library in Ponyville, and they’d have a quiet evening together, with tea and maybe a bit of book reading. Except this time, if Dusk Shine saw the opportunity, he’d ask, that way he wasn’t filled with regret. Even if the whole evening was a bust, he would have an answer to his question, and could move on with his life.