The small diner behind the Ponyville train station was not a place sophisticated ponies like Octavia Melody frequented often. She looked quite out of place as she sat at one of the outer tables, wearing a pink bowtie that made a mockery of the checkered tablecloth (and vice versa), and nursing a mug of hard cider for the third hour straight, sometimes looking wistfully out the window at the trains that came and went.

Ponies who do come in such places tend to have a good feeling for when somepony wants to be left alone, so the few other patrons at this time of the day sat well away from her, and in return she bothered nopony. Looking at her, one might have gotten the impression that she was out of place in a deeper, inner sense too, ironically making the diner the right place for her to be.

Of course there was nopony around who would appreciate that delicious little paradox.

Then Pinkie Pie came skipping through, humming along to the insipid pop music streaming from the sound system, on her way to doing whatever it is Pinkie Pie does.

“Hiii Octavia!”

Octavia looked up from her cider and stared tiredly at Pinkie.

Pinkie screeched to a halt. “Oh no, you’re sad! Why are you sad? Oh, oh, oh! I know exactly what you need to cheer you up. Wait here, don’t move!”

Then she zipped off, not waiting for a reply.

Not half an hour later, Vinyl Scratch barged into the diner and stomped up to Octavia’s table. She sat down across from her.

“What the spinning splat are you doing here?” demanded Vinyl.

Octavia looked up again. “What does it look like?”

“Well, it doesn’t look like you’re out playing a gig. Pretty sure I’d know if you had one anyway. And otherwise you only ever come to Ponyville to see me. So. What kind of creepy stalker are you?”

“The pathetic kind who can’t even bring herself to go to your side of the town.”

“So instead you sent Pinkie Pie to get me.”

Octavia sighed. “She’s your friend. Do you have a way to make her do or not do something when she gets an idea?”

“Point,” Vinyl said. There was a long pause. “So what do you think you’re doing here?”

Octavia made a show of collecting herself. “I’m being stupid. I shouldn’t have come at all. I know you need some time to stop being angry before we can talk it over properly, like grown-up mares.”

“Really.” Another pause. “Well, I’m here. So talk.”

Octavia shook her head. “I can hear you’re not ready yet. I respect that.” She looked back at her cider.

Vinyl started saying something, but caught herself several times. Eventually she gave up. “At least tell me why you did it.”

“Why I did what?”

“Why you did what!? You tricked me into, into brutalizing that stallion! And you just hung around while I did it, like it was all a laugh. Is that all I am to you, someone to laugh at while she destroys –”

“Vinyl, we’ve been through this already.” Octavia sighed. “I didn’t make you do anything. It was all something you decided to do. You were in charge of that scene; that’s how it works. And if you ask me, then I will readily agree that you went a bit overboard there, but –”

“Then you should have stopped me! Why didn’t you stop me?”

Octavia reached out towards her in a calming gesture. “Listen, precious, I don’t think –”

“Don’t call me that!”

“– Sorry. But that’s the point, isn’t it? When you’re being on top, what kind of friend would I be if I didn’t let you make your own mistakes?”

“A real one! Do you think I wanted to be a monster? Dammit, Tavi, I trusted you! You’re the one who knows how to top. You’re supposed to help me get it right.”

“And I would, if you had asked me.”

“Asked you? What the hay kind of behavior is it to wait for me to ask you when you can see I’m going off the rails?”

Octavia frowned. “I wouldn’t say you were ‘off the rails’ as such, just –” She stopped herself and rubbed her forehead with her hooves for some time. Then she shook her head violently. “Alright, I’m sorry if you feel I should have said more. Okay? Okay?”

“And what about him?” asked Vinyl.

“Who?”

“The stallion! The guy you made me brutalize! The guy whose life I ruined!”

Octavia sighed. “Vinyl, you’re entirely too hung up on what that mare said. Look, she’s his boss, alright? Of course it’s against the rules for him to have sex with the customers, so naturally he’d tell her he didn’t want to. Probably gave her a real tearful show for her money; it’s that or be fired. But you know he was actually having a great time.”

“Says who?”

Another sigh. “Really, Vinyl, I know you don’t do stallions a lot, but you had sex ed in school, didn’t you? It’s not generally a subtle thing whether they’re enjoying themselves.”

“That doesn’t mean they want it!”

“Yes it does. Trust me on that.”

“No it buc– why, you didn’t even know the guy! I thought he was one of your usual toy colts, whatever you call it –”

“Is that what you’re upset about?” Octavia reached a hoof across the table again, wearing a pained frown. “We’ve talked about that before, and you were okay with it then, but if you’ve changed your mind, just say the word and I’ll swear off stallions forever.” She paused. “Damn it, Vinyl, I need you. The things you do, the things you can take . . . Don’t you understand? You’re the one pony in the world I would put up this whole pathetic show for.”

Vinyl looked away, watching a train huff off towards Fillydelphia.

Eventually she said, so quietly it was barely audible over the music, “I miss the Tavi I could trust. I don’t know – I think she’s left Equestria. Together with the Vinyl I could wake up and like being.”

“Vinyl, how can I be that Tavi again?”

“I don’t know. Convince me you can be trusted, I guess. How about finding Fi–, I mean, that fine pegasus you made me abuse, and make good by him?”

Octavia sighed demonstratively, rolling her eyes. “Vinyl, read my lips here: It’s not about him. It’s about me and you. Us. Vinyl, I’m fucking desperate; I will do anything it takes to be alright by you again.”

Vinyl raised her eyebrows. “Anything.”

Octavia nodded. “Just tell me what to do.”

Vinyl looked at her for some time. “Okay, how about this: I know this guy in Manehattan who runs a nightclub . . .”

* * *

“Rise and shiiine!”

Light streams into the small room as the stallion kicks open the door. It’s not even really a room, more like a janitor’s closet with delusions of grandeur. There’s a grey-coated earth mare lying on the floor, in the space left between a mop trolley and a collapsed stepladder.

“I’m awake,” she answers, not moving.

“Then what are you doing there on the floor? Come on, the music’s about to start, and you’re gonna miss the show!”

“Oh, haha, very funny.” She tries to turn her head, but her neck is shackled tightly to a bracket in the floor. “Why didn’t you become a comedian?”

“A comedian, moi? When bartending pays so much better?” He reaches in with his magic and unlocks the small combination lock that held her collar together. “There are so many fascinating ponies to meet. And we both know you’re our real star anyway.”

She grunts while she gets on her hooves and steps out of the closet. It opens up into the back of the gentlecolts’ washroom.

“How are we feeling today then?” asks the bartender, still chipper.

“Hungry,” she says curtly.

“Oh yes, you didn’t make quota yesterday, did you? Tell you what, if you reach nine today, come up to me at the bar and you can have the tenth from me.”

“That’s what you said the day before yesterday. And then you went to the other end anyway.”

“I did? Oh dear me, how fickle and fleeting are the promises of ponykind these days! You can’t trust anypony! The offer still stands, though – who knows, perhaps today I’ll keep my word.”

She glares at him. “I’m thirsty too. I’m allowed to have water, that’s the rules!”

“But of course!” Ducking into the broom closet, he picks a floor cloth out of its bucket and dumps it into the long urinal. It makes for enough of a barrier that water begins to pile up upstream of it when he pushes the flush button. “Here you go, miss, best quality Manehattan tapwater.”

The mare looks between him and the trough in disbelief, but then sighs deeply and starts drinking from it. It’s probably the cleanest thing she’s going to taste today anyway.

While she drinks, the bartender runs a hoof across the short black fuzz growing on her scalp and crest. “Looks like your mane is growing out again. Time for a fresh shave soon, eh?” He grabs the dock of her tail as well, casually rubbing a hoof against her marehood as he picks it up. “Your tail too.” The short hairs on the stump are barely a quarter inch long.

“Yeah yeah, just get it over with.”

“Oh no, miss, no need to do anything rash right now. I’m sure you’ll be able to last for, oh, several hours before you’ll be hairy enough to need that.”

“By which time the place will be full of ponies,” she says flatly.

“Of course! We artistic types, we have to let the hoi polloi have their little diversions, don’t we? Oh, why couldn’t you have been a pegasus? A plucking, that would have drawn some real crowds!”

She saunters over towards a booth where a group of stallions have just started their first round of beer. It’s not easy to saunter when one has no mane or tail to swish, but she makes it work. More or less.

“Well, hello, stallions!” she says in her sultriest voice. She has to raise it a little to be heard above the music.

They look at her. Some of them decidedly looking her over. Good.

“Um, can we help you?” says one of the older ones, blue with a yellowish mane.

“I was wondering whether one of you fine equines might be interested in a free blowjob?”

The stallions look at each other. “A free what?” asks one of them at the other side of the table, a big black-maned guy.

She smiles at him. “Darling, don’t you know what a blowjob is?”

A few of the other stallions begin snickering, but he responds calmly, “I’m wondering whether you do. It’s not something mares are usually eager to pass out to strangers, even in a place like this.”

“Well, it’s your lucky day, isn’t it? Okay, to make sure everypony can follow along, I’m here to suck some cocks. Would any of you have a cock that needs sucking?” She blinks her eyes seductively.

“What’s the catch?” shouts a younger stallion at the back of the booth.

“No catch, no strings. You whip out your thing and I show you what heaven is like – full satisfaction or you get a free second try. You game?”

The stallion who shouted blushes hard and shakes his head, trying to shrink into the couch he’s sitting on.

“I think what he’s saying,” says the yellow-maned one who spoke first, “is there has to be something in it for you.”

“I . . . it’s –” Suddenly the seductress persona fails her. “I don’t get to eat unless I can find ten stallions to blow before closing time, and I didn’t make it yesterday, and I’m so hungry. Please, won’t one of you let me blow you?”

The stallions look awkwardly at each other again. One of them decides to be a wiseguy. “So if a blowjob buys you a meal, how much is a real fuck worth?” Yellow and black mane both glare at him.

She winces slightly. “I am not allowed to resist if you try that,” she says tonelessly. “But it won’t count for my quota. Please, can I just suck you off instead? It’ll be amazing, I promise.”

He waves a hoof in her direction, backpedaling. “Just kidding.”

“How about you?” She turns to the one of the stallions who hasn’t said anything yet, licking her lips.

“Um, no, sorry,” he says nervously. “I’ve got a marefriend.”

“Oh, come on, who says she needs to be told?”

“She’s my sister,” declares the black-maned one.

“Look, lady,” says the yellow-maned stallion, “we’d like to help, really, but I think that’s just too weird for all of us. Nothing personal.”

“I see.” She lowers her head, admitting defeat.

“Hey, can’t we buy you something to eat?” asks the one with the marefriend. “I think they serve food here.”

“Not allowed to accept that either. But thanks for offering.” She looks around to the others. “If any of you change your mind, come and find me. I’ll be around all night.”

She turns around and trudges away from the booth, trying to get back into the saunter.

“Good luck!” shouts yellow mane after her. “Sorry we couldn’t help.”

Later on she’s sitting on her chair, by the doorway towards the restrooms, staring into space for a moment.

A small gaggle of youngsters enter the club at the other end of the room. As soon as they’re all in, they make straight towards her. The unicorn in front walks with a confident swagger; the rest try to match his bravado with various amounts of luck.

“You the broad who gives out free blowjobs?”

She looks up at the unicorn. “Yeah. Interested?” It’s taking her a moment to get her charm into gear.

“Our friend Nimbus here thinks it’s time for him to become a real stallion. Isn’t that right, Nimbus?”

The group parts to let a pegasus colt through. “Hi,” he says, grinning nervously. He doesn’t quite look old enough for the bouncer at the front to have let him in. Yet here he is. “Um, what happened to your mane?”

“Let’s just say I lost a bet. Don’t worry; it’s not contagious. So you’re here for a good time?”

“I guess.” He glances around at his friends who’re boxing him in on all sides. “Are you sure it’s free? I don’t have any money.”

“Oh, you’ve come to the right place. It’s free like the sun and the wind here.” It’s been some time since she saw either. She stands up from the chair.

He shuffles his hooves a little. “Uhm, how does it actually work? Is there a room in the back we go to? Or is it just, like, a bathroom stall?”

She takes a deep breath – this is where it gets difficult. “Sorry, no back room. It has to be out here where it can be seen from the DJ box.” She points towards a raised platform behind the dance floor. The blue-maned pony up there grins and waves back at her.

“Here? That’s not – I’m sorry, I didn’t think – I mean, I thought it would be somewhere more –”

The unicorn interrupts him. “Nimbus, for pony’s sake! You’ll never get to anything if you keep locking up like that every time a filly talks to you.”

“Yeah, and we didn’t come all this way just to see you chicken out,” says another of his friends.

She walks up to him and puts a foreleg comfortingly around his withers. “Shh, it’ll be all right. You’re gonna be too busy feeling wonderful to even notice them. I promise.” She massages him gently while she murmurs into his ears.

“Really?” he manages.

“We’re all here to help you, pal!” shouts one of the hangers-on from somewhere behind them.

She feels something in him give way, the resignation of somepony who gives up fighting the inevitable. “That’s good, sweetie, now you just sit on that stool here, forelegs out to the side. Yes, like that. Then lean back and relax – I’ll do the rest of the work.”

He sits stiffly on the chair and presents his belly to her, breathing quickly and nervously. His stallionhood isn’t out from its sheath yet, so she moves her head in between his legs to suckle gently at one of his testicles. There’s no stallion she can’t get in the mood when she puts some work into it. He gasps when she first touches him and shuts his eyes, as if to make the room go away.

His friends stand clustered around them, most of them watching in disbelief or awe. The unicorn leading them is standing back a little, staring at the mare’s hind end. An erection has been growing between his legs since it became clear that Nimbus would go through with it. It doesn’t take long before he’s ready.

“Watch this!” he shouts to his comrades. When he has their attention he rears up behind the mare, forcing his stiff member into her exposed marehood. He doesn’t even have to swipe the shorn stump of her tail away.

“Fuck, Trotter,” says one of the colts. “You can’t do that! I mean, just fuck!”

“Why yes, that’s exactly what he’s doing,” says another one. They all laugh.

A few of them look nervously towards the mare’s head, expecting an angry reaction, but she merely moves her hind legs apart so there’ll be better room for him. She knew this would be coming, from the look in Trotter’s eyes when he first talked to her. She moves her head a bit to the left to nibble on Nimbus’s other testicle.

Trotter stands tall above her, his forehooves planted on her withers and pulling on her skin each time he rams into her. It only takes seven or eight thrusts before he’s done and pulls out of her to aim a deluge of semen at her buttocks and tail. At the last squirt he pushes off her croup with his forelegs and lands down on the floor, grinning smugly.

“That’s what all these sluts really want,” he explains. “Of course it’s against the rules for her to ask for it, so one needs to be a bit sensitive. Right?” He slaps her flank, far enough forward that it’s not dripping with semen. She doesn’t answer him.

“Okay, who else wants a go? Nopony? How about you, Comet?”

“Ew, no,” says another unicorn with a bit of a slow expression. “When she’s got your gunk all over? No way.”

“C’mon, don’t be a sissy. I’m sure you could get some napkins from the bar to clean her up with.” Trotter laughs at his own joke, but when he looks back Comet is nowhere to be seen. “Where did he go?”

“To the bar, I think.”

“You mean, he actually . . .? Oh, this ought to be good.”

Meanwhile, the mare has given up on Nimbus’s testicles and moved up to the opening of his sheath, reaching her tongue in to tease the penis out. He’s never had a marefriend to teach him the inside of the sheath is a place that needs washing too, but she perseveres, and his cock begins growing up towards the light. When it’s large enough to be seen from the DJ box, she steps to the side for a moment to make a clear line of sight.

The music that was playing stops abruptly, and in the sudden silence a spotlight comes on to illuminate Nimbus and the mare. Then the loudspeakers start blaring the theme from Offenbuck’s Tartaric Gallop. She didn’t think it was possible to hate an orchestral piece that much. With a sigh, she lowers her head around the penis in front of her and sets to work.

Comet comes back from the bar, carrying a stack of napkins that he sets down on the mare’s loin. “The barpony gave me some water too,” he announces, holding up a big glass of water in his magic. It has lemon slices in it, and a generous helping of ice. He pours some over the mare’s hindquarters.

She gives a jolt when the cold water hits her. Most of the napkins slide off her back, and she narrowly avoids emasculating Nimbus with her teeth in surprise. She shuffles a bit to the side, planting her hooves further apart to steel herself against this new onslaught. If she lets go of Nimbus now, it will all have been for nothing.

Comet alternates between pouring water over the mare and wiping her off with a wad of napkins that he holds in his magic field. Eventually he’s satisfied that she’s clean enough. “Ready now, ma’am?” he shouts.

She doesn’t answer. She has just managed to make Nimbus come and has enough to do with not choking on his load. She’s shivering from the cold, and Comet seems to take that as a sign of excitement, because he climbs onto her and takes careful aim with his dick before penetrating her. He ruts her slowly and methodically with a beatific smile on his face, hugging her forebarrel.

Nimbus finishes ejaculating, and she lets go of his cock. “See, that wasn’t so – oof! – bad, was it?” she asks, interrupted by a particularly deep thrust from Comet. Nimbus doesn’t answer, still sitting straight up with his eyes closed like when she began working on him, only now drenched in sweat. He unsteadily stands up from the chair.

“Okay, next, up front!” she calls out to the group at large. Nopony answers.

Comet has stopped pumping and lies draped over the mare, panting hard. Trotter nudges him in the ribs. “No falling asleep up there; there’s a line.” He snorts and climbs slowly off the mare.

“Anypony else for a blowjob?” the mare shouts again.

Trotter puts a foreleg around Nimbus’s withers. “Well done,” he says. “See, there’s the other end for you too, so you can really become a stallion.”

Nimbus wiggles out of his grip and backs away from him wild-eyed. “No! I’m not – I mean, that’s not – it’s all wrong!” He turns around and bolts towards the exit.

Trotter looks after him and shrugs. “Okay, who else –”

“– wants a blowjob?” says the mare hopefully, turning around towards Trotter. This brings her hind end in line with one of the earth colts, who seizes the opportunity to jump up and hump her. It takes him a few tries to get his cock properly into her, but then he’s up and riding her, basking in his friends’ attention. She lets her head drop in resignation.

“Way to go, Silver!” somepony shouts.

“Wait a minute,” another one interjects. “Comet, you just came inside her, didn’t you?”

“Sure did,” replies Comet proudly.

“So Silver’s basically wiggling his tap around in a pool of Comet’s jizz?”

Silver stops humping and looks uncertain as wheels begin to turn in his head.

“And, um, won’t that make you gay?”

“Aargh!” Silver pushes himself off her as if she’s burning him, and starts trotting panicky in place, half-erect penis dancing in the air under him. “No, get it off! Get it off! I didn’t mean to! Shit, what am I gonna do?”

The mare turns around to face Silver while his friends laugh at his misfortune. “You know, if you get an actual mare to lick the gay off you, I think that’ll break the curse.”

There’s a sudden glimmer of hope in Silver’s eyes. “You think so? Yes! That’s it. Thank you so much!” He rears up to climb on top of her head and push her in under him, smearing his dick desperately across her face so it takes her a few seconds to maneuver her lips around it.

Even while trying not to choke, the mare is aware that the spotlight comes on and Offenbuck starts playing again. Another point in her tally is recognized. Only eight more to go for today now – –

* * *

“– and when you’ve made quota on, let’s say, seven days, then we’re quits!” Vinyl grinned and wiped sweat off her forehead. She had become somewhat excited while she outlined the plan, throwing in piquant details left and right as she thought of them. “So, what do you say?”

Octavia stared at her open-mouthed.

“Vinyl,” she said at last. “You’re sick. No, of course I’m not gonna do that.” She stood up noisily, looking at Vinyl with disgust. “Seriously, Vinyl, you need to get some help. I don’t even know why I came here.”

Vinyl watched her leave, slamming the front door and stalking across the tracks towards the station.

“Right,” she mumbled to herself. “Anything it takes.”

After some time she sighed and stood up herself. She downed what was left of Octavia’s cider, and made her way towards the exit. She had her own anything to do.

Author's Note

Edited, as always, by Taialin.

And for those who don't get the reference, here is Jacques Offenbach's Infernal Galop.