You hold the pregnancy test in your hooves.

Negative.

Again.

A single tear rolls down your cheek and your hooves start to shake as you continue to stare at the test, hoping that it miraculously changes to "positive" - but to no avail. For several years you tried to get pregnant, waiting for your estrus and making preparations, finding a mate beforehoof and receiving several "fillings" of your mate's seed and keeping it in you as long as possible. But it doesn't seem to work.

What am I doing wrong?

You stare out of the window, the sun illuminating the world outside of your house. You see children playing outside, their parents chatting with each other, smiling. Another tear rolls down your cheek, bigger than the first. You turn your head and look in the mirror. All you see is your saddened expression. You massage your belly and think to yourself.

I always thought that it's the stallion's fault, that... that all of them have been... impotent or incompatible with me. But... I still have no... child.

Your legs don't want to carry you anymore, your body dropping to the floor, your head meeting the ground with an audible smack. You can't take it anymore, you start to cry and scream.

"Why? WHY?!"

The floor gets pounded by your forehooves as you continue to scream.
"It's not fair! I just want a child!"

You curl yourself together, holding your tail against your chest, caressing it as you would caress the mane of a child. Your child, your own. You fall asleep as you continue to cry into your tail.

A week has passed since you first visited the hospital to get a checkup. They took several blood samples and today is the day they want to talk with you about the results and perform other diagnostic procedures. You sit in an examination room which is relatively small and packed with apparatuses you can only imagine their purposes. The door creeks open and Nurse Redheart enters the room. She looks at her clipboard that she holds in her magic aura and closes the door. She looks up to you and smiles.

"Hello dear, how are you feeling?" she asks in her caring voice.

You look down and caress your belly, then back up to her. "Empty."

The nurse's smile fades. "Oh dear... I wish I could say that I understand."

She closes up to you and embraces you in a tight hug. All you can do is sniffle as a tear rolls down your cheek. Not because you feel empty, but because somepony cares about you. You don't mind that she cares because she's a professional, the hug feels too good to mind. Too good to hold back your feelings. She breaks the hug and looks at you in a warm manner.

"I have good news for you. The blood tests didn't return any results that are alarming. But..." once again the warm smile fades and a look of worry takes place in Redheart's face. "We still don't know what is wrong."

She hands you the clipboard which you grab with your hooves. Your eyes wander over the document, but all you can understand is your name and your birthday, since everything else are medical terms and values you don't understand. You give the clipboard back to Nurse Redheart who places it on a counter.

"I'm going to perform some diagnostic spells on you, are you okay with that?"

You simply nod in return.

"This might tingle a bit. if it gets too intense just tell me and I will stop."

She lowers her head and points her horn to your abdomen. Her horn starts to glow as a small beam finds its way to your belly. You gasp at the sudden tingling intrusion. First it's just your skin that is hit by the beam that tingles, then it gets deeper, tingling its way into your core. You start to shiver as the tingling experience gets to your ovaries - at least you think that it reached your ovaries. You can feel the beam exploring your inner depths and soon you find that your whole nether organs are tingling. Suddenly the feeling changes to a feeling that could be best described as massaging. You suppress a moan but your face blushes softly as the nurse explores every bit of your nether organs with her beam.

"Oh... dear..." she quietly says as she stops her spell and looks up to you.

"Do you go into estrus from time to time?"

You still pant slightly as you look at her, your head tilted slightly.

"Yes, of course. Why do you ask?"

The nurse looks away, a worried expression decorating her face. "Well... you shouldn't." You blink several times, trying to comprehend what she just said. Before you can say something she continues, looking back at you.

"What you experience is a false estrus. You just do what other mares do without you knowing about it. I hate to break it to you, but..." She closes her eyes and lowers her head.

"You are infertile."

Your mind races.

Infertile.

That word. Your world collapses around you. You realize you'll never get pregnant. You'll never be able to hold your foal, your own foal. You'll never see it grow, see it say it's first words and steps...

This realization hits you. Your legs give out and you fall from your chair onto the floor, a blank expression on your now tear streaked face. You just lie there, just breathing and crying as you feel a hoof on your side.

"I'm... I'm sorry... I can only imagine how hard that must be... Your ovaries are just... not working, I don't know why... but maybe there's something you may be happy with."
You look up to her, frowning. "I don't want to adopt a foal that isn't mine!"

The nurse flinches slightly. She hoped you take one of the children from the orphanage. Estrus leaves a lot of unwanted children.

"There's still another way." You look up to her, still frowning.

"You would help foals who don't have a mother by nursing them."

You open your maw to protest, but Redheart cuts you off.

"Listen before you reject this offer." Since angering the nurse is a bad idea you simply nod.

"You'd nurse the foals, either by milking via a machine or by directly nursing them, whatever you are comfortable with. The hospital pays you for your work and you get to help children in need." She caresses your mane to comfort you and silly as it seems - it works. Your breath slows down to a normal rate and you stop crying.
With hope in her eyes she looks at you. "So, what do you say?"

You look into her eyes, the pleading look nearly forcing you to agree. "What's the catch?"

She starts to smile warmly again as she realizes that you don't deny directly. "The only downside is that your teats will swell - obviously. But we have trained masseuses who will help you with that."

Nurse Redheart stands up and opens a cabinet, holding a small tube in her magical aura. "If you should agree to this, this will help you." She sets the tube down into your hooves. "This creme will soften the skin of your teats, making the stretching less painful." The nurse walks to the door and opens it, looking back at you. "Apply this for a week, twice a day, and come by again then. We will discuss everything else after that, okay dear?"

You look at the tube and then at the nurse. Nodding with a smile you respond "Will do."

Maybe it's not as bad as I think. Nursing foals is probably the nearest motherly feeling I'll get, so why not. I'll give it a try.

Author's Note

Yay, first chapter done!
"Billy, where the hell is our clop?!"
Probably not in chapter 1, silly. In due time, most likely in the next chapter - even though it will contain just plain milking and masturbation.

So, yea. Comments, thoughts, criticism?