Nosing & Tasting

by Aurora

Rating: mature
Tags: My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, Other, Romance, Octavia, Sex, Human, Sad
Length: 12632

Two kindred spirits share a bottle (also of spirits), and other things besides.

Wherein a certain renowned equine musician and a nondescript human female—having discovered that getting their not-quite-so-disparate universes to briefly overlap generally involves getting really hammered—find solace in each other's company (and a nice bottle of whisky).

(F-Human/F-pony, first-person perspective)

Published 2013-06-28 22:10:02 UTC
Last updated 2013-08-14 21:49:55 UTC

La part des humains

Nosing and Tasting

Chapter 1: La part des anges humains

"I wish I could drink like a lady. I'll have one or two at the most.
Three and I'm under the table; four and I'm under the host!"
- Dorothy Parker

[ What to expect this chapter: no sex yet, whisky, silliness, heartbreak, flirting, kissing ]

"My word! How on Equestria—or, or wherever you are from, did you ever get your hooves—I mean—" Octavia ran a hoof over her face in frustration. "Oh, for crying out loud... What I am trying to say is: how did you manage to obtain something like this?"

I smiled at her idiomatic fumbling, having made similar gaffes myself already. By some incomprehensible cosmic coincidence, we both spoke perfectly good English—although hers was perhaps just a tad more perfect, with that adorably posh, vaguely British inflection—but there was still a language barrier of sorts between the two us.

"The internet," I replied simply. Which probably wasn't a very informative answer, I realized a moment later.

Octavia was generally gracious enough to gloss over my idiosyncrasies though; this time, too, she hardly responded to my using yet another (to her) meaningless term.

"Oh yes," she said approvingly, leaning in closer to the bottle in an attempt to decipher the fine print on its label. Which was a bit of a challenge, given the sparse light offered by the flickering candles around us. "Yes, this will do quite nicely, I think."

Looking at her out of the corner of my eyes, it struck me how even the mildly irritated way in which she brushed away a lock of dark mane obstructing her vision was effortlessly elegant. On top of that, she was also very good at masking her more neurotic tendencies. Take, for example, the nonchalant way in which she inspected the bottle and the set of glasses next to it in such a way that, when all was said and done, they just happened to be neatly lined up which each other, the way her perfectionism demanded.

Despite her obsession with the precise placement of our glassware, I couldn't help but notice how she was performing nearly every action in the same, overly-meticulous fashion so typical of the inebriated. It was actually pretty cute how she was still pretending to be in full control of all her faculties despite the obvious slur in her speech. Not to mention the way she was slightly wobbling from side to side... (Except I just did mention that, of course. Whoopsie.)

It made me glad we weren't seated on anything as precarious as, say, chairs, but had instead opted to sit safely on the ground. She seemed to be more comfortable that way regardless.

"I'm glad you approve," I said jovially. "Would've hated to have to create another rift in space and time just to fetch another bottle of booze."

She studiously ignored my playful sarcasm. "I imagine it was rather expensive though... It's over forty years old, if I'm reading these numbers correctly!" She frowned. "How many bits was this?"

"Bits? Uh, well, assuming an exchange rate of... Factoring in inter-dimensional VAT... That would make about, um..."

I used my fingers to do some made-up calculations, adding and subtracting in an exaggerated manner and muttering about 'carrying the one.' I did this mostly because it seemed to amuse my ungulate drinking buddy to no end.

"A lot," I said eventually.

"Quite." Octavia's head bobbed up and down in the sagest of nods.

I gestured to the bottle. "Shall I do the honors, then?"

"By all means," came the ever-polite response.

Which was a pity really, because I would've loved to see this semi-intoxicated pony attempt to pop the cork using only her mouth. Aside from the obvious entertainment value, I had to admit that, tipsy though she was, there was something strangely graceful, even somewhat erotic, about the oral dexterity Octavia had been putting on display thus far. Watching her toss back her glass using only her teeth really was something else to behold. The novelty of it hadn't quite worn off, and I was guessing it probably wouldn't anytime soon.

"It is your bottle after all," Octavia added in response to my dawdling, pointing a slightly unsteady foreleg my way. "Therefore you ought to be the one to open it."

I shrugged. "Fair enough, oh eloquent one."

Octavia studied my hand as it grasped the neck of the tall whisky-bottle with apparent interest. "It should be a trivial task for you, what with all of those redundant digits."

"Pfft. Least I'm not forced to traipse around on my tippy-toes all day," I shot back, before the giving cork a twist with said superfluous fingers and pouring us both a good measure of dark amber liquor, spilling only very little in the process.

I'd brought along a typical tulip-shaped whisky-tasting glass myself, whereas Octavia had gotten out a (far more earth-pony-friendly) sturdy tumbler.

"May I perchance offer you a complimentary drink, Miss Clippity-Clopperton?" I said, as I slid the aforementioned glass towards her across the floor, saloon-style. "On the house!"

"Why, don't mind if I do, Miss McNohooves!" She stopped the tumbler from careening past her with a well-placed hoof and inclined her head gratefully. "Much obliged."

I smiled to myself. The excessively polite, archaic language we used; the silly and ever-changing nicknames... All of these were things that had spontaneously grown between us since that first, fateful meeting, little in-jokes we both found absolutely hilarious. We hadn't known each other for very long at all, yet sometimes, it almost felt like we were already old friends.

Octavia glanced down, probably noting just how generous I'd been whilst pouring, and narrowed her eyes at me, the way one would when suspecting someone of nefarious schemes.

"You know, if I didn't know any better, I would almost say you were trying to get me drunk..."

I laughed, only to act shocked and scandalized a second later. "Why I never! I would not dare stoop to such underhanded tactics—unless the lady in question was exceedingly attractive." I gave her a meaningful look during that last bit, waggling my eyebrows.

The way she averted her eyes and flushed ever-so-slightly at this frankly terrible excuse for a compliment was, simply put, unbearably adorable.

"Hmph! Well, I'll have you know that I can hold my liquor very well, thank you very much."

"Except I'm, like, twice your size," I helpfully pointed out. Which was only a slight exaggeration from my part, by the looks of it.

She probably had a brilliant comeback to my scurrilous implication that she was in any way a lightweight, but I fear I am unable to reproduce it here, seeing as how it was tragically interrupted by the cutest little high-pitched horsey-hiccup I ever did hear.

Octavia clapped a horrified hoof to her muzzle, giving me a pleading-but-stern look that said, in no uncertain terms: "You did not just hear that."

I cracked up. I couldn't help myself; I just couldn't stop laughing. Thankfully, my laughter proved infectious: Octavia eventually joined in, getting a good chuckle out of her own 'inexcusable faux pas'. And of course the hiccups didn't stop at just that single one... Between the uncontrollable giggles and the involuntary spasms, it wasn't long before the poor mare was struggling for breath.

Naturally, seeing her in such a dire predicament, I helped out by suggesting ever more outlandish ways to 'cure' the hiccups, until she was quite literally (and breathlessly) begging me to stop. Once I did, Octavia slowly but surely regained control of her diaphragm, although the effort involved left her panting and more than a little sweaty.

"Oh, oh sweet heavens," she gasped, "it hurts to laugh..."

At this strategic moment, I employed my secret weapon, letting out a loud, supremely unladylike yet completely unapologetic burp. In our current state of inebriation, this was, of course, absolutely and without question, the funniest thing ever, setting us both off again.

"You humans!" she huffed, trying and failing to convincingly feign indignation, "No sense of decency whatsoever, I see!"

"Says the girl wearing naught but a bow-tie," I quipped back, referring back to a previous conversation we had had concerning the—to a prudish human, at least—shockingly clothing-optional nature of pony society.

We exchanged a few more playful verbal jabs, chuckling softly.

After a while of this however, it dawned on me that Octavia's responses had grown almost robotic. Even her laughter rang strangely hollow. The pony opposite me seemed distant, hardly even noticing when I stopped laughing and abruptly stopping herself, once she finally caught on.

Picking up my glass, I pretended to nose my whisky in silence. It was only then, as I surreptitiously studied her, that I noticed her eyes. In the dim light of the candle-lit room I imagined I could see a strange interplay of light and shadow within them, as they stared off into nothingness. The embarrassed smile plastered onto Octavia's muzzle, too, had changed almost imperceptibly; it seemed now a mere shadow of itself, bereft of all genuine mirth.

I just couldn't make sense of this sudden and inexplicable swing in her mood.

"You okay, hon?" I inquired cautiously, trying to catch her eye.

It was a while before she reacted, returning to the here and now with a mildly bewildered, "Hm?"

"Earth girl to Equestrian Girl, earth girl to Equestrian Girl, come in please!" I said, mimicking a distorted radio voice. "Status report!"

Octavia blinked at me, and only then seemed to realize how badly she had zoned out. There was an abrupt dip of her muzzle when she hastily looked down, avoiding my gaze.

"I'm, uh—" She cleared her throat and tried again—"I'm fine, thank you."

I didn't buy it, of course; something was clearly bothering her. When pressed, however, she seemed evasive, and would only say that she had been reminiscing about someone. A mare who had apparently been, and I quote, 'the cheapest date ever,' as well as 'very much inclined towards teasing her (not to mention belching).'

"It's all just so unfair," Octavia muttered under her breath.

I wasn't quite sure how to respond to this rather cryptic statement.

"Uh, nobody ever said life was fair, I guess?"

Which was an extremely tacky thing to say, of course. Dammit, brain!

Octavia raised her head, seemingly shrugging off whatever was bothering her, although the goofy smile that appeared on her muzzle seemed overly wide.

"Yes, I suppose so," she said, nodding slightly. "Sorry about that."

"That's all right," I said, still a little embarrassed by my own banality. "If there's anything I can—"

"That's quite all right," Octavia interrupted. "Let's... Let's just focus on the whisky for now, shall we?"

"Yeah. No prob."

At least Octavia seemed to genuinely perk up a little after taking the first, tentative sniff of her drink. Her expression certainly suggested she was enjoying the volatile aromas wafting from her glass.

"Pray tell, Great Hairless Whisky Sage," she said, in comically reverent tones, "in what type of cask was this so-called 'Scotch' matured?"

Now there was a welcome change of subject!

"Oloroso sherry ca—" I paused, considering—"Wait, do you guys have something called 'sherry' here?"

"Of course we do!" She sounded like I was accusing ponykind of the basest barbarism. "It's produced from the Potro Ximénez grapes that grow near the city of Jennet de la Frontera."

"Naturally," I said, taking yet another uncanny coincidence in my stride.

We had long since stopped being surprised by all the remarkable parallels that seemed to exist between our two worlds. Now, we just rolled with it. Even the completely bizarre and inexplicable could become commonplace after repeated exposure, it seemed.

Remaining in varying stages of drunkenness at all times helped quite a bit, too, in that regard.

"We also have whisky, you know," Octavia drily pointed out, almost succeeding in masking the accompanying, obnoxious little smile.

"You don't say!" I exclaimed, as if we hadn't already imbibed several dramfuls of quality trotch from the famous Clydesdale distillery tonight. "I thought you guys only enjoyed salt-licks!"

"What a preposterous notion!"

"Ah! But then surely you ponies must be veritable experts on all matters alcoholic!" I continued undeterred. "So please, your horsiness! Share with me the intricate aromas detected by your no doubt incredibly skilled nose!"

I was kidding of course, but Octavia rose to the challenge with her usual aplomb. As we compared notes, I was forced to defer to my tasting partner's superior sense of smell quite often.

"I'm getting some jammy notes," I might, for example, venture to say, sticking my nose into the glass and sniffing carefully. "And raisins, of course."

"Strawberry jam," she would then immediately correct me, her nostrils flaring as her sensitive nose picked up all the nuances I missed. "And an entire concerto of raisin-y goodness. There's a second layer, too; this really is a complex beast! Camphor, mint and licorice... Some faint touches of tar..."

I raised a brow. "'Raisin-y goodness?' Really?"

"Give me a break," Octavia groaned, rolling her eyes.

We glared at each other. Then we laughed.

A sip later, we were both smacking our lips and exchanging thoughtful 'hmm'-s, 'yes'-es and 'indeed'-s.

When it came to the palate, at least, the playing field was a little more level.

"It's pretty drying," I noted. "Lots of oak. But that's to be expected at this age."

She couldn't argue with that, though she did hasten to add, "It's not cloying, though. The tannins are actually fairly enjoyable. Pretty impressive for a first-fill cask!"

We continued like this for quite a while, nosing and tasting, poring over our respective glasses and picking out countless delicate flavors and fragrances that ran the gamut from raisins to figs, from dark rum to sweet sherry, and from cigar boxes to mints.

And then, gradually, like a babbling brook gently petering out, our lively discussion became ever more intermittent, until only the occasional tap of our glasses on the table remained. We drank, and listened quietly to the classical music playing in the background. (It was a piece by her favorite composer, and so, inevitably, also a favorite of mine.)

It wasn't an uncomfortable kind of silence; not really. Just two kindred spirits enjoying the things they loved, savoring each silky-smooth swig and every beautiful note. A quiet moment of introspection, spent gazing at navels—or, in Octavia's case, studying the tears of slightly-viscous single malt lazily trickling back down the side of her glass.

With a shock, I realized that she was actually fighting back tears herself.

She had that forlorn expression on her face again, which kept stealthily creeping onto her face during unguarded moments such as these, rolling in like a dark cloud and covering up the bright sun of her smile. I'd seen this happen several times before, tonight, but only when she thought I wasn't looking.

I'd had enough. "All right, let's have it then!" I said brusquely, slamming my nearly-empty glass on the table to punctuate my demand.

Just then Octavia caught herself, hastily recomposing her face into an unconvincing smile.

"Come now, what are you on about? Must you speak in riddles?"

It was a decent enough facsimile of her customary, slightly haughty exasperation, including the single raised eyebrow. She usually only broke that one out during performances with the Ponyville Philharmonic...

"Your dismal story of heartbreak and woe," I insisted. "C'mon, out with it!"

There was only silence at first. I could hear her swallowing. Considering.

"V-very well." Another lengthy pause, and then: "I—thought I had found the love of my life," she began half-heartedly, staring intently at the dark, inscrutable liquid in her glass. "She appreciated everything I was, and embodied everything I wasn't. She changed me for the better and influenced me for the worst." A melancholy smile played along her perfect, darkly delineated lips; I could tell that this was probably where the inevitable 'but' would rear its ugly hindquarters. "But she wanted to see other ponies, too, it turned out. Said only being polyamorous could truly make her happy, that we should have an open relationship... Said monogamy was for squares..."

There were no tears, but the words coming out of her mouth were clearly the gall of an injured heart, their taste and tone both so bitter she very nearly spat them out. I'd never heard her be quite that terse before, not in all the long hours I'd known her...

"Whereas you'd much prefer being square over, say, assuming a trapezium-like shape, I take it," I said facetiously, for lack of anything actually helpful to say.

"Trapezoid," she corrected me automatically, like the adorable pedant she was. "But yes..." A humorless laugh—purely for my sake—followed. She looked so sad, toying aimlessly with her glass with the tip of a forehoof. So alone.

Another muzzleful of whisky seemed to strengthen her a little, at least, washing away the bad taste left behind by her tale and temporarily anesthetizing the sharp pangs of fresh heartache.

By that time, however, I'd already made up my mind and sprang into action.

The sudden burst of movement startled her a little, but before she knew what had hit her I'd pulled her into a spontaneous, comforting hug. She seemed to resist it initially, remaining stiff and tense and motionless, but eventually leaned into me, her narrow chest and shoulders deflating as she let out a lengthy sigh.

And then, finally, it all came pouring out.

"M-music is my life," she stammered, her lower lip trembling. "I don't have much time to pursue relationships, to go out on dates and meet ponies the way others might. When I met Vinyl in a bar... It was pure serendipity. We talked for hours that first night. Even though she lived a completely different life; even though we had dedicated ourselves to completely different styles of music... I just, I just thought that we were on the same page, that we understood each other—better than anypony else. Like, like we were meant to be together, you know?" She looked at me with shining eyes, the light within them kindled by fond reminiscence. But fairly soon a shadow passed over them again. "I couldn't have been more wrong. We grew apart. I tried to make it work, but... I refused to acknowledge our glaring differences, thinking them surmountable, when really... Goddesses, I was such a fool..."

She buried her snout in her hooves and broke down sobbing.

"Aren't we all?" I said soothingly, gently patting her back. "You were merely listening to your heart, the advice of which isn't always the most well-thought-out, to put it mildly. But there's no shame in clinging to someone dear to you, Octavia, even when it proves futile in the end. At least you tried." Struggling with the limited ability of words to offer genuine comfort, I also tried a heartfelt: "If you ask me, Vinyl was a fool to ever give you up..."

She sniffed, but looked gratefully up at me. "Oh, look at me," she scolded herself, scowling and wiping angrily at her nose, "crying like a heartbroken little filly. Pathetic!"

"Here..." I said, and I gently cradled the side of her head with my hand. With a swipe of my thumb, I wiped away the fresh tear that was rolling down her cheek, following in the dark and damp trail blazed by its predecessors. It was a tender gesture but also an intimate one. This seemed to confuse Octavia momentarily, the conflicting emotions vying for supremacy of her facial muscles. The resulting expression was pretty hard to read.

Just when I decided I'd best retract my hand, however, I felt the velvety fur of her cheek beginning to slide affectionately along the tips of my fingers. Fairly soon, this pleasant sensation was exchanged by another: that of a slightly-moist nose experimentally nuzzling at the proffered palm. A sigh's worth of warm air hit the inside of my hand, and a soft, muffled sound—not unlike a nicker—briefly became audible.

Octavia's eyes were closed now, and even though faint traces of liquid pain still clung to her lashes, there were the beginnings of a smile upon her face.

Carefully, slowly, I ran my splayed fingers along the length of her muzzle, across her cheek, past her temple, and up into that luxurious, jet-black mane. Her face noticeably relaxed the moment my fingers began caressing her scalp, her mouth staying every-so-slightly ajar afterwards, in a barely-restrained little perma-gasp.

"I really rather like you, you know..." those parted lips whispered tremulously after a while. Octavia's cheeks regained some color after this admission, and she flashed me watery smile.

Now it was my turn to blush. Did she really mean what she said? I mean, drunken people (and ponies alike) do have a bit of a habit of simply blurting stuff like that out...

I said nothing for a while, unsure on how to proceed. It was a while before I realized I still had my arms wrapped around Octavia, and that she hadn't moved an inch. She seemed to grow warmer to the touch the longer I held her, even though she herself kept trembling in my arms.

And she was looking up at me, surreptitiously, expectantly, while at the same time trying her darnedest to appear disinterested in anything more than a simple hug being shared between two (unlikely) friends.

(It was fast becoming obvious to me why Octavia'd been attracted to a sexually adventurous and outgoing pony like this 'Vinyl' character in the first place: it relieved her of the need to take initiative, to overcome her own uptight nature.)

"So..." I said. Always a great start to a sentence, that. "Uh, you're into girls, then?" It didn't take me long to realize just how ridiculously transparent that casual observation had been. Really not something I'd intended to say out loud, but, you know, copious amount of whisky were involved. "Mares, I mean," I corrected myself awkwardly, being, as always, brutally efficient at making things worse.

Octavia smiled disarmingly down at me, peering over the edge of the gaping hole I'd dug myself into.

"Indeed; I like all of those things." She hesitated for a moment, taking a sudden and keen interest in the strings dangling from my sweatshirt, before finally confessing: "And, erm, stallions, too."

She looked up again. Her grin was sheepish but also—if I wasn't just imagining things—just a tiny little bit closer by.

Had she scooted closer to me when I hadn't been looking? I couldn't be sure.

"Good. That's good," I responded lamely. "Equal opportunity, then, huh?" I could tell that my ineptitude was actually empowering her, building up her confidence and putting her at ease. I was, in essence, succeeding by screwing up. Go figure.

I leaned forward an inch without really thinking about it.

"I guess you could say that..." Her voice was really quiet now. But then, there was no reason for her to raise it at all; she was so close our noses were almost touching.

It was like gravity, or magnetism, or some other fundamental force of the universe—inexorably pulling us in.

"I—" I paused to blink in pleasant disbelief. "Wait, is that your hoof on my butt?"

It was a purely rhetorical question: there was unmistakably something flat and hard absentmindedly touching the (reasonably curvaceous) seat of my jeans; something which, I was sad to discover, could not have been yanked back faster had it been fondling the white-hot core of a sun.

"Oh no! Oh no, I'm so dreadfully, terribly sorry!" Octavia cried in utter embarrassment. "I wasn't thinking! I just got lost in the moment, and for a second I thought—I thought you were—" She quickly aborted that sentence. "I got carried away," she concluded apologetically.

Laughing (and hiding my disappointment), I did my best to put her at ease. "It happens. Simple case of mistaken identity. No, really, it's all right! I don't mind."

Octavia nodded, looking quite relieved. I was certain she'd be beating herself up over this 'inexcusable slip-up' for quite some time still, though.

"Besides," I added, winking, "now I know you weren't lying when you said you were into girls."

"Ah, um, concerning that matter... What about, well, what about yourself?" She was trying to put on an air of nonchalance, but couldn't really hide her curiosity.

"What about me?" I replied evasively, ever the insufferable tease.

She was quite justified in rolling her gorgeous, purple eyes. "Come now, don't be coy."

"Well, I'm pretty fond of stallions, too," I said—only to regret it a moment later. "Wait, that sounded kind of wrong."

Her thin brows furrowed almost instantly. "How so?"

"Uh..." My brain balked at the prospect of explaining this human taboo to a magical talking horse, of all things, threatening me with summary implosion should I dare get it mired in that particular moral morass. "I just meant I like... guys. Males. In general."

"Ah." Her disappointment was almost tangible. "So—"

"—and you," I interrupted her, prodding her fuzzy chest with an index finger for emphasis.

Her reaction was priceless: Her mouth hung open, suspended in mid-animation, until she finally came to her senses and managed to close it again.

"P-pardon?"

"I like you," I said plainly, gently taking hold of the flabbergasted mare's shoulders and looking her directly in the eye, so that she could see this was no jest. (I was feeling particularly bold, for some reason; the cask-strength whisky coursing through my veins probably had a lot to do with that.) "As in, I like you a lot. I'd totally like to have sex with you, I guess is what I'm saying. In a heartbeat, or at the drop of a hat—I'd take any excuse, really."

"I—" My blatant honesty seemed to have fazed her quite a bit. She pulled away a little, as though burned by my touch.

Just when I feared I'd made a terrible mistake, however, she blurted out: "I'm really flattered!" There was a lot of furious blinking before she continued, and it was obvious she was choosing her words very carefully. "But, but I'm not sure if I'm ready for, for a new, uh, you know, relationship." She fidgeted frantically with a poor, innocent little lock of mane, biting her lower lip. "So soon, I mean," she hastened to add.

"Well, I don't want you to do anything you might regret," I told her in all honesty.

But then, after much internal struggle, Octavia held up a hoof to stop me from saying any more and took a deep breath, mustering all of her not-inconsiderable courage, "Actually, I... Well... What I mean to say is, I would very much like to, to be intimate with you tonight, too, actually... I'm just not sure if you would, you know, be okay with us just... Without being... Uh."

"I understand," I said happily. Then, with a modest smile: "I'd be quite content just to be your extraequestrial rebound girl, if need be."

She made to protest this—vehemently, from the look of things—but I silenced her with a kiss on the nose. Her look of blushing bewilderment I answered with my patented capricious and carefree smile.

She rubbed her nose gingerly, with a shaking hoof. "Well, you certainly mean more to me than that..."

I bowed my head in gratitude. "I'm very glad to hear it."

"But just so you know," she announced formally, as if I might try to impugn her character, "I generally don't make a habit of engaging in so-called 'one-night rodeos.'"

"I wouldn't dare imply anything of the sort," I said dryly. And then promptly contradicted myself with: "Besides, nopony has to know. It'd be our little secret."

Octavia allowed herself a nervous, yet surprisingly flirtatious whinny-giggle. I noticed a twinkle in her eye. "True. And, well—it would be a start, I suppose..."

"The beginning of a beautiful friendship," I murmured, half-expecting her to totally get that reference and reveal the improbable existence of a movie called 'Casablankflank,' or something similarly punny. Thankfully, she was much too busy being all giddy and sexually repressed, sparing me the mind-boggle.

"I've... never done anything with a human, though," Octavia confided in me, scraping circles into the wooden floor with the cusp of a hoof. "I didn't even truly believe they were real until you came along."

"Well, that makes two of us then," I joked, trying to inject a healthy dose levity. "Don't worry though: it's my first time, too."

"All right. So where do we, uh—"

"C'mere you." Without further ado, I decided to take charge for a moment, literally taking the hopelessly passive and proper little pony by the hoof and pulling her over to me. "First, we need to get this thing off of you," I said firmly, indicating her eternal bow tie. "This was a casual dress party to begin with, and it has now officially become clothing-optional."

(Of course, every party in Equestria was clothing-optional, but that was besides the point.)

Once I had rescued Octavia from the offending garment, which had so cruelly been constricting her neck, I knelt down on the floor behind her and instructed her to sit back and relax. It didn't help, of course, but I didn't rely on words alone: Digging my fingers into the now-naked pony's tense shoulder-muscles, I played the part of amateur masseuse as best I could, following the breadcrumb-trail of vertebrae and slowly working my way down her neck and back. Then I let my hands wander, branching out in meandering, symmetrical patterns, kneading and smoothing out every nasty knot they came across.

"Ooooh, sweet merciful sun goddess, where have you been all my life?" Octavia sighed out.

"Around. You like?"

"Do I ever," the pony-shaped pile of putty in my hands cooed, leaning back against my chest in a leisurely sort of way. "Your fingers are so strong! And you're so gentle, and so, um, soft."

This wasn't very surprising, given the fact that my breasts were currently serving as makeshift pillows for the reclining pony, pressing flat against her withers and back.

"A-are those your—?"

"Yeah. Don't worry though, it doesn't hurt."

She still decided to get off of me, rolling over and dragging herself up onto four supremely unsteady hooves. But at least she didn't feel the need to apologize again.

"They're in such a weird place," she observed, leaning in a tad closer for a tentative peek down my cleavage. "Don't they get in the way?"

"Sometimes," I replied conversationally, casually cupping and weighing the subject matter in my hands, below the partially-unzipped sweater, showing off a little. "But they sure do make hugs more interesting!"

Octavia looked on with interest, shifting her weight from one hoof to the other nervously, while her tail flicked to and fro. "I imagine so." And then, eagerly: "I would really like to learn more about you humans and your unique, um, bodies."

"Fine by me," I said, and I smiled widely.

Our eyes met. With mirrored, automatic gestures, we both brushed aside our bangs, keeping them from getting in the way. Then we spent a fraction of an eon staring at each other, suspended in a sea of mutual reservations, held back by shame and self-consciousness and fear of rejection. But bonds had already been forged between us, and our inhibitions had been lowered, most of our doubts and insecurities mollified by the heady synergy of whisky and wanton lust.

And then, finally, the sexual tension that had been building between us came to a head.

In the end, I could not tell you who broke the spell and made the first move; it was all a blur of unbridled desire exploding into a flurry of movement. All I can recall was that I held out my arms upon hearing the sound of rapid hoof-falls on the floor. This was followed by a dull impact against my chest, and then a whole lot of not-entirely-human affection started being lavished upon me.

There was the nosing, for one thing. At my arms, my chest, my neck, and even my hair. It gave me goosebumps; the change in skin texture seemed to fascinate my curious little fillyfriend quite a bit. And I could hear her inhaling, sniffing, instinctively taking in my scent. I thanked the stars that I'd taken a shower and decided against wearing perfume that day. (I assumed terrestrial fragrances were probably a lot less dilute than Equestrian brands, given how olfactorily challenged we all are.)

And then there were our attempts at nuzzling, our mismatched faces rubbing lovingly albeit awkwardly against each other. Her stumpy snout bumped clumsily against my chin a few times, whereas my own nose somehow ended up in her thick mane, which, together with her downy facial fur, tickled something fierce. Eventually I had the presence of mind to employ my far more conveniently-shaped hands to play with her muzzle and cheeks instead, tracing the contours of her beautiful, equine face until she was shivering in delight.

Octavia gave me a look. It was subtle, but still I instantly noticed how her eyes had changed: Half-lidded, sultry, and mysterious they were, her massive dilated pupils strewn with entire constellations of twinkling stars. But then, in the literal blink of an eye, those purple-rimmed little universes vanished, closing into two cute little black arches. Octavia leaned closer, tilting her muzzle up and pursing her flawless lips; a nervous flick on her tongue ensured they were invitingly moist and shiny.

How could I possibly resist?

We'd pretty much finished with the nosing, I figured, so now it was high time to have a taste.

Our kiss was preceded by a clumsy but intricate ballet of tilting heads. We were both pretty uncoordinated, after all, and her muzzle was kind of in the way. As a result, there was also a lot of embarrassed giggling involved. But we made the best of it, both of us leaving a trail of searching little smooches on the other's face until, finally, my lips found hers.

They were warm and smooth against my own, but also a little bit wider, making it hard for us to truly lock lips. But we didn't let that ruin our fun. We hummed softly, intentionally producing a wide variety of ridiculous kissy-kissy sounds, like we were playing with musical instruments instead of each other.

But we couldn't remain quite so silly and unaffected forever, of course. We grew more and more serious after every little break we took, be it to catch our breaths or just to exchange smoldering looks. The level of passion between us escalated quickly, with hands and hooves coming into play, doing everything from squeezing innocent shoulders to fondling firm little flanks. Our tongues, too, grew restless; she was the first to lick me, her long, broad tongue easily covering the entirety of my lips in a single, affectionate lap. I quickly followed suit and teased the tip of my tongue along the very edges of her smile, following the delicate curve of her upper lip. Eventually, it was all I could do to just keep licking back feverishly and allow her to explore my mouth.

"Well," Octavia gasped eventually, panting from the sheer intensity of it all, "that was—different..."

She wiped her muzzle in a sheepish sort of way, no doubt a little self-conscious about the cowlick-riddled mess that had once been her carefully-groomed facial fur.

"Bad different?" I said, cocking my head and trying to hide the fact that I trying to pluck a number of little grey hairs from .tongue.

She shook her head in response, leaving me sputtering against a faceful of her mane.

"My word, are you all right? I'm such a klutz..."

"Wasn't your fault."

And it totally wasn't. We were just so close together still; close enough for the breath spent on those words to feel slightly chilly on our still-glistening lips. This prompted Octavia to moisten hers with a smidgen of warm saliva again—and then, as an afterthought, mine as well.

"For the record, it was a very good kind of different," she clarified in hushed tones, chuckling at my mutterings about rough pony-tongues.

We had a bit of a staring contest then, still nose-to-nose, daring each other to make the next move. Her gaze kept shifting, focusing first on one of my eyes and then the other, in a comical back-and-forth. We shared breath without hesitation, already completely comfortable with such close proximity, our personal spaces having evaporated approximately ten minutes of Prench-kissing ago.

"Oh hey, I still have some whisky left," I noted, glancing at my glass.

"Ah. Indeed you have." There went that eyebrow again.

"Just wait," I told her, before getting up, snatching my glass off the table, and downing the last dregs of my drink.

I did not, however, choose to swallow it just then.

Instead, I knelt back down next to Octavia and calmly took her head in my hands. She looked utterly adorable, looking up at me all befuddled and bemused, with those wide and faithful eyes, those folded-back ears, and with her cheeks being gently smooshed.

She might have been a little unsure initially, but quickly figured out where I was going with this, and blushed her approval.

"Open wiiide..."

Bashfully, Octavia opened up a little bit, allowing me to slowly transfer the pleasantly-burning contents of my mouth over to her muzzle, by means of world's most intoxicating kiss. I felt her shiver beneath my fingers—and not from disgust. This was the kind of act only lovers could appreciate, and she clearly loved every extremely intimate second of it.

The richly-sherried aftertaste lingered long after I let her go.

"Don't swallow it yet," I told her.

Octavia nodded breathlessly, swilling the expensive whisky around a little as she would when tasting normally, before getting up to return the favor, steadying my face with her forehooves whilst she allowed the lukewarm whisky to dribble back out onto my outstretched tongue.

(I got some pleasant off-notes of wet hay and grassiness with all of the raisins and mint this time, along with faint hints of those sugary donuts I knew Octavia considered her greatest sin.)

We totally indulged ourselves. Pressing our lips together again, we managed to swap the precious spirit back and forth a few times, although it was now really more of a blend, increasingly intermingled with both human and equine saliva. Granted, it was a slightly messy affair, with not a little bit of diluted whisky trickling down our chins as well, but in the end we had milked the last of our sample for all that it was worth, having sloshed it around betwixt two eager tongues until the exquisite taste had completely saturated our taste-buds.

"And that was just completely lewd and unsanitary," Octavia said shakily, after having been the one to finally gulp down the thoroughly-shared muzzleful. And then, with impossible-to-say-no-to hopefulness: "Can we, erm, do some more of that?"

"That it was," I agreed, acutely aware of even the slightest bit of friction caused by the fabric on the inside of my bra. "And that we can."

I didn't even try to hide the damp spot in the crotch of my pants anymore, even spreading my legs a little when I felt a surprisingly forward hoof caressing my thigh.

Our fit of debauchery had gotten us both extremely hot and bothered; we could keep neither hands nor hooves to ourselves anymore, and Octavia's ever-expressive tail was swishing erratically behind her, as would mine have been should I have had one.

"W-what do you want me to do?" Her eager-to-please yet uncertain smile darn near broke my heart.

"Weeell," I said with my most unassuming smile, a bit distracted by the way those perky ears kept swiveling around as I played with them, "I don't mean to take advantage of such an innocent little pony, but—"

"No, no, please do," Octavia interrupted me heatedly, giving the low-cut V-neck of of my semi-exposed shirt another longing glance. "I wish to take full advantage of you, myself." Surprised by her own candor, Octavia blushed furiously, but continued nuzzling the nape of my neck nonetheless.

"Why Miss Melody!" I gasped. "If I didn't know any better, I'd say you were coming on to me..."

"Oh be quiet, you," she said huffily, trying not to laugh. 'This innocent little pony, for one, would very much like to see what type of frivolous human-style undergarments you're wearing underneath all of those scandalously excessive clothes..."

She dragged a long, languid lick across my defenseless clavicle, eliciting a shuddering sigh.

"Well when you put it like that..."

La part des petits poneys magiques

Nosing and Tasting

Chapter 2: La part des anges petits poneys magiques

[ What to expect in this chapter: sex (finally!), awkwardness, failed stripteases, boobs, oral ]

Counter-intuitive as it may sound, when it comes to oral sex, some people (and ponies, too) seem to prefer giving over receiving. As I was staring up vaguely at the shadowy beams on the wooden ceiling, I found myself idly wondering why that was...

There's the psychological high of getting to stimulate your partner to such an extent, of course. The super-intimate interactions help, too; all of your senses are constantly being treated to some form of pleasing feedback, be it a heated moan, a look of adoration, or the ultimate pay-off of a shuddering climax. There's also the exhibitionistic thrill of being watched intently when you're doing something so dirty and sexy—or just the thrill of performing such an act to begin with, really. Lastly, there's the sense of power that comes with it, the feeling of being in complete control of your lover's pleasure, curiously juxtaposed with the submissive position you'll generally find yourself in. All of these things combined, to some, actually outweigh the base physical pleasure of being on the receiving end.

Just goes to show that the brain really is the most important sex organ.

To be honest though, I really hadn't pegged Octavia as being the type of pony to whom this might apply. I mean, here was a mare who generally preferred to keep everypony at foreleg's length, whose self-admitted worst nightmares were public pony-restrooms and who couldn't go two bites of food without reaching for a napkin. For all intents and purposes, you'd expect her to be the first mare to shy away from something as intensely 'hooves-on' as going down on another girl.

Yet here I was, flat on my back on a floor which was now a fresh set of fingernail-scratches richer, trying to fathom what was going on between those perky equine ears—when I wasn't too busy passionately crying out her name, I mean—as Octavia lovingly licked me closer and closer to a helpless orgasm.

She was like a different pony, unconcerned with the sticky, embarrassingly copious arousal dampening the business end of her muzzle and undaunted by the exotic (and perhaps pungent) taste and smell of a human female. She actually seemed to be savoring the experience, savoring me, her oxytocin-addled brain rendering any such concerns moot.

At least, I hoped it was...

When I lifted up my head to look at her she was lapping tirelessly, having already worked her way up along my inner thighs, lavishing lick after superficial lick upon the naked labial lips, already plump and puffy with arousal. She was preparing me, teasing me, getting me nice and wet and steamy with both tongue and snout and subsequently using her cute, stumpy nose to spread the love.

Her eyes were closed; it was almost as if she were in some kind of trance. But just then she chanced to look at me, studying my ecstatic face with those breathtaking eyes. I was absorbed by them, my mind instantly put at ease; perfectly transparent and enormous as they were, I could detect no boredom, impatience or suppressed revulsion in them, only genuine, dreamy enjoyment.

Octavia was clearly loving every slow, drawn-out, sopping-wet second of this—and therefore so was I.

My neck-muscles could take the strain no longer, though, so I let my head drop back to the floor with a minor bonk. As the room swam slightly before my eyes, my thoughts began drifting again...

Earlier that night, when we'd still been mostly sober, she'd played me a difficult and moving étude on her beloved cello. I had been enraptured, marveling at her skill and wondering how she managed to stay upright on her hind legs when she had to balance such a heavy instrument at the same time. Not to mention how she was able to manipulate the bow with such delicate precision with only those (purportedly rather clumsy) hooves to work with.

It required such self-control from her part, such mastery of her limitations, such discipline... Only then did I realize that she had truly devoted her entire life to her craft, to this one instrument. Most ponies become very focused and single-minded once their cutie mark manifests itself, but the level of dedication Octavia displayed was, if you ask me, simply unprecedented. To say merely that she was talented would be an insult.

But now I was seeing another side of her. I was glad to see that there was room still in her broken heart for something other than her music; some part of her recognized there was more to life than that. She just needed to just let it go sometimes, let herself go, even if only for a little while. As such, what she needed was somepony to distract her, to get her to lighten up and safeguard her from falling into all-consuming obsession.

Vinyl had been perfect in that role; I was a far less suitable candidate. After all, I would soon have to go back from whence I came...

I tried to recall how we had ended up like this; the exact details of our night together were beginning to grow fuzzy in my mind. It felt as if the memories hadn't even gotten a chance to sink in properly before being washed away again by waves of spine-tingling pleasure.

What I did remember was how, not too many licks ago, our mutual arousal had reached a fever pitch, after much flirting and kissing and whisky-swapping. Octavia had quickly grown frustrated with my excess of clothing, particularly after she herself had been stripped of her formal attire, which, in accordance with all the rules of Equestrian etiquette, had consisted of a single bow tie. This gross imbalance in our respective states of undress had to be amended post-haste, we'd unanimously agreed.

Of course, as we all know, getting into a human girl's pants can be a tad complicated...

My hoodie had offered little challenge with its handy-dandy zipper, which had practically been made to be lovingly unzipped by an eager little pony's teeth. Nor had the tight-fitting shirt beneath it, although there had been a bit of fumbling and mutual giggling as it had briefly refused to go all the way over my head, rendering me both temporarily blind and extraordinarily goofy-looking.

The striped pair of socks on my feet hadn't been much a match for Octavia's oral prowess either—although she'd been surprisingly reluctant to see them go. When prompted, she would only bashfully admit to finding them 'strangely appealing' on me.

Getting rid of the jeans, though... Well, that had proved a bit (or two) more time-consuming.

As we all know, getting out of a human girl's pants can be a tad complicated.

"How did you ever even get into these things?" a bemused Octavia muttered, sounding a little winded after several fruitless attempts at extracting my legs. The hoof-sized scuff-marks on the wooden boards behind her were a testament to her epic struggle and ultimate failure to gain any kind of traction.

"Lard," was my deadpan reply. "Lots and lots of lard."

She raised a brow while I continued struggling with it, wiggling in an attempt to get the tight denim past the first hurdle: those obnoxiously wide, childbearing human hips and my Celestia-level posterior.

"Is that some form of lubrication?"

Pony. Vegetarian. Right.

"Oh hey, look!" I said quickly, suddenly blessed with the superhuman speed and pulling-power of one in dire need of a distraction. "They're finally coming off, see?"

Thankfully, my eagerly anticipated and violently blue G-string proved sufficiently distracting.

"It's, um, it's not particularly covering, is it?" was the first thing that occurred to Octavia after I'd twirled around a bit to model my fancy human undies for her. Tilting her head and stroking her chin with a hoof, the intrigued mare looked more like she was studying some abstract piece of art, rather than a (extremely realistic) piece of arse, "I thought humans wore clothing mostly to compensate for their tragic lack of a nice, warm pelt?"

"Well, they don't all have to be quite that practical, do they?" I pointed out. And then I thrust out my scantily-clad bottom a little, giving it a illustrative wiggle.

"Touche," she said slowly, appearing to be partially hypnotized by the dancing bum in front of her. "S-so these are purely for, um, aesthetic purposes then?"

"That's one way of putting it. Kind of like that saucy little lacy saddle you have stuffed in the back of your closet."

Impressively, the mortified mare managed to go from blanching straight to full-on blushing in about the space it took to sputter, "H-how did you—"

"Oh, I have my sources," I replied with an enigmatic smirk. When pressed, I might have reluctantly admitted the anti-climactic truth: that I had noticed it, alongside other assorted pieces of bedroom tack and toys, when she was rummaging around in there, looking for her hidden emergency stash of alcohol. But the look on her face was just too precious!

Even more vexing to the embarrassed little pony, once she had recovered from the shock, was my bra—a bright blue, balconnet-style number with soft demi-cups, numerous adorable little bows and plenty of floral lace. Particularly when it came time to unclasp it, which Octavia had adamantly insisted on attempting herself.

"What manner of sadistic human came up with this confounded contraption?!" she wondered aloud—as had untold generations of teenage boys before her. "What could possibly be its purpose, other than to frustrate would-be lovers?"

I told her about the oft-unpleasant interactions between gravity and boobs, and the discomfort that might result from them without proper support, particularly for more buxom individuals such as myself. Then I carefully explained how its magical anti-gravitational properties worked to keep from keeling over, as well as how the thin layer of soft inner padding protected me from sudden frontal impacts. And of course I didn't neglect to mention that, on top of all of this, it also doubled as an emergency flotation device!

"True, they do look rather heavy," Octavia admitted, showing some sympathy for the plight of all bipedal and top-heavy creatures, "but surely, enabling one to easily remove said garment with their teeth wouldn't detract from these crucial functions in any way?"

I couldn't really argue with that. So I did the next best thing and took it off for her, thereby automatically winning the entire argument. Particularly when, in a classic stripper move, I lobbed the piece of lingerie at my adoring audience of one.

"Impractical as these things are, I must admit that the craftshumanship on these embroidered bits is rather remarkable," Octavia commented dryly, peering down her snout unflinchingly at the discarded bra that hung there. Only then did she toss her head to fling it off.

That made me laugh; she really was the perfect Straight Man. Except she wasn't technically straight, of course—nor a man, in any sense of the word...

Still.

Getting back to the serious business of getting nekkid, I turned around, bent over at the waist and hooked my thumbs behind the thin straps riding low on my hips, slowly and provocatively pulling last remaining vestige of decency down my long legs.

Octavia averted her eyes, ostensibly to preserve my mostly-non-existent modesty, but I still caught her stealing plenty of furtive glances. In fact, it wasn't long before she dropped that pretense entirely.

"Oh hey! I didn't know humans had cutie marks, too," she observed enthusiastically, derailing my last-ditch effort at salvaging this thus-far-not-very-sensual striptease.

I paused—I'd plumb forgotten about the tattoos. There were the subtle tribal designs on my lower back, which I now somewhat regretted. And then there were the little red hearts on my hip... The largest of which, re-inked and rendered broken after the fact, still bore a name.

Something I definitely regretted.

"Right..." I didn't really want to go into my own past, so I decided to provide some fluffy exposition instead.

"It didn't just appear there magically though," I told her. "Sometimes, humans like to decorate their bodies by, uh, having another human—usually a big, hairy, sweaty one—strap them to a chair and then stick a bunch of needles full of colored ink into their skin. Repeatedly. Uh..."

That really hadn't sounded even half as non-insane as I'd intended it to. Some spokeshuman I was turning out to be...

"Oh," Octavia said, her ears flattening. With a doubtful frown and matching smile, she added: "Well, that sounds... unpleasant."

Translation: "That sounds absolutely dreadful; you humans must be certifiable to go through all of that." Given that the design on my tush didn't even denote any kind of special talent (other than a talent for making spectacularly bad, alcohol-fueled decisions), I had to admit, albeit begrudgingly, that she was probably right.

"It's, uh, fairly pretty though, isn't it?" I suggested hopefully.

"Oh, yes..." Octavia said softly, reaching out with a hoof and touching the tattooed skin, lost in thought for a moment. "Very shapely indeed."

"Wait, are we still talking about the tattoo?" I said with a grin, pulling her back to the present. "Or are we discussing the relative attractiveness of my luscious human rear?"

"Erm, both?" Octavia giggled. She blushed guiltily, pulling her foreleg away like a filly caught red-hoofed in the middle of raiding the sugarcube jar. But there was also a glint of defiance in her eyes, a brazen sort of je ne sais quoi. And then, in a surprisingly risqué move, possibly due to her significantly lowered inhibitions, she gave my nearly-naked rear a playful swat, leaving just the slightest rosy indentation of a hoofprint.

"I daresay it's a pretty nice flank—" She paused just a beat before the predictable punchline—"for a biped."

"Eep!" I gingerly rubbed my freshly-spanked behind. "Hey, did you just intentionally touch my butt, or was that just me?"

"Color me impertinent, but... I do believe I did, yes." She beamed up at me as I looked over my shoulder, a little startled by her own boldness but otherwise looking quite pleased with herself. "Third time's a charm, shall we say?"

"We shall," I concurred. And then I pulled down my undies the rest of the way, sensually swaying my hips—at least, until it became clear that peeling the clingy, damp thing off wasn't going to be quite that easy.

Dropping to her haunches, Octavia looked on with polite interest at the whole ungraceful spectacle. "Are they always this, erm, sticky on the inside?" she said pointedly, just as I was hopping around on one foot.

She probably would've come across as far more sincere if she hadn't been smirking like that.

"Yes..." I lied, before unceremoniously tossing the panties-in-a-bunch over my shoulder. A moment later, after several seconds of dumbfounded blinking, Octavia was frantically attempting to dislodge it from her right ear.

"Augh! Again with the throwing!" she cried, rearing up a little, her forelegs flailing comically. "Would you please... stop..."

She trailed off as soon as I turned around, her ire instantly forgotten. When I noticed where Octavia's eyes were automatically being drawn to, it was my turn to blush.

"You're so smooth," she said softly, forgetting her impeccable manners for a moment and staring unabashedly at some of the most private parts of my body.

There was an audible gulp from her part. I quickly found myself reciprocating. We spent the next few moments seeing who could blush the hardest and fidget with their hair the most.

Octavia won.

(I'd like to say she won 'hooves down,' since I'm the type who enjoys a good pun. Or even a terrible one. But really it was kind of close.)

I mean, there we were: Both as naked as we were going to get, facing each other within a semi-circle of discarded clothes. Our goofy, flirtatious smiles had faded, to be replaced with far more apprehensive ones—mere shadows of their former cocky selves, bereft of all drunken bravado.

It was only now, I think, that we realized we were actually going to do this thing; that, all playful bantering and silly shenanigans aside, things were getting serious, moving beyond mere tipsy flirting, heavy petting and the occasional experimental girl-on-mare kiss, into territories unknown.

We were so different—to the point of belonging to entirely different species—yet united in our taboo-transcending desire for a little love and affection. We were so painfully unfamiliar with each other's bodies, which made everything a little awkward but also, in a way, all the more exciting...

It was like being virgins all over again.

I brushed my bangs out of my face. Again. I couldn't help it; the way my soon-to-be first equine lover was admiring me would be enough to make any girl feel a little self-conscious. It was pretty flattering too, sure, but I wasn't quite as used to nudity as Octavia was. And it wasn't entirely fair to begin with: whereas her sex was neatly hidden away between a set of haunches and an enormous tail, mine was now on full display. There was a niggling little twinge of shame; some part of me was willing my arms and hands to take up strategic positions between my legs and across my chest, or to go find a fig leaf or something, but I steadfastly ignored such impulses. Raising myself up to my full height and stretching luxuriously, arms above my head, I decided to revel in my nakedness, stripping off every last shred of clothing and modesty.

"Are you naturally this, erm—" With some difficulty, Octavia tore her eyes away from my exposed and cleanly-shaven femininity, only to get stuck in stare again somewhere halfway between my tummy and my face. "—f-furless?"

"Almost," I replied, sauntering over to the stammering mare in order to liberate her from her ridiculous-looking new headgear. "Certain parts require a little maintenance."

"I see..." She didn't really, of course; for one thing, her eyes were far too busy following every little sway of my breasts—which were right next to her face at the moment.

I briefly explained about the ordeal of frequent hair-removal, secretly jealous that fate had spared marekind the endlessly recurring rituals of exfoliating, shaving, moisturizing, rinsing and repeating. (Then again, I didn't even want to know what Octavia's shampoo budget looked like, how many hours she had to spend brushing and grooming that coat, or what kind of monstrous files and clippers 'getting one's hooves done' generally entailed.)

She was hardly even listening. "Are they, are they always this, erm, for lack of a better word, swollen?" she said breathlessly.

"'Fraid so," I said, shrugging and smiling sheepishly, a bit bemused by Octavia's fascination with the more obviously mammalian parts of my body.

"Not that I find it unattractive, mind you!" she hastened to add. "In fact, they're rather alluring in a way..." It was pretty funny how she was addressing my chest rather than my face, in a manner usually reserved for the males of my own species. "It's just, I've never seen ones this big before; not since that one pornographic movie Vinyl made me watch." An involuntary giggle escaped her but was hastily stifled. "It featured this, um, this obscenely well-endowed mare from Trottingham. Ahem. With teats like you wouldn't believe. Engaging in all kinds of... You know, activities."

"Did you like it?"

The question seemed to shock her. Octavia froze, going a little shifty-eyed. "N-no. No, of course not! It was poorly acted and amateurishly scored, utterly tasteless and exploitative, and, and—"

"—and the two of you made like horny bunnies after watching it?"

I could say this with a knowing smile; it couldn't be a coincidence that the brassiere laying at my feet had a cup-size measuring in the higher echelons of the alphabet, and featured some much-needed under-wire as well. Octavia must have had a good reason to be drawn to me...

Or two good reasons, to be precise.

Octavia, however, declined further comment and quickly changed the subject. "Well, these are certainly more proportionate than hers, while remaining fairly, uh, prominent."

"Well, I'm glad to hear it," I said, beaming. But then I allowed my smile to falter and feigned a wince. "They're a little sore though..." I let that sentence hang there, like an open invitation. Pouting, I reached up to massage my poor, poor boobs, which still bore the faint floral marks of being cruelly imprisoned for so long.

"Erm, p-perhaps I could help by massaging them a little, too?" Octavia timidly suggested. Finally. "Just to make it feel a little better, I mean."

"Naturally." I couldn't resist a spot of playful skepticism.

She flushed. "M-may I? They aren't too sensitive?"

I smiled disarmingly, feeling a little bad for teasing her. "Be my guest... It'll be fine."

Kneeling down so she could reach, I laid my hands down on my lap and resisted the urge to lean forward or puff up my chest; I didn't want to seem too eager. Closing my eyes, I sat and waited, letting her go at her own pace. We were both new to this, after all. Sort of.

At first, all I could hear was the pounding of my own heart.

Then there was a tentative clip, followed by a cautious clop, as the diminutive mare shyly approached me. Then a nervous shuffling of hooves, as she tried to find a good place for them on either side of my folded legs. Then I could feel two little puffs of warm air from her nostrils hit my skin as she hovered over my chest. When she inhaled again it was through her nose, giving her a whiff of sweat and pheromones and who knows what else. The very ends of tiny little hairs brushed past me, the resulting sensation staying just below the threshold of tickling but resulting in a serious case of goosebumps nevertheless.

I sucked in my chest and held my breath, focusing on my senses, all of which felt perversely augmented. Every nerve-ending below the taut skin of my tits was primed and hyper-sensitive, the anticipation alone enough to make my nipples harden. Then, at last, came the sweet release of that initial touch: a gentle nose prodded the underside of my right breast, sinking every-so-slightly into the yielding mound of milk-glands and cushy, fibrous and fatty tissue, testing its springy softness. The inquisitive snout was then lifted slightly. A warm weight briefly came to rest on Octavia's flat, equine nose, before she pulled back and let her jiggly load drop down again, perhaps merely to watch it bounce.

"It doesn't hurt?"

I sighed my approval. "N-no."

Encouraged by this, Octavia began nuzzling and nosing my breasts in earnest, no longer content to merely test the waters. I loved feeling her fur brushing along on my skin, and I could tell she, in turn, was enjoying the silky texture of it beneath her sensitive nose and lips. A gentle shower of pony-kisses began, raining down onto every softly heaving inch of my chest. On each spot she chose to plant a kiss a tiny little burst of pleasure blossomed; the warmth of her lips and rapid breaths seemed to linger there even after she moved on, seeping into my shivering skin until it felt like my entire chest was aglow with affection.

When those little smooches finally faltered and eventually stopped, my disappointment was almost palpable.

"Did that make it allll better?" The sing-songy way in which she stretched out the one word suggested she was getting into it.

Her voice was close to my ear, but I was too relaxed and in the zone to be particularly startled by it. But then came an equally-unexpected lick on my cheek and I was left all ashiver again.

"Not quite," I replied, letting my fingers dance up along her mane in search of a few twitchy, pointy equine ears to scritch behind. "I think you missed a spot..."

There was no need to tell her twice; before I knew it, I felt her tongue, richly coated in warm but rapidly-cooling mare-spit, dragging a languid lick up along the swell of my breast, across one of the two swollen and protruding 'missed spots.' The smooth, wet muscle she kept hidden in her muzzle proved strong enough to lift up the entire boob and pull the unsuspecting nipple along for the ride. I could feel the tiny bump of every pink papillae, deliciously grinding past. The heated, happy little sigh she let out afterwards might as well have been an icy blast of arctic wind when it blew across the rosy-brown, saliva-slickened nub.

I shivered for her—even let out an honest-to-goodness gasp, slipping my fingers down from her ears to tickle her temples instead, taking delicate care to thoroughly muss up her prim and proper manestyle in the process.

Then I opened my eyes and caught her smiling hopefully up at me, fluttering her eyelashes and blushing brightly.

"I'd like to, um—Could I...?"

"Yes," I said simply, saving her trouble of having to phrase such an embarrassingly specific request. She didn't have to explain... I just wanted her to enjoy herself. "Please..." I added urgingly, apparently rendered incapable of producing coherent sentences.

But despite my distracted laconicism, Octavia understood me perfectly. We had apparently skipped ahead to the point where, like with an old couple, only half a word and a noncommittal grunt would suffice.

Soft lips wrapped around a pert nipple, and beneath my trembling fingers I could feel her cheeks go concave with tender suction as she drew it into her muzzle, areola and all, her eager nose creating a deep dimple in the malleable flesh. Shiver-inducingly sharp incisors grazed the trapped nip, the intense stimulation straddling the line between delight and discomfort. Octavia seemed to sense this, however, responding to the tightening of the fingers that clutched desperately at her mane, and started suckling softly instead. Awash in soothingly-warm saliva and being rhythmically pressed against a wet, velvety tongue, it wasn't long before the tingling in my poor teat subsided.

Looking down, I ran my fingers along the side of the serene-looking mare's muzzle once more, teasing along the blissfully smiling corners of her eagerly-working mouth with my thumbs. Her eyes remained closed, however, her mind lost in some extremely relaxing, instinctual happy place. I, too, felt a strange mix of emotions whilst watching her indulge herself; the feeling was, perhaps paradoxically, somewhere midway between the maternal and the erotic. It was like my brainstem couldn't decide whether it wanted to nurture and protect this precious little pony, or ravish the sexy little mare sucking my tits like there was no tomorrow.

This dilemma was quickly resolved when Octavia, her nursing instincts finally sated, took a more active role in playing with my breasts. Letting my thoroughly-sucked nipple slip from her mouth, she brought her forelegs up to massage them—gently at first, but getting firmer with her rubbing the more I encouraged her, communicating by way of soft whimpers and moans. Lifting them upward and inward, she pressed the two round, lightly-flushed boobs together into slightly-smooshed ovals with her strong and surprisingly dexterous hooves.

Alternating between the two, she brought each nipple to her muzzle in turn, lipping them and circling them with her tongue while her hooves kept toying with my tits. She was drawn to them somehow, utterly enamored with them, driven into a feverish frenzy of licking and sucking by my lusty and rapturous cries of encouragement. I loudly implored her to be rougher, begging her to please just mash the two fleshy orbs together, to roll and knead them between her hooves, slick and shiny as they were, or to stuff both nipples into her muzzle simultaneously. She was only too happy to oblige.

After playing with those ample breasts for a while, though, the novelty eventually began to wear off a little. We started to tire of this form of foreplay, although it had left us both in quite a state, panting and even sweating a little. Our metabolisms had kicked into high gear at the titillating prospect of sex. Octavia still had her snout buried between my tits though, for the time being, nuzzling the cleft between them lazily whilst murmuring sweet nothings about being able to hear the beat my heart.

I wanted to comment on the way she was rocking her nose from side to side into my cleavage like that, but decided against it in the end; it actually did feel kind of nice, and it wasn't like she was making silly noises. Besides, I didn't want to embarrass her, and I couldn't even be sure they had motorized sea-faring vessels here in Equestria...

"Octy?" I said softly.

"Hmm?" she hummed, the vibrations of her elongated 'm' feeling a mite ticklish, what with her lips still being pressed firmly against my sternum.

(If she had even noticed the newly-coined pet name, she didn't comment on it.)

"I kinda can't feel my legs." Being on my knees this entire time really wasn't doing me any favors.

"Oh! Well that won't do..."

She stepped back, allowing me to sit back and stretch out my legs a little, which began to tingle back to life almost immediately. I flexed the muscles in my calves and thighs, bending and extending the two lissome limbs to hasten the process along, even wiggling my toes a little.

This seemed to fascinate Octavia, who was taking this opportunity to study my feet; the next in a cavalcade of weird body parts.

"What is the purpose of these?" she asked, narrowing her eyes at the neat rows of stubby pink digits. "They're like your fingers in a way, albeit less functional-looking..."

I said nothing, but nodded when she glanced up at me briefly and lifted my leg up for her, giving her a chance to explore on her own. Ponies, of course—be they sentient or no—had a bit of natural inclination towards doing this with their noses and mouths. Octavia, as it turned out, was no exception in that regard, and immediately took to nuzzling curiously at the sole of the proffered foot. This tickled, of course, albeit in a strange way... Somewhere deep in the haphazard hard-wiring of my brain, the stimulation on my feet was being translated into something far more erogenous, making me wet and shivery with somatosensory delight—when I wasn't too busy squirming and giggling.

Octavia enjoyed tormenting me for a while, even going so far as to lick at and suck on my toes, which felt really weird. But when I lightly cupped the dark-skinned bridge of her nose with my toes and attempted to semi-playfully push her away, she got her revenge by forcing that powerful tongue between my toes a little, causing me to laugh uncontrollably and lose my balance, milling my arms around in vain. Before I knew it, I was flat on my back.

"Are you quite all right?" a disembodied voice, fraught with barely contained laughter, called from somewhere beyond my limited field of vision.

"Never been better," I replied, gasping out the words for being so desperately out of breath.

To make up for it, Octavia started licking and kissing and nuzzling all the way up my legs, her affections just as curious a mix of the animal and the humanesque as she herself was.

"Lay back," she whispered urgently, when I tried to raise myself up onto my elbows to see what she was doing.

I complied without hesitation. My legs were parting of their own accord, in a most unladylike fashion, allowing the advancing mare to draw ever closer—lick after lick—to my pussy, already dewy with natural lubricants meant to accommodate a cock that would never come.

Something deep within my abdomen twitched giddily in anticipation, but nothing could prepare me for that moment supreme when she first sampled my smoothly-shaven slit, effortlessly covering my entire vulva and scaling my mons venis in a single lap. Smooth and slick and slathered with saliva as it was, that big equine tongue nevertheless managed to drag along the slightly-engorged but neatly-tucked-together lips of my labia a bit, while the relentless licks that followed slowly worked their way in between them. Particularly when Octavia began twisting her head this way and that whilst continuing to lap away. Those wet, enthusiastic licks soon parted me, exposing the hopelessly-sensitive inner pink.

"Goddesses, you're delicious," she murmured, which was about the hottest and most comforting thing she could have possibly said, netting her a giddy little womb-quiver that rippled out from that pulsing epicenter all the way down into my toes. She braced herself and pushed her snout into the slick cleft of my pussy, kissing the tight and rhythmically-twitching vaginal opening and eventually even forcing that long, inhumanly-sturdy and happily-wriggling tongue into me a little ways. Her nose kept bumping into my clit, which, like myself, felt like it was fit to burst...

Then her tongue found that vulnerable, squishy little cluster of raw nerve-endings, and my world was all ablaze; every neuron in my brain lighting up like a dazzling display of fireworks...

"Oh! Oh god, Octavia—"

My butt was lifted clean off the wooden floor, my back arched dramatically and my body convulsed. I vaguely heard my pony lover let out a fond and muffled nicker as she drew back her weary tongue and found it richly coated in warm, gooey girlcum, which she lapped up and swallowed down with surprising gusto.

"Whew," we said simultaneously, after a long time spent recovering and catching our breath.

"Whehl, dhat wus duff'rent," Octavia said, even her tongue a little swollen and numb after all that strenuous activity.

This got us laughing like mad-men and -mares again, and we didn't rightly know when we would stop.

"So, um, who was this 'god' person you were referring to?" Octavia inquired, once the worst of the swelling had gone down. "Is he like The Royal Sisters; the monarch of your world?"

"Uh, yeah! Sort of..." I really didn't feel up to discussing the vagaries of human theology with this mare, whose alicorn demi-gods literally walked the earth and directed the motions of celestial bodies, or to explain the fact that I was technically something of an agnostic—at least, not at the moment.

I went for a clever distraction instead: "Sooo... are you guys all, like, 'Oh Celestia!' when you get particularly excited?"

"Maybe..." Her coy little smile was simply to die for.

"Let's find out," said I, stretching out a trembly leg to engage in some pretty unique and enjoyable footsies with her hoof and hind leg.

"Let's," said Octavia, lasciviously licking her still-glistening lips.