You've Come To The Right Neighborhood

Spike stilled his nerves as best he could. Here he was, meeting the two rulers of Equestria. Two ladies that, at the very lease seemed able to rule simply by sheer presence. Yet, they gave off an almost demure air. Quickly girding his composure, he responded as best he could. "H-hi... oh wow...uh...sh-should I bow or kneel?"

The two looked at him in silence...before the one who'd been introduced as Luna giggled. "I think we made more of an impression than we planned, 'Tia."

"Looks that way." Celestia replied, the smile she had shifting to a friendlier mode. "Sorry about that. It's just something we do to look professional when meeting other races for the first time. We didn't intimidate you too much, did we?"

"A...a little." He admitted, his legs getting a little wobbly before Tempest and Applejack moved to help steady him.

"I have to admit, given that you didn't seem to even plan on coming to this world, you're taking things surprisingly well."

"Yeah. I mean, there is a little part of me that wants to scream 'SWEET CARAMELIZED LOVE CHILD OF BUDDHA AND VISHNU WITH A SIDE ORDER OF WHAT THE ACID-TRIPPING FUCKERY!' but I don't think that's really gonna do me any good right now."

Celestia shrugged slightly. "Understandable." She said, over Luna's giggles of 'so remembering that for our next poker night'

"Only question is..." Spike looked around and flopped his arms against his sides helplessly. "What do I do now?"

"Well, first off, now that the formalities are done..." Celestia reached behind her and the sound of a zipper could be heard. Luna followed suit with pulling hers down, giving him an unashamed view of the light blue nipples she was sporting, compared to her sister's cream white ones.

Quite the erotic tune began playing in his head as he watched the two slide the garments down off their bodies, letting them pool around their feet and leaving the two as naked as the others. Spike mentally debated on just how hard he should pray that they didn't see the tent starting to appear.

"Much better!" Celestia sighed, shaking her now bare hips. "Now..." She paused and cocked an eye, smirking a bit. "Heh, nice to know a couple mares our age can still get that kind of reaction out of a stallion. Eh, Luna?"

"Hey..! How come Trixie get a response like that!?" She pointed indignantly at Spike's erection.

"Maybe 'cause you probably aren't his type." Rainbow replied, earning a glare from her.

"More like I've been fighting this bastard ever since I first saw Fluttershy in the buff." He replied, listing every insult he could think up at his hormones. "Seeing the others naked didn't help much."

"I gave a guy a woody?" Pinkie asked. "Woot!"

"You...you mean he found me...?" Fluttershy blushed heavily, hiding behind her wings with a squeak.

"Was there any doubt?" Trixie puffed her chest out.

"Wh..." Spike looked at the girls; all of them seemed to be realizing something; and responding...rather positively.

"Well...Ah..Ah gotta admit, Ah ain't never had a bloke react to me like that." Applejack added, pulling her hat down a bit, though a bit of a smile could be seen.

"Heh, me neither." Rainbow buffed her nails on her chest. "Means my body is just that awesome."

"Again, still got it." Tempest looked smug.

Twilight and Moondancer were blushing up a storm.

"So, we actually got a stallion's attention? In that way?" Sweetie Belle had a silly grin and blush of her own, along with Apple Bloom and Scootaloo.

"Well, I must admit, it is rather flattering, darling." Rarity replied.

"Heh...y-yeah." Barb added. "This is kinda new for me."

Starlight just looked at him, cheeks bright pink.

"You...none of you...you're not appalled or shocked??"

"Actually, given how scarce males are, and the competition some towns have over those that are unattached, being found sexually attractive by one is considered a compliment." Tempest said, getting a couple nods.

"Ok...y-you lost me." Spike called out, any embarrassment long gone, "What do you mean 'scarce males'?? I mean, I was wondering why there were hardly any guys around, but I was figuring they were just elsewhere." He quickly realized that his theory was very wrong when Celestia spoke up.

"Spike, for the last seven hundred years, males have been extremely rare for us and nearly all our neighboring countries. The only exception is the dragons, and their males equal about a quarter of their population."

"C-come again...? Wait...but I saw lots of ponies..." He said, gesturing to the ones currently in the room."

"Thankfully, we, as well as other races like the griffons, yak, deer, and zebras have spells that can temporarily swap genders for female couples that want a child. However, due to the difficulty and power required for that kind of transformation magic, only the country's strongest magic users have access to the specific information, and the spell doesn't guarantee conception. Even then, the child is always female. Colts require an actual male."

"Oh...well...that's actually a little depressing when you think about it." He said, finding a chipped floor tile fascinating at the moment. "Um...you said something about competition between...?"

"Yes." Luna took over from here. "Because of the spell's limitations, some towns can run a risk of losing their population if there's no more stallions. So, they tend to resort to desperate measures to keep the town going; usually by enticing or bribing stallions to stay, especially if they're unattached. However...there have been occasions where underhanded tactics have been employed; threats...spells or potions to keep them there...even a couple of abductions." She gave Spike a pointed look "Actually, this is a good forewarning for you. I'm going to guess that you were not currently dating anyone back where you're from."

He shook his head. "Not really...my classes took up a lot of my time."

"Single, and you obviously appear old enough to be familiar with sex.

"Not really...I mean I know it, but the farthest I ever got was one date a couple years ago where I accidentally grabbed her butt when I tripped...and got slapped for it." He absentmindedly rubbed the cheek in question, and missed the look of outrage that crossed the faces of a couple of the mares.

"Untouched, and to be honest..." She stepped a little closer, looking him over in a -if he was willing to imagine it - appreciative manner. "Quite exotic. By those three factors alone, I can name at least three towns that would try their hardest to get you to leave wherever you're currently staying and go live with them, and odds are they would be unwilling to take 'no' for an answer."

"OVER MY DEAD BODY/THE BUCK THEY WILL!" Spike and a couple mares jumped at the declaration. A look at them showed one had definitely been Trixie, when the other was...

"Land sakes, Fluttershy!" Applejack wiggled a finger in her ear. "A lil warnin' next time? What's got you riled up anyway?"

"If some harpy thinks they can just waltz off with Spike, they'll have to pry him from my cold dead...!" She stopped and looked around, blushing when it dawned what she was doing. "I...I mean...ehehe..."

"I think we get the idea, Fluttershy." Barb said.

'I don't...' Spike thought, but kept it to himself. Seeing Fluttershy's growing embarrassment had him deciding a change of subject was in order. "Say, those stained glass windows, they look pretty old."

"A few are." Celestia said, thankfully catching on. "More than a third of them were transported from the old palace, located in what's now the Everfree Forest. a couple are well over a thousand years old."

He whistled "They look in pretty good..." He trailed off when he looked at one of the window. "Did someone mess up that window?" He pointed to the one in question.

"Which one?" The others followed Celestia as she looked to where he was pointing; an image of a male unicorn with a long beard and stereotypical wizard clothes. He was also standing on all fours. "That's Starswirl the Bearded. What's wrong with it?"

"He has four legs in that, and you all...."

"Oh! I see what you're talking about. It's kind of funny in a way. A millennium ago, except for most dragons, we were all on four legs. Griffons, elk, buffalo...everyone. But for some reason, our bodies began to change. Each successive generation was born more and more bipedal, with gradually developing hands, feet, and bodies like you see." She performed a quick twirl on her heel. "Unfortunately, as that happened, fewer and fewer males were being born. Some suspect that whatever caused us to change, took most our male population in 'trade'. There've been attempts to try and balance the population out again, thinking it was a spell or some kind of curse. However nothing was successful."

"Oh" Spike managed to get out. That was a lot to take in; first an alien, and now possibly some kind of rare commodity if he wasn't careful."That's a hell of a transition."

"Luckily, we've gotten accustomed to it." Luna added. "So! Any thoughts on where you're going to be living while you're here?"