Author's Note

TRIGGER WARNING!

This chapter may be harmful to read if you are of a sensitive mindset or are processing certain events linked to the red tags, especially those raised in this fiction. These tags are to be taken especially seriously for this chapter.

The other chaps are fairly tame. Turn back now if you are unsure.

YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!

Chapter 3 [TRIGGER WARNING!]

Crash.

At least the safety conscious bastard has firm doors.

Crash.

I look at the terrified mare in the mirror with pity.

Crash.

I instinctively cower away from the noise, shrinking into the corner by the toilet.

Suddenly, silence.

Some heavy footfall.

A door slams. The door to the flat? But I don’t dare leave.

I uncurl, tottering towards the door, like a chick reluctant to leave its nest.

With a sudden jolt, I realise that the bottle of Mareium is in my hoof.

“We’re dead either way,” I say to the mare in the mirror.

I don’t take it. I put it to one side and slide it onto the vanity, crushed by the feelings of doom, self-hate, and fear.

The edges of the walls go white as the adrenaline, drugs, drink, and general madness of the evening — Hitch, Jazz, the bouncer — all seem to roll into one.

In my state of disassociation, the shrieks of manic laughter and hysterical sobs seem to come from another mare, and I feel pity for her. At one point I feel a sharp pain in my side and feel the oozing warmth of blood. Did she stab me? Am I dying?

Eventually, the panic attack ends and, exhausted, I crumple to the floor. I am still too scared to leave the bathroom.

I do not know how much time has passed or what is happening: had he just left? might he be asleep outside? will he be waiting for me?

Lying on the tiles, my consciousness begins to ebb.

Suddenly, heavy hoof-steps outside jolt me fully awake and I rise, my body sick with adrenaline.

I back away as the door explodes with a colossal crack.

Screaming, I cower in terror next to the toilet bowl. I see an axe blade twist and withdraw, taking with it a chunk of door-panel.

An amber face peers through at me and for a split-second our eyes lock. It is the most hated that I have ever felt.

There will be no reprieve — if he has his way, I will die. Soon there will be nothing to stop him.

My flight-designed body jerks involuntary with the desire to survive, wanting to run, but I am hopelessly trapped. The throbbing in my head is overwhelming, but the fear of death keeps me sane.

"Help!" I scream. But I know it's no use.

Crash.

The barrier of the door splits fully open. My last protector. The hole is big enough for his entire arm, which reaches through to the handle.

Without thinking, I attack. I don’t remember seeing the glass shard on the floor.

He roars with pain but doesn't withdraw.

Instead, turning with the practiced motion of a stallion trained in combat, he punches through my weapon with his bloodied hoof, smashing it and sending me flying back against the toilet, almost knocking me out. I crumple to the ground.

Unwilling to accept the inevitable, I try to shuffle across the floor away from him, sliding on the blood-slick, white tiles. I make a pathetic attempt to return to my corner, as if I would be safe there.

Over the sound of my ragged breathing, I hear the door click — the room is filled with light as it swings open.

Unthinkingly, I scrabble for the Mareium, which had been knocked to the floor in the melee. I drink it. All of it.

The rush cuts through even the adrenaline of this moment. The edges of my vision are pink and white — I roll my head back on the tiles.

In a state of hazy detachment, I see Hitch raise the axe above me, before throwing it away and stomping out of the room.

I gasp with gratitude. More moments alive! I just want to be back home, safe, with Jazz.

But then I am hit by an incredible pain from my groin, worse than any I have ever experienced. It’s the Mareium. Oh, Sol!

Gingerly, I reach between my legs, to the epicentre of pain. The tucking panties are empty, and very bloody.

Finally, a mare! The real me.

But I’m so tired.

Still, if I’m to survive, I must move. Though all I want to do is lie here and sleep, I know it’s either move or die.

I uncurl from the corner, forcing myself up, propping myself on the toilet bowl.

I feel a heaviness below my stomach. I always wondered what that would feel like. My embryonic uterus. An engine.

The pain from it is incredible. I am a defective chassis, and its power is brutal.

I only make a few faltering steps beyond my prison before he crushes my throat in his hoof.

He shoves his face into mine; it smells heavily of whisky.

“I’ll show you what it is to be a mare.”

His other hoof reaches down and pulls hard at my panties, which snap off, revealing myself fully.

But he is not looking.

Releasing my throat, he swivels me, and I am shoved into the bathroom. I fall forwards over the toilet bowl.

My legs are sticky, my died-white fur is a horror show.

Splayed over the toilet seat, he grabs my pink tail, lifting me up.

“You wanted me to fuck you.”

The beast-voice cuts through the haze of pain.

In a daze I feel him wrap a hoof around my waist.

“N-no, please.”

With all the force of that terrifying body, he thrusts.

My bloody fluid lubricates him and somehow my new body feels something other than pain.

An unfamiliar sensation of arousal builds.

The feeling is unlike anything I felt as a male — it is more like a pleasurable paralysis. Waves open me up even further, willing him inside, ignorant of the damage.

And his thing responds, as it would to any mare.

As I ebb and flow, he grunts and grunts and grunts.

Not satisfied, he turns me over, so that my back is to the toilet tank and my sex is in the air.

He spits on my face and continues.

I can’t bear the hate in his eyes. I don’t want that to be my last memory. It’s not fair.

He is panting more and more.

The madness distorts his face.

Lifting me bodily, he turns me over and dumps me back on the bathroom floor.

I lie crumpled at his hooves, until he yanks me up by my tail.

I’m an object to him now, not a pony, nor even a mare. I am a repository: for anger and lust. But at least I can’t see those hate-filled eyes.

My soft, failing, body judders with each of the thrusts that follow.

The treacherous new sensations rise to a climax, and I join him, lowing like a cow.

We tremble and shudder.

Time passes in painful ecstasy.

With each thrust, more flows. Soon the edges of my world dim.

With a final grunt, he buries himself.

Other than the pressure on my new vagina, I can’t feel him unload. I imagine the fuel roaring into me, igniting an eternal fire, burning me away.

The pain returns as the pleasure subsides. It is too much.

My vision goes white, and I pass out.

I do not know how much time has passed.

I am cold, cold, cold.

I open my eyes, but they are unseeing. I can feel fluid — gallons of it seems to cover the floor, spreading from my legs, smelling of iron.

A power beyond me compels me to try, one last time, to live.

“Hitch,” I call, feebly.

I wait a while in the dark, as moments flash before my eyes: foreground thoughts of Jazz, pleading with me not to dose so heavily; the hostile stares of mares in the club; Hitch’s tenderness, before he changed.

As the numbness spreads from my centre, my thoughts turn to older memories. The sun on my face as I explore the dunes of Mareocco with my old love. Mom’s sharp voice telling me off for getting lost. Bullies galloping after me in the playground. Rosemary saying that she didn't want an ugly, smelly, little brother.

With that last memory, I succumb to sleep.