“Play a prank on a person you know,” Gallus recited as he and his friends lounged on the grass beside the lake. “Be sure to determine if it’s a fun prank that they will enjoy and list the pros and cons of your prank.” He flopped on his back and groaned. “Professor P is getting way too Sparkle if you ask me.”

“Well, remember what happened with Rainbow Dash,” Occelus reminded them as she read for the assignment scroll. “We don’t want to have to do a ‘night of zombie cookies’ on you, would we, Gallus?”

“I’d take that over the alternative assignment. Make a half dozen foals smile,” Smolder said with a snort of smoke.

“Oh, come on, it’s not that bad,” Sandbar said with a chuckle.

Smolder shot him a flat look, holding her hand flat, slightly above her head. “Getting eaten by a roc,” She lowered it an inch. “Getting turned to stone by a cockatrice.” Another inch. “Dealing with baby anything.” And one more inch. “Everything else.”

“So if we’re doing pranks, should we prank each other?” Silverstream suggested with a frown.

“Yona not want to prank friends,” Yona agreed, then added, “Though yaks have best pranks.”

“Let me guess, you give a nice piece of petrified wood as a smashable log?” Gallus suggested with a smirk.

Yona’s eyes got huge. “Yona think that best prank ever!” Gallus groaned, covering his face with his hands.

“Way to blow a great prank idea,” Smolder chided.

“Well, it doesn’t have to be blown. What if Yona pranked her family with the petrified wood?” Sandbar offered.

Yona laughed as she rolled on her back. “Yona’s father, mother, sister, little brother all love that prank! Unsmashable wood!”

“That’s an idea,” Occelus thought with a nod. “After all the assignment doesn’t have to be on someone at the school.”

Gallus had a thought of some feather mites that would be just perfect for any number of griffons he knew. “Yeah, but if we just send them a package from us, they’re going to be suspicious,” he pointed out. That got him a number of looks. “Okay. They’ll be suspicious of anything I send them.”

Silverstream lounged in the shoreline’s water, her rump thrust above the waves as her fin idly splashed the water behind her. “We need a way to make it a real surprise,” Silverstream mused.

“What if we put them in the shipments Professor Twilight is sending to our leaders?” Occelus suggested.

“Do who to what now?” Gallus asked.

The changeling let out a little sigh. “The professors are sending back the artifacts that were lent for the spellvenger hunt. They’ve got a whole class room filled with the things and boxes. We could put our pranks in the box and prank our leaders.”

“You want me to prank the dragon lord?” Smolder demanded, making Ocellus shrink back in worry before Smolder lunged and hugged her. “I love this idea! I can brag for months hitting her with a perfect prank!”

“Queen Novo is always up for a good joke too,” Silverstream agreed, clapping her forefins together enthusiastically before she hopped out, somersaulted, and transformed in midair into her hippogriff form. The six talked for a bit more, and finally split off. The greatest prank ever way on!

They met the very next day, pranks prepared, at the classroom storing the relics. Through the keyhole, Gallus could see the crates, the artifacts, and some bags of packing straw. “Looks like we’re right on time. They’re packing them up right now.”

“We can save them a little effort, get the crates out, and write our prank reports,” Silverstream said and then scratched her beak. “If we start a world war with our pranks, do you think we’ll fail? I mean, long shot but it could happen, right?”

“We’ll be extra careful not to start world war prank,” Sandbar assured him. “From what I hear, Princess Celestia enjoys a good prank.”

“Write us from the moon if she doesn’t,” Gallus quipped back, gesturing at the keyhole. “You’re up, Ocellus.” The changeling’s transformation magic flashed in a ring around her, and when it ended she’d shrunk down to a tiny ladybug and flew through the hole. A moment later she opened the door on the far side.

“You know, I would have expected the professors would have been a lot more careful with these after Cozy nearly used them to drain all the magic in Equestria,” Sandbar observed as they entered, closing the doors behind them. “You have your wood, Yona?”

“Yona does,” she said as she lifted a log of petrified wood. “Professor Pinkie’s sister eager to help Yona get hard wood.”

“You mean she wants your wood?” Gallus suggested with a chuckle, making Smolder snicker.

“No. Professor sister gave Yona wood. Why she try to take Yona’s wood?” the yak asked as the pair nearly collapsed laughing. “What so funny?” she asked in ominous tones.

“Nothing! It’s just a really dumb, dirty joke,” Sandbar said as he tried hard not to laugh too. “I’m glad you got your... hard wood.”

“Yes! Yona wood hard as stone!” the yak declared, and Gallus, Smolder, and Sandbar collapsed laughing.

“I don’t get it,” Ocellus stated flatly.

“I can’t... stop! I can’t breathe!” Gallus gasped. “I think I’m going to pass out!”

“Um, don’t we have a time limit here? I’m pretty sure Professor Sparkle and Glimmer aren’t going to let us just put this stuff in while they’re watching,” Silverstream pointed out.

“Right. Right. Not like we can’t talk about Yona’s wood later,” Smolder pointed out as she flew over to a box holding the dragon artifact. She’d brought a pillow case and she pinched her nose as she removed the artifact, and dumped in a collection of dragon sneeze blossoms. Then she put the relic in, covered it with more hay, and then put down a lid. A few bangs of a hammer, and the lid was in place.

Gallus located the box with the Crown of Grover, tugged it out, and pulled out a bottle full of tiny gray bugs from his saddlebag. It’d been a challenge convincing professor Fluttershy to talk the bugs into the bottle. “One load of feather mites. Good to go,” he said as he nestled the bottle in the bottom and put the lid almost off. He returned the lid, and then noticed there were more than six artifacts here.

“Hey, what’s that?” Gallus asked as he looked at some other artifacts that hadn’t been on the Spellvenger hunt. There was a staff topped with a bright green crystal. A tiny sign said ‘Storm King staff, hazardous.’ He glanced over his shoulder at the others, but they were occupied with their prank preparation. He looked at some of the others, reading them aloud in case any of his friends were nearby. “High Scepter of Maretonia, too ponish.” He moved from one box to the next. “Starswirl’s third grimoire, needs further study. A fragment of Holder’s boulder, not engaging enough.” Gallus regarded the pebble and let out a little snort. “‘Engaging’ must be eggheadese for ‘boring’.”

Some of the ‘artifacts’ seemed like mere junk, trinkets, or weird stuff. Jars of zap apple jam. An open magic box. “Changeling Jelly, ask Thorax what this is.” He opened one of the three jars and sniffed the minty jelly inside. He took a lick and clacked his beak, then put one of the three in his saddlebag. It’d go well on toast. He regarded several of the next, and wasn’t even sure if ‘Artifact’ was applicable. “The Golden Apple... okay, it’s an apple made of gold. A roc feather... cool but it’s just a feather...” His eyes moved to the end of the table.

Then he spotted what had to be the largest artefact. It was a huge, filling the corner of the room, but covered completely with a canvas drape. “Mirror of Deepest Desire. Return to Discord ASAP,” he read aloud, rubbing his chin. “Discord’s mirror, huh?” He grabbed the edge of the canvas drape as the other five argued about if Ocellus’s prank was even a prank. “A peak never hurt,” he said to himself, lifting it up slowly.

Beneath the cover was a surface that appeared flat, yet his own reflection seemed to be shifting and sliding inside like a funhouse mirror. “Woah,” he murmured as he stared at himself looking older and more baddass than he thought possible. “I like this mirror,” he muttered, but before his eyes the reflection changed and he was small and timid, with huge blue eyes staring back. “Okay, not so liking now.”

He reached out to the strange flat, yet not flat, surface and touched it with his hand. A whisper spoke in the back of his mind in strange unearthly voices. Somehow, the hissing made sense of a sort, the question forming in his mind. “What do you desire, mortal?”

“Yughhh...” was all he could say. Anything calling you a mortal couldn’t be good. He wanted to pull his hand away, but it was locked tight to the surface. He could feel something in the back of his mind slither like a snake. The slippery sensation moving through his head was matched by the sensation of honey dripping inside his skin.

“I desire... you... let me go...” he muttered. He glanced back at his friends at the far side of the room, wondering if he should try to call out to them. A stubbornness kept his mouth closed.

“In a moment. You’re a teenager. There must be something you desire. Just tell me what it is. Wealth? Oh yeah, you want that! I can feel your heart quicken.”

“Like I’d trust a mirror to give me money,” Gallus grumbled. If he’d been offered this back before joining the school he probably would have jumped on it, but having a magic cave testing him made him a little more leery about blindly accepting offers from magical things.

“Power then. Power to crush your enemies?” the voice purred in his head.

Again, old Gallus would have jumped on that offer. He had images of a super griffon blazing in a corona of blue fire. “I don’t need you for power,” he muttered. “And I’m not sure I have any enemies to crush, anyway.”

To his great dislike, the voice laughed in delight. “Oh, I love a hard sell! One more, then I’ll let you go,” the voice said, and Gallus was relieved to see his thumb move. “What to do? What to do? Mmmm... sex?”

“What?!” Gallus blurted, blushing furiously as he glanced over his shoulder at his friends. Only one looked back, but they were the only one that needed to. He immediately stared at the mirror; his thighs pressed together. “No! You’re a mirror!”

“Not with me, dearest. With your darling friend over there. I could help make it happen,” the voice said calmly, and was it just him or did it sound like Professor Glimmer? “Not mind control. No, no, no. But I could make it far, far more likely to happen... if you like. But hey, if you wish to woo them on your own, I will get out of your courtship and back to reflecting.”

Gallus’s eyes darted around a moment. “What would you do?” he muttered.

“Make you more like what they desire,” the mirror said. “The rest is up to you. I can help, but I’m not going to control anyone’s mind. No no. I can only just make it easier. Something you can’t do on your own.”

“I...” his mouth worked as he kept his tail tucked and his thighs together. Money and power, no problem. Tempt him with this though... it wasn’t like he was scared to talk to girls. It wasn’t as if he’d never thought about it. It was just every single time he tried, his tongue turned to mud and he sounded pure lameness and she’d just look baffled. Then all he could do was try to play it cool as a joke because skies help him if he was ever just honest with a girl! Galus swallowed hard, feeling one part of him between his nethers that was quite keen on the idea. He felt his skin growing hot under the feathers, and a cautious part of his mind warned him to start thinking of Grandpa Gruff before he started flagging it around in the air. “I-”

Suddenly the door burst open and a purple beam flashed across the room. The blast of magic washed over Gallus, and he let out an ‘ee!’ sort of noise as magic danced a jig in the space between his brain cells. Fortunately, whatever magic held his hand to the mirror disappeared and the canvas fell back into place. Professor Twilight stepped in and stared at them laid out on the floor. “You? What are all of you doing in here?” She asked as the other professors entered as well.

Slowly, the busted six friends picked themselves off the floor. Ocelus became their spokescreature, timidly approaching. “Well, Professors. We wanted to do the friendship lesson Professor Pinkie set out for us and we thought we could... well... I wanted to give this to Thorax.” She said as she pulled a piece of wood out of the crate going to the changeling hive. ‘A Prank’ was carved across the front.

Pinkie gasped. “It’s a plank prank! A prank plank! It’s a pun and a prank! Extra credit Ocellus,” the pink pony said as she rushed over to the little changeling and gave her a hoof bump.

“Yona give Prince unbreakable wood! Yona give hardest wood!” she exclaimed. “Prince love it!”

The professors exchanged looks, and Rainbow Dash couldn’t suppress a snicker. Twilight took a deep, dignified breath. “Well, while I’d like to commend you for thinking outside the box, you probably shouldn’t have tried to do so with these artifacts. Some of them are quite dangerous if ill used.”

“Like this one?” Gallus said, gesturing over his shoulder at the mirror behind him.

Twilight immediately frowned. “Exactly like that one!”

“Like is it a soul sucking, mind trapping mirror or something?” Gallus asked, his hand tingling.

“No. It’s just Discord’s mirror, which means that it’s bound to be anno- interesting!” she amended at Fluttershy’s cool look. “Interesting and unpredictable! In potentially annoying ways.”

“I doubt it’s dangerous, Twilight. I specifically forbade him from donating anything that might endanger the school, the students, or Equestria,” Fluttershy assured her. “Granted... Discord is a little fuzzy on what is and isn’t dangerous, but I’m sure he wouldn’t mean any harm.”

Gallus nodded slowly as the others started out, the professors departing with them. Especially her... he bit his lip and backed up, his hind leg slipping under the canvas. “Well?” the voice murmured in his head.

“You swear it’ll get her to like me?”

“It will get her to like you more. I can give you a chance. If you call her fat and insult her aunt, I can’t be responsible for that,” the voice replied in almost sing song rhyme. Twilight was turning her head towards him. It was now or never.

“Yes,” he muttered. There was a zing that went up his leg, making him yelp as he darted away.

“Are you alright?” Twilight asked in alarm. Gallus stamped his hind leg several times, trying to make the sting go away. Fortunately it was rapidly fading, whatever it had been.

“Cramp,” he said as he darted for the door. After all, he didn’t want Professor Sparkle to simply poof away whatever the mirror had done. And it had done something! His body felt like he’d just flown through one of Professor Egghead’s thunderclouds.. Maybe it was turning him into a suave hunk of a griffon? From the classroom behind him he heard Twilight shriek, “Oh, Sweet Celestia! Wing mites! AH! They’re getting everywhere!”

“Wonder if that counts for my friendship lesson?” he mused before detouring to a bathroom. He wanted to see what that zap might have done. Fluttershy’s assurances aside, it WAS Discord’s mirror. He plopped down in front of the mirror, checking his beak, his eyes, his tongue. Nothing seemed different. He lifted a leg and took a quick check down there, then turned and lifted his tail to get a better view... but he couldn’t see any changes to his blue furry sack or the fuzzy ridge beneath it...

Then a pegasi colt winged in and landed, and took in the sight of Gallus posed before the bathroom mirror. His eyes went just as wide as Gallus’s as they stared at each other. “What?” Gallus snapped as he felt himself blazing under his plumage.

“Uh... I’ll just go use the one by the cafeteria,” the green pegasi said as he turned and rushed out.

Gallus sighed, dropping his leg and turning around. He glared at his own reflection in the mirror. “If that stupid mirror was just giving me ‘confidence’ or some junk like that, I’m going to go smash it. Seven years bad luck or not.” He turned on heel and walked out, the ebbing staticy sensation fading away with every step.

Gallus wasn’t sure what to make of his exchange with the stupid mirror. If Professor Sparkle hadn’t been watching him, he definitely would have asked that mirror a few more questions with Yona’s wood in hand. As is he kept glancing around, wondering what, if anything, the mirror might have done to him. All through Professor Applejack’s course, he kept glancing over at her and wondering what, if anything, the zap might have done. Or maybe this was just Discord setting him up for a laugh.

“Hey, Sandbar?” he asked during lunch as Sandbar and he were stuck in line for hayburgers and scones while the girls were over at their usual cafeteria table. The students were clustered at lunch tables surrounded by vendors serving the highly varied diets of the students. “Do I look different to you?”

He stared for a moment... then two... and just when Gallus wondered if his friend was suffering some sort of attack, answered, “Naw. Why do you ask?”

Gallus ground his beak a moment. “You don’t think I look... I don’t know? Different?”

“Well, sure my main bird,” Sandbar said. “We’re all different. Why, yesterday I carried my saddlebags on the left. Today? Totally right.” And he gestured to his side with a cool smile.

“My mind is blown,” Gallus replied, groaning and pressing his face into his warm scones before taking a deep breath. The cafeteria mare, her face utterly inured to the drama of her teenage students, filled their trays. “Okay. I’m going in,” he said decisively as he rose to his feet, his eyes locked on his target.

“Cool. Going where?” Sandbar asked. “Oh, man. Are the scones bad or something?”

Gallus stared straight ahead, decided that the universe didn’t allow dumb questions like that in it. “If I don’t make it back... shhh... I don’t know. Forget about me. Deny I ever existed,” he answered, and then turned and started towards the table with the four girls.

Time seemed to slow as he walked. Maybe this was it. Maybe he just needed the right moment and the magic chaos mirror would do whatever the mirror was supposed to do. All four slowed their conversation, watching him with a mixture of expressions. He set his feet, fluffed his feathers, ran a claw through his plumage, and said in a deep voice, “Hello, ladies.”

Or that’s what he would have done had his voice not cracked and made him say ‘LayDEEZ!’ Still none of them were laughing! He still had a chance. Coughing, as if he had something in his throat, he pushed up. “I mean... ladies.”

“Uhuh,” Smolder replied flatly.

“Yona yak, not lady,” Yona reminded Gallus flatly. As if he needed any.

Occelus knit her brows together with a slightly confused smile.

“Hi, Gallus!” Silverstream replied, waving her hand vigorously in the air above her head.

Gallus blinked at the four. “Notice something different about me?” he asked, trying to give them the smolder. The actual Smolder crossed her arms and let out a skeptical snort of smoke as she arched a brow. Yona blinked and Ocellus just wore that polite, patient smile like he was doing something stupid.

Silverstream cocked her head, cupped her chin, and narrowed her eyes thoughtfully before her eyes brightened. “Oh, yeah! Now I see!”

Gallus’ heart leapt...

“You took a bath!” she observed.

...and crashed upon the floor in a thousand tiny pieces.

“Yeah, I thought you looked a little shinier! New conditioner?” Silverstream asked.

Gallus had pride, and ego, and... and self respect damn it! Nevermind if it was all the same thing! He opened his mouth, looked into those periwinkle eyes, and suffered brain damage. “yyyyyeAH!” he said, his right eye twitching a little. “That’s it! New conditioner! You nailed it!” he said with beaming happiness as he died inside. Smolder covered her face with a hand while Occellus gave a sad shake of her head.

“Griffon not look clean to Yona,” she observed flatly.

“O... oh yeah! Well you look... big! Really big!” What was wrong with him? He whirled on heel and ran off, leaving four baffled friends watching him go.

Gallus ditched the last three classes, trying to get in to ask that mirror some pointed questions, but there was always a person inside working and he had to leave in growing frustration. He finally retreated all the way back into the bedroom he shared with Sandbar, climbed up into his bunk, and settled into full sulk. “Stupid mirror.”

He heard the door open and buried his head under the pillow. “Brought you snacks since you missed dinner,” Sandbar said, and Gallus heard a clack of a tray on the desk table. “So, you okay?” said his roomie.

“I’ve got my head buried under a pillow,” he muttered, not caring if Sandbar heard him clearly or not. “What do you think?”

“You know, if you really want really want Silverstream to like you, you can just tell her you like her,” Sandbar suggested.

“I’m not like you and Yona, Sandbar. I’d just screw it up,” his tail flicked as he grumbled, curling away. “Even with help.”

He could imagine Sandbar shrugging and climbing into bed. Gallus liked that about Sandbar. As infuriating as he could be sometimes, he knew when to shut up and leave Gallus alone.

Once the moon was out and he was pretty sure that Sandbar was asleep, he withdrew his head and rolled on to his back. He wasn’t exactly sure when he’d started to get really interested in Silverstream. Maybe back when the tree of Harmony had tested them. While they’d been in the pool, he’d been rubbing really hard against her. Of course, it wasn’t like he could go ‘hey, you remember that time I was grinding against you while you were totally freaking out while you thought the Storm King was coming back? Ya wanna do that again?’

And he wanted to do that again. Silverstream was the closest person to a griffoness at the school, with a beak and claws to die for. And sure, her flank might have been a little ponish, but... well, there really wasn’t anything wrong with that, was there? But past that, she was also the most ungriffon person he’d ever known. It wasn’t just that she was always bubbly. Heck, half the girls here were. No, it was that she was bubbly and optimistic in spite of what the Storm King had done to her people. She had baggage and she dealt with it. That was so cool.

Only she never, ever, seemed to be interested in him! Not the slightest bit! And he had tried to tell her he liked her! Plenty of times. Only every time he did, she’d gush, ‘I like you too’ faster than you could say ‘friend zone’. But was it that she wasn’t interested in him that way, or that she was but didn’t think he was in her, or something else even more crazy? What was he supposed to say? ‘I want to eat your pussy or whatever hippogriff mares call it until you cum?’ Because oh did he want to.

Just thinking of it made him want to. He felt his furry blue sheathe tighten up and stir. Normally, this would be the time to stop thinking about her, but he couldn’t really help it. He splayed his hind legs wide and let his hands caress gradually up and down his torso, claw tips lightly nudging his nipples with each pass. Gradually, he moved his hands inward until he finally teased his digits along the furred container of his member. With every motion up and down, more and more of his maleness within swelled under his careful claws. The tapered pink head pushed out into the open air, glistening. He tried to suppress the moans. He was a guy. Sandbar was a guy. This happened and you just pretended it didn’t till they finished.

As more and more of his pink cock slipped out, his sheathe started to bunch up against his sack and his hands shifted from his furry crotch scruff to his cock itself. The base of his shaft swelled slightly, keeping the skin of his sheath out of the way. Every griffon male learned the best way to masturbate: carefully. He wrapped his talon around the shaft, keeping his claws away from delicate bits, and rubbed briskly. After a few minutes, his other hand dropped down and fondled his coin purse, coaxing the heavy treasures within. There wasn’t a lot of finesse or technique. He tried to keep his panting down as his toe beans curled as he felt his sack pull snug against his body. He tried to keep Silverstream in mind as his hand worked, feeling the spring inside tighten up bit by bit.

What was taking so long? This was usually easier! He inhaled deeply and screwed his eyes shut as his hand worked even harder, drawing his hind legs up as he thrust into his strokes. He struggled to just... get... it... out! The base suddenly swelled up to almost the size of his fist, and his entire body went rigid, arching his back and lifting his hips as his body unloaded. Deep muscles began to rhythmically clench, the spring unloading all at once. He felt the fluid press against the knot from the inside, pressuring for a moment before the hot seed overcame the resistance. Streamers of white pumped onto his chest before his legs relaxed and he fell back onto the mattress. Aside from a bit of fuzziness, he didn’t feel super good. Just... spent. His frustrations of the day had been transformed into a few sticky seminal teaspoons. He reached over for a handkerchief he kept for just short occurrences and carefully daubed it up. He’d get the rest in his shower.

Well, the day might have been made of frustranium, but it was over. Sandbar was was too quiet to not be awake, but Gallus knew that Sandbar wouldn’t say anything. You didn’t do that when a guy was getting personal with himself, just like Gallus would be ‘deaf’ whenever Sandbar needed that time. It happened. No need to talk about it.

Gallus wadded up the cloth and tossed into the hamper where the towels, sheets, and unmentionable cloths were put to be washed. Then he pulled back his sheets and closed his eyes. As his mind drifted off, he wondered if he’d done some damage or something with that last yoink. After all, his bits usually weren’t this sore and tingly after he came...

But all further curiosity faded away. A pair of snores filled the air, punctuated by a frequent shuffling of hind legs.

The morning brought no more relief for Gallus than last night had. He’d woken up even stickier than he’d anticipated, with viscous residue mashing the fur along his belly and sheath. Grumbling, he flew out of bed and quickly stripped it of the sheets. Really, he hadn’t thought he’d made that big a mess last night. In fact, he was still sore from it. His entire pelvis ached. A part of him feared that, maybe, he could have done himself some harm. You couldn’t break your thing by jerking on it too hard, could you?

Falling back on the old griffon adage ‘you’re not hurt if you’re not bleeding’, he decided to suck it up, stuffing the sheets in atop the incriminating evidence. He didn’t know who did the laundry here, but he suspected that they were probably used to it. You couldn’t have hundreds of teenaged creatures in one school and not get some funky smelling sheets.

“Long night?” Sandbar asked as he emerged. Gallus glared back at him, his eyes bloodshot with dark circles around each. “Oooh... yeah, long night. You okay?”

“Of course. I’m the picture of joy. Isn’t it clear on my face?” he asked, making Sandbar wince.

“Whoo, early morning snark,” he replied, waving his hoof in front of his face as if Gallus had bad breath. “Well, if you need to talk, dude, I’m here to listen.”

The urge to make another caustic remark fought with the fact that Sandbar was probably the only guy here he could talk to. A truce was declared as Gallus sighed. “Yeah. I know. Thanks. I’m just... it’s a crappy morning.” He tried to stretch and winced. “I think I slept wrong. My back is all cramped up and I’m stiff!” He stretched one hind leg out and then the other. As for what he’d done last night, that wasn’t something you talked about. “I just need a shower is all.”

Sandbar nodded and together they walked down the hall to the showers for their business. The school had a large communal bathroom where most of the students got ready in the morning. Large windows ran from floor to ceiling, light flooding across the marble tile. One corner was dominated by a large, steaming pool for bathing, in which Silverstream was already lathering up, and waved joyously as they entered. Two walls of shower stalls ran along one wall, each one allowing three ponies to shower together. A second wall sported a dozen sinks and mirrors. Sandbar and Gallus usually shared a booth, so they could give each other’s hindquarters a scrub when needed. A row of toilets and sinks were tucked away in their own annex for a little more privacy.

Gallus went straight to a stall with Sandbar, passing Yona and Smolder doing their daily wash. Gallus stood in the hot stream, and let the heat wash away the ache. The warm cascade of water certainly helped, and Gallus used a long handled scrub brush to make sure any evidence was washed away rather than ask Sandbar for that assistance. By the time he finished, his mood had shifted up quite a bit.

He still couldn’t get that dumb mirror out of his head. Maybe it’d needed overnight to kick in? Well, what could a little more humiliation hurt? He got a towel and dried off. Immediately his plumage fluffed up in a disorganized mess of spikes and slicked back patches. He gave his reflection a level stare and swished his tail irritably. “This is not a good sign,” he informed himself. The feathers were a temporary thing. They’d lay down eventually.

Usually, things worked out, one way or another.

He limped his way out of the bathroom when there was a streak of red behind him, an explosion of pain stabbing right up his body from under his tail to his eyeballs, and a thunder of hooves as a colt yelled ‘tag!’ and raced off, leaving Gallus beak down on the ground, curled up, and now wishing things would work him back into bed. The laughter of the colt left Gallus contemplating if there was a friendship loophole for ponycide.

“Gallus? Are you okay?” asked a familiar voice, and he cracked an eye to see Smolder standing over him. “Tag?” Gallus nodded, doing all he could to nod without sobbing. “Crack your eggs?” Gallus squeezed his eyes shut and gave another little nod. “Need the nurse?” The nurse was only for getting out of class and throwing up. To be fair, he was pretty close but chewed it back in an effort to regain some dignity.

“More like a reset button on the last twenty four hours,” he muttered as the sharp stab from his crotch faded to a more agonized throbbing and merged with the ache in his hips. He forced himself to sit up and though he really wished for an ice pack, he wasn’t going to give Tag the satisfaction.

You had to bully carefully at the School of Friendship, and the red earth pony had found his niche. He ‘played’ with people he ‘wanted to be friends with’ as a ‘joke’. That often meant running behind people and ‘tagging’ them in the crotch with a well placed kick or hoof smack. They’d reported the colt more than once, but all it seemed to merit him was a lecture that he seemed to enjoy, and detentions that never bothered him.

“I keep telling you guys to tell Starlight. She’s not nearly as soft as Twilight is,” Smolder pointed out as he limped to the cafeteria. Gallus spotted the red colt with a knot of other boys, laughing and looking Gallus’s way. “You think saving Equestria from a power crazy filly gives you a ‘get out of detention for setting somepony’s mane on fire’ free card?”

“I wish,” Gallus said as they made their way over to their own table. He heard Tag let out a squalk, forehooves clutching his own privates as his eyes rolled, tongue hanging out. “I sooo wish...” he muttered.

Silverstream immediately broke off her talking with Yona, Sandbar, and Ocellus as they joined. “Hey Smolder! Hi, Gallus.” Immediately her brow furrowed. “Are you okay. You’re limping!”

“Gallus-” Smolder began.

“Just pulled a muscle! Last night. In my sleep,” he blurted, preferring that to admitting what’d happened. Smolder sighed, giving an eye roll.

“Oooh, I do that sometimes too. I’ll wake up and think I have fins and suddenly I’ll be all ‘Acccck! Two legs! Muscles, why you not work?” She cried out. “Or I’ll shape-shift in the middle of the night because I forgot to take off my necklace. Boy is that awkward,” she said with a light.

“Tell me about it,” Gallus said as he carefully took a seat. At least the surface was cool. Smolder walked over to get their breakfast trays.

“Okay. Well usually it’s because I’m having a swimming dream but once it happened while I dreamed the whole school flooded with pudding and I was going ‘ACK! Noooo! Can’t fly in pudding!’ But I could swim! So I changed in my dream and I must have changed in my sleep, because...” she trailed off.

“Because Yona’s friend’s fins smack Yona in face as Yona trying to sleep,” the yake stately flatley. “Not the first time.”

“Sorry, Yona,” Silverstream immediately apologized as Smolder arrived with muffins and started to pass them out.

“That fine. Yona forgive Silverstream because Silverstream is Yona’s friend,” and the yak nodded as if that was that and popped a whole vanilla muffin into her mouth, masticating furiously.

“So,” Sandbar said, keeping the conversation rolling. “What are we going to do about that alternative assignment, since the thing with the artifacts didn’t work out.”

“I’m not even sure all of those were artifacts! Did you look at some of the ones that weren’t on the Spelvenger hunt?” Gallus asked.

Oceullus didn’t munch a morning cupcake along with the others as she answered, “Well the call for artifacts were put out by Cozy, so she got a lot she didn’t need for her plan. Some of them weren’t even magical artifacts. Like Thorax sent a jar of jelly because it's a special changeling thing.”

“Really. What’s it taste like?” Silverstream asked as she buttered her muffin.

“Evil,” said Ocellus as Gallus said, “Mint.” That got him five looks and he blurted. “What? It was green. Like mint jelly. I certainly didn’t taste it!”

Ocellus leaned away from Gallus, her eyes narrowed in suspicion, for a few seconds before going on. “Good thing too. That was Chrysalis’s jelly. I can’t believe Thorax sent it. Of course he also sent a dozen other bits and pieces too. Fortunately, Knucklebocker’s Shell was magic enough to count. Or... unfortunately.” the Changeling pointed out.

“Why do you think she used those six and not others?” mused Smolder. “I mean, there was some cool stuff in there.” Gallus swallowed, wondering if Smolder had seen Gallus and that stupid mirror.

“What do you mean?” Gallus asked.

“Well there’s all those artifacts. Why did Cozy Glow encourage Twilight to use the six artifacts in the spellvenger hunt and not like, say, Starswirl’s Book?” Smolder wondered.

“I think she picked artifacts for geomagical effects,” Ocellus explained. That got a lot more blank looks and Ocellus sighed. “She wanted to drain the magic from all of Equestria, right?” The friends nodded slowly. “So she needed to pick artifacts that would let her draw that magic correctly. It was actually really advanced magic for a filly.”

“I’m still not convinced she wasn’t just a midget with a cutsey voice,” Sandbar said with a sad shake of his head.

“Well, I guess it’s lucky for us she didn’t use some of those others. Did you know that there was a mirror from Discord’s realm in it?” Ocellus said with a grin at the exact moment that Gallus was trying to swallow. The air in one pipe mixed with the muffins in another, leading both to erupt in a spray that left his coughing and gagging for air. And unfortunately, the person directly opposite him happened to be one hippogriff he desperately wanted to not cough muffin all over.

“Ah... ha...” Gallus murmured with a sickly grin as everyone stared. “Napkin?” he said as he offered his; a square of cloth woefully insufficient to clean off the gooey bits peppering her mane and feathers.

Silverstream blinked for a few moments, as if trying to process the correct response to being sprayed by your friend’s mouthful of food. “I’ll... be right back,” she replied, rising and flying for the girl’s bathroom. Gallus stretched out a claw towards her as she departed. Was she upset? Was she furious? Could he buy a hint?

Gallus pressed his face to the tabletop. “Kill me,” he groaned.

“Nah, dragons aren’t big on mercy,” Smolder retorted, patting him on the back. “Nice range and spray though.”

“You know... if you talked to Silverstream...” Ocellus began.

“What do you know about that dumb mirror? You said it was Discord’s?” Gallus asked in a valiant effort to get the subject off spraying Silverstream with his breakfast.

Ocellus sighed and shrugged. “I heard the professors talking about it. It wasn’t so much ‘Discord’s mirror’ as ‘a mirror found by Discord in his realm’ so they didn’t put it out. Apparently it has the power to grant your heart’s desire.” Ocellus tapped her hooves together. “Apparently, they thought putting something like that around lots of young creatures might not be the smartest move.”

“Can’t imagine why,” Gallus muttered. “Anyway, they didn’t have to worry. It was simply a weird fun house mirror. Nothing to it at all.”

“You messed with it?” Sandbar asked.

“Yup,” he said and then gushed to Ocellus. “And it didn’t grant my heart’s desire, so don’t worry.”

“What did pony desire?” Yona asked, cocking her head.

“I- You- She- It-” Gallus blustered before he took a deep breath. “Why to be the coolest griffon at in all of equestria, naturally. It came true too. See?” He gave the three the best smoulder he could pull off, waggling his brows.

“Yeah. Pretty sure you should get your money back,” Smolder snorted.

“Yona confused. Is something supposed to happen?” she asked Sandbar, who gave a shrug.

Ocellus gave a polite, if somewhat pitying, smile.

“Clearly the threats of chaotic realm spooky mirrors are overrated,” he grumbled as he held his head in his claws. The bell chimed just as Silverstream walked out of the bathroom, further robbing him of the chance to apologize for spraying her with his breakfast. Keeping his head down, he walked at the back of the group. Today was clearly not going to be his day. He was certain of it.

Hell was trying to make a dozen foals laugh. It wasn’t that he was opposed to babies in theory, but rather that he didn’t precisely know what to do when them. Sitting in the Ponyville daycare, with its bright yellow colors and garish red and blue smiling flowers, Gallus couldn’t help but feel a little resentment. Griffonstone child care was a pile of rocks and good aim. Nevertheless, the penalty for trespassing on the artifact room was to give baby ponies a laugh.

So Ocellus was transforming into a whole menagerie of cute and cuddly critters while Yona gave twelve a yak ride all at once. Smolder made smoke shapes, or maybe babies really liked fire. Silverstream twisted her face into bizarre expressions, crosseyed to tongue hanging out, punctuated with baby babble like she was fluent in foalist. Sandbar sat there and that was perfect hilarity for his dozen.

Gallus eyed his dozen and leaned in. “Look. Laugh and I’ll give you all cupcakes.”

The foals blinked at him, one emitting a long streamer of mucus from one nostril before he... she... it caught the dangler with a tongue and slurped it into their mouth. A second one fell asleep while the last one seemed more occupied by blocks than anything else.

“You just gotta do something silly,” Silverstream called out, giving an impression of a dog, sitting on her hind legs in a begging position..

Gallus was still really hurting from the Tag he’d gotten that morning. Of course, the last thing he wanted was to go into the nurse’s office and tell. You just didn’t do that and stay cool. Gallus inhaled deeply and cut loose. “Whobadubadurrbadooble!” he shouted, rocking his head back and forth as his eyes rolled in their sockets.

One woke. Twenty four eyes stared at him. Then in unison they began to bawl and shriek at the top of their lungs. Gallus slumped. “That’s it. I flunk,” he announced as he headed for the door. “I’m heading back to school.” There was a time to cut your losses, get an ice pack, some aspirin, and call it a day.

He was almost to the door when he felt hooves wrap around his hind leg. “Momma!” a yellow and maroon pegasi foal said as they hugged his foot.

“Wha... no I’m not. Get off!” he cried out, giving his leg a shake.

“Momma!” the foal insisted.

“I am not a momma! I am the opposite of a momma!” Gallus squalked. Of course, several of the crying foals found that hilarious! Maybe he’d get a D?

The daycare attendant trotted over. “Sorry about that. She’s very clingy,” the caretaker said, tugging the foal off of Gallus’s leg.

“Momma!” the foal cried, waving her hooves at Gallus as she was carried off.

“And needing some glasses too,” Gallus muttered as he left and started to fly back to the school. His mood was shot, and his whole body ached. Not ached. His bowels felt clenched up tight, and he’d spent almost half an hour in the toilet. Worse was just how much Tag’s tag had left him sore. Sure, a nut smack wasn’t the best thing ever, but usually after a few hours life moved on. His wasn’t.

All because of that stupid mirror. Okay, maybe not all of it, but that mirror had promised it’d make getting with Silverstream ‘easier’. How did getting kicked in the nuts count as easier? Or his voice cracking? Or choking on a muffin and spattering Silverstream with baked shrapnel? Unless Silverstream found pathetic hot, and a tiny shred of hope still remained that, somehow, she did, the mirror had done, at best, nothing and, at worst, made his life miserable.

As he flew back, sore, towards the school, he knew that he needed to have another little chat with that magic mirror before it was sent back wherever Discord lived. He flew down the hall to the classroom where the relics were stored, but this time the door was covered with giant glowing purple padlocks and chains. Gallus rubbed his beak as he hovered before the door. “Huh. Well not getting in this way, even if I had Ocellus.” The classroom windows were almost certainly locked too. If he had to scram, they’d be a quick exit, but how to get in? He thought for a moment, then his eyes dropped to one of the brass grates set in the hallway floor.

A very familiar terror gibbered in the back of his mind at the thought of trying to squeeze through a duct and getting stuck. But, he reminded himself, he’d already faced this fear once and gotten out when the tree of friendship tested He just had to do it one more time. Find the mirror, threaten it with a rock, and get it to fulfill his wish. All he wanted was for Silverstream to... something! He didn’t care what.

He moved into the adjacent classroom, Professor Applejack’s, but didn’t see a connecting vent. Then he moved through the classroom and entered Applejack’s supply closet full of hay bales and spotted it down near the floor. “Whew. I totally might have lost it if I’d had to go through the floor. He crouched down and peered through. Hah! The mirror still sat in the corner! He grabbed the vent and gave a hard pull. The grate scraped, then popped free. It was just big enough, he estimated, but if he could get his shoulders through he could get his body through. He stretched and slipped his arms through, then his head.

Twisting his body diagonal, he slipped his shoulders past the gap, scraping his fur. He clenched his jaw as he pushed his wings through, but once they popped through it was just a simple matter to pull his waist through and get to...

His hips connected solidly with the edges of the hole.

“Huh?” he blinked as he looked back at himself. That was strange. He pushed again, but he felt his pelvis catch on the edge and go no further. “What the hay!” He tried to back up... and his wing caught the edge. He pushed forward again, but no matter how he twisted, his hips were stuck. “Okay, this is not good!” He tried to twist his body this way and that, but neither his hips nor his wings allowed him more than a few inches of movement.

A little part of his brain was definitely freaking out. “Relax Gallus. You can find a way out of this. You just gotta relax. The hole isn’t going to magically close and squish you. As soon as you just,” he rammed his hips forward... and winced. “Or maybe...” he pulled back, hoping his wings would somehow magically invert and let him pull himself free. They didn’t. “Oh come on!” The gibbering terror was growing.

A thin, ethereal laugh filled the classroom and Gallus froze. The canvas tarp covering the mirror in the corner fluttered, and then with a hiss slid right off. He stared into the warped fun house reflection as he struggled. The stone around his waist seemed to undulate, and he looked down to check that he wasn’t being squished in two. Every time he looked the hole seemed fine, but the second he looked away he felt it jiggle like flan.

He turned back to the mysterious, warped mirror. All at once, the distorted image flattened into his own reflection. Inexplicably, he felt a pressure on his beak, and to his horror, his own mouth moved to speak. “Feeling frustrated?” his voice simpered in a babying voice. “Feeling stuck? Can’t go back? Can’t go forward?” The voice lowered a little. “Feeling... trapped?” Gallus gasped as he felt the stone press tight around his ribs, but when he stared, nothing had moved... had it?

Bafflement was the only thing keeping him from wetting himself right now. The only defense he could think of was to ask this... this thing... something to keep his mind off the sensation plaguing him. “Who are you? What are you?” Gallus demanded as he stared at his own reflection. It was like working his jaw against invisible hands manipulating it.

“Nothing important,” the Gallus in the mirror answered with a casual wave of his claw, and Gallus’s own limb mimicked the motion. “You, however, are far more interesting to me than I would be to you,” he murmured, giving a sneaky grin that felt all too comfortable on his face. Gallus doubted that a lot. “But perhaps you’d appreciate a show of good faith? Yes? You appreciate a good show?”

Gallus clenched his eyes shut, and the manipulating hands disappeared. Maybe if he kept them closed he could prevent the control? “Fine. Sure. Whatever.” No response. He cracked an eye and peeked at the mirror.

Instantly the control resumed, and his beak and brow smirked. Gallus watched in the reflection as the hole trapping him suddenly widened. Gallus glanced back... nothing had moved. Then he looked at the hole in the reflection and watched as he casually stepped out of it. As his hind legs stepped on the classroom floor, he looked back again, and to his astonishment the hole looked no different. “Huh? What? How?” He blustered before looking at the mirror again.

“Oh, that’s hardly important now, is it? Not compared to your problem,” the mirror Gallus chuckled.

Gallus had to admit that was the point of this visit. “Yeah. What was the deal? You told me you’d help me get with Silverstream,” he said with a frown, flying over to stand in front of the mirror.

“I did. Some things take time,” the mirror Gallus purred. “I could do things quicker, but that might be... unhealthy. And you wouldn’t want Twilight or Starlight to... interrupt things, would you?” Ugh, how did the mirror make him sound so... girly? And hot?

“Seriously? Can’t we just skip to the good part?” Gallus muttered with a roll of his eyes.

“Oh, you mean... this part?” Mirror Gallus said, and suddenly Silverstream stepped into view inside the mirror from the side. Gallus immediately stared around the room, but of course she hadn’t appeared. His eyes locked to her eyes, those blue eyes gazing at him in ways the real Silverstream never did. His chest tightened, his heart pounded, and his breath stilled. His eyes roamed along her pale rose body inside the mirror, and more than anything he wanted her with him. Her arm went around Gallus’s neck, holding him close. Gallus could feel the soft tickle of her feathers. The gentle scratch of her nails against his skin. He jerked back in alarm, but struck a row of desks behind him and could go no further.

“Hey! What are you– Don’t touch–” He yelped in surprise, but as the touching continued he slowly relaxed. He couldn’t help but groan, watching as his reflection turned and kissed her. Part of him wanted to fight this control, but a more base Gallus craved even a figment of tenderness. Gallus went limp, feeling his beak open and something bizarre stroking against his mouth. He’d never been kissed like this before... or kissed at all... but the more it went on the more he wanted it!. He closed his eyes reflexively, and staggered forward as the sensation cut off.

Opening them again, he saw silver stream kneeling at his side... her claws reaching down, stroking and manipulating his aching sack possessively with one claw and stroking along his sheathe with the other. He reared up on his hind legs, leaning back against the desk, bracing himself with his claws clenching the edge. His sheathe’s opening started to brim with bubbles of precum. Was it the mirror that was making his member ooze this much, or was he this hard for anything with Silverstream? A part of him, screaming caution, was getting silenced as he was gradually overwhelmed by the ghostly sensation of digits artfully teasing against his member as inch after inch emerged. As his breathing quickened, his traitorous knot began to slip out. Whatever was going on, this wasn’t normal... wasn’t... there had to be a catch. There had to be...

But he couldn’t stop himself from watching, allowing the reflection to continue. It didn’t take longer than a minute for his slick, dripping cock to push its way out into the air... only this time instead of his claw meeting it, it was caressed from tip to base again and again with passes of that soft, tantalizing tongue. Pathetic gasps as moans escaped him as he was assaulted by this unexpected attack.

His resistance crumbled, his hips beginning to pump instinctively forward. His fleshy knob slid out completely with a moist squish, leaving it bobbing in the air and exposed to the mirror’s manipulations. The knot at the base stiffened, ruffling back his sheathe. Gallus didn’t dare close his eyes as that beak carefully took his tip into her mouth and started to press it deeper into the back of her throat.

“Oh... yes...” he groaned, despite himself. The warm, slippery fluid crept down through his fur and down the inside of his thighs. He could feel the inside of her mouth, the movement of muscle in her throat against the back of his member. The slow bob of her head. He watched the motion of his cock disappearing into the illusory Silversteam’s mouth. His reflection kept moving his claws, touching a head that would vanish if he just closed his eyes.

“Is this what you want?” Mirror Gallus asked.

“Oh yeah,” Gallus murmured, the building pleasure tension threatening to blast through his loins with alarming intensity.

“More than anything?” Mirror Gallus teased. He could feel Silverstreams claws manipulating his sack, fondling it more and more.

“Ah, yes!” he gasped.

“And are you willing to give anything to be with her?” his reflection taunted himself. He could barely follow the question as his pelvic muscles began to throb.

“Yeah- huh? Wait–” Gallus choked. Of course this was the very moment his cock erupted in a stream of ivory. Only instead of going into a certain hippogriff’s beak, it shot out into the air and splattered across the crazy, warped surface. Gallus’s eyes clenched shut as his body unloaded, his arms gripping the desk behind him to keep from collapsing as his cock repeated shot out into the thin air. The clenching deep in his pelvis finally made him collapse onto all fours as his member unload every last drop from his body.

He lay there for a moment, focusing on breathing as he felt his entire body squirm from the force of his orgasm. It on and on, the tapering convulsions becoming exhausting as weakening gouts dully throbbed from the end of his member. He was going to die! To fucking–

Like that, it was over. His body withered, as if a year of his lifespan had been extracted out his dick. Compared to what he’d just done, last night’s wank might as well have been a wet dream. He felt muscles still working and squirming around in his gut and pelvis. He cracked an eye and saw his thighs were soaked with ropes of gleaming white and a trickle of fluid from his sheathe soaking his thighs. He dared look at the mirror, seeing its flat yet warped surface gleaming with his jizz.

Then he saw the drips disappear into the surface, the entire thing clean as if it had never happened. “Ehh?” he muttered and leaned forward, then, after a moment, tapped the mirror.

Nothing. Had anything happened at all? Well, something certainly had from the musk of his seed in the air and streaks on the floor, not to mention the goo staining the inside of his thighs. It still bubbled in a clear froth from his sheathe as his cock rapidly shrank in the cool air. “Am I losing my damned mind?” he muttered. He’d never been this ‘drippy’ before afterwards. Then again, he’d never been molested by a reflection of Silverstream before either.

He barely had enough presence of mind to use a corner of the canvas drape to try and clean, or at least smear around and obfuscate the spatters on the floor. Once it was more or less clean... cleanish... he couldn’t do anything about the smell... well, once it was as clean as it was going to get, he returned the canvas drape to the mirror and headed to the classroom windows, unlocking one and slipping out. If he was lucky it’d stay unlocked, in case he needed another visit in the middle of the night.

The sun was already setting. He made a beeline straight for the lake. With any luck, he could get cleaned up without any more awkward questions.

No... with any luck... he’d get to do this for real with Silverstream. Soon.

Somehow, all of this had gone wrong. Instead of being elated that something that at least looked like Silverstream had blown him, he felt pathetic for being blown by a frigging mirror. Instead of feeling good for having busted the biggest nut he’d ever had, he felt empty and even in a bit of pain. He wondered if, maybe, he should just go to the nurse and tell Twilight or Starlight what he’d been doing. And they’d look disappointed in him, like everyone else did.

Nevermind what Silverstream would think of him if she ever found out.

After flying to the lake to wash off... god had he really cum that much? It was everywhere! His cock ached as much as his balls had all day. Perhaps worse. The sensible thought, in Ocellus’s voice, told him to go to the nurse. But simply trying to explain... how did you explain this? It was humiliating. He imagined the school nurse, or worse, Professor Gimmer, handing him a doll and asking him to show where the bad mirror touched him.

No nurse. No Professor Glimmer. No more mirror. When he finally got back it was post dinner with everyone starting to head to bed. He got to his bedroom door and opened it up–

The reek of pony and yak struck him like a hammer. He got a glance before he slammed the door shut. A horseshoe he’d overlooked hanging on the doorknob fell to the floor with a soft ping. Gallus ran down the hall before he realized he had no idea where he was going, then sat down with his back against the wall. Right now, that was the last thing he’d needed to walk into.

“Gallus?” Asked a familiar voice. Ocellus. He lifted his head, seeing her standing with Smolder. The dragon with her hands on her hips as she looked down at him. “What’s wrong?” the changeling asked with a worried smile.

“Yona’s in our room with Sandbar,” he said, and rubbed his face with a talon. “I missed the horseshoe.”

Ocellus blushed a little. “Horseshoe?” Smolder asked.

Gallus sighed, not really wanting to explain it. “Just a way to have some privacy.”

“Huh. I think the molt is way simpler. You’re old enough to do that sort of stuff, see yah!” Smolder said, taking a seat on his right. “Anyway, we know something’s up with you. Well, Ocellus says something is.”

“You’re kinda one big knot of emotions right now,” Ocellus said, sitting on his left. Smolder sighed and rolled her eyes a moment, but finally slid to the floor on his right. Gallus pulled his knees up and hugged them. Tilting his head back, he gazed up at the moon rising through the hall’s skylights. The silvery sphere cast the hallway in an ivory glow. Ocellus leaned over and rest her head on his shoulder as she went on, “I don’t know why. Only that it started yesterday.”

Gallus sighed. Might as well get this over with, like ripping off a bandaid. “Do you think Silverstream likes me?”

“Of course she does,” Ocellus answered at once.

“Like Yona likes Sandbar?” He amended, looking over at Ocellus.

“Er...” the changeling balked, chewing her bottom lip. “She really, really, really likes you... as a friend.”

“Is that what’s wrong? Terminal friend zone?” Smolder asked.

“No. Yes. Maybe!” he growled and clutched his ear tufts. “I want us to be a thing but I have no idea how to make us a thing because I don’t even know if the thing is even possible.”

“Talk. To. Her.” Smolder stated bluntly, holding out her hand and poking her palm with every word. “Seriously. That’s how Yona and Sandbar worked out. They talked. They talked some more. I assume there was some smashing involved. Now they’re a thing. That’s how this works. Mooning after her and sitting her sulking isn’t going to change it.”

“I’ll screw it up,” he muttered. “That seems to be all I ever do.”

“It might not be you, Gallus. Silverstream may not be in a place to have a thing with any creature,” Ocellus offered with a hopeful smile.

“Yeah. Isn’t she a princess or something?” Smolder asked.

“Well her cousin is, so... I think that makes her like a duchess or something,” Gallus said with a wave of his claw. He sighed, facepalming. “I know you’re right. You both are. I just... I’m terrified that I’m going to screw everything up and she won’t want to talk to me again.”

“Dude, right now you are screwing up. Unscrew down and go talk to her. At the least you’ll have tried,” Smolder offered.

“I know she takes a bath before bed,” Ocellus offered with a hopeful smile.

Gallus took a deep breath. The lake might have destroyed the evidence, but an actual bath couldn’t hurt. “Okay,” he muttered, rising to his feet. “I’ll go and talk. Who knows?”

“Right. Who knows?” Ocellus echoed brightly. Smolder smirked and shrugged. The pair rose along with him, and said goodnight. Gallus steeled himself and headed down the hall towards the bathroom while the pair left to their own room.

Sadly, the pair underestimated Gallus’s hearing as Smolder said, “Think he has a chance?”

“Nope, but it’s important to support your friends,” Ocellus answered. Gallus gave himself a point for not looking back at the pair. Tonight had been weird enough already. There was a part of him eager to do anything with Silverstream... the real Silverstream... but he couldn’t quite get the memories of that stupid mirror out of his head. It’d been so... so real...

The memory was going to make the bath difficult. What if something poked out?

Gallus rushed to the bathroom before his steel resolve rusted away completely. Even at this late hour, there were a few people washing up. Silverstream lounged in the large square bath in her seapony form. He took a deep breath and walked towards her, hopping into the pool right away. He hissed at the balmy water but focused on her on the far side of the pool. Silverstream waved a fin immediately. “Hey, Gallus! There you are. You left the daycare so fast I was worried. Are you okay?”

Nope. “Yeah. Sure. I just ate something bad,” he lied, trying to push the mirror from his mind as much as possible... though the sensations of that tongue... “I wanted to ask you a question, actually.”

“Sure!” She asked as she swam back and ‘sat’ on the ledge that ran the perimeter of the bath. “What’s up?”

A dozen questions bounced around in his head before he blurted, “Do sea ponies lay eggs?”

And then he died. Or wished he’d died. Why the heck was that what popped out of his beak?

“Sure!” she gushed. “I have a booklet in my room all about it.”

“You do?” he blinked and then relaxed. “Of course you do,” he said with a small smile. Of course now that he was on this topic... “So... uh... eggs. Yeah. How’s that work?”

“Well, it really is the only option! I mean, when you’re shapeshifting, even with magic, you want to get the young out as quickly as possible, and that means eggs,” she said brightly. Thank all the glittery gold in the world, she didn’t mention sex. “Of course, if you don’t lay them in time, the shells dissolve and then you have to have live birth, and that’s not fun at all. Not that laying eggs is a picnic,” she added with an eye roll.

Gallus couldn’t help himself. “Do... you?”

“Oh sure,” she went on with a wave of her fin. “Once month, give or take. Aren’t griffons the same? Smolder too, though she’s more on a three month cycle.” This was getting into a world he really didn’t want to know.

“I’m not exactly sure,” he confessed. “I mean, yeah, eggs, but I don’t know how often,” he said with a touch of guilt. “I know I was a live birth. Kinda why I’m an orphan,” he muttered.

She reached over and patted him on the back. “Yeah. Live birth is rough for hippogriffs too. Something goes wrong, it can get ugly. At least in seapony form we sorta... slip out? But that means being a seapony for months. Once the egg’s lodged inside you, transformations are dangerous.” At least she wasn’t smiling as she consoled him.

“And what do you do with them?” he asked, as he rubbed his beak. “I mean, they don’t hatch... right?” A little naive part of him had to wonder.

“Oh no, you need a boy for that,” she said, and Gallus’s loins remarked that he was a boy. “If they’re unfertilized, you can tell. They kinda only look white. If you wait too long and don’t lay them they get absorbed by the body. There’s some griffs that do that, saying it prevents brittle bones and stuff, but I don’t take the chance.” She gave a little shiver. “Things can get icky.”

“And what do you do with them? The unfertilized ones?” he asked, morbidly curious, and trying to keep the topic off things that would make him harden.

“Same thing you do with almost everything else your body pushes out that you don’t want to keep around. It goes in the toilet,” she said with a shrug.

“Seriously?” Gallus reeled as he nearly went cross eyed trying not to think of it and failing miserably. He thought of a gargantuan egg lodged in the plumbing. “But what if... I mean...” She gave him a concerned look. “I mean... it just seems... It’s your egg.”

“Well, yeah, but I trim my claws too, but I don’t get attached to the clippings.” She gave a dismissive wave of her fin. “You’d understand if you were a girl. It’s a thing that happens.”

“I guess,” he replied, rubbing the back of his head. It was one thing to have a vague idea and another for Silverstream to state it so matter of factly. A part of him was relieved she didn’t say something like ‘eat them scrambled. They’re a great source of protein.’ And worse, if she said it, she’d mean it.

At least the topic had settled his nerves somewhat. He gazed at her a moment, all finny and fantastic. Even as a seapony, she was beautiful. A part of him was glad she was in this form. If she’d been in her hippogriff from, he probably would have choked after the word ‘egg.’

“So... I was wondering something else. Do you... like... anyone?” he asked. His eyes traced along her sleek and glistening form. He felt things stirring down there and carefully obscured it with his tail.

“Well, yeah!” she answered with a grin. “There’s Yona and Smolder. Ocellus is a sweetie. There’s you and Sandbar. Oh! My mom and dad! Professor-”

“No no no!” he said, waving his claws before him. “I mean that you like–like. Like how Yona likes Sandbar.” Go down! Go down! Please go down. This was a mistake. He was at half mast as he felt the tip of his cock rubbing against his tail tuft... that wasn’t helping! There was a part of him that wanted to flee and deal with a boner.Easier than dealing with his feelings...

Silverstream blinked at him a moment and answered in a slightly less certain voice. “Well, yeah.”

“There is?” he asked, and a little part of him couldn’t help but beg ‘please be me!’ The fantasy of being Silver’s chosen was stirring all kinds of lewd thoughts. He mentally screamed furiously at those thoughts to get back into his sheathe. He felt his length in the hot water underneath him. Once the knot emerged and locked his sheathe back it’d be all over.

“Yona, Smolder, Ocellus, Sandbar, you, mom, dad...” she trailed off. “Is something wrong?”

Just trying not to freak you out by popping my knot while asking this. Gallus covered his face with a dripping claw. “Silverstream, you know that Yona and Sandbar are a thing, right?” He completely expected his knot to start doing its thing at this point and betray his feelings, but he’d managed to keep it at bay; a little miracle all of its own.

“Well, of course they are,” she answered, and he furrowed his brow in worry. “They’re friends.”

“They’re kinda a little more than friends, Silver,” Gallus pointed out, failing to keep the envious edge out of his words. “They’re dating.” To his amazement, the ominous erection was actually going down. “Like... sex.” He considered it a personal accomplishment that his penis was taking this topic so well.

“Oh,” she said, her eyes big and round. “Yona said she was going to smash with Sandbar.”

Gallus chuckled mirthlessly. “I think yaks use that word for way too many things.” He took a deep breath. “So... do you?”

Silverstream brought her tailfin up and hugged it, not unlike Gallus had been in the hall. Her pink eyes turned soft and distant, her voice dropping. “I was afraid you were going to ask me this too,” she said in a small voice as she looked away.

“Ask... what?”

“If I wanted to date you,” she said.

Well, that took care of the erection problem. His cock called a full retreat, fleeing back into the protection of his sheathe before he was exposed and routed. “Ah...” he said as he felt his heart being torn down inside his chest, like an anchor had been hooked inside him and was trying to pull him through the floor. “I guess the answer’s no?”

She shook her head. “I like you, Gallus. You’re a nice guy. But I don’t really like any boys here. It’s not really an option for me,” she said.

Nice guy. Somehow that cut even worse than if she said he was a jerk. “What do you mean?” he asked, hoping he didn’t actually sound as dead to her as he did to his own ears. What, wasn’t his nice good enough?

“I mean that someday Queen Novo is going to probably tell me who I’m going to marry and... that’ll be that,” she said with a half smile. “I mean, they’ll probably be nice. I doubt she’ll arrange me with a mean person. But... yeah...” she said as her eyes fell. “Sorry. I have to tell a lot of guys this.”

A lot. Silverstream was popular, but that was because she was awesome. Still, a part of Gallus wanted to take names to... do something. “But what about in the meantime?” he asked.

She shook her head. “It’s not even that. I... I don’t really like you like that. I don’t think of you like that. And it’s not because you’re not an awesome guy. I don’t really feel like that for any guy. Maybe it’s the marriage thing. Or maybe it’s... maybe it’s not you, it’s me and I’m the weird one.” She said as she bit her bottom lip.

“Wrong with you?” he asked in shock.

“Yeah. Like, I know I’m not the sharpest coral in the sea. What if there’s something wrong with me and I like... I can’t like someone like that?” she dropped her eyes to her fins. “Sorry.”

“Hey! Hey,” he reached out and took one of her fins. “Listen. There’s nothing wrong with you. You just haven’t met the right person yet,” he said, somehow finding the ability to smile in spite of the pain in his chest. It was worth the effort, though, as she mirrored his expression. “Listen. Just forget about it. If I’m a good friend, it’s better than nothing,” he lied, but right now a lie was easier than the truth.

And the truth was that weight in his gut was only getting tighter and heavier.

But if there was one thing he could do, it was pretend. Pretend to smile if it made her smile. Pretend to laugh to hear her laugh. Because that mattered more than the feelings that were twisting around his gut. He thought that being told no would somehow resolve things, but the only thing that was resolved was that he wished he hadn’t asked. That the mirror had given him some... something. A part of him wanted to fly in the window with a hammer and see if the mirror could do better, but his heart simply wasn’t in it. Better to be with her, let her wash his feathers in her stupid girly shampoo because he could complain about the fruity smell and not about her.

Some times, laughing totally hurt, but you kept it up because the alternatives were just so much worse...

She flashed back to her hippogriff form, looking at him with those adorable rose quartz colored eyes. “So, you’re okay?”

Well, he’d gotten through a bath with silverstream without his throbbing wang coming up to join the conversation, so he called that a win. “I’m fine,” he lied and chuckled. “We should do this more often. You’re fun to talk to.” Even if he couldn’t shake the image of her dropping a chicken egg into a toilet.

“Yeah!” she blurted. “I’d really like that. See you tomorrow!”

“Right. Tomorrow.” Gallus walked out with the glossiest feathers he’d never had before, smelling vaguely of strawberries and wishing that he’d been able to climb into bed and forget today ever started. After what he’d done with Silverstream’s reflection, he felt even more creeperish. Fortunately, this time when he got back to their bedroom, there was no sign of the horseshoe. Yona had probably gone back to her room. He walked in, head hanging low, trying to ignore the smell. At least Sandbar had opened a window. “Hey,” Sandbar said as he tossed a towel over his shoulder. “Did you take a bath?”

“Yes,” he replied flatly.

“I thought you hated baths,” Sandbar asked in confusion.

“I do,” he said as he flew over to his bunk and disappeared under the covers. He didn’t hear sandbar move, and finally he muttered, “I talked to Silverstream.”

“Woah,” his roommate murmured. “What’d she say?” Gallus turned his head and gave him the most dead eyed stare he could. “Oh. Wow. Ah. Guessing it was no, right?” The stare intensified. “Yeah. No. I’m sorry, dude.” Gallus turned his head away. “Wow. I’m really sorry, Dude, but at least this way you know, right? You can move on. Focus on meeting someone else. Right?”

“Sandbar?” Gallus croaked.

“Yeah, dude?”

“Can you... like... go away? I just want to be alone right now.”

He left. It was always easier for Gallus to cry alone.

Afterwards, he simply laid there, feeling sick. Maybe it was the mirror or getting twisted up before crashing and burning. Maybe it was because he could feel how shiny and smooth his plumage was after using her girl’s shampoo. He rolled on his back, feeling his entire abdomen feeling tight, but also ooky. Like something alarming were trying to roll about inside him. He couldn’t think of what he could have eaten to get that kind of feeling... nor explain why the ookiness ran from his gut all the way down the inside of his thighs. His hips hurt, but at least the soreness from Tag’s kick had finally worn off. It didn’t stop the dull ache in his loins, of course.

When Sandbar returned, he crawled into bed below. “Hey, tomorrows a new day. Try and make it better than today, Bird Bro.”

Gallus sighed. He really had no idea how he could make tomorrow worse. “Yeah,” he replied as noncommittally as he could, rolling on his back with his blanket up to his chin. After that mirror, he didn’t want to mess with himself. Finally, eventually, he went to sleep.

When dawn arrived the next day, he woke feeling like he’d been run over by a herd of Yaks. The soreness in his hips had gone away, but there was something off. He dropped down and took a step... and... yeah. His step felt different. His wings felt fine, but as he tried to walk his gait didn’t seem the same. He couldn’t put his claw on it.

Sandbar woke and gave him a questioning look as he merged out of his bed. “I’m fine,” Gallus lied, before Sandbar could ask. “Just stiff, I think.” He took a few steps and rubbed his throat.

“Right,” he said. There was no need for a shower this morning, so after hitting the toilets they made their way to the cafeteria. Yona, Silverstream, Ocellus, and Smolder were already there. They were laughing about something Yona was saying, her forehooves measuring something in front of her, and another round of laughter broke out. Silverstream looked up and spotted Gallus. Her laughter was cut short, a worried smile on her face. Then her brows knit together and she patted the seat beside her with a friendly friend zone smile of a friend to a friend. Friend like.

A part of him didn’t want to play along. Wanted to fly off in a huff that told them all he wasn’t okay with this. That it hurt and sucked and was Silverstreams fault for not liking nice guys so why be nice? But that part of him was stomped down by the urge to actually be kind and generous, and play nice. And maybe, just maybe, the ache inside him would subside and maybe, just maybe, something good would happen. So he put on a smile and joined his friends at their table.

“Hey, Gallus,” Smolder greeted as he sat next to Silverstream and then the dragon pointed at his plumage. “Why are your feathers all shiny?”

“Oh, no re-” he started to say, flushing as he tapped his claws together. “I mean, I- um-”

Silverstream jumped in. “Oh. He used my conditioner last night. It’s, like, the best thing for making your feathers glossy. You should really try it,” she offered. “It’s made out of sea slugs and it would do wonders on your scales.”

“Yeah. No. Dragons don’t do conditioner. Polish, but not conditioner,” the dragon corrected with a smile that got a laugh.

Gallus stretched for the salt. “Well it re–.” He cut off in time to see the tell tale red streak of colt. He managed to plant his butt on the chair as Tag missed his target and instead smashed the small of Gallus’s back. “Damn it, Tag!” he shouted, waving a fist at the departing, laughing colt.

“Are you okay?” Silverstream asked in alarm. She reached up to hold his shoulder, and that was all that kept him from pouncing on Tag and earning a detention.

“No. I love it when a pony keeps trying to use my nuts as a boxing bag!” he snapped, pressed a hand to the small of his back. It was starting to ache again. “Guess he smacked me pretty good,” he said as evenly as he could.

“You should tell professor Twilight about Tag. It’s not right what he’s doing,” Ocellus pointed out.

“I’m not going to tell. Clobber him if I catch him, maybe,” Gallus muttered. The professors weren’t going to fight his battles for him.

“Still, you should go to the nurse,” Ocellus said with a tap of her forehoof on his shoulder.

“Fine,” Gallus replied, “I’ll go to the nurse.” Partly because he didn’t like to admit to being hurt and the other to try to tie together some of his dignity. Of course, it would have been different if he was simply pretending to be sick to get out of class. That was always fair. But actually being sick was just a drag.

He limped his way down the hall to the nurse’s office. He really didn’t know what they could do besides give him an x-ray, some medicine, and an excuse to skip morning classes. He had to wait along with other sick colts and fillies, and was relieved when he got in to see the nurse.

It went about as well as he’d expected. A few concerned ‘hmms’ and ‘ahah’s before the pony admitted he didn’t know much about griffon physiology. The X ray magic was kinda neat; was that how his pelvic bones looked? It seemed like the image was stretched out or something.

Least he got a cherry lollipop out of it. It even tasted really good, which surprised him.

“Well?” Sandbar asked when he walked into Rainbow Dash’s class while she was supervising buckball teams.

“I’ll live,” Gallus muttered, to the snickers of other classmates. “What? He missed.”

“Dude, not gonna laugh at you. That’s super annoying. I dealt with him trying to smack me for a week.” Of course Sandbar smiled, but at least he seemed sincere. He grinned. “Maybe you’re so shiny you’re an easy target.”

“Ugh. I need to find some dirt to roll in,” he muttered. He was never going to use girl shampoo again if this was the effect. Still, eventually it was his turn at Buckball, and flying helped take his mind off of his problems. By the time the day was over, he felt a little better... even if he was still walking funny. He passed Tag, the red colt pointing at Gallus and then clutched his groin, his eyes rolling as his face twisted in mocking pain. “I got claws, Tag! See?” He raised his talons, but that only made the pegasi colt laugh harder.

When Gallus was finally in bed, he contemplated having a rub to deal with the edge, but his sheathe simply laid there like a sad sock against his belly. “Ugh,” he grumbled... but then his digits brushed against his nipples. Normally he didn’t pay they any mind. They were like elbows. You had them and... that was it. But as the fleshy yellow part of his claw rubbed against one, a zing went from the little nub straight to his brain. “Ah!” he was unable to silence before biting the sheet. Sandbar shifted in bed below him, but started snoring immediately.

Okay, this was getting weird. He ran his thumbs along the four nubs. What was going on? They shouldn’t feel so... zingy. Should they? Was this normal? A part of him thought of writing Grandpa Gruff, but that part died in the fires of mortification that raged at the thought of talking about any part of his body with his guardian. He poked and prodded the firm nubs, barely visible through the velvety fur that covered his belly and sheath. A few tugs and flicks of the nipples made his legs twitch. Honestly, if it was only this it wouldn’t be so bad, but no amount of playing with them could give him the three alarm raging boner he needed right now. The only product was a sticky emission of fluids matting his inner thighs as he tried valiantly to pump his sheathe.

He tried to think of Silverstream in the bath. A collage of images from their time together ran through his mind's eye, including the various bits that he’d peeked at from time to time. It wasn’t like she wore clothes. A little peeking was natural, right? He remembered her soft skin as she clung to him, fearing the Storm King’s return. Yet enticing as the memory was, he only got hard enough to get about halfway out of his sheathe before it stopped. Memories about the reflection Silverstream started to intrude, accompanied by the sensations of that tongue gliding along his member. No matter how he tried to imagine her, that stupid mirror barged in, and he couldn’t get further. As soon as his rubbing stopped, his penis slunk back inside.

“No joy,” he muttered, putting his hands above the sheets to stop him from fondling himself. Thinking about Silverstream had always worked for him before, but now... now it wasn’t. Was it the mirror? Was it him? Stress? What kind of healthy griffon boy couldn’t get off thinking of a cute hippogriff girl like her? Could anything be weirder?

“Okay, mirror, it’s time. You and me,” Gallus said as he slipped into the classroom three very frustrated days later. He hadn’t been able to get away from classes, homework assignments, his friends, or Silverstream to have his percussive heart to heart with the mirror. Three days of his penis not working right when he really needed it to work was damned well enough. He had all the motivation he needed and right now the seven years bad luck would be worth the frustration that raged inside him. He was so heavily in the friend zone that he would probably be a bridesmaid at whatever hippogriff lord Silverstream was forced to marry.

And don’t get him started on his stupid feathers. Even a few days after his bath with Silversteam, he was getting teased about his ‘shiny feathers’. It’d been even worse when Silverstream had tried sticking up for him about his feathers being pretty. Not that that hadn’t been awesome, but that, for some reason, he burst out crying after she did! What was the deal? The hug made up for it somewhat, but he hadn’t meant to cry like a baby just to get a cuddle. And then, ten minutes later, he was back to only being generally frustrated.

And that wasn’t the worst of it. His nipples weren’t simply sensitive now; they were puffy too. Puffy! Four small bumps protruding from the velvety fur. What kind of griffon had puffy nipples? It might have been different if he could get some relief from it, but instead all he was left with was this sense of frustration that made him want to scream!

And why couldn’t he? Because his cock had decided to take a vacation on the rare moments when he wanted to relieve some of the tension! Like his penis had given up the fight and was sulking in his sheathe. Oh, he could get it drippy in ten seconds flat, but he wasn’t able to get hard, even when focusing on the reflection’s damned molestation. He had to force his sheathe back and rub the half turgid end. It drove him nuts that he could have this much lubrication, get wound so close to popping... and still not have any... ‘grand finale’. It made no sense, given how sensitive he felt down there, but all that toying with himself and he could barely reach half mast. It made him want to scream, and not in the good way.

So now that it was lunch time. He pushed open the window, glad it was still unlocked, and entered the classroom... only to find it bare. The tables were returned to their original places and the mirror, that damned mirror, was no where to be seen. The hammer slipped out of his powerless grip, landing on the floor with a solid thump. His butt followed. With the mirror gone, how was he supposed to fix it?

He staggered through the school day almost in a daze until he finally got to his kindness class. Silverstream kept looking at him in worry, but he barely noticed. How had that mirror jinxed him? He needed help, but after that stupid reflection molested him, he was mortified to even mention it. He had one more hope, and then he’d go to Councilor Glimmer and... vomit this problem all over her and let her deal with it.

When class was over, he hung back. Fluttershy loaded up baby animals from her refuge and jumped in surprise as she realized he was still there. “Oh my, Gallus. Are you okay?” she asked, pressing a hoof to her chest. “Is something... I mean... are you okay?”

“Yeah, I’m fine.” He said, then coughed. “I was wondering, do you know where that mirror artifact went?”

“The mirror? Why do you want to know about that?”

Gallus’s left eyelid twitched. If he started sobbing now... He fell back on the last ditch excuse every student had at the School of Friendship: “Report! History report for Professor Sparkle!” Please believe me please believe me... “We have to do one on a magical artifact and I was interested in the mirror.”

She stared at him skeptically. “Oh, well, Discord took it back to his dimension,” she replied.

“Oh really. Well that’s great!” he lied, his jaw aching to maintain his grin. “Where’s that?”

“I have no idea. Apparently only the mailpony can find it because of his special talent. Otherwise, Discord has to come and get me,” she stated as she helped animals into their carrier.

“Oh,” he said, his last hope dwindling rapidly. “Can you call him... or write him... or is there a summoning spell?”

“I can certainly ask him to stop by and tell you all about it,” Fluttershy replied with a smile, adding food for each of the critters. “Is that all that’s bothering you?”

“Yeah...” Gallus started to say, turning for the door, and then whirling back. “No. I... what do you do when you like someone and they don’t like you? I mean... romantically.”

Fluttershy blushed but smiled. “Well, I’d say you keep being nice.” Kill me now. “Maybe they won’t ever feel the same for you, but you can at least have something together.” She gave a little shrug and a sad smile. “But sometimes it doesn’t work, and if it doesn’t, then you do your best not to hurt each other. Not everycreature works out.”

Gallus slumped a little but nodded. “Okay. Yeah. I get that.” I don’t LIKE it, but I get it. “Friendzone. Yay.”

“Well, is that better than ‘no friend zone’?” Fluttershy countered, though from her giggle, Gallus wondered if she knew what friend zone even meant. “Just give it time. These things work out one way or another.” Gallus fought with all his strength not to roll his eyes. Pony optimism. Sometimes things didn’t work out. He didn’t know if losing his friendship with Silverstream was something he could stand to lose...

“Okay,” he muttered, then sighed. “And I do need to talk to him. Discord. About his mirror,” he added in a rush.

“I’ll be sure to tell him,” she assured him, then hooked up the little cart and wheeled the baby critters out of the classroom. “ And don’t forget your homework for my class!” she called out in parting.

“I won’t...” he muttered, then blinked. Oh, crap. “Wait! We have homework?” he shouted as he flew after her. “Professor Fluttershy!” he wailed. “I wasn’t paying attention!”

“You know, maybe things are starting to look up,” Gallus muttered as he struggled in vain to get his headfeathers to lay flat. Between showers in the morning with Sandbar and baths in the evening with Silverstream, he was pretty sure this was the cleanest it was possible for him to get. His feathers positively gleamed, and he was sure that if you stroked his feathers they’d squeak. He and Sandbar walked down the hall, Gallus still annoyed by his hips fighting his normal stride. He didn’t know what it was, but every step seems to make him... sway.

It’d been a weird three days since the artifacts had departed, but good riddance. Whatever that mirror had done hadn’t made getting with Silverstream easier. It’d just dumped a whole ton of problems on his lap. He was so twisted up over being in the friend zone and pretending to be okay with it that his penis and him were no longer on speaking terms. Rubbing while thinking about the mirror didn’t do anything but make him all sticky from precum while his cock simply laid there. Honestly, he didn’t know he could get so horny without the damned thing getting hard, but he could. He’d decided a break was in order. Get his head together and then worry about getting off.

The worst part was he still wasn’t sure how things were with Silverstream. She seemed the same as always, goofy and a little dense. Their bath talks were always fine and funny, laughing about the day. Twice, Ocellus had joined them, and Silverstream had been... amazing. Like she always was. But when she met his eye there was sometimes a slip in her smile. A worry in her eye. Not that he’d do something. He wasn’t that much of a creep. But still, they weren’t back to being friends again.

“She feels guilty,” Occelus explained as they walked to their next class together. “She knows you’re a nice guy. Heck, there’s lots of people who would like to date you.” She paused, as if hoping he’d press her for names. He just waited. “Anyway, she knows she upset you and she’s upset that she upset you. You should...”

“If you say talk, I’m going to scream from the rooftops. That’s all we’ve been doing for days,” Gallus interrupted. “I told her I’m fine.”

“I know,” Ocellus said with a sigh. “Are you?” Occelus asked, cocking her head and putting a hoof on his shoulder.

“I thought I was,” he muttered. “I haven’t been feeling very good.” Not since that stupid mirror. And things were still weird. He’d had some trouble in the bathroom. It was an oval bowl in the floor. How did you miss that!? Fortunately, he’d managed to clean everything up before someone wondered who pissed on the wall. Stupid mirror. A part of him still wanted to track it down with a hammer. He suddenly caught a pleasant scent and smiled, closing his eyes and inhaling deeply. “Is the cafeteria serving cherry pie?”

“You can smell that from here?” she asked in surprise.

“Never underestimate a griffon’s sense of smell for tasty things” he said with a half smile.

But then he walked into their next class, Rainbow Dash’s. Suddenly there was a red blur behind him. “Tag!” came the shout and a smack right under his tail.

He hissed sharply through his beak and then snapped at the colt darting to the far side of the gym., “Not funny, Tag!” He breathed hard, glaring death at the colt.

“I thought it was funny!” The colt yelled back as he laughed.

“He is such a jerk,” Ocellus muttered. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah,” Gallus replied, clenching his eyes closed as he prepared to recompose himself, then blinked. “Yeah, I think actually am.” Which was odd given how fast the pain ebbed. He hurt, but no more than if Tag had struck his wing or shoulder on his passing. A part of him wanted to check where he was hit, but there wasn’t any time before class started.

They walked over to the rest of their friends and took seats, watching the matchups. He sat right behind Silverstream, and tried to forget the smack... except why didn’t it hurt? Last time Tag tagged him he’d nearly thrown up! He leaned this way and that, scritching his butt against the bleachers... something was very wrong. Still, the match was starting and he wanted to be ready if Professor Egghead called on him.

Still, why hadn’t it hurt? He thought of running to the nurse, despite his ignorance on griffon anatomy,but something caught his eye. Silverstream was swishing her tail back and forth idly. Nothing odd about that. Lots of creatures did. He did! But most of them didn’t swish their tail... up. And every time she did, he saw the teardrop shape of her sex. Normally, it wouldn’t be a thing. Unless you always wore clothes, you’d eventually see things and they didn’t really matter. Only for some reason, as he stared, he saw her sex was glistening, and he could smell a sweetness rolling off her. As he watched, a tiny little drop dripped from the base, elongating, then getting lost in her tail.

Silverstream was aroused... and it wasn’t due to him! A part of him roared in jealousy and he lifted up, trying to see who Silverstream was gazing at. Gallus would... do something! Take him aside and...

There wasn’t anyone in front of Silverstream except three fillies. The unicorn goalie levitating the basket goal was doing a ridiculous gyrating dance with her hips; a gyration that Silverstream’s hips matched, as if she were grinding herself against the unicorn. Her flank was pointed right at Gallus and his friends, and she was flipping her tail up with every rotation. Almost no one was paying attention in the heat of the game.

No one except Silverstream. As Gallus’s eyes dropped back to her sex, he saw it twitch, and twitch again, as if it were winking at him. But perhaps more disturbing than all that was what wasn’t happening to him... no tightening in his pelvis. Instead, there was this warm wetness that seemed to be oozing back under his tail rather than forward. He half rose, seeing a frigging puddle where he’d been sitting. What the hey was going on! His eyes returned to that majestic display Silverstream was putting on and... nothing! His brain roared a storm of desire at his privates, only to be utterly ignored by his loins. No awkward firmness slipping out of his body. No raging erection to plunge into her. His eyes watched in amazement as her pristine folds gave another twitch, a clear drop of heaven collecting at the base before rolling off. All he felt was a quiver within.

His mind started to scream as he looked from the stupid gyrating unicorn below to Silverstream’s arousal. Fillies. She was aroused by fillies. His breathing grew faster and faster as Sandbar and Ocellus both looked at him in concern. One of them was asking him something, but it sounded as if they were talking underwater.

Gallus’s gut clenched. ‘I can change you. Give you a chance.’ That was what the mirror had meant. Gallus chanced a hand down his belly... over his sensitive quartet of nipples... down to where his sheathe was. Where his sheathe... should... be...

Gallus’s heart froze as he felt nothing but his belly. He darted from the seats, raced for the exit, and flew as fast as he could. He heard Rainbow Dash calling after him, but didn’t stop. Didn’t stop until he reached his bedroom and flopped on his back. His hands rubbed over his stomach again and again, as if feeling for the edge of some illusion that was just hiding his missing cock. Nothing. “Oh no... oh no...” he whispered as he remembered that sight of Silverstream’s arousal. Arousal at a mare. A female.

He didn’t want to, but he reached further down, spreading his hind legs wide. It wasn’t like he saw his back end often. It was a stretch, and even now he was having trouble seeing... he closed his eyes, his hands trembling. He reached down, found his tail, his rear and then right beyond it his nail scraped against a sensitive ruff of... something!

He shot off the bed to the desk. Occelus had given him a mirror as a Heartswarming present. He flopped onto his back once again, spread his haunches wide, and stared into it at his own reflection.

He was a girl.

“Oh, fuck...” he whispered. Then his eyes popped wide! “What...” he muttered numbly as he reached down with a claw. His sheathe really didn’t look like a sheathe anymore. It was too far back from his nipples, as if it were migrating towards his anus. He reached out with a claw, poking the blue scruff of fur that had once held his cock and was now a fat, wrinkled oval of fur mashed up against his pelvis. He felt the sharp sting as his talon hooked the skin. He tugged the skin lightly to the side, and a creepy drawing sensation he felt matched his hand motion; what he was seeing in the mirror, as mad as it was, was actually real.

Dropping the mirror he started for the door. He had to tell the nurse! No, the headmare!

Then he froze as his mind whispered, ‘And then what?’

And then what? If he went to the professors, would they be mad? Would they think he’d done it to try and do something with Silverstream? Would they tell Grandpa Gruff? The thought of his guardian knowing he was turning into a girl exploded like a bomb of humiliation in his mind. ‘I’ve known Gallus was turning into a girl for years.’ ‘Gallus? A girl? What else is new? The sky blue? Water’s wet? What a surprise.’

Then there was his reputation at school. He got a little flak just for being a griffon. Sure, Cozy Glow was gone but there was still some animosity there. He could hear Tag now. ‘I smacked his balls so hard they disappeared!’ And then how would everyone treat him?

But what about his friends? Would Sandbar be okay with Gallus as a roommate? Would Ocellus simply... know? Like pick up his girly emotions? He could imagine her licking her lips with a long, sinuous tongue. ‘Why, Gallus. Your new emotions are so feminine... and delicious!’ Okay, maybe she wouldn’t sound quite so evil as she did in his head, but still! Smolder would be scornful. Maybe. Gallus had been sure she was a he until he saw her in that froo froo dress. But Smolder had always been a girl... they hadn’t known enough about dragon physiology to tell.

Was that why no one else had noticed? It wasn’t like there were other griffons who could tell. Or maybe the others were just as oblivious to his testicular status as the nurse had been. Maybe Silverstream was more familiar with horse hindends than leonine ones?

Gallus’s panic was starting to abate. At least it lessened enough that he could do a little... self evaluation. He propped the mirror up against the wall and started to explore his... thing. He couldn’t even think of what to call it. It wasn’t exactly a sheathe anymore, but it also wasn’t exactly what girls had either. He reached down and pulled, feeling the skin stretch and thin. It was like his skin wasn’t exactly sure where it was supposed to go as it was migrating.

“Okay,” he muttered and then pulled the... skin... back. What was left of his penis came into view. It was no bigger than his thumb, and glistened brightly. The tip had no hole to see, and he had to push the pink thumb sized cone aside to spot the small round hole that, he guessed, was where he peed from now. Rather than think further on the horrors of that, he focused on the ruin of his masculinity. It tickled as the translucent fluids upon it cooled in contact with the air. Finally he moved his gaze to where a wet orifice seeped clear fluid. He took several deep breaths, then reached down and pushed the pink flesh apart. A sensation his brain couldn’t identify made his pelvis quiver as he examined the opening. It was harder, but he saw a deeper entrance into his body. The manipulations coated his fingers in the viscous substance, creating sticky streamers connecting his digits.

He heard astrange whining noise, and it took a few seconds for Gallus to realize it was coming from him. He pulled his hands away, clutching his head and rocking a little as he tried to process this. Okay. A thing was happening to him. So far, no one had screamed ‘hey Gallus, why do you have a pussy?’ Somehow he’d escaped without anyone noticing!

The knock on the door sent a stab of terror right into Gallus’s gut. “One second!” he cried out, in a childish, panicked squawk. “One second!” he repeated, forcing a deeper bass as he pulled himself to his feet, looked around, and spotted one of Sandbar’s green towels. He immediately pulled it around his tail. “Just... taking care of something!” he yelled and knotted it tight, unbalancing, and nearly landing on his face. “Ack!”

The door opened and Sandbar poked his head in. His green eyes examined to room, him, and the mirror propped up against the wall. “Uh, you okay, dude?”

Gallus pushed himself up and then immediately spread his wings. “Hey! Of course I’m okay! Why wouldn’t I be okay?” He kept his voice husky, afraid that any second his voice would turn all high and girly, “I just needed some personal time!”

Sandbar stepped in and looked over his shoulder. “Call of the search. He’s here. Ah... give me a second.” Then he kicked the door closed. “So, what’s up? Anything I can do to help?”

“Nope, I’m fine. Everythings fine,” he assured him, snorting and tossing his head back. “What could be wrong?”

“Well you tore out of gym class without a word,” he said, his brows furrowed. “And you’re talking like you got a bad head cold all of a sudden.” Maybe the voice thing was in Gallus’s head.? He’d need a closer examination. “Come on. What’s the deal. Let us help.”

Not unless you can instantly regrow a penis, and if you can then boy do I have more questions. “I just needed some personal time. You know. Me, myself, and I...”

Sandbar knit his brows together. “Yeah, dude, no. I don’t know what’s up, but you weren’t cherrying your chonga.”

“How– How do you know I wasn’t?” Gallus stammered.

“Well, it doesn’t smell like it,” Sandbar replied flatly.

“Smell...” Gallus balked. “What do you mean smell?”

Sandbar stared at him a moment. “Dude, do you know when I’ve been waxing my board?”

Waxing his... ohhhh. “Yeah.” Leather and saltwater taffy. Better when yak wasn’t mixed in. “Wait. You mean you know what I smell like when I’m...” Gallus trailed off in horror. Beyond the mortification was a tiny voice wanting to ask, ‘like what?’ Gallus mentally strangled that thought and dumped it in the mental pit of ‘never be thought again.’

“Right, so what’s up? Ocellus felt a ton of alarm come off you right before you ran out.” He glanced to the side. “And you’re wearing a towel, but you’re not wet like you’ve showered.”

Gallus knew he should come clean about the mirror and the changes. It would have been the smart, reliable thing to do for his friend. Then they’d go to Twilight together and somehow unmagic whatever magic was cast on him. Of course, he was just as capable of telling Sunbar what had happened as he was of pulling off his own head and doing Shakespony monologues with it.

Instead, Gallus took a deep breath and answered grimly. “Diarrhea.” Sandbar’s lip curled. “Explosive diarrhea. It was like a bomb went off in my butt. I think I took out a toilet. And I just got back from the shower after washing. Back there.” He nodded behind him and Sandbar gave an ‘oooh’ of comprehension. Gallus adopted a mask of stoicism. “Even now, I can still feel the gurgling...”

“Okay, dude!” Sandbar blurted. “I get it. That totally makes sense! Just... stop talking about it...” He took a deep breath. “Are you okay? Do you need some stomach medicine from the nurse? A fresh towel?”

“I already got some,” Gallus lied. Last thing he wanted was for Sandbar to talk to the nurse, and the nurse examining him again. “I think I just need to rest. Maybe this will all just sort itself out.” Oh please, let it work out somehow!

“Okay, dude. Just take it easy. You’re really worrying us,” he pointed out, and Gallus felt a twinge in his gut. These were his friends, wasn’t he supposed to tell them things like this. But despite that want, the fear of humiliation gnawed at his heart.

“Thanks,” Gallus answered with a smile. “I’m just deal with some things, you know?”

Sandbar nodded slowly. “If you can think of any way we can help, we’ll help,” Sandbar assured him, promising that he’d bring him something easy for his stomach and get his homework from the rest of his classes. “Also, make sure my towel gets in the laundry,” he said with his easy smile as he departed.

“Yeah, I will,” Gallus replied, glad when his friend finally left. He wasn’t sure if Sandbar believed him about the need for the towel, but he took it for what it was worth. After a short wait to make sure Sandbar didn’t come back immediately, he chucked the towel and repositioned the mirror and tried to figure out what the heck was going on.

Start with the face. At least it seemed relatively unchanged. He twisted his face this way and that, checked his tongue, and peered deep into his eyes... unsure of what he was expecting to find, but it was important to look closely. Aside from the glossier plumage atop his head, he seemed normal, but that he could chalk up to Silverstream’s champoo. He carefully spoke aloud, but aside from a little timbre which could be stress, he thought he sounded the same. Maybe?

His forelegs and claws, likewise, seemed the same. He poked and prodded his wings, but they seemed roughly the same. There were some subtle differences between boy wings and girl wings, but he doubted any of his friends could tell the difference. Likewise his shoulders, forelegs, and claws all seemed unchanged.

Now his hands roamed down to his nipples. Normally he didn’t give them a second thought, but now he carefully examined all four. The nipples were a little more sensitive and puffy than he thought they should be, but females had a very subtle layer of fat underneath. All his poking and prodding didn’t reveal anything, so if he was changing, he guessed they would be next.

He’d checked his... thing. Was it a sheathe or a vagina? He put that thought aside for the moment and he checked his hips, standing up on his hind legs. It wasn’t just soreness. His hips were different too. He took a few slow steps, and realized his hips were wider than he remembered. A whole lot more of his butt seemed to be moving with every step. There was a sway to his gait he didn’t remember being there before. The bedroom didn’t offer enough space to run, but even a few steps revealed that whatever was going on, it had changed his bones.

Checking his feet, he felt a spike of panic to see that the footpads’d gone from blue to a more berry purple! He poked and prodded his footpads, but there was no doubt... purple instead of blue. If this change altered his coloration, It’d be impossible to hide. Still, the fur on his hind legs seemed the same. Mostly? Kinda. He wasn’t 100% sure...

That left his thing. He gently peeled the skin back again. There was his penis... or what was left of it... and there was that hole right next to it. Was it a girl thing? Did he have more girl things in there? How deep did it go? If his hips had changed, how much had that changed too? He didn’t exactly want to find out, but he also kinda did. Now that he wasn’t in full freak out, he stroked a knuckle against the pink protrusion. Was this really all that was left of his proud griffonhood? Eight... seven... six and a half inches of griffony glory gone. His knot barely even a knuckle now.

The contact shot electricity up his spine and down his left leg and he clenched one eye closed, barely suppressing the grunt of surprise. Was this some damned kind of magic? Just rubbing slowly up and down the glossy remains of penis was almost too intense to bear. He had to take it slow, and even then his left leg was twitching in nervous response at every pass.

Wait? Was this how girls... did it? Was this going to make it worse? Should he stop? And yet, the moment he stopped touching himself, his libido demanded he take this to some kind of conclusion. So he reluctantly returned his fingers to the skin. If this did... do something... it’d be good to know... right? This was... exploration. Like... going into the Everfree Forest and learning junk. Yeah, he was just learning junk.

His libido didn’t give two shits how he rationalized it, so long as he kept touching himself.

Within just a few rubs, a warming and relaxing spread throughout his pelvis. He stared in horror and fascination as that hole started to twitch and then a spring of sweet nectar began to flow. And in great quantities. He coated a digit with the viscous substance, and resumed stroking that pink spur of flesh. Crazy though it may be, Gallus desperately wanted to see if he still had nuts somewhere... anywhere... in his body. If he could spurt... if he was potent... somehow... then he was still a guy.

He kept leaning back, his hind legs splayed wide as he watched himself in the hand mirror. He kept hoping to see some tiny hole at the end of that cone open up and put out something... but no. His body was winding up into that tension that preclude climax, only this was a far different kind of winding! Before, it was like a trap that built up that was going to snap closed at any second. This time... this time he didn’t know what it was doing! He couldn’t rub any faster for fear of... something! Maybe what was left of his cock exploding! What- he didn’t-

Something happened, rather like a cramp mixed with a spasm mixed with shaking covered in chocolate. He didn’t cry out so much as gasp for breath as he stopped rubbing right away, his knees clamping together as he fell on his side. Instead of the trap springing, it felt like some kind of monster started to rampage inside his pelvis! A monster jagged and tickly and tingling and wet and it was just thrashing left and right inside his body. It raged for almost a minute before settling down, the cramping feeling relaxing a little to a vaguely sore throb.

“What the hell was that?” he asked in shock. The sensation inside had been so chaotic and unpredictable that he wasn’t even sure if it counted as pleasure! Did all girls go through that, or were his insides so malformed that whatever he’d gone through had been some kind of crazy fluke?! Even now, as he flopped over on his side, his legs felt numb and his tail base tingled. Why was his tail tingly!? Tails didn’t tingle like that!

Did they?

He didn’t uncurl for almost five minutes. He could still feel that monster lurking in his loins, hungry to be released again. If he’d been normal, he’d be cleaning up by now and going to sleep, or eat, or something. The fluids that hole had emitted had soaked the furry scruff surrounding his thing, and he snagged Sandbar’s towel again to scrub it dry. He’d need a bath to–

“Oh, no. Baths!” He couldn’t do his bath with Silverstream? What if she noticed? But what if cancelling it upset her more? “Think Gallus. Think...” he muttered. He had to fix this. Fix this somehow without anyone finding out what he’d done to himself. No! What that stupid mirror had done to him! It was evil. You fixed evil with a hammer...

Later.

“I can’t believe this, but I’m going to have to hit the books. There’s got to be some magic that turns guys into girls and girls into guys, right? I mean, ponies have been doing magic for centuries. At least one of them must have swapped an innie for an outie,” he said as he rubbed his head.

Only... where the heck did you start looking for something like that?

Chapter Five: I Know a Creature who Knows a Creature

Gallus and authority figures went together like oil and water. It took some vinegar and vigorous shaking to try to get anything useful from it. And right now, he was dealing with one of his more difficult instructors.

“Let me get this straight, Gallus, darling. You want me to make you some... pants?” She asked as she finished packing away her sewing machines. Gallus had learned one important thing in her class thus far: sewing did not aid friendship.

“Mhmm!” Gallus replied, forcing a smile. “Or shorts. Whatever. I’ve really never tried the whole clothes... thing... and I really thought it might be... neat.” Rarity was always good for help in a pinch, but first you had to get through the pinching. He’d waited till he was sure his friends were gone before darting away to her classroom. Fortunately he’d caught her during her prep, but one did not simply ask Rarity for clothes.

“Well, I can’t say I haven’t considered a line of apparel for griffon kind. My encounters with Captain Celeno had me imagine an ensemble or two. I’ve found that most griffons seem averse to apparel,” she said as she trotted over to her desk. “What changed your mind?”

“Oh... ah...” His eyes darted as his tail pressed hard against that strange new orifice that seemed to scream ‘look at me’ to the griffon. “Gabby! She’s trying all sorts of new things. Got me... thinking! Why not try something different?” Like anatomy. Done! I’d like my original equipment back, thank you.

Rarity pursed her lips thoughtfully, rubbing her chin. “Well, she is the odd duck... er... griffon...ess... Still, if you really want to try some of my griffon apparel, I’ll hardly stop you. I only ask that you give me any tips or pointers that might make them even more appealing to the griffon in the street, as it were.”

“Yeah. Sure. Fine. Whatever!” he said, his grin so strained he felt his cheeks twitching.

She finished packing up the sewing machines and retrieved her tape measure. “Alright. Come here. Let me get your measurements.”

Squawk! Gallus covered his beak in embarrassment. “Do you really have to measure me? Can’t you just guess my measurements?”

Rarity raised her nose primly. “I am a professional. I don’t guess measurements, particularly when they’re not ponyish. Now come here. This will only take a moment.”

“Are you sure?” Gallus asked, his tail pressed so flat that he thought it might turn inside out.

“Honestly, Gallus, you’re acting like a filly nervous about her fall formal dress,” Rarity said as she placed her glasses on her muzzle. Gallus froze with a small screaming noise in his throat. Then she let out a soft ‘ah’. “Oh. I see. Dreadfully sorry, dear. I didn’t realize.”

The scream trailed off. “Huh.”

“I understand that you’re having difficulties with that colt, Tag. Yes. Mmmm. Rainbow mentioned he did something right before class today. I can understand that you’d be uncomfortable with getting touched there after that.” She was actually blushing a little as she kept her eyes raised.

“No! Well, yes! I mean–” Gallus didn’t know which humiliation was worse, the changes made to his body, or the humiliation of acknowledging Tag was... had been... using his sack as a punching bag. Honestly, if it fixed things, he’d let Tag use it as a speed bag. “I’m just... sensitive... about by back end.”

“I see,” Rarity murmured. “Well, I’ll levitate my tape from over here and try to keep everything loose. Maybe see about a little padding?”

Gallus’s face twisted up in bafflement. Did she know? Then he realized she was talking about something that would protect his bits from Tag. Gallus slumped in relief; it would help hide his missing bits. “That’d be great, Professor Rarity.” Better if you expelled the red ass, but at least it might obscure shapes.

She took his measurements, all without getting too personal with what he was hiding under his tail. Having mutilated several garments in this very classroom, he acknowledged anyone that could put together some shorts inside five minutes was damned skilled. The fabric was heavy linen that obscured his hips and hindquarters, and luckily a strip of cotton padding right under his tail would prevent people from knowing there was anything missing. He stood on his hind legs, tugging the drawstring snug.

“Darling, how are you doing that?” she asked.

“Huh?” Gallus frowned.

“You’re standing on two legs! I thought only Captain Celeno could do that!”

He laughed. “Nah. Any griff can. It just takes more balance is all.”

“Wait. Right. There.” She said with a grin that filled him with dread. A second later a storm of cloth whirled around him, and he watched as he was changed from one outfit to another. “Saddle arabian! Mariponian! Hippogriff navy!” He went through a half dozen more.

“Professor!” he squalked as she reached for appoloosan cowpony wear.

She waved a hoof as she dug through her cabinet. “One more minute, darling. I’m inspired!” she gushed. “This could be a full frontier of bipedal based fashion! Even ponies. If those fancy Lipziggians can walk around all day on two legs, why can’t other ponies?”

Never look a gift mania in the mouth, Gallus, he told himself.

On the plus side, if he took these he’d have at least a half dozen outfits to hide his body with. On the negative side, he’d have to put up with wearing Rarity’s latest ‘bipedalism chique.’ Not a hard choice, he took the least embarrassing outfits, assuring her that he’d give feedback on how the fit. In reality, there wasn’t much different between two legs and four, save that the material bunched up a little around his hips. Small price to pay to keep the traitorous bits concealed until he could fix them.

And that meant a trip to the library. After dropping off his outfits in his room, he headed to the school library. Even if things were getting late and he should be going for dinner, Gallus wanted to see if maybe he could get just as lucky and find an easy reversal to whatever the mirror had done for him.

Most of the students were filing out. Even better. Gallus went up to the librarian, Ms. Checkout, and tried to ask nonchalantly, “I was wondering if the school had any books on magical transformation.”

“Practical or theoretical?” she replied as she trotted over to the card files. Her horn glowed as pulled one out.

“Practical. Definitely practical.” His response drew a curious brow arch from the puce colored unicorn, and he quickly amended. “It’s for a report.”

“Mhmmm,” she replied, and led him down an isle to a selection of a dozen books. “Here you are. Let me know if you need to check any out. We close in two hours.”

“Yes! Thank you! This shouldn’t take long,” he said as he rubbed his claws together.

Two hours later he’d reached a breakthrough. It was considered to be fundamentally impossible to transform apples into oranges. You could turn a bird into an orange. You could turn a frog into an orange. But for some reason, you couldn’t turn apples into oranges. Curiously, you could also only turn fish into apples. But most importantly: “None of this helps!”

“Gallus!” came Silverstream’s voice from the next lane over. He started, spilling the books he’d had on his lap all over as Silverstream came around the corner. “Oh, it was you! I had no idea you were sitting over there. We could have been study buddies!”

Instead of bed buddies. “Hey, Silver. I was just...” He stared down at the books. “Curious about the paradox of why you can’t turn apples into oranges.”

She gasped, “That’s fascinating! Tell me more!” She reached under her wing, pulling out a notepad and pencil, and leaned forward with rapt interest. “Can you change bananas into kumquats? What about strawberries and carrots?”

“Uh,” he glanced at the book and rubbed the back of his head, not having any clue where to start with any of that, least of which to mention carrots weren’t fruit... were they?. “Well, apparently Star Swirl tried to change apples into oranges or some junk, and he couldn’t, and that became a super big deal or some junk. So lots of unicorns try the apples to oranges challenge, but it doesn’t work because of thaumaturgical kinds or some junk. You can change apples to fish and fish to oranges, but you can’t go straight from apples to oranges.” He rubbed his chin. “To be fair, it was a little more interesting than I anticipated.” Unhelpful, but interesting.

“Wow! That is so neat!” She held up her book. “I was reading all about horseshoes. Did you know the first horseshoes were made over two thousand years ago out of wood? Isn’t that wild?”

He forced a chuckle. “Well, I guess. Can’t say I ever thought of it, because... you know... no hooves.” Then he pointed at the book. “Why are you so interested? Don’t hippogriffs have horseshoes?”

“No!” She said with a grin. “Isn’t that weird? Ponies use horseshoes all the time, even pegasi, but we never did. I dunno, maybe Mt. Eris’s salty coast made metal and wood horseshoes impractical. Oooh, or maybe we once used horseshoes out of clay, or coral... though that would be kinda fragile,” she noted tapping her beak thoughtfully.

Gallus stared at her a moment and couldn’t help but smile. “You’re brilliant...”

“What? Me? Pfffft. Stop. I’m not. I just find dumb stuff interesting, that’s all,” she said with a dismissive wave of her claw. Ocellus is the smart one. She reads everything.”

She does... doesn’t she? Gallus thought to himself.

“I’m sorry, Gallus, but I’ve never read about anything like that,” Ocellus answered when he’d countered her in the bath as silverstream did laps in the big pool. Really, given her shell, she only needed a rinse and a wipe down to be clean. “I know there’s an artefact that could change genders, but I don’t know of any kind of spell.”

“Oh, come on. You’re a changeling. It’s in your name and everything. You must have some idea,” Gallus complained as silverstream zipped back and forth underwater with alarming speed.

“Sure, I could change, but I don’t,” she said as she shook her head and looked off to the side. Unless the sinks were suddenly fascinating, something was wrong.

“Why not?” he asked, cocking his head. The towel he’d draped over his butt might be giving him a little protection, but he kept a grip on it.

“Because it’s important when you can become other people to have something that’s consistent. A changeling can go crazy if too many things change, and being a girl is an important thing to me.”

“It is? Have you tried being a boy?” he asked and she gave a little nod.

“When Thorax freed us. I didn’t like it. I was much more aggressive and... I was mean too. I mean... I was mean.” She said, her eyes blazing with a blue fire before she blinked it away. “But I didn’t like it. It felt too much like how Chrysalis wanted us to be. I even tried being both and neither.” Both? “The first was too confusing, and the second left me feeling left out.” She rubbed a leg. “So... yeah. I’m a girl. It’s something I can always come back to when I change into other things.”

Gallus pondered this a moment, and then Ocellus asked, “Why do you ask?”

His eyes shot wide and he felt it clench along with things that should clench. “No reason!” he yelped.

“Gallus, I know you’re going through a lot right now,” she said, putting a hoof on his shoulder.

“You do?” he asked in horror.

“It’s stressful. I understand,” she said with a slow nod.

“It is,” he murmured, feeling himself start to crumble.

“But turning Tag into a girl isn’t going to make him stop harassing you,” she said.

“I don’t know how–” The crumbling was replaced by a record scratch. “Wait, what?”

Silverstream surfaced, pulled herself over the lip of the tub. “Hey guys. Whatcha talking about?”

“Gallus is plotting to turn Tag into a girl,” Ocellus states.

“Gallus... that’s an awesome prank! That’ll teach him to keep trying to ‘brush’ up underneath girl’s tails. Honestly, I don’t know why he hasn’t gotten suspended yet,” she said with a snort and splash of her fin.

“After Cozy Glow, I think that they’re trying to focus on fixing ‘hard cases’, rather than give up on them. If they can find a way to make Tag behave better, maybe they can use the same technique when they let Cozy Glow out.” Ocellus shrugged. “He’s milking it.”

“Well, some ponies just need to go to school somewhere else,” Gallus growled.

“I agree. Friendship is important, but not everypony can learn that,” Ocellus said. “But unless the people he harasses file complaints, the teachers probably won’t think he’s bad enough to expel.”

“Yeah, well, you try writing that he smacked you in the nuts,” Gallus muttered. “Anyway, if either if you do happen to stumble on a way to turn him into a girl, let me know.”

“Sorry, but the only person I know that did anything like that was Professor Twilight,” Ocellus said with a tap of her hooves.

“Sorry, Gallus, but I’m afraid that Ocellus might have missed the fact that in my duel with Trixie, I didn’t actually change Applejack into a stallion. It was simply her brother painted orange,” Twilight said as they gathered in Starlight’s office the next day. He’d had a particularly awkward time trying to explain the outfits to Sandbar. Since when did Griffons wear pajamas?

“Are you sure?” he pressed. “There has to be some way. It’s magic after all!”

“I’m afraid that not even Starswirl the Bearded has come up with a spell to do that,” Twilight said, casually crushing his feeble hope beneath her hoof while they had tea in Starlight’s office. He sat uncomfortably in Rarity’s white shorts and top, which she’d inexplicably picked a nautical theme for. Still, it was the first time he could walk around and be absolutely sure that no one would ask ‘Hey, Gallus, where did that hole come from?’

“Yeah, and while I can do things to cutie marks, I’m pretty sure that a change like that is beyond me,” Starlight chimed in, levitating her cup and taking a sip before going on, “I mean, I can ask Sunburst if you want, but it’s not like you can do things like that. It’d be like... I dunno, me collecting a bunch of pony feathers and giving myself wings. But that’d be crazy! I’d never even think about doing something like that,” She added at once and took another hasty sip.

“Uhuh...” Twilight murmured, giving her friend a troubled look before continuing. “Anyway, I’m afraid you’ll just have to tell your friend it’s impossible with pony magic. It’s like apples into oranges.”

Starlight growled, “I swear I’ve come this close to pulling off that challenge.” She took a frustrated bite out of a tea cake.

“But I... I mean... my friend was so sure it had to be at least possible, right? What about non-pony magic?” Gallus asked, trying to keep the teacup steady on the saucer. How did Smolder handle this? Sitting with leaf juice and tiny cakes had to be a special level of tartarus. He wanted to gulp down a dozen, slurp the cup empty, and get out of there but he had to be polite and exhaust every possibility.

“Well, only changelings or Discord can do such a thing, and even Discord’s changes aren’t permanent. Annoyingly long, maybe, but it’s not like he changes people forever. That’s not really ‘chaotic’, you know?” Twilight pointed out. “I suppose your only other option is Zecora.”

“That freaky zebra who lives in the Everfree Forest?” Gallus asked with a skeptical arch of his brow. Matching frowns. Bad sign. “Who is, I’m sure, a fine and wonderful creature and freaky only in the absolute nicest meaning of the word!” he added all at once.

“Right. She knows all kinds of usefully specific potions and the like,” Twilight pointed out.

“I’m still wondering why she had a potion that only responded to alicorn magic, and that only showed you specifically what you wanted to see,” Starlight mused.

“Eh. What can I say, she’s freaky like that. In a good way,” Twilight added, giving Gallus a wink that did little to certify her as an expert in street lingo.

“Well, I guess it can’t hurt to ask,” Gallus said as he rose to his feet.

“One sec, Gallus. One more thing,” Starlight interjected, and he groaned and sat back down again, and distracted himself by stacking sugarcubes in a pyramid. “I walked to ask you about Tag.” Starlight’s question sent the sugarcubes tumbling away. “Is he bullying you?”

“Tag? That loser? Pfft! He wishes he could bully me,” Gallus said as he snatched up a tea cake and ripped it in two before gobbling one of the pieces, his mouth chewing a bit harder than needed. “He’s just a dipshit that thinks stupid things are funny. I don’t know why he even came to this school.”

“Well, his application was that he wanted to make some friends,” Twilight said, but there’s been people mentioning he’s been doing inappropriate things. I was hoping that you might go on record if he’s been doing something inappropriate.”

“If you know he’s doing something, why don’t you do something about him?” Gallus challenged.

“Because you can’t expel a student without just cause, and that at least takes a witness saying he did something wrong, or us seeing him do it. While people hint he’s being a bully, if no one will come forward then we have to give him the benefit of the doubt,” Starlight said as she tapped the table top with a hoof.

Gallus grunted as he crossed his arm. These clothes were itchy and ridiculous, but they obscured his body and that’s what mattered most. “Sorry. I don’t get bullied or harassed. Talk to Silverstream and Ocellus though. They might know someone willing to go ‘on record’.”

“We did,” Twilight sighed. “They told us to ask you.”

Gallus winced internally. “Well, I don’t know why. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with me and that moron.” But if Tag wound up with his nuts in a vice, Gallus wouldn’t complain. “Can I go now?”

Twilight nodded and rose. “Gallus, can you wait just a second,” Starlight called before he could leave. Twilight gave Starlight a curious look, “I just have one little question for him.” She nodded and left, her magic closing the door behind her. Gallus turned as Starlight approached him and took a deep breath. “Gallus? I want to ask... and it’s fine either way... but, well...” she took another deep breath. “Gallus, do you want to be a girl?”

A numbness spread throughout him and he could only stare as he felt something like a boulder crashing and smashing through his chest. Oh, that’s my heart, he realized. “What?” he blurted, trying to put up a front of indignity but somehow his mental feet kept slipping out from under him. “How... why... what is wrong with you?!” he found himself shouting, and was glad when she winced.

“Look, I know something is going on with you!” Starlight countered. “You haven’t been your normal self for a couple days. Sandbar and Fluttershy’ve both noticed and... well... you’ve been doing a lot of things that are odd, for you. Clothes? Running out of Buckball class? That’s not like you.”

Gallus fought with all his being not to cry. It was so easy to cry. To bawl and confess everything. As humiliating as it would be, it would be over. But then it would be over, and Grandpa Gruff, his friends, Tag, and Silverstream would know. And while there was a tiny flicker of hope in the last, this was not how he wanted to be with her!

“Well maybe I’m just trying something new! Like, that’s a thing you know! Like you being good!” he snapped, seeing her wince, but he couldn’t stop and apologize now. “How can you think clothes make someone want to be a girl? If that were the case, don’t you think I’d be wearing dresses or something?”

“Maybe you’re working your way up to it?” Starlight offered lamely, then took a deep breath. “Look, Gallus, coming to ask about a ‘friend’ interested in a gender changing spell? That’s one of the oldest dodges in the book. I have a real hard time believing sandbar would want to know how to turn into a girl. You, though... I mean... well... you’re walking more like a girl, Gallus. All... swishy.”

That wall was a crumbled pile of rubble, but the ghost of his ego refused to surrender. “Oh, and you’re an expert on griffons? I have... hip strain! From Buckball. Made me stuff so I’m walking funny.”

“Gallus... did you take a jar of changeling jelly from the storeroom with the artifacts?”

Gallus sputtered. It was all he could do. “Oh! Oh! So I’m not just a pervert but a thief too?”

“Wanting to be a girl wouldn’t make you a pervert, but one of the jars of royal jelly was missing. That stuff is powerful and one bottle is gone. I know there’s people who try to use it to help someone switch genders. That’s not what it’s for, but they try. So with you acting odd and it being gone, I thought it was a guess.” Starlight said, taking a deep breath. “Look, if you are, I want to help, and if you aren’t, then I still want to help.”

“The best way you can help is to keep your advice to yourself! How’s that for helping?!” Gallus screamed at her before whirling and charging out of the room, leaving Starlight and heading straight out of the school. He was seconds from sobbing, and he at least wanted to be in the air. How could she ask that? How could you ask anyone that?

He got as far as the edge of the Everfree before disappearing inside and collapsing. He pressed his face to the grass and sobbed, balled up a fist and slammed it into the turf. How could she ask if I want to be a girl? Why would anyone want that?

He had to wait for the storm to subside before he took a deep breath. She hadn’t known. She’d thought he was a boy wanting to be a girl. “I gotta find this Zecora. I think she’s near the treehouse... somewhere... kinda.”

Of course an hour later and he still hadn’t come across her. A startled cockatrice, an annoyed phoenix, two cragodiles, and a half dozen irritable timberwolves, but no zebra. Worse, flying in clothes had to be the absolute worse. His head feathers were getting sticky with sweat, and his hind end was getting all tangled up in the clothes. He spotted a pond fed by a creek that trickled in from a rock face. Slabs of stone formed a shelf around the deep blue water.

“That’s it,” he replied, landing. “Time to get this stuff off. The sooner I get transformed, the better,” he stated, pinning all of his hopes on this zebra. If she couldn’t help, and if Fluttershy couldn’t find wherever Discord had gone off to, he’d just have to tell Starlight everything. And apologize.

But first he stripped off the sailor outfit. Whomever this Captain Celeno was, he doubted she would be interested in pony made clothes. This cotton was way too heavy for a flyer. Maybe silk... he shook his head hard and tossed the clothes aside. “Ugh, did I just think that? Girl brains are so stupid!” He smacked his temples repeatedly. “Boy things. Think about boy things. That’s what you want.”

Okay, that sounded way too weird out loud. He ducked his head into the water and gave it a hard shake, then shook his body and sprayed water away from his feathers. Trying to wash with a towel wasn’t washing much at all, so he jumped in completely, paddled to the edge, and climbed out. Another shake and a stretch and oh everything was so much better!

Then he froze. It was the first time he’d seen himself completely bare in a large mirror since all this began. He hadn’t done more than check his progress in the little hand mirror that confirmed his ‘sheathe’ and ‘cock’ were now ‘vulva’ and ‘clitoris.’ He had to keep those words clinical or he’d lose his mind. But now he could see the big picture. He knew the mirror had been turning him into a girl.

He hadn’t realized that it was a sexy girl.

Most likely, non-griffons would never know, but one look at the curve of his rump or the arching of his back and a griffon knew that was one fine blue ass. Except it wasn’t only his ass, was it? The change had gone up to his shoulders as well. The slight curve of the shoulder and the joint of his wing was smoother and less bulky. Even his tail felt more supple, and he gave it some experimental waves.

He’d been right to avoid Gabby, fending her off with excuses. One look and a griffon would know he was female. He couldn’t even be sure if it’d gotten to his face. He turned his head this way and that, but couldn’t confirm the change hadn’t reached there yet. “Oh, Boreas, I think I’m losing my mind.”

Then he felt the slow drip of warmth in the cool air. He blinked several times, then reached back and drug his fingers along his folds. Was he getting aroused by... himself? Was that even a thing?! He pulled his fingers away and spread the digits, staring at the spiderwebbing fluid extending between them.

The beast growled in his pelvis. Well, he was alone in the middle of a forest. Who was going to see? And if Silverstream or his friends did pop in on him now, he had a nice deep pool to drown himself in. His hand thrust down between his hind legs as he crouched there. It was a bit of a reach... easy to touch but he couldn’t move his arm a ton. Still, he didn’t need too. As his fingers stroked back against his traitorous addition, even the simple caresses were amazing. The rubs make his blue haunches twitch as he found the hard nub that was all that remained of his penis. Nothing could stifle his cry of delight!

The beast inside his loins stretched out its claws and hooked the inside of his belly, and the only way to placate it was to rub harder, feeling the wet ooze out of him. Maybe things were utterly horrible right now, but... well... that’s what silver linings were for, right?

He collapsed on to his side and splayed his legs wide. If someone did come by, impossible as that was, he could quickly close thighs and flop into the water. Evidence destroyed... his eyes closed as his fingers gave his slit the first real attention since he’d learned of its transformation. At first he’d avoided it out of fear that touching it would somehow speed up his change, but since he had no idea how fast he was changing in the first place, that seemed silly.

But there was also the fact that his girl bits felt so very different! Not better... exactly. It was just that as a boy he rubbed, he came, he stopped. Now it was rubbing... rubbing some more... and some more... and the hungering, wet sensation kept building and building without any kind of clear stop. He also couldn’t really stroke his clitoris for too long either. A second or two was fine, but longer than that and his whole hind end started to hitch. He was getting used to the sticky arousal. Was that normal? There was a part of him that wanted to ask Gabby or Gilda... and then the vast majority of his brain tried to smother the rest for daring to have such a thought.

His fingers began to curl in, caressing slightly deeper into his body. The sensation was so intense and alarming he chickened out, withdrawing and instead focusing more the lower half of his sex while bumping his clit. Poking too deep into that space was acknowledging something he wasn’t quite ready to handle, so he satiated the beast by teasing his sensitive exterior. He failed to suppress another moan. The beast approved. It approved a lot. He was more than a little nervous that it would be like last time. Maybe he could just... taper it off?

No, roared the beast. More!

He clenched his eyes, his digits now working double time and accidentally teasing into the opening. Every now and then his claw would graze the pink walls of his entrance and he’d cry out because it was the only noise befitting both bliss and pain. He finally rolled onto his back, hips raised off the earth supine. His fingers tried desperately to feed the beast so it would do whatever the heck it was trying to do! Suddenly his leg gave out, jerking in shock as he felt the beast roar, waves reverberating up his spine and down to his toes. Yet his hand, as if possessed, didn’t stop!

He should be laying back and cleaning up, yet still the beast demanded more. “Ah... Ahhh! Yes!” he cried out, idiotically, the monster inside his pelvis was ready to explode and he had no clue what he was supposed to do about it! His hips raised again, impotently humping at the air as his fingers worked this new sensation. His three digits worked his entrance with vigor, and even attacked his super sensitive nub directly. And just as before he felt the roar coming. This time ready, his whole body strained and shivered. Stars exploded behind his clenched eyelids as he came harder than he’d ever had in his life!

His fingers slowed... and then... then... started again...

He started down in horror at his slit, pink and exposed, his loins and tailhole as wet as his head had been minutes before. Was something wrong with him? Was he sick? He shouldn’t be doing this a third time! His tongue hung out as he breathed hard, letting out girly whines that humiliated while doing nothing to stop him. Again and again the fingers worked, the beast growling its approval as he drew his hind knees back and wide. There was nothing to do but to touch and rub. His free hand, desperate for something, seized his nipples. They stroked, rubbed, and pinched the tender beads, sending tiny explosions shooting through his hips.

“Ahhh... ahhh... GAAAAHHHH!” Gallus screamed right along with the beast, his whole body going stiff as a board. Finally... finally!... he pulled his hand away. The warm glow radiating outwards from his crotch smouldered throughout his body. He was going to be limping when he got back to the school.

“Ugh,” he groaned, panting, covering his eyes with a wing. “I’ve got to find Zecora and deal with this...”

“Quite glad I am this sight to see,” a mare said from nearby. Gallus’s eyes shot wide and he sat up to stare at the zebra mare casually leaning against the trunk of a tree. Her striped hide and the light coming through the trees blended together to obscure her from his view. But more than just sitting there, she was sitting with her legs splayed just as wide as his, and one forehoof firmly rubbing at the entrance of her wet sex. “But happier still to hear she’s looking for me.”

“Zecora, I presume?” he asked weakly... then died.

The end.

Ponies were weird. A good kind of weird, with their wanting to help and always being eerily happy and whatnot. It was a weirdness that Gallus could understand. Even admire, on those odd days when he was honest with himself. However, there were so damned many that the weirdness blended together into this sort of fog that you learned to accept. Even enjoy. That was one thing that made his other friends so special. They stood out. And Sandbar... eh... was Sandbar.

But none of that could prepare him for his first encounter with a zebra.

He’d been lucky not to break his beak when he’d woken and tumbled out of her bizarre hammock, nearly smacking his face on the cauldron of bubbling green slime. Then there was the minor panic attack that had come with the masks leering down at him... followed by the horrified realization of his first words that even his voice had started to sound... off. It was softer and less... him. If he couldn’t even talk at school, he was done.

He probably could have handled that if he could pull his thoughts together, but somehow everything seemed to assault his senses all at once. The fact that Zecora seemed to press every single button on his libido not labeled ‘Silverstream’ didn’t help! He really wanted to make things happen with her, and his damned cunt wasn’t getting the memo.

For starters, he could not stop staring at her ass. It was maddening. Pony butts were boring, but throw some stripes on them and the hemispheres became a magnet for his gaze. Add to the fact that her tail covered nothing at all around the base and every motion seemed to promise some kind of erotic delight. There was even a smell that was different. Maybe it was her life in the Everfree. For once Gallus was glad his penis was gone, because it would be out loud and proud. As it was, he felt his sex drive growling in the depths of that moist cleft. The little trickles of wet tickled maddeningly.

Oh, sweet Boreas, had he just acknowledged that he had a cunt?

Worse, when Zecora had come down stairs, he’d had to figure out what to say. Professor Applejack might be all for honesty, but he had no idea how closely associated Zecora was with his teachers. Would she immediately inform Professor Sparkle if Gallus explained his interaction with the magic mirror? Or did she simply not care? Gallus couldn’t recall any zebras in attendance when school started. He would have noticed her standing out.

“So you attend twilight’s school, Gallina my dear. But what, may I ask, brought you here?” Zecora asked as she set out tea. Not only was having a vagina messing with his voice, but it was also messing with his taste! This boiled grass actually tasted... not bad! It almost distracted from her strange rhyming habit.

He’d go with... 51% honesty. That was good enough, right?

“So, miss Zecora, I... have a friend. A girlfriend... who happens to be a griffon too. Named... uh... Gona. And she’s trying to get with another friend of mine, named ah... Silver... spire! And she... Not me! She was wondering... um... if...” his voice kept dropping more and more. Ugh, what was wrong with him! It had to be that drooling hole in his loins! It was letting all his brains drip out! “If you could... gim m pns...”

Zecora dug at her ear a moment. “I am afraid I could not hear, could you repeat a little more clear?”

Gallus really couldn’t. “Giv a grr a pnis...”

Zecora turned her head and leaned in closer. Sweet Boreas, she even smelled good. Like sandalwood and gold. “I am afraid you must speak up. Did you ask for a dog in a cup?”

What? How had she gotten that? “Give a girl a penis!?” he shouted, nearly knocking Zecora over, then clapped his talons over his beak, feeling himself blush horribly.

She gave a cool look, rubbing her ear a moment. “It is, I see, another day of people shouting at me.”

“Sorry. It’s just super embarrassing!” Gallus whined. “I don’t even know if its possible Like that stupid apples to oranges thing!” He must have sounded crazy. “I just... would like to know if it’s possible to give a girl a penis so she can be a boy.”

Zecora’s frown melted away in an oddly disturbing fashion. “You wish to act the role of male, but lack the equipment that would entail.” She said with a swish of that brush like tail. “Fortunate that you found my door, for I have what you need in store.” She said as she turned to all of her bottles and jars.

“So you can do it?” Gallus gushed as he flew to Zecora’s side. “Something that’ll turn me into a dude?”

“I confess it is not the norm, but I can give you something to help you perform,” she said as she reached over and rubbed Gallus’s jaw with a hoof. “I have a potion I make now and then, for lovers who want their sex-lives to extend.” Gallus felt that stupid damned blush burning on his cheeks. “A bit inexperienced, are you not, my dear? Confess, because the evidence is rather clear.” And dripping down the inside of my thigh!

“I... I’ve fooled around,” Gallus said coolly. The mirror counted as fooling... didn’t it? And it wasn’t like griffons were monogamous. In fact, sex was pretty transactional. It was what you could get out of it that made it good or bad. Hell, some considered a bad lay a theft of one’s time, while a griff who was good in a nest could have their life made. Of course, Grandpa Gruff had a very firm ‘No fooling around in my house rule’ but that was just to prevent having to pay for even more mouths to feed.

Of course, Silverstream was different. She was special... but Gallus had to admit he really would like to have a little more experience before doing it with her. One of his nightmares was them being alone in her room, the lights went out, and he couldn’t figure out how to put it in. Or worse, he accidentally... put it in the wrong hole. Yeah... that would be bad.

“Ah, I stand corrected, but lacking experience shouldn’t be disrespected,” she said as she gathered up her jars. “Am I right, and please don’t wail, in assuming you’ve never been with a male?”

“Y... no. Wait... No. Definitely no,” Gallus determined as Zecora set out a wooden bowl and then shook a small blue flower petal into the middle. “Is that poison joke?” he asked in alarm.

“You know the herb, I’m happy to see. Quite a bit grows wild here in the Everfree,” she stated as she retrieved a second jar and carefully dropped three bright purple berries into the bowl as well. “Purple morpheus berries are perfect to make all your merries. Be sure not to use the pink or blue. You will not enjoy what happens if you do.” She warned ominously. Her tail then gave a swat to his rump, and Gallus’s eyes popped wide.

Now, Gallus wasn’t Gibbins McDoomcock. He didn’t get hens draping themselves all over him, hoping for a good time. In fact, depressing as it was, the one person that had shown the most sexual interest in him was... Tag. Gilda scared him that she’d bite it off, and Gabby was just... Gabby. So to have Zecora now teasing him... now that he didn’t look like a him... and was missing his him parts... well, it was more than a little overwhelming! And... flattering? For all the wrong reasons... Fuck...

Would Zecora be doing all this if he looked male? Or was somehow him as a girl... better to other people? Would Silverstream like him better this way? He was so confused... no. He’d fix this and THEN ask questions... but Zecora’s tail gave another pat, and the impact rolled right through that traitorous hole and straight up his spine. A part of him wanted to move away... but it was attention! He found himself shifting sideways, closer to her, till their hips met. The sensation of her flank on his made his whole body hum. Oh Boreas, just set his face feathers on fire already!

“After that, what you will need, is a bit of ambrosia seed,” she said, carefully adding a sprinkling of tiny, white seeds. “Finally, and this is a bit smelly, we will need some royal jelly,” she announced, getting a small bottle filled with the same green ooze as the jar Gallus had hidden away. She added a dollop of the pungent mint smelling fluid into the bowl, then stoppered the almost empty bottle. “I will need to find some more. Sadly they don’t carry it in a store.”

“I should introduce you to Ocellus. She can hook you up,” Gallus mentioned with a chuckle. Then he coughed and blurted, “But don’t tell her why I was here!”

Zecora cupped his chin and gazed into his eyes with those rich blue ovals, and his hips quivered. He wanted... something! Anything! But... that was wrong? Wasn’t it?

Then her lips met his beak and screw that mirror. A phantom reflection was nothing compared to the pressure of her lips on his. She clearly knew how to kiss a griffon, turning her head just so, letting him open his mouth so that his sensitive pink tongue could slide against her softer equine one. Just a kiss made his whole body shake. There was a little romantic part of him that was a little disappointed it wasn’t Silverstream, but the mob of raging hormones and sexual anxiety beat it into submission as their tongues twined together.

“I... You know... don’t know how zebras are about... this...” Gallus panted when they broke.

“I think you will find I am like your own kind. We take what we get, so no need to fret.” Zecora assured him, stroking his crest gently. Oh Boreas, it felt so amazing. The pressure made his skin tingle with every pass. “Or perhaps you are worried then about the feelings of your hen?”

“Huh?” Gallus stammered, and oh damn the four winds to heck, he was blushing furiously! “I don’t... I mean... Maybe...” The fact was that Gallus didn’t know. If Silverstream had been a griffon, it was pretty simple. You wanted to get together and you did it. If you got with someone else, that was a totally different transaction. And Silverstream’s brain was in her bird half, so maybe she’d see things the same way too? A small part of him, the part of him that was against making the deal with that stupid mirror, wanted to wait. To find out just what the fallout would be with Silverstream if he did do something with someone else.

But it was drowned out by the part that remembered in her in the pool. ‘Nice guy. Not interested.’

Well, that part concluded, Zecora was and he was old enough to decide things like this.

“I haven’t... I mean... I haven’t done it with someone like this,” he murmured, dazed and accidentally honest. “But I kinda wanna be...” he couldn’t bring himself to look her in the eyes, and so closed them as their lips met again. And again. Kisses that repeated, growing longer and longer, with tongues intertwined. Each one, Gallus felt himself slipping further and further away. Every kiss made him lay further and further back, until he found himself as he had next to that pool, on his back.

Her hooves kept his hind legs splayed wide, as he clenched his eyes shut, biting the side of his hand to keep from telling her to stop, or worse, moaning for her to continue. But continue she did, her mouth finding his nipples, now fully feminine. When had that happened? Somewhere between passing out at the pool and now, maybe? Now there was a sensitive pad of flesh beneath each, making the hard nipples stand rigidly out as Zecora caressed each. Then he felt the warm, wet, sensation of her tongue caressing each of his nipples in turn. The gentle contact of her tongue on each of the teats pulled an invisible cord on the end of Gallus’s head, drawing it back till his neck and shoulders arched.

Then Zecora’s mouth moved down to that traitorous hole and he abandoned all pretense at silence. He cried out, ‘Yes!’ as Zecora’s tongue curled a slow orbit along the inside of that tan ring of flesh. Suddenly it thrashed vigorously against that tiny pink nub; Gallus nearly screamed, hind legs twitching against those restraining hips, but also trying to desperately press his crotch towards that thrashing sensation. Abruptly it disappeared, and he gasped for breath, the electric sensation fading for just a moment before her lips pressed to his sex and a firm, general suction pulled at his body. That set off wet tingles deep in his pelvis as the pressure reversed. Needless to say, he could feel his excitement just pouring out of him, into that hungry mouth.

And aside from the pleasure was something else. A deep seated need that burned deep in his chest. A need to be wanted. To be desired. To not be dismissed as a ‘Nice guy.’ And with every lick of her tongue and pull of her mouth, Zecora fed that need. Maybe being alone out here in the Everfree, she felt it too?

The explosion that ripped up his spine and down his legs was the best by far. He wept in pleasure as his whole body trembled in joy. How long had it lasted? Minutes? Lifetimes? Zecora observed the attack with a pleased, feline smile.

Her ministrations relaxed for a moment, his legs going slack, but waves of bliss crashed back and forth through him. There was no beast this time. Just waves that went on and on and -

Oh, Boreas, she was licking again.

Then his eyes popped wide and he did a little sit up, as if to verify that she was actually... but she was. He stared, his eyes locking on her calm, even amused blue ones as her tongue worked. Gallus wanted to stammer some sort of inquiry that Zecora was okay with licking... there. But the gaze he got told him to just settle back and enjoy. It wasn’t the gaze of someone doing this grudgingly... but someone doing it with enjoyment. Within seconds he fell back, just enduring every motion and pass of that length. He couldn’t believe she was doing it. Couldn’t believe anyone would do that!

Oh oh, sweet Boreas, Gallus feared he’d just explode into a cloud of blue feathers and lust at this rate! One thing was certain, though! No more kissing till she brushed her teeth!

Then he exploded into a cloud of blue feathers and nothing mattered anymore.

When Gallus came to, there were a number of new sensations. Not the drying stickiness between his thighs, stretching from that hole all the way down to his toes. How the heck did they get sticky?! No, it was more the sensation of waking up with something very warm and yielding next to him. Something smelling intoxicating.

Then he raised his eyes and found himself spooned up against the zebra, who watched him with an amused smile. They swayed together in her hammock, which fortunately was strong enough for two. Gallus gave an embarrassed little squirm against Zecora. “Um... hi. Was I out long?”

“No need to fear, it was only a few minutes, my dear,” she said as she lowered her mouth. Zecora laughed. “Oh, dear Gallina, don’t be a sucker. Was that the first someone licked your pucker?”

“Yes. Yes it was,” Gallus stated, but Boreas help him, it was still tingly. He dropped his eyes in embarrassment. “I didn’t know you could cum from that.”

“It’s something I save, my little petal, for people who I think are quite special,” Zecora murmured as she stroked Gallus’s head plume. “Normally I don’t, but I could tell from your sheen, you are a girl who likes to keep clean.”

Stupid shampoo, Gallus thought. “Well, no offense, but I hope you brushed,” he said quietly. She blew gently, and he smelled mint. Well, that was considerate at least. Gallus still wondered what he was supposed to do now? Were they... done?

Gallus didn’t want to be done. Back in Griffonstone he’d be making excuses to go, but he didn’t want to do that. Instead his eyes were down towards Zecora’s rump. A part of him wanted to give what he’d gotten, but he had no clue where to begin or how to start.

“Please forgive my little quirk, but we got distracted from our work,” Zecora said as she reached over to the bedside table and picked up the bowl. Inside was the bluish purple paste, which now looked like a slightly raised blue ball of dough. “If you plan to use this to seduce you should be taught in its proper use.”

Gallus, relieved at the distraction, nodded. Zecora shifted on her back and let the drop fall on her belly, just above her sex. A moment later it changed from blue to white, and slowly sank into her body. “You just put it on you? You don’t eat it?” Her entire belly seemed to be shimmering like marshmallow whip. The feminine teats diminished, the nipples shrinking down to barely visible nubs.

Zecora’s eyes popped wide. “Goodness no, that would be quite a tale, if it turned you completely male. To avoid anything strange, place it only where you wish to change.” Gallus tried not to show his excitement. He had it. Everything he needed. All he had to do now was... oh sweet winds above, what was happening?

A blob was growing like a fungus, her skin stretching and elongating as her body manifested a male member, and Gallus couldn’t pull his eyes from the sight before him. The tumorous mass stretched out like some sort of stalk, before thickening out and laying atop her belly. Zecora groaned, her eyes closed as a blissful expression crossed her face. Two thick knots sprouted at the base, forming into a firm equine sac. It was different from what he’d expected, though. The length and shape, though undeniably male, seemed almost... cute. Maybe a little shorter than Sandbar’s... but maybe Sandbar was just well endowed?

As the striped member... it had stripes! For easy measurement. Gallus fought to suppress a giggle... as the member grew and filled out, he saw the hints of a sheathe at the base. It seemed very much like a ‘girl cock’. But maybe that was only because Zecora hadn’t eaten it? Did she have a vagina still, or was it gone too?

Gallus couldn’t help himself. He reached out, running his digits carefully along the length, from the flared tip to the medial ring in the middle. Zecora gave a little shiver at his touches... she could feel it! Did it function like a real penis? Zecora had jewels now. Were they full of cum? What would it feel like when she came? His fingers reached down to those heavy orbs, and Zecora emitted a soft coo. He couldn’t help a small smile; this might be the last time he was ever a girl. Why not enjoy this moment before he fixed himself for good?

Holy shit, why am I thinking so much on this?

Strike that? Why am I so wet thinking about this?

It wasn’t like with Sandbar. With him, penises just never came up. Gallus had his, Sandbar has his, and never the topic would be mentioned. But now, so close and intimate with Zecora, Gallus couldn’t help but wonder things he could never, ever wonder when he was a guy. What did it smell like? What would it feel like... inside...?

“Is it your first time?” Zecora asked gently, and Gallus couldn’t help but nod. It was a first, with this stupid girl’s body. And Zecora just nodded, “I think you will find it quite sublime. Play with it if you dare, just be sure to take extra care.”

Gallus could certainly empathize with that, and ironically, he knew exactly how to touch a penis with a clawed hand. He ran his fingers up and down, finding the tactile sensation oddly familiar and alien at the same time. Maybe it was the flared tip, he wondered, his fingers toying with the ridge. What did it feel like when it went inside? Did it hurt? It felt spongy, compressing a bit around a more solid core. The musky scent rising off it was tantalizing as well; not as heavy as Sandbar. Lighter. Like saffron.

What did it taste like?

He’d lost his mind. That was it! He was gibbering crazy now... no, not crazy. He was... learning. For when he was male... and with Silverstream. He’d know what it felt like for a female. What it tasted like...

He carefully lowered his mouth and gave the very tip a little lick. What had he expected? Certainly not the sweet yet faintly salty mix. Zecora groaned as he dragged his tongue slowly along the flared edge. It had a girl smell to it... even if it was a boy bit. He didn’t think he was gay for licking a penis... It’s not gay if it’s a girl’s penis!

Was it too late to reconsider the crazy defense?

Then he felt Zecora’s hoof against that treasonous nether region. The soft squish... oh he was soaked, and just the pressure against his skin was so... distracting. It was mad. Mad! That was all there was to this!

So if he was mad... would it be so wrong... to try it?

“How does it go in?” he whispered, in fascinated horror.

“Do you really want to try? You seem as if you’re ready to fly,” Zecora murmured in concern.

If he didn’t do it now, he might as well go and become a monk of Boreas! Would it hurt? A lot? Or would it just be more new and terrifyingly wonderful and awful sensations he was dealing with today? But though he didn’t answer, Zecora carefully rolled him on to his back, moving over him. His heart thundered in his chest. He should stop! He should stop! He was a boy, not a girl! It didn’t matter how good it might feel, this was wrong! Except those protests got stuck somewhere in his throat and garbled up so it just came out as a whine.

Then he felt that flared tip against his nether flesh. Just a slight pressure against, and Gallus realized this was, in fact, going to happen. It might be bliss or horrible, but the fight left him. “Please...” he begged, not even sure what he was begging. That pressure paused and he closed his eyes. “I’m afraid it’ll hurt,” he whispered, disgusted at how pathetic he was about all this. Why couldn’t he be like Gibbins? Why couldn’t he at least be like Gilda?! He knew nothing about Gilda sexuality, but he couldn’t imagine her lying there like this!

“It will all turn out fine. It’s always scary the very first time.” And that pressure against increased... and then to his horror it transformed from a pressure against to a pressure into... and suddenly Gallus cried out as he felt that flesh yield. His heart hammered as he felt this oddly pleasurable discomfort... which made no sense at all! It was like a stretch that strained his muscles, but also felt good at the same time. Only this strain was muscles that... he wasn’t used to straining. He gave a little cry as that flared head rasped against insides he couldn’t even imagine. Inch by inch, it moved deeper, and it felt so big that he knew it must be in his chest!

Then he felt her hips meet his, the soft yet firm orbs lightly touching that soft skin between his tailhole and now full hole. “There. It’s all inside,” Zecora assured him. “It’s not easy to be stretched wide.” He had no idea how wide she was. One mile? Two? Ten? It was hard to say. He thought there was supposed to be blood and tearing... that’s what Gilda had said when he was a chick. But now he just felt... very full and very, very vulnerable... and yet there was that traitorous part of him glad to feel this way.

Slowly Zecora reversed motion, and Gallus groaned as he felt that flared tip grinding against every inch of his insides. He felt helpless and wonderful as that tip slowly pulled forth, along with a gush of his wetness. Was this normal for a griffon hen? He wanted to ask someone, terrified of the answer.

As the tip was about to escape, Zecora reversed yet again and pierced him. Part of his skin crawled at the feeling of this living pole of meat inside, and part of him delighted in the zinging sensations that shot up his spine and down his legs. Part of him was humiliated that he was flat on his back, getting slowly penetrated again and again by that striped member... and part of him felt the sickest sense of delight at the motion, and even wanted it to continue.

And continue it did. The singular motions started to thread together. In and out. In and out. The pumping fell into a regular, quick pace and it was all Gallus could do to cling to Zecora’s sweaty hide as she took him with that marecock. He was certain that, at any moment, he would come to his senses and beg her to stop... but that moment always stayed just out of reach. In and out. In and out. Again and again. So simple and wonderful and uncomfortable and humiliating and he just did not want it to stop.

Because, as with her tongue, something gave. It wasn’t like a beast, but a phoenix, singing this wonderful song... and he was singing too. Well, crying out as his loins clenched hard on that invading member, as if trying to claim it forever.

Suddenly Zecora grunted and held him firmly, and with detached fascination, as his body floating in that song of carnal bliss, he felt a wet warmth spreading out through his hips. It passed further and further, sloshing and pouring and travelling further and further in. Spurts, hot and thick, flooding inside him. And Gallus just laid there as if this were a dream.

I just had a zebra mare cum inside me, Gallus reflected, and I think I really... really liked it.

It would have been really nice to pass out again. Fall asleep. Part of him wanted a break, but another wanted more... but all that was broken by the creaking of the door to Zecora’s hut opening. Gallus just gasped, looking over at the figure standing in the doorway.

Spike stared at the pair, his green eyes wide, a blush firmly burned on his cheeks. He held a scroll that Gallus bet was in Headmare Twilight’s writing, and it fell from his claws. But it wasn’t the look on his face.

It was that he was staring right at Gallus.

Don’t say it, Gallus thought as zebra semen sloshed inside his hips. Don’t say it!

“Gallus?” Spike murmured in bafflement.

And Gallus died.

Again...

Galling Tendencies
By Somber
Chapter 7: Getting Into Character

Gallus nursed a cup of tea, trying to think of a way to stay ahead of everything that threatened to spill out into the open while Zecora calmly talked, reclining in her seat and utterly indifferent to the masculine bits that by all rights should be Gallus’... would be his the second he could get away. Spike had been sent by Professor Sparkle for some herbs, and he’d been chatting cordially with Zecora, but his green eyes constantly shot towards Gallus. Gallus had even tried to ask for the bathroom with the hopes of jumping out a window, but no luck. Zecora had an underground grotto complete with hot springs.

And worse, she’d accompanied Gallus down there and had helped wash her hind end. Gallus didn’t know if he should sputter and object or just accept it. Which would offer less suspicion from their purple interloper? Spike, at least, he hoped would stay out but the young dragon was curious about what he’d seen. So Gallus sipped tea and hoped that one of these rocks would magically devour him as Zecora talked about growing a phallus as if it was normal! For all Gallus knew, it was!

But that wasn’t the worst part. The worst part was playing over the sensation of that firm fleshiness pressing into him... that building pressure that straddled the line of uncomfortable and pleasurable... that explosion of bliss at the end... that spreading warmth and wetness... none of it was bad. Weird. Exotic. Strange. But as insane as it had been, he couldn’t say he never, ever wanted to do it again. He wasn’t sure he wanted to, but he was sure he wasn’t sure he didn’t.

Boreas save me, he thought, I need my penis back. I need it back now.

“Well, thank you so much for everything,” he said as he slipped off one of Zecora’s seats back upstairs, glad for the wash at least. He wasn’t quite sore as just... very aware the zebra had just been inside him. Vigorously. “But I really should get back.”

“I’ll walk with you!” Spike said, setting aside his tea at once.

“You really, really don’t have to. Stay and talk some more!” Gallus said, gesturing to the stable. Zecora arched a brow at him, her smile turning into a baffled frown.

“No, it’s okay. The Everfree Forest is dangerous, and it never hurts to have a dragon bodyguard!” Spike said as he snatched up his satchel and raced to the door.

Gallus groaned, then regarded the zebra. “Well, thank you. Can’t say for sure when we’ll meet again but thanks for all your help.” Strangely, he meant it. Too much time around ponies...

“Feel free to come again. It is always nice to see a friend,” the zebra offered as Gallus headed out with Spike right behind. The... things... pills? Candies? They lay within a hollow gourd on a string around his neck by a rope.

How to play this? Fly off? But would that just get Spike asking around the school? Play it like Gilda? That might work, but it could ruin things with Spike. Play it like Gabby? Ugh, he didn’t have that much bubbly cheer in him. Like himself? Might give something away.

“So you’re Gallus’s sister? Funny he never mentions you. I thought he didn’t have family,” came question one as they flew towards town.

Of course, he wants to chat. He’s Spike. “Yeah. No surprise. Family wasn’t ready for two chicks from one egg. They kept me, left him. It’s a pretty sore subject,” Gallus lied. Well, mostly. The sore subject wasn’t. “We just avoid each other. Easier that way.” Matter of fact. Cool. Worldly. Yeah, Gallina was starting to flesh out in his head. “Not that having parents was much better. I’m mostly on my own these days.”

“Huh,” he said as he flew besides her, and then his eyes glanced back... and again... and again! “So that’s why we’ve never seen you around?”

“Pretty much. I just needed something from Zecora, so I flew here to get it. Don’t get around ponies much. Or dragons.” He added, hoping Spike might get the hint. Only Spike was falling a few feet behind him, staring right at Gallus’s rear... no. Gallina’s rear. And from the blush on his scales, Gallus knew just what the sight was probably doing to him. Do I have a cute butt? Gallus mused, and had no clue if musing that was a good sign or not!

Spike immediately gushed. “Wait? Yes! I mean... ah... kinda. It is cute... I guess... Um...” He trailed off, biting his lower lip and Gallus mentally smacked his brain over and over for saying that aloud. “Is that strange?”

Gallus wished a bugbear would swoop out and save him from this conversation. “I dunno,” he said, trying not to lie too much. “I can see the appeal of say, a pony or... um... hippogriff.”

“Or dragon?” Spike interjected and Gallus tripped and nearly fell flat on his face. He whirled, now hoping he wasn’t blushing. Shit. Shit shit shit, he thought furiously as he looked at Spike standing there with his fingertips playing together... and something definitely poking out between his lowermost scales. He was... interested? Then again, he had just walked in on what Zecora had done to him... but that had been... um... temporary insanity! Temporary insanity on a temporary basis due to a temporary cock acting upon a temporary body. Temporarily!

Gallus had to admit, he’d always wondered where dragons kept their things. It was normally just smooth, but now there was definitely a gap forming betwix Spike’s loins and this purple fleshy spade like protrusion was sliding out. Gallus tried desperately to recover. Gallina was cool with shit like this, right? She’d just banged a zebra like it was nothing. She’d handle this. “Heh. Feeling hard up?” he said, knowing just how hard that could feel. “Sorry, kid, but you’re really not my type. You’re too...”

“Nice?” Spike said in a voice of utter dejection that Gallus knew painfully well. Gallus had never been quite 100% on dragon ages. Spike had his wings now. Did that mean he was a teenager, or still a ‘baby dragon’ like Professor Twilight always insisted. And he was interested in... relations.

“No! No. I don’t mean you’re too nice. I don’t mean that. You are a nice guy, Spike.” Gallus said all in a rush, knowing how bad that line hurt. “I mean... isn’t there a dragon at your school who’d be better for that?”

“She’s not interested in me,” Spike said with a sigh and a shrug. “I asked...”

Ouch. Not that Gallus wasn’t surprised. He wasn’t sure Smolder was interested in anyone romantically. Maybe Ocellus? “Bummer...” Gallus muttered as he stroked his beak with a feather. “A pony? I bet there’s got to be ponies inter-”

“She’s not interested,” Spike said flatly, “And I’m not interested in her anymore either.”

Ah. She whom? Gallus shook his head hard. “You can’t really want to do things with me,” Gallus said with a nervous laugh.

“Yes, I do! You’re beautiful! I can’t take my eyes off you!” Spike gushed and rubbed the back of his scales. That spade had pushed all the way out, and was now fattening up. It certainly looked more... exotic... than just a zebra member. He wondered what a hippogriff penis was like... wait. Why... no... focus!

And worse, the flattery was working! He felt his plumage fluff. No one had ever called Gallus beautiful before! He struggled to get a ‘handsome’. “You think I’m beautiful, huh? You know there’s this griffon named Gabby you should talk too. She’s good at everything!”

“I’ve met Gabby. She’s just a kid though. I don’t think she knows about... sex stuff,” Spike replied. “It’d feel kinda wrong to ask her.”

Gallus grunted. Spike was a good guy. Gabby was so eager to please, it’d be easy to rope her in. If she wasn’t practically his little sister... Gallus sighed, rubbing his face. He trotted off the path and took a seat on a log. Spike hopped up next to him. “Listen, Spike... you wanna do with me what I was doing with Zecora, right?”

“I’d like to,” Spike said in a little voice that echoed three quarters of Gallus’s own adolescence. “I just don’t know how. I always thought that if I was just nice... things would happen, you know? That’s usually how things work out in Ponyville.”

He reached out a wing and patted Spike’s back. “Yeah. Sorry. Just being nice doesn’t always cut it.” He tried to muddle his way through this. “Look, this is strange for me. I’m not sure this is good for either of us.” Gallus wasn’t even being honest with who he was right now. Did he want this? Was this cheating on Silverstream... who wasn’t interested in a relationship with him at all? Was this just for Spike’s sake? What would happen when he turned back? What if Spike developed a crush on Gallina? But Gallus knew... he knew... what Spike was feeling right now.

“It’ll be good. I’ll be good. You just tell me how!” Spike said eagerly.

Gallus took his hands before Spike grabbed something, “I mean, I’m not staying in Ponyville. Heck, this day will probably be the last day you’ll ever see me again. Are you sure you’ll be good with a one time thing?”

Spike nodded. “I don’t really know what I’m doing, but... yeah. I’d like to try. I’m a quick learner.”

Am I actually going to do this? Spike wasn’t a stranger. He was a... well... nice guy. Maybe a little geeky. Definitely a little lonely. Heck, rumor had it he was once interested in a cardboard cut out of a female animated pony skeleton. But did Gallus want this? He was still a little sore,definitely a bit sticky, but not bad, and Spike wasn’t near the size of Zecora. And as he stared down at Spike member, that traitorous part of him that had been curious about Zecora was now getting curious about Spike too. This was the last day he was going to be a girl.

Plus, he knew what it felt like to be ‘too nice.’

Gallus dared to reach out and carefully run his fingers along it. Her fingers. For this, he’d have to be Gallina. There was no way he could follow through as Gallus. Gallina reached out and caressed from the tapered tip down to the thick base, watching as Spike groaned and bit his bottom lip. “You’re cute, but you have to realize that if we do this, it’s just feeling good. No broken hearts afterwards, right?” she said, determined not to leave Spike pining afterwards.

“Yeah,” he panted a little as she gently touched along his length, feeling the odd bits and bobs. It was now fully engorged and she could hold it carefully in both hands. The skin had an odd, wax like texture. Gallina ran her fingers around, minding the claws, and explored all the rises, swells, and knobs. The tapered tip in particular made Spike throw his head back with a groan. Little spots here and there also made Spike twitch.

Gallina then brought the tip towards her beak and gave an experimental lick. It tasted... well... not really like much. She’d expected something, but the closest comparison she could reach was olive oil. Spike suddenly went ridged and she glanced up as he gave a sheepish laugh. “Ah... um... mind the beak...”

Rolling her eyes, Gallina put the tip firmly in her mouth and revealed the secret that while beaks were hard, they weren’t razor blades. She’d have to bite pretty hard to hurt, no different than teeth really, and so she took enough inside to provide a firm suction, running her mouth around the tip. She then rubbed the bottom as her mouth worked. It probably wasn’t the best blowjob, but she doubted spike had much to compare it too.

“Can I lick you?” Spike asked, causing her to arch a brow.

Gallina was cool about stuff like this after all. He gestured towards her rump and she let the member pop free. “You sure? There might be some zebra back there,”

Spike nodded slowly. I heard it’s important to make a mare feel good too for this,” he said, flushing a little. “It was in a book on pony health at the library.”

“I guess it’d be hard to find a textbook on dragon sex,” she said and he flushed and averted his eyes away. “Oh. You looked...”

“Yeah. And talking to Smolder didn’t help either,” he said as she moved up alongside him, running her feline rump against his scales before casually rolling onto her back. “Her response was ‘Ew, boys are gross.’ and Ember just sort of didn’t say much.” Having never met the Dragon Lord, she could only speculate. His claws ran over her nipples, stroking the soft cones and their subtle mounds. “Woah...” he muttered with freshly flushed cheeks.

“Change your mind?” Gallina asked she stroked his head spines.

“N...no! I’m just...” he stared down at it a moment, then puckered his lips and planted a firm kiss on the oval opening. Feat accomplished, he beamed. “I did it!”

Gallina laughed. “Now try licking a little.” Galina was confident. Cool. Controlled.

Spike put a hand on each of her splayed knees, closed his eye again, and gave an experimental flick of his tongue. Gallina’s leg twitched at the sensation, light and ticklish and different than Zecora’s. Every time the tongue bumped up against the base of her slit, she gave a little jump. Spike broke off the licking enough to ask, “Am I doing it right?”

Gallina replied by shifting her entire body back, her rump bumping Spike to the ground as she nearly sat on his snout. He opened wide, his tongue resuming its work as that perverted spring of pleasure tightened more and more in her gut. Gallina, not worried or embarrassed like Gallus was, moaned aloud at the zings zipping up between her legs and along her spine.

Her sex clenched tight around his tongue as she cried out in delight. A wet slurry went into Spike’s mouth, and the dutiful dragon attentively licked it up and swallowed it all down. Gallina pulled herself off him, and he grabbed her haunches, drug up as his tongue kept thrashing around inside her.

“I give! I give!” Gallina laughed, and Spike detached with a soft pop, dropping on his rear as his half lidded eyes gazed up at her in a daze. Gallina pulled free and turned around, leaning in and kissing him. Because that’s what she’d do. Her tongue assertively slipped into his mouth as she pinned him, kissing again and again. Finally she broke off the assault, looking at him beneath her. “You’re good with that tongue of yours.”

“I am?” he murmured, and she nodded. “Thanks,” he said as he glanced down between them and suddenly flushed, biting his lower lip.

“What is it?” she asked and then glanced down between them as well. She saw his draconic erection completely free of his body and had to admit, it looked weird. Not that pony wieners were pieces of art, but they weren’t complicated. The thing looked almost like a spiral or corkscrew with... bits. Ridged bits and bumpy bits and bits she could barely describe. Still, she couldn’t imagine it as all that different from what Zecora had put inside her, right. “Oh,” she said and then stroked his spines with a claw. “Still want to go all the way?” Somewhere in the back of her mind, Gallus prayed Spike would just squirt and pass out.

“I... ye...m... um... I...” He stammered as she gazed down at him. She started to rise off him, but he grabbed her shoulders firmly as he clenched his eyes shut. “Yes. Yes, please.” She paused, examining him as he relaxed a little. “I’m sure. Please? Can we?”

Gallina was cool about sex. Gallina had no problem doing something like this with a dragon. Gallina probably had already done it with a dragon, right? So the Gallus in the back of her head needed to shut up and let her be Gallina. She reached back to that corkscrew like protuberance. “Sure.” And then scooted back, guiding to her freshly tongue washed egg-hole. At least it had a sharp tip, so getting it inside shouldn’t be a...

Her eyes popped wide as it popped wide inside her and she suddenly wondered if she hadn’t just made a terrible mistake. It felt as if she’d just shoved a pine cone in her body, with dozens of prickly, pointy bits scratching and catching at the walls of her channel. Worse, the shape of the thing seemed to dig the pointy bits deeper into her walls. And were those ridges... they were! Her face twisted up as she realized getting in was one thing. Everything made getting him out a lot more difficult.

“Are you okay?” Spike asked from beneath her.

“Fine!” She gasped, her voice cracking. “It’s just... different. Differenter than what I was expecting.” She braced herself and rose off of him, and Spike cried out along with her as she moved him out of her. It wasn’t exactly painful... precisely. It hurt, but... not in a bloody and terrible way. The ridges scraped against her and seemed to tease her to move faster on that corkscrewing member. Her walls squeezed on it, but it yielded, only to spring back against her walls as soon as she stopped.

“The face you’re making doesn’t say you’re okay,” Spike said in worry. The face Gallus was making in the back of her head wasn’t okay either.

Gallus groaned. What had she gotten into her? Well, he knew what but... maybe Gallus should just shut up mentally and let her handle this? Gallia sighed, flushing a little. “Sorry. To be honest, this is my first time with a dragon,” she admitted. It felt... so different from Zecora.

“We should probably stop,” Spike said.

“I said I would...” Gallina muttered.

“I know. And thanks. I think that’s what I wanted more than anything,” Spike said. Gallina set her haunches and pulled... and lifted Spike off the ground under her.

“Urk,” Gallina muttered her face twisted up, all those bits lodging in. “I think... wait...” She tried to push his hips off her, but that just made it dig in more. “Medic,” she whimpered.

“Wait. Let me,” he said as he started to wiggle... and wiggling was the very last thing he should have done as it made that entire thing stuck inside her because as uncomfortable as it was, it also... felt... good? The more he moved the more it moved. He wasn’t thrusting much more than an inch, but that was all he had to move to hit everything from her entrance to even deeper inside than she thought possible. She lowered her hips more as he kept moving, not so much trying to pull out as do something. It was like sex with a flopping fish, except...

One of those barb bits caught on something inside her pelvis and she rolled on her side, reached down to hold Spike close as his hips jerked and twitched as she cried out both in perverse pleasure. Suddenly he clutched her shoulders as something hot... very very hot... wet and slippery began to flow. For a moment, she wondered if he’d done something unspeakable, before she reached down and collected something oozing out from the base of that corkscrew like member. To her relief and slight consternation, what clung to her claws seemed like a white oil, almost like paint. As it spread inside her, she felt that spring slip easily inside her, and then with a pull, pop free. Both of them collapsed on their backs, panting as they lay next to each other.

“Oh...” Gallina muttered.

“Oh wow,” Spike echoed...

“That was...” What? Gallina didn’t even have a vocabulary for it. It was like he’d both clawed her egg-hole with sandpaper and then covering it in hot massage oil.

“Yeah...” Spike said with a little chuckle. “You okay?”

“I think so,” she suspected that she was going to be super sore. A part of her was a little disappointed she hadn’t climaxed, but it’d just been too much for that. “You liked it?”

“Yeah. I mean, it was my first time so... I mean, it wasn’t bad or anything,” he blurted. She saw it was already shrinking back into his loins. “Did you?”

...kinda...? The mental glare Gallus gave warned her not to dare think of trying it again! “I don’t know if it’s different for dragonesses. It was... yeah...” she muttered.

“You know if you ever come by Ponyville,” Spike began, but she put her oily claw to his lips.

“I probably won’t. Don’t wait for me. You’re a nice guy, Spike. You deserve someone that’s there for you all the time, not just an occasional thing.” She said and then carefully rose. Oh yeah, she was going to be feeling that in the morning. “Still, I definitely won’t forget it,” she said with a wry smile.

They got cleaned up as best they could, with Spike having the easier time of it. Aside from some leaves grass on his scale, that corkscrew niightmare was back inside him, waiting for the next poor victim. After a brief walk they reached the edge of Ponyville. “You want to come back to the school with me? Maybe say hi to Gallus?”

Gallina laughed, partly over joyed that he seemed to have bought the twin sister story. “Oh no. Like I said, Gallus and I really don’t get along. Best you don’t even tell him you met me. It’ll just be awkward for him,” she said with a wave of her claw.

“Oh. Okay,” Spike said and gave a sheepish grin. “Um... if you ever stop back in Ponyville...”

“I probably won’t do that again. No offense but that was way stranger than I planned. Not bad! Just... not my thing.” You can say THAT again, Gallus grumbled in the back of her head. “Thanks though. I’ll never forget it,” she said as she patted his head.

“Okay. Well. Take care,” he said, flying off towards the school and looking back once. Gallina kept an eye on him until he disappeared out of sight.

Then, she disappeared.

Gallus waited two seconds, checked around to make absolutely sure no one was around, then dug out the little round balls from the gourd. He didn’t want to make one part male. He wanted to just be back to normal. He opened his mouth and popped it into his beak, masticating firmly.

It felt as if a fist suddenly grabbed his gut and twisted. “Oh Boreas,” he gasped as he fell to his knees and elbows. The hands were grabbing his insides and moving them too and fro as if a potter were shaping his entrails. “I think... I think...” something white and oily pattered to the grass behind him. “I’m good. You can stop now! I’ll go tell Twilight everything! Just stop,” he begged the magical forces and seemed to pull and twist his body.

He fell on his face, praying nothing worse happened as he felt things shifting inside. Had he just done something horrible to himself? Was his tongue transforming into a zebra penis?! He clutched his throat, eyes bulging a moment... but no. The sensation was working its way down. It was working. Please, let it be working!

“Passing out sounds... great,” he whimpered.

Then, as abruptly as it started, it stopped. The wobbly sensation in his gut was gone, but aside from Spike’s fluids nothing else seemed to be oozing out. Gallus breathed hard, then closed his eyes and reached down between his hind legs.

And felt something wonderfully familiar and firm. He let out a long breath as his hands moved further. “Oh, thank goodness. They’re back. They’re all back.” But he knew better. He carefully reached behind it, feeling for any sort of groove or hole.

Nothing. He rolled on to his back. “Oh my sweet Griffonhood, I swear I will never part with you again.”

“Finally. This nightmare is over,” he said as he rose to his feet, still feeling a little rubbery. He needed a bath and a chance to talk to Silverstream. He flew back to the school by a roundabout route. After all, it wouldn’t do to have anyone asking questions, but if it came to that, he could just claim to be coming from the clubhouse.

First he made his way back to his room with Sandbar and stored the gourd under his pillow. Then he used his towel to clean off the... residue. “Seriously, Gallina, what were you thinking?” he muttered with a smile. Gallina sulked in the back of his mind as he stepped out with plans to make his nightly visit with Silverstream.

Except he ran into something purple and scaley with a thing that made his pelvic muscles clench. Thankfully, THAT was out of sight, but he doubted he’d ever forget...

Spike blinked at him a moment, rubbing his noggin, “Oh, sorry Gall–... OH!” His eyes popped wide as his cheeks went pink. “Ah... Hi, Gallus! You must be in a hurry! Ah...”

Gallus’s heart thundered in his chest. “What?” he asked in his usual brusque manner.

“I... ah... Your... ah...” Gallus gave him his best Gilda impression. Finally Spike blurted, “Power Ponies! Have you seen the latest issue? It’s really... ah... really... intense!” He cupped his hands over his crotch. “I gotta go!” He fled so quick he left a Spike shaped cloud in his place.

Gallina gave a throaty little chuckle in the back of Gallus’s head. Gallus was too happy to be annoyed as he practically skipped to the bath.

He’d gotten away with it.

Galling Tendencies

By Somber

Chapter 8: The Catch

Gallus swaggered; there was no better word for the strut he employed as he walked through the school. He’d gotten away with it and beaten that stupid mirror. He had his twig and... no, his staff and orbs of powah! Sure, there was nothing different about it physically, but in his head he could have wrestled an Ursa Major with one claw.

“Hello, ladies,” he said smoothly as he spotted some fillies from class, getting weird looks and giggles rather than strange looks and frowns. Victory. Right now he’d take every victory and then some. Because he’d actually solved a problem on his own, like a griffon was supposed to. No embarrassment or humiliation... okay, nothing permanent. He’d won.

Mostly. He went back to his dorm room. Thankfully it was empty. He stuck the candies under his pillow. If he even needed them, but still, better to be safe than sorry.

He spotted Ocellus, Smolder, and Silverstream together by the courtyard fountain. “Heeey ladies,” he said with a grin. “How’s it hanging?” Very well, thank you!

“Woah. Someone’s feeling better,” Smolder called out with a wave as he walked up. “See you ditched the sailor duds. They really made you look like a dork.”

“How’s what hanging?” Silverstream mused, scanning the court yard. “That potted plant? Mmmm... looks a little crooked,” she said as she eyed some suspect geraniums dangling from an eve. She flew up and Gallus’s eyes followed her form in flight. Zecora was nice but there was nothing quite like her. She corrected the potted plant hanging in its sling. “There!” she said primmly, fluttering back down. The plant immediately tilted back over.

Ocellus and Smolder shared a look. “I’m really glad you’re feeling better. I heard you were really upset after you left Miss Glimmer’s office,” Ocellus commented, screwing up her face as she regarded him. “Though right now... hrm.”

“Yeah, what’s the deal? This morning you were wearing clothes, which are probably the second dumbest pony invention ever, and now you’re...” she trailed off and her cheeks immediately flushed. “You didn’t.” Gallus polished his knuckles on his chest fluff. Ocellus turned red as well. “You did!”

“Did what? What did he do?” Silverstream asked as she looked from one to the other.

“Who did you do?” Smolder demanded.

“No one you need to worry about,” he added, trying not to think of the fact that more people did him, but he wasn’t going to spoil the mood. The fact that he’d impressed Smolder of all people boosted his ego even higher. “It’s alllll goood.” And it had been, for Gallina. He’d claim victory in her absence.

“Who did what to whom for what and how was it good?” Silverstream demanded as she looked from one to the next. Occellus leaned over, whispering and she immediately flushed magenta. “Gallus?! You had sex?!”

A dozen eyes of ponies across the quad locked on him and finally popped his bubble of euphoria. “Can you be a little louder? I don’t think they heard in Canterlot.”

She immediately clasped her hands over her beak. “Oops. Sorry. I just... wow. Huh. It looks like everyone’s maturing. Yona and Sandbar. Now you too.” She glanced over at the other two.

“Don’t look at me. There’s no one here that I’m interested in doing that stuff with,” she said with still a hint of pink on her cheeks.

“I don’t think I’m quite ready to do things like that yet,” Ocellus admitted with a shy smile.

“And I can’t or it’ll be a political incident,” Silverstream muttered, getting two confused glances from the changeling and dragon. “Long story.”

“Well anyway, that’s where I was. Went pretty well too. Not what I expected but not bad at all,” he said, assuming a little more of his swagger. “Where is Yona and Sand-” he started to ask and then clicked his beak. “Nevermind. I just answered my own question, didn’t I?”

“I still have to wonder how that all works,” Smolder said as she mashed her cupped hands.

“I don’t have to wonder, and I’m not going to share,” he said and stretched. “I just need a long bath. And I need to give somepony an apology.”

“Well, hope I see you in it later,” she said as he turned to go, flying towards the door.

Before he re-entered the school, Ocellus called out to him. “Gallus, wait!” And she flew over to him in the doorway. “Gallus, are you sure you’re okay? You’ve been... I mean...and right now...”

He shushed her with a feather to her lips. “You’ve been worried about me. But you don’t have to be. I had a problem. I took care of it.” He still had to manage Tag and stuff, but it was handled.

“And I’m glad you feel better. Just, if you ever need to talk, please do,” she told him.

“Thanks, but I can handle anythi-”

“TAG!”

“FUUUUARRGGHHHH...” he collapsed as the yellow colt ran off cackling.

He didn’t get far. Ocellus transformed into a hummingbird, zipping after him like an arrow, before turning to face him. Then she got big... really big... transforming into an enormous winged, fanged monstrosity that bellowed, “KNOCK IT OFF!” Spittle sprayed all over the yellow colt as he blinked up at her.

“TAG!” He shouted again, smacking her on the snout before racing off down another hall laughing. She shrank back down, rubbing her muzzle before realizing he wasn’t the only one laughing. Gallus seemed to be trying to laugh and cry at the same time.

“I’m fine! I’m fine!” Gallus wheezed as he curled up there. “Everything is perfectly fine!”

“Boys are so weird,” she said as she trotted off to go find the nurse.

It was actually an icepack later that he was close to fine, but the fact he needed an ice pack at all gave Tag a pass. A small pass. The colt was going to get turned into a statue at this rate. Still, once most of the soreness worked off, he wrote a little note of apology for Councillor Glimmer and then headed to the baths for his evening soak, glad that he finally wouldn’t need to worry about anything.

“Hi Gallus,” she called, waving a fin from the steamy pool. He jumped in, splashing her. Big mistake, as the seapony used her tail to show him what a splash really looked like. By the time it ended though, he floated in the steamy water, arms and wings spread wide on the seat in the pool. “So. How was it?” He blinked and looked at her as she bobbed on a little floaty.

“It?” he blinked and then his eyes went wide. “Oh. It! Hah.” He glanced askance at her. “You really want to know?”

“Yona’s not much for girl talk. All she says is Sandbar is ‘Big as Yak’, and that’s it. I mean, I get that it’s good and all but she’s not really chatty on the subject. Smolder’s not interested at all. Ocellus... I dunno. But yeah. So... how was it?”

Gallus considered. “It was all right. Like... it was good. It wasn’t anything I really expected but when it was all done it felt pretty good.” He saw her huge blue eyes and added, “And no, I’m not telling you with who.” Last thing he needed was for the little detail of Gallina slipping out.

“Awww, meanie,” she said, her smile now smaller and softer. “I am still sorry it wasn’t me.”

He was too. “Hey, no worries. If you’re not interested, you’re not.” He paused, and arched a brow. “Or are you?”

“I wish I was,” she said with a sigh. “It’d be so much easier. I even asked Ocellus to watch my feelings and stared at a lot of colts all day. Nothing. I just... I don’t feel that way. I don’t know why I don’t! But I don’t.” Her voice was small as she looked down at the water. “Sorry,” she murmured.

“Hey. You got nothing to apologize for,” he said.

“Yes, I do. It’s going to be a problem. A problem for my parents. My fiancee, whomever they settle on. Me. If I just liked people like that, it’d be easier. Then I wouldn’t feel like I’m letting others down.”

“Can’t you just be with a girl you like?”

She rolled her eyes. “If I wasn’t the queen’s niece, absolutely. But the nobility are a lot more particular. No one wants marriages that result in kids out of wedlock. I could have a lover on the side, but that just feels... really dishonest. Like marriage is supposed to be for love, like Princess Cadence and Shining Armor.”

Gallus was pretty sure there was some politics at work there too, but didn’t want to spoil what she clearly had as an ideal marriage. “Griffons don’t even do that,” he said with a sigh. “For us, it’s like a business merger. Five years, who gets the kids, who gets the property, options for renewal. Some griffs stick it out, but you get a lot of empty nests and lost eggs. Especially when neither parent wants to pay for raising the kid. Grandpa Gruff’s weird in that he actually takes care of us, even if we’re expensive.”

“That’s got to be rough,” she said as she bobbed there. “Is that what happened to you and Gallina?”

“Gallina?” Gallus muttered, feeling icewater along his spine.

“Your sister?” she asked with a little frown.

“Oh. Yeah. Dad took her, mom left me. She didn’t even grow up in Griffonstone which is why almost no one knows about her!” he said in a rush as he leaned towards her. “How’d you hear about her?”

“Well... I overheard Smolder talking to Ocellus about overhearing Spike talking to Twilight about meeting a beautiful blue griffoness named Gallina who was your sister in the Everfree Forest.” She blinked at him. “Funny, but you were in the Everfree Forest this afternoon too. Did you see your sister?”

“Hah.... yeah. Funny... hah... will you excuse me for just a second? It shouldn’t take long.” He said as he jumped into the air and flapped his wings, flying, and shook hard.

“What won’t?” she asked back. But Gallus was gone before he answered.

She floated in the middle of the pool. “Gallus leaves in the middle if the afternoon for the Everfree forest and Spike meets his sister there... and Gallus says he’s done it.... Won’t say who with.” Then her eyes went wide and she slowly sank down into the water till just her eyes peeked out, blurting out the unthinkable connection that these facts drew in a storm of bubbles.

“Spike! Spike!” Gallus yelled as he flew through the school. He glimpsed the purple dragon in a classroom grading papers, simple friendship worksheets from Rainbow Dash’s classes. “Spike! What did you say about Gallina?” Gallus demanded as he darted into the classroom.

Spike fell over with a wail, scattering papers all over the desk. “Wha... how... huh?”

“Yeah. Who’s Gallina?” asked a dangerously familiar voice. Gallus slowly turned to stare at Smolder, Sandbar, and Yona sitting nearby in the classroom. Suddenly his brain, which must have been left behind in the bathroom in his haste to throttle Spike, caught up.

“My twin sister,” he lied. “I was raised by Grandpa gruff. She was raised by someone else.” He coughed. “What are all of you doing here?”

“Mainly keeping Spike company,” Sandbar said lazily as he snuggled up against Yona.

“Making sure Dash actually grades things rather than just giving every creature an A has been a little challenging,” Spike said with a flush.

“Dragon didn’t mention meeting Griffon’s twin sister,” Yona rumbled. “Griffon also didn’t mention having a twin sister either.”

Gallus thought fast. “She’s... kinda embarrassing. She just flies from Yakyakistan to Mount Eris doing whatever she wants. I heard she was near Ponyville. She was going to go meet a zebra for something.” He then gave Spike the eye. “She didn’t try anything, did she?”

“Uh... she was nice. Really really nice,” Spike muttered.

Smolder let out a skeptical snort. “A nice griffon? I can count those on one claw.”

Gallus gave an exaggerated eye roll. “Oh, she’s cool enough. She just does stuff. Stuff other people probably shouldn’t talk about.”

“She’s cool, huh? I’d really like to meet her,” Sandbar said. Yona gave him a side eye with arched brow. “What? Don’t you wonder what a girl Gallus might look like?”

“She was super hot,” Spike muttered.

“Aren’t you with Gabby?” Smolder inquired, for which Gallus was glad as it deferred further speculation on Gallina’s hotness.

“Gabby’s my friend. I’m her friend. If we become more then friends, then we’ll worry about it. But Galina was just... amazing.” He sighed as Gallus sputtered.

“Amazing sis, huh? Like to meet her myself,” Sandbar chuckled.

“And aren’t you with Yona?” Smoulder asked, eyeing Sandbar.

“Course,” he replied.

“Yak not worry about Sandbar doing anything stupid with griffon sister,” Yona added.

“Yeah, since she could totally smash me if I did.”

“Yak best at smashing,” Yona stated with a wide grin.

“You bet you are,” Gallus chuckled. Smolder twisted away so the pair wouldn’t see her stick her finger in her mouth, mimicking retching.

“Well, if I know her she’s not going to come anywhere near this school, ever,” Gallus swore firmly, his mind working. “She’s more of a free spirit. She goes where she wants and does what she wants. She certainly wouldn’t stick around a lame school like this one.” Then he caught Spike’s downcast eye. “Sorry.”

Spike gave a shrug. “She made it clear she wasn’t sticking around. I kinda got the feeling she wasn’t nearly as, ah... cool, as she acted.”

Gallus patted him on the spines. “Hey, don’t worry. Some day you’ll meet a dragon... pony... whatever works for you.”

Spike sighed, leaning back in the chair. “Awww, but she’s so cute! She had this delicate beak and her rear was so soft and her–”

Gallus’s cheeks blazed. “You... you don’t have to talk about her body or cuteness. In fact, why talk about her at all? I don’t see any reason to! None at all!”

“You know, for an estranged sibling, you sure seem pretty defensive of her,” Smolder observed.

“Caaaause... she’s not here. And Professor Applejack said talking behind a person’s back was dishonest,” he said as he backed towards the door. “Speaking of teachers, I should totally make sure my homework is ready for tomorrow! See yah!” And he darted from the classroom.

In his absence the four shared glances. “Did Gallus just invoke Applejack and say he had to do homework?” Spike asked aloud.

“Changeling, gotta be.” Smolder stated bluntly.

“Maybe he, like, swapped minds with his sis?” Sandbar suggested.

“Yak suspect mind control magic. Gallus did see Glimmer pony earlier,” Yona pointed out.

Spike just glanced towards the door, saying nothing as he went back to his work, a new furrow added to his brow.

Gallus spent the next week putting the whole debacle behind him. Zecora’s cure did the trick, and while there were a few more mutters about ‘Gallina’, none of them came from anyone important. By the time his next day off rolled around, he felt like the mirror had been licked for good. Every morning he ate one of the chews and checked to make sure all his parts were his.

“I don’t know what it is about you,” Silverstream commented as she rest on the edge of the steamy pool, her forelegs folded under her head, exquisite rump poking from the water as they enjoyed their bi nightly soak. Gallus wasn’t sure Griffons were supposed to get wet so regularly, but if he got to look at her for some late night alone time material, he’d take it. Besides, in her own way, she was fun to talk to. It was hard not to be swept up in her enthusiasm. “You seem different lately.”

“More masculine?” he said, trying to force a baritone that cracked halfway through.

“Kinda. I guess you’re happier? Or you seem like you are,” Silverstream observed. Gallus just laid back in the water. Was it just him or was it particularly warm tonight?

“Eh, I had a problem and I took care of it,” he commented with a smile.

“Tag?” Silverstream guessed.

“Ugh. I swear, next time he tries to ‘tag’ me I’m going to maul him if I catch him!” Gallus swore. “No, it was something else.” She glanced over her shoulder at him. “N- nothing big,” he stammered, waving a claw.

“We would have helped,” Silverspring said as she turned to face him in the soaking pool, a small frown in her face.

“I know, I know,” he said quickly. “But it’s important a griffon solve their own problems, you know?”

She disappeared under the water and he had a strange moment of panic before she surfaced as a seapony and ‘sat’ on the bathing pool ledge beside him. “Nope. Don’t know that at all, cause I’m not a griffon.” She said as she gave her fluke a splash.

“Right,” he said and took a deep breath. “You’ve never seen Griffonstone before, and I hope you never do. It’s a really rough place. Almost every griff is out for themselves. I can count the exceptions on one claw.” He said, flexing his fingers before looking away. Why was he being so maudlin about this? Just blow it off. “It’s really important a griff can handle things on their own. Bad things happen to griffs who can’t.”

“You’re not in Griffonstone anymore though,” Silverstream pointed out.

“Sure, today. But what about tomorrow? It’s not like I can just hang out and join the royal guard some day or something.” He closed his eyes, trying to bottle things up like normal. It wasn’t usually this hard! Just pfft and you’re good. He felt all weird as he sat here next to her... like his insides her all melting wax. “One day, we’re going to graduate. You’ll go to Mount Aris and marry whomever. Smolder will do whatever she wants. Ocellus will go back to her hive, or maybe just stay here as a teacher. Yona and Sandbar will probably settle down.” He glanced at her, unable to hide his misery. “I just see myself going back to Griffonstone and winding up looking like a blue Grandpa Gruff. I have to be able to take care of myself on my own. I won’t make it otherwise. I can’t count on you guys being there for me forever. That’s not fair to you.”

“Gallus,” Silverstream said as she put her head on his shoulder. “I don’t know what’ll happen to everyone, but I do know that whatever happens, we’ll always be there for you. We’re friends.”

But he didn’t hear her because something was wrong. Silverstream was cozied up to him. Even as a seapony, her body was curvy and soft and wonderful to brush against... but something bad was happening... or something good wasn’t happening. His hands disappeared under the water as he felt his torso, the soft and yielding flesh meeting his examination. Panic erupted inside him as his claws shot betwixt his legs... normally a risky act.

But not right now, for there was nothing there for his claws to endanger. “Gallus? Is something wrong?” Silverstream asked with a concerned frown.

He forced a grin. “Yeah. Just think those oat muffins might not have been good,” he said, closing his eyes and breathing deep. He wasn’t going to change. He refused. He’d worked so hard for so long that he could stop this. He could! Just long enough to get out with some dignity intact.

But he felt things moving around inside his guts. They crawled, like the organs themselves rearranged. “Really? I thought they were fine. Are you going to be okay?”

“Sure,” he lied. He couldn’t handle it. Worse, he could feel it spreading. His shoulders, skull, face. It was like tiny hands pushing his bones ever so slightly. To a griffon it would have been blatantly obvious. But then again, there wasn’t much difference between Hippogriff faces and griffon faces. Practically none at all. He splashed his face, mussing his features to obscure the changes. “I just... I just need a moment.” He said, sitting back on his haunches, he rocked to confirm that far more was lacking beneath his tail, and from the disturbing feeling of water, there was fluid pressing against an orifice he shouldn’t have.

“Gallus? What is it? Did you get your tail caught in the pool intake again?” she asked and her head disappeared underwater.

“Ohgoshgotathinggottago!” he screeched and flapped, spraying water over the others in the bathroom as he streaked like a sodden arrow straight for the exit. He returned, seeing her staring at him with wide eyed bafflement as he grabbed a towel and tied it around his hips, and a second one to cover his face.

“Please no horseshoe. Please no horseshoe!” he muttered, his voice becoming lighter and smoother with every echo of the prayer to Boreas. He rounded the corner and dove towards his dorm room, his wet feathers failing to break him properly as he fell to the ground.

He slid along the ground to break before slamming into the door of his dorm.

Horseshoe.

“GYA!” he screamed, and became aware of others in the dorm hallway. If someone got a good look... if Spike wandered by...

As if the universe had a vendetta, he spotted a purple scaly form strolling down towards him. Guy code be damned, he drummed his fists on the door in a wild staccato. He couldn’t even trust to yell.

Then the door opened to a yak. A yak who was a good friend. A yak who was kind and wonderful. However, she was a yak who had clearly been interrupted from doing something she wanted very much, and despite months amid ponies, still had ‘Smash’ as an option. Gallus didn’t care. He launched himself into the air, soaring over her and depositing two wet towels on her face. Sandbar was mostly covered by a sheet, pitched well enough for a three ring circus beneath.

Gallus launched himself into his own bed, under his sheets and dug around for the little bag. He immediately popped one of the round chews in, and almost swallowed the thing whole. He felt the warm clay sensation of his body altering, feeling organs in his pelvis shifting around. “Uh, Gallus. Everything okay?” Sandbar asked from below.

“Sec!” he croaked, feeling his throat loosen and relax from his feminine squawk. Like a sausage casing, firmness was squeezed back into his loins as the member reappeared. His hands ran over those fleshy, puffy breasts to confirm they were tightening up. He even dared to feel between his haunches, feeling the slit melting away even as he touched it. Like apples bobbing to the surface, his berries reappeared under his hands from somewhere within his body.

“Griffon,”rumbled a far more dangerous yak.

“Second!” He said, yanking the drawstring closed and tucking it under his wing. He dashed over to his saddlebags. “Almost forgot a thing! Almost done!” He shouted as he shoved the sack of chews inside. “Got to go do a thing! Have fun! Bye!” He shouted as he darted out the door, slamming it shut in his passing and sending the horseshoe bouncing down the hall as he ran.

He didn’t stop till he reached the tree house. “Oh shit. Oh no. Oh crap,” he muttered as he paced back and forth. He hadn’t solved it. He hadn’t ‘cured it’. All he’d done was delayed it! “What am I going to do? What am I going to do?” he whimpered.

“I dunno. What are you going to do?” asked a light voice from overhead. Ocellus stared down at him, a pair of pudgewugies flanking her like prickly bodyguards from a loft reading nook. Her purple scleria narrowed. “Gallus? Um... what is going on?”

Everything caught up with him in that moment and he did the only reasonable thing one could in this situation.

Gallus died. Again. For real this time.