The Peculiar Thief, Chapter One: Discovery
A unicorn mare makes a discovery that will define her entire life.
When you grow up without something, you don't suffer for the lack of it. The other fillies and colts around you may have had things you didn't, but if you didn't see them or experience them, you would have no idea you were missing out. While that's something many consider from the standpoint of material possessions, it isn't something people always consider when it comes to anatomy, or particularly birth defects.
For Blossom Seeker, there was only one thing that occupied her mind as a filly, and it was what eventually got her her cutie mark: botany. She had only just learned the word for it at that age, but she'd been in love with flowers since her first memories, and while other foals were out playing games together, she'd have her head down looking at the plant life, searching for some new flower to capture her attention.
When she grew old enough to start learning about biology in school, she proved to have a brain like a sponge when it came to plant life. She quickly surpassed her teachers in memorizing entire catalogues of local flora, and then expanded out into other nations around the globe. Her parents eventually got used to her constant attempts to convince them to travel abroad, the descriptions of sights and cuisine always eventually giving way to her true motive of wanting to wander around the local forest or jungle to study what she'd learned about in books.
While initially a bit of a shut-in, being outside all the time inevitably brought her into contact with others her age, and she eventually started to make friends. She was delighted to find that while most ponies her age weren't as obsessed with plants as she was, the thrill of hunting for something you haven't seen before is pretty much universal, so it was easy to find volunteers for trips through the forest and fields where she could show off what she knew and wow an audience.
Obviously, as one grows older, some of what fascinates you in your childhood begins to take a back-burner to new fascinations, and Blossom was more than perceptive enough to notice as her friends and others, both male and female, started paying far more attention to each other. She certainly appreciated the occasional glance at a nice looking stallion, maybe even a flash of his package past his tail, but some of the discussions of sexual topics left her confused because of a key piece of context she seemed to be missing.
It wasn't until her first estrus and that of all the other new mares her age that she realized exactly what made her different. She had heard her friends whisper about "playing with myself" before, but when anyone had asked her about she had feigned shyness and they usually left her alone about it. She knew enough about it to know that the "playing" was with her marehood, but poking around and even rubbing didn't really seem to do anything exciting. She found the contact with those soft parts soothing and she knew they got wet when she thought about stallions and what she wanted them to do to her, but it was more relaxing than anything it sounded like from her friends' conspiratorial whispers.
The mystery gained a crucial piece of evidence the first time she decided to do some clandestine research and followed a mare and the stallion she'd been flirting with back to her home. It took a little doing to find an angle where she could peep in through the back window of the small one-story house, but she had a more than good enough view to see the mare bend over her bed with her rear to the door, flip her tail up over her rump, and then came the shocker. As she watched, a large, slightly lumpy knob of flesh pushed itself out of the bottom of her marehood, followed by a small spritz of thick, creamy looking fluid. She didn't get any more view than that because the scene rapidly turned into what she was already familiar with from the lurid stories of some more experienced fillies, but the sight of that strange protrusion stuck with her.
Upon returning home that same day, she snuck into her mother's room, took a small hoof-mirror, and locked herself in her own room with it. With the mirror held in her magic she spread her thick lips with her hooves and probed around with her magic, having to concentrate to maintain hold on the mirror while also poking around inside herself. She spread herself as wide as she could and used her magic to worm up under the curve at the top of her parts, but couldn't find any sign of that strange protrusion she'd seen before. She became increasingly frustrated as she could have easily solved this mystery if she'd just had the courage to visit the library and check out a book on anatomy, but she was always afraid of being questioned about what she wanted it for, especially since she would have to specify a book aimed at adults and not foals.
The book turned out not to be necessary thanks to a friend of hers. Zalika and Blossom had arranged to have a sleepover at her friend's house to go over the latter's extensive notes on local flora to help study for a test they had coming up. Anyone who knew Blossom knew that you weren't going to find a better study partner for botany anywhere within hundreds of miles. Zalika was more inclined toward animal biology than that of plants, which made the two of them together the top scorers in biology time and again thanks to their study sessions together.
This time, however, rather than just swapping note-cards and quizzing each other to sharpen their knowledge, Blossom had a far more specific topic in mind. Her friend had the advantage of a cutie mark focused on anatomy and was planning to attend college to become a doctor, so she had access to medical textbooks that Blossom didn't, and knew a lot more than what was strictly necessary for the grade they were in. They'd never really had cause to talk about it before, but she was confident her friend would have the answers she was seeking.
They got settled in after dinner, dessert, and some idle chat and the study materials came out. Nervousness made Blossom wait a little longer than was strictly necessary to ask her question, minutes ticking by as the two traded notes for a test coming up next week. Her friend was reclined lazily across the floor in front of her, hoofing between pages and notecards occasionally, tail-dock occasionally flicking as they talked. Thinking about what it hid kept her question in the front of her mind, until when finally a pause came she took a deep breath, swallowed, and finally opened her mouth.
"Hey, I wanted to ask you about something...but it's kind of...personal," she started out.
The zebra looked up from the page she was reading and quirked an eyebrow. It wasn't like Blossom to be cagey like this, and she realized that fleeting thought she had about passing this off as a tangent and backing out of asking wasn't going to work now that she'd basically outed the fact that wasn't the case.
"It's an anatomy thing. I noticed a while back that I...well I think I might be missing something. Anatomy-wise. In an...odd place."
At this point she felt like she was going to scream in frustration at her own reluctance to just spit it out. She'd known Zalika for years, they'd talked about pretty much anything, and what she was worried about fell squarely under the purview of her friend's talents. She needed to stop beating around the bush and just say it.
"So...you think your body is missing something?" The zebra did indeed look more engaged now.
"Okay, if you don't want to talk about this then just tell me, and that'll be fine, but...I've seen this part that other mares have in their - well - 'mare's parts' and I don't think I have one." Blossom could feel her heart pounding in her chest now, fervently hoping her friend would want to help her get to the bottom of this and not be freaked out.
Zalika sat bolt upright and fixed her with a stare that might have freaked her out if she hadn't recognized it from all the times she'd seen the zebra examining some creature they'd found while out adventuring.
"So you're saying you think you have a birth defect in your genitals? That's somewhat rare!"
"Yeah, I've been...getting that feeling," she chuckled nervously, "and I wanted to try and figure out what was going on, but I can't get the books that you can."
"Can you describe it more? Or...would you be okay with me...looking?"
Now Zalika was being uncharacteristically cagey. This discussion was getting almost as awkward as she was afraid it would when she'd been agonizing over it for the past week. She had considered the fact that her friend would want to make a visual examination like she always had with everything else she was interested in, but the thought had been too embarrassing for her to really focus on. Hearing the zebra ask that now left her frozen for a few moments with a blush visibly building under her coat.
As the silence starting stretching on a bit too long to feel comfortable for either party, Blossom was shocked to realize she was strongly considering saying no or trying to find some way out of the discussion. Had she really gone to the trouble of all her personal explorations and then come to her best friend for aid only to back out at the first sign of difficulty? She growled deep in her throat at her own reticence and opened her mouth to respond before she could think anymore.
"Absolutely! That's why I came to ask you after all," she declared before unceremoniously turning her rear end toward her friend and tossing her tail up over her rump.
The realization that that was probably a bit too abrupt and extreme a way to handle her own indecisiveness quickly made her want to smack herself in the forehead, but she held her ridiculous pose and waited, pretending she wasn't internally berating herself. She could hear papers being moved out of the way behind her as she lay on her belly, and she tried not to hold her breath as she thought about what was coming next.
She couldn't help but jump when Zalika's hooves contacted her butt, even though all they did initially was encourage her to raise her rump a little higher so her friend could get a better look with more light. Blossom's heart was pounding loud enough she was absolutely certain Zalika would hear it and think she was having a panic attack. After seconds that stretched on far too long, she felt her best friend's hooves on either side of her lips, and then they were spreading them apart.
There was silence at first, and then the hooves shifted around a little to pull and peek around inside her marehood, with an occasional hum of concentration coming from the unseen zebra as she performed her examination. It wasn't until she placed the tip of her hoof at the bottom curve of Blossom's parts and pulled back the skin there than she let out a quiet gasp and leaned in closer so her breath could be clearly felt. The thought popped into the embarrassed unicorns head that she was very glad she had bathed immediately before this sleepover before Zalika spoke up.
"Oh wow. Blossom, you're...aphallic!"
"What? You sound like I'm supposed to know what that means," she said, trying not to sound too frustrated.
"Okay, so, in equines the vagina itself is tucked back inside of an outer pouch that's called a 'vestibule'. That's shaped with a slope leading up to the vagina to help guide in a stallion's penis, which I'm sure you've figured out like we all did. At the bottom of the vestibule is the clitoris, which extends deep in past the external part you can see and runs up along the vagina, providing pleasurable sensation during sex."
At this point she heard her friend falter, and she smiled a little as she realized Zalika was herself just realizing that she was calmly describing pleasure during sex to her female friend while spreading her pussy open with both hooves. She suppressed a snicker as she heard the zebra clear her throat to continue.
"Aphallia is a very rare birth defect where a stallion is born without a penis, but it can also happen to mares. You see, when we first start developing in our mother's womb, we're all actually female. It's the introduction of the right balance of hormones into us that changes some of us into males, so aphallia can also affect mares, in which case they're born without a clitoris."
Blossom had frequently thought about what her reaction would be to finally learning what was different about her, whether it was something fixable or maybe even permanent, but none of her imagined scenarios fit. She didn't feel enlightened, depressed, or any of the other feelings she'd imagined. She honestly just felt confused.
Zalika had just said that this 'clitoris' she apparently didn't have was responsible for making a mare enjoy sex. Did that mean she wouldn't? Did that mean that unlike that mare she watched through the window, she wouldn't actually feel good when she tried it? She found herself starting to feel angry at how unfair that would be, but then another thought occurred to her, and that was to wonder how good it actually was anyway. As soon as she'd thought about it, she realized that she had a way to find out sitting right behind her, and the thought made her have to swallow a pretty big nervous lump in her throat.
"So the...clitoris makes you feel good?" She asked tentatively.
"Yes! It contains most of the nerve endings that make you enjoy sex and masturbation."
"Masturbation?"
"'Playing with yourself'. Basically - uhm - rubbing the outside part to make yourself feel good."
"So...could you show me? What it looks like I mean! It's only fair after all, with you looking at me..."
Zalika opened her mouth to say something, closed it, opened it again, and then just pressed her lips together with her face reddening slowly and turned herself around so her rear end was facing her friend before taking a deep breath and flagging her tail off to the side. The first thing Blossom noticed was that her friend's lower lips were thinner than her's, but a big longer, and had a bit of a bulge near the bottom. She felt her heart start to race again as she realized that bulge must hide what she had been so curious about, and leaned in closer. With her magic she spread those slightly wrinkled black lips and pulled down the hood over the bulge, revealing a small, black, knobly circle of flesh nestled at the bottom of her lips tucked in amongst the red flesh around it and where she knew only an empty space resided in her own.
"It's...small..."
"It - um - gets bigger when you -you know - get excited," Zalika replied, clearing her throat.
At long last, Blossom was face to face with the thing that she lacked that made her different from every other mare. Actually, she now realized, made her different from every other female species on the planet. As she stared at the small lump in her friend's marehood, her feelings ran the gambit from excitement, to sadness at what she was missing, to resentment at the idea of not being able to experience what her friend described. That last thought, however, aroused her curiosity, and without fully thinking about what this would mean, she let go of her friend's hood, pressed her hoof up underneath of it, and started rubbing the thick protective skin back and forth over the part hidden beneath.
"Ah! Blossom what are you doing?!" Her best friend sounded startled, but not offended, and her tail only dropped slightly before bobbing back up.
"I'm performing an examination. Shush." Despite her best efforts, her voice had a bit of a quaver in it.
Zalika's head slowly dropped down to the floor and her body seemed to relax. Blossom kept rubbing back and forwards over her friend's hood before then trying to do it side to side, listening for a change in her friend's breathing, before then trying to rub around in circles which made her friend seemed to tense up and shudder. Her heart was pounding loud enough to hear in her ears as she watched that bulge begin to swell bigger and heard her friend begin to pant a little at what she was doing. She'd known Zalika since they were both fillies in elementary school, and now she was masturbating her in her bedroom. The reality of the situation seemed impossible to believe but at the same time was only adding to the firestorm of emotions she was feeling.
As much as she was trying to stay quiet, she let out a gasp and her heart skipped a beat as her friend's hidden clitoris pushed back against her hoof, forced itself out of her folds, and exposed itself in all its glory to Blossom. It was easily three times as big as it was before she got Zalika so excited, and she immediately held it still in her magic and spread the zebra's folds as wide as she could. Her friend jumped at the strange sensation and whimpered, but only turned her head to look at Blossom over her shoulder as the unicorn stared at the now much larger protrusion.
"Wow..." was all the unicorn could muster.
It was shiny black, seemed to be separated into a few lobes of flesh with folds in between, and was visibly pulsing with the zebra's heartbeat. She squeezed it gently in her magic and it deformed easily in her magic almost like a water balloon, eliciting another whimper of what she now knew was pleasure from her best friend. This part she was staring at right now could make her friend a shivering, limp mess just by playing with it!
"What would - um - if I kept doing this?"
"Well...I'd eventually have what's called an orgasm. That's what happens at the end of sex. With stallions it makes them shoot semen, which is how mares get pregnant, and with mares it kind of...makes everything clench up inside and sends tingles all over you. I've read that with stallions it's all in the penis, but with mares it kind of...spreads through your body."
She had to stifle a giggle at how her friend had to keep stopping to get her thoughts together. She'd seen her friend give long lectures for school projects without even a pause, but now her formidable mind was just a puddle of jelly and it was all because of her. She felt a sense of pride at being able to accomplish that, but that pride brought another thought to mind. She would never be a nerveless lump of quivering pony lying on her own floor as someone pleasured her, because she was missing what was apparently one of the most important parts of a mare. Even if she found a stallion she wanted to have sex with, she wouldn't be able to enjoy it like any other female could.
The sudden release of her most sensitive body part made Zalika jump a little and turn around. Blossom was sitting behind her, the glow gone from her horn, staring at the floor in front of her with a dark expression on her face. She almost looked like she was going to cry, but holding it back, and immediately she felt guilty as she realized what her best friend must be thinking.
She settled herself next to the distraught unicorn and wrapped her forelegs around her tightly, hugging her against her shoulder, the arousal quickly fading as it was replaced with sympathy. Instead of speaking, she just held her close to let her know she was there for her.
The storm of emotions in Blossom's head might have given her pause if she was aware of them, because her friend's earlier feelings of resentment were back in full force. They had no target, and were being fired off at random toward anything she could think of. She had been born into the world predestined never to enjoy the touch of others like her friend had been so enjoying, and as far as she knew there was no way for her to fix that.
"I'm sorry, Blossom. I haven't read anything about there being a way to fix this, but maybe you could find a doctor and ask them? I mean, with medicine and magic they can fix almost anything these days! Maybe there's a way they could - I don't know - make your body grow one? You unicorns can do almost anything!"
Blossom could feel the warmth of happiness starting to bloom once again at her friend's words, a caring voice making her feel far less helpless and alone. Magic itself wasn't specifically her forte, outside of the normal spells like telekinesis that they taught all unicorns in school, so she had no idea of her friend's idea of trying to grow body parts was possible or not. It did, however, give her some hope for the future, and also told her she had a lot more reading to do when she got home the next day.
For now, she nuzzled Zalika, thanked her for her help, and suggested they get back to preparing for their test. It was a little awkward to just go back to studying after her first sexual encounter, but having something else to focus on helped her mood greatly, and soon the two were back in the old flow. Before the lights went off that night, Blossom was determined to find a way to fix her body, no matter what it took.