4/27/14 11:30am Ponyville, Equestria
“When is he going to arrive? I’m not a fan of having to spend time with these ‘primitives’.” A female voice stated.
A hiss of static was followed by another voice. “This is quite interesting music don’t you think? With the right advertising, this could be the next big thing.” A male voice stated.
Another hiss and different voice took over. “We will have the same rights as any other country.” The female speaker’s ire was clear. A small hiss followed by the last of her threat. “I will be filing formal charges with The Hague for attempted assault on diplomatic personnel with immunity.”
Lyra sat in Bon Bon’s living room going over her recordings from the gala. It was a plain room with buttercream paint and a small purple couch on a hardwood floor. But, the xenobiologist sat on a yellow and purple area rug, going over all of her materials. It was hard to focus on her work though, a date the previous night kept distracting her.
Vinyl had taken it upon herself to send advanced warning through the portal of Lyra’s return. Bon Bon ambushed her that night by saying they were going out to eat to celebrate her return. She had failed to mention it was at Maison de Fantaisie, the nicest restaurant in Ponyville. They had stayed at the table for several hours and just talked. It was the most fun she’d had in a long time, she hated that it had to end and that Bon Bon was currently at work.
It was nice. Lyra conceded. But that was two days ago. She had to move, to clear her head, to think. Now, what was I supposed to do today? Lyra opened up the door to see a familiar orange pony with a raised hoof on the other side. “Um, can I help you Applejack? I was just on my way out.”
“Yeah, we have an appointment with Anthony.” Applejack reminded the mare.
Lyra gave the farmer a quizzical look. “Why do we have this meeting?” She still couldn’t remember this appointment.
“Cuz I don’t trust that Aiko lady.” Applejack confessed. “She’s doesn’t act like anypony in love.”
Lyra’s mind started to muddle through her knowledge, all energy being redirected. “Well, they do marry for more reasons than love.” She began to run through any information she had acquired on human power struggles. “They can be arranged by family to solidify holdings and a power base that was a part of a large number of their Empires. Because one side had something the other wanted, that can be over one thinking that the other is beautiful and that person wanting the paper or advantages that come with marriage.” The mint-green mare started to grin, mind focused completely on the problem at hoof and the implications.
Applejack didn’t seem convinced.
“If things stop working out they have ways of separating.” Lyra tried to soothe. “Unless they’re religious or are strongly tied to cultural norms.” She conceded. “Then they stay together until they die, even if they hate each other.”
“Maybe I’ll just ask him.” Applejack stated, not liking this new information about humans. She then turned around and walked towards the embassy.
“If you want I can put more time into studying marriage rituals and reasons, “Lyra said, the excitement more evident on her face. “I can work on that after I finish this current research. Their class system is interesting.” Lyra started, following the earth pony. “Did you know some societies have a class called untouchables?”
12:00pm Human Embassy, Equestria
Anthony was sitting at his desk, having to deal with the fallout of a bar fight and an attack. Rizzo, one of the instigators of the bar fight, would be sent back to Earth for punishment and to make sure his arm was healing properly. The rest of the marines would only serve a few days in the Brig that was part of the second floor Embassy basement and docked a few weeks’ pay. He was thankful to Avery for his quick thinking, it wouldn’t play well on Earth with the politicians, but it went a long way to showing good will towards Equestria.
The Ambassador had even sent a letter of thanks to the Ponyville Guard. The pony responsible though had wound up in the hospital with a broken wing. It was her little brother that had attacked them the prior day out of anger. The Guard had come by earlier in the day asking if Anthony wanted to press charges against the young colt. He declined; the colt had enough problems without getting in more trouble. After running into Aiko, he’d learned his lesson. There’s no need for further torture. The Guard wasn’t too happy with the ‘show’ in the marketplace, but her action had fallen within the law; she had acted only in defense and hadn’t brought any weapons into Ponyville proper.
The intercom on Anthony’s desk came to life. “Sir, there’s somepony here to see you.” His receptionist stated.
Before he could respond, the door flew open and a mint-green unicorn ran in. “How does the human class system work?” Lyra blurted.
The two guards standing by the door had their pistols pointed at the floor, unsure if this new ‘guest’ posed a threat. They had orders from Avery, which probably originated with their protectee, to not shoot unless there was a proven threat or orders were given.
Anthony raised an open palm into the air. “Relax.” He said. “It’s ok, she’s a colleague.” As the two guards put their guns back into their holsters. “That needs to learn how to knock.” He said towards the excitable pony, who had the good manners to at least look embarrassed.
Anthony looked out his office towards the receptionist’s desk. As expected there was an orange pony waiting quietly. “Applejack, can you come in here please?”
The farmer walked calmly into the office, giving the other pony an admonishing look.
“I believe you had some questions for me Applejack? Once we settle those we can go get something to eat.” Anthony said
Lyra tilted her head. “What questions?” She inquired. “Hay, what about my question?”
“Applejack had an appointment.” Anthony informed her.
“Why couldn’t ya stop her from traumatizin’ that poor foal?” Applejack asked after a moment’s pause, not wanting to be rude, but having sensed some sort of problem.
Anthony had to stop for a moment to think. “Her job is to protect me. I don’t have any experience in protecting someone. I don’t know how far is too far or too little. But if I were to start questioning her, it might reduce her ability to act. Just like I can’t tell you how to buck apples” He informed the cowpony. And I would hear about it when we got home. “But he wasn’t exactly innocent. That foal came at us with a knife. It’s not like we are pressing charges.”
“Ahlright then, how’d you two meet? Y’all seem different. She’s so cold.”
Anthony laughed. “We met in high school.” He reminisced. “It was my senior year; she was a year younger and very cute. I decided to learn some Japanese thinking it would help.” He laughed again as he leaned back in his chair. “One day I asked her out on a date, in Japanese. She turned me down chuckling, she never did say why.”
Lyra had been waiting patiently while listening, piling up questions to ask. Upon hearing this she quirked her head though. Something wasn’t adding up.
“At the end of the year, I graduated and transferred to University, never expecting to see her again.” The Ambassador stated, still minorly laughing. “Two years later she bumped into me while I was headed to class. We talked about the weather for a minute and when I was heading off she asked me something I never expected to hear. She used the same cheesy pickup line on me that I had used in high school, saying how it had to be fate.”
He closed his eyes as memories of their time together in college ran through his mind. “We couldn’t spend as much time together as either of us wanted with my internship and tutoring and her ROTC training. We started dating on a regular basis and I fell in love with her. We got married before I graduated. I transferred to another University to work on my Masters and she finished her Bachelors. We lived in a small apartment halfway between our two schools. Somehow, I got a dream job translating in Japan after graduation and Aiko managed to get a transfer to a military base close to Tokyo.”
Lyra raised her hoof, trying to be more polite than when she entered. “She became a bachelor while married? That doesn’t make much sense. Aren’t bachelors unattached human males?” The anthropologist asked.
“A Bachelors and Masters are different types of degree. Advanced education. After high school you go to college for four years to get a Bachelors degree and an additional two years to get a Masters.” He informed her.
Anthony looked back at Applejack, her expression still unsure. “And she isn’t cold, just very focused. She’s known her whole life’s plan since she was little. She refined certain skills and ignored others. She’s actually very nice once you get to know her.” The Ambassador tried to reassure.
“This should help out a lot when I start studying human courting rituals. But that seems like a lot of time in school.” Lyra said shocked and trying to change the subject.. “That means you don’t finish school until you are 24 years old. Ponies finish by 17. And this was all just studying language?”
“No. Half of that is general stuff on science and history.” Anthony replied. “But I don’t think that’s how ‘courting’ typically works on Earth.”
“How does courting typically work with humans?” Lyra asked, speech speeding up. “How long does courtship last? Does each sex have specific roles it has to act out? How common are same-sex courtships? Do they differ? What about education? Does every human have to go through that much? Don’t you have apprenticeships? Isn’t there-“
“Whoa Nelly.” Applejack cut off the excited pony. “How ‘bout we can discuss this over food. This is in’trestin an all. But this here is one hungry pony. Can we finish this conversation over lunch?”
Anthony looked at the clock on his desk. 12:30 “Perhaps that would be best.” He chuckled and stood. “Where did you want to go Applejack?”
5/5/14 4pm Equestrian Territory, Earth
Rainbow Dash, a cyan blue pegasus with a mane that implied her namesake, sat on a lone cloud above the Equestrian Embassy. She was having to work at keeping the cloud together, the water particles wanted to separate from each other and it was only through effort could Rainbow keep her little perch together. Technically weather manipulation wasn’t to be performed on Earth, but nobody seemed to care so long as it was kept over this three mile area and was kept below the path of aircraft; something about not knowing the full effects of magic on technology and Earth weather occurring higher in the atmosphere than back in Equestria. It was also the only way Roseluck could work on her plants.
As she thought about the weather differences, Rainbow doubted that even she had the kind of control needed to keep clouds stable at Earth height and over such a small area, even without needing to move water into the atmosphere using pegasi tornados. Earth weather made no sense to the pegasus. Jet streams, warm fronts, cold fronts, freak storms, all without a hoof being lifted. They can’t work with their world. It tries to kill them and they try to kill it. Their aircraft made more sense than their weather, both of which she been reading about. If only Twi could make that speed conversion chart. How else can I know what the fastest thing on Earth is?
Rainbow Dash was on guard duty, watching for either humans or ponies where they weren’t supposed to be. She didn’t hesitate; nopony could ever say Rainbow Dash didn’t do her best. But it’s still sooooo boring. She incessantly complained to herself, after spending four hours watching dirt and ponies move about on their daily business, no other signs of life anywhere. She went back to playing with her cloud, the only thing she could do and still keep an eye out. Rainbow moved her wings and made the cloud move on a small circuit, seeing how minute it could be moved. It moved slowly and had to be pushed down, with its internal temperature being particularly finicky.
Her partner on a cloud a dozen feet away was looking in the opposite direction. Another pegasus, but an opal blue with amber mane. She had joined the Royal Guard shortly after information on humans was released to the public and putting her dream to join the Wonderbolts, the best fliers Equestria had to offer, on hold. Her recklessness had almost gotten her drummed out before even leaving basic.
“Anything on your side, Lightning Dust.” Rainbow asked, the monotony of doing the same thing every day was trying her patience.
“Still nothing.” Lightning said, exasperated. “After this you wanna get some training in?”
“Don’t we always?” Rainbow replied. “I’m gonna do a little flight recon and stretch my wings.”
“Roger. You have five minutes, make them count.” Lightning offered, they were supposed to check on the other watchclouds.
Rainbow gratefully lifted her wings and took off, careful to stay in their little area. Her speed was slower than back in Ponyville, her wings designed to work with ambient magic to provide lift. It felt good to move her wings, have the wind blow through her mane, to feel gravity lose its grip on her. She closed her eyes for a moment to enjoy the feel. When Rainbow opened them again, a small dot of movement became obvious. It being too large for a desert animal, she still had yet to see one, Rainbow swooped down to investigate.
The speck was heading towards Bridle Lake at a slow pace. Its brown coat blending in with the ground. The movement felt off to Rainbow Dash, she didn’t have a ton of experience watching them but humans moved faster than this and the movements weren’t hobbled indicating an injury. She looked around and saw no means of transportation for how the human could have gotten this far out into the desert.
Rainbow slowly swooped in to get a better view. Upon closer inspection, the coat was designed to look like dirt. This felt very wrong to Rainbow, this was camouflage. “What are you doing out here?” She calls, ready to bank away at a moment’s notice.
The face turns towards Rainbow, clearly male with a long beard. His right arm comes up holding a metal L and points it at her. “Get off our planet!” He spat, “You don’t belong here.” The man then proceeded to fire wildly at the pegasus.
Rainbow turned as quickly as she could, throwing in a corkscrew and some of her other tricks to throw off his aim. The shots were loud, and that clearly wasn’t a pistol. All ponies were warned about guns and the various types, that was a rifle, an automatic rifle. A machine designed to kill quickly and without precision. Rainbow saw a light blue heading towards her.
“What’s going on?” Lightning yelled.
“It’s an attack.” Rainbow yelled back, the air making it harder for the two pegasi to hear each other, but pegasi were adapted to high speeds. “He has a gun. I’ll stall him, you get help.” Rainbow replied and banked back towards the human who was going at a dead run.
The human wasn’t looking towards the sky; obviously not used to threats from above. The human was almost directly below her. Rainbow dove straight down, letting him gain a little ground. She pulled up a few feet above the ground, forehooves stretched out before her and smacked the human square into his back.
The human went into a roll and came back up onto his feet. He tried to turn and fire at his attacker but she was already back in the sky. The human’s coat had gotten moved in his tumble to reveal a thick shirt covering his body and a small metal tube in his left hand. The tube had a small red button on one end and a cable going from the other and into his shirt.
Rainbow had no idea what the little tube could be, and didn’t care. Nobody tries to hurt my friends! She screamed inside her head, flying back at the human as fast as her wings could push. A siren began to sound from the Embassy, alerting all the guards of trouble. Only a minute had passed, but it still took too long. There was only a hundred feet separating the human from the village; too close for Rainbow to let up now. The human pointed his gun at the approaching pegasus and opened fire. Only a handful of rounds came out before the magazine clicked empty. He dropped the rifle, having no way to reload it quickly. The human looked around, a saddened expression caught his face; they were completely alone.
With Rainbow closing in faster than he had expected, the human pushed the little red button in his left hand.
Rainbow Dash saw the motion, but she had no idea what it could be. She wouldn’t let up though. A split second later she saw the bright flash of an explosion. The human had tried getting close enough to the village to get as many ponies as possible in the blast. His shirt was filled with homemade explosives and nails for maximum damage. The polychromatic pony closed her eyes out of reflex at the blinding light and hit a solid wall of energy.
5/4/14 4:00pm Portal Research Room, Earth
Twilight had returned to the portal room, now that the humans liked to take the weekends off. It gave her the perfect opportunity to look at the step. She had written a small letter explaining the odd communications blackout but there was no proof yet as to how it could have happened.
She walked up to the step that made travel between the two worlds easier and began to probe it with her magic. A maze of wires and machines that snaked through the step became visible. She traced the large amounts of energy that coursed through the step. It had an incredible amount of power that felt like a small sun. The energy was used to power something in the step as she began tracing its routes. Is it going…IT IS! Twilight stepped backwards, eyes wide and ears raised. The wires are going into the portal! But is it connected to something or is it powering the portal in some way? As her magic traveled the length of the wires it eventually hit the portal and fizzled out.
A loud noise caused Twilight to stop dead as she exited the portal building; the attack siren. It was based off of old warning sounds, designed to inform everypony, the sound escalated into a deafening high-pitched roar. Rainbow!!!
Without a moment’s thought and a flash of light, Twilight vanished. She reappeared several hundred feet away, right under Rainbow Dash’s cloud. Before she could start looking for her friend the sound of gunshots reached her ears. Twilight saw her friend flying towards a piece of dirt topped with black, a human. And both of them were too far away for Twilight’s normal spells; especially without knowing what the human had on it.
Twilight teleported closer to the fray; ready to assist. Just as she appeared, the purple pony saw the human push a button on a small metal tube. She had no time to think and no time to act before the chain reaction started. She couldn’t have teleported, one of the few spells she could have pulled off without thinking, but with the speed Rainbow was moving it would have taken too much effort. Twilight’s magic acted on its own, casting a shield spell. Twilight could only cast one shield and the human was too close to enclose both her and Rainbow.