Friendship is Revolution

by ultiville

Social (In)security

"Awright Twi," Rainbow calls from the bathroom, towel still covering her newly-showered mane, "You ready to check out all the awesome things here? I want to see if I can afford a tablet like this!"

"Rainbow," Twilight frowns, "how can you afford anything? You don't even have a job."

"Well," Rainbow's face falls and her ears flatten, "I sorta was hoping you'd loan me a bit. You know, I'm sure their weather team will need someone as great as I am. I just need to find the office."

"They don't have weather teams."

"Horsefeathers."

"It's ok," Twilight smiles, "I'll still share. But I don't really know how expensive anything is. I have nine hundred and eighty-three dollars and forty-seven cents from the shifts I've done so far. We'll just have to see how far it goes. My priority is to try to get us phones though, and some kind of saddlebags."

"I can't really argue with that," Rainbow says. "It'd be lame to have cool stuff and nowhere to carry it. And those phones do sound really useful."

The two mares hurry down the stairs, out the bar's employee exit, and through the alleyway on to the street proper. As soon as they emerge, all the nearby pedestrians stop for a moment.

"What's with them?" Rainbow whispers to Twilight. A moment later, they start walking again, not meeting the ponies' eyes.

"Ignore it," Twilight whispers back, "remember, they've never seen an intelligent creature that isn't a human before. We're lucky they aren't all hiding inside like everypony used to do with Zecora, or worse."

Rainbow shakes her head. "Well why don't we fly, then? This is gonna be weird."

"I remember how many times you've run into the library," Twilight says, "and a lot of those wires carry a whole lot of electricity. I know ponies can take that sort of thing, but I'd rather not risk it. And at least now they're not hostile. I don't want to trust their good will if we take out half the city's energy by getting tangled up in the power lines."

"You worry too much," Rainbow keeps trotting, despite her words.

"You might be right, but let's take it a bit slow, okay? I know you want to fly, but let's start with some practice from the roof after shopping, so we'll be above the power lines."

Rainbow rolls her eyes, but doesn't argue, and they walk on. Soon they see Harvard Square ahead of them. Though the university borders it, the main draw of of the Square these days are the many shops, as well as the subway station; it's become something like an outdoor mall, complete with the crowds of shoppers.

"Wow," Rainbow says, "that's a whole lot of people. Are there even that many ponies in all of Ponyville?"

"Probably more than this," Twilight says, "but not a lot more. There are a lot more humans than ponies."

"No kidding."

Despite their heads being level with the average human's chest, the brightly-colored ponies have no trouble navigating the crowd. Indeed, the groups of humans part for them wherever they go, whispering and staring, even as they keep about their business.

"Not a very friendly lot, are they?" Rainbow whispers.

"Annie-Jane warned me about this," Twilight says, "humans take the idea of being strangers really seriously, at least around here. They mostly think it's rude to accost someone on the street. I don't think it means they're upset at us."

"Should we introduce ourselves?"

"Every few steps? I think we'd best just leave it be. If they're rude to us in when we have business with them, then we'll worry."

At least they move quickly through the skittish crowd, and soon they walk into the futuristic-looking interior of the Verizon store. Again all the humans stop and stare as they enter. Rainbow ignores it and eagerly goes to look at the tablet display. A few moments later Twilight follows, and the humans return to their own conversations, except for a nervous-looking young man in a store employee shirt, who walks over next to the two mares.

"Hello, uh..." he pauses, seemingly considering which collective noun to use before giving it up as a bad job and just forging on, "can I help you with anything?"

"Oh," Twilight says, "yes, please! We are hoping to get phones, and maybe other things." Her eyes dart over the prices. "Though it looks like just phones will be about all we can afford."

"Well," the employee says, "the phones are a lot cheaper if you get them as part of a new contract. You, uh, you're the one I heard about on the news, right? So this would be your first phone?"

"That's right," Twilight says.

"Are you sure you can, uh, use them? The buttons aren't really made for...those," he gestures to her hooves.

"I'll be fine," Twilight says, and uses her magic to play with the display tablet a bit.

"I'll probably get one of these," Rainbow says, picking up a stylus in her mouth.

"You can keep that one," the saleshuman looks at the drool-coated stylus before continuing. "Anyway, you pay for the phone, but you also have to pay for using it. You can pay as you go, but then you have to buy the whole phone, or you can agree to get a monthly plan through us..."

Rainbow's eyes glaze over as the young man explains the intricacies of telephone contracts to Twilight, who of course understands perfectly what he's saying, though her eye twitches a bit at the complexity of it all.

"This seems way too complicated," she says, "but we're planning to have the phones for the foreseeable future, so I suppose we'll have contracts."

She browses the many options (including side-tracks to figure out things like what texting even means) and finally settles on a family plan. Unfortunately, as she begins filling out the contract, a problem arises.

"What's a social security number?"

The employee sighs, and starts another explanation.

"Well that was a waste," Twilight says as she walks over next to Rainbow, now playing with one of the display tablets in boredom. "Because the federal government hasn't decided our status yet, we don't have some identification number we need to get a phone contract."

"Wait, so we can't get any of this stuff at all?"

"No," Twilight sighs, "we just have to pay a lot more for the phones, so we can't get anything else."

"Wow, that's lame," Rainbow says, "I bet if I got photos of us hanging out in the city, I'd get the likes up to six digits. Bigger numbers are always more awesome. What a waste."

"Yeah, I agree," Twilight says, looking downcast. "Well, come look at what kind of phone--"

She's cut off as another human, an older woman, walks close. Her name tag identifies her as a manager.

"Excuse me," she says, "did you say you got thousands of likes? Do you mean on Facebook?"

"Yeah! All you humans love my pictures," Rainbow says, thrusting out her chest and standing proudly tall.

"What's your name?" The manager pulls out her phone as she asks.

"Rainbow Dash! Fastest pegasus in the world! Well, also in worlds where there are other pegasi."

The human looks at her phone for a few minutes, moving her fingers on the screen, then she looks up and smiles.

"I think we can make a deal, Ms. Dash...."

Twenty minutes and several photos (carefully location tagged) later, Twilight finds herself carrying a large bag out of the store, filled with more or less everything Dash asked for.

"See," the pegasus smirks, "I told you having fans was awesome."

---

The rest of the excursion meets with mixed success.

"Argh," Twilight laments on the way back to the bar, "this world seems like it just wants to spite me sometimes!"

Her attempt to get a bank account had failed, due once more to the lack of official US citizenship and accompanying social security number. Similarly, none of the clothing stores she'd stopped at had anything that could possibly fit on a pony, and she'd been perplexed to find that personal tailoring became a luxury good sometime during the Industrial Revolution. So both ponies remain naked, though only Twilight seems to mind.

They do sport saddlebags, though. Twilight finally found them at a sporting goods store. Though they're intended for bicycles, they've combined them with some rock climbing webbing and achieved a passable result, if one that Rainbow won't be able to get on without Twilight's help. Still, Twilight's glad that at least some of the outing was successful, and that they now have phones and bags, her highest priorities. So she has a little smile as they trot into the alley towards the bar's back entrance.

It fades as she sees a human man leaning against the bar wall next to the door. He's dressed in an immaculate gray suit, and is wearing fancy bluetooth earpiece, though neither pony recognizes it for what it is.

"Twilight Sparkle," he says. His voice is flat, like he's stating the world's most boring fact.

"Yes?"

"Who's your friend?"

"Rainbow Dash."

"Fastest pegasus ever!" Dash breaks in. The human just nods.

"Is she like you?"

"She's a pony, if that's what you mean."

"Is she a machine?"

"No, she's a living pony. Who are you?"

"You can call me Mr. Gray," he says. "I'm here on behalf of office of the President." He displays an official-looking ID. Twilight examines it closely, but of course has no idea if it's authentic.

"Oh good," she says, "are you here to give us social security numbers? Not having one is a real pain."

"Perhaps," he says. "Congress is currently discussing the citizenship status of intelligent nonhumans. If they decide to grant it, you'll be able to get numbers."

"And if they don't?" Twilight asks.

"Then you'll be deported. Unless Homeland Security decides you're threats to national security."

"If you can deport us to Equestria," Twilight says, "please go ahead. Otherwise, where would you send us?"

Mr. Gray shrugs. "Not my department."

"So if they don't know yet," Dash says, "why are you here?"

He looks at the back of his hand. "I've been instructed to offer you a deal. It's come to our attention that you have some extraordinary abilities, Ms. Sparkle. It seems you believe you do as well, Ms. Dash. If you've read about current events, you know our government is engaged in a campaign against international terrorists. We'd like your help."

"Oh, you have no idea," Dash crows," we're the best at this sort of thing. Celestia calls us all the time to take care of stuff!"

"Hold on, Rainbow," Twilight says, frowning. "Mr. Gray, I am aware of current events, and this is a divisive issue here. Indefinite detentions, wars justified by deeply questionable information, the whole drone controversy...I trust Celestia to tell me the truth about threats to Equestria, and to never end a life if she can possibly avoid it. I don't think I trust you to do either of those."

"You haven't heard what I'm offering yet."

"I don't think it matters," Twilight says, "my objection to being a hired killer isn't based on the pay."

"The vote on the citizenship issue is in two days," Mr. Gray says, "and it's looking pretty close. The President supports it, of course, but that means the Republicans don't, even if half their evangelical wing weren't calling you the spawn of either the devil or man's hubris. There's also talk that it might require a constitutional amendment, and if that's the decision, that would be even harder to pass. The President supports equal rights as a matter of justice and personal conviction. But as a matter of political reality, his administration and and congressional allies might support it with more or less enthusiasm. Not to mention the other kinds of attention - journalists, fans, protesters - we've been working to keep safely away. You already benefit a great deal from our friendship, Ms. Sparkle. Be careful before you throw it away."

"Wait," Rainbow glares at him. "you're threatening to kick us out of the country if we don't help you hunt down your enemies?"

"I'm explaining political reality, Ms. Dash. And I think Homeland Security will be much more suspicious of you if you don't want to help us fight terrorism."

"Mr. Gray," Twilight says firmly, "this behavior doesn't do anything to put my fears to rest. Trying to bully us into being your thugs is repulsive."

"Politics isn't pretty, 'Princess'," Mr. Gray almost spits this last word, the first emotion he's shown in the whole conversation, "at least not here, outside magical cartoon land. And as happy as you are with Celestia, she's a mother stand-in, in a show for children. Here, we can't keep everyone safe with rainbows and deus-ex-machina accessories." He begins walking out of the alley, but places a business card in Twilight's saddlebag as he passes.

"Give me a call if you change your mind," he says over his shoulder, "but I wouldn't suggest waiting long. The wheels of politics wait for no man. Or mare."

"Huh," Rainbow says, "he was pretty specific about the rainbows and jewelry. Seems like he watched the show."

"Probably just research," Twilight sighs. "I'm less fond of it when someone else is researching me."

"Twi'," Rainbow says, voice lower, "what are we going to do? I don't want to work for that jerk, but how can we live in this world if their whole government turns against us?"

Twilight levitates the business card out of her bag and idly stares at it. It's gray, of course, and completely blank, save for a phone number printed in small black letters in the center. "I think," she says slowly, "it's time you met Alanna."

Comments

[CCC]

Well, this is an interesting story so far.

It leaves a few questions; how did Twilight end up in that robot's body to start with? What bought Rainbow there, and can other ponies be bough through in the same way? Is there even an Equestria that they came from, or are their memories formed out of the episodes Lasombra put into Twilight's head?

When Twilight does to sleep holding a Rainbow Dash doll, she ends up with Rainbow Dash - what happens if she goes to sleep holding (say) a Buzz Lightyear toy? Does she wake up with a disorientated spaceman? (Might be dangerous - he comes with an arm laser. A barbie doll might be safer. Probably best not to try letting her sleep with a teddy bear...).