Romi
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Urg, my head... Why is everything so bright?
I could barely make anything out, it was so white. It just kinda hurt to look. My ears were ringing, too, and my mouth was pasty dry. It was cold, really cold.
The light didn't really have any sort of source I could make out. It was just kinda blinding. Even with my eyes closed I could still barely take it. And yet, I was shivering from the lack of warmth. It felt so backwards.
But then it wasn't so bright anymore. A shadow separated me from the blazing light. I squinted and realized I was looking up at something resembling a head. It was tough to make out, but it had short, bobbed hair and large ears sticking up from the top, similar to a fox or a cat. The face was much too rounded to be a cat, though.
"O-oh my," it said. It had a very feminine voice, jubilant but still caring. I couldn't help but think back to some of the more stereotypical anime I'd seen on YouTube, where there was some girl who was unrealistically naive but still tried to do her best at whatever she did.
"Are you...? Y-you can't be..." the voice continued. Whoever she was (I was assuming it was a she based on her voice), she was confused by something. And since she was standing over me, I had to guess I was the problem.
"Ugh..." I managed past my unnaturally dry lips. Why was I so thirsty? And ache-y? And sensitive to light?
And... Where was I?
"Oh, are you hurt? Do you need anything, sir?" Sir? Was she talking to me? 'Sir' is not something I'd ever been called before, but between the odd situation and unpleasant sensations I was experiencing, that line of thought didn't continue for long.
"Where... am I?" I asked, squinting and still trying to make something of the silhouette. She... I don't know, was... familiar...
"On the Home Screen. You can go anywhere else from here. Is there anywhere you'd like to go?" she added, cheerful but clearly worried. She had a Flight Attendant-like attitude, happy and reassuring yet still also conveying whatever other emotions she was trying to get across. In this case, care and worry.
I had no idea about what she meant by what she just said. "Is there someplace less... Bright?" I tried. I just kinda wanted to see at this point.
"Of course! One sec, please," she said. An odd response, but I guess it made since, kinda. Not that much else she'd said had.
The shadow disappeared from above me and I could feel my body getting pulled up and onto something. This something was furry, in a fluffy kind of way, and I was placed on top of it lengthwise, two limbs hanging off of each side and my head laid sideways on, urg, something. I just couldn't see what.
But whatever this was, it was comfortable. And warm.
I could feel an upward push and a gain of altitude, although the light still prevented me from deciphering how high, or even what was carrying me. I think I heard flapping as well, but I was too, well, in sensory shock to think much about it.
Not much time passed until something amazing happened. The lights disappeared, quite suddenly. There wasn't much of a transition, but I did now feel a slow, descending feeling.
I blinked my eyes open to an odd sight. There were thin blue veins in strange, perfect lines. Each one was pulsating downwards at its own pace, some faster then the others. The wall itself was a dark shade of blue and didn't stand out much compared to the amazing lines of shining... well, lighter blue.
I felt a thump as whatever I was on touched the ground. I was carefully moved off of some kind of raised platform and softly shrugged onto what I could make out as a dark blue and metallic floor. The heat leaving my chest made me shiver again.
"Um, sir? Are you okay?" asked the voice again.
I looked up, because I could now, and saw that the voice had belonged to, well, a pony. Not the realistic petting zoo pony, but a cartoon pony, the kind you'd see if you watched My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic. This one, however, was never introduced in the show itself. It was still a pony I know well, though, because I click on her at least 20 times daily.
It was the Chrome pony.
Her fur was pure white and radiant. Her mane was short, bobbed, and sporting a light blue color also matched by her medium-length tail. She wore a Chrome icon hair pin and Chrome cutie mark. Her wings, as she was a pegasus, consisted of three large and thick feathers that came together at a white-feathered joint. On each wing, the feather closest to the head was red, the one closest to the tail was green, and the one in the middle was yellow. Her eyes were looking into mine; they were hard to miss, actually, as each was an ice blue, more complex then her mane's blue but still similar in shade.
She noticed my shivering and, embarrassingly enough for me, hurriedly jumped behind me and laid next to my sideways form. Her front hooves curled around my neck, and I could feel myself blush a bit. But she was warm, and I guess I can see her logic behind her action. I just, uh, don't think she knew you can't just snuggle with people.
I reached up to try to move her hoof away and explain I was fine, but as my limb entered my sight, I realized something was wrong. Where my hand should be, there was a hoof. I looked down, trying to ignore the other pony hugging me, and saw that I wasn't human, like I should've been. I, too, was a pony.
"I... B-but..." Too much information to take in! Lucky for me, it all fell under one question.
"What is going on here?"
It was hard to be mad when you're lying on the floor with someone, or, I guess, somepony. Especially when she was trying to 'keep me warm'. But I did my best. Although my headache didn't make anything better.
"I can answer that question," said the pony behind me. "We're inside an Apple iOperatingSystem, installed onto the hardware Apple iPod 4G. And you... You aren't a program, aren't you?"
Okay then, this is a dream.
"Woah woah woah, slow down," I said, shaking myself from her embrace and trying to get on my feet- uh, hooves. "We're where?"
The Chrome pony stood up. "We're inside an Apple iOperatingSystem, installed onto the hardwa-"
"I got that part," I grunted. My hooves decided not to work right, and I fell flat on my face with my back legs buckled but still supporting my other end. Overall, I looked very silly. "But I'm inside the software?"
"You are," the Chrome pony giggled as she watched me try to get my footing. Or maybe hoofing? "My search engine can't find any similar stories with keywords "inside software" besides a numerous amount of sources referencing "Tron". May I ask what you last remember? Maybe that can give you an idea as to how this happened."
I was standing now, wobbly but up right. "Um, I... I was using the Chrome app to view Soundcloud, and I had my headphones in. It had been a long day, and I was in my pajamas. It was late, and there was a storm outside. My iPod was plugged into the wall... I think."
"Hmm..." the Chrome pony thought, scratching her roundish chin. After a few moments, her face lit up, and she looked at me. "Using this data, and suspending certain things that would seem impossible," she began, "I think you fell asleep. Perhaps lightning struck your house or a nearby power cable and sent an electrical shock through the system, blazing through your iPod and shocking through your headphones. That, possibly, could have created a consciousness bridge from your brain to the device. You might be connected right now using that very method!"
I stated at this pony, completely bewildered. Yeah, definitely a dream. "Uh..."
"I'm sorry, but that's the only explanation I can come up with." She sighed. "But the truth of the matter is that you're here now! ’Hows' can be computed later."
She walked in a circle around me. I felt really uncomfortable being examined like that. "Goodness, you really are a user! I have file browsing functionalities, but even using that I can see your programming is just an .exe file. Normally, this OS couldn't run .exe, but that would be if you were actually a program, wouldn't it?" She stopped in front of me and beamed. "Hello, user, my name is Chrome, but some programs here call me Romi for short. I think it sounds cuter, don't you?"
"Uh, yeah," I said. She giggled.
"Welcome to your device. I can't wait to show you around! Oh, you do want to be shown around, right?"
"Give me a second," I asked of her. "I have a few questions first."
"Sure, fire away!" she grinned back. She looked so happy to help me, and it wasn't creepy happy either. She honestly wanted to make my day easier. I guess it was in her programming, but all the same, it was reassuring.
"Why are you a pony? And why am I a pony, too?" I asked.
"All programs here look or resemble the icon that is attached to them," she explained. "It's the only graphical guideline we have attached to our coding. The programs here resemble ponies because you modified our icons to a pony-like representation of the original logos. Eventually, the rest of the programs took on pony-like forms, too, even without a change in icon. Every program here, including you, is going to look and move like a pony. You've customized us this way."
It was true, I had figured out a way to change icons on an iPod. I could have never guessed it'd change the program's body itself. Or maybe it was dream logic, I don't know.
Romi sat down and looked to her right before smiling at me again. "Uh, not to interrupt, but can I ask a question, too?"
She actually looked kinda adorable smiling up at me like that. I tried to imitate her sitting, to a certain degree of success. "Sure, go ahead."
"I know a lot about you. I was designed to get you, to recommend for you, and to do everything as best suited for you as I can. So I understand your personality very well. But I honestly can't say I know about you as a person. Your history, your stories. Do you mind telling me about what it's like in the Users' world? What you think and feel about it?"
"E-everything?" I asked. That was kind of a broad topic. Everything I do, have done, and planned to do?
"Anything, anything at all, please." She was so... Urg, I don't really have a word for it. Passionate? She was really passionate about me- or, rather, the tales I could tell her. She continued, "I've seen pictures and read stories about it, but I've never been, and I wanna know what its like. I wanna see what you've seen, through... Through your eyes." Was she... Blushing? Was that even possible? More dream logic, perhaps?
I took in my surroundings. It was cold, dark and blue, and rather soundless. The lines of what I guess were data pulsed and pushed from above us, where a white light seemed to glow.
"Well, it's not cold," I began. "There's something like that light above us called the sun that gives heat and light to the world."
She closed her eyes and smiled lazily. It was actually really cute, I found myself realizing. Which was weird, because she was apparently my web browser.
"There are tons of colors, and lots of other people. For the most part, they have their own computers, too." I didn't really know what more to describe, if she had already seen it all.
"Wind, could you describe wind for me?" she asked.
"Wind... It's kind of... It cools you off, it can push and pull, but it's not really like it's there. It's gentle, and if there are trees around, you can hear it coming." I racked my brains trying to think of other words.
"And what's water like?" she asked eagerly. I had questions, too, and I really wanted to ask them, but I couldn't seem to say no to her.
"...Smooth, wet, transparent, and... refreshing. It's kinda like... well, it feels like it's a loose solid, not sturdy but, uh, not not there."
"Do you like swimming? What's it like?" she pleaded. Once again, her eagerness couldn't be ignored by me, and I went on to explain a numerous amount of things. My own questions kept piling up, but I held them back to answer hers to the best of my ability.
Discreetly, I was testing if this was a dream. I had taken a mini-lesson on dreams from my Language Arts teacher as an attachment to a story we had read, so I knew that certain things about dreams were off compared to reality. All of my senses were working, so that wasn't reassuring. The conversation stayed completely on topic, even when I thought random things in my head. The room never changed at all, even though it was very detailed.
Doubt began to creep in. Could this... not be a dream?
"Oh, that is so cool! I've noticed the change in IP periodically, but I never knew you went on vacation!" She was giggling the kind of way friends do when they talk, even though nothing was very funny. I was, too.
"Yeah, it's really neat! A great way to recharge your batteries," I beamed back. Honestly, I liked this pony. That made sense, as she was (as I was beginning to come to terms with) my web browser. But she got all my jokes, knew exactly what I was talking about when I said something, and laughed at all the perfect times.
I began to think about stuff, as this whole Tron-ish thing being legit became more and more of a fact in my mind. I used Chrome more everyday then I did basically anything else. She was already like my best friend, even if we'd never met before.
"I didn't know you yodeled!" we both finished the joke at the same time and burst out laughing, neither of us keeping our balance and falling onto the floor in fits. It was only when our giggles subsided that I realized her head was on my chest, looking up at me. We both blushed, and I looked up back at the light above us.
But she didn't move.
I looked down to see her smiling with her eyes closed. She sighed, and my pony face blew up with red. I probably hadn't blushed so hard before in my entire life. Then again, I've never... connected to anyone else before, not like this.
"Ooh!" She shot up and to an archway leading out of the room we were in. "Do you want a tour, user?" She spread her wings out, priming them for take-off.
"Oh, yeah, sure," I got out. I stood up, too, and trotted my way over to Romi. I'll admit, being a pony is cool. Once you get comfortable with it, it's actually a lot more stable (no pun intended) then just two legs. Now more comfortable with the way it felt to be a quad pedal, I could sense the better balance. It was weird to not have fingers and such, but compared to everything else that was happening, I can't say it was the weirdest feeling I'd had that day.
I trotted through the archway and she took off behind me. Every step seemed to echo a clip-clop sound. The air was still cold and my head still kinda hurt, but now that my eyes were working, I was completely stunned.
An expansive city of tall and oddly-shaped skyscrapers covered the whole of the area I could see. Certain ones were tall enough to breach the layer of dark-blue cloud-like stuff that covered it all. I looked at every blue structure in awe from the high balcony I was standing on. It seemed like the tower it was attached to was the biggest one, and was much thicker at the point where it breached the clouds then the others.
A staircase wound around the tower, and I trotted down it. Despite the height, it took barely any time at all to get down to street level.
My eyes were wide with shock. Pegasi, unicorns, and earth ponies (most of which were white, black, and blue) ran about the street, seemingly all of which were carrying boxish saddle bags that had crosses of blue data lines. Realization struck that these were programs carrying data from one place to the next, the mailmares and mailcolts of the digital city. Who knows what kind of code those packages held.
Romi landed next to me and smiled. "The tallest towers you saw were the programs that could contact you when you weren't using them," she explained. "The ones you allow notifications for."
"Wow," I thought. "That's crazy."
"It's all about perspective," Romi grinned. She then trotted off down the street, with me in tow.
"What do you want to see first?" she asked, turning her head to look at me.
"I-I don't know," I laughed sheepishly.
"Then we'll do it alphabetically!" the Chrome pony exclaimed excitedly before grabbing my hoof and tugging me down the road faster then we had been before.
And so we did. She took me to all of the app's headquarters (minus her own) and showed me how they worked differently, which had the most programs, ect. We saw the Facebook app's earth ponies, the Safari app's unicorns and the E-mail app's pegasi. Each app had its own head pony, and these ponies recognized me immediately, unlike the lower-grade programs. They were all very nice and respectful, and if I had given them a pony icon, they looked just like the little picture did. If not, like Safari pony, then they still looked very much like a pony version of their app should look like.
Eventually, we had seen every major app's building, from the App Store to Voxer, all but one. There was so much left to explore, I could tell, but somehow I knew Romi was too excited to hold it off any longer.
We were going to the Chrome App building.
As we entered through the sliding glass doors, Romi smiled with an air of authority; this was her domain, I could tell, and she was proud of it. The main room was large, with rounded balconies going along the second, third, fourth, and so on floors. Looking up through the building made me dizzy, so instead I looked at the decor. It was all very modern, and most of it was white with light blue lines. It took me a second, but I realized that the lines acted as illumination and decoration all at once.
Romi trotted up to the front desk to a smiling receptionist pony who had light-blue fur and a white mane. All of the smaller programs seemed to match a reversed color scheme of their boss, but they all shared the same cutie mark.
"Please call an elevator," Romi grinned. The receptionist pony nodded and hit a switch. To our right, a modern-looking, glass wall elevator descended to the first floor. Its doors opened and Romi led me in. Her hoof tapped a button on the right side of the elevator and, after the doors shut, we both began to rise through the building.
It was amazing. Every app had an unbelievable amount of workers, but Romi had at least an army of programs on each level. And the floors just kept coming. Most of them weren't that busy, though, and were either talking with other programs, taking a nap, or messing around with glass panels that were floating next to them.
Romi could see my confusion. "Each floor works on one tab of your browser," she said. "We spread out the work, but as we have 101 floors, most of the time not every program is working."
"Why 101?" I asked.
"The first floor, 99 floors for tabs, and one for my office," she smiled.
The elevator continued upward. They seemed horribly over-staffed, but by the looks of it I wouldn't have a problem when it came to tab number.
The 101st floor came quickly, and we stepped into Romi's... office? It was more of a rec room then an office, although I did see a few shelves stacked with files and folders. There was a comfy looking couch, a kitchenette, a big TV, and a coffee table. The room was a mixture of blue, yellow, red, green, and white, the colors popping up in very creative and eye-catching ways. Romi seemed to blend in perfectly.
The white pegasus pulled me across the sproing-y carpet of the room and sat me down on the fluffy couch, quickly taking a seat next to me. We sat in the traditional pony way, flanks on the ground and front hooves keeping our heads and chests held up, which was odd to do on a couch but surprisingly not uncomfortable. "What do you think, user? Is this place cool?"
"This place is beyond cool!" I smiled. "Your building, the other apps' buildings, the city itself, and the fact this is all inside my iPod... It's crazy."
"We all do it for you, you know," she said. I'd honestly never felt so honored. A modest blush crept its way onto my face
"Heh, the only bad thing is how cold it always seems to be," I shrugged.
Romi smiled. "That's an easy fix."
My eyes went wide in shock and I turned my head, but she had already started. Her whole upper body leaned in, and her front hooves wrapped around my torso. Her head was laying against the arm side of my shoulder, and I could see she had kicked her back hooves so they both rested one on top of the other on the side farthest from me. She was hugging and leaning on me, efficiently covering me with a lot of her body. I looked away to hide my quickly reddening cheeks.
I won't lie, it was warm. And I had been cold.
Situations like these never had presented themselves to me before. I wanted to tell her no, tell her I was fine, but all I did was sit there and blush. I could feel her breathing on my fur (which I'll admit felt weird, considering I had never had fur before, but by no means bad), and every few seconds I'd notice she'd lent even closer onto my side.
This was too much. She was pretty, she was nice, she honestly liked me, and she was hugging me in a not-just-a-friend way. I knew I couldn't let myself look at her. I'd fall for her, if I hadn't already.
But then she had happily sighed.
And I couldn't help it.
I turned my head to face her, not too quickly, but not too slowly either. She noticed my movement and glanced up at me. Her fur was somehow a more beautiful white and her mane was slightly messy. Her wings were outstretched, showing off each of her feathers. And her eyes... They were looking up at me, and now that they had me, I couldn't turn away. Each was a pool of pure blue, a beautiful and deep blue that I couldn't get enough of. Her expression was one of complete care and trust, and I noticed she was blushing, too.
She grinned, ever so slightly, and I was gone.
Slowly, carefully, I returned the hug, sliding my hooves under hers and also moving my back legs behind me. My head naturally rolled over hers, and we both found our chins resting on the other's shoulders. She hugged me even tighter, and I hugged her back.
"I-I was made for you, to be everything you need; you made me who I am," she said, her voice cautious. She pulled her head back, and so did I, so now we could see each others' face. Her's was curious, a bit confused, and blushing.
A question escaped her lips. "Is that why... I'm so attracted to you?"
We were both getting closer to each other. I didn't know what I was doing, but it felt so right, even if it made no sense. But at that moment, I didn't wonder what I was doing, or why I was doing it.
I just did.
I kissed her.
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The alarm was always way too loud. I guess that was the point, but I don't think it's meant to wake up your neighbors, too.
I hit the button that shut off the infernal noise and stretched my arms up above me, cracking my knuckles. Realizing I felt a tug from my ears, I reached up and pulled off my ear buds. They gave me a bit of a shock as I took them off, but I didn't think much of it.
Until I remembered why.
Eyes wide, the whole adventure came rushing back to me. Every part of it, from the bright light, to the being a pony, to the city, to Romi's-
Oh my god, Romi.
I grabbed my iPod. How would I do this? Thinking off the top of my head, I opened my Chrome app and tapped the address bar.
I blushed a bit at the memory. What do I say? I tapped the letter keys until my message was spelled out:
I remember.
Daringly, I hit go. I held my breath as the webpage loaded, but sighed in disappointment when the generic Google search screen popped up. I checked the web pages, but there wasn't anything there, either.
Disappointed, I hit the home button. Maybe it had been a dream? But it was so real. And you can't just fall in love with a girl from a dream. Not like this.
I was about to get out of bed when I saw something was off. There was a new app, right there on the screen. I'd never seen it before, and there was no way I'd forget a new app download.
I got a closer look at the app. It was a black icon, and on it was... my Ponysona? Pony me was sitting, facing real me, and smiling. Curious, I checked the app name.
User.exe
My heart exploded when I read the title. It hadn't been a dream! It was really real! Romi and the city and... Well, honestly, I couldn't stop thinking about Romi. She was really there! And she... She really...
It was so weird. I wanted to find her again. I... I wanted to hold her again. She was a program, but I still liked her. A lot. And as I held my iPod in my hand, I didn't feel like that was weird. I felt... warm. And that was reassuring.
I clicked on the app. A message popped up, saying that the user must be asleep with the ear buds in. I was half-tempted to do that just now, completely blow off work and just get back to where I was, if it even worked. But I made myself put it off until tonight.
I would see her that night... And... I don't know... We could do whatever. Have a pizza, watch a movie, do whatever programs do.
I don't think I was more excited for anything else in my life.