“Gloaming, do I owe you anything for the medical treatment?” I asked. “I don’t know how your health care system is organised.”
“The clinic is financed by the government, so you don’t have to pay.” Gloaming turned to me. “I also said that you are my guest, because the government doesn’t want to provide free medicine for people from other countries. They make exceptions for guests of ponies, for example, and for emergencies that happen on our territory.”
“I see, thank you for that.”
Then I realised I didn’t know much about their government. “And how is your government organised?” I asked. “For example, is this clinic a government organisation?”
“That topic is very broad, so I will give you a summary.” Gloaming slowly inhaled. “Basically we have several institutes, which are coordinated by ministers. Two queens advise the ministers and their institutes if needed. The queens also command the military forces.”
Gloaming paused for a moment, possibly waiting for a question.
“Regarding this clinic, it is financed by the Institute of Medicine,” she said. “And its doctors follow the guidelines from the Institute—for convenience sake all government organisations are called institutes. For example, city guards are members of the Institute of Defence.”
We reached the library and Gloaming led us inside.
“Do you have big taxes, to support the government?” I asked, when we sat around the table.
“Taxes?” Gloaming looked at me, then got some book from the nearest shelf. After quick looking through she said, “Well, other countries have taxes, but we don't.”
“But how are the institutes financed?”
“I think the government as a whole is self sufficient” Gloaming said, putting a new book on the table.
“Yes, I helped my little sister learn about it recently,” Curiosity said. “Several institutes, like the Institute of Medicine, generate enough income to share with the others.”
“That must be nice,” I said. “I have to file taxes for my singing career, and there is too much paperwork.”
Gloaming nodded and checked the journal for received messages, but there was nothing. Maybe my parents hadn’t gotten it yet.
“By the way, don't you have a cat, Curiosity?” I turned to her, as a stray thought came to me.
“Why, I do have one,” she said. “A big white one. How did you know?”
She mentioned the name of a breed, not “big white one”, but I didn’t get any associations with cat breeds from Earth.
“Just a lucky guess, he-he. Does it have a name?”
“Yes, I call her Opal,” Curiosity said.
At least the cats had simple names here....
She possibly wanted to add something else, but the communication journal started to shimmer with the colours of the rainbow. Gloaming opened it immediately. I also leaned forward, to look inside. We saw a vortex of colours on the first page. Gloaming also created a magical effect around the journal, or maybe even several effects, as the light from her forehead pulsed several times and slightly changed its tint.
“I’ve never seen anything like that,” she said, “but this kind of journal has never been used to correspond between worlds before. It is unusual, but I have checked for all harmful radiation I can detect, and I believe it is safe, so let's wait and see what happens next.
After several minutes the vortex of colours disappeared and the pages became their usual light-grey colour. Then several grey blobs appeared on the first page, and gradually transformed into letters.
“What is that?” Curiosity asked.
“These are letters of a language I'm familiar with, I think.” I looked closer to confirm my suspicion. “Looks like the journal can't translate, it just sends words as they are.”
“Unfortunately, it can’t. So, could you please...” Gloaming asked.
I only nodded, and began to read.
Greetings to everyone who reads this journal. We had to wait for experts to stabilize a connection between the two issues, so we are sorry if you had to wait. Let me introduce everyone on our side:
Andrew, an operative from the Coalition. I’m writing in the book right now.
Snowy Clothes' mother and father, we believe she can introduce them herself.
Doctor Castorov, a scientist from the Coalition.
Mr. Smith, a director from the Coalition.
“I propose to introduce ourselves and greet them.” I turned to ponies.
They nodded and I wrote in the journal about everyone in the room. After several minutes an answer appeared.
It is nice to meet you all. Before we continue, everyone here is very curious: How have you managed to send this book to Earth?
They were quick to spot the fact that only some high-level spirits can deliver things, and fewer still can cross from the spiritual world to the physical. I could hardly have found the necessary spirit and made it work for me so fast, so they concluded that I had someone’s help.
“You know already.” Medley chimed in, making a circular motion with her foreleg in the air. “Just write it down.”
“Indeed,” I said, and I began writing.
One of the natives, Medley, has a number of unusual abilities. These abilities aren't really understood by mages and scientists here. As I can understand, there are no other natives with similar abilities in recorded history. That's why it is very hard to make any theories. According to her friends she can appear suddenly near other ponies, produce specific items from random places, and feel what is happening to other ponies at a distance.
According to her, one of the postal workers here could send mail to Earth somehow, although Medley can't explain how she knows that. We decided to send this special journal with the letter. We haven't asked the mail pony how she did that, but we can ask later today.
Soon an answer came.
Thank you for the detailed account of events. We didn’t know about these kinds of abilities in the Coalition until very recently. In short, there are a small number of users of these abilities on Earth, one per ten million at most, and they call these abilities Invisible Magic. There are several varieties of this magic, though most of them are similar to very high-level regular magic. Most of the users we know agree that someone can't just study Invisible Magic, he or she has to have a gift.
And one more thing. We have a special directive in the Coalition: in case of discovery of a potential Invisible Magic user, we should immediately report to the expert in this field, who is an ally of the Coalition. So as we write this to you, we are preparing another message for said expert.
We will let you know about any developments. Meanwhile, could you please tell us more about this world?