//------------------------------// // SciTwi1978@aol.com // Story: TwilightSparkle Online // by TwiPON3 //------------------------------// "Good luck with that on-a-line thing," Applejack said to me, driving off in her truck, grinding the gears as she went. I wiped my frameless, circular glasses on my shirt as my dad pulled up to the front of the school, sporting his new Lexus, "Ready, Twilight?" "Coming!" I went and got in the car, "I have my things packed and-" "Actually," he said, pulling onto the road, "Your mom and I figured we could handle this on our own, so we're leaving you and Midnight at home for the weekend." "Oh," I said, remembering an incident that happened not-too-long-ago, then returning to my former demeanor, "You two have fun, then." The ride back to our house was an easy thirty minutes, but with Dad, it felt closer to three. When we pulled into our driveway, Mom was outside, ready to go to Manehattan. She had a suitcase and her purse I wasn't a big fan of there anyway, especially after we moved here when I was five years old. I had even been back a few times, and didn't like it now, so I was glad to be home. Besides, Midnight would be asleep so I would be able to figure out some more on that newsboard page about the friendship games incident from a few months ago. "We'll be back Sunday at 11:30 at night, honey." "You two have fun," I said as the three of us hugged. "Is this it, Velv?" "It is." "Twilight," Mom said, "If you need anything, you know our cellphone number, right?" "302-333-8989." "You two have fun," she said, her and dad leaving. I went inside, expecting Midnight to be asleep on the couch, but instead... "Why does she have to fill my face up with lipstick and not yours?" "Gah!" Midnight, even with having several kiss prints from Mom on her face, was still scaring me. "Look, sis," she said, "We got the whole place to ourselves for the weekend, so you better not lock yourself up in the attic doing God-only-knows-what or sit at your computer and reading articles on 'thermodynamics'." "Actually, I have 25 people on my buddy list that I wanted to chat with for a while." "You've never even met these people." "That's the beauty of it," I explained, "You type a message, press enter, it sends. They receive the message, read it, type a reply, press enter, and you get the reply. There's no need for social contact, thus eliminating the timing standards implied in conventional, face-to-face, and occasionally via telephone, exchanges." Midnight slowly shook her head in disapproval and crossed her arms, "You poor, lonely bitch." "I may be a few cyberdates away from an engagement." "I made you a cappuccino. On the island. I'm gonna go wash this lipstick off." "I just don't trust her. I don't know why." "Gee, it couldn't be because that I'm ultimately the demonic spawn from you and magic that no-damn-body knows a thing about, could it?" she yelled from the bathroom. "Sorry!" "Don't mention it. It's the lipstick fumes." "Don't use the phones for a while, though." "Are you going on a 'cyberdate'?" "No, but I'll let you know when I do. Right now, I'm logging onto a USENET newsboard about what happened at the Friendship Games. Someone from Czechoslovakia thinks that it's a black hole." "Have fun with that, but I will pull the circuit breaker out if you stay up there." That's a hollow threat. I'm fine. "Okay." I ran upstairs to my bedroom, threw my books down, on my bed, hit the power button on my computer and waited for it to boot into kOS. "C'me on, baby," I said, noticing that the fans and motors were louder than usual at bootup. 100 Megahertz, 32 Megabytes of RAM, 1.5 gigabyte drive, American Megatrends, blah blah blah. It was slower to come on. When it got to the splash screen (a light-gray rectangle reading k Operating System with the k in front of a rotating gear), it seemed to hang there, the only audible noises were me drinking finishing the coffee and the fans, blasting air into the system. "Maybe it's just taking its precious time," I said, looking at the pixelated-hourglass cursor that was becoming the bane of my existence and getting up to get a can of soda. "Is it some kind of game?" Midnight asked me, flipping channels from the other side of the open-concept kitchen/TV room. "Is what some kind of game," I said, getting a Pepsi. "That thing you're doing." "kOS hasn't even started yet. Did-" "I didn't do anything. I like being alive, despite popular belief." I saw that she had finally settled on something that I'd rather not be around for longer than I had to, "Well, I'm going back up, now." "Good luck." I went back upstairs and found that, while kOS was loaded up, kPPP was already open, so I clicked it. Connected to 1-800-899-9697 Username: SciTwi1978@aol.com Password: I love my sister Connection speed: 28.8 Kbps That's strange. I'm already connected. I looked at my desktop. My regular icons for AOL, my drives, printer, documents, and shortcuts were all there, but there was one: VRNet. What? I opened it. "What the- DEAR GOD, SOMEONE HELP ME!!!" I was in this room. Numbers were running down the walls, binaries. "Where am I?" I looked around and saw several signs: Twilight Sparkle's Email, America Online Weather, World Wide Web, My Channels, and several others. "Is-" I was pulled out and woke up, being slapped by Midnight. "What the hell were you doing!?" "I don't know! It was loud, and it took forever to start, and I went for a drink, and it was on AOL, and it sucked me in, and I don't know what to do!" "I would say for you to call Sunset," Midnight said as I laid on my bed, "but she'd probably kill me with a friendship laser, she doesn't know anything about this, and our phones may have a spell on them." It sounded the AOL noise, then just shut off. "Unplug it," I said, not taking my gaze from the questionable box.