"So you're the one who made the portal? And without magic to boot. I'd be impressed if I wasn't freaking out so much right now." Rainbow Dash said as she drank from her mug. None of the cups Abe brought down matched. Much to the chagrin of Rarity.
"Really I do not understand how you don't have a proper matching tea set." Rarity said drinking from her tea cup."I told you I don't get visitors. Well, unless you count the pizza guy or the delivery person." Abe said chuckling to himself. "Seeing that all of you are gonna be stuck in the house here for awhile, maybe I should order one?"
"What do you mean stuck in the house? Is it dangerous outside or something?" Twilight asked. There was a short pause before Abe started to talk again, his face twisting for a moment before he continued. "Well lets just say if my government found out you guys exist you'd probably never go home. So for now you gotta stay a secret. Humans have a...... bad track record with aliens." Abe explained as he watched Pinkie Pie blow bubbles in her cup, through its attached straw. "Its a good thing my grants allowed me to be so far away from town, plus there is a good amount of woods around the property. So if you want you could go outside if you wanna see what it looks like."
At hearing the word woods Fluttershy perked up a bit, but the poor mare still looked like she was on the verge of tears still. Her and Applejack had remained almost silent drinking from their glasses, no doubt coming to terms with exactly all the people they had left behind, who know doubt thought they were dead.
"What does that mean exactly?" Twilight pressed setting down her now empty clear glass. "I don't wanna freak you all out too much but, as far as most people know humans have never actually met other sentient life, not even on earth." After a small pause Abe continued rubbing the back of his neck as he explained. "There are rumors however, and if we ever DID meet anything else our government has it locked up in some bunker in the dessert."
The gravity of their situation began to dawn on then as Fluttershy began to quietly weep, quickly getting comforted by Applejack. "Ah can't Believe y'all would be so cruel." Applejack said, giving quite the dirty look to Abe.
"It's not like humans want to hurt things, its just, we just... Most of us react out of fear from getting hurt. However, I can't always defend the action our government has made in the past either." Abe was left as a loss of what to say next, so he just let the room grow silent, his gaze drifting into his nearly empty yellow ceramic mug. That's when Twilight decided to ask another question.
"So how long would it take to fix the portal? I am sure everypony here wants to go home."
"Well now that I know that it works reconstruction could take up to year, maybe two? That is assuming that the coordina- OH MY GOD." Abe shot up and ran out of the living room, throwing open the door to the basement, leaving the girls perplexed in his living room. They heard him shout No over and over again, as his heavy footfalls grew quieter as he descended down the stairs.
Meanwhile the girls were wondering what just happened to their host. The five on the couch all seemed to elect Twilight as the one to go find out as they all turned to look at her. With a huff she says "Okay, Ill go figure out what happened." She slowly left to go down the stairs, the door left wide open from Abe's frantic departure a few moments ago. As the quite clop of her hoofs sounded as she descended she could here Abe tossing things on the floor, followed by a sharp clang of metal. As she finally made it into the room she could see him hunched over a metal box sliding a cover off of it, as he began to try and pop something out of it.
"So what was that all about?" She asked as Abe managed to get the silver square out of the machine.
"When I opened the way to your planet I used a guess on where a place might have life forms out side of our solar system, which means if I lose the coordinates I entered it'd be a guessing game to find your home again" Abe said frantically as he slid the item into his pocket and moving back over the desk taking out a laptop from under it throwing the papers on top of it to the side as he flipped open its silver top. leaning over it on his desk.
It took a moment for Twilight to understand what he said, but once she did her eyes opened wide rushing over to the side of the desk asking "Is there anything I can do to help?" Her hoofs propping her up next to Abe, looking over his shoulder to see the computer screen. Had things not been so dire she would have been inquiring about the odd typewriter he was using. She made a mental note to ask about it later.
"The only thing we can do for the next few hours is to wait as the drive boots, and see if the feedback didn't burn something." A loading screen started on the laptop, Abe moved to plug in the charger into the wall outlet turning to the purple mare and getting down on a knee to look her straight in the eye as he said. "The fact that its trying to load at all is a good sign." He lied hoping to put her at ease, "I needed to get this started as soon as possible, sorry if that freaked you out."
Looking at the Laptop and trying to distracted herself the way she always does when stressed, by asking questions. "So how does that work?"
"What do you think they are doing down there?" Pinkie asked as she read the titles of the books and DVD's that were on the shelves. The other four electing to not move from couch.
"Maybe something bad happened.." Fluttershy managed to say, having recovered from earlier. The other four looked among each other silently agreeing, they had been gone for an half hour, the tea had long since been finished. However, they then hear the sound of Abe talking as the two ascended the stairs. His voice became clearer as they walked back into the room. "- More then books, full images and reference guides often how to's videos as well."Abe said.
"Okay then what about more abstract things like feelings and things that fall under psychology?" Twilight asked. She would have to wait for the answer however, because a certain pink mare scooted up close to her and asked. "What were you to down there for so long for? We were getting super BOOOOORED."
Abe answered quickly before Twilight had the chance. "I had to make sure something downstairs was taken care of, and then Twilight started asking so many questions. I kind of lost track of time." Looking out the window Twilight had seen it started to get dark, "Umm Abe, where will we be sleeping?" Twilight asked turning back to Abe.
"Oh geez uhh." Abe thought for a moment putting his finger to his chin. "Well there is the couch, which can fit two. The arm chair.... I have a inflatable Mattress. And maybe using extra blankets... the tub?" He said putting his hands up a bit.
"A BATH TUBB!" Rarity shouted, "Now I may be able to put up with a non-matching tea set. Sleeping in a tub is a WHOLE other matter." She said with a huff.
"Now don't fret Rarity, ah'll take the tub." Applejack said hoping that would help calm down the others, by taking the worst option herself she hoped the others might be more understanding.
"Dibs on the chair!" Rainbow Dash said as she trotted over to the chair.
"I am staying on the couch!" Rarity simply stated, followed by Pinkie playfully shouting "Mee tooo!" before hopping onto the couch.
"I guess, the air mattress will be okay." Fluttershy said tapping the tips of her hoofs together.
"Well, Twilight I guess that leaves you with my bed." Abe said having watched the others claim their places.
"W-what? But where will you sleep?"
"Oh I wont be, I plan on making good on my word. I will be working all night assessing the damage downstairs, and seeing what can be salvaged." Abe said rather dryly his voice already showing cracks from lack of sleep. he had forgotten to mention to the ponies that to get the portal working he hadn't slept for awhile already. "I will go and get the extra blankets and such." Abe said turning to walk down the hallway. Twilight looked back and forth trying to think of somewhere else she could sleep. She knew Abe had made a honest mistake and putting himself out like this wasn't necessary. Nothing came to mind however, and as Abe returned with bedding and the Mattress. As the air pump filled it he walked Applejack to the bathroom and set her up in the tub. Apologizing and promising a better option soon. Returning and making sure everyone was reasonably comfy, he turned to Twilight "Alright, just you left." Motioning for her to follow him farther down the hallway.
"Night girls" Twilight said as she left her friends. Each saying goodnight in return.
As they walked they passed the bathroom, then they passed the kitchen turning left there was another room with two doors, one metal with a large glass window that showed the night. Twilight could make out some of the trees and a large metal looking thing. I'll have to ask about that in the morning, she thought to herself. She then snapped her head forward toward the light creak that was made as the other wooden door was opened. After flicking on the light she saw Inside was a bed, more bookshelves and a fair amount of clutter all piled along the right side of the room. The clutter only parted to make a path to the bed, which was nicely made, in fact it looked like it was never slept in. Now this clutter wasn't garbage, mostly boxes of papers, and what looked like more and more books. Twilight would have been excited if she wasn't so tired and freaked out. "Sorry about the mess, normally I just fall asleep downstairs or in the arm chair watching TV."
Keeping herself from asking more questions she climbs into the bed and lays above the covers, Abe says goodnight before turning out the light and leaving. Minutes pass as they turn into hours, but eventually Twilight falls asleep.
Picking up yet another mangled mess of metal and wires and tossing it into the large green bin. Abe takes a deep sigh as he moves the corner of the room, and opens the wood grained decorated mini-fridge to grab himself a large glass bottle. As he drinks from it he moves back to his desk to watch the laptops idle loading screen. God I hope it didn't fry, if it did... there is no way for them to get back home. You really messed up this time Abe. This was a really big risk and even then....".
Downing the rest of the bottle as he leans back in the small black office chair, his eyes wander to the scorched cement and the wreckage of what once was his life's work. In the past ten years technology had continued to only grow more efficient and better, but here he was not satisfied with the solar gird or the ozone reconstruction his contemporaries worked on. No, he had decided to keep working on his portal technology, a choice now he began for the first time in his life, to regret.