Magic mirror, spell gone wrong, one of a million other contrived plot devices, never mind how it happened. Because this time, it’s real. She’s here.
She showed up yesterday, and no one’s quite sure how. Reports say she was first found somewhere in the northern Sahara, and then taken to Algiers. It sounded kind of peculiar at first. But when you think about it, if she had to pop up anywhere, it probably wouldn’t be smack in the middle of Times Square, would it?
The earliest widespread coverage of the event came from Al-Jazeera. Everyone thought it was hoax. No one could believe it; it was utter nonsense. But videos cropped up online. A lot of them. Like, too many to comfortably call it a conspiracy. Internet sleuths tried to debunk them, analyzing the clips for overlaid animation. And when they failed, the internet went into a frenzy.
From Algiers she was brought to London. The Algerian government was pretty insistent on keeping her on lockdown, but the media circus had already blown it wide open. Even to this day, it seems the Crown’s still got strings to pull. See, it was in London that the world’s foremost authorities were gathering to discuss the matter. There was no precedent to follow. Our governments had a hundred contingencies for little green men beaming down from the skies, but a colorful little pony? Where do you even begin?
World leaders poured into the city. Academics, politicians, ecclesiastics, anyone with a domain of influence was brought to address the situation. The summit was to be held behind closed doors, a total media blackout. But when you’ve got a room full hundreds of international leaders and news agencies throwing around huge payouts for even a tiny nibble of the story, you’re going to have leaks. Smuggled cell phone footage of the summit made the rounds on the evening news.
Apparently, no one had made much of an effort to talk to her until that day, not counting the questions in Arabic hurled at her in the first couple of days. So asking her to speak on a platform in front of hundreds was something of a big request.
They asked for her name and she gave it to them, same as the one on the show. They asked if she was familiar with something called My Little Pony and all she could submit to them was that it was nothing more than a turn of phrase in her homeland. Equestria. That last bit certainly got some murmurs.
When asked why she was here, nothing. When asked how she came here, nothing. When asked what her intentions were, nothing. The more she was pressed, the less she had to offer. She recoiled into herself more and more with every question. It was more a public spectacle of an interrogation than anything. The crowd was growing more and more aggravated. Under the circumstances, it was difficult for everyone to keep their composure.
The problem with people is that they rarely respond positively to the unknown. There is a certain quality to that unknowability that brings us discomfort. A known threat, no matter how insurmountable, can be analyzed. It necessarily has qualia, something we depend on to inform our thought process. We can rationalize it, break it apart into discrete boxes and deal with it piecemeal. We plan for the circumstances when we know what we’re up against. But how do you plan for something you don’t know the first thing about?
All that was gleaned from the summit is that she came from an essentially identical world to the one that was portrayed in the television show. How that was possible was up for debate. The intellectual leaders of the world couldn’t agree on a single facet. Scientists suggested she was made here on earth, a replica, that somehow escaped or was abandoned. Religious fanatics argued that she was, in fact, the Messiah, assuming a form that would be soothing for us. Debates about extraterrestrial origin, philosophical ramifications, religious significance all circled the summit floor. No one had a satisfactory explanation. No one knew what this meant.
But you thought about it for a while. And your conclusion was rather simple. Maybe it doesn’t mean anything. Maybe she’s just here, and that’s all there is to it.
The summit ended with one final question. What do you want from us?
“I just want to go home to my friends.”
Could you blame her?
She’s been here a few weeks now. She enjoys a quiet life, removed from society. Apparently, she lives with the monarch and is well taken care of. People like to write her letters. She even responds to some of them, with messages of hope and sympathy. She’s done a couple exclusive interviews. In them, she talks about her home, her old life. How much she misses being able to enjoy her special talent. They ask her if she’s watched the show. She tried, but seeing herself projected as a moving image was too surreal for her to handle. They ask for the toughest adjustment she’s had to make. She says the biggest difference is that this world feels… cold.
The outside world has been much less peaceful. There were a few million fans of her show before all this. Now there are well over a billion. The whole world wanted to get to know their new princess. Hasbro, retaining the rights to her likeness, jumped to the top ten of the Fortune 500 almost overnight. She became an icon of the people. A symbol of something purer than themselves. It was an idea that resonated with everyone.
You’ve been following it closely the whole time. You couldn’t believe it when it happened. You watched her show for years. You read stories where this kind of thing happens. You’ve wanted this for yourself. You prayed for this.
But so have a lot of other people.
Long before she arrived, there was a number of people who were particularly attached to her. And now that number has exploded. The message boards are plastered with people trying to get messages to her, manifestos declaring love for her, threats to others who vie for her affections. A lot of people had their own personal fantasies about her. And now here she was, tangible, in reach. Or was she?
Because a lot of those stories you liked to read were written like fairytales. You meet a pony from a different world than you, literally, and against all odds, you fall in love. You end up together. You get your happy ending with this fictional-turned-real character. But now it’s actually happening. It’s not just a story anymore. She’s here... but there’s just one problem. You’re not the protagonist. You’re not even a part of the narrative. And there’s millions of other people who love her just as much as you do. It’s like a giant tapestry with her image sewn into the center, and you’re just a frayed thread in the corner.
Of course, she’s not falling in love with anyone these days. Even if someone managed to get to her and declare their love for her, what would that accomplish? You know, deep down, that she could never fall for a stranger who simply barges in, proclaiming how irrevocably enamored with her they are. In the stories, the good ones anyway, that ultimate passion was always gradually built on a foundation of intimacy, not big, sudden gestures.
You see, you build up this kind of worship for a character. It happens over years and years; the infatuation grows deeper and more rooted in your mind. It’s half of a relationship. Because she doesn’t exist.
Until she does.
And then you’re supposed to expect that she’s suddenly caught up? Like those years of idle worship mean anything to her? No, you scold yourself for even entertaining the idea. You want it to be real. You want the fairytale to come true. You hate yourself for how much you want it. But real life doesn’t work that way. Even if she comes, she doesn’t want you. She has her own world, her own life, her own problems to deal with. It’s selfish to want her. So you tell yourself the truth. You have to face it. You’re not important to her. And you never will be.
Every day she gets thousands of letters. They start to pile up.
She's stopped bothering to even read them.