"Do you think he'll be mad if he finds out?" asked Twilight as she paced nervously around her library.
Spike snorted and picked up a stack of recently returned books. "You know how he is. I think he'll be irritated, but not flat out mad. Besides, if you actually do it then you get to find out. You know that you're not exactly all that stealthy when you're doing your field research."
"Well there is no way, I repeat, no way that TD has TD Sense. I mean, it goes against everything he's told me about humans!"
Twilight Sparkle groaned and continued her pacing. Ever since TD had come to Equestria, Twilight had been forced to admit that one of the benefits for her was the fact that she got to do a ton of research on a completely new type of intelligent being. Of course, flat out admitting that to herself made her seem rude as TD was certainly more than just a subject to study and he would likely not appreciate her attempts. His irritation would likely be exacerbated given the fact that it hadn't been more than a month or two since Princess Celestia had told him that she couldn't send him home, despite her best efforts.
Still... SCIENCE!!!
Her dragon assistant sighed at Twilight's antics and began re-shelving a few books. "You know you're never going to get back to sleep unless you at least try, right?"
Twilight screeched to a halt and cocked her head. "Wait, are you saying that I should actually do this?" she asked.
Spike shelved another book. "Not exactly, although it would help me get to sleep tonight. You and I both know that you're not going to rest until you have as much information on TD and humans as you can." Spike turned around and crossed his arms. "Not to mention that you've had your saddlebag packed for field research for three days now," he deadpanned.
Twilight blushed and giggled nervously. "Well... when you put it that way I guess a little field research couldn't hurt, right?"
"Or it could," Spike observed. "I seem to recall that last time you tried to stalk a pony for research you ended up with the entire contents of a moving truck on your head."
"Again, that was Pinkie Pie!" said Twilight. "I'm sure that a little time observing TD would hardly yield that kind of danger."
Spike sighed and grabbed another stack of books. "I guess in the end it's up to you whether or not you want to stalk him," said Spike. "But just be careful, okay? His mood has only just begun to improve and that's because he spends three days a week with Cheerilee's class."
Twilight squealed in delight now that somebody had given her permission to do a little observational work. Still, it wasn't like Spike was actually going to talk her out of it in the end.
Twilight levitated her saddlebag on to her back and unfurled a large checklist that she quickly scanned before rolling it up and placing it on a nearby table. "I'm off, Spike! If I'm not back in time for dinner it means that either I'm to engrossed in research or he's caught me and holding me in his den, demanding my notes! If it's the latter then get big Macintosh to dramatically burst in, defeat the human, and sweep me off my hooves!"
Spike facepalmed. "Good grief, Twilight, just go!"
Twilight giggled and shut the door behind her.
The Ponyville air was just as fresh and uplifting as ever. The pegasi had done a good job today for not a single cloud was dotting the sky, threatening rain and ruining the canvas of pure sky blue that covered the world. Celestia's sun shone down on her while she trotted into the center of town. TD was always somewhere around here washing windows or holding down the fort at somepony's stall. It wouldn't take too much effort to... ah-ha!
Twilight dove into a nearby bush. There he was!
Twilight poked the upper half of her head out of the bush to get a better visual on the target. He was working Applejack's apple stand right now while the farmer was off... well, she didn't know where she was but that was hardly important. What was important was TD.
She eagerly levitated a quill and roll of parchment out of her saddlebag. She licked the tip and placed an ink regeneration spell on the quill; a recent invention of hers. No need to lug around all of that ink now. She cracked her neck and began verbally dictating.
"Okay, this is the beginning of my observational reports on the recent Equestrian addition of a species known as a 'human'; the plural of which is 'humans'. Since his arrival in Equestria, the subject known henceforth as 'TD' has shown to act differently from the various Equine tribes, both in body language and anatomy in general.
"TD is a bipedal creature with appendages on the ends of his legs known as 'feet'. I would normally provide a detailed description of said appendage but I woefully have to admit that I have never, in fact, seen a bare foot--singular form of feet--before. TD keeps them covered at all times with shoes, though it is likely that he does not wear them all the time as he can remove them as he sees fit.
"He has arms that are capped off with penta-digited appendages called 'hands' while the digits themselves are called 'fingers'. He uses his hands and fingers to grasp and hold on to objects with a dexterity that far outstrips the hooves of a pony. I have to admit I have no idea if the fingers have any names which would distinguish them, so I shall provide some."
Twilight tapped the end of the quill to her chin and frowned. What exactly should she call each of his fingers? They had to have names, otherwise how were her readers supposed to tell them apart? She shrugged and put quill to paper.
"Well, for the sake of this essay I will provide my own names to his fingers. The finger that juts out to the side his hand, the inward most one, I shall call The Grasper, since it is the primary finger that aids in grabbing things, the finger next to that shall be The Pointer, since that seems to be one of its primary functions, the one next to that will be The Strengthener, as it is the finger that strengthens his hold on an object, the one next to that shall be The Backup Strengthener, and the one at the end shall be The..."
Twilight sighed but reasoned to herself that she could always think up better names after more observation. "The End Finger," she finished lamely.
She took a deep breath and turned her attention back to TD who was idly looking around the town square, waiting for customers to serve or Applejack to relieve him of his post. He took a deep breath, and placed the palms of his hands on the upper edges of the stall and leaned back.
"Incredible! It seems that TD can use his hands and arms not just to aid him in grasping objects, but also for support. They seem to be strong as well given that they can support a fair amount of his weight. It appears that they can also rotate backwards as he is not leaning his weight forwards to balance himself, but backwards."
TD sighed and straightened back up causing Twilight to nervously duck back in the bush. The noise of rustling leaves caused TD to perk his head up a little more and look straight at the bush, making Twilight a little nervous. Had he seen her? What would he do if he had? Oh he'd be mad, wouldn't he? Twilight took a quiet breath and waited to see if the human would come over.
To her immense relief TD shrugged and turned his attention to the apple stand. Twilight breathed a sigh of relief and levitated her quill and parchment once more.
TD cracked his neck and began bobbing his head slightly much to Twilight's confusion. To cap it off, TD started singing one of the songs from his home world! Twilight had to hold back a squeal of delight as TD hadn't shared many of them with her. To add to her excitement, it was one that she hadn't heard before! She swiveled her ear to hear the human song and brought the quill tip to the paper.
"Oh the shark babe, has such teeth dear, and he shows them pearly white.
Just a jackknife has old Macheath dear, and he keeps it out of sight."
TD then raised his hand to his waist and pressed his Grasper and Strengthener fingers together before quickly rubbing them together so his Strengthener hit his palm creating a sort of snapping noise. Twilight was elated to say the least and eagerly turned her attention towards her parchment and quill. "The subject TD is using his Strengthener and Grasper finders to create a sort of snapping noise to a musical beat! It's almost like some sort of bodily instrument that is built into his hands! I must ask Spike if he can recreate such a noise later."
At that moment Applejack walked back up to the stand. TD turned around to greet the apple farmer and the few exchanged a few pleasant words before TD took his too small apron off and left the apple stand.
"The subject is on the move. I must follow him!"
When TD was far enough away from the bush, Twilight leaped out of it and 'stealthily' tip-hooved behind her object of study.
* * * *
The rest of the day provided an absolute gold mine of information for the unicorn. She observed TD doing things such as tying a string for a fishing pole and tying balloons for a Pinkie Pie party later that afternoon, which Twilight was looking forward to, and she even saw him flip a coin in his hands. That was her favorite part even though she had seen Spike do something similar once in a while.
Eventually TD was done with work for the day and he trekked back to his simple home, much to Twilight's chagrin. She had no guarantee that he would be in a place where her see-through-walls spell would be able to help her! What if TD took one of his random naps and his hands didn't do anything?
"No, Twilight, you mustn't think like that. Even if he doesn't do anything, you've still gotten a gold mine of information from him today. I mean, the snapping thing alone was amazing! Still, I suppose that it wouldn't hurt to try to see if I can get a little more information out of him today. There's nothing wrong with trying."
Twilight held back a little when TD unlocked the door to his house and walked inside. Twilight was careful to note the way he grasped his keys and the door handle, but she rolled up the scroll and put the quill inside before moving over to a wall opposite the door. She fired up her horn as quietly as she could and the solid image of the wall in front of her melted away as if it were made of ice and she had a full view of inside TD's home. she felt a little guilty for invading his privacy like that but it was for science! She had to do it if she was going to learn about his hands in a natural manner.
To her surprise TD was sitting as his desk with a pencil in one hand and the other steadying the paper he was writing on. Twilight made a few more notes on the manner in which he was holding the pencil but... he was just sitting there writing something. Or he could be grading something for Cheerilee. Either way his hands weren't doing anything different.
Twilight's stomach growled at that moment and she looked down at it. "Oh yeah, I haven't eaten at all today." The unicorn slowly nodded and used her magic to put her scroll and quill back into her saddlebags. She powered down the spell and the image in front of her faded back into a wall. She took a deep breath and quietly trotted away to find the closest restaurant. Hay fries sounded amazing right now.
* * * *
Twilight walked back into the library an hour later, her stomach content with the hay fries and veggie burger she had recently consumed. Combined with all of the data she had obtained on TD's hands, it was turning out to be a pretty good day.
"Spike, I'm back. did anything interesting happen while I was gone?"
"Not much but you have a letter from TD. He came by about fifteen minutes ago to deliver it and he told me to tell you something when you got back and read it."
Twilight frowned and put her saddlebags on a nearby table. Surely he hadn't noticed that she was there. She had been very sneaky; much more than she had with Pinkie Pie. Plus he certainly didn't have TD Sense. That would... that would be silly, right?
With trepidation, Twilight levitated the proffered letter over to her and opened it with her magic. Inside was a bunch of folded scrolls. Twilight levitated the first one in front of her and began reading.
The study of the Twilighticus Sparkleicus By TD Powell
The aforementioned unicorn specimen is one of the oddest creatures in the Equestrian kingdom. It continually takes a keen interest in other species and record the goings on of said other species without really saying anything interesting or relevant. What's more amusing is the fact that it thinks that it is being stealthy and quiet during its observations but in reality is makes about as much noise as an elephant trudging through a pile of sticks with drums attached to its legs.
Twilight looked up from the scroll in horror. "Spike," she whispered but her dragon companion motioned for her to continue. Gulping, she returned to the parchment.
What's odd about the unicorn in question is that on top of the noise that it makes physically, one can tell that such a creature is around by the scratching sound that it makes when its quill comes into contact with its paper. It may be a mating call in other scenarios but in any case it certainly denotes interest. If you hear such a noise around you it means that you are the object of its attention. There is no word yet on whether such attention indicates physical desire, but I intend to do more study in a stealthier manner than the creature itself. Indeed, the Twilighticus Sparkleicus will never know when I am behind it, watching, waiting. It might go to bed at night and wonder if I'm going to sneak in and watch it sleep while recording its nighttime habits. It's a pity actually. We could have avoided this in the first place if it had just asked me to be its object of interest instead of stalking me. It would have been less awkward for her, that's for sure.
Twilight let out a quiet whimper and looked up from the scroll. "Oh dear," she whispered.
"There are another five pages of that," Spike admitted. "And like I mentioned before, he told me to tell you something."
"What?" asked Twilight, afraid of the answer.
Spike looked uncomfortable now which made Twilight almost keel over right then and there. "He... he may have bribed me with a sapphire to send a copy of those notes to Princess Celestia. Actually there's no 'may have' about it because he did."
'I'm dead', thought Twilight. 'I can never look at him the same way ever again. I might have to move away just to get away from him.'
"And this all could have been avoided if you had just asked me about my hands earlier," said a voice from behind Twilight. The unicorn wheeled around to see TD come out of the kitchen.
"Oh yeah, I forgot to tell you that too," said Spike.
TD looked at the stunned unicorn with a look of grim satisfaction on his face. he walked over to Twilight and leaned down so their noses were almost touching. "Was it worth it?" he asked.
Twilight blinked twice to clear some of the shock out of her head before answering. "N-Not really," she whispered. "Actually maybe it was."
"Well good," said TD, straightening up. "I hope you'll ask me next time."
With that, TD walked out of the library leaving the stunned librarian alone to reboot her brain.
Suddenly, Spike's cheeks bulged out and he burped flame making a letter materialize in front of him. He picked it up and examined it. "It's from the princess," he said.
"Eep!" said Twilight but despite her fears she levitated the scroll in front of her and began reading.
My most faithful student,
...what?