When his scrambled brain finally began to reboot, Max thought he heard chirping birds, somewhat reminiscent of the last time he’d been knocked unconscious with a blow to the head. However, he realized this was impossible when his memory began to work again, and according to that part of his mind, he was still locked in a stone cell inside of a medieval-style dungeon.
The next brain function he regained was the one that recognized pain, and Max immediately wished he could turn that off again. Now, he noted, not one but two spots on his forehead were painfully throbbing, and the bruises were complemented by a splitting headache that he didn’t remember plaguing him before. Apparently his skull could only handle one instance of blunt-force trauma every twenty-four hours before real damage started to occur.
When Max’s attention began leave the subject of pain and wander to some other senses that he was slowly regaining, he noticed his ears were ringing so badly that he couldn’t hear anything that was going on around him, and he was lying in an awkward, crumpled position on the cold stone floor. Normally he would have tried to sit up after regaining consciousness, or at least shift into a more natural position on the ground, but the painful throbbing in his head convinced Max to remain motionless.
After a few seconds, the ringing in his ears started to subside, and he could hear muffled voices making their way into his muddled consciousness. He concentrated on the voices, and soon, he was able to make out the speaker as Twilight Sparkle, the purple unicorn pony that he had been conversing with before. She sounded as if she was timidly trying to explain something to someone, and upon opening his eyes, Max learned just who that someone was.
It took roughly a second for his eyes to regain focus, but even before they did, Max immediately recognized the shape, color, and flowing ethereal mane of the pony that demanded his surrender in the forest, whom Max had assumed to be Princess Celestia. She wasn’t wearing the golden armor, and there was no blinding light coming from her eyes or horn, so she appeared slightly less intimidating than before. Just slightly, though.
His vision continued to sharpen, and soon Max was able to see her expression. During his conversations with Lyra and Twilight, Max gathered that he could read facial expressions on ponies as easily as he could those of any human. And right now, the expression he saw told him one thing; Twilight was busted. The smaller unicorn continued her sheepish explanation, which Max could now fully understand as the events of the past few minutes, but the princess that dwarfed her did not seem to like what she was hearing. With every word that came out of Twilight’s mouth, Celestia’s expression darkened and her critical frown deepened.
“Twilight,” she said condescendingly after her student finished explaining. “What could have possibly come over you to do something like this?”
At the sight of the second being on the planet to speak to him without threatening to kill him get a dirty look from the being who had threatened to kill him, Max decided he had to do something. However, one of the other ponies in the room took action first. This pony was definitely larger than the average pony, but still not quite the size of the white one. Her coat was a dark blue, and she also had a rippling, billowing, ethereal mane, except that that looked like it was made of the night sky, with its deep blue color and the twinkling points of light scattered throughout it that resembled stars. Based on the black chest piece she wore and the crown on her head of a similar hue, Max decided that this was the other princess, whom Lyra had identified as Luna.
Twilight was about to answer the princess, but that was when Luna spoke. “I hate to interrupt you, Celestia,” she said softly. “But I believe our visitor is awake.”
Before he could so much as scramble into a more natural position, all five ponies in the room turned and locked their eyes on the hapless human. Two pairs of eyes, belonging to Celestia and presumably a bodyguard of sorts, narrowed with suspicion. Princess Luna’s eyes remained remarkably neutral, while Twilight’s and Shining Armor’s widened in panic.
Celestia’s eyes began to glow fiercely again as she flared her wings and took several menacing steps towards the iron gates that Max was suddenly very grateful for. “Who are you, and how did you find this planet?” she asked, and while her voice hadn’t increased in volume that much, she put every ounce of force she could behind each word.
As she approached the bars, Max finally got an appreciation for Celestia’s real size. Ponies like Twilight and Lyra were roughly the height of his waist, not counting the four or five inches that the horn added, and Shining Armor looked like he might come up to Max’s chest, but Celestia truly dwarfed both pony and human alike. If Max ignored her horn, which easily added a foot to her height, the towering princess looked as if she would stand a full head higher than Max, had he been standing.
As it were, Max was still lying on the ground with his legs tangled hopelessly in the fabric of his pants, and the sight of the Celestia advancing on him with her glowing eyes and flared wings, along with the intimidating tone she spoke with sent him scuttling pathetically back into his corner, dragging his pants along with him by the one foot he’d managed to force through before he’d fallen against the wall.
Once he’d put as much distance between himself and the princess as the stone cell would allow, Max finally addressed the governing power of a new civilization.
“Please, you don’t need to hurt me,” he said evenly, straining to keep his fear from shaking his words. “My name is Maxwell O’Hara, and I came here alone on an exploration mission. I don’t know anything about where I am, and my people don’t even know there is anyone on this planet, and we didn’t know that another planet was even here until we saw it completely by accident. I’m not a danger to anyone.”
If he’d been watching himself, Max would have been very impressed by how calmly and collectively he’d managed to speak, given how the closest thing he’d ever seen to a goddess looked like she was about to vaporize him.
Celestia’s posture didn’t change, but her scowl disappeared at Max’s confession. Even though he’d managed hide the fear in his voice, the rest of him told the whole story. The human looked genuinely lost and scared. Also, having borne the Element of Honesty for upwards of a thousand years, she had developed something of a sixth sense for deception. After all, one did not simply rule a kingdom for thousands of years without hearing a few lies, and it had been a very, very long time indeed since anything had successfully lied to Princess Celestia.
“You… You mean that you know nothing about ponies?” Celestia asked as her blazing eyes faded back to normal.
"Well, excluding the things that Twilight Sparkle just told me a few minutes ago, no,” Max said, his fear giving way to confusion, a transition that was facilitated by the princess’s diminished intimidation factor.
“Then how did you find this planet?” Celestia asked, her voice containing its own odd mix of confusion and suspicion.
“Like I said, we found out this planet was here totally by accident,” Max said. His tone of voice and posture was gradually becoming less anxious as Celestia seemed less bent on killing him.
He continued, “Based on what Twilight has told me, you won’t find it hard to believe that there’s another planet capable of sustaining life in this solar system, one that you can’t see because it’s on the other side of the sun. That is where I come from. Twilight also said you were able to see the vessel that I used to get here. My kind has sent many similar space vessels out to explore the solar system, and one was tasked to take pictures of the inner system. It showed this world, in a place all our theories said was impossible. Closer examination of the readings suggested it was a living world. Obviously, we wanted to explore it first hand, and that is my mission.”
Second after tense second ticked away as Celestia processed Max’s explanation. Four ponies and one human anxiously awaited her next move. Finally, Celestia asked, “Are there more of you coming?”
“No,” Max answered quickly. “I came here all by myself, and I haven’t had contact with home for weeks.”
“And your sole intention is to learn what you can about this world,” Celestia said for clarification.
“That is correct. Interaction with any civilization I found here was a possibility that was planned for, but you, um…” Max paused, trying to come up with a diplomatic way to describe his apprehension earlier that day. “Happened upon my landing site–” he said after a moment. “–Before I was prepared.”
The room was quiet once again as Celestia pondered what she’d heard. She closed her eyes in contemplation, and suspense dripped from each second of silence, since the fate of a human and two ponies would likely be sealed for better or worse with the Princess’s next sentence.
At long last, Celestia opened her eyes and regarded Max with something other than hostility. “Very well, Maxwell O’Hara,” she said, her tone lighter than it had been in days. “You will have to forgive the less-than-ideal circumstances under which you were initially met. They were simply precautions.”
Smiling for the first time in hours, Max replied, “I understand, Princess. It’s not every day an alien drops out of the sky and lands in the middle of your kingdom. I believe many of the people back home might have done worse had something like this happened to them unexpectedly.”
Celestia actually managed a small, sheepish chuckle, also the first gesture she’d made of its kind in days, before Max spoke again.
“Now, I explained this to Twilight before, but where I come from, it’s really not acceptable to be in the presence of others in this state of undress.” Max paused to gesture to his pants that were still coiled around one ankle. “Before I go anywhere, could I have a moment to finish putting my pants on?”
This seemed like a very strange request to Celestia, and she raised a questioning eyebrow and said, “What do you mean by–” The Princess stopped midsentence, however, when Twilight stood up on her hind legs to whisper a quick explanation of the request in her ear.
“Oh,” Celestia said when Twilight finished, and an almost imperceptible blush crept its way onto her face. “Very well then… We’ll go discuss some, uh… things, and be back momentarily to release you. Come along everypony.” With that, Celestia swiftly turned and left the dungeon, followed by her bodyguard, Luna, Shining Armor, and lastly Twilight, who gave Max a small, unsure smile and a shrug as she filed out.
Breathing a heavy, final sigh of relief, Max stood up, stretched out his muscles again, and finished putting his pants on.
With a heavy clang, the large double doors to Celestia’s private study slammed shut, leaving both princesses alone in the room again.
After releasing her telekinetic hold on the doors and slumping down onto the cushion behind her desk, Celestia miserably said to her sister, “I cannot imagine that going any worse than it did.”
“Whatever do you mean to say, dear sister?” Luna asked as she retook her position from earlier. “The humans apparently still remember nothing, and this one’s intentions appear to be peaceful.”
“That’s not what I mean, Luna,” Celestia replied coldly, staring at a spot on her desk.
Luna regarded her sister with a concerned expression. “Then what is so bad about what just happened?”
“Perhaps it could be we sent an army to arrest a single, innocent being?” Celestia suggested, irritation rising in her voice. Before Luna could say anything, the elder princess continued, “Or maybe that we blindfolded it, robbed it, and cast it into the dungeon?” she said with increasing anger. “Or that the only pony to give it a chance to prove itself had to disobey my direct orders while I simply paced in my room, fretting about everything and unable to make a decision? Does this sound like how a princess should act to you?”
“Celestia, there’s nothing to be upset about,” Luna said calmly. “Like the human said, this is no commonplace occurrence. How else could a leader be expected to act when suddenly and unexpectedly confronted with an alien being, especially given the unwritten history that we have with beings who drop out of space like this?”
“Oh, I don’t know, perhaps like Twilight did?” Celestia mumbled. “Perhaps I could have not let my fears control me and try to extend a hoof of friendship instead of sending three entire companies of the royal guard to arrest a being that means nopony any harm?”
“Twilight doesn’t know everything you do. She didn’t have anything to be afraid of. You, on the other hoof, had very much to be afraid of.”
Celestia simply sighed sadly, and continued not to look directly at Luna. “Well, she should have known. I should have told Twilight and all the others on that first day. They should have known what happened to the humans the last time they dropped out of the sky like this, and why I expected them to be hell-bent on revenge if we ever saw them again. I should have told everypony long before now; especially you, Luna. I should have told you a thousand years ago. You deserved more than anyone else to know. I’m sorry it’s taken something so dire for me to come out with the truth.”
“There is no need to apologize, dear sister,” Luna chided. “It was not an easy tale to hear, and I feel that, had you told me before my little pilgrimage to the moon, I would not have been mature enough to have taken it as well as I did a few days ago. And I’m sure it was no easy tale to tell, either.”
Celestia stood from her desk, and slowly walked to tall window at the back of the room. From there she stared whimsically out at the waning sunlight of the late afternoon sky. Unsure of what to do in the gaping silence, Luna got up as well and stood quietly next to her older sister. After a few minutes, Celestia finally spoke.
“Do you remember our mother?” she asked quietly.
“Very vaguely,” Luna responded. “Like you said, I was but an infant when she and Father sacrificed themselves in their plight. I’m afraid the only memories I have of her are just images and feelings, really. And why ask me? Surely you remember her better than I.”
“I’m afraid not, Luna,” Celestia replied sadly. “Ruling the kingdom alone for one thousand years was rather hard on my memory, and regrettably all I remember of either parent is the day we lost them, and the story they asked me to pass on to you when the time was right. Please, Luna, tell me what you can recall.”
“I remember more of Mother than Father,” Luna said wistfully. “She was …” Luna had to pause while she searched for the correct word. “She was radiant. Her mane, wings, and tail shone like the sun, and she always had a loving and gentle smile that was just as bright as the rest of her.”
“And what do you remember of Father then?”
“He was a bit darker, and a bit more mysterious,” Luna answered. “But he was kind and compassionate whenever he could afford to be.”
“How do you think they would have handled today?” Celestia asked. Her voice was barely louder than a whisper.
“I don’t know. You said they knew humans had the capacity for harmony, which is why the Elements didn’t destroy all of them outright, but this one is nothing like the humans you talked about. I think they might have something other than vengeance on their minds, and deserve a chance to prove it.” Luna smirked slightly before adding, “Besides, nearly two hundred thousand years of an existence without a spark of magic or an inkling of your true origins makes my incarceration on the moon sound like a slap on the wrist.”
“Yes it does Luna,” Celestia said glumly, the humor not cheering her up in the slightest. “Their crimes and the actions of Nightmare Moon compare in the same manner.”
After seeing her attempt at a self-deprecating joke fall flat, Luna thought hard on something else she could say to make her sister stop sulking. Finally she said, “Celestia, look at the bright side. Had you told Twilight everything about the humans before now, she might not have had to courage to go down there and talk to him.”
Celestia sighed in defeat. “I suppose you’re correct again, Luna. I just wish I could have done something that didn’t require my prized student to lose faith in me to do what she did.”
“A reputation with a friend can be repaired easier than relations with another race,” Luna said. “If you handle the rest of this entire fiasco in a better manner, I think Twilight’s opinion of you will return to its lofty position soon enough.”
“And how do I go about doing that?” Celestia asked. She wasn’t being sarcastic or condescending to Luna; she really valued her sister’s input on the matter. Celestia had noted over the course of the past few days that the younger princess had managed to stay relatively calm and level-headed, and as Celestia felt the sequence of events drive her closer and closer to the edge of panic she found herself relying on Luna’s counsel more and more.
“Well, releasing the human, returning his belongings, and returning him to his vessel were excellent starts,” Luna said, her words being about a third jest and two-thirds serious. “And sparing Twilight and her brother punishment for the time being was a good move. And I dare say appointing a pony as bright as Twilight to be Equestria’s representative while he’s here was a stroke of genius.”
“I get it, Luna,” Celestia interjected tiredly. “Please stop trying to cheer me up and just answer the question.”
Luna sighed in defeat, and said in an all-serious manner, “Celestia, remember what you told me, and what this human told you. The humans have no memory of this world or what happened all those years ago. To them, none of it ever happened. Perhaps it’s time we start acting as if it never happened as well.”
“It’s not that simple, Luna. You don’t know what it looked like, what it felt like, watching your mother and father just disappear in a brilliant flash of light, and knowing that everything you loved and hated in the world is just gone. And then, thousands of years later, realizing that’s all you remember about them.” A solitary tear ran down Celestia’s cheek, only to be wiped away tenderly by Luna’s hoof.
“I know it’s different for you,” Luna said quietly. “I know that I didn’t have the kind of connection that you did with Mother and Father. To me they’re just fuzzy memories. But now, the fate of both worlds that revolve around your namesake relies on you. The past doesn’t define the future, Celestia. You do.”
For a moment, Celestia said nothing. She continued to gaze out at the sky while thinking hard Luna’s words. After a few seconds of contemplation, she said, “Luna, there must be something in our moon dust. One thousand years ago, I was the wise one.”
Luna giggled at the compliment in disguise, and said, “A thousand years of thinking can do wonders for a pony. You ought to try it sometime.” With that, the Princess of the Night turned and quietly left her sister’s study, closing the door softly behind her.
Once she was alone, Celestia allowed herself the first genuine smile she’d experienced in days, and muttered to herself, “There are days when I wish I could, Luna.”
Earlier that day, when he saw Lyra walk towards the little village on the edge of the forest, Max had been under the impression that he had maxed out the weird factor for the day. However, the rest of the day had proved him woefully mistaken and literally taken the weird factor to astronomical levels.
In the span of a little over twenty-four hours, he had become the first human to set foot on another terrestrial planet, met and spoke with a sapient creature from the planet that just happened to be a magical unicorn, watched that unicorn nonchalantly toss multiple scientific principles out the window, managed to get himself arrested by an army of ponies that blindfolded, robbed and stripped him before throwing him in a dungeon, and somehow managed to negotiate his release with a four-legged goddess. The last thing on the list took much less effort than Max had expected, given the situation, but he was willing to hold off on questioning his quick release for the moment.
Now, Max was adding a yet another new object to the list of things he never would have considered possible, but ended up happening within forty-eight hours of touchdown. Princess Celestia had seen it fit to release him from prison as soon as he was dressed, and allowed a chariot to take him back to his landing site. He was riding in a flying, golden chariot pulled by two pegasi, (fully clothed, this time) accompanied by the unicorn Twilight Sparkle. The sun was just beginning to set, and according to Twilight, that meant that the Princess was hard at work making it happen.
Looking out at the sunset, Max just had to let out a sigh. It had been one hell of a day.
“It’s a nice sunset tonight,” Twilight said. She was sitting on the opposite side of the chariot, which was designed to hold four ponies, which was roughly equivalent to one pony and one human. “Sometimes the Princess will make these miniscule adjustments to where the sun appears in the sky when she’s ending a day, and make some spectacular vistas.”
“No kidding,” Max replied, and said nothing more, allowing the silence between him and the unicorn sitting across from him to return.
“Max?” asked Twilight after a few seconds, breaking the silence. “Is… um, is everything alright?”
“Yes, yes. I’m fine.” Max said, snapping out of his thoughts. “It’s just been a bit of a strange day for me is all. But, considering where I was an hour ago, everything is actually pretty good.”
“Heh, yeah, I guess so,” Twilight said and laughed nervously.
“Please, Twilight, don’t feel bad about anything. To be honest, the only part that surprised me was having all my clothes taken away. Where I come from, we’ve been making up stories about what would happen when humans finally met a civilization from another planet for more than a hundred years now, and a lot of those stories ended much worse than today did.”
“So is that what you call yourselves?” Twilight asked. “Humans?”
“Yes, but there are a few different terms we use. Mankind, Humanity, the human race, and people are a few.”
“So if not all the stories went well, what happened?”
“Well, the in worst stories, we didn’t leave home at all; civilizations from other planets come to our planet and try to colonize, enslave, or just destroy us.”
“That sounds awful!” Twilight exclaimed.
“Yeah, most stories like that were pretty bad,” Max said with chuckle. “But there are plenty of other stories where we leave our home planet and found other places, kind of like what I’m doing now.”
“And how do those stories go?” Twilight inquired.
“Most of them go pretty well. In some of the better stories we find other civilizations that are more or less like ours, communicate with them, and establish friendly relationships. But a lot of stories go further, and humans find many other civilizations. We get along with some, others not so well. But the best stories are about the grand adventures of whoever is brave enough to go out and explore the universe. We call those stories science-fiction.”
“Those kinds of stories sound exciting!” Twilight said. If humans managed to combine her two favorite things in the world, science with reading, maybe they weren’t so bad after all. “Have you read all of these stories?”
Max actually laughed at the question. “No, not even close. There are thousands of stories out there, and some are so long and complicated that they take dozens of books to tell. And then someone else likes the story so much that they write their own stories to go with the original one, so you could have hundreds of little stories branching off of the first one. Eventually, some people create entire fictional worlds.”
“It sounds like you humans tell a lot of stories,” Twilight mused.
“Humans have been telling stories for as long as anyone can remember,” Max responded. Then remembering a mental note he made earlier regarding science fiction in pony culture, he asked, “You have fictional stories like that here too, right? You know, stories about you meeting life from other planets?”
“Well, I think so,” Twilight said, tapping her chin with a hoof thoughtfully. “But there aren’t enough stories like that to name a whole sub-genre after it. In fact, I can only think of one story like that off the top of my head. You make it sound like humans take it seriously.”
“We really do,” Max said and chuckled. “Some people take it a little too seriously. Humans have gotten really good at coming up with stories, and you’d be surprised how many people prefer the worlds in their books over the real world.”
“Actually, I used to be like that myself,” Twilight said, ignoring Max’s inquisitive expression.
“What do you mean by that?” Max asked.
“Well, I told you I was from Ponyville, right?” she said, and Max nodded. “Well, I wasn’t born there. I was actually born in Canterlot, the city where we just were. And I’m Princess Celestia’s personal student, so I spent a lot of time studying, reading, and learning everything I could about magic. It got to the point where I was spending so much time studying that I never spent time with other ponies.”
“Hmph,” Max chuckled. “Sounds like my first two years of college.”
“College?” Twilight repeated with curiosity.
“It’s our general term for additional, specialized education for a specific career,” Max explained. “Humans take their education very seriously, and I had to go through some especially rigorous education to be qualified for this mission.”
“Oh, that sounds kind of like what I’m doing right now,” Twilight said thoughtfully. “Except I got a bit too involved in my studies while I lived in Canterlot, so the Princess sent me to live in Ponyville where I could make some friends.”
“You were kicked out of school for being TOO studious?” Max said incredulously.
“What? No, no. It’s nothing like that,” Twilight clarified. “I’m continuing my studies of magic and other things in Ponyville. In fact, now I’m studying the most powerful kind of magic.”
Max raised an eyebrow questioningly. They already control the weather AND planet’s rotation! What on Earth could possibly be more powerful than that? he thought nervously, and then reminded himself that he was not ‘on Earth,’ and in fact was as far from Earth as anyone had ever been. “And what exactly is the most powerful kind of magic?” he asked, almost scared of what Twilight would say.
“It’s the magic of friendship,” Twilight answered proudly.
For a second, Max thought he’d misheard the unicorn due to the wind. But even though they were in an open chariot flying at least a hundred feet above the ground at what Max guessed to be somewhere between thirty-five and forty miles per hour, there was very little wind noise. Before, Max had decided that this was simply some kind of magic that hadn’t been explained to him yet, an assumption he’d been applying to almost everything he’d seen today that should have been impossible, like the flying chariot itself.
“Sorry; did you say the magic of friendship?” Max said, leaning towards Twilight slightly as if getting closer would make her say something that made sense.
“Yes I did,” Twilight said just as proudly as before.
First it’s weather control and telekinesis, then planetary rotation and lunar orbits, and now this? Max thought to himself. The first four uses of magic at least were at least concrete functions that Max could imagine, but something as abstract as friendship requiring magic was something of a stretch. “Is everything here powered by some sort of magic?” Max asked.
“Pretty much,” Twilight answered plainly.
“Well, I’m sure you’ve been able to figure this out by now, but on my planet we don’t have any magic, so this is all kind of new to me.”
“Oh, we knew that before you even landed,”Twilight said casually.
“How did you–” Max began to ask incredulously, but caught himself. “Wait, don’t tell me…magic,” he deadpanned.
“Max, I think you’re starting to get it,” Twilight responded happily.
“I highly doubt it,” Max mumbled to himself.
Although it had escaped Max’s notice, the chariot had been flying over the forest for quite some time, and as soon as those last words left his mouth, Twilight pointed excitedly to something behind him with a hoof.
“Look, we’re here!” she said, and Max twisted around to look where she was pointing. Sure enough, he saw the clearing in the forest and the Birdie parked exactly where he’d left it earlier that day. The sun was just starting to dip below the tree line, and they were casting their elongated shadows on the spacecraft.
“What do you call that thing again?” Twilight asked as the pegasi pulling the chariot began to descend.
“It has a lot of names, but for simplicity’s sake, you can just call it a space ship,” said Max.
“No way, that’s the name we made up for it!” Twilight exclaimed.
“You don’t say…” Max deadpanned again.
By now, the chariot was getting ready to land, and Max grabbed onto the sides to brace for the landing. Surprisingly, the touchdown was very smooth, and the pegasi were flying so slowly that they were able stop in just a few yards. When they were completely stopped, Max grabbed his backpack and gun belt, which had been lying on the floor of the chariot next to his feet during the flight, and hopped out. As soon as he was on the ground, he turned back to Twilight.
“Are you sure it’s a good idea for me to move this thing to Ponyville? It’s big, loud, and can be kind of frightening to someone who hasn’t seen it or anything like it before.”
“Don’t worry about a thing,” Twilight said reassuringly. “Right now, guards are going door to door telling everypony in town what’s going on tomorrow, and as long as you’re on time, Pegasus guards will escort you in. We’ll even mark a place for you to land with flashing arrows and everything.”
“Okay…” Max said, still a little hesitant about taking the Birdie and parking in plain view of hundreds of ponies.
“What’s wrong?” Twilight asked, her voice laced with concern.
“Nothing’s wrong, really,” Max replied, scratching the back of his neck nervously. “It’s just that this is all moving pretty fast compared to what I expected. I planned on just hanging back and, well, observing until I knew how to talk to you and was sure I wouldn’t scare anyone. I’d planned to spend days, even weeks doing that, just to be cautious, but things didn’t exactly go as planned.” Max shrugged with the last sentence, emphasizing his point.
“Hey, everything worked out in the end, right?” Twilight told him optimistically.
There are two hundred million miles and a sun between me and home, Max thought. This is nowhere near the end.
He almost said his last thought out loud, but the words caught in his throat. Max just couldn’t bring himself to say anything contrary to Twilight’s infectiously sunny attitude. The unicorn’s bright smile and wide lavender eyes weren’t quite as potent as Lyra’s lethal pouting, but they still didn’t leave much room for argument.
“Yeah, I guess they did,” Max conceded. “And tomorrow, I believe some proper introductions are finally in order.”
“I’m looking forward to it!” Twilight said excitedly. “Just don’t be late.”
“I wouldn’t dream of it,” Max said, and then let out a lengthy yawn. “Speaking of dreaming, it’s been one wild day for me.”
“I know the feeling,” Twilight said, and then yawned herself. She wouldn’t tell Max, but she hadn’t exactly been sleeping well ever since his space ship appeared in the sky.
“Well, Twilight, Sparkle, I will see you tomorrow morning,” Max said with a tone of finality. He swung his backpack over one shoulder, turned around, and walked towards the Birdie. As he approached the ramp that led up to the hatch, he turned around and waved. Twilight returned the gesture, and as soon as she put her hoof down, the pegasi pulling the now-almost empty chariot began to gallop away. As they took off, Twilight had to strain her eyes in the dimming light to see Max as he walked up the ramp and disappeared into the hatch.
When she could no longer see the human or his vessel, the exhausted unicorn slumped into her seat tiredly. “How long until we reach Ponyville?” she called out to the guards pulling the chariot.
“About half an hour, Miss Sparkle,” one called over his shoulder. “We’ll be going quite a bit faster without all that extra weight.”
The prospect of even just a thirty-minute snooze was just too tantalizing to resist for a pony who had gone days without a proper night’s sleep. Twilight allowed her eyes to drift closed and her head tilt downwards, and spent the next half-hour in a restful state that wasn’t quite sleep, but was definitely a far cry from being fully awake. In this state, the part of her mind that kept track of time was powered down, and it felt as if only a few minutes passed before Twilight was pulled out of her trance by the gentle jolting of the chariot wheels touching the ground.
“Here we are, Miss; Golden Oaks Library,” said one of the guards.
Twilight yawned, stretched, and carefully clambered out of the chariot and on the ground. “Thank you, gentlemen,” she said dreamily, and after nodding politely, the two guards galloped off, pulling their chariot back into the air. While she was snoozing, the sky had completely darkened, making way for a clear, crisp spring night. Twilight turned and watched as the chariot took off again and soared into the sky, headed for Canterlot. When she could no longer distinguish it from the multitude of twinkling stars, she turned and lazily meandered back towards her front door. Light coming from the windows illuminated the surrounding ground with rectangular patches of light, and the faint sound of clanking dishes and running water could be heard coming from inside.
When Twilight pushed the door open and stepped inside, she a familiar “Whooo!” as Owlowiscious swooped down from his perch on a tall bookshelf to greet her. She extended a leg for the bird to land on and nuzzled him affectionately.
“I missed you too, Owlowiscious,” she said, and the owl flew back up to his perch just as a particular baby dragon came bounding out of the kitchen.
“Twilight! You’re back!” Spike said happily, and wrapped his arms around Twilight’s foreleg and immediately began pelting her with questions. “How did your research go? What were you researching? What happened with the stars? What are all the guards for? What did they mean when they said–”
Twilight put a hoof over Spike’s mouth, and hugged him back. “Everything is fine, Spike, and something incredible has happened.” She paused to yawn again, and said, “But I’ll explain everything tomorrow morning. I am positively exhausted right now.”
“Oh, sorry,” Spike, said, releasing Twilight’s leg and backing up a step. “Do you at least want to hear what happened while you were out?”
Twilight highly doubted that anything more interesting or noteworthy had occurred in Ponyville than what had happened in Canterlot, but she decided to humor her faithful assistant. “Of course I would, Spike,” she said kindly, but before the baby dragon could say anything, she added, “On the way to bed.” Twilight gestured with a hoof to the stairwell, and slowly began to trudge in its direction.
Spike quickly caught up with her and began to relate the events of the past few days. “You remember that research session you arranged with Lyra last week?” he asked, and Twilight nodded silently. “Well, she came by after you left, and she wanted to know about that author spell you found a few weeks ago.”
Twilight nodded again, this time adding on a contemplative “Mm-Hmm” as she dragged herself up the stairs. She vaguely remembered coming across that particular spell and casually mentioning it to Lyra in passing a few days later.
“I got the book and loaned it out to her,” Spike continued. “And the next day she came back with these weird drawings of some strange image that the spell created.”
Twilight had just reached the top stair when finished the last sentence, and despite her sleep deprivation, she found her interests piqued by her assistant’s last statement. Whatever Spike was talking about was more likely than not connected somehow to reason Lyra had gone off into the forest the previous night, and that was something Twilight had been dying to know ever since Max brought up her name. She turned around to face Spike and said, “What strange image?”
Spike, who was still a few stairs behind her, suddenly found himself looking up at a unicorn that, thanks to the steps between them, appeared twice as tall as she normally did, and her sleep-deprived, slightly bloodshot eyes stared down at him questioningly. It was not a pretty sight “Heh, maybe you really should be getting to bed, Twilight,” he said nervously. “You don’t look so good.”
“Spike, this could be important,” Twilight said sternly. “What happened with Lyra?”
The baby dragon hopped up the last few stairs to level himself with Twilight and remove some of the intimidation, and said, “She said the spell showed her something really weird that wasn’t a pony when she played an old family tune, and we both looked for hours, but we couldn’t find anything like her drawings in the library.”
“Did she leave any of the drawings here?” Twilight enquired, suddenly very awake and very interested in what Spike had to say.
“No, but I can tell you sort of what they looked like,” Spike offered. Twilight’s sudden change in demeanor had him somewhat worried, and very curious as to why exactly she was so keen on knowing what Lyra had been looking for.
“Then what did they look like?” Twilight pressed on, getting a little anxious.
“It was some weird kind of animal,” Spike said thoughtfully, trying to recreate the images in his head. “It was kind of tall and skinny with only two legs, but it also had arms and these weird claw-type finger things, but without the claws. The head was kind of small too.”
Twilight could only stare at the baby dragon in bewilderment. Spike had just described the basic shape of a human, and the only human she’d ever seen had just dropped out of the sky the just over twenty-four hours prior. “When was this?” she asked.
“This was all two, maybe three days ago. Twilight, are you sure everything’s okay? You look really worried about all this.” Spikes eyes widened in worry and he asked, “Lyra isn’t in any trouble, is she?”
Twilight sighed, allowing her drowsiness to overtake her once again. Whatever was going on with Lyra merited serious investigation, but if she or Spike was going to get any sleep tonight, this would have to wait until morning. “No, Spike. She’s fine, and I am too. I’ve just been staying up late researching every night for the past few nights, and I really need some proper sleep.”
Twilight turned and headed for her bedroom, but before she reached the door, she felt a scaly pair of arms encircle one of her forelegs again. She looked down so see Spike hugging her again.
The tiny dragon looked up at her, his eyes full of worry. “Are you sure you’re okay?” he asked. “You can tell me whatever’s going on.”
When Twilight saw how concerned Spike was for her, her heart almost melted. She reached up with her other foreleg to pat him on the head tenderly. “I’m fine, Spike. And soon there won’t be any explaining to do. You’ll see everything tomorrow morning, I promise.”
Spike finally seemed satisfied with the answer, and let go of Twilight. They entered the bedroom silently, and entered their respective sleeping arrangements. Spike crawled into his basket and curled up under the blanket, and Twilight flopped down on the comforting, familiar sheets of her bed. Once she was properly snuggled up with all of her blankets and pillows, she called out softly, “Goodnight, Spike.”
“Goodnight, Twilight,” he called back, and promptly began snoring.
Twilight had to suppress a giggle at Spike knocking himself out so quickly, but once she was sure he was totally asleep, darker thoughts began to creep into her mind. If Lyra had somehow stumbled upon something mentioning humans, or at least detailing what they looked like before he even set foot on Equestrian soil, then there was certainly more to know about them then everything she currently knew. And that line of though all but confirmed her brother’s suspicion that Celestia knew more than she was letting on. But what could be so terrible that a ruler as open and caring to her subjects as Celestia would keep secrets from them? The better question was, why wouldn’t Celestia tell everything to the select few that she chose to inform about Max’s arrival in the first place?
By now, Twilight could see no reasonable doubt that this wasn’t the first time a human had set foot in Equestria. But as her exhaustion finally pulled her into a deep sleep, three questions echoed throughout her consciousness. When were they here? Why did they leave? Why don’t they remember?