//------------------------------//
// Chapter 6: Party 
// Story: Xenophilia: Advanced 
// by SpinelStride 
//------------------------------//

We didn't stop with just three sets of results. I don't think I could have stopped Twilight from drawing up a six-month project plan if I had tried. I was able to distract her by pointing out all of the other experiments that were still waiting to be done. She would have been unhappy afterward if she had gone so far into a single subject, so it would have been an unkindness to let her continue too far.

She struck a balance by spending the rest of that day getting a series of samples among all the different types of ponies in Ponyville. I became very familiar with the expression of 'cautious curiosity.' I don't think this was the first time Twilight has invited public participation in experiments. After making some frankly brilliant adjustments to the equipment to allow for basic timing records, she divided the group into ten samples. Three sets were wholly pegasi, three sets were wholly unicorns, and three sets were wholly earth ponies. One set of each tribe was instructed that the balls should strike at the same time, one set was instructed that the lead ball should strike first, and the third group was given no instructions about what to expect. The tenth group was comprised of one pegasus filly, one unicorn filly, and one earth pony filly, with no instructions given to them about what to expect. Twilight Sparkle kept the tenth group for last.

The results were illuminating. There was a clear variance in effect between the pony tribes; the influence of the pegasi was visibly more intense than that of the unicorns, while the effect of the unicorns' observation was in turn distinctly stronger than the influence of the earth ponies. Any group specifically informed that the balls were to strike at the same time was statistically more likely to see that phenomenon, though the lead ball did hit first more often than the wooden ball even among these groups, most often among the pegasi. Some preconceptions do not disappear even on the word of an authority figure in a lab coat, even Twilight Sparkle.

Twilight produced a cross-correlation that I lacked the information to pursue even if it had occurred to me to try. She had a chart of the speed of each pegasus in Ponyville, rated on a scale of wingpower. Plotting the time differential of the dropped balls to the wingpower of the individual participant produced a clear linear relationship. The stronger the pegasus, the greater the difference between the lead ball and the wooden ball. The greatest difference was between Rainbow Dash, for whom the lead ball promptly slammed to the bottom and the wooden ball lazily rolled down, and Fluttershy, who demonstrated very little perceptible effect at all.

Twilight was tremendously excited by these results; she was literally bouncing around the laboratory, and her eyes were doing that sparkling thing again. "Gus! Gus!" she sang out. "Empirical proof! Total validation! Pegasus magic is innately connected to gravity, cross-related to ego as related by wingpower! There's going to be a whole new field of study based on this! We'll call it Sparkology! No! Gusology! Gusparkology!"

I waited for her to finish. It didn't seem useful to interrupt. She eventually noticed that I wasn't bouncing along with her, and she promptly came back to my side. I think she looked contrite.

"I'm sorry, Gus. I didn't mean to get so excited when you can't even feel it," she said.

I patted her head. "You have every right to be excited. It doesn't bother me that I can't join you. I have a question, though. What did you mean when you said pegasus gravity control is cross-related to ego?"

Twilight blinked, then said, "Oh! Of course, you don't know everypony. I noticed the effect back when Ponyville had Tornado Duty, providing the water for Cloudsdale. We were measuring the wingpower of every pegasus in town to see whether we could break the record for total wingpower, and I made some very rough estimates of the individual force of ego of each pegasus. There was a very strong relationship. I didn't have specific numerical values I could attach, only a basic ranking from one to ten of each pegasus' confidence, with Fluttershy as a one and Rainbow Dash as a ten."

"I take it that the ones who thought they were the best fliers were the best fliers," I said. "Normally that would be an indication of accurate self-assessments."

Twilight nodded. "That's why I didn't bother showing my results to anypony. But in this context, I think it might be the other way around! Pegasi who think they're the best fliers are the best fliers precisely because they think so!"

Twilight's eyes sparkled again. "Oh! Data points in favor of the hypothesis! Rainbow Dash has the most ego and is the best flier, but when she got nervous before the Best Young Fliers competition she could barely stay in the air, but when she stopped thinking about herself and started thinking about how she had to fly faster to catch Rarity then she rainboomed! And when Rainbow Dash was Discorded, she may have been subconsciously sabotaging herself, while Fluttershy was able to catch her because Fluttershy wasn't thinking about being a bad flier or being high in the air, she was thinking about helping her friend!" She hopped and clapped her front hooves together.

"It would probably be possible to test that theory via hypnosis, if ponies can be hypnotized," I suggested.

Twilight frowned at me. "Ponies can be, but I'm specifically banned from doing any mind-altering magics without an alicorn personally attending unless the safety of Equestria is at stake. There was an incident with a Want-It-Need-It spell. And between that incident and Discord doing mind-magic and a few other things, I don't think hypnosis is in very good repute in Ponyville at the moment. I'll put that down for a later experiment."

She looked around at the wreckage of the lab. That tenth group may have violated several other laws of physics. Apparently not satisfied that dropping balls down an inclined plane was 'science' enough, those three fillies somehow stacked several workbenches on top of each other and dropped many more objects from near the ceiling than just a lead ball and a wooden ball. Twilight did manage to get all of the fires out before they got too large.

"Why don't you go have dinner with Lero and the girls, Gus?" she suggested. "I'll clean up in here and meet you later."

***

Pinkie Pie joined us for dinner at the library, where Lero's herd lived. Despite her excellent cooking, she left the food to Lero. Her explanation was straightforward enough: "You just don't mess with another cook's kitchen," with what I assumed was a rare degree of seriousness.

Rainbow Dash flitted about the place like a mayfly. Not unexpected, considering all I'd seen of her thus far. "So did I win?" she demanded.

My reflextive reaction was to ask "Win what?" but I stopped before saying it. The answer was obvious. "You had the largest difference of all the participants," I told her.

"Yes!" She pumped a forehoof and performed what can only be described as a midair strut. "Greatest at science too! Oh yeah!"

"How come you didn't ask me to try, Gus?" asked Pinkie Pie, giving me a smile. "I bet I could've done lots of science!"

"Twilight Sparkle said, and I quote, 'Science runs away screaming when Pinkie Pie is near.' You seem to have impressed her," I said.

Pinkie giggled. "Silly Twi. She's still fixated on Episode Fifteen. We're way past that!"

"Just go with it," Lero suggested.

I asked anyway. "Does Twilight Sparkle have 'episodes' that routinely?"

Pinkie shook her head. Then tilted her head, thought about it, and nodded. "Hey, yeah, she does! You're good at this, Gus!" She beamed at me. After a few seconds she frowned and pulled a clipboard and pencil from her mane with her hooves. That might be another experiment to investigate later. "Okay, 'praise' isn't it," she mumbled, and tapped the clipboard. "Oh! I know!"

I have no idea whatsoever where she got a bag of flour or why she broke it over her head and said "Ta-da!" to me. Lero and Rainbow Dash were clearly startled, while Lyra remained difficult to read. "Wow, you're a toughie," she said. "That one always works."

"Covering yourself in flour?" I asked.

"You are so not making Spike clean that up," Rainbow Dash warned.

"Clean what up?" Pinkie asked. Everything went to numbers.

I was flat on my back staring up into Pinkie's horrified face when I could see again.

"I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry" and then I could only make out rapid repetitive sounds, so she was probably saying "I'm sorry" faster and faster. She started to cry and hugged me while I was still on the ground. Her voice slowed back down. "I didn't mean to! It was supposed to be funny!"

"What the hay just happened?" asked Rainbow Dash. She was hovering over me, behind Pinkie. "Nopony did any magic or anything, right? Twilight told us about you and magic. Was it a song? I didn't hear anything."

"It was my fault!" Pinkie sobbed. "I won't do it again! I promise!" Her hair fell down from those bouncy curls and drooped flat against the side of her head.

There was only one thing I could possibly do. "We should have a 'Gus Is Okay' party," I told her.

Her eyes widened, and they sparkled. That really did look painful. Her mouth opened in a smile so large it appeared to deform her skull. She hugged me again, so hard I felt my ribs creaking. My heartbeat was a blue balloon thudding in my ears.

And then she let go, and she was standing on her hind hooves. "Yes yes yes yes yes!" she squealed out. She reached to the side - and then she stopped, her eyes wide again, and she exclaimed, "I'll be right back! I've gotta go get a Party Cannon!" She was gone in an eyeblink. Honestly.

Lero knelt down and helped me sit up. "Are you all right?" he asked.

"I feel fine," I told him.

Rainbow Dash was hovering in place, looking at me with her jaw open. "Did... you... just..." She stammered. I waited. ".... Did you just beat Pinkie Pie to suggesting a party?"

Lyra didn't move, but she caught my attention. The numbers were around her. I wasn't blacking out otherwise, but where the unicorn had been, the numbers were there. Not just numbers. Waveforms. Possibilities. Laws. Everything mixed into one. She was part of them, but she was observing them at the same time. Part of the numbers made a choice, and probability moved under Rainbow Dash's chin. The blue pegasus' jaw was lifted up, and reality reasserted itself. I could still sense hints of patterns dancing along Rainbow Dash's wings. It made it hard to see her feathers.

Lyra looked at me. Her eyes widened. "Gus? That didn't hurt you, did it? I didn't cast anywhere near you."

I realized I was staring at her and hadn't been listening to something. "I don't know," I said. "Your magic. It was... different."

Lero's head lifted up and he sniffed at the air. "The fish!" he exclaimed, and ran for the kitchen. I could see black smoke coming out through the door. I sniffed.

I didn't smell anything. At all.

***

According to Lero, the 'Gus Is Okay' party was a restrained affair by Pinkie Pie standards. She wheeled an actual cannon through the door, though she was panting from the exertion. "I usually don't have to pull them very far!" was her rationale, so presumably she normally hosted parties near her cannon storage, probably Sugarcube Corner. She then looked at me, looked at the cannon, shoved it back outside, and started decorating the library by hoof, tossing streamers around and blowing up balloons.

She supplied a cake and a platter of cookies, and somehow was able to get Lero's other friends to come by on short notice. The other Elements of Harmony, along with a cream-colored mare with a blue and pink mane who Lyra introduced to me as her old roommate, Bon Bon. Twilight Sparkle brought out a gramophone, but before she started it up she made me sit down, and they watched carefully. The music played and I was unaffected, and there was an exceedingly well-synchronized exhalation from the ponies.

Pinkie Pie started watching me very intently once the music was going, so I visually searched the room for some sign of what she was expecting to happen. Applejack and Rainbow Dash were talking, Lyra was sitting next to Bon Bon in what looked like a physiologically unsuitable posture, Lero was sitting on the floor talking quietly with Fluttershy. Twilight Sparkle was dancing to the music, presumably. Moving spastically in front of the gramophone, at any rate. I pointed at her. Pinkie Pie nodded enthusiastically. I shrugged to indicate neutrality. Pinkie started to make a gesture, paused, then shrugged back at me. Still trying to make me smile.

***

Twilight Sparkle joined me back at the laboratory in the morning. She was energetic despite the sustained physical exertion of her excitement yesterday. "Good morning, Gus!" she called out to me. "Can we do radios today? I thought very hard about everything Lero's ever said about technology on your world and radios sound like a very key central piece."

I considered it. A spark-gap transmitter and a crystal radio set might be possible to put together. If I remembered it all right. We'd need to make a capacitor first to make the transmitter, and then I'd have to see if I could make a set of earphones to receive with, even if all it would receive would be crackles. And then a diode of some kind. But before that, there was a more fundamental issue. Several of them, in fact.

"That would be a multidisciplinary process," I explained. "Radio waves are themselves a form of light outside the visible spectrum, so first we would want to perform comparative experiments in optics to see if radio waves even exist here. Then the process for generating radio waves, or at least the method we could potentially use here, involves properties of electricity that might be different as well. And then we'd need some sort of earphones to hear the sound with."

"Earphones we can do!" Twilight said eagerly. "I can borrow a set from Vinyl Scratch!"

I should have recalled Twilight's gramophone. They had that much technology, so records weren't out of reach. They might be magical earphones, but we might be able to make them work to translate electrical impulses into sound. We'd have to cross that gap when we came to it.

"Earphones are the last step in the process. We can't do anything unless we know how electricity works," I said.

"I think Rainbow Dash is at work this morning, but I can try to find another pegasus who could help," Twilight suggested. I was starting to get a handle on her emotional expressions. I could see her shifting rapidly from disappointment at not getting to make a radio into excitement at another round of comparative science.

"Before we bring in another pony, can you tell me what Equestrian physics says about electricity?" I asked.

Twilight blushed. "Oh! Of course. Sorry, Gus. I'm just so excited I keep forgetting you want to know my side too."

I didn't correct her. I knew what she meant. She took a deep breath.

"Lightning is the fundamental form of electricity. Lightning is created as a magical wave either naturally when a magical charge accumulates in clouds, or when a pegasus consciously chooses to concentrate ambient magic to cause such an effect. The most common form of lightning is the traditional jagged-bolt form, which delivers a precise burst of kinetic energy, heat, and light to a specific point. This form can range in potency from the hoary pegasus 'cloudbuzzer' prank to frighteningly dangerous intensities. Lightning travels along the path of least resistance from its origin to the lowest-magic point it can reach, which is why it is able to be directed by lightning rods, as these provide a ready-made, safe path.

"An alternate manifestation of lightning is the 'crackle' form, rarely seen in modern times in large scale except in aerial displays or in 'wild' areas such as the Everfree Forest. 'Crackle' lightning tends to be white rather than yellow, moves more quickly, and is much narrower, with multiple branching 'arms' that may loop back to the main bolt. A very minor variant of 'crackle' lightning can be seen in the form of 'static electricity,' often a result of being struck by lightning or during mane brushing in hot, dry areas.

"Electricity gets its name from linguistic drift, dating back to an ancient story regarding mythical seaponies. It is said that a favorite prank on their part was to trick sailors and pegasi fisherponies into consuming portions of a certain type of eel, which used lightning as a defensive measure. As soon as a pony tongue touched their dinner, they would receive a powerful shock, to the amusement of the seaponies. The term 'eel-lick-tricks' developed as a shorthand from some lost original phrase, describing the prank, and over time lost its separation into distinct words, becoming a term for any use of lightning in non-cloud form."

Twilight bobbed her head to the sides for several seconds, as though looking through a set of invisible bookshelves, then nodded. "It's far from a complete examination of the subject and completely lacking in any useful specifics, but that's the schoolfilly version of it. Lero's told me that lightning on your world all acts like 'crackle' lightning, but he doesn't know much else about it. Your turn!"

I nodded. "Without going into too many details, then." I considered. It would be difficult to discuss electrons without going into atomic theory to at least some extent, but Twilight had requested to not know about that at Lero's prompting. I could restrict the topic to just electrons and 'other particles.' That seemed like it would work.

"In our world, electricity is the movement of extremely small particles called 'electrons' from one place to another. Electrons normally are attached to other particles, but in some circumstances can be made to move separately. A single electron carries with it an electrical charge of very low intensity, but they are small enough that a lot of electrons can move simultaneously. Electrical charge will move from an area of high charge into an area of low charge. When this happens from a cloud to the ground, which is usually the lowest area of charge around, the resultant cascade of electrons is called lightning. Lightning rods provide a minimally-resistant path to the ground, as they do here.

"Electricity is tightly coupled to the magnetic force; a magnet rotating within a conductor will cause an electrical charge to form. This is called electromagnetism. There are other forces that are also coupled to electromagnetism, but they shouldn't be relevant to anything we can do with the materials at hand. Similarly, running electrical current through a conductor wrapped around a material such as an iron bar will cause the bar to become magnetic while the current flows, and in some cases persist in weaker form afterward.

"Electricity gets its name from an older language's word for amber; it was called 'electrum' in that language. Electricity was named for the phenomenon where rubbing a piece of amber with a silk cloth would cause sparks; things that also made sparks were behaving like electrum, thus were 'electric.'"

Twilight rubbed her chin with a hoof. "Tiny particles? How small? Grains of sand?"

I shook my head. "A grain of sand would have quintillions of electrons in it."

Twilight blinked at me. "Quintillions. A one followed by eighteen zeroes. In one grain of sand."

I nodded. Twilight took a deep breath. "You come from a really weird world, Gus. How'd anypony even count that many electrons?"

"Statistics, theory, and math," I said.

"Weird but good," Twilight amended with a smile. "Okay. So I'm pretty sure it doesn't work, since somepony would have noticed it by now, but let's try your thing with the magnet and the conductor. You do mean a wire and not somepony who works on a train, right?"

"Correct," I said, and we got to work assembling the apparatus.

The lab had magnets, and the lab had wire. We set up a treadmill to spin the magnet and wrapped fine copper wire around it, with a wooden framework to hold the wires in place just off of the magnet. Every time Twilight used her magic to move things, I couldn't see her or her target at all, only sense the probability waveforms in those areas. I don't have any word but 'sense' for it; it wasn't seeing or feeling. Since all we were trying to do was determine whether any electrical energy was being generated, heat would suffice for an effect, so we simply ran the copper wire out a little ways where I could touch it with a finger and see if it was hot, laid atop a nonconductive glass plate. Not an intensely rigorous process, but I thought it would work.

If it would work at all. As best we could determine, it did not. Twilight ran on the treadmill at first, then went out and found Rainbow Dash to take her place. The treadmill apparatus certainly worked smoothly; the magnet spun freely and rapidly. The wire did not react at all. It stayed completely cool to the touch throughout the experiment.

We tested further to see if Twilight's presence was influencing the experiment, or Rainbow Dash, but even when both of them left the laboratory and another pony with no idea what we were doing came in, the wire still failed to heat.

Twilight seemed to be pleased by the results. "Not that it wouldn't be fascinating to discover two new fields of study in two days, Gus, but I'm glad to know that we're not totally upending all the physics textbooks," she said. "It would be convenient to be able to make electricity without a pegasus or without using a lightning spell, but we can do experiments with the old standbys."

I of course couldn't care less. Or more. Or at all. But it was another piece of information to consider. "We'll need a capacitor next," I said. "Something to store up the charge until it gets intense enough to ionize the air and jump the gap."

The purple unicorn smiled at me. She became an interaction between forces, and so did a cabinet against the wall. A smaller interaction came over and landed on the table in front of me. I could see Twilight and the object on the table. "Capacitors we have," she said proudly. "Some lightning-based welding techniques use them, among other things. I got an assortment of sizes and strengths. Pegasi have had them for centuries, ever since the very first Neighden jar demonstrated a way to capture lightning in a bottle."

"Then we should be able to build the transmitter," I said. "Figuring out whether it generates radio waves will be the harder part." I thought about it again. "Does your lightning make ozone?"

Twilight clearly ransacked her memory for the word, then shrugged. "I don't know. What's ozone?"

"Ozone is the gas that produces a characteristic smell after a lightning strike," I told her. It seemed like the most likely context in which she'd recognize it.

"Usually all anypony can smell after something gets hit by lightning is smoke," Twilight said.

I considered this. "Even if it hits a lightning rod?"

Twilight rubbed her chin again. "I don't remember smelling anything after a hit on the lightning rod. It's going to be stormy weather in a few days, so maybe we could borrow a thundercloud then and test it?"

"If lightning doesn't produce ozone, it might not cause an ionizing reaction at all," I said.

"Why wouldn't it?" Twilight asked. "If we can see the flash, then obviously it does."

"Why is that obvious?" I asked.

"That's where it gets its name," Twilight said, and then facehoofed. "Or are we using the same word with different meanings and yes of course we are. In Equestria, any reaction that produces light is 'ionizing' because you can keep your eye on it. What does it mean to you?"

"A reaction that causes one particle to end up with a different number of attached electrons," I said.

Twilight sighed. "And there's no such thing as electrons here so we could have gone around that all day. I'm glad we cut that one short. Okay, so how do we find out whether there's an ionizing reaction by your definition, other than getting a thundercloud and smelling it?"

"That wouldn't work for me anyhow," I noted. "I seem to have lost my sense of smell somewhere."

Twilight blinked at me. "What."

"I noticed it yesterday when Lero's fish started burning. I couldn't smell anything. I can breathe perfectly well, but I can't smell at all."

Twilight turned to waveforms and then suddenly back, stomping a hoof on the floor. "Don't break your study buddy," she recited to herself. "Not everypony can do the same things." She took a deep breath and let it out. "Now that brings me back. Sorry, Gus. I'm used to doing spells any time I want. I almost used a spell on you. So. Um. Without magic, I have no idea what anypony could do to investigate you losing your sense of smell. Was it gone when you came to Equestria?"

I shook my head. "I could taste Pinkie's cake before. The human senses of taste and smell are tightly coupled. The cake last night was muted."

Twilight frowned at me. "I think I'd better tell Princess Celestia about this. This might be more serious than continuing to do experiments. Losing one of your senses is a big deal, Gus."

I considered. "Please don't."

Twilight frowned more deeply. "Why not?"

Time for some honesty, then. But without hurting or betraying Pinkie Pie. "I need you to promise to not tell anyone."

Twilight looked at me for several heartbeats, then lifted a hoof and waved it in front of her chest. "Cross my heart and hope to fly, stick a cupcake in my eye," she said, then "Ow!"

That did probably hurt. I told her. "I think it was a result of something Pinkie did after she broke that bag of flour over her head. When I recovered, there was no flour anywhere and I couldn't smell anything. Pinkie would be badly hurt if she thought she did something to injure me, and I think I deflected her with the party. I would rather not raise the issue. Also, I've had another change in symptoms. Magical effects around me are... evident to me now. When you lift things with your magic, I stop seeing or hearing you or your target. I sense numbers and patterns in those areas instead. That's what I meant when I said Lyra's magic was different."

Twilight gaped at me. Then she shook her head. "Gus, you aren't thinking clearly! You absolutely should ask the Princess for help if you're suddenly having whole new symptoms! Fixing things is what princesses do!"

"She told me she doesn't know how to fix me, Twilight," I told her as gently as I could, but I'm very bad at vocal subtleties. Too long without speaking. "It would only hurt her, and hurt Pinkie to find out."

Twilight stared at me. I watched her breathing hard. She stared at me more. Slowly she relaxed. "I... I'm sorry, Gus. You should be scared. You should be really scared. I know why you're not, but I still feel scared for you. But then seeing you not be scared of it, that makes me feel like you're being brave, even if I know better, and it makes me feel braver too." She took one more deep breath. "But I promised, and breaking a promise is a good way to lose a friend."

I felt a sudden surge, and everything began to disappear. I staggered. But it stopped, and I didn't lose my senses, and I caught my balance. A few seconds later, there was a knock on the door, and then Pinkie Pie stuck her head in. "Forever!" she said, then bit her lower lip and waved a hoof. "Sorry." And then she pulled back and closed the door.

Twilight looked at the door, then stared at me. "Gus? I think she knows." She looked at the door again, then at me again. "... Sweet Celestia, did Pinkie Pie literally break your brain?"

I nodded. "Probably. If Pinkie already knows, then you can tell Celestia in your report. But we don't need to stop for today."

Twilight looked at the door, then back at me one more time. "So... you want to do something about ozone that doesn't involve smelling?"

I nodded again. "Not ozone specifically. There's a simple test we can do that should tell me whether electrochemical reactions work at all."

Twilight blinked. "Electrochemical? Making lightning out of chemicals?" She paused. "You said you're not going into anything that might make a Horshoema," she cautiously reminded me.

"Nothing close to it," I assured her, then corrected myself. "Or close to Hiroshima. Similarity in names and suffering a destructive incident aside, the actual cause may have been very different."

"That's not totally reassuring," Twilight pointed out, but frowned. "Well, what do you have in mind?"

"I need a sealed glass tank of fresh water, two wires, a pegasus, and a match," I told her.

***

All of those items were easily acquired. It was another high school science demonstration, if it worked. I was neutral in my expectations. I still didn't know whether I was locked inside my own mind or not, so taking everything at face value was my only sane option. I declined to explain to Twilight what the experiment was supposed to do precisely so she wouldn't be able to form any expectations of her own, having seen the observer effect in play before. She was notably displeased, but accepted my rationale.

Water is made of an oxygen atom with two hydrogen atoms attached by a covalent bond. Supply free electrons and that bond can be broken, resulting ultimately in separate oxygen molecules and hydrogen molecules. Open the tank, wave a lit match, and there should be a brief but impressive fireball as the hydrogen is ignited, combines with the oxygen, and returns to being water.

Rainbow Dash was willing enough to cooperate, bringing a small thundercloud into the laboratory and stomping lightning bolts out of it into the wires until the water was boiling and the tank was creaking. She was less patient about waiting for it to cool back down, and soon departed. Twilight and I waited. If this worked, then at least electrochemical reactions did happen. If not, there were a lot of things I knew that weren't going to work at all. If the water in the tank was at the starting level after it cooled, then none of the water had been converted to hydrogen and oxygen.

Same level. I opened the top and waved a match across, but nothing at all happened. I extinguished the match in the water.

"I don't think radios are possible here," I told Twilight. "If there's no electrochemical reactions, then... to make it short, then the reaction that makes the radio waves won't happen."

Twilight sighed and flopped her head down on a table. "So now will you tell me what that was supposed to be doing, at least, even if it won't do it now and never could?"

I nodded. "Water is a compound of two gases. Running electric current through them should make it separate into its component parts. It didn't work."

Twilight looked at the tank, now with a matchstick floating in it. "Water's made out of two gases? Gus, I may have mentioned this before, but your world is really weird."

I looked at the tank, too. Something was percolating in my head. Then it came together. "There has to be something more going on," I said.

"Why's that?" Twilight asked.

"If electrochemical reactions are completely impossible, I ought to be very, very dead," I explained.

Twilight stared at me. "Gus. I know about the brain injury. I know about the lack of emotions. But could you please pretend to panic just a little when you say things like that?" Her mane was starting to frizz up.

"I'm not dead," I said. "Therefore we don't know everything."

Twilight frowned at me. "Are you quoting someone? That sounded sort of like Aristrotle."

I shook my head. "The human nervous system operates on an electrochemical basis. If electrochemical reactions don't work at all, I should be dead. I am not dead, therefore either my brain is not operating on an electrochemical basis, or we are misunderstanding our results."

Twilight bounced to her feet. "I have just the thing! Wait right here! We're going to do brain scans!" She clapped her hooves together, and then teleported away.

If I have another dream with Luna, I'm going to show her 'Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow.' If she's got a mad scientist on her hooves, she should get familiar with the genre.

Twilight returned more mundanely, walking, along with Lero and Lyra, and a large red pony pulling a cart laden with what looked like old computers and a colander with wires attached to it.

"Exactly what are we doing here?" Lero asked, while Twilight turned into a froth of probability and took charge of the cartload.

"Some of the basic physics behind human bodies doesn't seem to work here," I told him. "We're going to look into why we're still alive."

Lero looked at what I presume was Twilight. "Is there any chance that you might find out we shouldn't be alive and then it might come true?" he asked. It was a very reasonable question.

Fortunately, I had considered it. "I don't think so. We are alive and we know we're alive, so if the observer effect is in play, we have a very strong pre-existing bias in favor of continuing to be alive."

"I'm not sure I like 'think so' as your basis for risking Lero's life," Lyra said evenly. It was again a reasonable point.

Twilight resolved into my perception. "If there was absolutely any chance this could hurt Lero, I would blow up this lab right now and build Gus a new house with my bare hooves," she told Lyra firmly. "Lero and Gus are alive and fine right now, and this is not going to even cast magic on either of them. The scan is completely passive."

Lyra shifted her hooves. It was a slight movement, and I don't think either Twilight or Lero noticed. It seemed significant. "What was that?" I asked.

"What was what?" Twilight asked.

Lyra turned her head to look at me. She looked very calm, very inexpressive. "It's called The Rock Before The Waterfall. You're very observant." She moved again, bringing her hooves closer together. "And I shouldn't have done it."

"Done what?" asked Twilight, looking bewildered. I was really getting very good at reading her expressions.

"Let myself think about getting into a fight with you over whether Lero can go through with this," Lyra said, still very evenly. "Lero can decide for himself and I trust you, and it was a very unworthy response on my part."

Twilight stared at the other unicorn, then shook her head. "What? Wait, Lyra, you were getting ready to attack me? I didn't see you do anything. What?"

Lyra stepped back one pace. "Gus noticed. I wasn't getting ready to attack. I was thinking about getting ready to attack and I started to move accordingly, which itself tells me I'm reacting incorrectly. If you'll excuse me, I need to meditate for a few minutes." She then performed a very crisp about-face and walked out of the lab.

Twilight gaped at the door. "... Over a brain scan?"

Lero hugged his purple unicorn. "I think she's feeling protective."

She hugged him back. "Lero, I would never in a million years do any experiment if I thought there was any chance it could hurt you. I would set every science book in the library on fire and use them to melt down every piece of equipment I have before I would do anything that would hurt you."

He kissed her. The mechanics of the process were themselves probably some sort of physics experiment, but they seemed happy with it.

The red pony cleared his throat. Twilight Sparkle squeaked and broke the kiss. "Oh! Right. Um, Big Mac, if you'd just stand right here? This will only take a minute."

The red pony nodded his head. "Ayup." He stepped into place next to the device with the metal colander, which Twilight placed on his head. I watched. The wires attached to the colander shimmered in the way I was coming to associate with 'low level magical effect' but the part on his head stayed in clear focus. The rest of the apparatus almost went out of view, but not quite. A printer of some sort chattered, and Twilight pinned up the resultant paper to the wall.

"OKay," she said. "Here's our normal pony brain. We can see regular healthy magical potentia all throughout, with different areas showing different levels of activity. We know there are magichemical interactions taking place as well. Totally passive, just monitoring the byproducts of thinking, totally safe. Now, Lero, if you'll put it on?"

Lero plucked the device off of Big Mac's head. "What's this part called?" he asked.

Twilight opened her mouth, then shrugged. "The part that came with the scanner was faulty, and they never did get me a working one, so I replaced it with one of those things from the kitchen you drain pasta in." She sounded defensive as she added, "Spike got another one." She sounded more defensive when she further added, "I don't know everything you know! Spike likes to cook, I deliberately don't learn about making more than sandwiches and other simple meals so I don't impinge on his specific area of expertise! It's being thoughtful and self-aware of my own tendency to make others self-conscious about not being as informed as I am about their hobbies! I've worked very hard to not familiarize myself with cookware and cooking terminology!"

Apparently I am observant.

Lero cleared his throat. Twilight cut herself short. Lero put the colander on his head.

"Right," said Twilight. "Okay. This will just be a moment. And... done." The printer chattered again. Twilight pulled out the paper and held it up. I couldn't see it or her.

"Magic," I said. If Twilight replied, I couldn't tell. I saw her again with another sheet of paper on the wall.

"Sorry," she said. "So, as I was saying. There's zero magical activity on display, but there is a significant amount of electrical activity. An entire field of it, in fact, with some similarities in patterns to the magical activity in a pony brain. There has to be some kind of interaction taking place between the electrical activity and the physical structures of Lero's brain, or else he wouldn't be able to think at all. But I don't know what that interaction is or how it works. Gus, do you have any idea?"

I looked at the image. It did look like a brain map. I hadn't tried neurology when I was bouncing between majors, so that was all the insight I had to offer. But the longer I looked at the image of Lero's brain, the more one particular idea came to mind. It wasn't all that much more likely than a number of other possibilities, but this one kept having a blue balloon tied to it.

"It's possible that chemical reactions and electrical activity themselves are subject to an observer effect, and Lero's brain chemistry is serving to act as an observer to the electrical energy, while the electrical field is acting as an observer on the chemical interactions," I suggested.

Twilight peered at the brain scan. "That's a pretty specific hypothesis," she said. "What makes you think that?"

"Just a hunch," I said.

Twilight whirled to look at me for some reason. I waited. She looked at me for longer, then pointed. "Your turn," she said.

I traded places with Lero. I felt fine with the colander on my head. Nothing went mathematical. The wires themselves were a little shimmery. It took a minute or so, then the printer chattered. Lero pulled the paper off and stuck it to the wall this time.

Most of my brain was covered with electrical activity, just like Lero's. But one section, around my left temple, had a bright spot of magical energy showing. That spot had long offshoots that extended across half of the hemisphere.

"I think we'd better keep an eye on this," said Twilight Sparkle.