Cube Land
Five: Realization
Twilight munched half-heartedly on an apple as her thoughts drifted. While the latter in itself was no abnormal event, the thing—idea, rather—that she was thinking of would be considered strange or downright silly under any other circumstances. The circumstances she was under and the things she had seen, however, made her current thought process inevitable.
From the expertly built house that included a fireplace, living room, bedroom, kitchen, carpeted floors, and Celestia-knew-what-else; to the garden that Fluttershy assured was expertly maintained, everything pointed to the bipedal creature's sapience.
That wasn't even taking into account the fact that it was capable of both metallurgy and calligraphy, if it indeed was writing the night before and not scribbling meaningless nothings.
Twilight shivered in excitement. This was big.
No... it was huge. Bigger than anything she had imagined previously. Finding and exploring an uncharted world was one thing, but meeting an entirely new and sapient species that lived in said world was a completely different ball game.
She could only imagine what this would mean for both ponies and... whatever race the biped belonged to. Cubian? Twilight wrinkled her nose: the name didn't quite fit. She would've kept trying and failing to guess the creature's name and race, but she had other things to do.
Namely, convince the biped of their sapience. While nopony could ignore its intelligence, Twilight was certain that it wasn't aware of theirs. Sure, it had sheltered and fed them, but nothing more indicated that it wasn't simply acting out of common courtesy to some simple creatures—of which they certainly were not.
Twilight pondered how to go about this monumental task as she took another bite of the apple made up of tiny cubes.
Everything was so strange here: even the objects that should've been circles, weren't. It was as if large quantities of small blocks were arranged in an irregular pattern in order to give the illusion of a circular face, whilst still remaining cubed. Twilight shook her head. It boggled her mind just how alien this world was.
After swallowing the last bite of her apple, Twilight glanced at Applejack, who was the closest. The farm pony was having a staring contest with a once-bitten apple.
"Ah don't understand how an apple as strange as this manages to be tastier than the ones Ah've grown my whole life," Applejack muttered under her breath.
Twilight stood up and cleared her throat. When she successfully attracted everypony's mostly undivided attention, she said, "Girls, I think that we need to discuss a topic that we've all been avoiding: namely, how to convince our host—"
As one, all six heads swiveled to look at the biped. It was sitting in a chair located in the corner, head down in concentration as it scrawled furiously into a perfectly rectangular book. As if feeling the dozen eyes staring, the cuboidal creature stopped writing and looked up. After glancing around with a confused expression, it seemingly dismissed what it saw by shaking its head, then went back to scribbling.
"—that we're every bit as smart as it is."
"Well how are we supposed to do that?" asked Rainbow Dash from her sprawled position on one of the couches. "It doesn't even blink an eye when we talk, and even 'Shy giving the Stare couldn't faze it."
Pinkie Pie bounced up and down on the other end of the couch in thought. "Maybe it can't hear?" she supplied.
Dash twisted around to peer at both sides of the biped's head. "Actually, I think you might be right, Pinkie," she said. "I don't think it has ears—"
"I-It's a he," Fluttershy interrupted softly. All eyes turned to her, save the biped's.
"Really? Are you sure?" asked Twilight.
Fluttershy nodded.
Twilight frowned in thought and observed the biped once more, this time taking Fluttershy's words into account. Having only one member of the biped's species made it hard to ascertain exactly what constituted masculinity in their case. "How do you know?" she questioned, wrought with curiosity.
Fluttershy fidgeted with her hair, unused to the attention."When I accidently used the Stare, I—" She paused, trying to think of the best way to interpret. "—I saw into his mind. No, that's not right. It's not like seeing, it's more like... feeling, but without actually... well, feeling." Fluttershy sighed in melancholy and seemed to shrink a little. "I can't really explain... I should probably just stop talking now..."
Ever supportive, Rarity stepped forward and said, "Absolutely not! You're doing an exemplary job of explaining something that shouldn't be explainable, and I implore you to continue!" Fluttershy swelled a teensy bit from the praise. "However did you figure out that the biped is male? I certainly don't see it myself..."
"There were some old memories," Fluttershy explained, her voice gaining a confident tone. "I saw his parents, and they—" she sniffed, "—they said that they were proud of him, no matter what his choices in life were.
"That's all I could understand," she lamented. "I wish I could've seen more, but our minds are too different, and the way his thoughts are organized is... too alien."
"So you looked into its—uh, his—head and saw some memories?" asked Rainbow Dash. When Fluttershy nodded, Dash exclaimed, "That's awesome! Kinda creepy, but awesome!" After thinking for a moment, she added, "Wait, why didn't you tell us earlier, 'Shy? Isn't that stuff important?"
Fluttershy rubbed a hoof against her foreleg. "I didn't want to freak anypony out," she mumbled. "And I didn't want you girls to think I was crazy..."
"Fluttershy! Of course we wouldn't think you were crazy," said Twilight. "It's just a little... odd, that's all."
Before another word could be spoken, the biped closed his book with an audible whap and stood up, immediately drawing a hush from everypony present. Twilight took a step backwards to let him by, with the biped barely acknowledging her presence. She watched him walk down the hallway and stop by the room that was almost certainly his bedroom. The biped glanced back briefly before closing the door behind.
To herself, Twilight muttered, "How can we make him realize that we're just as smart as he is?"
Her eyes drifted towards the biped's chair—more specifically, towards the book and quill that remained on the armrest.
Day 95, late afternoon
Too much has happened. Far too much. I doubt I can recall it all, but that won't stop me from trying.
...
After gathering the spelunking equipment that I would need to venture into the Pit once more, I left my bedroom, mind clouded and heavy. My subconscious told me that I was missing something painfully obvious, but I couldn't decipher what it was. With my head down and staring at the pattern of the carpet, lost in thought, I didn't notice that the creatures were waiting for me. When I looked up, I stopped and took a step backwards in surprise.
They had moved from their previous positions and had assembled in a rough concave, facing my direction. Their piercing, intelligent eyes bored into me as if expecting something. A feeling of danger pulsated from within, which I found strange considering I had never felt endangered in their presence before. Unbidden, my hand crept towards my belt. When I realized that my hand was reaching for my sword, I jerked it away before I could ruin what little trust had been established between the creatures and myself. I had already vowed to protect them; I wasn't about to fall flat on my promise.
But what caused me to react in such a way when I never had before? Was I that easily threatened, or was there something else causing me to feel this way?
I want to believe that it was the latter, but I fear that it was the former.
My moment of internal conflict was transformed into disbelief when a translucent glow a few shades lighter than its fur coalesced around the purple creature's horn. Before I could ponder the implications of what exactly that did, the answer was thrust upon me when my journal floated in the air right in front of me, bathed in the same aura as the purple one's horn. I froze, simultaneously mesmerized and terrified.
I'm not sure how long I stared at my journal in disbelief. A few seconds? A minute? Several minutes? Regardless, I eventually mustered enough strength to break my trance and free my limbs from my self-inflicted paralysis. I looked at the creature responsible.
It looked at me back, and pantomimed the motion of reading.
With unsteady and shaking hands—they still are now, albeit for a different reason—I reached for the levitating, open journal. When I made contact, I felt a strange tingling sensation: not unpleasant, but not a cold drink on a hot day, either. It was only after the purple haze disappeared that I realized there was writing that was not my own scrawled on the very last page.
The language was different to mine in every way imaginable, as different as water and lava. Where my words are precisely formed with bold and careful strokes, the creature's is elegant and cursive, with each letter—if they are indeed letters—moulding into one another to create a flowing and almost unending script.
That said, I still couldn't read a single character. I didn't need to, however. My eyes had been opened, and my subconscious must have been feeling awfully smug at that moment. The answer had been in front of me the entire time; I had just been too blinded to see it.
The creatures were as intelligent as I, perhaps more so, if judging how long it took me to realize was any indication of intellect. As I made this connection, a piece of the puzzle slid into place after I asked myself a single question.
If I suddenly found myself stranded in an unfamiliar land, what would I do first?
The answer was simple: remain where I was, and wait for rescue. That was the rule ingrained into my mind from a young age, and I imagine any mentally equivalent race would teach the same to their young.
That was what the creatures were doing when I first spied them: they were waiting for rescue, or something close to it. I don't believe for a second that the obsidian mysteriously appeared there out of coincidence, either. The fact that the purple one was visibly angry at it cements my theory that the obsidian had something to do with their arrival.
Only my coaxing had made them leave. Had I not done this, I wouldn't have made this incredible discovery, but would they be where they belonged, happily reunited with their families?
No. No time for guilt. What's done is done; there's no sense crying over spilled milk.
...
I lowered the book and met the purple creature's eyes. They were purple as well. I could see the comprehension when it realized that I did, in fact, understand. I saw my own weary eyes reflected back at me.
I understood what I needed to do clearly for the first time in what felt like eons. These were no mere pets of a higher intellect, but thinking, sapient beings, and I would do everything in my power to return them to whence they came.
And I knew, I felt that the solution to my goal... our goal... was held within the Pit.