Twilight makes first contact

by Immanuel

Chapter 4

Major Quais checked a name off his list. Professor Jackson would be the last one arriving at the base, Dr. Rosen having refused to agree to the non-disclosure, and Dr. Marlin temporarily unavailable at a conference in Oslo. That made the core of the first contact contingency team eight strong, him and Lieutenant Mills included.

No matter. There would undoubtedly be plenty more people joining the team soon enough, and they had the whole not inconsiderable might and know-how of the Air-Space technical corps at their disposal. That also meant their equipment, which was being supplemented by the hour with any resource they had the whim to ask for. Already a dozen high-powered computer centers across the country were churning out numbers trying to model out every scrap of raw data the tiny swarm of surveillance drones, spy planes and assorted other data sponges were providing.

And with him and this team, it would all come together. They were the spearhead that was to pierce the gap in communication and understanding between the humanity and the strange visitors that had so suddenly arrived to Earth.

"That's the last of them," he said to the lieutenant by his side, as they watched the professor being herded across the tarmac. "Let's get this show on the road."

"-yeah, it was a bit surprising to me, as well. I never knew I was on any kind of list, so I had just wrapped up an evening lecture when these army guys march into my office and ask me to 'come join a team of scientists about to make history'. I mean, can you believe it?"

"I get what you're saying. For me, I sometimes suspected I was on a call with the papers Pentagon had asked from me, but something like this, I-"

"May I have your attention, please," Major Quais announced loudly, walking into a conference room, not much unlike the one the president and the Joint Chiefs had at their disposal. "Thank you.

"Gentlemen, Ms. Morris," he greeted them and sat down. "I am Major Quais and this is Lieutenant Miller. We will be coordinating with this team and the military analysts assigned on the project Kitalpha. Our purpose is to smooth out the conglomeration of intelligence and help with the logistic side of things, so that you, the experts, can concentrate on what you do best as freely as possible.

"That also means keeping you updated on whatever we find. By now, I take it all of you have a rough idea on what is going on at Texas. You've been given written summaries of the events at the ranch these past ten hours, as well as the guesses and conclusions our people have been drawing on them. The lieutenant here will be shortly handing you out some identification keys that will allow you direct access to the closed network we're in the process of forming for project Kitalpha.

"It should go without saying that, as per your non-disclosure agreements, none of this may ever, under no circumstances, be allowed to reach the internet or the media or any member of the public at all without an expressly approved, planned publication that may or may not happen some time in the future."

"Aw," said one of the men at the table whom Major Quais recognized as Dr. Stephen Argyle, mathematician and computer scientist, "so no cloud-computing?"

The major nodded. "I'm afraid not. Only the limited capacity within the project's own network. I should point out, however, that the network already includes fourteen mainframes that classify as supercomputers and about eight times as much cloud-computing power. We're adding more resources by the minute."

"Okay," Dr. Argyle said, mollified. "Any chance of adding MIT or Berkeley to the network?"

"Maybe, eventually. It depends on how well you manage to communicate your need," Major Quais said evenly. "Any other questions?"

"Just want to make this absolutely sure," said Professor Jackson, who had had less time than the rest to get to terms with the situation. "This is really happening, right? This isn't a hoax or anything?"

"Absolutely not, Professor. We have already about a thousand hours of footage on the visitors from every possible angle, ranging from serviceable to prime quality, also eye-witness reports, limited audio of them communicating with each other and a recording of the short exchange of greetings between the president and the leading visitor."

"Yeah, about that..." began the only woman in the room, Professor Morris of the Woodrow Wilson Academy. She was a multiple doctorate, specializing in the inter-disciplinary school of Public Affairs. She was already fairly sure what her role in the team would be. After all, the Pentagon had commissioned her for several papers on managing crowd responses, mass hysteria and more nebulous 'movements'.

"Our experts, and Dr. Tyson agrees, that it was merely a gaffe caused by unfamiliarity with our language," major Quais said quickly.

"Really?" Professor Morris asked dryly. "Because what I see here is an expert move on managing crowd response." The room blinked. She sighed. "Look, let's read some of this stuff on these reports without knowing how the ...visitors... act and look like.

"Wind rises and speaks to people. A massive golden dome of light appears and covers the land. Massive objects fly through to air and gather up to form a castle by themselves. The creatures even walked forth from a well of brightness, for heaven's sake! Can you get any more biblical?

"So, a lot of this stuff could get people panicking, mortally terrified. No matter what we ourselves have accomplished technologically, this stuff appears new and unexplained and touches some of our deeper beliefs.

"But on the other hand, we got actually cute little critters that act just a bit goofily and a whole lot endearingly. They look about the most unthreatening things possible. They're about the size of humanity's best friend, colored like our childhood toys and even have big-eyed faces that scream 'a cute baby here'.

"When this eventually gets public, all that's going to mellow the populace a whole lot. A whole lot. Everything they are and a lot of what they do is so going to steal the wind out of any panic. So, you're telling me this isn't by design?"

"That actually makes a lot of sense," said Dr. Carmichael, a biologist. "Because the thing that caught my attention is this," he said, throwing an enlarged picture of a visitor's head on the table, and tapping at the muzzle. "Well, not the only thing; I'd very much like to study their vestigial wings and find out about their reproduction, but anyway: Unless I'm wrong here, these here are nostrils, and this here is a mouth. Can you confirm I am correct, and that they breath through both?"

The eyes of two other scientists in the room widened in realization and they let out small sounds.

"Um," the major replied, "I'm sure a study of the video footage can shed some light. But we'll be heading to the site itself soon enough, so you can verify anything like that yourself on the location. No poking or cutting or otherwise diplomatically hazardous examinations, though," he added. "I'm not sure I understand where you are going with this, Doctor."

"I think I do," said Dr. Pierce, an astrophysicist and a leader of a SETI project. "Correct me if I'm wrong here, Doctor, but you're referring to the fact that us having our noses above our mouths is one of the truly random things in our evolutionary history?"

"Exactly," said Dr. Carmichael. "Even today, the existing air-breathing fishes have quite differing morphologies when it comes to their breathing apparatuses. That the land animals of today all happened to evolve from the one species with its air and digestive canals mixed was a complete happenstance with no advantages or disadvantages whatsoever, before our species learned to speak and became prone to suffocation by food crumbs.

"And even before that, there's the Cambrian explosion. Named so, because apparently after at least three and a half billion years of single-cell life on Earth, the fossil records suddenly show a veritable cornucopia of multi-cellular life. We don't know why. It could even be just a lucky, or unlucky, quirk of the nature of the fossil record itself.

"But that's not the point. The point is this: During the Cambrian explosion there appeared so many different types of morphology that today's life on Earth looks boring by comparison. Every species you see today, not counting anything microscopical, is the offspring of just three branches out of several dozen.

"Again, just a little bit of chance here or there, and this world would be unrecognizable. Are we to believe that all of their similarities to us are just the result of convergent evolution? That nature itself favors terrestrial forms? Frankly that's just a little too much anthropic principle for me. I'd lean towards them having manufactured their appearance for our benefit."

"That actually makes sense considering what I've been thinking," said Dr. Kuhn, a physicist. "The mini-dome, as you've been calling it, it's been referred in the reports as a portal, a matter transmitter or a replicator of some sorts," he said as an introduction.

"Doesn't matter, in my view, which it is. The practical functionality is the same, see. Information compiled into matter. Would you agree, Dr. Pierce?"

Dr. Pierce cleared his throat. "Well, like with everything else mentioned here, we might be simply ignorant of what is actually going on here, but on basis of what we know now, the probability is strongly on the side of this thing not being a superluminal gateway. If it were, we would expect to see some kind of distortion, most likely gravimetric, and of course then there would be the matter of time travel and logical paradoxes. So yes, I'd say the likelihood is that we're looking at a compiler of some sorts and that wherever the information to this mini-dome comes from, it comes at light-speed, maximum."

"So, woah," Dr. Argyle said. "Are you suggesting they, whatever they really are, are actually nearby? As in, possibly in our solar-system?"

Dr. Pierce nodded. "I'd say, yes. It would make the most sense from multiple perspectives. For instance, the matter of knowing we were here. They might have surveyed our planet sometime in the past, maybe millions of years ago, and left a ...sentinel behind. Space Odyssey, and all that. The only other real alternative, as I see it, is passive EM-survey like our own exo-planet finding program, but hugely improved. Say, an array the size of a solar system. That would give enough accuracy to maybe spot an advancing technological civilization from light-decades or centuries away. But again, travel. I think it would be more likely, especially in light of what has been said, that there's an artificial intelligence somewhere in our solar system making contact with us by puppeteering the creatures we see."

"Or," Dr Argyle said slowly, "perhaps there is some kind of information substrate in space. They could be living as a civilization in a virtual environment, and creating bodies for themselves now just for the purpose of saying 'hi'."

"Anyway," Dr. Kuhn said, "my point was simply this: Since their technology is likely effectively creating or recreating the bodies we see, there's no real reason for them not to manufacture them to their liking. Doubly so, if they normally even don't have bodies. I'd suspect a few million years in a virtual environment would leave one flexible in such matters," he said with a small chuckle.

"Ah," Professor Jackson, an expert in constructed, especially mathematical or logical languages, said with a small cough. "Does this mean I don't have a job here, after all?"

There was a small spatter of laughter around the table.

"Hey, it's not just you," Dr. Pierce piped up. "What about all my knowledge on Lincos or lambda calculus?", he asked with a fake pout.

"Unlikely, Professor Jackson, Doctor Pierce," Major Quais said with a smile. "They are not really talking with us, after all. With all due respect to Professor Morris, I doubt they've faked an entire afternoon of painstakingly learning our language just for the sake of putting us at our ease."

"Nevertheless, her other points stand," Professor Jackson said. "I am actually kind of interested about the religious connections here. The ancient myths of Pegasus, no? Earlier visits, or manifestations, or whatever?"

"Or perhaps the result of surveillance," suggested Professor Morris. "Even if they don't know our language they must have noticed our artwork. And arriving at a pony ranch kind of underlines that. Maybe they saw the reverence and affection shown to horses in our cultures and decided a mythical pony-equivalent would make a good choice for an ambassador, mixing cuteness and divinity in an irresistible package."

"Those would be pretty far-reaching conclusions based just on basically visual observations," Dr. Kuhn said skeptically. "Then again, I can't deny your point about the psychological mastery their appearance and behavior seem to indicate. If we assume they have planned everything to the t, then they are showing just about enough inexplicably advanced technology to scare military response off, enough adorableness to make humans not want to go violent, and enough restraint to make us feel kind of safe. I mean, basically they just appeared, made their presence known, and now wait for us to move."

"I'd like to add something," Dr. Argyle said. "Let's assume we are dealing with an artificial intelligence or people that have uploaded their consciousness into a VR. This may be the first time in generations they've actually had to use a language, as we understand it."

"What about the whinnies?" Professor Morris asked.

"Ancestral language, maybe?" Dr. Argyle said with a shrug. "Imitation of our horses? I don't know. My point is this: Let's teach them how to use our computers."

There was a pause.

"We'll use Logic Gate Matrices and lambda calculus to get enough agreement in order to show them how our computers think and give them some detailed blueprints about microchips and data storage. Then, we hand them a drive with a full dictionary, the current Wikipedia, maybe audio and video samples so they can start making connections with what they hear and see us doing, and some other necessary stuff we can think of.

"And voila, their massive technological edge does all the work for us. Their unimaginable flop counts crunch our language and information, and they can get on teaching us what we need to know," Dr. Argyle finished, crossing his arms with a satisfied grin.

"I'm impressed," said Dr. Kuhn. "That's the laziest solution to first contact I've ever heard."

"Hey, mathematician and information scientist here," Dr. Argyle defended himself with a mock pout. "We have to be lazy if we want to get anything done."

"I'm not sure the brass will like the idea of practically handing the visitors the keys to our databases while we are left to the mercy of their generosity," Major Quais said with a small frown.

"If they're interested in their contents at all, it's the same end result anyway," Dr. Argyle said with a shrug. "I rather doubt our encryption keys will hold against them. Trying to speed up the learning process like this is just faster and cheaper, in my view. But yeah, we'll try to learn their language as well, I guess, not that I expect anything very soon," he said looking at Professor Jackson.

"Not in years, possibly," Professor Jackson said, then reconsidered. "Well, actually, if we construct a Lincos-equivalent with them we might be communicating with them about science at least soon enough."

"Not that they would be very interested in our science, I suspect," Dr. Pierce said. "I mean, they must know everything we do and a whole lot more. I'd expect they're a lot more interested about our art and culture than our primitive science."

"Ooh, I can't wait to get to study all their science!" Twilight squealed, hooves literally off the ground in her excitement. "What unimaginable discoveries they must have made about the physical world to be able to build such things! I mean, self-moving carriages? Talking across distances?! Can you imagine?! I suppose one could build a constantly teleporting matrix that would transmit the sound-waves wherever I want them, but I can't even imagine how much calculations that would require let alone doing that by purely physical means!"

"Yes yes, darling," Rarity said and tugged the excited princess back to ground. As the supreme pony authority in this particular universe, Princess Twilight was effectively outside any admonishments any member of the expedition would dare to give her. Any, except for her friends, which showed the wisdom of bringing them along. Somepony needed to be able to rein Twilight in when she got over-excited.

"It's all very exciting, I agree," Rarity assured Twilight. "I really do! But you really should get some sleep. It's not just you studying the locals here, and like was mentioned on several separate occasions, the team looks up to you and needs you for leadership, counsel and coordination, and you simply cannot do it without getting a bit of rest.

"Now be a good princess, and get to bed. The locals will be back here tomorrow with all their exciting inventions and the night team will give you their reports on what they have discovered during the night. Pinkie and the rest of us girls will clear the party away, and you will get some sleep."

"Oh, you're right, Rarity," Twilight said, but couldn't stop herself from bouncing excitedly. "It's just that there's so much! The language, the hints at hierarchy, the tools, the clothing... What, for instance, is the relationship between the spindly prime-sapients and the queen-aliens and their smaller cousins? Is there a significance to the different types of clothing? The hats! What is the deal with the hats, Rarity?! Were they color-coded to mark rank? Is it a herd thing? How does sapience work here? How does life?! How does everything?! These people can teach us EVERYTHING!!"

"Twilight," Rarity said locking the excited mare in place with her forelegs, and looking her in the eyes, "do I need to use the spell you taught me?"

"Yes!" Twilight squealed.

With a flash and a grunt of effort, Rarity blasted Twilight with a specially designed, custom-tailored, absolutely guaranteed no-fail make-Twilight-go-sleep spell. And with that, she was out like a lamp.

"Applejack!" Rarity shouted. "Would you be a dear and help me carry Twilight to bed?"

Commander Robert Patrick, the X.O. of the cruiser Antietam, which had been assigned to the hyper-advanced carrier group Gerald R. Ford on account of her newly acquired i at the end of her designation, making her officially CG-54i Antietam, was feeling tense.

This was because they had been ordered to assist in a highly classified situation in the homeland involving euphemistically jargonized 'objects-of-interest', that by all accounts were honest-to-God extraterrestrial aliens. To do that, they had had to cruise in a neat, unbelievably, insanely tight and vulnerable line through a canal that just barely managed to accommodate their Very Important capital ship. In addition, they had received nicely worrying standing orders to refrain from acting in any way that could even remotely be interpreted as 'hostile' while making sure they observed as much as was possible about 'the anomaly' and reported back every little thing that could be called 'unusual'. To top all that, Commander Patrick was painfully aware that 'the anomaly' was almost exactly centered on the ranch co-owned by his wife's niece.

That meant he was worried about family while trying to act like he wasn't and at the same time trying to keep himself from not worrying so that when the time for decisions came no one would be able to say after the fact that he had been influenced by personal concerns.

As it was, it was nice of the captain not to try to order him to get some sack-time. Thus, he was on the bridge, refraining from biting his nails while watching the radar image of the Antietam's Seahawks getting closer to the anomaly, when the petty officer in charge of the ECCM, especially the new AN/RBM-1 unit that had given them their 'improved' designation, piped up.

"Commander, there's a problem with the ECCM," the technician said.

"What is it, Petty Officer Taylor?" he asked, already feeling dread.

"It looks a lot like the glitches we had with the RBM unit early on, sir," the technician said. "It began when we started getting feed on the anomaly. The pattern recognition couldn't get a hold on it, so the unit decided it was being jammed. But instead of starting to nicely hone the image, the algorithm takes a few hundred steps and stops, then starts again. Which means the RBM decided to create a whole new category of jamming, and tries to solve it. Which it can't because the algorithm isn't working right. It's a vicious cycle, sir, and it's eating most of the RBM unit's processing power."

"What's wrong with the algorithm?" Commander Patrick asked. "I thought that glitch was just part of the unit's learning phase."

"We don't know, sir," the technician replied. "We can't tell, when it's up and running. I'd like permission to reboot the system and see what happens, sir."

"There isn't anything heading towards us on the radar, Petty Officer Harris, is there?" Commander Patrick asked immediately.

"Negative, sir. There are small distortions in the SPS, but they are stationary and within the anomaly," said the radar officer.

"What kind of distortions?" Commander Patrick asked.

"Can't tell with the RBM on the fritz, sir. Could be a glitch, or maybe some interference from the anomaly."

Commander Patrick frowned. The reports they had received had had no mention of radar distortions. In fact, they had explicitly mentioned the lack of anything other than some light in the visual spectrum as part of the anomaly's peculiarities. And now Antietam's ECCM was going haywire. Was it a coincidence? Without war-time power their radar system was no sharper then the ones on the AWACS planes they had been using to map the anomaly.

"Inform the captain," he said. "Also, ask the Princeton if they are having better luck with their systems. What does the frigate's radar feed look like, Petty Officer Harris?"

"According to them, everything's clear, sir. No distortions. Everything's marked, down to individual objects-of-interest," the radar officer replied.

"The Princeton reports identical behavior on their ECCM and radar, sir," said the communications officer. "The captain says to hold while he informs Rear Admiral Blake, sir."

A few tense moments passed, a minor technical issue growing by the moment into something large and sinister in the bridge crew's minds. Finally, Captain Hale arrived personally with their orders.

"At ease," the captain said, face carefully blank. "The admiral decided to greenlight the reboot of our RBM unit. Make sure to record and transmit everything to Kitalpha. The Princeton will keep watch and see if they can fix their system on the fly." He narrowed his eyes. "And keep an eye on the radar, just in case."

Cassie watched the ruddy morning light seep through the cracks in the stable wall, as she groomed the contently breakfasting Daisy. Her mind was buzzing and there was a pit in her stomach. Just hours ago she had been a part of an oddly familiar celebration in the company of strange alien quadrupeds, cautiously tasting fizzy drinks that tasted the most apple-like things she had ever had - like someone had distilled the essence of apple and poured it into a mug, and nibbling the moistest, tastiest cupcakes in the existence.

During the night she had expected the alien food to cause her to fall ill or poison her, but apparently the visitors were a lot more aware of her biology than of her language. They had spent a majority of the party calling her, each other and everybody else 'cute' in an oddly chirping little chime. She didn't know how they managed the sound.

Cassie had also played pin-the-tail-on-a-cardboard-alien-quadruped.

She had laughed hysterically at the time. Now the laughter was gone and the hysteria had calmed down into a vague terror. She hadn't been able to sleep with everything that had happened roiling in her head. That always made her feel unreal and jumpy.

The vaguely equine faces and chubbily adorable bodies of the aliens kept jumping at her in her mind. The odd colors and the shining horns, the massive pylons flying through the air and the tornado of construction that had created the ...fortress, all mashed together in a maelstrom of surreal.

She remembered the voice in the wind. God, the voice. It was so inhuman. The tone was so cheerful, the pitch and accent like that of a precocious child's, but the words so oddly disjointed. And it was so unearthly creepy hearing the wind speak.

They marched from the light, she thought, to my ranch. Why did they come here? Why are they here? What will they do to me?

The brush fell from her hand as a sob escaped from her throat. She couldn't hold on any longer. Suddenly she fell against the wall and started weeping uncontrollably, the tension and fear of the day that had been gathering the whole day and festering in her mind the night bursting forth in a torrent of tears. She was shaking, mind-numbing terror taking hold of her body.

Daisy nuzzled her gently, confused about the human's behavior. After a while, Cassie felt another touch by her side.

"Hey. Hey," Michelle said soothingly, as she hugged her friend. "It's okay, Caz."

"Ah'm sorry," Cassie said with a hiccup after a moment of sniffing and drying her eyes. "It's all just a bit much, y'know?"

"Ah know," Michelle whispered. "Ah didn't sleep well either. Heard when ya got up."

"Ah just wish ah knew what they want," Cassie said, referring to their visitors.

Michelle was silent for a moment. "Are ya scared a' them, Cassie?" she asked. When the other woman didn't answer, she continued. "Ya seemed fine yesterday. All in control, like always. What's wrong now?"

"Ah don't know," Cassie said in a small voice. "It's just too much. The aliens, the president, the military. We're smack in the middle a' some darn huge things goin' on an' it's terrifying me. An' the things, they jus'... they cain do awful scary things, Shelly. Ain't ya scared a' them at all?"

Michelle shrugged. "It's like ya said yesterday. 'They're jus' cute.' Ah cain't really git scared a' critters that look like that."

Cassie giggled a bit. "Yeah, ah guess. An' they haven't done anything yet. It's jus' all the stories of aliens comin' to Earth an' invadin' or abductin' or whatever. Guess ah'm just bein' silly."

"Scared a' them stealing our women?" Michelle teased and squeezed Cassie's shoulder. "Maybe they want some experienced pony ranchers to take care a' their manes?"

"Ha ha," Cassie said and stuck her tongue out. "Guess they chose our ranch fer a reason then. We got the best cared-for ponies in the state," she said proudly.

"That we do, Caz. That we do." There was a pause. "Feelin' better now?"

"Yeah. Thanks, Michelle," Cassie said smiling and squeezed her friend's hand briefly. "Ah appreciate it."

"Always," Michelle said. "Now git up an' let me fix ya some breakfast. We'll be havin' more guests today. Better git ready."

"Yeah," Cassie said.

Pinkie Pie was sitting contentedly facing the rising sun, her eyes lazily half-closed as she scanned the impressive display in the horizon. The party had been cleared up and all the other ponies had gone to sleep, except for the night shift, who were busy in the laboratories trying to figure out the secrets to the universe, but Pinkie didn't quite feel the need for sleep yet. Despite having had much fun, she had had the most peaceful and relaxing day for as long as she could remember, and was still feeling energetic, if calm. As such, she would rather stay up and greet the day shift and her friends as soon as they were up. At the moment, she was simply staying put and letting the wind rustle her coat and mane, not feeling the slightest push to do anything.

This is so relaxing. Like sleeping except not at all. More like wakeleeping.

[No, silly! Wake-leaping is when you leap from wake to wake!]

Ooh, am I talking to myself?

[Well, duh! Except I'm not talking, and neither am I. I'm thinking, and I'm always thinking to myself, except when I'm trying to think at others, but it never works, because they're also thinking to themselves, so there's no way I could think for them. Unless they're thinking about something I've said or done, when it could be said I'm derivatively thinking in their minds. That's culture! But not agriculture or petriculture. More like cogiticulture!]

Well, this seems awful lot like discussion to me anyway, and I rarely do that unless I am talking aloud, whether it's to myself or otherwise. So, what gives? Am I making friends with myself? Because if I am, then hi me! I think I'm a nice pony, no matter what I think sometimes!

[Oh, that's so sweet! But I'm actually thinking to myself because the part of me that normally keeps all the secret stuff secret from myself in order to be surprised at stuff doesn't have any stuff to keep secret at the moment.]

I don't?

[No. No twitches, no itches, no hunches or squiggly wiggly crunches that tell me where everypony will be or what their mood will be. Most of the stuff that normally keeps fizzing and bubbling is completely still.]

Hm. Is this what Applejack meant when she said this place feels dead? Or deader than dead, though I don't see how that could be unless there's such a thing as slightly dead or mostly dead.

[This place isn't dead, silly! The grass is growing right there!]

Oh, I know that! But Applejack likes to grow things, and she can't do that here, since there's no magic. Ooh! Does that mean that Pinkie-sense is magic too?

[Earth pony magic!]

Why don't other earth ponies have it, then? Maybe it's pinkie pony magic!

[Oh, I'm sure other ponies have it too. How else would they know where to be when I need to find them?]

Oh, I guess I'm right. Still, should I make some kind of surprise-present-party thing for Applejack? Feeling like the world is dead must be so sad.

[What do I have in mind?]

Well, there's balloons and laughter and foals and sunlight and whipped cream and cream brulées and *gasp* That's it! Baking!

[How do I mean? I doubt even the very best cupcakes in the world would make Applejack feel like the world is alive, though I could be wrong about this. Cupcakes are very potent.]

No, silly! I mean chemistry! I should know that baking has chemistry in its core, and I know a lot about its practical applications as well as about other sciences I don't normally think about because I'm busy keeping that part secret to myself so I don't get bogged down by the wonders of the world when there are wonders of having fun to be bogged down with.

[But now that I am not keeping necessary secrets from myself I can use all that knowledge to unravel the secrets of chemistry of this world and find out how life here works! Then Applejack won't need to feel like this place is dead anymore!]

Say, how does life here work? While I don't normally think about it, I know there's usually at least a bit of magic that directs chemical reactions. That's why love makes such great pastries!

[Oh, so that's why I thought about baking. We need to get some yeast, then, or whatever the local equivalent is. Oh my! Do I think the locals even have pastries? Maybe without magic the dough won't rise?]

For a moment, Pinkie's eyes widened in horror and sadness, but then she set her jaw in firm determination.

I refuse to believe that! Where there is life, there is bakery! And if the ponies, or the giant ponies, or the funny-looking spider-monkey ponies haven't discovered the secret of the pastry yet, I will do it for them! There shall be cake!

[Onward to the chemistry lab!]

Oh, wait! Look at the shiny sky-carriage coming towards us from behind! Noisy! Is it bringing new friends, do I think?

[See, this is the kind of thing I normally already know about, but won't think so I won't ruin the surprise! In this world I don't have to! It's like the world is made out of surprises here!]

"I think people will be expecting quite a lot from the visitors," Professor Morris explained while watching the approaching dome that glimmered against the lightening morning sky. "We have people desperately wanting to get gods to solve our problems, whether they be aliens or angels, people wanting to exploit the newcomers through fame, association or economics, or directly or indirectly through politics, people just wanting the aliens to notice them or to make friends with them and of course all the worlds' nations wanting to get an edge over each other with the new exciting technologies they might be bringing.

"And there will be an enormous amount of resentment because the emergence of another intelligent civilization will be challenging people's power, beliefs, ideology or simply because all this disturbs their way of life, which is quite enough for most people to get angry.

"This is an unexpected and a very large event that no-one can just ignore. A lot of people will be in angry denial, while others will get annoyed for having to rethink what they though they knew. And the people who are content in their comfortably established power will be mortally scared of this disturbing the balance of power and will be doing everything they can to exploit people's fears and anger."

"That's a cynical view, Dr. Morris," Doctor Pierce said.

"It's a cautious view, Jake," Professor Morris retorted. "You have been thinking about first contact for your whole life and are looking forward to it. I, on the other hand, am wary of human reactions. As a species, we are very much ruled over by our baser instincts. The individual may be enlightened and aware of the impulses that drive him to fear, or racism or knee-jerk reactionism and may attempt to control them, but for most people what they feel and think is just the natural order of things that should not be challenged without retribution.

"When it comes to meeting our new friends, there's basically two mass reactions I expect. Initially, many will be overtaken by the wonder of the new. Equally many will be overtaken by the fear of the new. While the former will fade away and be replaced by familiarity and whatever response the aliens' behavior provokes, the latter will fester into resentment, mistrust and irrational hate unless mitigated.

"If the aliens will not deliver on our expectations, many of the hopeful will join the resentful ones.

"As a whole, I tend to consider humanity as any other animal. You say hi and back off, let them sniff you and come to you, and you have a chance of making friends. Give 'em food and gifts and be unthreatening and they will become your staunchest friends. But keep poking 'em and trying to make friends with them, and they'll just get nervous, frightened and angry.

"The only real difference with animals is that humans tend to act as you expect them to. If you treat them as untrustworthy backstabbers, that's what you get. If you give them responsibility and trust, they'll try to prove worth it.

"Otherwise, the reactions are just as instinctual as other mammals'. And any reaction we will have about the visitors will merely be amplified by how big a splash they make. They cure all our problems? Fine, that just means that humanity divides into two camps: the ones that hail them as gods and the ones that denounce them as satans.

"They keep a low profile and do nothing? Fine, we get people who think they are funny and cute on the one hand, and people who think they are undeserving trash on the other.

"That's why we need to manage their public image for them from the get-go, even before they can speak enough of our language to express their own opinion. We can't manage their behavior, but we can, to an extent, manage the response our species will have."

Dr. Pierce shook his head. "I'm not going to argue here," he said, "but that just sounds too much like censorship, intentional obscuring and propaganda. Doesn't what you said about trusting your fellow humans count in this, too? Isn't what we are doing right now a good example of an enlightened response? How can you be so elitist in your views about the general populace?"

Professor Morris shrugged. "I'm not. But I've seen how bad things can get, when public relations aren't managed properly. We really don't want to give the aliens an embassy and watch some idiot mount a terrorist attack against it."

"We're here," interrupted Major Quais. "Get ready to meet our new friends, people."

Pinkie ended her song in a cheerful note, hooves raised in the air in triumph, before landing back on all fours.

And now, a carefully dignified retreat and maintaining distance as per Cranky Doodle -protocol.

[Well done, me! They look so welcomed!]

How can I tell?

[It's in the eyes. They got a lot bigger.]

"Is it...singing?" Professor Jackson asked from no one in particular.

"Ah, yes," Major Quais said in a low voice and coughed in his fist. "That didn't quite make it into your reports, because you were in transit at the time, Professor, but the aliens exhibited similar behavior in the ceremony they arranged last night. We were hoping to get some kind of cultural or anthropological expert on the team later on. We don't quite know what to make of it."