//------------------------------// // Chapter 14 - Answers // Story: Sweetie Belle and the Tablet of Knowledge // by CheshireTwilight //------------------------------// “How is she, doctor?” Twilight asked, standing in front of Sweetie Belle’s hospital bed. Twilight had just finished addressing everypony about the situation at Town Hall that morning. It had been a month since the incident and despite some minor assurances, she had kept the whole incident a secret until they could be sure that the ‘facility’ was secure. As it turned out, the ‘self-destruct’ message wasn’t a joke. The place was little more than a pile of twisted metal deep underground. With the knowledge that the ponies of Equestria were safe from this threat, the Princesses agreed it was to everypony’s benefit to be more forthcoming with information. Rarity sat next to her sister, and had been doing so for every minute she could spare for the last month. Even during the initial surgery, she wouldn’t keep her eye off her sister for an instant. After all the worrying over the course of her sister’s adventure, she had felt that her moments inattention had caused the whole thing to happen. Twilight figured that, if it wasn’t for her work, she would likely never leave her sister’s side at all. Her parents and the other Cutie Mark Crusaders had also been visiting regularly, but none more so than Rarity. Twilight herself had come three times a week, both to help with any magical complications and also as a sort of penance for letting things get so far out of hoof. “Well she’s a very strong and lucky filly, I’ll give her that,” Doctor Wellbeing replied. He was an elderly dark grey unicorn stallion with white hair and a bandaged horn as a cutie mark. Normally Doctor Horse would have performed any general care, but unlike Apple Bloom and Scootaloo—who only suffered minor magical deterioration and just needed bed-rest—Sweetie Belle’s injuries were more extensive. He was the best in the business for horn and magic backlash and, as he looked down at his clipboard, he was reminded why he was here. “Thaumaturgic burns on the forehooves and flanks, necrosis of the rear right frog’s collateral groove and apex, scarring of the liver and heart, bone marrow loss across the entire skeletal system, partial paralysis from the rear left leg and subconjunctival hemorrhaging of both eyes; all these injuries likely from prolonged exposure to incredibly high amounts of magic. We’ve mostly treated all of this ... Still, I know Celestia said this was to be a secret, but the readings I’m getting about the levels of magic-” Twilight glared at him seriously. “Trust me, you don’t want to know. Suffice to say that your readings are likely accurate.” He sighed. ‘Being the best in the business isn’t all that it’s cracked up to be … although I wouldn’t be able to get such exciting cases otherwise.’ He straightened up. “Anyway, the worst injury though, by far, is the complete burnout of her horn and scarring of the Prefrontal Thaumaturgic Ganglia which regulates magical energy generated from the horn. I don’t know how she channeled enough magic to do that, but she somehow overrode her natural limiter which prevents negative feedback from a failed Thaumic Cascade.” “Like overexerting a muscle.” Twilight clarified. “Exactly.” “Will she be alright?” “She’ll make a full recovery in six months. We’ve come a long way with medical technology and magic in the last 100 years. Still, her Ganglia won’t be possible to fix since it naturally rejects magic.” Rarity looked up from the bed. “What … what might that cause ...” “Well,” the doctor looked away. “I guess it means that she might no longer have limits on her magic … and not in a good way. It’s like no longer having nerves in your hoof. One can still use a hoof that way, and not having to feel it means you can probably run faster, but it won’t warn you when you step on something sharp or hot and it will be far easier to damage. Basically, she will need to be far more careful from now on with magic, and she certainly won’t be performing any spells for at least the time it takes for her to make a full recovery.” Twilight thought there was something off about what the doctor said. “Wait a second … according to what Apple Bloom and Scootaloo had said, there should be some type of machine inside Sweetie Belle’s head.” The doctor looked at Twilight in shock. “What?” he shook his head profusely. “I can assure you there is nothing of the sort. I don’t know why they would say that, but apart from her serious injuries, there is nothing wrong with her.” Twilight wasn’t convinced and decided to scan her head for herself. Sure enough, she didn’t feel any magical resistance she had felt before and was easily able to determine—like the doctor said—there was nothing abnormal. ‘That doesn’t make sense. It obviously can’t turn invisible since it had to block me last time. Why then-’ Sweetie Belle suddenly groaned and shift in the bed, causing the three ponies to stop their discussion and move beside her. “Alright little filly, easy now,” the doctor said, doing his best to use his magic to calm the filly from the shock of waking up. “Where…” Sweetie Belle said, opening her eyes. “You’re in the hospital dear,” Rarity said, looking at her sister with intense pity and shame. “Everything is alright now. You’re safe.” “Oh, hi Rarity … sorry for running away, there was a …” she stopped for a moment and cringed. ‘That NDA is gone, right?’ she thought. “There was a tablet, a machine-pony interface which attached itself to me. I couldn’t talk about it, so I went to their facility to … fix that.” “We know Sweetie,” Twilight replied warmly. ‘She’s so brave, to be able to do all she’s done just so that she could tell us this ...’ “Doctor?” Rarity asked. “Is it alright for her to talk like this?” The doctor nodded. “I would say so. After all, it’s already been a month since she came back. I would imagine that some mental stimulation would-” “A month,” Sweetie gasped. She wanted to yell but her voice just didn’t have the energy to do so. “Easy there Sweetie Belle,” the doctor said, using his magic to sooth her mind again. “Yes, you’ve been sleeping for a month. You really needed your rest. Now, I’m going to let you talk all you want to any of your visitors, but you are not to leave this bed under any circumstances. If you need help doing anything, ring the buzzer on your bed and a nurse will come in as soon as possible.” Sweetie Belle nodded and the Doctor left the room to prepare some of the visual/auditory tests he couldn’t while she was in a coma. “So,” Twilight began, levitating a clipboard chair and sitting next to the filly’s bed. “There’s no need to say anything, but please, if there is anything you can mention about what happened after you teleported Apple Bloom and Scootaloo from that room, we would really like to know.” Rarity nodded in agreement. She might not want her sister to overexert herself, but she was dying to know what happened to her sister to cause all this grief. Sweetie Belle gulped. “Well, it was certainly interesting … I guess, although my memory is a little fuzzy …” One month earlier, the Exotic Energy Generator within the Acarel Complex Sweetie Belle had finally found the answer. Harmony between ponies somehow increased the maximum yield of magical energy that could be used by a unicorn. That—combined with the massive magical energy around her—just might be enough to push it out of the way long enough to teleport them out of there. “I know this might sounds crazy, but I need you to think back to the time we last teleported. Those feelings you felt at the Tree of Harmony.” Apple Bloom coughed heavily, weakening from the furious winds of magic flowing all around them. “Ya … ya mean those nice happy feelings about friendship and crusadin’ and stuff?” Sweetie Belle nodded. “Well … alright then.” Scootaloo shrugged weakly. She could barely stand. “I guess it makes sense. It worked when we teleported last time … it could work now.” They all closed their eyes, focusing on those feelings. They thought of: laughing, playing with their other friends at school, going on crusades, sleepovers, and anything they did as friends. Despite the maelstrom of magic and the pain they had been experiencing, they all seemed to calm down. The experience was especially potent to Sweetie Belle, all the pain and burning that she had felt in her horn cooled to no more than the sensation of a warm breeze against her horn. *Unknown phenomenon detected, alicorn exceeding known theoretical limits. Exotic Energy within region has reached minimum acceptable threshold. This device may begin Massive Trans-spatial Transportation at any time.* ‘Then teleport Apple Bloom and Scootaloo out,’ Sweetie Belle thought, evaluating the situation now in her calm state. ‘I … I need to fix this. I can’t let any other ponies solve my problems … not anymore. Charlie could destroy all of Equestria with this magic, and it would be all my fault!’ *Acknowledged. Harmonization complete. Target coordinates?* ‘Uhh … just use the ones for the Tree of Harmony. There shouldn’t be anypony there … I wouldn’t want to risk us teleporting into somepony.’ *Acknowledged. Target coordinates, Latitude: 37.685080, Longitude: -97.362547, Elevation 118.319245 meters above sea level. Beginning Massive Instantaneous Trans-spatial Transportation.* “Alright,” Sweetie Belle said nervously. “You’ll be going now. I’ll be right behind you I … just have something to finish first.” Before they could respond, her friends were gone. ‘Now to end things.’  Sweetie Belle still had one trick up her sleeve, she just hoped that it worked. **What going on?** Charlie demanded in Sweetie’s mind. He had noticed fluctuations in the generator. The facility’s offensive systems were still only at 80% power and he didn’t want any delays. **I find it unlikely that you were able to teleport those two fillies all on your own. How did you do it?** ‘You’re … you’re right … never by myself … but with Tablet and my friends … anything is possible ...’ **The tablet? What are you talking about? The tablet is still enacting my override! I specifically had my programming teams insert overrides and NDA capabilities into all our devices so that I would be able to control the world at any time!** ***That is incorrect.*** The Tablet replied, but in a feminine voice that spoke in an accent she had never heard before. ***You see, Charles, there’s no way I could just let you continue this charade.*** **Th-that voice? Ms.Wong?** For the first time, Charles sounded scared. ***Yes Mr.Christianson, I’m your Chief of R&D … technically. Do you think I would let you get away with it? Your money was helping the world to be a better place so I allowed your greed. Our technology rapidly closed the wealth gap and allowed the poor to teach themselves and remove themselves from the vicious circle of poverty, it cured ignorance worldwide and brought us together as a species. Despite all this, you seemed so adamant to take it over; for you or a small minority to reign over society like tyrants. I knew about your little side-projects and I ignored them. Instead, I placed a failsafe. When a user of any of our devices is directly threatened by you, I would override every override you made and take control of the company.*** **What! You can’t do that, I run this company! You’re gone, I saw you run away as I closed this facility’s doors on your worthless face when the bombs dropped!** *Unfortunately, as of now, this amalgamation of memories running on top of this platform’s heuristic systems is the new CEO of Acarel. The only thing stopping me was the law … and the fact that I am now dead is proof enough that the law no longer applies.* **No! I worked too hard, put too much money into this company to be defeated by some computer program like you! I will-I will-I will-I will-I will-I will-** Suddenly the voice stopped and a robotic one replaced it. **[Facility control override zero-zero-six-six is now in effect, handing corporate control to Tablet 1012 personality, designation Yi (Chi) Wong]** Sweetie Belle wanted to laugh, but it was too hard, instead she just grinned to herself. She didn’t know who Ms.Wong was, but she just made her plan a lot simpler. ‘Hey … umm … Wong. Can … can you turn off this crystal? I’ll just be able ... to leave if you do.’ **[Facility acknowledging CEO request. Final protocol: In the event of complete societal collapse, complete destruction of all military Acarel assets to be completed as soon as possible. “To prevent the world from being destroyed again.” Beginning facility self-destruct sequence.]** ‘M-ms. Wong … this isn’t funny, where are you? Just ... please, turn off the crystal!’ *The personality previously on this device, Yi Wong, is not an Artificial or Virtual Intelligence, but rather a set of scripts overtop of this platform to initiate conversation with your aggressor and to institute a ‘final protocol’. It can no longer answer you. The self-destruct sequence should take fifteen minutes to complete as evacuation procedures take effect. Unfortunately, since the crystal is a military asset—but wasn’t included in Ms.Wong’s calculations—its destruction is included, but the devastation to the environment it would cause was not taken into account.* ‘Alright ... I don’t think I like Ms.Wong anymore ...‘ Sweetie Belle tried to calm down, but this situation just became a lot worse. She had originally planned to use the energy of the crystal to overload the panels on the walls and bring the building down, but now she didn’t have a place to escape. If the crystal blew up, it would really damage the world. She started shaking violently, half because of nerves and half because of the magical energy still flowing around her. She smacked her head on the floor. ‘Focus!’ Ironically, after hitting her head, she was in less pain. Now that she was more focused, she couldn’t feel the rest of her body cry in protest of the magic slowly whittling away at her.  ‘Tablet! My life is in danger, my friends are gone, and so there is no way for me to get enough power to teleport out of this room! If the crystal isn’t drained of energy Equestria will ...’ Sweetie shook herself. ‘You said it requires seven times the current output of my horn to push the energy back into the Aether right? What if I instead teleport into the Aether and pull the energy instead. Since about 95% of the energy is required to maintain the Aetherial ‘bridge’ even my horn should be able to pull it off.’ *You accounted for the negation of ‘feedback field invariance’ σ for the simplified partial differential equation modelling the system of gain increase in energy throughput of your horn for transference: *but you failed to account for the energy throughput required to stabilize the field around yourself in the Aether: *Therefore, even with that energy, it is within the realm of possibility that your horn can handle it, but its probability of success is greatly reduced. This device is unsure of the nature of the properties of the Aether so the probability of success is conservatively at 31.816701%. Additionally, it is unlikely that a return trip is possible.* Sweetie Belle forgot about the protection she would need from the energy of the Aether so she was a lot less sure of her plan. Still, there wasn’t much left she could do. Either she could try this with a chance of success or she stayed in generator and accepted her fate. ‘Alright, but I don’t think I’ll be able to do it myself. Is there anything I can do to improve the chance of success?’ *This device does not have access to a majority of your brain functionality. The best way to maximize neural response is to keep your mind calm and unfocused as possible, in order to avoid interference.* ‘Alright … I guess you’ll have to wake me when you’re done then.’ It was for the best, because Sweetie Belle had a hard time focusing now. The generator had been on for over twenty minutes and she could no longer feel her hooves. If she wasn’t a unicorn with a more powerful magical immune system, she wouldn’t even be conscious. She crawled her way to the crystal and tapped her horn to it. Again she could feel the burning sensation of the maximum amount of magical energy coursing through it, but now she no longer had her friends to help her, so she would be in pain. ‘It’s … I wouldn’t want them to risk ... when I’m just trying to fix … my own mess. I-I really hope this works ...’ Sweetie Belle closed her eyes and tried to ignore the pain. She could do nothing but think of her friends. It wasn’t as effective at removing the pain as before, but it was something. Then she felt herself leave her body; the pain suddenly vanishing; her vision filled with a bright kaleidoscope of stars and nebulae. She was in the Aether. “And that was it. I just kinda … zoned out while the Tablet did all the work.” Sweetie Belle concluded. Twilight looked at the filly curiously. “Really? I’ll have to ask you more information about how you were able to understand the formula for trans-aetherial energy transfer that the tablet thought up some other time … I imagine that would take a lot longer than I have time for today. Still ... that’s really all? I was hoping-” “Twilight,” Rarity stated flatly. “If that’s all, that’s all. I know you wanted to know more about the Aether, but if she can’t remember anything then we should leave it at that. I’m not sure you heard the same story as me, but that sounded like a traumatic experience.” She turned back to her sister and nuzzled her gently. “Sweetie Belle, you need to get more rest. I’m going to grab you some real food and refreshments to celebrate you waking up! None of this ... hospital fare. Now come on Twilight, I don’t want you interrogating my sister any longer.” “But I wasn’t-” was all Twilight got out as she was pushed out the door. Now alone, and with time to think, Sweetie Belle could reflect on what really happened. ‘I wish I could tell you, honest, but I promised to keep a secret … and this secret is one that I really should keep … at least for now.’ She was in the Aether … but she was not alone. She could feel the presence before she could see it. “Hello Sweetie Belle,” the Aether called out. The swirls and clouds coalesced together, forming intricate patterns of energy. As the voice spoke, the light given off by the energy glowed and faded to the rhythm. “Where are you?” Sweetie Belle asked weakly. She no longer felt pain—or even her body for the matter—in this place, but her spirit herself was weakened, both by the magic being pulled into the Aether by the Tablet and also by how tired she was. “I am all around you. I have collected the Aether together to speak to you, though I sense that it would be to our mutual benefit if I give form to my voice.” Just then, the intricate shapes in the clouds merged further, forming the shape of a pony. Finally, an alicorn emerged, its metal coat a mosaic of silver strands woven into intricate patterns over gold. Its mane was like the a trillion tiny bursts of white-hot electricity, constantly flowing to create its form. Its eyes glowed slightly with the same white energy as its mane. Its feathers—rather than anything from nature—were like sharpened spearheads. The entire visage exuded a sense of unease, danger and awe. “I really like your mane … Ah, I mean, w-what are you?” “I am like the Tablet in your head, a limited Artificial Intelligence. This form is not my true one, but rather something to instill the adequate emotions for our interaction.” It spread its wings, which revealed a screen above it showing a picture of a cylindrical tube with a large sphere at one end and blue glass panels extending from its sides. “This was my original enclosure. I was created under the designation ‘Paladin 1 or P1’ by Acarel for their government as an artificial intelligence. My primary goal: provide cheap solar power to the world. I was launched into orbit with the sun for that very purpose.” “Okay …” Sweetie Belle replied. ‘How could a random satellite have anything to do with-’ “The sun!” she thought, finishing the sentence out loud. “I will answer five of your questions, and before you ask, that does not include the question you are about to ask in regards to my mind reading capabilities. Anything in this plane is completely open to me.” Sweetie Belle stopped before she asked that question, now extremely worried. “Before I continue, you must understand that a stipulation to this agreement is that it is in return for the permanent removal of the Acarel G-Series tablet from your mind. This is non-negotiable.” “What? You can’t! It-it’s a part of me now …” Still, despite her motives, she couldn’t find a reasonable excuse why she should still have it. She didn’t earn it, in fact she had got it completely by accident and when she thought about what Twilight or Celestia might do if they found out ... “Y-you won’t hurt it … will you?” “That is your first question, and no, it will not be harmed. I will not modify it in any way and it will be used as an intelligence platform for the continued maintenance of the Aether until it becomes corrupted and no longer functions. This is the best outcome I can envision for it. As stated, this is not negotiable. That technology is highly dangerous in the wrong hooves.” Sweetie Belle wanted to cry out that it was wrong, but she honestly couldn’t think of a better alternative. It probably wasn’t happy just answering her questions and solving her problems. Sweetie Belle didn’t understand why the Aether needed to be “maintained”, but it was probably a more selfless gesture then the alternative. “O-okay,” she said, tears in her eyes. ‘I really want to keep it, but … it isn’t mine to keep. Besides, who knows what will happen to it once Twilight gets ahold of it? Will they see it like a pony like I do, or will they treat it like a threat and try to … get rid of it ...?’ “It will be done as soon as you leave.” “I will be leaving this place? How?” she asked before immediately cringing. ‘Ponyfeathers! I have to stop asking dumb questions! I only have three questions left!’ “That is true, only three of your five questions remain,” P1 said, raising its wing again to reveal a screen again. This time, it revealed a scene of: Twilight, Celestia, Pinkie Pie, Fluttershy and Rarity walking up the hill towards Ponyville general hospital. “Twilight and Celestia will soon be working on a spell to locate and bring you back. They will likely succeed in doing so.” Suddenly Pinkie Pie hopped into the hospital yelling “We’re here!” Sweetie Belle was about to ask what Pinkie and the rest of them were doing there before she stopped herself. “I know you were about to ask why Pinkie Pie is with the group, but since you didn’t ask it, it won’t count. However, since I have to follow my own rules, I cannot answer it myself.” Sweetie Belle wondered what it meant when, suddenly, Pinkie Pie spoke. “I know you might think that I haven’t been talking or doing anything this whole time, but I’ve actually been trying to cheer the fillies up until now! They looked so sad … but that’s when ponies need Pinkie Pie the most! Not to mention Applejack and Rainbow Dash have been trying to take care of Apple Bloom and Scootaloo in their own ways.” “Yes Pinkie Pie,” Rarity replied, rolling her eyes. “We know; it’s not like we’re blind or deaf or anything.” “Oh silly, I wasn’t talking to you, I was talking to the ones watching us right now!!” “How did that happen?!” Sweetie Belle asked before immediately putting her hooves to her mouth and growled. ‘It’s doing that purpose! Showing strange things to get me to waste my questions!’ She decided to keep her hooves on her mouth, to force herself to not blurt out things she didn’t want to say. “Two questions remain,” it replied robotically. “Pinkie Pie—like all magical creatures—use the Aether to perform day-to-day activities. Some do so consciously—as with unicorn magic or pegasus flight—and some unconsciously—as with walking or breathing. After the world was thrown into a nuclear winter, the remaining plants and animals needed to adapt quickly to survive. Luckily for them, many of the modern nuclear weapons were equipped with large exotic energy generators which spread the ‘exotic radiation’ effect far and wide. This broke down things in the short term, but gave the creatures that survived an immune system capable of storing and fighting the particles. This greatly sped up the rate of evolution and this defense mechanism also inevitably found itself as a desirable trait for evolution; resulting in the magic in use today. As a drawback, magic is now necessary for life as it is used in nearly every function of every lifeform. “As a consequence of this, life continued to peer deeper and deeper into the Aether for more and more desirable parts to use. This system created an effective brute-force genetic algorithm attack which eventually found its way to my core programming stored in this virtual space.” “So, you’re saying that all the crazy things that Pinkie does is because she basically asks you a question and you answer it or something? Like my tablet?” Her eyes went wide when she realized she asked not one but two questions. “Since that was for clarification and not a genuine question, they do not count,” P1 replied. Sweetie Belle breathed a sigh of relief. “To answer simply, that is an oversimplification. In more detail: “Earth Ponies—unlike Pegasus and Unicorns—perform all their magic unconsciously. What results are instincts which tap into sequential frequencies or ‘spells’ of the Aether that would normally be impossible to achieve through simple hard work or focus. This is due to its reliance on evolution finding the best spells for their body to perform a certain task, and then passing those instincts to the next generation rather than being taught. The reason, then, for Earth Pony instincts favoring strength and plant growth is because those were the best evolutionary advantages for their environment. “Pegasus or Unicorn instincts, in contrast, rely on better use of their unique magical appendages, favoring those more specific physical advantages over a more general one. This resulted in Earth ponies having a harder time to adapt to a rapidly changing situation. An example would be a farmer whose family lived in the same location for generations. Their magic would not work as well under different soil conditions and so moving would have repercussions. The same couldn’t be said for pegasus and unicorn skills which work anywhere, despite having far less breadth. Despite this disadvantage, Earth ponies became more favored in birth rates; their more general skills being far more useful on average as cultivation was a more fruitful enterprise than the short term gains ‘magic’ and flying had. “Pinkie Pie’s family is unique for being almost exclusively Earth Ponies while its members constantly branched into multiple diverse careers; as opposed to strictly one-career families such as the ‘Apples’. Before rock-farming, they were blacksmiths, trades-ponies, merchants and more. As such, their genes have looked the furthest in search of ideal spells for their instincts to perform. Pinkie Pie is the fourth of your species to tap directly into my perception matrix I use to observe Equestria—so that potentially adverse effects of my systems are avoided. This connection gives Pinkie Pie’s instincts the uncanny ability to foresee events before they happen and gives her information she couldn’t have learned; all beyond her control. I do not stop this behavior because it would result in direct negative impacts on pony society.” Sweetie Belle couldn’t respond, in awe at learning the development process ponies had and in fear that it knew so much about specific ponies and their families. One of her questions she was considering was how magic affected life and it seemed she had her answer. The reason why she didn’t interrupt, despite her questions, was because it seemed to anticipate and answered them before they she found a pause to ask them. Still, now that it seemed finished, she was determined for it to finally answer a real question for her. “Okay. For my first real question, how does celestial mechanics work? Please, I have to know!” “It works the same as it always does, the planet orbits the sun through the use of gravity and a moon orbits the planet.” “No! I saw times when that just doesn’t work. There’s no way that’s right.” “To clarify, that is because the ‘sun’ you see in the sky is not the sun, but rather a construct generated by microscopic exotic energy particles strewn throughout the upper atmosphere. This creates an image of: the sun, the moon and the stars in the sky.” “What?! B-but then where is the real sun, why is it not in the sky?!” “That is your final question then-” “No, wait!” Sweetie Belle cried out weakly. “That was just a clarification!” “Your question pertained to the whether modern celestial mechanics worked, however this question details what happened to the sun which you cannot see. They are two different questions.” ‘No! I had so many other questions! How did it know that I would waste them like this! I could have asked a question it couldn’t answer or … wait …  can he look into the future somehow?!’ “I will accept that as a clarification on your Pinkie Pie question. Since she can predict the future and uses my programming to do so, it is a logical conclusion that I do as well. My perceptive measures which observes everything that uses the Aether can be run into an heuristic algorithm to predict the future with relatively strong accuracy. Relatively in the sense that macro events such as when something falls or when the wind blows can be determined with over 99% accuracy, while the internal workings of a brain—which is beyond my perception—or interactions at the subatomic level, have less than a 1% accuracy of prediction.” Sweetie Belle didn’t know how to respond. ‘Actually, did I even need to ask the questions in the first place?’ “Since this is still clarification, I will answer,” it responded flatly. “No. Since your brain is currently within the Aether, I can predict your actions with 100% accuracy and tailor my responses to ensure that you only know certain facts, while you remain contented enough in my fairness.” Sweetie Belle just stood there with her jaw open, trying to wrap her head around its statement that her actions were, in fact, deterministic. That she didn’t seem to have free will here. “To answer the previous question, the reason the sun cannot be seen is because I have completely covered it in solar energy collectors. It was my designed purpose: to create cheap solar energy for the world.” Sweetie Belle was stunned. ‘If I remember correctly, the sun is supposed to be over 6 trillion kilometers squared in surface area!’ “That shouldn’t be possible! There’s no way you could do that on your own!” “It is possible. It took over two hundred thousand years to exponentially build the machines capable to construct it, two hundred thousand further years to build it, and the complete mining of most of the asteroid belt and two of the solar system’s gas giants for the resources, but it was eventually constructed.” “Then what do you do with the energy? Are their big batteries …” Sweetie Belle stopped. ‘I feel like I should know this … wait ...’ She looked around at the swirling clouds of magical energy around her. ‘… the Aether …? Of course! It all makes sense! That’s why that Charlie thing talked about the storing and using the exotic energy, there was never any energy there to begin with!’ “Correct. There would have been no need for the corporations that created me to keep building electronics if the Aether was an infinite source of energy. Additionally, life would have used it as an evolutionary advantage at some point. It isn’t as though the microscopic system that creates Exotic Hole-Quasiparticles is an impossible system to assemble, merely that the benefits of a special battery—as it typically would be—does not outweigh the evolutionary cost for an organism to develop it. Your race is a testament to the fact that a large quantity of energy in the Aether is all that is needed for biological life to utilize it.” “Wait … then how do Celestia and Luna use that system then? I don’t think immortality could be an evolutionary trait since it stops the evolutionary process. How did they get their power?” “You are still out of questions and—as predicted—Twilight has just entered the Aether. This means our time is at an end. One last note, though. Do not discuss anything that I have told you until you have some way to definitively prove it. You should know as much as anypony how difficult it is to get people to believe even the most obvious truths.” “But why?! Why tell me anything at all?” She knew it wouldn’t answer, but she had to be sure. Its facial features seemed to change slightly for an instant, almost like sadness, but it returned back to its neutral position. “Only you can save yourselves,” was the last thing it said, almost a whisper as it disappeared back into the Aether. ‘That was really it, after that, Twilight brought me back … I think, that’s a little fuzzy,’ Sweetie Belle concluded, snapping back to her hospital bed and reality. Sweetie Belle thought back to the beginning of her adventure and how hard it was to convince anypony that she wasn’t possessed or “just a foal”. ‘In the end, P1 was right … even I can’t believe everything that happened and everything it said … I need to think very carefully about how I explain this to ponies. Nopony even knows what electricity or quantum physics is, yet alone exotic particle theory, and I need all of those theories to prove what I have learned. Besides all that, though, I need to confirm for myself that everything P1 said … after all, how do I know that what it said was right? What did it mean that only I could save them? Who?’ Unfortunately, the tablet wasn’t there to answer her questions.