//------------------------------// // Act 2 - Chapter 3: With and without an audience // Story: Friends like these // by Istaran //------------------------------// Angelica was worried. She tried to hide it, but this time she failed. Adagio caught her frown as she entered the garage where there band did their music videos, before the teenager could hide it with a sheepish grin. Adagio also noticed her mouse moving toward something. "Angelica~ You wouldn't be trying to hide something from me would you?" She asked with a threatening tone of fake sweetness. "Come on, let me see. Is it a porno? You don't have to hide that kind of stuff from your friends, you know. We won't tell your parents." "Umm, yeah, that's all it is. You caught me!" she said with a blush, but Adagio was a bit too good at reading people to fall for that easy of a misdirection. "Come on, let me see," she said pushing Angelica out of the way, as the other Dazzlings strolled into the room, still finishing off a couple beverages. "What's going on?" Sonata asked innocently. "Our friend, Angelica, is hiding something from us," Adagio complained, as she took the mouse and reopened the minimized window. Faced with an image of her own face, along with her friends, she was really confused for a moment. This was their latest music video, why would Angelica try to hide it from them? Then she looked down. She frowned as she started scrolling down. Then she trembled, rage visible in her eyes. Then she clicked over to some of the previous uploads. Tears formed in her eyes, making it harder to read but she didn't need to see the actual words. Blood trickled down her cheek from biting her lip. By now, Sonata and Aria were at her sides. Aria's look managed to get even blanker than usual, as if her emotions had simply decided to retire and move to Florida, leaving an empty husk behind, reading the comments mechanically. Sonata leaned in and gave Adagio a comforting hug, that didn't seem to actually be working. "That one doesn't seem too bad," Sonata suggested, pointing out one of the comments. "The one that suggests we do our videos naked while making out? Ugh. Even if I was gay, I wouldn't let these pervy wankers have a peek at what I've got," Aria said, her voice dripping with disgust. Sonata sighed. She wasn't overly interested in the sexual aspects herself, but sadly that was the only comment that had actually been favorable to them. They had gotten a few likes, but no positive comments and even more dislikes. "I'm so sorry, you guys," Angelica began. "I didn't want you guys to see this. Your music is so good, it must be my editing job, or the special effects or something. Or maybe we need better recording equipment? I could get a part time job to be able to buy some better microphones maybe..." Adagio sighed, sharing a glance with her fellow sirens. From their looks, she felt certain Aria knew what she was thinking and Sonata didn't. Typical. Their magic probably couldn't carry through the Internet. Certainly not without some special tweaking of some kind, they had no idea how to even attempt. It was still a bit soul-crushing to have such a purely negative reaction from their audience. They thought their voices were fairly good even without the magical compulsions backing them, the lyrics were strong and the music rocked. But the best they got beyond a few silent thumbs-ups was accusations of being wannabe ripoffs of other singers and a suggestion to make a porno. "It's alright, Angelica," Adagio finally said, giving the girl a reaffirming hug, mirrored more sincerely by Sonata. "You did the best you could with what you could afford. I think what we really need to do is find a way to do some gigs in person, where there's no issues about equipment. What do you think about that? We could hit the road, do a tour?" "Right.. in person," Aria confirmed, nodding. "Road trip!" Sonata declared excitedly, throwing her hands up and giggling. "I'll go pack!" When Angelica and Sonata heading inside to start packing, Adagio turned to her coconspirator. "Aria, my dear. We are going to find all these wankers and turn them into geldings. You catch my drift? HaremJutsu13754, we're coming for you." "I'll pack my rusty spork," Aria confirmed with an evil grin. Unfortunately, Angelica wasn't the only one able to find Twilight Sparkle's new email address. She had, after all, used it openly on countless public forums. Twilight! OMG, I'm like ur #1 fan! Plz tak me too Equestria and b my waifu! XOXO, lololo, -Josh Dear Josh, - Thank you for your support! I had to look up what waifu meant, and I am very flattered, but I don't think I am interested in dating a human right now. For one, I understand long distance relationships can be really hard, and it doesn't get much more long distance than interplanetary. Also, I don't currently have the means to travel to your world in person or bring someone from there to here. If that changes, I will include you in the collection of potential suitors I reconsider, but I can't promise to even notify each and every one of you personally if that happens. There's just so many of you! And I can't exactly date everypony all at once. -In the meantime, I hope you find a special somepony all your own. Sorry, special somehuman! Don't stop looking! -Best wishes, --Twilight Sparkle Dear 'Twilight Sparkle', I know the Internet is often a place for farces, but I feel yours has gone on quite too long already. If you really believe you are a Technicolor pony with a magic appendage extending from your forehead, I urge you to seek immediate psychiatric help for the sanity of yourself and other around you. Or as our peers so succinctly put it: 'pics or it didn't happen'. Pics attached. Enjoy. The first one is me, the second is me with some of my best friends. -And before you ask, no you can't see a pic from the other end. We ponies might not have a nudity taboo, but I am aware that you humans do. -Twilight Dear 'Twilight' I admit to being impressed by your photoshopping and/or 3d modelling skills. While I am sure it is not too hard to change the colors on a photograph of a pony, your attention to detail and workmanship deserves a kudos. As for your other comment, I was not going to ask and I am offended that you would even suggest it. I am not some pervert, much less one who is into bestiality. That you would even think of such a thing speaks much more about your own sickness than about me. Hey Twilight! How was your brother's wedding? I so wish I could have been there. That would have been incredible! Though I guess the changelings must have been scary? Though I bet they could be a lot of fun if they were nicer. You know like fun. Am I sick for thinking that? Maybe. I dunno, lol. I wish I was a changeling, but I'd be a nice one and not an evil one, and I'd be super nice to you, especially if you were up for some fun. My brother's wedding was lovely and beautiful and quite formal, but not all that exciting when you get down to it. I had trouble understanding what you were talking about until I looked up the 'episode' to which you were referring. While the first season is.. rather creepy in terms of how accurately they portray my life, the entire Human War seem to have been neglected in your depictions, and quite a lot diverged after that. The changelings were our allies in our time of greatest need, but there was a falling out toward the end that lead to them being banished. As far as I know, none of them showed up at the wedding. And while Shiny did marry Princess Cadance, they didn't take control of the returned Crystal Empire, Celestia claimed that for herself. Princess Cadance is now serving effectively as the mayor of Canterlot, and general ambassador to the other nations who send representatives there. Though as an alicorn and a unicorn, they spend as little time in the city as they can get away with. It's just too stifling for one with a horn to stay in a city where nopony can use magic! For a while, I thought maybe changelings could be nice, but when they turned on us, all of them sided with their queen and that makes it harder to trust any of them. Even if they wanted to be good ponies, would they have the choice? I don't know. I'm glad you would try to be a good one if you were one, but maybe it's better to just be yourself? If you want to have some fun, though, I have a great game I've been playing with some other people. The way it works is we each recommend a book to the other, then report back with our comments when we've finished reading. For our purposes, it has to be something available on the Internet, though I've been able to transcribe a bit of pony literature for emailing. I've attached one of my favorites. When we both finish, we can exchange another set of recommendations. I'm a pretty fast reader, but with so many playmates to keep up with, it makes things more fair, don't you think? And to be fair, I'll warn you if you pic something I've already read. Sound like fun to you? It sounds like fun to me! -Twilight Sparkle Before Twilight could start the next email, the spider reached down a spindly limb and tapped on an icon, reminding her that it was nearly time for her big appointment. Alarmed, she took off in a panic, quickly taking the time to prepare herself in the bathroom in every way possible. When she was bathed, brushed, dry, and otherwise ready to go, she stopped to consider her wardrobe. Unfortunately, her clothing options were rather sparse. She had some very fancy clothing and some winter wear, but nothing that really fit the situation. She finally settled on the black dress she had worn during Mrs Redcliff's funeral, minus the veil. It was functional and professional, covering most of her front half in a nod to human sensabilities, and she would simply not turn her bottom half where he could see anything beyond the cutie mark. While the humans who had visited her world had been quite permissive of the nudity thing, they were surrounded with ponies and their own constantly clothed bodies were clearly the outlier. On the Internet, dealing with humans in their own environment, she had already learned that expectations were very different. Finally, she started the client, and made the connection. Shortly, a window appeared on screen, with a placeholder while she waited for the human to accept the call on the other side. It was a few minutes before a scruffy looking police officer in his uniform appeared on screen. "Miss Twilight Sparkle?" he asked, dubiously. "In the fur. It's good to finally talk to you, Detective. Miller, was it? Welcome to both our worlds' first interplanetary video call! I only wish it was regarding a more pleasant topic," Twilight Sparkle greeted. "Is there a reason you don't have video show- Aaaah! eheh, sorry, it just. Wow. Okay, umm. wow. You weren't kidding, huh? Sorry, that's.. probably the most unprofessional greeting ever in the history of first contacts.." Detective Miller responded. Twilight couldn't help but giggle, hiding her mouth behind her hoof for a moment. "That's alright, Detective, I knew you didn't believe me, so I expected a bit of shock. After all, that's why I wanted to talk to you this way instead of just by email. Is everything coming through clearly? Is the translation all making sense?" "Translation? Of course, sorry, I guess it makes sense you don't speak English natively. And that explains why your lips look a bit out of sync. Yes. Okay. Oh! I need to let you know, we're recording this on our end, for the investigation. And, history I guess. No pressure.." A part of his mind was still hoping this was some elaborate hoax involving very sophisticated CGI. But with every frame of the call, that idea became less and less plausible, and Occam's razor fell more on the side of suggesting that 'I'm talking to a purple unicorn on another planet over Skype' was the simplest explanation. What a day. "Right. Though I imagine you're under a lot of pressure to get your job done, so why don't we get started? You had questions for me regarding the missing persons," Twilight prompted. "Right, so you said you knew specifically what happened to each of the people who did not come home, right? Let's start with that," the officer suggested, trying to be professional. "Right. So first off, Mrs. Redcliff died here in Ponyville. I was.. asked to help decontaminate the site. She apparently dranking a distressingly large number of assorted potions in a very short period of time, resulting in out of control magical interference, and ultimately death. That's why we normally advise against drinking more than one potion in a day, and consider drinking more than three to be unacceptable under even extraordinary circumstances. We believe it was suicide, prompted by the destruction of her son's phone. While they were here, they had a link between their cell phones that sent them all a message when one of them was 'eliminated', either by dying or by the destruction of their phone, with no distinction on the message between the two," Twilight began. "Did anyone witness her drinking it? Did she leave a note?" the detective inquired. "There were no witnesses, no, at least none came forward. She died in Trixie Lulamoon's mobile home, where she had been picked up as a hitchhiker, but Trixie claims to have been absent when it happened," Twilight answered. "Can you arrange for me to speak to Ms. Lulamoon?" he followed up. "Maybe? I understand she showed up on your world, at the home of one Relena Swift. I don't have her address, but you have her email address now, right? I can confirm she is absent from our world, but not the means. Her mobile home was found smashed into a tree at the bottom of a hill; it looks like she just vanished while pulling it up the road," Twilight offered. "Relena.. okay, yes, I have her email address. I'll get in touch with her later. What about the others?" he continued. "Each of the humans received a different magical artifact when they came here. Joshua Swift's artifact transferred any harm from his daughter to himself, and ultimately functioned to save her life from an otherwise lethal attack by bandits in a neighboring country. We have done what we could to pursue justice in that matter, but we have not been able to secure extradition. Relena was there for his funeral, and can possibly tell you more when you make arrangements to interview Trixie," Twilight offered. "That's.. okay, I'm talking to a unicorn, I guess I'll accept your expertise on magical artifacts on faith for now. Did any of those artifacts come back to Earth with the humans?" he asked. "Most were turned over to us for safe keeping. A few have been lost or destroyed, and a few are sadly unaccounted for. One in particular, Daniel Holden's, could not be safely removed from his body. So his is the only one we know went through with him," Twilight offered. "Great.. I remember his emails..." "As do I. If he really plans to become a villain, he can be incredibly dangerous. Take him seriously!" Twilight urged. "Can you explain what his artifact does?" he asked. "Not really. It makes spiders? Like, spider machines that can make more spider machines, or grow bigger, and do all kinds of stuff? I'm really not clear on its limits. Like, the spider that is translating our Internet connection so I can talk to you was made with his power," she replied with a frown. "Speaking of translation, it sounds like yours is glitching. I keep hearing 'spider'. You know, eight legged bug thing that makes webs?" "That's right. That's what they look like, typically. They're like.. spiders made of smaller spiders. 'Fractal spiders' is what he called them," Twilight confirmed. "Any idea how to stop them?" he asked. "No idea, really. Ryan Smith's item was very effective against them.. as well as us ponies, and the changelings, and anypony else who got within a few miles of his every expanding swath of destruction. But that was destroyed, so we couldn't use it to help you if we wanted to. Speaking of which. Ryan killed Monique Ashland with his item, and in turn was killed by an 'international military coalition'. That's the final official word on how it ended," Twilight offered. "I'm sure I'll have some more follow up questions about that, though email should suffice. What about Benjamin Coleman?" "He was killed by a dragon, shortly after arriving. He was unlucky enough to appear in her home, and was taken to be a thief. He apparently thought he could fight her off rather than apologizing or fleeing. It didn't work out so well for him. His item is still in her treasure hoard, which seems like a safe enough place for it. In any case, we can't get it back from her without a serious fight, which isn't worth the loss of life," she answered. "Killed by a... " right, unicorn. "Killed by a dragon, got it. Alright, Miss Sparkle. If I have any other questions, I'll email them to you. Thank you so much for your cooperation," he finished. "Thanks. I hope your investigation goes well, Detective. I especially hope you manage to find Zeke, alive and well," she said, frowning. The detective nodded in agreement, and disconnected, before pushing away from his desk, staring at the ceiling and trying to make sense of the universe.