Twilight Sparkle stood outside of Red's door. Shining Armor was right, the alicorn did just sit by his window and stare out of it all the while mumbling to himself. She could not blame him, for he has to stay indoors, but it seemed extremely alien to her. Maybe she should give him some books to keep him company maybe? She shakes her head peeking inside more.
Yet again, as with previous times, except with different ponies, the armor stand had Red's polished armor hanging on it, with the gameson folded on a table in the room right beside the armor stand. It was all very formal and clean.
The room had next to no modification. Barely anything was on the nightstand, there was just nothing else but Red's meager possessions such as his halberd, which leaned on a wall next to the window, his armor, and maybe some other small things she did not know about. It was almost sad to think about such a life, but maybe he has become used to living without much material objects?
Shaking her head, she proceeds to knock on the door frame with a hoof, attracting the attention of the alicorn, who's body twists in his position to look over at her with a blank expression.
He motions his head for her to come inside, to which she does, entering the room itself over to next to Red's bed, which was not that far away from the window where Red sat. His bed was not exactly the most tidy bed one would ever see, some of the sheets falling off of the bed itself.
"Don't the maids come in to fix up the room every time you are out of here?" Twilight asks, the crimson alicorn shaking his head.
"They refuse to, for they are afraid of me." he says flatly, an ear flickering, looking out the window yet again. His simple gesture of indifference to the cleaner's fear of him was enough to send a chill through Twilight's spine. He was almost like a robot in this case, expressing next to no emotion in its activities or in this case, inactivity.
Silence, both lips sealed, Red not talking for he sees no need to, and the student for she is nervous. Twilight Sparkle looks over at the door, contemplating walking away and doing this some other time, but she shakes her head. If only he-
"What is your purpose of being here?" Red asks, his head moving over to face Twilight. Her muzzle scrunches up as she thinks of what to say.
"I think we came off on the wrong hoof yesterday..."
"How so? Your reaction is justified." Red gives a confused stare, an eyebrow raising.
"Wait... What? Justified?" She asks, shaking her head. He cant be serious, she thinks to herself.
"Yes, justified. My actions were rather... 'awkward' and 'creepy', and yes, I realize myself to be a beast of large proportions, an elephant in the room per say. You cant ignore the elephant in the room nor ignore his features and what you feel of him, taking past experience and present experiences to judge him. Although, that is how I look at it." Red expains, finally getting up from his position of sitting on his haunches and stretching. A few cracks and pops of his bones being stretched can be heard as Twilight looks on with a slight frown.
He begins to pace around the room aimlessly, stopping only to look at Twilight for a second. He is obviously out there and probably see's nothing to talk about with her. Maybe he does not know how to start up conversation.
"Dont say that." Red stops and looks at her, approaching her slightly with a step, her eyes darting side to side, "Dont be so self deprecating, its not a healthy thing to do.".
"How so? Its true, all the things that I am supposedly. I eat meat, for The Moon's sake." Twilight recoils instinctively at the mention of a pony eating meat, of all things. This only makes him scoff, rolling his eyes and walking towards the window, looking outside yet again.
"Red Dusk?" she asks, hoping to bring him back over to talk.
"Red Dusk?" she says again, his ears flickering now as his neck sinks in. He mumbles something she cant understand, however.
"What?"
"I said, my point has been proven. It just would not work for me to lie to myself and to others. I must be straight forward with others about who I am, or else I lose my credibility as a pony, which has already fallen apart. Now, if you dont mind me asking..." he looks over at her with a blank face.
"Please leave. I wish to be alone."
"But---"
"Leave." he says with authority. Her gesture of fear was enough to make him pissed off enough to want her out, presumably. However, she was not going to find out.
She quickly gets up and trots out, looking back one time to see the back of his head towards the window. She looks forward again, trotting down the hallway to hear a door close with a click. She breathes a sigh of relief, heading to her guest room.
"Shining Armor, might I ask, what is this?"
Red pokes the glowing part of a machine on the desk. It had a blue background with some grey bar on the bottom with weird icons on it and some other icons on the blue space itself apart from the bar. The thing itself was big and boxy, with the front glowing part of it projecting from the main thing. It was a light shade of grey.
Right next to it sat a bulky, whirring grey box that the glowing part was hooked up to and the box being hooked up to cords that went into things on the walls. Then there was this large, hoof imprint shaped thing with two buttons and a wheel in the center ontop of a black mat. Infront of the glowing part lay this large board full of small buttons that were more wide than high, presumably to allow for one to press them with the tips of their hooves. Each button had a letter of the Equestrian alphabet on there, aswell as numbers and things like "Tab" and "Enter".
Red just looked at it all with a look of absolute confusion. It was absolutely alien to him, the whirring object that stood on the desk of Shining Armor's dark office. There were ofcourse, other things on the large desk, but this was a center piece.
"This, Red, is called a computer."
"A com-pew-ter?" Red repeats.
"Yes, a computer. Its a thing that does all sorts of stuff! I can make documents on here with these keys and go on Equestria Online and do all sorts of stuff on it, like play games!" Shining Armor explains with a smiling face. It was night outside, which was why the office was sort of dark, except a dim lamp and the 'computer' screen.
Red's face still signified him being confused. Only a few seconds from now, Shining thought.
"W-What?" Red gives a stern statement of his feelings. Shining chuckles to himself, shaking his head as he grabs the small thing on the mat around. A white arrow starts moving, attracting the attention of Red, who's eyes track it with interest.
"This is called a mouse. This big thing here with the glow is called a monitor, the box is called a PC or CPU, and this thing is called a keyboard." Red nods as Shining explains, still curious.
"Show me what you can do." Red says, Shining happy to oblige as the cursor floats over to some weird icon labeled underneath 'Simville 2000'. The mouse clicks and within seconds, some stuff is happening on the screen. A spiraling galaxy, a floating purple saucer thing flashing the screen, some green latice framework and then terrain and buildings springing up like rubber.
As Red watches the short intro, his face slowly changes from skeptical to extremely impressed. His mouth was a perfect O and his eyes were fixed on the screen. Meanwhile, Shining Armor sits down on the cushion on the floor, doing all sorts of things that become a jumble of bizarre movements to Red's medieval eyes.
The alicorn looks away, shaking his head.
"This is impossible! How can this be done? How?" Red asks as Shining navigates the menu of the game to a button saying "New City.". Within moments, there was generated terrain out on the screen, and Shining was getting to work, only for him to speak.
"Its called electricity and things called 'transistors' and 'hardrives' and all this other stuff. Its really, really cool. What you are seeing here is a graphic representation of terrain and this game is a simulator for cities. In some ways, but thats beside the point." Shining Armor explains, as he lays down zoning for residential housing, roads, and other things that Red could not effectively decipher.
"But... What about magic? Cant you do things with magic?"
"Nah, those things were slow, bigger than these, and more expensive. Im not even kidding! The crystals liked to overheat apparently, so thats why they arent in use anymore." Red looks at the CPU with a concentrated face.
"Aren't you supposed to be working?"
"Who says I cant take a little break while Im still here? Besides, not much this week because all we had to do to deal with security regarding you is beef up patrols, cancel most if not all meetings with the outside ponies, which really helps on making things less messy, and tons of other stuff that just gave me not much work." Shining's head was on a swivel, looking at the screen for a second and then to Red.
Red Dusk just hums, processing. Right now, Shining had sort of a strange looking town going on with hospitals and guard stations, all sorts of stuff. Though, he remembers his confrontation with Twilight earlier on, and a part of his mind pushes him to seek counsel on how to deal with Twilight from Shining. However, he pushes it away, and instead thinks of a simpler question.
"When should Twilight and her friends leave?"
"Day after tomorrow, why do you ask?" Shining presses a button labeled "Esc", bringing up a box and some buttons, but pausing the game entirely, it seems. Red shakes his head, a small, yet nervous grin appearing on his face.
"Nothing major. Im just wondering." Shining squints at him, before shrugging.
"Wanna try?" Shining gets up, backing away and presenting the cushion with a hoof.
Red internally sighs in relief, but on the surface, he takes a step back. Only to come again.
"I would assume that it would be quite... stimulating to 'play' this." Red sits down, and Shining uses his magic to exit out of his city, choosing not to 'save'.
Within moments, a new terrain appears, and Red's face crunches into one of concentration as it is illuminated by the white glow of the computer.
"Now, what you do..."
Within a few minutes, everything went to absolute shit.
"Red, why do you have residential next to industrial? Why do you have twenty guard stations for what, 10,000 ponies? You are taxing your people to all hell!"
"Shining, quiet! This is my first time!"
"But just because its your first time doesnt mean you get an excuse to throw logic out the window!" Shining lectures to him aggressively. A guard walks by, looking inside and giving a rather disgusted face at Red Dusk sitting on the cushion.
Red Dusk's face was quite peeved by Shining Armor's nagging. His placement of zoning and roads clearly communicated his lack of knowledge of how to design a city: The roads were clogged by both hoof and cart traffic, taxes were higher than Canterlot, and ponies lived right next to the industrial areas.
Plus, he forgot to put down schools and mostly focused on guard stations which were in no shape or form scarce. So not only were ponies in his city stupid, they were flooded with an influx of guards.
"Shining, calm yourself!" Red growls softly, clenching his teeth. He puts down another row of zoning and roads, which are filled up with houses instantly, and traffic becomes more of a problem.
"You have no commercial zones, man. Why don't you allow your people to buy somethings they want?" Shining Armor jabs Red with his hoof, Red's leg retaliating with an effective punch with a knee.
"Back off, damnit. They can make shit themselves!" Red gives a mischievous smile as he thinks about it. Shining, on the other hand, blows out some air, shaking his head.
"Your people cant do that, that's not in the ga---." Shining stops as a message appears, announcing this:
"A LARGE BALL OF DOOM COMES FROM THE SKY. RUN FOR THE SHELTERS!"
Red sees this too, and is initially calm, while Shining looks away, putting a hoof to his face.
"The guards can take care of it!" Red responds, seeing Shining walk away.
The guards didn't do jackshit. The ball ravages the city as it walks on 6 legs mechanical legs, destroying houses, monuments, fields! Everything in its wake was destroyed and just a pile of black pixels.
Red looks on with disbelief, seeing his mess of a city be turned into more of a mess. He looks on, disturbed by how ironic the ball thing came out of the sky and wrecked havoc, almost a sign to him, mocking him. But he shakes his head, the only thing being conveyed is that this giant, cartoon-ish looking ball of doom just kicked over the tallest building, an apartment building, over onto its side.
"Amazing." he says, watching his debt go deeper and deeper. Actually, now that he thinks about it, how did he even get people in his city if he had taxes? Oh right, there was barely anyone in the city in the first place!
After a minute of both the ponies watching on, the ball of doom walks off the screen, signalling that the suffering of the city people should be over. Except, now Red was in huge debt, and cant build much anymore... Sooo, he claps down his left hoof, the right one going up to rub his face.
He looks at Shining, who had bags under his eyes, looking back at Red. It was a blank, tired stare.
Before, he made a small chuckle, a small smile on his face. Red's lips bend and curve partially, giving a half smile.
Before they both knew it, both softly laughed at the absurdity of the situation.
Maybe they could do another new game before hitting in for the night?