Chapter Four: Sequitur
Chapter Four: Sequitur
Twilight studied the strange being she walked with on the way into Ponyville. He claimed to be immortal, unable to die. His rather dramatic resurrection seemed to bear that claim out, but he looked so unassuming, so fragile; he tottered along on just two legs and she constantly felt the urge to steady him with a hoof as he seemed on the verge of toppling over with every step. He had a rather faraway look in his eyes, but they would occasionally focus suddenly. Jeremy was clearly not all that he seemed to be. What is he hiding? she asked herself, Perhaps now would be a good time to push a little.
To fill the silence, Twilight said, “So Jeremy, what do you hope to learn from the Princesses? I mean, they’re ancient and maybe even immortal like you, but what are you looking for?”
Jeremy shook himself out of his daze and blinked as he replayed the question in his head. He hesitated a moment before answering. “Do you live in Ponyville, Twilight?” The question seemed innocent enough, if completely non sequitur.
“Uh, yes. I live in the library, Golden Oaks.”
Jeremy nodded, “I thought so. Tell me, what does it feel like? Coming home, I mean.”
Twilight eyed him and gave a little shrug, “Good, I suppose. I mean, there are all the books, and my bedroom, and Spike of course.”
“Would you say that it feels safe?” Jeremy had resumed his thousand-yard stare and had slowed his pace a little.
Twilight nodded, considering, “That would be an accurate way to describe it. Though there really aren’t any dangers in Ponyville to speak of. We live in a very safe place.” Barring a few notable exceptions, Twilight thought, grimacing to herself.
“How would you feel if you couldn’t go home?”
Twilight paused, thinking about Jeremy’s question with more weight. “I’d feel...awful. Home isn’t just a place. It’s...it’s a… feeling, I guess.”
Jeremy nodded his head once, firmly. “Exactly. Twilight, I can’t get home. I don’t even have the option right now. When I got here, my teleportation device was broken. I can’t fix it because the technology is entirely beyond me. As welcoming as you and your friends have been, and as beautiful as your home is, I feel cut off. Alone in a way that is impossible to describe. To answer your original question, Twilight, I’d like to see if they can send me home.”
“But I thought you were going to travel the universe? See the sights and all that.”
Jeremy sighed and pulled a strange looking silvery oblong device from his pants pocket. “I did want to see the sights; but I wanted to do it on my own terms. Not like this. And besides, with a broken teleporter, I can’t do much sightseeing now can I?” He fiddled with a few tiny buttons on the silver device and pressed a large button. The thing sparked and a little puff of smoke curled up from a seam in the metal case. He sighed, “That’s all that this stupid thing has done since I got here. It should have whisked me away halfway across the galaxy when I pushed the button, but now it just fizzles and dies.”
“Can I see that?” Twilight asked, curiosity piqued. Wordlessly, Jeremy held it out to her. She gripped it in her telekinetic field and hovered it over to her, inspecting it closely.
The device measured about as long as her horn and tapered smoothly at each end. One end had a multitude of small buttons protruding from it and a large red button in the middle--the one Jeremy had pressed to cause sparks to shoot from it. The other end of the device was notched and grooved, perhaps for easier gripping. It looked entirely innocuous to Twilight. She hovered the teleporter back to Jeremy, who took it back and pocketed it. They were just walking into Ponyville proper. Twilight surreptitiously steered them along the familiar streets, ignoring the gaping ponies who stared after them.
She was silent for a long moment. Finally, she decided she had to broach the subject that had been bothering her since he’d told his story last night. “Jeremy… you said that you basically just ran away from Clint when you were telling us how you got here last night. You didn’t mention anything about a teleporter.”
Jeremy raised an eyebrow and smiled a small, enigmatic smile that didn’t show any teeth. “Noticed that, did you?” He sighed and put his hands in his pockets. “Maybe I just picked it up before I left?”
Twilight shook her head, “I don’t think so, Jeremy. I don’t think you’ve told us everything.”
Jeremy blew out a short breath and clenched his hands into fists in his pockets and hunched his shoulders tensely before relaxing. “You’re right, Twilight. I haven’t been entirely...forthcoming with you or your friends. I have my reasons.”
“Reasons?” Twilight asked nervously, “Forgive me for saying so Jeremy, but, barring the accident near the Everfree, we’ve treated you with nothing but compassion, friendliness, and trust. Don’t we deserve some of that trust?” She stopped walking and turned to face him, a grave but pleading look on her face.
Jeremy glanced at their surroundings. They were standing outside of a fanciful building that looked to be designed by a demented confectioner. It seemed to be a gingerbread house with a couple of pink cupcakes stacked atop it. It almost gave him diabetes just looking at it. The door was open and a bright pink pony with poofy mane was standing in the doorway with a huge smile plastered on her face. Standing just inside the building were Fluttershy, Applejack, and two other ponies Jeremy hadn’t met yet, but who he recognized from the photograph on Fluttershy’s mantle. He frowned as he realized what Twilight had engineered. “Are you sure you want to know?”
Twilight looked over her shoulder at her friends clustered in the doorway of Sugarcube Corner and then looked back, her resolve solidifying, “I think I have to insist. We don’t know you and the one chance you had to let us in a little, you decided to give us a lie of omission. What am I supposed to think of you now? We don’t know what you’re capable of. Give me--give us--a reason to trust you Jeremy. Please?”
Jeremy stared at the ponies in the doorway. Other than the pink pony’s wide smile, the others looked various degrees of grim and determined. One pony in particular--a pegasus with a rainbow-colored mane--looked ready to fight: her wings were flared and she glared at him with more than a hint of challenge in her rose-colored eyes. “I don’t think you really want to do this, Twilight. Believe me when I say that not knowing is probably better for you. There are beings that would consider you and your friends as part of this if you knew the whole story. I deliberately didn’t tell you a few things because I didn’t want to put you in any danger.”
“I appreciate your concern,” Twilight said slowly, “but I think we’d rather make that decision for ourselves. Besides, I think you probably crossed that line last night already and I’d rather know what’s coming than be surprised by it.”
“Fair enough. But can we go inside? I’d rather not endanger someone who hasn’t made that choice.”
Twilight nodded, relaxing slightly. The other ponies backed into the bakery slowly as Twilight and Jeremy entered. The rainbow-maned pegasus trotted up to Jeremy and gave him a hard glare before deliberately turning her back on him and shooting Twilight a quizzical glance, “This is the joker you were so worked up about? I could take him with one hoof tied behind my back!”
Twilight just shook her head and went to one of the tables. Twilight turned to the aggressively smiling pink pony and asked, “Pinkie, are the Cakes out?”
“Out of what?” Pinkie deadpanned, then broke into a fit of giggling at her own joke, and answered, “They went to Manehattan yesterday and took the twins. The shop’s all mine for the next couple of weeks!”
Twilight nodded and gestured with a hoof to Pinkie and the other ponies, “Jeremy, I’d like you to meet Pinkie Pie,” Pinkie bounced around the table, waving one hoof and fairly bursting with barely contained energy. “Rarity,” Twilight continued and a white unicorn with a gorgeous purple mane and a smoky look about her eyes graciously inclined her head. Twilight finished her introductions, “And this is Rainbow Dash,” the rainbow-maned pegasus posed with her chest thrust out and a pugnacious gleam in her eyes. Jeremy waved to each of them in turn and looked around for a chair.
The ponies sitting around the table seemed content to simply sit on their haunches though, and there seemed to be no chairs in sight. Jeremy dragged a table over and perched on the edge. “Hi there, Applejack, Fluttershy.” Applejack nodded grudgingly, though her friendly demeanor had cooled somewhat since they had spoken earlier that morning. Fluttershy smiled and waved a hoof at him before hiding her face behind her long pink mane.
“When you went to sleep,” Twilight said, “I took the liberty of telling Rarity, Rainbow, and Pinkie here what you had told me and how we met. They each agreed that your story, while amazing, wasn’t everything it seemed to be. We agreed to discuss it with you today when you came into town; give you a chance to be completely honest.”
Jeremy was silent for a moment. He put his hands back in his pockets and nodded his head, reaching a decision. “I don’t like the idea of putting more of you in danger, “ he stated flatly, then sighed, “but it’s not fair to you to leave you in the dark. I just have to know though, what tipped you off?” Jeremy asked, “I thought I’d been pretty careful.”
“A lot o’ little things,” said Applejack, “like how you said you’d joined the Travelers, but you never mentioned ‘em when you was tellin’ your story.”
“And the teleporter thing,” Twilight added.
“And, um… when Applejack said that you ran out of the Everfree forest like something was chasing you, but nothing came out of the forest after you. But it really could have been an honest mistake,” Fluttershy murmured.
With each recitation, Jeremy deflated a little. “Damn,” he muttered, “and here I thought I was being pretty slick.”
“Are you really immortal like the Princesses?” Rarity asked, leaning forward, her eyes wide. Pinkie bounced by the table and deposited a tray full of cupcakes. She bounced back behind the counter, humming happily to herself.
Jeremy scratched his head, “I don’t know if I can really answer that, Rarity. I can’t die, if that’s what you mean.”
Rarity’s eyes widened even more and she looked at Applejack for confirmation. The orange farmpony nodded, “True ‘nuff. I rang his bells good enough to see the inside o’ his skull and he popped up not even a minute later.”
Rarity turned a pale green and smiled at Jeremy weakly, “Oh.” she said in a tiny voice.
Rainbow Dash was eyeing him speculatively, “So what, you like, heal or something? From anything?”
Jeremy nodded, “Yeah, pretty much. I’m not exactly eager to test the theory, but so far, that seems to be the case.”
Rainbow Dash looked impressed, “That is so cool,” she enthused, “can I see it?”
Jeremy chuckled weakly as Rarity rushed from the table, looking decidedly even greener than before. “Like I said, I’m not exactly eager to keep experimenting. Getting my brains kicked out of my skull once was really more than enough.”
“All that aside,” Twilight said impatiently, glaring at Rainbow, “do you think you could finish telling us what actually happened?”
Jeremy picked up a cupcake and took a thoughtful bite, smiling as he chewed, “These are good!” he said around his mouthful of cupcake. He swallowed, put the cupcake down on the table next to him and cleared his throat. “There’s not a whole lot more to tell you, but it’s really the meat of the story. Remember how I told you about Clint changing and chasing me through the library at Nexus? Well, it didn’t quite happen like that…”
~*.*~
“Look, I don’t really give a fuck what you say, Clint. You’re not even human! You don’t care about the same things I do! Fucking etherium?! A magic rock that grants you wishes? No man, I don’t really give a flying fuck for any of this.” He tossed Clint the ball of etherium and turned his back on the old man. “I just want to go home. Wake up from this fucked up dream.”
“You don’t understand yet, Jeremy,” Clint said softly, “You don’t get to wake up. It’s not a dream. If you go home, nothing’s going to change. And besides, what really gave you the idea that you even had a choice?” Clint sat quietly, waiting for Jeremy to respond.
Jeremy narrowed his eyes at Clint, looking at him suspiciously. “Wait… I thought this whole thing was a choice. Me choosing a Society, me choosing what to do with my immortality. What are you talking about?”
Clint sighed and the breath came out in a reptilian hiss. “Jeremy,” he stated dryly, “you seem like a bright kid. Tell me, even with all of eternity at your disposal and with money as no object, how likely was it that Jane just happened by your wrecked car on the night you just happened to come by your precise location on that lonely country road? And then you just coincidentally found a wise immortal who showed you around a fantastic new world, explaining everything and showing off everything in this secret new existence. All for free.” He shook his head sadly, “I had really expected more of you.”
Jeremy swallowed uncomfortably. Clint’s skin seemed to be crawling from within with bizarre and alien shapes. His eyes were changing somehow, becoming less human and more… predatory. The old man looked hungry and alien to him all of a sudden. “Um, I guess I hadn’t really thought of it like that before…” he hedged nervously, surreptitiously edging away from Clint.
“There’s a principle I read about on your home planet,” Clint said, his voice losing its emotion as he spoke, “an idea that the mere act of observation changes the observed. This is a truism that the Observers have known for countless ages. Jeremy, we’ve been observing you for a very long time.”
“You mean that you knew I was immortal for, what, years?” Jeremy edged a little further away from Clint.
“There are methods to detect the potential. We had isolated your particular region in space-time as having a high degree of likelihood for producing an immortal within the next century. We simply had to approach and wait. It only took forty six years for you to arrive. We’ve watched you grow up, Jeremy. We’ve orchestrated a great deal of your life up until now.”
Jeremy stopped moving, his head spinning with the implications of what Clint was telling him. He forced the distracting thoughts out of his head. He had to get out of here now, but Clint was paying too much attention to him. He had to play for time. “Why?” Jeremy asked, his voice small and weak-sounding.
Clint shrugged, too many joints moving for the human gesture. “We had to engineer your life to a great degree so that we could approach you at the exact time you would be prepared. The illusion of free will is one of life’s greatest tricks. You have never had a true choice, son. Not really. None that mattered anyway.”
“Why are you telling me all this now?” Jeremy asked, “I mean, this sounds like a cliched villainous monologue and I don’t even know the point.”
Clint hesitated a moment and then smiled as he answered, “That’s the only intelligent thing you’ve said since I met you, Jeremy. Congratulations. Why don’t you apply that stunning brain of yours and astound me with your reasoning capacity.” Clint’s voice had dropped a couple of octaves, though it still retained its flat, emotionless quality. His skin was darkening to a deep, bruise-like blue and his face began protruding, looking more and more like a snout.
“Um… hey, listen, Clint. D’you think you could stop all that weird shape-changey stuff? It’s really freaking me out and making it hard for me to think.”
Clint chuckled and shook his head, “Sorry kid, but I’ve been in that ugly human form for far too long. It’s time to get back to being me.”
Jeremy shuddered as the changes continued to boil across Clint’s features. “Right. Right. No problem. So, uh, you want me to join the Observers? O-okay, that’s cool I guess. I mean, it’s not like I really care about these Societies, so I guess one’s as good as any of the others. But, uh, d’you think I might have a little while to think about it. Maybe say goodbye to a few people back home?”
Clint’s eyebrows rose in surprise, “What, really? You want to join us, just like that? You weren’t put off by the whole menacing speech or threatening overtones I’ve been throwing out? Intimidation doesn’t usually work this quickly.”
Jeremy ran a hand through his hair and smiled weakly, “Well yeah, that did freak me out. A lot. But it’s all kind of new to me and like you said, you’ve been showing me the ropes about… about well, everything. I guess that makes it so I kinda owe you or something. So… what do you say? Gimme a day or two to say my goodbyes back on Earth and then sign me up I guess.”
Clint’s disturbing transformation ceased and he reverted back to his human form in an instant. He was smiling genuinely. He reached out his right hand for Jeremy to shake, “Well, that’s just peachy!” he hooted, “Welcome to the team! C’mon, let’s go and get you a room for the night and then tomorrow, we’ll get you signed on officially in the Society. After that, we’ll go back to Earth and you can take a few days to say your farewells. After that, we’ll see about your first assignment! Oh,” and here, the flat menace in Clint’s voice returned in spades, “and don’t even think of trying to run. There are Observers everywhere. And we’re very eager to have you.”
Jeremy swallowed convulsively before gingerly shaking Clint’s proffered hand. “Sure man. Sure thing. Can we get that bed you were talking about though? I’m dead tired and those medical nanites are going to take some getting used to.”
“I like you kid. You got a good head on your shoulders. C’mon.” Clint released Jeremy’s hand and stood up, leading them out of the library.
Jeremy watched the old ‘man’ walking in front of him as they once again walked through the uniform hallways of the library. He had seemed to shrink back into insignificance. He was nothing more than an ugly older man ambling along. But the memory of Clint’s startling change would stay with him for the rest of his li… for a long time anyway. Everything about his situation was confusing and Jeremy felt a squeeze of terror worm its way through his guts, but there was one crystal clear thing for him: he had to get as far away from Clint as soon as possible.
~*.*~
“So this scary monster-thing just believed you?” Rainbow Dash asked incredulously.
Jeremy kicked his legs as he took another bite of the cupcake. “I have no idea. But he certainly seemed to. He was very confident. I mean, he’d pretty much strong armed me half a million light years away from the only home I’d ever known and told me everything I knew about immortals. About how things worked. He had every reason to be confident. I don’t know though, throughout all of my time with him, he never struck me as stupid. It’s a thought that keeps me up nights.” He shuddered in remembered fear. “It’s as if he couldn’t conceive in the possibility that I’d run. Or maybe he just figured it didn’t matter if I did.”
“But you did,” Twilight said. “You did run. You came here.”
“Not right away.” Jeremy answered, “But we’re getting ahead of the story here. He took me back to those dormitories…”
~*.*~
Clint led Jeremy back to the living quarters they’d stayed in when he’d been given the translation nanobots. At least, that’s what it looked like from the outside. The inside looked like a cheap motel room, right down to the cheesy, sun-bleached landscape paintings hung over each of the full beds. There was an old color TV sitting in a cabinet and a rickety table that nonetheless looked like it weighed about a thousand pounds. “You can rest here,” Clint said. “Don’t let the room fool you, the beds’re way more comfortable than they look and you can tell the table to fix any meal you’d like, just like in the cafeteria. I’ve got some things I need to do, but I’ll be back in an hour or so.”
“You’re leaving?” Jeremy asked, alarm making his voice rise an octave above normal.
“I won’t be long. But here’s some free advice: don’t go wandering. There are beings here that are nowhere near as friendly as me. Besides, I really don’t want to track you down through Nexus. It’s tiresome.”
Jeremy forced a laugh out and flopped down on one of the beds. It was more comfortable than it looked. “Don’t worry,” he said, “I think I could sleep for about a hundred years. I’m not going anywhere.”
Clint grunted and left then. Jeremy watched the old man walk out of the room and suddenly felt filled with a tingling sort of nervous energy. He felt like he might throw up, and his senses all felt like they were on overdrive. He stood up and paced around the room, hopping on his toes once or twice. A few times, he headed for the door, then stopped himself. Not yet, he told himself each time. When he judged that about ten minutes had passed--though it felt more like ten years--he opened the door to the room and poked his head out, looking up and down the hallway. It was empty. He pulled his head back in and closed his eyes, taking a deep breath.
While his eyes were closed, he formed an image in his mind of a blank white surface with a black circle in the middle. He felt a tingling little feeling run up his back which faded almost instantly. When he opened his eyes again, he was holding a tablet computer like his cousin’s iPad back home. Well that’s a relief, he thought wryly, I wasn’t sure that I could change its appearance like that on the fly. He opened the tablet’s browser and ran a search for ‘map of Nexus’, which the browser returned instantly. He tapped on the image and it projected itself off the screen in a three-dimensional map which hovered in front of him. A little red dot announced his location in relation to everything else.
“Let’s see here…” Jeremy muttered to himself. He scanned the projection and found the cafeteria. It wasn’t too far away. Jeremy closed the browser and went back out the door. Once again, he looked up and down the hall. It was still empty, so he nervously stepped out and began walking down the hall. It wasn’t too long before he was all-out running.
It didn’t take very long for him to reach the cafeteria. The darkened room was as crowded as it had been earlier that day, but Jeremy shied away from any contact and hurried to a darkened and empty depression similar to the one he and Clint had eaten at earlier that day. He kept his eyes glued to the ground about ten feet in front of him, determined not to be drawn into the hypnotic sight of the heart of the galaxy. Once he settled himself into the booth, he pulled out the tablet again. He tapped on a little icon of a human brain which was titled ‘AI Template’.
After a moment, a blank white sphere hovered in front of him. A perfectly neutral voice said in a conversational tone, “Please state the primary function of the AI.”
“Um… personal assistant? Friend? Someone I can trust?” Jeremy guessed.
The blank white sphere was silent for a minute or so, then it spoke again. “Please indicate the preferred form of the AI.” Jeremy stared at the sphere for a while, completely nonplussed.
“Uh… how do I do that?”
“Imagine the desired form.”
Right, of course. Of course, his mind went completely blank at that point. He hated situations like this. In every online game or roleplaying game which offered that degree of customization, Jeremy agonized for hours over how his character would look. This was similar, only much worse: he was under the gun and he couldn’t think of anything. Jeremy felt himself beginning to fall into a panic and forced himself to take a deep, shuddering breath. Don’t freak out, he thought, this is simple. It doesn’t matter. “Can I change it later?”
“Yes.”
“Fine. Just stay like this. A white sphere or whatever. It doesn’t matter right now.”
The sphere took another small pause and then seemed to take on some indefinable feeling of increased resolution. “Would you like the personality core to be dynamic or static?”
“Uh, dynamic, I guess. Come on!” Jeremy snarled, clenching his fists, “ I don’t have much time!”
“Done,” the sphere announced. “Would you like to assign a designation for this personality construct?”
Jeremy growled in frustration, “There’s no time! I need to get out of here like thirty seconds ago! Can you tell me how to get back home?”
“No designation set. The quickest way to leave Nexus and get back to your home would be to join a Society. I see that you’re already listed in the preliminary membership database for the Observers. Would you like me to contact a representative to--”
“No!” Jeremy almost shouted, then remembered he was trying to keep a low profile. “No, I do not want to contact the Observers!” Jeremy hissed. “I don’t want to have anything to do with them! Any other bright ideas?”
The sphere paused and Jeremy had the distinct impression it was staring at him pointedly, “Join another Society.”
Jeremy rolled his eyes, “Thanks, genius! I figured that out. But which one? Which one will get me away from here the fastest?”
The sphere bobbed in the air for a long moment. “I have entered your information into the Society recruitment auction pool. As of this moment, the Travelers have presented the most beneficial bid. I did not submit your auction announcement to the Observers. The Travelers have offered to give you a full Traveler’s Kit within five minutes of your confirmation in joining their ranks. Should I accept their bid?”
Travelers? Jeremy thought, perfect! They’ll be able to get me out of here no problem! “Yes!” he said aloud.
“Please state your full name.”
“Jeremy Wade Campbell.”
“Done. You are now enrolled in the official membership database of the Travelers Society. Please wait here. A representative of the Travelers is on the way to present you with your Kit. I feel obliged to inform you that your decision is a public broadcast. The Observers are protesting it formally. I imagine they will send a representative here soon.”
Shit. Jeremy poked his head above the level of the booth. The doors to the cafeteria opened and he saw Clint stride in. He was too far away to see the old man’s face, but his pace was quick and he was heading right for Jeremy. “How did he find me so fast?!”
The sphere bobbed again and answered dryly, “I imagine it has something to do with the horde of tracking algorithms in the nanites coursing through your bloodstream. Would you like me to scramble their signal?”
Jeremy widened his eyes and hissed, “Yes!” He watched as Clint stopped his purposeful stride and began turning his head to look at each booth in turn. “Shit! It won’t take long for him to find me. I have to move! Can the Traveler rep still find me?”
“Yes,” the sphere answered, “I have simply neutralized the tracking nanites the Observer injected into you. Though it will not take him long to figure out what has happened. If you desire to keep away from the Observer, immediate action will be necessary.”
“Any suggestions?”
“Run.”
Jeremy stared at the white sphere in mute surprise for a moment, then shook himself and climbed up the stairs and onto the main floor of the cafeteria. The white sphere hovered at his side at about head-level. He turned away from Clint and ran toward a cluster of--well, he’d be liberal enough and call them people for now--and pushed his way through them, earning a series of angry shouts as he dashed through the cafeteria. He nearly tripped several times as he ran, always aiming for crowds. The cafeteria was huge, almost as big as a football stadium and it was packed. People were constantly milling around and getting in and out of the sunken booths and the dimmed lights made it difficult to see properly. Hopefully that would work in his favor.
It was like running through a packed stadium. Hustle and bustle made it impossible for Jeremy to tell exactly where he was or how far behind him Clint was. He lost all sense of direction and time and he dashed through crowds of bizarrely shaped beings. No one really seemed to pay much attention to his headlong rush, other than to yell after him in varying shades of irritation and anger. Jeremy ignored them as he ran, searching for another convenient nook where he could hide. The AI construct floated serenely by his side advising him of best routes to take.
Eventually, his lungs burning and his legs feeling like hot lead, Jeremy jumped down into yet another empty booth set into the floor. He laid there, breathing hard and praying that Clint wasn’t right behind him. “I took the liberty of setting a false trail for the Observer agent as you seemed intent on personal privacy. It will not, however, distract him for long. I estimate roughly two minutes until the agent begins heading to this location.”
Jeremy groaned, “Great… How long until the Travelers rep gets here?”
“Right now,” Jeremy startled at the feminine voice. It had not come from the construct, but rather from the stairs leading to the booth.
The source of the voice was completely incongruous with the timbre. The voice suggested curves, alcohol and sex while the body suggested arachnophobic nightmares. There were too many legs, too many eyes, and the coloring was a greyish white that made Jeremy think of something bloated and dead. He also realized that he wasn’t actually hearing a voice per se, but that there was a strange smell in the air which reminded him of burning motor oil and movie theater popcorn. The scent lingered and the words echoed in his head, fading as the scent faded. He took a deep breath and calmed himself as much as he could. “You’re the, uh, Traveler rep, huh?”
“This One is indeed a representative of the Traveler Society. Is this the corporeal encasement of the sapient identifying itself as Jeremy Wade Campbell?”
“Um, yes, that’s me.”
The spider creature approached him and a small, perfectly formed arm ending in a hand with six fingers reached out. It took a beat for Jeremy to realize that it wanted to shake his hand. He gingerly grasped the hand and shook it. The ‘skin’ was chitinous and smooth, cool but not cold to the touch. Its grip was incredibly strong, though Jeremy sensed that it was holding back the lion’s share of its strength so it did not crush his hand. “This One is pleased to welcome the Jeremy Wade Campbell entity to the fold of the Travelers Society. This One is given to understand that the Jeremy Wade Campbell entity is currently evading pursuit of an Observer agent and desires to depart from Nexus with alacrity. Is this data correct?”
It took Jeremy a moment to parse the dense ‘speech’ of the spider creature but after a moment, he nodded. The air was layered with the Traveler’s word-scent. The layering created additional meaning to the words the spider thing had spoken, somehow adding a flavor of gentle humor, trepidation, and urgency. “It is gratifying to know that This One has successfully located the Jeremy Wade Campbell entity. This One has the Traveling kit requested by the Jeremy Wade Campbell entity. In the interest of preserving time, This One will not give a detailed description of the kit’s contents. This One has instead elected to grant the Jeremy Wade Campbell entity’s AI construct full access to the Traveler log database for later perusal. Would the Jeremy Wade Campbell entity be pleased to understand the immediate workings of the Traveler personal teleportation device?”
“Yes! The quicker the better,” Jeremy bit at a fingernail nervously, the desire to get away warring with his burning curiosity at the oddly polite spider-monster. He was getting some seriously mixed messages from the tone of the creatures voice and the words’ dry and stilted content. Finally, he decided he’d best just find out what its name was, “And uh, maybe your name? I don’t want to keep thinking of you as This One, it’s a bit awkward.”
“This One apologizes most profusely to the Jeremy Wade Campbell entity for any perceived slight. This One is at times unaware of the need for the singly-conscious to identify all entities they encounter. This One has no formal designation, though This One has been referred to as The Collective on more than one occasion.” The Collective reached up into its large abdomen and withdrew a small backpack, holding it out to Jeremy. The pack was covered in a thin sheet of viscous fluid which immediately began to steam. “This One must once again apologize. Due to the immediate nature of the Jeremy Wade Campbell’s request for the kit, This One was unable to secure the Traveler’s kit in a more palatable fashion. The fluid is quite harmless and evaporates in oxygen-rich environments in a matter of seconds.”
Jeremy took the backpack from The Collective gingerly. As it had said, the fluid was already almost all gone, boiled away in the thick vapor. “Thanks, uh, The Collective. Um… not to be rude or anything, but I really am kind of in a hurry…”
The Collective tapped its legs on the ground in a gesture that was translated as agitation. “This One apologizes once again. Please, open the pack. Within, the Jeremy Wade Campbell entity will find a slim rod, tapered at both ends with a number of buttons. That is the personal teleportation device. When the device touches a part of an entity’s body, it links up to the cortical computer’s operating system and provides a user interface which allows the entity to choose a desired location. Anywhere in realspace is accessible, and This One has been told that the next update to the firmware will stabilize teleportation to non-real space to within acceptable parameters.” The many-fingered arms twiddled in obvious pleasure. “Within the teleportation software are a number of filters as well as a search utility which allow fine-grained control of the teleportation. Once the desired location has been set, the teleportation program is executed by pressing the large red button on the rod.”
Jeremy dug the device out of the pack and looked at it curiously. “So can I go now?”
“That might be a bit difficult kid. You broke our deal,” Clint’s gravelly voice growled at Jeremy from the top of the stairs leading down into the booth. Jeremy couldn’t see the old man because The Collective was blocking his view, but his voice was flat and emotionless once again.
Quicker than Jeremy would have thought possible, The Collective twirled in a dancer’s pirouette and ended up facing Clint. “This One is gratified to report that the Jeremy Wade Campbell entity has given full consent to join the Traveler Society. The Observers have no jurisdiction in this interchange. The idiom has changed.”
Jeremy felt himself break out into a cold sweat and he clutched at the teleporter and pack in unthinking terror. He fought against the panic, but it was hard. He felt frozen in place. The Collective’s sensuous voice kept smoothly speaking. “The Observers have already lodged a formal grievance against the Travelers, but the decision ultimately lies with the Jeremy Wade Campbell entity.” As The Collective droned on, Jeremy got it. He understood that the spider creature was doing two things for him: it was stalling Clint as well as blocking his view of Jeremy.
With this realization, Jeremy’s panic slipped away and he frantically thought at his AI Construct, We need to get out of here! Call up the teleport app!
The construct’s neutral voice spoke clearly in his head, The teleportation application is now running. Please set filters for the desired location.
Earth! Jeremy thought immediately, then shook his head, No, that’d be too easy for him to guess. I’ve gotta get some breathing room. Somewhere friendly. Somewhere that I’ll be able to escape from the Observers. Somewhere I can hide.
This set of filters has been accepted Jeremy, the AI reported, but the list of available locations is rather small. And none of them exist in realspace. The Observer presence throughout the Universe is too heavy within your acceptable living parameters to meet your ‘escape from the Observers’ parameter. Do you wish to continue?
Jeremy heard Clint’s voice growl something impatient and then The Collective was simply not there anymore. The only remnant of the spider creature was a small pile of greasy ash on the ground in front of him. Clint stood there, a weapon vaguely like a pistol clutched in one hand, pointing at Jeremy. His eyes had gone flat again and he gestured with the pistol. “Get up. We’re going to withdraw your name from the Traveler’s database and you’re signing on with the Observers. Now.” Jeremy stood up. “ In case you’re thinkin’ of runnin’, here’s food for thought: while complete particle disintegration won’t destroy you, it really hurts. A lot. And, although it’d give me a great deal o’ personal pleasure to turn you into a greasy spot, I’m gonna give you a chance.”
Jeremy eyed the barrel of the pistol Clint held and he nodded slowly. Yes! He screamed in his head, Go! Go now! He felt a tingling that began at his toes and quickly spread throughout his whole body. It felt like every atom in his body was vibrating at a different frequency at once. Clint yelled and squeezed the trigger, but before its beam could vaporize Jeremy, he had already disappeared.
~*.*~
“And that’s how I ended up here,” Jeremy finished.
Applejack looked at him skeptically, “And what’s to say you’re bein’ honest this time? I still think y’ain’t tellin’ us everythin’.”
Jeremy spread his hands and shrugged, “You’re right, I’m not telling you everything. But what I’m not telling you doesn’t really pertain to you. Or to this story really.”
“Does it have something to do with how your teleporter got broken?” Twilight asked.
“Yeah. And although it was definitely a thrilling and exciting adventure, it’s something I need to discuss with your Princesses.”
“Pff,” Rainbow scoffed, “why can’t you tell us? Why’d you get so cagey all of a sudden?”
Jeremy sighed, “Look, I like you all. Really, I do. You’re some of the most friendly creatures I’ve ever had the pleasure to meet. But I have some information about things going on here, things that I believe that would interest your Princesses.”
“Awww,” Pinkie piped in, “you don’t have to tell us if you don’t want to, Jeremy! We’ll still be your friends!” Applejack glared at Pinkie, but the pink pony simply giggled and started humming a cheerful-sounding tune.
“Be that as it may,” Rarity said, “it could be a while before you can actually meet the Princesses. They are royalty, after all, darling. They’ve got a country to rule.”
“How long are we talkin’ about here? The information I have could be time-sensitive.”
“I’ll send Princess Celestia a letter with your request,” Twilight said slowly, “but I can’t make even a guess as to her availability. Princess Celestia is kind and generous with her time, but like Rarity said, she is quite busy.”
Jeremy sighed, “It’ll have to do. I guess that leaves the question as to what to do now.”
“Um,” Fluttershy said, startling Jeremy. She’d been so quiet, he’d completely forgotten about her. “You said you chose your AI c-construct. It’s sort of like a pet, right?”
Jeremy cocked an eyebrow and answered slowly, “I… guess so. Yeah, sure. Why not?”
“Can I meet her?” Fluttershy’s smile was wide and expectant.
“Uh, sure. Thought it’s not really a ‘her’. It’s just, well, a white ball.”
“Oh, that’s perfectly all right,” Fluttershy said.
Jeremy blinked and called up the holographic representation of his AI. Instead of the white sphere though, another unicorn appeared right next to him. When Jeremy saw it, he found he could no longer apply a gender-neutral pronoun. It had become a ‘her’. Her coat was deep blue and her short magenta mane held in place with a headband. A microchip cutie mark adorned her flanks and her hooves were colored a paler blue than her coat. Her eyes were a bright red color and held a trace of restrained laughter. “Um,” said Jeremy intelligently.
“I am Jeremy’s AI construct,” the pony said to Fluttershy. Her voice was deep and melodic, warm and inviting with a hint of humor, “And I would rather consider myself a friend than a pet.”
“Oh!” Fluttershy squeaked, blushing and hiding her face behind her mane, “I’m sorry! I didn’t know! I thought you were a… well, Jeremy said you were a white ball.”
The blue unicorn glanced at Jeremy and laughed softly. “I assure you that the shock is as complete for him as it is for you. Jeremy set my personality core to be dynamic, which means I have a degree of free will not normally granted to artificial intelligence constructs. I chose this form to blend in more in this environment as well as because I find this form to be aesthetically pleasing. Certainly more aesthetically pleasing than a form like that of Jeremy’s species.”
Rainbow Dash burst out laughing, pointing a hoof at Jeremy. Even Twilight giggled softly. “Did you just call me ugly?” Jeremy asked, his eyes narrowing.
“Oh no, Jeremy,” the blue unicorn replied, all innocence. “Just not as aesthetically pleasing as these locals. Would you like me to change my form back to the white sphere?”
Jeremy scowled and rolled his eyes. “No,” he said, “Just stay like that.”
“What’s your name?!” Pinkie asked excitedly, “I’ve never met an imaginary pony that everyone else can see!”
The blue unicorn laughed, “I was not given a permanent designation by my creator, Pinkie.”
Pinkie stared incredulously at the blue unicorn then at Jeremy, “He didn’t give you a name?!”
“I was kind of pressed for time,” Jeremy said defensively, “and it hasn’t exactly been all sunshine and roses since then!”
“Well, darling,” Rarity said, “that simply won’t do! We’ll help Jeremy think of an appropriate name for you. Something that fits with your personality.”
The construct smiled and said, “That would be lovely.”
~*.*~
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I want construct AI pony
If he had more time he would have said 'NO SHIT!'
*picture of AI pony*
AWWW I WANT ONE!
And i'm going to use my future sight to predict what will happen.
CELESTIA AND LUNA ARE IMMORTALS! :OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
P.I.N.K.I.E V 2.0
Yes. You updated.
... Now do it again.
3110458
Awwwww, c'mon! I updated The Apple Tree last week-ish, and now you want ANOTHER update? Chapters of The Magic of Immortality average around 7500 words!
a fricken' immortal with dangerous information shows up out of nowhere and they can't take her to the princess?!
3110569
I imagine a lot if people will comment on this... Suffice to say that perhaps Twilight still doesn't entirely trust him...?
3110598 yeah, i was thinking that too. since applejack couldn't entirely get a read on him and all of that jazz
When i saw first A.I scene i know with time it will became a pony and i was right sooner than i expect
I so called the tracking nanites!
Well, I probably wasn't first, so yeah...
Now the name... dang it, I am not good at names! More so in a second language...
Edit:
Nothing... well, gotta read some more fics then get some sleep. Maybe that will give me ideas.
oh daaaaaaaamn :D
An AI pony. Why am I getting a strange sense of Deja vu?
I like this. AI constructs sound cool. I WANT ONE!
Suddenly got some thoughts and edits are not easily recognizable.
It's kind of strange that they are all surprised he still does not trust them... I mean yeah, they are friendly, trust him and are willing to help... just like Clint appeared to be... are they this dense? He has absolutely no reason to trust them. For all he knows, it's all an elaborate trick! I know I wouldn't trust them; cute, cuddly ponies or not! Jeremy is already showing terrifying degree of trust, what with this whole story and asking for Princesses. They are immortals, they might be his enemies, he doesn't know that! True, they're his only chance but still...
His mistrust and secrecy are less severe than they should be, taking his story into account.
Rainbow... so many fics make me dislike you so much...
I needed it out of the system. I normally try not to comment on my personal preferences...
I really do not like how she is all "I'm gonna beat the crap out of you, doesn't matter I don't know you, you are new and different and I don't like new and different so I gotta attack!"... It's not being loyal to friends it's being downright suicidal and retarded. I kinda want to read a story where Dash takes this a step further, actually attacks and gets her flank handed to her, really hard... like "stay in hospital for a month or ten" hard. She just begs for it...
I apologize for that, I've recently read more of these stories than normally and it kind of... compromised my integrity... yeah, let's go with that.
Still got no name...
Your world-building for your character is truly original.... I love it...
Not many stories can lay claim to such originality.
3110568............ Then while your at it, make that average 10000 words.....
So if I just read that right, the Equestria that Jeremy ported to doesn't exist in real space? That's a bit of an interesting twist.
Unicorn AI construct? Well, he did choose dynamic after all.
Update! ;3
Update again!
Little did they all know, something was watching them.
XD
You know I can't help but wonder, given how angry the societies seem to be at one another (or maybe Clint is just a jerky exception,) if the whole Nightmare Moon thing is in anyway related to the observers.
Maybe Nightmare was a parasitic species belonging to one of the societies, one of the more nihilistic ones, and Celestia banished her sister and it until she could seperate them.
"Assuring Insight".
Call her "Assuring Insight".
Well, at least this chapter opens up more around why Jeremy ditched Clint. I'm okay with it, and I find a good tinge of dark humor over the fact that Clint took care of the Collective (Or did the Collective teleport?
)
Either way, it was hilarious to see him try and book it after pissing Clint off.
3110967
BRILLIANT
Way to subvert my expectations. I definitely didn't have the Travelers or Watchers pegged as thoroughly antagonistic until this chapter. Makes you wonder if the others are even worse, or if it really has nothing to do with the name or credo. It'd be ironic if the Brotherhood was a force for good.
3110775 I feel the same way. Weird Right?
if i were him my ai construct would be a smarter version of wheatly
I say.....'Informing Artificiality.'.
..He just met a hanar.....hanars are squishy not crunchy
This is getting so exiting!!
3110775
Y'know, I've never read that story before. It's been sitting in my Read Later list for a while now, so I'll get around to reading it eventually. I hope it's a good comparison y'all are making...
3111082
I'm glad you were so pleasantly surprised! I really wanted to get the 'alien' feel to these Societies across. That includes them having goals that may not seem to align with their ethics. I always got a creepy vibe from the Observers though. Isn't it a creepfest when you see someone just watching someone else?
Oh why did you have to go and do that! Oh please, please, please, PLEASE take down the pony creator image for the AI. You established how Clint and all the other characters looked quite nicely and you didn't even have to resort to using some generic OC creator to do it, so I don't see why it should be needed now. It just seems beneath this story
Well I'm sure that Twi is going to have a surprise after sending the letter. Why. Well, immortal guy with a "tail" after him show up, and have info for Rulers of the country. Info which probably is about situation in said country/world... don't see that day court and royalty problems are more important than this.
3111356 Knowledge is power so... observing stuff can get a lot of intel about everyone. Many ways to simply harass others and force them to do as Observers intented this to be.
3111478
Sorry to break you out of the immersion, my friend. I'd have drawn her for real, but that would have taken too long and I didn't really feel like making y'all wait even longer. This will probably be the only image in the entire story (I honestly just wanted to have some art for one of my stories.) I may take her down later on, but I kinda like her.
3110568
... Please?
Don't make me whip out the eponicons...
3111748
The next update will (likely) be for The Apple Tree, though if the mood really takes me, I may update TMoI first. Either way, Rome wasn't built in a day and even a second-rate fanfiction about immortals and pastel ponies takes a bit longer than that to write. I'm workin' on it!
3111756
3111766
...damn it. You had to go and pull out weepy Fluttershy, didn't you. Well, I'm immune to your backhanded tomfoolery!*
*I'm soooooooo sorry Fluttershy! This author has to work and be a dad and do all that other boring stuff! Pleeeeease don't cry!
3111779
*sigh*
Okay.
...
Woah. Just noticed the SEX tag. Well, can't blame an immortal for wanting a piece of pony ass, now can you?
3111324
No, I don't think the comparison is particularly good. CelestAI is very different from what we've seen of this AI, and the story isn't going anywhere near the same direction and...wait, that's not what you meant by "good comparison" at all.
I certainly think it's a good story to be compared to, and you really should take it off your read later list and put it on your read now list.
Anyone else notice that even in this story that Equestria is technically not real. The AI said there was nowhere to run to in "real-space" for him to run that fit his parameters. So that is probably why the teleporter broke, it didn't have the firmware update that would allow it to move him to nonreal space properly
3110432 3110422 Supposedly, a Tulpa runs along the same guidelines by creating a semiautomatics entity process in your mind if you actually want one. I can't say from experience, since I can't think of anything that I'd actually want to have as a permanent companion.
Is it bad that whenever given an AI construct in any story on here be it "Among the Ruins" or this(the only 2 I could think of really quick) I hear Legion. Even now as the AI is a mare I can sort of hear a Legion quality to her voice.
3111667
I think the image does break the immersion quite a bit. It wouldn't be so bad if you put it in an author's note at the end, but I just think your story would flow so much better without that break.
A name... Hmmm... How about Dymo? Mostly because he set its personality in dynamic or whatever. Still, an idea... By the way, awesome chapter
The name sould be something to do with computers, idk...here's a few ideas:
Core,
Nan0, (I like zero's...must be from GLad0s)
Eden,
Beta,
Wiky, (like in wikipedia :P)
and Ada (name taken from Ada Lovelace, a woman who's known for to help Charles Baggage creating the first computers...or something along those lines, never really payed attention in class :ppp)
got me-self some other ideas, but then this comment would be too long ;)
Call her Arcee.
The colors match...somewhat.
See?
images3.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20100928081730/transformers/images/6/61/Prime-arcee-1.jpg
Good job mate, I look forward to the next chapter!
The name should be Sherlock. Because all responses will be preceded by 'no shit?'
Any form of comedy/computing mixup would also work though, as she seems like she's got a sense of humor.