Twilight groaned, her head throbbing painfully, her eyes edging open bit by bit. It became apparent to her that she was certainly not in her room, and that she certainly wasn’t recovering from a long, peaceful sleep in her bed. Her first thought was about her location, where she was and why she wasn’t in the safety of her library, snuggled in the warm blankets in the early sunrise of the day. She found herself on a pitch black floor, looking down at it from her prone position on her side. Getting on her front hooves, she tried to shake off the sudden exhaustion that racked her being after waking up. She held her hoof against her temple, massaging the skin to try and sooth the soreness that the strong beat of her heart was causing. When she lifted her head sufficiently, her focus moved to the floating numbers and letters all around her, giving her a wide enough berth to breathe and exist comfortably, the characters sometimes forming words as they continuously slid down their vertical axis.
Her ears bent back as she remembered her situation. She looked at the ground, or at least where the ground was supposed to meet her hooves, and found the text slid past the imaginary horizon in the background through the threshold at the height of her hooves towards a vast emptiness below her. The pit in her stomach grew, and she nervously got to her other hooves and took a step back only to realize that there was no solid earth behind her either. She stared with terrified eyes at how hollow everything looked around her; there were no features, objects, or anything recognizable anywhere. There was no sun above her, no sky, no moon and no stars. The world she now lived in was as void and dark as Sombra’s heart, and Twilight’s fears came to fruition when for a very brief moment her paranoia let her believe that she was actually, in fact, inside the deceased evil king’s soul.
Suddenly the atmosphere reverberated around her, sudden rumbling shockwaves pushing the air around her, crashing in to her as she braced herself against the sudden oncoming storm. A few seconds past and the rush stopped, replaced with something that she had not expected in the least.
“Twilight?” David asked, putting on his headset and fiddling around with the microphone so that he wasn’t directly eating it, his fingers wrapped around the sensitive end of the device. “Twilight, are you there? Can you hear me?”
“David!” Twilight called out. “Goodness, I forgot about you for a moment. I’m so glad to hear from you. How did the computer-sleeping test go?”
David rolled his chair up underneath his glass desk, shaded with the hue of a soft, cloudless sky. The log-in screen was the center of attention of his 20 inch computer monitor, and he typed in his password, 18 characters exactly, giving him access to all the functions of his user once again. He scratched his head and reached over to grab the tinted glasses surrounding his mouse sitting on the rather large mousepad. He put the glasses on with ease, taking care not to poke his eye out from adorning them too quickly and kept his eyes glued to the screen as his desktop appeared.
His green t-shirt and cargo shorts were under the light of his monitor that reflected around the room. The window was open once again, but a large standing white fan was plugged into the socked near his bed behind him, blowing a nice, cool breeze in his direction. He rubbed his feet together in anticipation, his socks creating heat and a bit of static against the carpet beneath him. The computer hummed softly in the warm atmosphere of late evening, the moon outside obscured by a large mass of clouds floating by, the wind almost non-existent this time.
“Well,” he began, tracking Task Manager as it popped up with the rest of his icons on his desktop. “The computer went to sleep successfully last night. How do you feel?”
“Eh, I have a terrible headache right now,” Twilight said. “But what do you mean, last night? How long has the computer been asleep for?
“Twilight, it’s the next day already. It’s been a whole night, morning and afternoon since I put the computer to sleep. The sun’s already set by now.”
David instinctively tried to open his web browser after finding it closed for some reason he could not fathom only to remember what he did in his flurry of key strokes the prior night and that his computer’s connection to the internet was severed. A metaphorical storm cloud smouldered over his head as he realized he would have to venture several days without the contact of the World Wide Web if he wanted to manage his A.I. safely until she learned how to control herself in his piece of hardware. He pinched the skin of his forehead together with the index finger and thumb of his left hand, gathering up the grease and applying it to the stubble that jutted from his sharp chin, looking at his black Logitech mouse idly, trying to think of what the best course of action would be next.
“Goodness, I really didn’t think it would have been that long,” Twilight stated. “I mean, I know you had to go to bed and all, but I would have liked to know exactly I would have been ‘sleeping’ for before you sent the computer to sleep.”
“Sorry Twilight, it didn’t really occur to me,” David apologized, trying to rub the heaviness out of the dark bags under his eyes. He let out a yawn. “I kind of lose focus in things when I’m falling asleep. Don’t let that stop you from waking me up if I do snooze when we’re in a conversation, ok?”
“What were you doing during the day?” Twilight queried tentatively.
The muscles on David’s cheek flexed. “I had classes. I’m attending university.”
“Really? What’s your major?”
“Creative writing,” David instantly answered.
“Interesting!” Twilight chirped. “I’ve always wanted to write a book someday. After reading so many in my life I think it’s apropos for me to follow suit in my own ideas, especially considering how many I have! I have some very intriguing angles on semi-conductive metamorphic materials and arcane influx operators.”
“Uhh,” David uttered.
“Books are so neat. I don’t know how I could possibly exist without them. Although, now that I think about it…”
David assumed Twilight’s pause was her re-assessing her surroundings.
“I don’t think I’ll be seeing another one any time soon.” she said, deflated.
“That’s not true,” David informed her. “Computers can hold entire documents of stories, transcripts of articles and audio files that are books read to you.”
“Really?” Twilight asked. “Do you think you could get me some of those? At least one, maybe two to pass the time?”
“Sure. I’ll just have to get connected back to the internet to see what I can get.”
David opened up windows explorer from the start bar, and pane of the directory of his hard drive opened. He furrowed his eyebrows, going straight to the program files and looking through the names for something called pony.exe, or anything similar that was related to horses. He soon found nothing, and cursed in his head, thinking that nothing could be exactly that simple. He clicked on Task Manager, his eyes still locking onto the process at the top, powering the chatty personality running as electricity on complex rig. He had no idea where to start searching for the root of the program.
“Your technology in A-mare-ica is really amazing, David,” Twilight tittered. “It’s light years ahead of what we have in Equestria!”
“I could tell,” David notified. He began a search of pony.exe on Windows Explorer. The progress bar at the top slowly filled in with a softly flashing green, making very, very slow progress. David clenched his jaw, but tried to calm himself down. “And it’s just America, Twilight. You don’t need to emphasize the middle.”
“I have to be patient with this,” he thought to himself. “I don’t need to rush anything. I’ll let the search run and talk to Twilight in the meanwhile. This is just the first step in a series of discoveries for that damn virus. I have all the time in the world to work through this. I think.”
“I see. A-mer-ica,” Twilight tried aloud, letting the word roll off her tongue. “It sounds so odd without the emphasis, though. Your society seems to be very interesting, David. One this is all done and through we need to establish a stable connection between nations! Equestria has pretty much known all of the surrounding lands on the continent, but we hadn’t considered the possibility of such a highly advanced society overseas! We haven’t even gotten that far, yet. I have so many questions for America!”
“Heh, yeah,” David simply said. He would be lying if he said he wasn’t at least a smidgen interested too. But his mood sunk when he remembered that a place like that probably only existed in the memory of Twilight Sparkle. He idly tapped the left mouse button beneath his finger, his chin going on to his fist as his elbow was placed on the cool surface of the table. “I would like to know more about your world too.”
“My world?” Twilight asked. “What do you mean? Shouldn’t America exist overseas from Equestria?”
“Twilight, my race, the human race, has mapped out the entire planet, and we don’t have a place called Equestria.” David calmly informed her.
“N-No way,” Twilight said. “You have got to be kidding me!”
David shook his head, even though he knew Twilight wouldn’t be able to see him. “We’ve never heard about anything that you’ve mentioned to me before. You claimed to be a Unicorn. Well, on my world, Unicorns are creatures of myth, animals of old tales and legends. They’re very mystical and I bet some stories about them involve magic of some sort, but they certainly don’t have the ability to speak.”
Twilight didn’t say anything for a couple of seconds. The disk light of David’s PC flickered. “Are you sure? Maybe your race just called our continent something else? There are other races that live on Equiden. Have you encountered any Gryphons, or perhaps the Earth Ponies that live on the outskirts of the deserts near the south? Pegasus ponies, Minotaurs, the Deer folk, Dragons, maybe even the Horses from Saddle Arabia?
David was floored. How could one single fictional location span all those kinds of species? What kind of memory did Twilight’s creator put in her? “Those are all just from stories, Twilight, just from stories. Humans are the only sentient species on the planet. Everything else is just animals. Horses exist here, but they don’t speak either, which I’m assuming they do on your, uh, planet.”
Twilight choked on her next words. David’s shoulder slumped.
“I’m sorry, Twilight.”
Twilight groaned. “This situation just went from bad to worse.”
David inwardly agreed. He leaned back in his chair, reclining it slightly, folding his hands over his stomach and went deep into contemplation. It was truly a hopeless situation for Twilight. “Remember what I told you before? You can’t give up right now. If you got sent here, there must be a way to send you back.”
“Yeah, I know,” she said.
He closed his eyes for a brief moment, visualizing the inner workings of his computer, imagining what was going on in that world of hers, how she found herself in a swirling mass of darkness all around her, filled to the brim with symbols and objects that had no meaning or value to her. He thought up of a grid along a three-dimensional place, outlined in pure-white lines, his vision something along the lines of those cheesy movies from forty years ago that tried to make a visual for the audience of what the insides of a network or computer looked like. He knew what he had in mind was nothing like the real deal, but he tried to imagine what it would be like. He contemplated about being stuck, alone, with nothing to do, nowhere around you that looked familiar with only an ominous, booming voice in the air to keep you company, owned by a creature that you haven’t seen yet with its true intentions unknown. He was surprised that Twilight put so much trust into him already, and that she didn’t suspect him of secondary motives. But in the end, in her position, she really didn’t have any choice, did she?
“And Twilight,” David suddenly said, shooting up in his seat and looking back at his computer monitor, a sly grin stretching on his face. His hands landed on his keyboard, clicking on Task Manager and going to the page labeled ‘Performance’ to click on the button that lay in wait there. “You know what the first step towards getting you back is?”
Twilight tapped her hoof on her chin without David’s knowledge. “Research?”
“Exactly. Or more specifically, experimentation.”
“Ooh, now this I could help you with, David!” Twilight said enthusiastically. “If there’s one thing I can do, it’s performing tests.”
“Fantastic,” he stated, grabbing some spare paper and a pen near the end of his desk away from his computer. “Let’s get started then.”
That might have been intentional, but I doubt it.
I don't know how I could possibly exist without them.
Ooh, wonder what these tests will involve!
6085921
@#$!
Thank you. Feedback like this always reminds me why all the editing software in the world doesn't beat an extra pair of eyes.
If it just me, or does this chapter feel too short? Usually I can make my chapters as small as ~1,000 words before anybody complains, and this chapter was over 2,000 words, but it still felt too short. Like nothing actually happened.
Honestly, you could probably delete this entire chapter and move straight onto the next one and almost no information would be lost. Maybe keep the two paragraphs about Sparkle's Equestria and David's reaction to it, and a single sentence saying that she safely came out of sleep mode, and that would be it. The rest of it seems extraneous.
But I'm just one person and I could be mistaken. What do you guys think? Pacing issues? y/n?
A very interesting challenge to write. Having two characters, being "immobile," and the entire hook and 'world' occurring in one spot and with not much changing in the environment, with the main emphasis of what 'occurs' being what one character is telling another, aside from personal PoV. I look forward to seeing where this goes.
Absolutely love this! Keep it up!
-ThePortalPonies
So much for Windows 10 being the final major version. Though I guess it wouldn't have been the first time Microsoft backtracked from something like this.
Right click process > Open file location? Nah, too easy. He'd probably just get some obscure error.
Really liking this story. It's not technologically accurate, but that's par for the course. Can't wait to see what happens when Twilight figures out how to go out on the Internet. (Rather literally in her case.) Skynet Sparkle?
6086009
This is exactly what I was worried about when I was reviewing the chapter before I published it. Sorry about that.
This chapter has two main purposes: To show how Twilight was affected by getting put to sleep with the computer, and Twilight's increasing realization on her current location. Because of this chapter, I can get the ball rolling 100% in the next chapter.
I think it would be fun if Twi ended in Reboot...
ITS HERE!
That you for your dedication to this story
Awesome update. I really love how well characterized Twilight is in this story, and the interactions between her and David. The premise still remains as interesting as it did at the start, and I'm really looking forward to reading on. The story also does a good job of showing instead of telling, with body language being used to good effect in showing what the characters are feeling. Not only that, but the writing quality is still good, and I've yet to notice any distracting spelling or grammar mistakes.
Honestly, the only thing I have the smallest issue with is David continuously referring to Twilight as an AI. Even Twilight's actions would be enough to pretty much kill that idea (self aware AI? Yeah, if someone came up with that, they'd be spending more time getting every Nobel Prize instead of wasting their life-changing discovery messing with some random guy). Combined with the fact that there's no way someone could have got Twilight on his computer through the game, and even bigger than that the fact that Twilight was able to create freaking purple lighting in his computer without messing things up means that this guy would have to be an absolute moron to think that this is nothing more than an AI. I seriously hope this misconception is dealt with soon, because seeing him just ignore all of these signs is becoming a bit annoying. Not enough to hurt my enjoyment of the story, but enough to make me want to skip the parts where he's thinking that there's just an AI there.
I can be your techno-babbler, if you want. I've built several computers and networks, done a lot of study on the inner workings of operating systems, and I'm majoring in computer science. Planning on becoming a programmer.
I'm also free all weekend.
6085939 IT NEEDS MORE!
You could've called this story 'Bird vs. Camel' and no one would've argued with you.
Hmm... nice.
Alright then, I hope for a future filled with programs that Twilight can use efficiently, like, use a 3D modeling program to give her body an image to be seen, that would be awesome.
Now... I wonder what the internet would be like, an ocean? A giant interconnecting web? A giant library?
I like representations of seemingly unimaginable concepts.
6086213 Calling Twilight an AI? Makes total sense because according to David he lives in the real world: no psychic powers, no known aliens, animals don't speak any human language, Earth is the only planet humans live... and magic doesn't exist.
That knowledge is so much of a core of beliefs that it makes sense David rationalizes everything Twilight can do as "being an advanced AI" as long as she's inside of the computer.
6086213
Thank you very much for your feedback. I love stuff like this, and I can't get enough of it.
I'm not gonna say anything about David. Don't want to give anything away. I hope I can drop some hints on his behavior in later chapters.
6086231
Thank you for the offer. I'll have to think about it. I'm not sure what kind of technology I'm including precisely, so I have to write the first copy of the next chapter first before I need to ask anything.
6086315
I just finished typing you a PM before I realized that you responded to this. Oops.
6086341
... What the hell do you even have in that thing? Dual Titans? Dual Xeons and a 295X2?
Isn't that the voice command to activate GlaDOS.exe?
I can be your technology guy. I can confirm I have no friends whatsoever and I spend some of my time learning about technology.
6086377
Thank you for your offer. I will keep it in mind.
You know, I don't know what you're apologizing for. You've crafted a story that took a premise I honestly had little interest in (I actually passed this story up a few times seeing it featured) and made it incredibly interesting and addictive. You're taking your time to build the narrative, the dialogue, for all your claims of it being crappy, is believable and flows naturally. David is a likeable goof, Twilight is her usual adorkable self and I really feel for her in this situation. I'm writing a sci-fi story myself, and it seems there's some overlap in how we both view Equestria in terms of technological development, so that was intriguing as well.
Admittedly, I think David is being a little obtuse with the AI theory, but it's not too far-fetched and that's my only real criticism anyhow.
Congrats on your success with the story. I'll be tracking it and I look forward to seeing more soon!
6086294
The bougiest of beat em ups!
Nice chapter, but there's a minor thing you may want to edit.
That should be "socket".
6086551 This is definitely accurate to the movie, remember?
Since he's an computer nerd like me I wonder if he will do what I would do and find pony.exe's sector on the hard disk and determine when it was written to disk and by what process. That would be the first step in finding where the file came from. I'm pretty sure it came from 127.0.0.1 via the process Chaos.trololo
inb4 he puts Twilight's performance to real-time and the PC crashes.
R.I.P Twilight Sporkle 2010-2015
6086643
@##@%! I changed that but I had one too many documents going on and I lost the edit! I totally remember that!
Thank you though for the heads up.
I wonder which programs are compatible with Twilight. She'll need to be able to at least interface with Microsoft Word (or some other text reader) to do any reading. We already know she can hear thanks to David's headset, so could she see him if he adds a web cam?
Maybe David and Twilight will game together in the future. Mods for everything.
6086706 Or Twilight finds MLP pr0n on the Internet and deletes herself to make the horror end.
6086817
I'm glad that it was just a computer mistake and not bad writing. I noticed many more mistakes throughout the chapter. I suggest (if you're not doing it already) that you give the chapter a quick proofread just to catch anything else that didn't save.
As for the not knowing much about the technical part of computers, for writing david, that's not such a bad thing, but for explaining things outside of the dialogue, google is a good source, but some information may not be the best. Don't let me tell you how to write your story, do what you want. I can only suggest.
I can just imagine how well it will go when David explains American history to Twilight...
"Hey Twilight, have I ever told you the history of America?"
"No. But, please tell me!"
"Alright. America was founded in like 1480- fuck I don't know- on the principle of 'Fuck You'. That is America, that is the American way. We have always taught our children straight from birth 'Fuck You', and 'Just Fuck All Y'All' and 'Go To Hell' and 'Let's See How Badly We Can Screw Up The Entire World'.
So, anyway, we landed on the shores of New Jersey. And the 'Swol' Native Americans came out and they were like 'Sup, nerds? Nice belts on your hats'. And we were all like 'I don't much care for you. I don't think we're going to get along- OH NO! We're starving!' And then the Swol are like 'You need some protein, bro. Here, take this fish and this corn thing.' And then we're like 'Oh, this is awesome! You guys are amazing! Hey, can we have all this country?', and then the Swol were like 'Eh, I don't know. That doesn't seem very fair to us.' And then they go off on their business, and we're like 'We gotta get rid of these guys, 'cause we're suddenly turning into giant assholes.'
And then we decide 'Oh, we could cooperate! You might need something from us, we might need something from you!' And they were like 'Maybe we need more sweat towels for our massive workouts because Native Americans are so amazingly awesome.' And they are.
But we were like 'Oh yeah! Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah! Sure! Hey, Smallpox Larry, you got a few spare blankets we could toss to them?'
And then we killed them all! We killed them, and that's how we started our tradition of 'Fuck You'. Then we were total dickbags, and Americans founded their entire nation on killing people and taking their stuff. And that's the history of America."
"........."
"Twilight?"
Haha.
Also, I think you missed this in your proofreading.
Shouldn't that be "appropriate"?
6086973
I'm not going to lie. I kind of want Twilight to be curious about LoL, get hooked while helping David play, then get so good they go pro with his team.
But, alas it's about getting Twilight off David's Computer, and helping Twilight get home, at the moment.
Still, a nerd can dream.
6087172
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/apropos
6086520
Holy smokes, I know you! You're that guy that's writing that robot pony story! Hey, thanks for the feedback!
Experimentation?
For Twilight, that's second base.
6087200 Ah, right on then.
Well, he could just simply right click pony.exe and click "Open File Location" rather than searching his whole hard drive.
MUCH EASIER
a light year is a measure of distance NOT TIME DAMNIT *flips table*
i1138.photobucket.com/albums/n522/keresihar/Pokemon%20Red/RedDay5-Lightyears.png
6087366 Didn't the first Pokemon gen say that?
Are you going to make Twilight sing Daisy Bell sometime soon? Since he already knows about HAL-9000 anyway.
6086375 Pretty sure that'd be GLADOS.COM seeing as how GLADOS is a full OS not just a single program.
Yes, one of if not the first use for the .COM extension dates back from the days of MS-DOS as the extension for core OS files.
I am sure many of your readers will correct you if something is wrong.
If you like working at your own pace, you could just have someone you shoot a question or two ever so often and that is cool to read over something once you are done. I also think an editor or proofreader would be good. I noticed a couple typos and other issues but didn't post them like I usually do cause it is late as fuck for me. If you want to visualize the inside of a computer, maybe start looking at images of lithography.
6086315
I feel referring to Twilight as an AI is good. Cause that is what she is. If we get to the point where someone can be uploaded to a computer and still remain conscious, I would call that an AI. It is artificial since it is no longer organic and the thing shows intelligence.
Now to get back to watching those Steam sales...
40.media.tumblr.com/694cfe07a289ce5994e1d330bcfcfff1/tumblr_npsml44ls61uqft13o1_1280.png
6087279
You can do that??
OMG it works!
The story of yours is truly intriguing. It's a very interesting concept and I like your writing.
I think it's one of the rare cases where a pony/human story really turns out well.
So, have my like.
Alas, I found one minor nitpick (couldn't resist...)
I have to object this.
There are legends of speaking unicorns...
Instead of using windows consider using an unspecified OS and then using more vague commands and programs. This way it's less clear to us that you don't exactly know what you are talking about. Never mention programs by name, just explain what David is attempting to do.
6087366
It's a common expression :P
6087366 6087853
...and "ahead" is a relative direction in space ("light years ahead", "miles ahead") that only applies to time due to our ability to think metaphorically.
6087279
The plot has something else in mind...
6086307
Alright, let's just say that he does think of her as advanced AI. In that case, why isn't he calling the news to announce to the world that he has found/created artificial life and getting beyond rich? Especially consider the AI is capable of physically interacting with things outside of the computer?