Assessment
Twilight Sparkle didn’t enjoy the party much. She didn’t sleep well that night either, though it was no mystery why. She didn’t mention any of what she had seen beneath Canterlot, not yet. There was no reason to fill her friends with stress and worry over questions even she couldn’t answer.
The next morning Twilight expected something insane to happen. She was so on edge that she spilled three cups of coffee, tried to read a book upside-down, and used toothpaste on her mane instead of conditioner (how it had even gotten into the shower she would never know).
Her castle still felt a little strange, but at least after all her friends’ hard work it felt more like home. The empty halls had been populated more and more over the last few months, and she passed more than one saluting guard as she went about her troublesome waiting.
She need not have worried. The “Creator” didn’t arrive with a massive ship or some blast of irresistible force, just a knock on her study door. “Yes?” Twilight called, staring out at a table full of open books. “Come in.”
A pony entered, looking more than a little sheepish. Twilight rose, as was her custom when strangers visited. Word of her existence had spread across Equestria by now; she did her best to make sure that when ponies came to visit they would at least bring pleasant stories back with them.
Twilight had to clamber over a leaning stack of books, narrowly avoiding bumping it with one of her wings. “I’m Princess Twilight Sparkle.” She took in the newcomer at a glance: earth pony, gray coat, white mane and tail with a few black streaks. Her cutie mark was a symbol of some kind, though Twilight couldn’t recognize it at a glance. Some kind of interlocking triangle pattern? “What’s your name?” Maybe doing something routine would help her relax in preparation for the visitor she dreaded.
The pony stopped a little further away than was normal for ponies, shifting uncomfortably on her hooves. “Specialist Maria Torres.” She gestured at the open doorway. Though she was no unicorn, something levitated through the door behind her, setting itself down on the ground at her hooves. Well, maybe levitate wasn’t quite the right word. The thing looked like a metal suitcase had grown propellers, all whirring away quietly as the thing flew itself. So far as come-to-life spells went, it had to be the most advanced Twilight had ever seen.
Twilight’s ears flattened and she stopped, her whole body tensing. “Torres. You…” She looked up, above the pony’s head. “You were taller last time I saw you.”
The pony rolled her eyes, sitting back on her haunches with a groan. “Oh, you and every engineer in this star system. Real knee-slapper. Did Colonel Dixon put you up to that?”
She shook her head. “I’ve never met anyone by that name. I was just commenting on how impressive your transformation spell was.” She walked past the pony, inspecting her. “No tells, not even the eyes. That’s changeling-level work.”
The earth pony shrugged one shoulder. “It’s not a ‘spell’. God, we’ll have to do something about that superstition… this body is just a machine. We already had one growing, so I just had to finalize a few last details. I’m controlling it from up there.” She gestured vaguely with a hoof. “Or doing some of the controlling anyway. A computer has to parse its sensory information to something my brain can comprehend, and interpolate my own nervous system’s muscular-responses into the context of this body.”
Twilight stopped again when she was right in front of this pony, finding herself relaxing. It wasn’t that she had understood much of what the pony had said. Rather, she had understood something about this pony. Her suspicions the day before were confirmed: she was a scientist, a bookworm, a wizard, whatever the word. No matter what their other differences, even if she was some kind of powerful alien from another world, that much could still unite them. She could be friends with someone who loved learning the same way she did. Not only that, but she wasn’t worried that she wouldn’t be able to convince a pony like this.
“I… I think I know what you mean. This computer does translation too?” she suggested. “Since you weren’t speaking Equestrian yesterday, I mean.”
“It does.” The pony nodded towards Twilight, as though in respect. “Guess Dixon didn’t set you up for what you said after all. Maybe you really are as smart as you seemed.”
“You don’t talk like godlike aliens from outer space.” The words came tumbling out of Twilight’s mouth before she could stop herself. She looked away, ears flattening in embarrassment.
The other “pony” laughed. There was nothing at all alien in her amusement, or in the way she clasped Twilight briefly on the shoulder. “You’re kidding me, right? Please tell me you’re joking. If somebody told you we’re gods, well... They need their head examined.”
Twilight was relieved, but not amused. “You are aliens though, right?” Her guest nodded. “Everything I’ve read about aliens— granted, it’s entirely speculation, since we didn’t know for sure you existed until yesterday.” Well, she learned yesterday anyway. “Ponies expected anything that evolved on other worlds to be so strange that we might not have any basis for understanding it. You should have... sensory organs we don’t. Strange nutritional needs, maybe. Maybe you can’t survive in the same atmosphere we need.”
If Twilight expected the alien to be secretive about her race, she was disappointed on that count too. “That’s generally true. What your scientists speculate, that is. It’s just not true about us. We have the same senses; we breathe the same air... We even eat the same proteins.”
Twilight paced back towards the open window, the one that had such a great view of Ponyville. “What about the cultural differences? Shouldn’t your perspective be so strange to me that we can’t communicate?”
“I’m sure my perspective is strange.” Torres followed her to the window, looking out on Ponyville. “Right now, my perspective is telling me that you’re probably stalling.” Her eyes narrowed. “Please don’t treat me like an enemy, Twilight Sparkle. Stranger I might be, but I’m also the only hope for EU-81 Alpha and EU-81 Beta. If I’m going to find a reason good enough for the admiralty board not to replace them, it will be because you helped me find it.”
Twilight opened her mouth, as though she were going to object again. Instead, she swallowed, counted to ten, and thought about what Torres had said. If these beings had half the power they had when they had landed a craft large enough to cover a continent, then they could probably kill if they wanted to. “Alright. I have an itinerary planned.”
Twilight levitated over a large scroll, unrolling the first few inches so she could get a good look at what they contained. “Stop me if any of this doesn’t sound useful to you.”
The other pony shrugged. “Anything that I can use to convince the captain. Probably not the regular tourist stuff…” She grinned. “Guess you probably don’t have a procedure for off-planet tourists. Still, I guess the expression works just as well for the regular kind. What do you have planned?”
“We’ve got a train leaving in about twenty minutes. It will be taking us to Manehattan, one of the most modern cities in Equestria. The train should give you a chance to see the countryside, but arrive somewhere that urbanization has become more extensive than it is here. Ponyville—that’s where you are now—is more rural. Unfortunately, the trip will take a little time, so I’ve arranged for five of my closest friends to join us. They’re a diverse group, each with different interests, so you should be able to use them to get any information you want about Equestria. We could also take a pegasus chariot if you don’t think we can spare the time.”
“No, a train will be fine.” Her guest expressed no confusion over the word; apparently Creators had trains? Either that, or she had studied them before. For all Twilight knew, she might see all Equestria as a look into some history book. “The general attitude of your people is one of the things I came to see. Somehow I don’t think I’ll get a terribly good idea of that from the sky.” She rose to her hooves. Her little machine seemed to recognize that as a sign to leave, because its little propellers started spinning, ready to take off and carry it after her.
“Follow me, then. We’ll pass through Ponyville first. If you see anything you’d like to know more about, say so.”
“Sounds good to me.”
They walked. Twilight was afraid that her guest might attract lots of attention with her golem and the strange way she walked, but few in Ponyville payed them any mind. Perhaps Twilight along with her was enough to relax the ponies of her town. They had seen so many strange things over the years that a floating bit of luggage without magic around it hardly qualified.
“I should warn you.” Torres spoke as they walked, when nopony was around to overhear. “If you or those friends have memorized propaganda, don’t bother reciting it back to me. If anything you say would change their minds about your “princesses,” we would verify it before making any decisions. Lying to me will only make the consequences harsher when they come.”
Twilight walked stiffly beside Torres, and she did a much better job hiding her anger than she had the day before. “My friends and I will not lie to you.” She moved more slowly, and only started up again when she realized her attitude was attracting attention. She hurried after Torres, muttering, “Are threats a common part of the way your culture does its diplomacy?”
To her surprise, the ambassador didn’t seem to hear her, not at first. The shorter earth pony’s eyes were all for the town. She took in the soft colored buildings, the unpaved and cobbled streets, the friendly faces and polite greetings that surrounded them. She didn’t stick out nearly so much as Twilight expected, save for looking like a filly first setting hoof in an unfamiliar place. She was also listening though.
Twilight’s words didn’t seem to anger her. “All civilization is about threats. We’re not trying to be unfriendly, we’re just being honest.”
“It is not!” The train station was already near. A line of royal guards and metal fences cut off a fairly sizable crowd of ponies. Evidently word had got around that a strange ambassador from far away was going to be visiting. Twilight cursed herself for mentioning this to Rainbow, but there was nothing for it now.
She had to lower her voice even more as they walked, so as not to seem angry at this apparently important guest. “Civilization is based on friendship.”
“Is it?” The ambassador whispered right back. “Those look like guards and fences to me. Last I checked those were both threats.”
Twilight had no response to that, though somewhere she just knew Torres was wrong, and she wanted to find out how to prove it. Not now though… not with reporters from the Baltimare Gazette there, not with more than a hundred interested ponies all watching her. They leaned close, whispering to one another. She could overhear some of what they were saying: “Is that the ambassador?” “Couldn’t be, she’s just a pony. The princess probably just got a new assistant?” “Do you think it’s really a dragon? I heard they were sending one this way.” “The princess's dragon is purple.” And so it went. She did her best to tune everything out.
At least the crowd behaved the way it ought to, parting like a sea around her and her companion. They could expect what they wanted. A disappointing headline would be far better for Equestria than one about aliens that had come to kill the princesses.
At her request, Celestia’s royal car had been brought during the night, and was one of only two others on the train waiting for them. Twilight hadn’t ever made such an extravagant expense, and never would have even if such luxuries were (in theory) available to a princess.
For an alien ambassador, no expense was too great. Twilight strode through the barricade, levitating the train door open. Her friends’ voices all came from inside, laughter at some shared joke. She hoped they were ready to take the next few hours a little more seriously. Twilight had stressed that this ambassador would be even stranger than the yaks, even more demanding, and that the consequences would be even worse if they didn’t appease her. Hopefully that would be enough.
“If you’d like to wait inside, well… it seems like the ponies out here are expecting me to say something.”
Indeed, silence had fallen all around them, with many eyes on her. Few bothered even a second glance for Torres, though the strange levitating contraption was enough of a novelty that she had heard a few whispering about it.
“Alright. I guess I’ll wait inside.” She left.
Twilight found a podium waiting on the edge of the train platform, facing the large crowd that had assembled on one half of the tracks. At least the guards and fences had kept ponies from obstructing the way, as they would’ve done had they stretched out onto the tracks. Of course, that wasn’t going to change the fact that Twilight had nothing to say to these ponies.
She had no ambassador to introduce, not with Torres pretending to be a pony. Showing them her would only build false expectations in their minds, and teach them to think things about her race that weren’t true. She tapped the mic. “Uh… Ponies of Ponyville.” She didn’t talk for very long—there wasn’t much to say. Twilight kept her remarks to just a few minutes of empty political nonsense, enough to meet the minimum requirements for what these ponies had come to see.
She hurried away from the microphone too fast to even judge their reactions. Nor did she worry about them, not now. Celestia and Luna were still in danger (apparently). Not only that, but the ambassador had been alone with her friends during the speech. What would they think of her?
Twilight made her way into the car as fast as she could, slamming the door shut a little too loudly in her nervousness. The assembled ponies all looked up, expression stretching from concerned to surprise to a little annoyed. The royal car was set out in exquisite luxury, its every surface either polished hardwood or plush cushions. A crystal chandelier glowed above with a thousand separate crystals, each one a slightly different shade. The sun motif spread to other parts of the car as well, with its larger windows stained for privacy into scenes of Equestrian myth.
Of course, none of that was what had captivated her friends. The smells hit Twilight’s nose like a wave, and she very nearly stumbled. The royal cart didn’t just have the finest decor Equestria could offer, it also had its own kitchen. The smell of rising bread and cooking pastries wafted in from out of sight, filling the room.
It was hard to guess which of her friends might’ve summoned the servants and started the feeding frenzy. None held themselves aloof now, though. The table was packed with different foods, each one looking more delicious than the last. There was only one opening at the low table off to the left of the car, obviously left for her. Each of the other seats were taken.
There was Pinkie Pie nearest the empty seat, several donuts filling her mouth. Rarity beside her, plate spotless and a single hors-d'oeuvre floating in the air in front of her. Applejack had no plate at all, just a mostly-empty glass of some drink Twilight didn’t recognize. Fluttershy looked shyly away from her own plate, nearly as packed as Pinkie Pie’s. Rainbow wasn’t shy at all, though she seemed to have made an effort to avoid the more fattening foods and stick to the fruits.
She was also the first to speak. “Where’s that fancy ambassador you promised?” She stared at the empty door, lifting away from the table and hovering in the air in her usual fashion. “We met your new friend. Where’s your alien?”
Twilight blushed, but she wasn’t fast enough.
Torres sat on Rainbow’s other side, and in just a few minutes she had managed to pile her plate with more food than any of the other ponies here. She was the only one who hadn’t stopped eating when Twilight entered, only now looking up. She spoke with her mouth full, looking completely unabashed.
“Oh, did I not get to that? I’m the alien.” She chewed, washing down a fancy fluff cake with a sip of what looked like champagne.
Pinkie Pie started giggling. “You’re not an alien, silly! You don’t even sound like you’re from outside Equestria! Aliens are supposed to sound funny.”
“Now dear, that’s rude.” Rarity tapped Pinkie Pie on the shoulder, frowning slightly. Somewhere far ahead, a blast of steam signaled the beginning of their trip. “I’m sure Miss Torres hails from exotic places indeed. Perhaps we were merely a little misled in our expectations by Rainbow Dash.”
“Hey, I told ‘em exactly what you said, Twilight!” She was still in the air, hovering beside the ambassador. “You told me you had an alien!” She landed on the table, though somehow managed not to step in or spill anything. “No offence Torres, but a funny name doesn’t make you an alien. Aliens are supposed to have lots of slimy tentacles, or… or maybe eyes on stalks like a slug!” She grinned, lifting her hooves above her head to imitate. “And they’d wiggle around when you talked, like this!”
“Rainbow.” Twilight’s voice was stern. She stepped into her place beside the table, but didn’t sit down. The train started to move, pulling past the dispersing crowd outside and jarring the many plates and trays and open bottles. “Do you remember the time I made us all into breezies?”
The pegasus deflated, ears flattening a little. “Yeah.”
“Well, I’m not the only one who can do things like that. Specialist Maria Torres made herself into a pony for her visit, so she wouldn’t attract attention like this.” She flicked her tail towards the window behind her, where the train was leaving the crowd behind.
“Really?” Fluttershy didn’t look up, though she was sitting very close to where Torres had taken her place beside the table. “Are you really not a pony?”
“Not even a little.” Torres swallowed, wiping off her face with the edge of one foreleg. “Not that I don’t think you people are adorable—absolutely you are. If my younger cousins could see that little town we were just in. Ponyville?” She giggled even as she said the name.
The natives, Twilight included, only stared. Maybe this was the sort of behavior Twilight had been waiting for. The alien way for contextualizing situations that were mundane for Equestrians, or the other way around. Small animals were adorable, but there weren’t any in here. She dismissed the thought for now, focusing on the more important part of her mission. This alien had sided with Twilight when she had defended the princesses. “Torres has come from far away to learn about pony society. Err...” She frowned. “Is there anything specific we should tell you about? It would be easier if we knew what we were looking for.”
The earth pony rose, leaning close to Twilight and whispering up into her ear. “How much can I tell them? Your country, your rules.”
Twilight didn’t whisper back. “All of it.” She didn’t say the rest of what she was thinking. How much better off would we be right now if Celestia had told us? Could they have prepared some defense against these aliens? “Anything you need to tell us for it to make sense, anyway.”
“Alright.” Torres gestured to her luggage, sitting in a corner near the door. It lifted into motion, flying into a prominent place across from their table. Instead of watch, she sat down and looked back at her plate. “My, uh...” She struggled, her mouth opening and closing several times. She seemed to be mouthing several words, as though looking for the right one. Eventually she settled on: “Projector. My projector will help. While it sets up, though... I’m gonna eat a little more of this.” She gestured at her plate, grinning. “Serious backup plan right here. We send a few crates of this stuff up to the senior staff, and fifty clips says the captain thinks twice about his decision.”
Behind her, her luggage wasn’t just levitating anymore. It seemed to be taking itself apart. Even Twilight found herself glancing to the pony’s forehead, searching for a horn that must be controlling all this. Of course there wasn’t one, nor any magical aura coming from her beyond the usual for a pony. She wasn’t using her powers. The metal box appeared to be reconfiguring itself into a little stand of sorts, with several glowing ridges rising from it. They glowed with their own light, not at all unlike the chandelier above them, and even began to hum quietly.
Twilight saw that several of her friends had gone back to eating too, sparing only a few passing glances for the contraption. Only Pinkie Pie and herself watched it. Twilight scrutinized the object all over with her magic, searching for the spell that animated it. A second time she found no spells at all, no trace of what made the thing move on its own. It didn’t just move, it obeyed commands. How could it do that without magic?
“Well, I guess we ought to begin from the beginning.” Torres sighed, pushing her plate away. She spread her metal pad on the table in front of her, and waved a hoof over it.
The effect was instantaneous. Light faded from around the room, as though drawn out by an invisible specter. Sound faded as well, the rumbling of the train and the jittering of little objects all over the car trailing away to silence. This left only the hum of her machine, and the faint glow from its base. The effect was dramatic enough even Rainbow Dash looked up with interest. Just above the “projector,” an object took shape, spinning silently in the air. To Twilight it looked exactly as she had imagined a planet might, as seen from space. No, that wasn’t quite right. It wasn’t what a planet might look like from space. It was what her planet looked like, as only Celestia and Luna had seen it before. Torres hadn’t done anything remarkable, really. It was just a globe.
The pony gestured, and somehow the projection knew what to do. It rotated around until Equestria itself faced them. The darkness in the car served a purpose she now saw, illustrating five little pinpricks of light that shone even in darkness. These were Equestria’s largest cities, with electric lights that defied the night. Manehattan, Los Pegasus, Baltimare, Canterlot, and Trottingham. A few other cities had them, but… apparently they weren’t bright enough. “This is your planet. Looks familiar, right?”
Her friends nodded. None of them spoke, all transfixed by the sight of the glowing globe. Such things weren’t beyond what Equestrian magic could do: her own castle had a map that worked quite similarly. That did not make the feat less impressive. Another planet began taking shape beside theirs, forming from light. “This is what we expected to find when we got here.”
The other planet had a slightly different shade of green on its surface, and it was a little smaller. The continents were all different shapes too. Yet on that planet, it was like a gigantic spider web of light. Light burned there, so bright that only small patches of the planet were dark. Even the oceans glowed. Whole sections of the planet reflected dark metal, not the green of plant life. Nor was that the only change. Twilight Sparkle leaned closer, inspecting the edges of the globe. Thousands of little objects floated around the second planet, in all kinds of different shapes. Some were thin tubes, others slowly rotating disks.
“Where is that?” Rarity asked. Her plate sat forgotten, her chair rotated to face the projection.
“Oh.” Torres grinned sheepishly. “I used my home, the way it looked…” She glanced down at her pad. “About three-thousand years ago, before we had to move it.” She shrugged. "Anyway—"
Applejack looked skeptical. “This is all new to me—I’m just a farmer an’ all, so maybe it’s just too fancy. Why’d you think that we ought to have all that…” She gestured at the objects floating around the second planet. “We’ve got along just fine without anythin’ pokin’ out all the way up into the sky like that.”
Torres rose, walking over to the projections. “Because Oritheon had independently developed to a class 1 civilization. That’s about what we expected from Equestria, and what we didn’t find when we got here. If the admiralty board was going to reconfigure your leadership, this would be why.”
Fluttershy shifted uncomfortably on her cushion, looking down. None of the others reacted so strongly. If they didn’t realize what it meant, Twilight wasn’t about to explain now. That would take time they could better spend figuring out how to solve the problem. The pain and shock of the revelation could wait for another time.
Twilight herself was transfixed by the image. She would’ve doubted its veracity, were it not for what she had seen beneath Equestria the day before. Now, though, she knew it could be true. Knew the Creators had the power to build such things if they wished it. “Equestria isn’t like that.” Twilight didn’t look away, trying to figure the reasons for the shapes she saw. Why did so many of the floating shapes rotate as they did? “We have no secrets like that hidden away. We aren’t that ‘advanced.’”
Torres nodded, though the news didn’t seem to deflate her. “Oh, we knew that. You’ve been ignoring the slipspace communication we’ve been sending for the last thousand years or so. The telescopes we had pointed at your world hadn’t even been detecting radio bleed. We’ve got telescopes about fifty light-years from here, so…” She trailed off. Aside from Twilight, she seemed to realize that the ponies in the car were only growing more confused.
“Egghead, do you have any idea what she’s talking about?” Rainbow asked.
Twilight nodded. “Some.” She looked back up. “So if you already knew we weren’t like this, why bother coming down here?”
“Simple.” She gestured, causing the image of Equestria to shift to a daylight picture, even as the other planet vanished. She zoomed it closer and closer, though Twilight couldn’t be sure which of her gestures the device interpreted as an instruction to look closer. Eventually it wasn’t the image of a planet at all, but the nation, its cities and towns all different colors from the rest.
“It’s a question of whether your princesses abandoned their mission or just didn’t finish it yet. To prevent them from being replaced, we will have to prove the latter. We have to prove that your civilization is on the path towards advancement, but just hasn’t reached it yet.”
Her friends didn’t seem reassured. Twilight herself shifted uncomfortably, staring down at her hooves. That was quite a vague thing to prove. “I assume there are specifics you aren’t telling me. Milestones your people would look for.”
“Oh, sure. A whole list.” At her word, one appeared, replacing the image of Equestria. The text was written in their language, not the alien script. It was dense enough to fill the air on that entire half of the car, obscuring the servant’s quarters and kitchens and everything else beyond.
“Seriously?” That was Rainbow Dash again. “Twilight, only you could find us an alien who makes lists. This is the most boring disaster ever.” She covered her face with her hooves, groaning.
“Maybe.” Twilight advanced, standing as close as she could to the list without blocking it off to her friends. “At least it’s somewhere to start.”
So they did. Twilight was of course the most useful, though she wasn’t the only one of her friends to offer useful suggestions. She had halfway feared the list would be subjective to the point of ignoring all of Equestria’s accomplishments in non-technological fields, but that didn’t seem to be the case.
Painting, music, fashion, sculpture, plays, storytelling… all had place on the list, besides other genres that seemed to have been translated phonetically, because they had no meaning to Twilight. They made some ground with culinary arts and architecture as well, filling in whole sections of the list with dense writing that appeared even as the alien spoke it.
There were some unexpected advances. Things Equestrians took for granted, like the civil weather system, prompted frantic scribbling and great enthusiasm on Torres’s part. Cloud cities impressed her even more, to a degree that even Rainbow got involved with the discussion. The woman’s rank of “specialist” seemed ill-chosen, because Torres seemed informed on just about any subject Twilight could think of. Whenever she didn’t understand the meaning of a category, Torres had a simple way of explaining it.
The work was exhausting, and promised to be more so. What Twilight claimed to prove from memory would have to be substantiated with internal sources, something they would have to look forward to next time they were in a library. Several of her friends had volunteered to help with that too, but… Twilight declined. She wouldn’t subject them to that. Spike ought to be back from his stallion’s camping trip by then, but… nopony else.
The trip to Manehattan took several hours, hours they used in intense study. The other elements, even Fluttershy with her amazing patience, didn’t stay in for the whole time, but moved to the next car, where they could still be called in to provide detailed explanations about their individual expertise.
Eventually the train came to a stop. They hadn’t finished with the list though, so Torres made no move to get off, and Twilight didn’t either. Her friends were not happy to learn they would have to stay aboard until the two “bookworms” finished with their work. It took hours more, long enough that the sun had moved much of the way across the sky.
Torres’s mane had gone frazzled and unkempt by the time they finished, her body smelling as much of sweat as it did from the sweets of the car. Yet she looked optimistic as she closed up her projector. She even managed a smile for Twilight, and a nod of appreciation. “We’ll have to find sources for all of that, but… I think we can do it.”
Twilight frowned. She hadn’t taken the stress nearly as gracefully as Torres. Princess or not, the list had felt like a test she hadn’t been prepared for. Only she wasn’t the one taking the test, it was her entire planet. “We didn’t even have half the things on your list. That’s an F.”
The mare chuckled. “No, ‘course not. If you didn’t have a failing score, we wouldn’t have been having this conversation in the first place. They would’ve sent you a diplomatic carrier, not a warship. You didn’t have nothing, though. Your civilization didn’t take the path we gave to EU—Celestia and Luna, I mean. You haven’t been sitting on your equine asses either, though. Your mastery of ‘magic’ is impressive. I think we can spin this. Pretty sure I can spin it.”
“Spin?” Twilight forced herself to look closer at the projector. “Why would you need to spin it?”
“Oh.” She grinned again. It was a good thing at least one of them could—the tension felt like it was going to make Twilight explode. Better that at least one of them could relax. Even if it was a little frustrating that her apparent “best hope” was joking about things, Twilight knew that relaxed ponies did better work. She had proved that theory true herself a dozen times in the last few years. “Spin, it means—represent the facts in a way that sends the message you want.”
“Your history isn’t all that impressive: ponies haven’t been advancing nearly as fast as the admiralty board expected, and your princesses objectively failed to do what they were supposed to. We just downplay those parts; emphasize all the great things you’ve figured out to do with ‘magic.’ Play it like they were trying to engineer a society more advanced than ours, just in a different direction.”
Twilight had an alicorn’s constitution, yet still she had trouble thinking. Never in all her life had she been more thoroughly grilled on every aspect of her society. It was like someone had put her brain through a wringer and dumped what came out back into her head through a funnel. “Why?”
Torres stopped, even as she snapped the metal closed around her projector. “Huh?”
“Why?” Twilight swallowed. “Why do you care what we do? Why don’t you just leave us alone?”
Torres advanced past Twilight, as though seeing the city beyond the windows for the first time. She didn’t actually look back as she spoke. “If we’d done that, you’d be dead. No Equestria.”
Indignance gave Twilight a measure of strength. “That’s not true! If you hadn’t sent—” She couldn’t even bring herself to say it. Celestia herself had confirmed the statement, had apparently shown her where she’d been grown—yet still she couldn’t believe it. “If you hadn’t interfered, we would’ve found a way.”
“The records from your planet are… pretty grim.” She didn’t argue more, though. “But suppose you did. Stranger things have happened, I suppose. Wouldn’t protect you when the real danger comes.” She sighed, all her excitement and joviality drained away. “It still won’t. When the war finally gets here, you’ll—you wouldn’t stand a chance.” Her eyes glazed, and she seemed to be looking away, at some ghastly horror Twilight Sparkle couldn’t see. “Your whole world would be dead before you blinked, and you’d never even see it coming.”
The door banged open, Rainbow Dash hovering near the ceiling. “You eggheads done yet? If we keep waiting much longer, I think I might go insane!”
“Yeah, we’re done.” Torres gestured, and the little floating luggage lifted off to follow her. “Let’s see this city of yours, eh?”
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This reminds me a bit of King David's Spaceship.
imgflip.com/readImage?iid=40595741
7026026
and now i must buy those books in that universe. thanks.
career->carrier
Am I the only one concerned that RD and the others aren't so concerned on Torres's warning?
So, a war? Trying to advance other races to help them in this war, perhaps? Looks like we've got Reapers inbound...reactionface.info/sites/default/files/imagecache/Node_Page/images/1310498335627.jpg
7036637
Probably because they didn't hear it. They were in the car over, and train cars are quite well insulated against sound by design.
You know, if The Doctor found out humans were behaving this way, he'd be very cross with them indeed.
You do not make The Doctor cross. It's a bad idea.
Plus, what the hell kinda war are they fighting? The Time War or something? They have a huge bunch of evil aliens or whatnot and yet they have the time to screw around monitoring ponies? PRIORITIES, sheesh!
None of this makes any sense.
With the technology they have, why would they need telescopes?
Sheesh, just quantum entangle a basic monitoring device and hide in low-planet orbit behind a cloaking field.
Then you can see what's going on in real-time close-up.
God, for supposedly advanced humans, they're hella stupid! Must be descended from those atheist otters in the Allied Atheist Alliance.
7478363 Physics major here. Entanglement doesn't work like that. Hollywood and most sci fi is wrong about that :p
I don't think Twilight understands what's going on here. This isn't diplomacy, it's debt collection.
7829262
While I half-remember quantum information transfer is supposed to be impossible (much like even the basic concept of quantum entanglement was), that is one of the theorized methods by which a quantum supercomputer might work. Assuming you could superposition enough potential q-bits.
Again, half remembered information from a decade old documentary I vaguely recall watching once; it might be wise to up your sodium chloride intake slightly.
War? Really?
So advanced yet they couldn't figure out a way to prevent conflict between different factions?
That's pitiful.
8549748
If that which they are fighting against is ether equally, or more powerfull than they are and has no intention of pursuing peace you can try to make peace with it all you want. Just don't expect it to work.
And this is of course assuming that what ever they are at war with even have a concept of what "peace" is. The Tyranids of the 40k universe are a perfect example of this idea.
8549748
What, you thought it was a piddling war between factions of humans? There's like a 90% chance that after spending a few thousand years as a space-faring race, we would've ended up fighting against another warlike race. Hell, maybe against a peaceful race due to random BS.