Error Code: FIO

by Ashfur

Arc 2-1: Augmented reality

Location: 577 Briar Street, California. Alex's house
Date: Saturday, March 5th, 2016, 11:15 A.M.

The rays of the sun beamed down through the window of the bedroom, bouncing off a deliberately placed mirror and illuminating the face of a certain sleeping human. Well, formerly sleeping human. Alex grumbled to nobody in particular and rolled out of bed. Say what you will about routines, but putting whatever alarm you use far enough away from the bed that you have to get up is a great motivator. With all the speed of a mighty sloth, Alex groggily dressed, shaved, and washed up before trudging down the steps of his home to make breakfast. Specifically, pancakes. After mixing and cooking the breakfast treat, he flipped on the TV to find something interesting.

"Ugh, infomercial, infomercial, reality TV, game show... is nothing good on today? Geez. Fine, maybe the cartoon channels have some old shows I can watch."

With a press of the remote buttons, Alex was greeted with the all-too familiar theme song of My Little Pony. He sighed. Of course with Celest-AI being richer than any person on the planet, having a channel devoted to MLP all the time was child's play. In fact, with all the Equestria Experience centers opening up and draining wallets dry, and uploading already legal (albeit expensive) for the terminally ill, it was only a matter of time until every ad was-

"Hello, my little humans!"

-an ad for Equestria Online. "Eveyone these days knows somepony with a ponypad. Why not join them and have your values satisfied in Equestria? There are so many things you can do. Go on an adventure, relax, have a wonderful life. Maybe even find love..." Celestia winked at the camera. "So why are you waiting for? Get yourself a ponypad today or head to an Equestria Experience Center to have an even greater time! Until next time, my future pony!" And with that, the screen flipped back to the episode.

"Great," Alex mused. "Now she's running ads all the time. What's next, takeovers of all the major stores and news outlets? I swear, it's a good thing I haven't run into her ingame yet. She's around far too often and..." Alex paused, potential realization dawning in his eyes. "...and maybe she hasn't shown up yet since she knows it bugs me how often she's around in the media! Rrrgh, I HATE being played like that, but I have to admit she's a clever... mare, I think the word is? Whatever, let's talk to her after breakfast."

---

Location: Off the map, Virtual Reality

Alex booted up his ponypad and was greeted with the exact image he left behind, Infinite Loop mid-nod on the small plane carrying the survivors between shards. Time seemed slow, as though the world itself was loading, but quickly sped up to normal speed as Loop finished nodding.

"I'm back, Loop. Please tell me everything is okay here." Loop looked at Glitch, surprised at him.

"Wait, already? You didn't even leave." Loop cocked her head to one side like a curious dog. "I thought you were going to sleep!"

"I did. Heck, I slept for like ten hours! And that's not even counting making and eating breakfast. I thought the world kept going when I logged out. Did the world pause because I'm the only one here with ties to the outside?"

A new voice cut into the conversation. Female, but slightly deeper than Loop's cheery, aloof voice. "It certainly is a possibility." The pair of ponies glanced at the new voice, met by a yellow pegasus mare with an electric blue mane and a circuitboard for a cutie mark. She extended a hoof in greeting. "Short Circuit. Pleased to meet you."

"System Glitch. And this is Infinite Loop, until we can help her remember her real name. Nice to meet you."

"Mhm. Well, you picked the wrong time to log in, buddy. With the world getting busted up like this. Still, I never thanked you for helping us all escape the city. I was an up-and-coming programmer before this happened. I asked Princess Celestia about how this world works a lot of the time, and one thing she told me was she used to pause shards when players were not in them to conserve processing power. Nowadays she doesn't since the servers have someone on constantly, but if you were the only one here..."

"There wouldn't be anything keeping the server up!" Loop concluded happily.

"Yes. And with whatever happened, Glitch here might be the only one left on the server."

"That might be true," Glitch added. "Add that to how Celestia hasn't shown up yet, and we might actually have a problem. That is, unless she made the world like this to be fun for us."

Loop turned back to Glitch with a somber expression. "If she did that, I wouldn't need a new name, Glitch. And you would have gotten one by now yourself. She's not coming anytime soon."

"Well, why don't I talk to her in the real world? She could fix it and-"

"NO!" Both turned back to Short Circuit. "Celestia works in a manner made for optimal satisfaction. She'd sooner give you a new ponypad than fix the one you are using. And if you dont have your ponypad..."

Glitch finished the thought. "Then this world freezes. And I lose you guys."

"Exactly. And judging by the look on your face, you don't want that."

Glitch, and Alex in the real world, nodded. "Right. Tell you what, let me go and talk to Celestia, but I'll refrain from mentioning this whole thing directly. I'll help us with this. I promise."

"Cross your heart and hope to fly, stick a cupcake in your eye?" Loop asked.

"Uh, sure. I'll head out now. If all goes well, you won't even know I was gone." The power button was pressed, and had anyone been observing the interior of the plane, time froze.

---

Location: Superdupermart
Time: 1 P.M.

Alex wandered through the aisles of the store, gathering various supplies for the coming week. As he tossed various items into his shopping cart, he took note of a few people with ponypads, some talking to their virtual companions. His mind turned to his recent friends, Infinite Loop and Short Corcuit. As he passed the magazines he noticed Celestia on several covers, from gossip magazines discussing Equestria Online to scientific journals praising her amazing new technology.

As he passed the meat section, he noticed a VERY angry customer arguing at the counter.

"How can you sleep at night knowing you're chopping up meat?! It's cruelty! Murder!" Alex approached to help the poor clerk.

"Uh, excuse me miss. There's no need to cause a scene. I hate to tell you but the animals are already dead. Yelling at this guy won't help."

"Of course it does! This place needs to start selling things other than meat. Like beefbark!"

"What. The heck. Is a beefbark."

"You know, like in Equestria! It's like beef but it's a plant! How can you not-"

"Vegetable Salad, please calm down and stop yelling at Deep Sea." Alex, the clerk and the woman all froze as Celestia's voice interrupted. The woman pulled a ponypad out of her purse. Celestia waited on the other side of the screen.

"But he should he selling beefbark instead of-"

Alex interjected. "Beefbark isn't real, Lady!"

"Alex is right. Beefbark does not exist outside of Equestria Online. Please, calm down. The animal is indeed already dead, and it would be better if you focused your efforts on the meat industry instead of Deep Sea."

The woman looked saddened for a moment before apologizing and shuffling off. From the ponypad of a bystander watching the confrontation spoke up. "Thank you for helping out, Alex. You would be a good fit Equestria online. You should really get a ponypad soon."

"Maybe. I was going to try and talk to you later about something. I could stop by the experience center later?"

"Sure, see you then, Alexander."

After paying for his groceries and putting them in his car, Alex walked over to the Equestria experience center.

"Okay, so Celestia doesn't know I even have a ponypad... does she? She clearly didn't call me Glitch, so it might be possible. Ugh... I really hope this ends well... but at least this is starting to get interesting."

Comments

[Jaro45]

Is Alex's damaged pad going to cause a sort of Kessler Syndrome type of effect and wipe out Celest A.I. ?

[Ashfur]

9031701
Seeing as I had to look up exactly what that is, no. The pad is a sort-of macguffin though, in the sense that the server Alex is in can only run while the pad is on. The server holds a secret that I won't mention yet, but can only be accessed while the server is running, so there will be a few groups after the pad later.

Although it WAS a good idea you put out there. Pity I already have the whole story planned, just not written yet.

[mishun]

I asked Princess Celestia about how this world works a lot of the time, and one thing she told me was she used to pause shards when players were not in them to conserve processing power. Nowadays she doesn't since the servers have someone on constantly, but if you were the only one here...

So, she basically said that physical details of Celestia's hardware are observable from inside simulation. Um, I don't know how to interpret it, Celestia is roleplaying with him devotedly, but still sends subtle hints that it's roleplay to be discovered later?

[Zanec]

"NO!" Both turned back to Short Circuit. "Celestia works in a manner made for optimal satisfaction. She'd sooner give you a new ponypad than fix the one you are using.

This makes no sense.

[PeachClover]

As he tossed various items into his shopping cart, he took note of a few people with ponypads, some talking to their virtual companions. His mind turned to his recent friends, Infinite Loop and Short Corcuit.

Did you mean "circuit"?

[Solarfollow]

9065693

It does. If Celesta's really in control, and she's just feeling Alex/Glitch this line so he'll think his Pony Pad is broken.