Imperatives

by Sharp Quill

33. Nora

Harmony did not immediately respond, the ripples across the her surface turning sluggish. They resumed their usual pace. “The set of possible realities in superposition is virtually uncountable. I could only examine an infinitesimal subset of them, even with the centuries at my disposal. This is the first and only one I found that met my criteria. I am truly sorry I could not do better.”

Discord placed a paw on Meg’s withers. “If it’s any consolation, consider that if she had picked any other reality, it is almost certain you would never have existed.”

Meg looked up at the tree.

“He is correct.”

Meg’s head dropped. And the same could likely be said for everyone else she had ever known or had merely heard about—excluding Discord and Harmony. “I get it. I was the means to an end, not the end itself.” She sighed. “I’m getting too old for this existential angst.”

Discord looked askance at her. “Wait till you’re our age.”

Nope, not touching that. She looked up at the Tree once more. “Is there anything else we should know now that we have your attention?”

---

Meg arrived at work early in the morning and started digging into the software controlling the magic caster. Luckily the source code had been on the caster’s computer and thus had been copied along with everything else. While parts of it were easy enough to grasp, like the user interface code, the actual code that controlled the lasers… Twilight would better understand the theory underlying that implementation—except, of course, for the small detail that those lines of code would only be slightly more intelligible to her than Star Swirl’s scrolls would be to Meg.

Twilight was right; they really did need to teach each other. Too bad that would take months, even years, that they didn’t have.

Still, the software was working as is without anyone or anypony’s comprehension.

In due time the others showed up for work, coming through the portal from the office on the other side. “Did you get it?” Meg asked, half rhetorically, as Martin was carrying a box.

He reached in and pulled out a smallish drone, maybe four-by-four inches square. “It’s actually programmable, using an app on your phone.” He returned it to the box. “Can’t believe how cheap they’ve become.”

“We’re still expensing it,” Jerry added.

Dianna shrugged. “We don’t know it’ll survive being brought to life.”

“That’s what we’re going to find out,” Meg said. “Once Twilight gets here. It shouldn’t be too much longer.” Twilight was busy completing her own personal time loop, going back with the rest of the mane six to prove to her younger self that it was safe to go human.

Then what he had said clicked. “Programmable? How do you program it? Did they create some brain-dead custom language that’s supposedly easy to learn and use?”

Martin shook his head. “Supports Python, and some language called Scratch.”

“Huh.” Maybe she should look into that. That was one of the experimental goals, to see how come-to-life interacts with a program. “Scratch was created as an easy language for children to learn.”

He placed the drone on a table and got out his phone. “Already have the app installed.” He did something and it lifted, then remained in place two feet off the table. “It’s in hover mode now.” He did something else on his phone and it lowered to the table and powered off. “Only has a dozen or so minutes of flight time.” He picked it up. “Better go charge it.”

Considering how small it was, that was hardly surprising. Couldn’t have much of a battery. Meg returned her attention back to the caster’s source code—or almost did, before she remembered something. “Faust will be coming here to see me, this afternoon, just so you know. Convention business, mostly.” Anything beyond that would be up to Twilight.

There was little comment to that. Maybe a half-hour went by of losing herself in code when a disturbance caught her attention. “How did you get past the guards?” Jerry demanded to know.

Meg spun her chair around and spied him strutting over to the new arrival. “Try looking at the cutie mark on her dress,” she declared, “and your answer will be obvious.”

A royal guard had galloped into the room and stared at the woman in question. His eyes went down to the cutie mark on her dress. It only left him more confused, and he looked to Meg for clarification.

Meg sighed. “Very funny, Twilight.” To the room in general, she said, “Yes, this is Princess Twilight Sparkle, and she just teleported here.” She turned back to the grinning not-an-alicorn. “Why don’t you teleport a few feet to prove it.”

“Sorry, couldn’t help myself.” Twilight teleported a few feet back as suggested, to the shock of everyone but Meg. The guard recovered first and, shaking his head, returned to his post.

“How is this possible?” Jerry asked. “Humans aren’t supposed to have magic.”

Twilight shrugged. “Being an alicorn has its privileges?”

Everyone looked to Meg.

“Yes, me too. I’d appreciate it if you kept this to yourselves—and that includes Twilight taking human form. Especially Twilight taking human form.” She looked back at woman in question. “And you should lose that skirt if don’t want to draw attention to yourself.”

Twilight waved it away. “Sunset’s already got other things for me to wear. But yes, I’d also appreciate it if you all kept this to yourselves—oh, and by the way I’m working on that encounter with Smooze. I’ll have details shortly.”

“And, I’m pleased to say,” Meg added, “you will be able to hold a conversation with him. My new voice synthesizer is working out well. But…” She exchanged glances with Twilight. “You might have to endure a Pinkie Pie party. Just an educated guess.” Dianna didn’t seem to mind in the slightest.

“Like I said, I’ll have details shortly.” Twilight walked over to them. “Did you get a drone?”

“Sure did!” Martin said. He picked it up, still plugged in.

Twilight inspected the drone on his palm. “Didn’t expect it to be so small.”

“It’s still programmable,” Meg said. “Though to be honest I don’t know whether the program runs in the drone or in the app running on a phone. I mean, there’s still a computer in that drone, and it is capable of some autonomous behavior, like hovering or landing.”

Twilight shrugged. “Good enough to start with. We should run the experiments in your realm, though.”

“How about one of the smaller conference rooms?” Meg asked, looking towards her co-workers.

“Delta should be available,” Dianna said. “Let me go check.” She quickly departed.

Jerry gave Meg a skeptical look. “You still have to get past the agents on the other side, you know. I don’t know why they still bother, when you can clearly come and go to our world without passing through that portal…”

As proven by her stunt at the Senate Judiciary Committee. “Chalk it up to bureaucracy, I guess. Obviously that won’t be a problem, for either of us. I’m assuming those agents don’t wander the entire floor?”

He shook his head. “No, they stay seated at the portal, half the time staring at their phones. Sure, one of them goes to the break room or restroom every now and then, but that doesn’t take them past Delta. And we’ll have the door closed, so no one will see you—assuming you can teleport there directly?”

“That’s the idea,” Twilight said.

Jerry checked his phone. “Got a message from Dianna. Delta is a go.”

“We’ll be there shortly,” Meg said. “Keep the back of the room clear.”

“Will do.” Jerry departed.

Martin kept the drone plugged in, instead unplugging its power brick from the outlet. Taking it all with him, he departed too.

Meg waited until she was alone with Twilight. “I hope you have some plaid pills on you.”

Twilight reached into her purse and pulled two pills out. “As it so happens, I came prepared.” She tossed one over and Meg caught it with her magic.

“Getting good with your hands.”

“Getting good with your telekinesis.”

Meg put a plaid pill in her mouth. “I’ll drive; I know that conference room.”

Twilight simply nodded, and put her own plaid pill into her mouth.

They both appeared in the back of conference room Delta. The other three were already present and the door was closed. The drone sat on the table, again plugged into a wall outlet, and a magic generator sat next to it.

Martin disconnected the drone from its charger. “So how does a ‘come to life’ spell work anyway?—in terms we can understand, that is. How does the object so enchanted know what to do, never mind how to do it?”

“Well,” Twilight began, “that’s part of the spell, you see: what to do. It’s not a single, one-size-fits-all-spell, but rather a framework for constructing a specific spell for the task at hoof.” She gave an uncertain look at the drone. “And it definitely helps to know how the object in question operates.”

Jerry also stared at the drone. “Was that why your snow plow went out of control during that winter wrap-up?”

Twilight cringed. “Let’s just say I hadn’t practiced as much as I should have before attempting something like that. That has been rectified.”

This was starting to sound like a bad idea. “Twilight,” Meg said, “how well do you understand how the drone operates?”

Twilight stared at the device in question for long seconds. “Not as well as I should. I know there are electric motors spinning the blades, and a battery to supply the power, and a computer to control everything…” She frowned. “And there’s nothing in the framework to address computers, because we had never invented them.”

Meg had thought as much. “What about sending data and instructions via radio?”

The frown deepened. “Nor that, though I’m not sure that matters for a drone that’s been spelled-to-life.”

“Perhaps not. But you can’t ignore the computer. It actively controls the individual propellers to keep it level in response to stuff like wind—or even when bumping into something—and it needs to read numerous sensors to do it.”

Twilight swung her head over to Meg, defeat written on her face. “No, there’s no known way to replicate that functionality. The drone’s computer must do its job.” Her eyes turned back to the drone. “Which is really handled by its software.”

Martin plugged the drone back into its charger. “I’m guessing that ‘framework’ doesn’t cover software either.”

Twilight was rubbing her chin in thought. “No, it doesn’t. But…” She shook her head to clear it, dropping her hand. “I need to ponder this.” She disappeared, having invoked the return spell.

Meg shrugged at her co-workers. “I guess we’re done here?”

“Sure looks like it,” Martin said, and he unplugged the charger from the wall.

“Try lifting the table,” Jerry said to Meg.

That came out of the blue. “Huh?”

He raised an eyebrow. “Earth pony strength?”

“Uh…” Well, as a human she had unicorn magic, so why not that? “I suppose it wouldn’t hurt to try…”

Meg put both hands under the table. Ordinarily, she might be able to barely budge it. She lifted one side of it an inch. It was like lifting styrofoam. She added a few more inches. “Huh.”

“Try flying?” Jerry next asked.

Meg carefully lowered the table back down. “Without wings, I don’t see how. Maybe I can walk on clouds? Make them rain? Dunno. I mean, if I have pegasus magic, and I guess I do, I should be able to do those things, but I don’t see how to test it. Unless you have a hot air balloon handy? And a good strong rope to tie around me?”

He persisted. “Do you need wings? You don’t need a horn, after all.”

Twilight had certainly proved that. “I’ll… get back to you on that. I want to pass this by Twilight first.”

“Fair enough.”

“Can pegasi walk on clouds here?” Dianna asked.

Meg shrugged. “Yes?”

Silence descended.

Martin broke it. “Let’s assume ‘come to life’ won’t be an option. Fortunately, it’s possible to coordinate an entire fleet of drones. I’ll look into that.”

“I’ll meet you back in the cave.” Meg invoked the return spell.

---

Twilight arrived back in the cavern, and before she knew it a guard approached her. “Your Highness, your presence is needed at the portal. Several humans wish to enter—to collect evidence?”

A little advance warning would’ve been nice. She transformed back into an alicorn. “I know what they want,” she said as she started walking. “I’ll take care of it.”

The guard followed her anyway. Shortly they entered the room where the portal was located. The other guard was there, keeping an eye on the humans on the other side. There were three of them, in addition to the usual two FBI agents in their pointless quest to take Meg into custody.

Upon seeing her, one of the humans presented a sheet of paper. “We have a warrant for all materials from the warehouse in Tracy where the anomaly was created.” She suddenly lost some composure. “We, uh, understand this has no legal authority—”

“I’ve already agreed to turn it over. But first, I’d like to take a look at that.” Twilight magically grasped the warrant and gave it a slight tug. Getting the hint, the human released it and it floated over to her. A quick examination showed it to be what she had been told to expect. “Follow me.”

The three humans, and one Royal Guard taking up the rear, followed her as she made her way to the tunnel used for time travel. Both unicorn and alicorn provided horn light. At the entrance to the destination tunnel, Twilight brought them all to a halt.

“The material is in here,” she said. “As you may have noticed, this tunnel isn’t tall enough for most humans to stand in. Please be careful.”

Twilight entered. The piles of stuff were just up ahead. Twilight stopped in front of the first pile, illuminating it with her horn. It wasn’t long before the humans were standing beside her, hunched over.

“It’s a mess, I know. I had little time to grab whatever I could before getting out of there. I’m pretty sure I got most of it.”

They considered the pile in front of them. One of them looked around it at the two other piles behind it. “No way can we carry all this out, and I don’t think we can drive a van back here.”

“I can teleport all of this to the portal. You can then take as much time as you need to move it.”

A disbelieving look. “Seriously?”

Twilight smiled. “Watch.”

The piles formed a straight line, a line too long to fit in the portal room itself. But it would fit in the tunnel going past that room, relative to the main cavern. That was good enough. “Guard, please guide our visitors back to the portal once I’ve teleported.”

“Yes, Your Highness.”

She walked to the middle pile and grabbed all three with her magic, then teleported.

And found herself exactly where she wanted to be; the portal was a few seconds walk away. Fortunately she knew the layout of these tunnels like the back of her hoof. It’d be several minutes before they’d catch up to her. She decided to spend that time looking for research notes.

It took a minute browsing through a pile before she hit pay dirt: progress notes on that spell casting machine. Her eyes hungrily consumed them, an almost contradictory mixture of cluelessness and deep insight. Magic seen from an utterly different vantage point. They may have been dangerously ignorant, but they weren’t idiots.

“Your Highness?”

Twilight jerked at the voice of a guard, so wrapped up was she in those notes. She turned around and saw the humans standing behind the guard. “Uh, right, here it is. You may come through the portal as many times as necessary to haul all this out of here.”

“To be honest,” one of them said, “we didn’t expect this much material. We’ll have to come up with a plan to move it all back to D.C. I assume we may inspect these piles at this location until we do?”

“You may,” Twilight said. She glanced at the guard, who nodded in return. “And,” she said, levitating the progress notes, “I need to make a copy of this. It’s their notes on their spell casting machine, which would be very useful to us in ending the anomaly.”

The three humans exchanged looks before one of them spoke. “We’ll make a copy for you.” She held out her hand. “Right now.”

They didn’t trust her? She’d already had exclusive access to those piles, but she figured that in their minds they now had possession. Could she trust them? No reason not to. She floated the notes into the outstretched hand.

“I believe we passed a copy machine by the conference rooms. I’ll be right back.”

She departed.

The other two had started to peruse the piles. “I’ll be in the main cavern,” Twilight told them. “The guard can direct you.”

Twilight walked over to the cavern, pondering what little she had read. Under different circumstances, she’d happily have those humans on the team here. If only they could be convinced that ponies were not an existential threat to humanity.

Upon exiting the tunnel, she could see that all had returned from the conference room. She continued on to the humans, who once more surrounded their attempt at a spell casting machine. “I’ve found their progress notes on that machine,” she told them. Their eyes searched her in vain. “They’re being copied by those people from the special counsel. We should have them shortly.”

“They’re here already?” Dianna stepped away from the others. “I’ll see what I can do to speed them up,” she said and left.

“Yeah,” Jerry said. “Wouldn’t hurt to have those notes.”

“Twilight, could you come over here?”

She trotted over to Meg at her workstation, who was still human. “Something to show me?”

Meg looked around but didn’t seem to find what she was looking for. “Not show, I guess, but tell. As a human I have earth pony strength. I imagine you do too.”

“It’s true,” Jerry said in a raised voice. “We saw her lift that table in the conference room.”

“Just one side of it,” Meg corrected. “Anyway, do you think we have pegasus magic too? And how would we use it?”

Twilight didn’t know what to say. No wings, obviously, but no horn either, and spell casting worked just fine. “I’ll… have to think about that.” That had been happening a lot that day.

“No rush, I guess.” Meg returned her attention to the monitor. “I wonder if those notes have anything to say about the software.” She swept her hand at the monitor. “That’s what I’ve been looking at. It kinda needs domain knowledge to make sense, unfortunately.”

Twilight resumed human form, the better to see the monitor up on the desk, and tried to make sense of it herself. Without much success. From the file name it looked like it had something to do with modulating the laser beams? But how was that modulation determined? How did the spell factor in to that? How was the spell even represented inside the computer? Looking at the source code on the screen would do precious little to answer those questions, even if she were fluent reading it. “I see what you mean.”

Meg scrolled down some more. “Fortunately, it works without us having to understand it.”

“Well,” Martin interjected, “we hope. We haven’t quite gotten that far yet. We were able to acquire the same lasers, etc., so it ought to work, but…” He exhaled. “We’ll know soon.”

Just then Dianna returned, holding a sheaf of papers. “Got it.” She found Twilight and headed straight to her. “I also got them to agree to make copies for us of anything else that looked magic-related.”

Twilight took the sheaf and starting skimming through it. “That’ll be helpful.”

“There’s… a catch, though.”

Twilight looked up.

“In return,” Dianna continued, a bit apologetic, “they want our ‘expert advice’ on making heads or tails of it.”

Twilight returned her focus to the notes. “I can live with that.”

Hours flew by, her eyes opening wider and wider as she got deeper into those notes. Deciphering the encoding of spells in crystalline matrixes, by x-raying the gems she had enchanted for the Pinkie Pie doll. Ponies had never accomplished that, deciphering the encoding of spells at the atomic level. Even if magic could replace x-rays, they lacked the computers to process the unimaginable amounts of data.

Then they figured out how to replicate that encoding using lasers and then to cast the gems so enchanted. Unicorns would have considered that silly, even if they had the technology to do it. All the while making sense of the spells left on Meg’s work computer they had stolen, resulting in an understanding of magic alien to the bearer of the Element of Magic. Twilight was determined to bring this to the attention of Arcane Scroll and others.

The most useful part for their immediate needs were the notes on calibrating the spell engraving/casting machine, getting all those lasers positioned just right. That was brought to the attention of the other humans.

They were all working on that calibration when a new voice interrupted them.

“Nora?”

It was Faust, and she was looking straight at human Twilight.

Comments

[Astorius]

“Nora?”

More timeloops

[Streamline]

Explains the show to a degree, which is nice