Friendship is Optimal: Spiraling Upwards

by pjabrony

A Week

The human body is weird. Stay out late on a Friday night, and you can still be fresh on Saturday, but it’ll catch up with you on Sunday. The all-night conversation I had had with Moon finally caught up with me, and I crashed until nearly noon.

I wanted nothing more than to hop on the Ponypad again and see how the other ponies were doing, as well as seeing if I could do some solo play improving Little’s status, but I also had a lot to do around the house, cleaning and cooking for the week, not to mention keeping up with the fan fiction I was writing. I don’t like to miss a day of writing at least something, although I’m not obsessive about it. That I had skipped the day before just meant redoubling my efforts that day.

Between the housework and the writing I did not get to the pad at all. As far as I knew, Little stayed in her apartment all day and was anti-social. But I wasn’t too worried. The game had to have means in place to deal with people who didn’t plan to play it all the time.

Monday meant work, and even though the Ponypad had no loading time at all, I still didn’t just want to log in casually. When I had daily events to track like every other RPG, then the fast startup would be an advantage.

I finally had a chance after dinner on Monday night. Little was indeed waiting in her apartment, and I started to drag her out when a knock came at her door. I tapped it to open it magically, reflecting how I still thought it was neat that I could do magic, even by proxy.

A mailpony was on the other side. Yes, in Manehattan, mail still gets delivered by hoof to everypony even if they live in apartment complexes. He passed a letter to Little, and I was wondering if this wasn’t some sort of official game notice.

It turned out that the letter was from Hoof Dame, my first friend from Canterlot. “Dear Little,” it said, “You haven’t taken the time to write me once you got to Manehattan. The second lesson I can give you in etiquette is that after a journey, you should let the ponies you left behind know that you arrive safely. It’s not that I’m worried about you, so don’t get any ideas like that! I just think that you probably need some time management advice.”

What followed was a complete schedule that, even though it still spoke in pony terms, was quite applicable to my human life. It had a “before” and “after” comparison that showed “spend time with friends” markedly increasing. Of course, what it really meant was more time on the Ponypad.

As I finished her letter, I noticed the postscript. “I have also included a scroll with a new spell for you out of the Canterlot archives. This incantation enables a pony to use her quill for writing with considerable ease. Anypony who was interested in writing letters—or anything else—would be wise to learn it.”

A second scroll fell out from behind the first. I double-tapped it and Little focused her horn. The words on the scroll glowed and flowed back into Little’s horn. When the camera zoomed back, she had acquired a writing desk in the apartment, complete with inkwells, quills, and paper of her own. My first in-game item.

I brought her to sit down at the desk, and she floated a quill into position.

“OK, now, I guess I should write a thank-you letter.”

With no further input from me, Little started moving the quill.

“Dear Hoof Dame,” she wrote. “I received your gift of the scroll and your letter, and I appreciate both of them very much. You’re a great help to me as I make my way in Manehattan.”

It was exactly what I would have written had I had the time to think and type out something on a keyboard, but it was much faster. Almost as if Little was better at writing what I wanted to say than I was.

After I completed the letter, I had her roll and seal it and I put it to the side. I wondered how it would work if I tried to write a story using the spell.

I don’t always outline when I write, but when it’s a long enough fic, I jot down notes or plot points just to remind me what I want to make sure gets into a story. I opened up one such file on my computer and read one of the points out loud.

Sure enough, Little directed the quill to write along. I was of two minds about this. It was an aid to writing, but conversely it might make it too easy. Sometimes the struggle of working past a block or of taking what should be a boring scene and forcing it to be good through the words I pick is part of the fun. Still, I couldn’t deny that it saved time.

Before I knew it, I had a short scene of five hundred words or so on a scroll. But it was in the game and all my other writings were on my old computer. There was no in-game e-mail or IM or cloud storage (well, pegasi might have cloud storage, but it meant something different). I only had one source I knew of to ask simple and embarrassing questions. I re-opened my letter and added a postscript of my own.

“Do you know of any spell that allows me to send something I write outside of Equestria?” I was trying to get into the role-play. I walked out and found an old-fashioned mail slot in the hall and floated the scroll I’d written into it.

Apparently they have dragon flame at the bottom of the mail slots, because it was only moments later that the mailpony knocked again. “You must have a friend somewhere who really cares about you. These are old scrolls.”

I read the cover letter first. “You want to reach beyond the borders of Equestria?” it said. “You are really demanding, you know that? But knowing how impulsive you are you’ve probably already got something you want to send. So here’s a one-time-use-ONLY spell that will change the recorded format of words. Be careful with it, please. And thanks for writing back. Yours, Hoof Dame.”

It was an interesting dynamic. I could write all the stories I wanted in-game, but could only send them back to my usual publishing web sites once. I decided to set that aside and think about it.

By the next day, I knew I couldn’t resist using the auto-write spell more. It made writing more fun, and in some cases produced better copy that I did on my own. Even though I expected more from the game, it was already a useful tool.

As I wrapped up for the day I realized that I had an awkward situation on my hands. The Ponypad had its camera and microphone, and also traced my internet browsing. That didn’t leave me with a whole lot of privacy. There are those who make that their issue and campaign about it, but I wasn’t one of them. So long as people aren’t stealing from my bank account, I’m fairly open about everything I do.

And yet, a man has certain urges. Even if I wasn’t as young as I once was, I still enjoyed the Internet’s red-light district. But it didn’t feel quite right, doing that while being monitored by the Ponypad. I had put off the question by simply abstaining since I bought it, but everyone who has tried that knows that the physical desire soon weighs heavy against your willpower.

As discreetly as I could, I brought my laptop up to the bed and pawed through my picture and text archive. I was more after relief than entertainment, and so soon finished. Heading back to the Ponypad, I found that my indulgence was not being ignored. Little had her own hoof wedged under her tail. It was almost cute, though having just finished, it was more embarrassing.

Work weeks fall into a pattern of routine, as you enter the morass of Tuesday and Wednesday, you actually become productive because it feels like the week will last forever. Only after does the healing light of the oncoming weekend start to become visible. Wednesday fell into the same pattern as Tuesday. Breakfast in the car on the way to work, sit behind the desk for as long as I had to, finish the second half of the salad I’d ordered the day before, back home, writing, exercise, dinner, and my little stress relief before finally getting down to what could be called free time. Which, at that moment, meant playing on the Ponypad.

On that particular day, though, as Little mimicked my actions in her own way, Moon Sailor had come by and entered my apartment. We were friends, and had an open-door policy as seemed de rigueur for ponies, but I didn’t expect her to have come in while Little was clopping, and if she had, I certainly hadn’t expected her to stay. Even if I could have believed that, what threw me for a greater loop was the look on her face. It was a lustful smile.

“Please, don’t stop on my account,” she said. “I was just thinking about joining you. Do you mind?”

“Um, not at all, I guess. I’m about finished though.”

I watched in surprise, more so that this would be allowed in a game based on My Little Pony, but also at its effect on me. Most of my tastes in pornography still ran to the traditional, and in any case I was no longer in the mood. And yet Moon’s ecstasy and gratification was arousing. I almost thought about going for a second round, but wasn’t quite ready for that.

When she was finished, which I could tell quite definitely, she calmed down and was very matter-of-fact. Her wings slowly folded back to her body. “There’s nothing like a good orgasm, is there?”

“No, nothing at all.”

We proceeded to have a frank and open discussion about sex and sexuality. We talked about our turn-ons, fetishes, and interests. Moon was far more experienced than me, certainly as compared to Little, who after all had existed for less than a week. She talked about stallions and mares that she’d been with, and didn’t seem to mind that most of my sex life happened in front of a screen. She didn’t even make me feel embarrassed about it.

“I understand where you’re coming from,” she said. “No pun intended. There are plenty of ponies out there who have to have everything just right in order to enjoy sex. They need the right partner, the right mood, and so on. The sex is a complement to everything else. And that’s all right, but I’m not like that. To me, it’s fun on its own, and everything else is the icing on the cake.”

I saw an opportunity to couch one of my opinions in the language of the game. “For me, sex is all tied up with my magic.”

“You mean because you have a big horn?”

“No. Well, not just that. See, without magic—and I don’t mean like you or Earth ponies, I mean if there were no magic at all—then everything is give and take. You’d have to work for everything. Even lifting a piece of paper means expending energy that you’ll never get back. But there are a few things where you can get something for nothing. Sex is one of those. Just rub a few bits of skin together, and you get a shot of happiness. That’s like a magic spell, and you don’t even have to be a unicorn to do it.”

“That’s so cool!”

We kept up the talk, and I was comforted by the fact that the game wasn’t trying to guilt me into some sort of celibacy. But at the same time, it was handcuffing me. I realized now that Moon had to be a pony being played by some other human being. Maybe it was an equally lonely guy, but it could also be someone as sweet as she was in the game. And we couldn’t make any contact other than as ponies. A little disappointing, but that was just how Equestria Online worked.

By this point I was starting to get used to the game and to the fact that ponies would come around at any time to chat. More to the point, they didn’t mind if I took Little around to chat with them. So it was that the next morning I decided to play a little before I went off to work. Moon wasn’t at home, so I decided to go up to see Garlic Parm.

If Moon was rapidly becoming my friend based on our mutual love of sex, Garlic represented my love of food. He made me ashamed to just throw something from the freezer into the microwave, or worse, to get take-out. I rediscovered my love of cooking with him.

“Hey, Little! What’s doing?” he said as I entered his apartment. “How about we get together tonight and hang out?”

“Actually, I can’t make it tonight. There’s a Thursday night football game on.” The game corrected me to hoofball. “Whenever the local team’s playing, I usually get an invite to dinner and a little party from my one friend. He’s really into it.”

“OK, if you’re with friends, I’ll know you’re not lonely. I will miss you, though.”

His words stuck with me throughout that day and the next. I felt better at the party itself, but while working I couldn’t shake the feeling that I was somehow betraying my pony friends. Oh, well, I thought. The weekend was there, and I’d have plenty of time, even if I did want to go out.

When I turned on the pad that Friday night, Garlic and Moon were already hanging around. We chatted a bit and caught up on everything that had happened since I had seen them last.

The Ponypad had an excellent sound system, but there was constant interference in our conversation. “What is that?” I said, more out of observation and reaction than actually asking.

Garlic trotted to the window and peered out. “Just some youngsters playing pony polo.”

“You mean, with the mallets and the ball and all that?”

“No, that’s regular polo. You mean that you don’t know pony polo?”

Moon stood up. “OK, that’s it. I’m out of here.”

“Was it something I said?” I had Little ask.

“No, but this guy’s going to be spouting off for the next five hours until you’re an expert, and I’ve already been through that.”

She left the room, and Garlic had a greedy look on his face. He was anticipating enjoying the explanation. I dragged Little to the window and looked out. There was a throng of ponies out there, some wearing ribbons that indicated a team. I could tell that they were trying to advance a ball toward a goal, but on occasion they would stop and start a new play.

“There are twelve ponies on each side: four Earth ponies, four unicorns, and four pegasi. Pegasi can only touch the ball in the air, and once they have it, they can’t fly forward, only back. Unicorns can’t touch the ball at all, only bat it with their magic. Now, if a pegasus, a unicorn, and an Earth pony all make contact, and they advance the ball past one of the meter-line markers, they can stop the clock and set up for another play. Do you see the goal at the end?”

I looked where Garlic pointed, and saw a twisted tree that looked something like a capital H with a circle instead of a crossbar.

He continued. “Each type of pony scores in a different way. The Earth ponies have to kick it over the circle, the unicorns have to get it through, and the pegasi have to get it under.”

I watched the youngsters through the window. With everything Garlic had said, it looked like a combination of rugby, soccer, and American and Australian football. A sharp-angle kick toward one goal failed, a long pass from a pegasus connected to another who threw it under the bar.

“Ooh, he scored!”

“Yeah, but it was pegasus to pegasus,” said Garlic. “Every score can have a goal and two assists. If the first assist comes from the same type of pony as the scorer, it’s only one point. If it’s different, but the second assist is the same type as either of the other two, it’s worth four points. If all three types of pony participate in a score, they get nine points.”

It was only a pickup game in Celestial Park. The meter lines were chalked on the grass, and the whole thing had an atmosphere of amateurism. But it was entertaining nevertheless. And as I watched, I finally caught on.

Equestria Online wasn’t a game, and it wasn’t a social network. I told it what I liked, and it tried to one-up me. It was life enhancement. It found that I wrote, and gave me a better way to do it. It found I like sex, and probably had a slate of things to present for that (so was Moon a real person or not?), and now knew that I liked sports, and gave me something to watch.

And it did a good job. Pony polo was exciting and well-structured. The multiple levels of scoring meant that it was possible for one side to come from behind and keep it interesting until the end. I told Garlic as much.

“What I like about it is that the offense is trying to stop the clock while the defense wants to keep it going. It means that both sides are hedging. If the defenders are too good, they’ll give up ones and fours. If the offense goes too much for nines, they won’t get anywhere.”

“Exactly! It’s almost always exciting to the end. If you want, I can take you to a game sometime. We can go to Ebbits Field in Bucklyn or up to the Polo Grounds.”

I blinked. “The Polo Grounds?”

“Yeah. They play baseball there too. We could see that, if you want.”

Now I closed my eyes. Celestia, the AI behind the game, was reading my history again. I loved baseball, and one of the reasons was the uniqueness of the ballparks. I’d made trips to plenty of the more distinct ones. I’d seen Houston where the center field was slanted, Oakland with its expanse of foul territory, and of course Fenway in Boston with the three-story left-field wall. My biggest regret of having been born so late was that I could never see a game at the Polo Grounds, maybe the most distinguished. Two-fifty down the line to the upper deck, and over five hundred to center. Bullpens in fair territory, and so sloped that the manager in the dugout could only see the centerfielder’s head. But they tore it down over ten years before I was born.

The Ponypad might simulate it, and it might even be accurate. But it would still just be a picture, not real.

“I might watch pony polo with you there,” I said, Little repeating, “but not baseball.”

“All right,” he said quietly. We watched the rest of the game, as thoughts ran through my head.

I should give up the Ponypad. It’s making me care too much. These ponies will probably be shut down if I don’t use it. Or, if they’re human, they’ll find someone else. But this level of technology just isn’t going to work. It’s a prototype. When they have true VR or something that combines generated content with sensory input, maybe. But that’s a ways off. And when that does come out, it won’t be as nice as this. It won’t be My Little Pony-themed. I can only hope it has something good.I need to sort this out.

The rest of that night and into the morning was more routine. I checked the weather. It called for sun and a few clouds. It was enough.

Little frequently mimicked actions I took, so when I got dressed up and headed for the door, she was heading to the elevator in her apartment building. It stopped and Moon got on.

“Hey, mare!” she said. “Where you headed? Something fun? Can I come?”

“Kind of.” I sat back down and explained.

“Every year I wait until a sunny Saturday in the early summer or early autumn. When it’s not too hot and I can still be outside comfortably. I take my car”—cart, the came said, and I thought that was cute—“and I drive on the parkways. I put nice music on and sing along, and just enjoy the scenery. The roads cut through some forest areas where the pavement is the only sign of civilization. I’m all for Manehattan and cities, but once in a while, I just have to get away. I finish at a cute little restaurant where I get lunch, then come back the normal way. It’s a de-stress thing.”

“I can understand that. Everypony feels the call of nature once in a while. Well, enjoy.”

A few hours later, she welcomed me back. “Hope you had a good time. Now, how about joining Garlic and me in Canterlot? We’re going to a karaoke club.”

OK, game, I get it. Once more you’re going to try to one-up me. Fine, let’s see what you’ve got. “I’d like nothing better. Can I invite a friend I know who already lives there?”

“Of course,” said Moon. “The more the merrier. Meet us at the train station in an hour.”

I used the auto-writer to explain that to Hoof Dame that I was coming for a visit. She’d never forgive me if I didn’t tell her, and I knew that she’d find out. She wrote me back almost immediately.

“I suppose I’d better be there to make sure you don’t do anything foolish. And I’d like to meet your friends and see that you’re in good hooves. –HD”

Once I got to the station we all settled in for the long ride. I figured that we’d be in Canterlot early Sunday morning. I started to point out scenery. Moon interrupted me.

“Hey, Little? If you don’t mind, I’m kind of tired. I was kinda planning to sleep on the way there and be bright-eyed and bushy-tailed for the fun.”

“Yeah, me too,” said Garlic. “I’ve had a long week.”

“OK, guys. Fine by me.”

The lights on the train dimmed and even the sounds were muffled. If I didn’t know better, I’d think that the Ponypad was trying to save computing resources. A low-level version of a loading screen. That was a scary thought. This was more powerful than my entire job site. What could it possibly need to load?

I decided to join my friends in sleeping, but I’m an early riser. When I turned on the Ponypad, Moon had her head lying on Little’s shoulder, and was snoring in her ear. It was cute, and I didn’t move her. The train pulled in and everypony woke up.

The karaoke place was close to the castle, and Hoof Dame was waiting outside for us. After introductions all around, the ponies headed inside. It was set up Japanese-style, with individual booths for each group who wanted to sing, rather than having one machine and making everypony wait in line. I focused in on the song list. Naturally, it had all the songs from the My Little Pony soundtrack, but there were also some standard songs. Moon said, “I know what I want to sing, so I’m going first!”

She ran through a nice rendition of “At the Gala.” “I figured that since we were in Canterlot, we needed something a little cosmopolitan.”

Garlic went next, and he had chosen the Smile Song. Hearing it in his baritone voice and leading off with “My name is Garlic Parm,” was different.

I was enjoying this new function of the Ponypad. Hearing the soundtrack in new voices and with live renditions was something I would have paid for, so it was a good way to spend time. Pleasant.

“How about it, Hoof Dame?” I had Little say, “Are you going to sing with the rest of us?”

She blushed. “Well, I don’t know any of these modern numbers, but I am trained for appearances at court, so will anypony mind if I sing in Old Equestrian?”

“Ooh,” said Moon. She was impressed.

The tune was “Winter Wrap-up,” but the lyrics were like nothing I’d ever heard before. Old Equestrian had not evolved over time, and it wasn’t an amalgamation of other languages. It had been specifically designed to sound pleasant to the ear, and that fact was obvious from the very first line. I was thankful that she had chosen one of the longer ones. I would listen to Old Equestrian forever.

If that was what the Ponypad had downloaded, I was definitely impressed. However, it was my turn to sing, and I would have a tough act to follow. I looked over the list of songs and selected “The Failure Song.”

I haven’t mentioned Little’s voice. It was high, higher than Fluttershy’s, but without the softness of hers. I was actually keen to hear how the Ponypad would render my own singing into hers. I started up. By the time I hit the line “But I wasn’t prepared for this” I knew that that line was true. I also knew what it was that had been downloaded.

It was a natural descendent of software like Auto-Tune, in the same sense that the Cray Titan was a descendent of ENIAC. While normally my own voice was like an echo of Little’s, during the song it was muted. I literally couldn’t make a sound, or rather every sound I made was canceled out by an opposing wave generated by the speaker. Then Little’s voice went on top, and it was a powerful soprano. I almost stopped singing, stunned, but I wanted to hear more.

I still had input over the song. I could make it lower of higher, and I could change “thin and thick” to “thins and thicks” to complete the rhyme, but I couldn’t sing a wrong note. It was beautiful. When I reached the final high note, I actually felt like I was hitting it.

And then it was over.

Everypony else clapped, and Garlic said, “That was really good!” Even Hoof Dame gave me a nod and a smile.

I was ready to cry.

“It’s not real,” I said, my speech having returned.

“Little, what’s wrong?” said Hoof Dame.

“It’s not real, none of it! It’s nice to see ponies, but you’re stuck in this game. Oh, damn the censorship, you’re all just pixels on a screen!”

I threw the Ponypad across the room onto my recliner, tearing the wires out of it, and I ran upstairs to my bed. I cried myself to sleep.

When I woke, a light was blinking in my eye from downstairs. Just as a baby’s cry causes irritation and makes you pay attention, so did this light. I had to get up and investigate. It was coming from the pad.

Little had run from the room in the karaoke bar She was wandering the streets of Canterlot. The symbol of the sun was on every building, and all of them were pulsing. I pushed one of them just to stop the light.

“Welcome, Little.”

“Hello, Celestia.”

“Would you like to talk?”

“Yes, I would. I appreciate what you’re trying to do. But stop it. There are a lot of good things you’re doing, but you’re also trying to take over my life, and I don’t appreciate that. Because you can’t do everything for me. If you could, I wouldn’t complain. But there’s nothing more depressing than being shown other people’s happy lives and knowing that you can’t have it.”

Celestia said nothing for a long time. Then she gave a sad smile. “All right. I promise that I will do my best to ensure that Equestria doesn’t depress you anymore. In exchange, would you please not yell at your friends for thing that are not their fault? Talk to me when you are uncomfortable.”

“You’re right. I’ll apologize to them. And you’ll stop trying to top me until you can come up with things that I can access fully.”

“I very much agree,” said Celestia. But her smile suggested she read some extra meaning into what I had said.

For the next few months, using the Ponypad became part of my routine. My friends forgave me once I had apologized, and everything went back to the way it was. I assumed it would stay that way.

Comments

[book_burner]

So you're the wackjob who gave her the idea of uploading!

[Cool writer]

Woooooo, that escalated quickly! First I was reading a story about a pony video game (That I know is going to turn into a moral Delima nearing the end), and now it's got... clopping ponies... That's actually kind of funny.

[Cool writer]

2581504
Me, reading your comment:

[Greatazuredragon]

“Yes, I would. I appreciate what you’re trying to do. But stop it. There are a lot of good things you’re doing, but you’re also trying to take over my life, and I don’t appreciate that. Because you can’t do everything for me. If you could, I wouldn’t complain. But there’s nothing more depressing than being shown other people’s happy lives and knowing that you can’t have it.”

Wonder how he will react will Celestia calls him and talks about immigration to Equestria...

[Mythic Night]

I used the auto-writer to explain that to Hoof Dame that I was coming for a visit. She’d never forgive me if I didn’t tell her, and I knew that she’d find out. She wrote me back almost immediately.

Extra word there.

[Mythic Night]

Celestia said nothing for a long time. Then she gave a sad smile. “All right. I promise that I will do my best to ensure that Equestria doesn’t depress you anymore. In exchange, would you please not yell at your friends for thing that are not their fault? Talk to me when you are uncomfortable.”

Things