Arrival: Victorian Progress

Gathering Data...

Opening Log...

Audio Log #2, Date [MANUALLY INSERTED] {Day 2}

Time 7:59 PM

So. I’m still here. Apparently, this wasn't all just a paranoid delusion created by a sleep-addled mind when one desired a moment of solitude away from the scheming of English Kings. But I might be in a coma. Or insane. At this point, however, I don't think it matters. I would have been caught talking to myself last night about being transported to a WHOLE NEW WORLD *Quiet chuckling* and off to the loony bin I go! Whee! And if I’m in a coma? There’s nothing I can do now. So I’m going to act like this is real. Hopefully. If I go into paranoid fits...Hoo boy. That would suck. Especially if I do so in front of the natives.

Speaking of the natives, I decided to do a reconnaissance mission on the nearby...hamlet I think is the correct word. Village? Burgh? Hell I don’t know. The nearby collection of buildings that contains living organisms. That works. Or not.

BACK ON TARGET. Okay. Oooookay. I set my alarm last night for 7:30 in a fit of tired masochism. Well, that might have been beneficial, but I'll be damned if I admit that to anything other than a soulless computer screen where odds are that nobody important will ever hear it or see it. But if someone is listening to this...HI! I SWEAR I'M NOT CRAZY. I'VE BEEN TO A PSYCHIATRIST AND EVERYTHING!

Calm down Rylee...calm. Deep breaths... Okay, thats better. So. At 7:30, I got up, took a shower, ate. Ya know, standard morning stuff. Here next to me are two notes I wrote myself, so I might as well read them off so that this log is accurate. “There are only 10 eggs left! Ration them idiot!” is the first. Yeah. I yell at myself a lot. The second says “Sun rise, 8:00 EXACTLY.” That'll be useful to determine what season it is. Right now, out my window, it looks like it is either Spring or Fall. Not sure which. It felt like either when I went outside on my scouting mission, but I’m not sure.

*Faint chimes are heard in the background*

What. The. Actual. Fuck. That, which you may have heard, was my grandfather clock which is currently located downstairs next to the front door. It just chimed eight P.M. As well, just as it did that, the sun set. And I don't mean around abouts. As soon as that motherfucking clock hit eight, the Sun went, “Fuck this! Providing life-giving light is hard!” and slipped below the horizon. If I “landed” here, for lack of a better term, on an equinox, that would be a bit freaky. Maybe equinox's here are weird. It would fit with the overabundance of freaky in EVERYTHING GODDAMN ELSE!

To qualify that statement, let me just speak a bit about what I saw in the neighboring... fuck it, I’m sticking with hamlet. Its more fun to say, and it reminds me of poofy wigs and copious murder.

To begin with, yes, everything does look like a graphic artist tried to design the perfect pre-industrial village, and succeeded in doing so. Everything is so...cute. Every roof is thatched perfectly, every windowsill has a basket of flowers. I swear I heard the birds even singing in freaking harmonies. Just...thats kinda creepy. Or really creepy. Imagine your just walking along one day, and you ran into the perfect town. Lovely neighbors, no crime. A mom,a dad, one son, one daughter, one dog, in every house. and every house had a little white picket fence and everyone loved each other and nothing was wrong. Sure, that may sound great. But your first thought upon entering that town might be of how great this place is. But eventually? You start thinking about mind control of some sort, cause there is no way in Hell people would ever act like that.

Yeah, I was a bit freaked out at first. Because of that, I decided, at the time, that the best idea was not to walk into town and knock on doors. I decided instead to camp on a nearby hill and just observe. With my binoculars. Okay, maybe I did pay creepy with creepy. But goddamn if I wasn't rewarded for doing so.

I got there about, oh, 20 minutes after sunrise. Luckily for me, there was almost no movement. I could see some action though the glass windows of houses, but being pre-industrial, the glass was all bubbly and unclear, so I really couldn't make anything out. I probably should have noticed how low the houses were, but I was really tired. That is probably the same reason I didn't bring any sort of writing instrument.

Some general notes on the population. There seems to be some sort of monetary system in place. Through what I could see, there was absolutely no bartering, and occasionally there was a tell-tale glint of gold among the transactions taking place in the street between merchants. Does this mean that gold is as heavily valued here as gold was back home? If so, I’m shit out of luck. I got none on me, and I don't recall my dad stashing any away, like he did non-perishables, water, guns, and ammo. Yeah. My dad’s that sort of person. Though he did organize most of it after 9/11, and after that...it really hasn't moved.

As well, due to the average time spent by the inhabitants at different stands, I can make a rough guess that prices aren't set. Frequently, I could hear a set of voices rise over the usual cacophony that a mercantile area produces. Thusly, I can make a very rough estimate that haggling is still alive and well here. Which I guess fits, since pre-Industrial and everything.

But, I might have to rethink that pre-Industrial bit. I saw some manufactured goods, which didn't look like they came from any local blacksmith or the like. I didn't even see any sort of blacksmith. Or not one that I recognized.

That bit might be because there are no humans in this town. They are all TALKING. FUCKING. HORSES.

Yup. I swear, I’m not crazy! Hear me out! Please! They evidently had some sort of civilisation, as evidenced by houses and money and the like. They are smart, from what I can tell. But, what I’m wondering is, how the hell did they thatch those roofs? It’s really bugging me! I mean, hooves! How do you put dry vegetation on houses with hooves? HOW DO YOU MAKE ANYTHING WITH HOOVES? HOW DOES THAT WORK? WE HAVE THUMBS FOR A REASON! I MEAN, WE CAN MANIPULATE THINGS WITH THUMBS, BUT HOW CAN you can you do so with hooves? and money? how doe...

*Loud gasp*

Goddamn I really need to stop doing that. Breathing is important too. But thatch? Would they just eat it? I mean they are FUCKING HORSES! THEY EAT GRA- FUCKING STOP YELLING RYLEE GODDAMNIT.

Calm. I'm calm. Very calm. Very very calm. Irrational things don't make you mad. Not at all. Nope. Nope. Nope.

I'm good now. Really. Not crazy! See? All better! Back to topics!

The inhabitants are horses. Talking. Horses. *Loud Thud* Damnit Grese stop shuddering every time you say that. Get used to it. You’re here now. On initial analysis, there appears to be three separate types of horse. Due to lack of any concrete evidence, I can't pinpoint any obvious difference between the three, beside the blindingly obvious. So I will take the duty, as a humble researcher, to catalog the differences between the three, and any similarities.

First off, every single goddamn one of them is some pastel colour. No exceptions. I have seen every different colour of horse. Occasionally, even multicoloured ones. The majority of coats and manes seemed to be different colours, with no uniformity. I could not tell by early analysis whether there were any family similarities. I mean, I’m good, but I’m not that damn good. I can't go, “Okay, those two are married, and they had that little ball of fluff as a kid.” Would children be referred to as kids? Or what? fillies? Mini-horses? Ponies? I'm calling them kids. Screw the rules, I have no money.

Additionally, the majority of them have tattoos displayed prominently on their asses. No, they don't own donkeys. On their sides, there are tattoos. Except for some. I wonder why that is? Maybe its some sort of indoctrination thing? I don't goddamn know, and I’m making no guesses when I could be wildly wrong. Speaking of which, there seemed to be a decided lack of clothing. An occasional straw hat, sure, but not much else. It seems kinda weird from a human point of view, but then again, it would seem weird to see horses wearing clothes. Maybe they're not cultured enough for clothes? No assumptions, but it seems kinda weird. What stopping a random bystander from spotting anything that shouldn't really be seen in public? Apparently, nothing.

And now for the big differences. Firstly, a bit of a basis. There are three different types. Did I mention that already? I don't remember. Just including this just in case I didn't. And yeah, these are all just early generalizations, so everything said after this statement is liable to change. And anything before it as well, I suppose.

First comes the common horse. Nothing all too interesting. Standard fare. They are built like horses. Four legs, tail, the works. Did I mention that every single one of these horses, not just the common type, are shorter than the horses that are back on Earth? And their heads are weird. Like, their eyes are HUGE. Staring-into-your-soul-and-finding-all-your-deepest-secrets huge. How is their any space for a brain if so much of their heads is filled by two huge eyes? but back to the common type. Yeah. Pretty much nothing else startling.

The second type is where shit starts getting a bit freaky. I'm starting with these because they at least make a bit of sense from an evolutionary standpoint. I have come to call this type “Unicorns” for an obvious reasons. They are horses. With horns. Jutting out of the front of their heads. So no shit I'm going to call them unicorns.

The same applies for the next. Freaking. Winged. Horses. No shit Im going to call them pegasuses. Pegasi? Maybe? I mean, Pegasus was a name. Of a horse. This place, man. Its still like, what the fuck. Honestly, what the fuck.

Am I crazy? I mean, shit, I'm sitting here, talking about mythological creatures to my computer. I wouldn't be surprised if i was actually sitting in a nice comfortable padded cell somewhere. If I ever see another mythological creature, I will slap myself. Hard. In the face.

Another side note about their culture. They seem to have some form of military, as per my observations. What prompted my departure from Creepy-as-fuck-ville was the arrival of 4 horses in a carriage. Not a horse drawn car-wait fuck yes it was, but not like, on the ground. It flew. HOW THE HELL IS THAT POSSIBLE! THEIR WINGS ARE A QUARTER OF THE SIZE OF THEIR BODIES ILLOGICAL FUCKING TRIPE!

But it happened. It happened. Two flew in, carrying another two in a sky-carriage. Two unicorns and two winged horses. The first unicorn was  brown. Dirt freaking brown. I almost missed it, and I probably would have if it didn't step out of the sky-carriage.

The other unicorn was pink. Hot Pink. I hope, for its own sake, that its a girl. Otherwise, that dude got railed on when it was in school. Do they even have schools? Or genders? I think so, but assumptions really cannot be made at this point.

The pegasuseseses *hehe* were both exactly the same. Same height, same shade of white, same freaking everything. While the other two could be passed off as something else, there is no way in Hell that those two are anything other than military. Armor plating, helms, the whole nine yards. They looked so Greek it wasn't even funny. Give them a spear and a shield and they would look like perfect Horse Hoplites. Which is kinda gory, considering spears are mainly used against cavalry. Just...ow. Its like inventing something that perfectly disembowels a human. Or making the perfect nut-kicking robot. Ow. Owowowowow. That hurts to just think about.

Anyway, they landed in the town, and I could tell they meant business. They touched down, and were all but swarmed by their fellow equines. And yay big words! The swarm, however, quickly seemed to organize itself, as the pink unicorn’s horn lit up. The townshorses, holy crap does that sound just so WRONG, quickly got into a single file line, and each one of them lit up, one by one, in the same colour as the light emitting from the pink unicorns horn. I think it was purple. Or red. I really wasn't paying attention to colour at a time like that.

Let me tell you, I was scared shitless. Still am. What the hell was that anyway? Its some Twilight-Zone level shit right there. Two of the other horses, the other unicorn and one of the soldiers, went around and started to knock on doors with their hooves. But I really wasn't paying attention to them. I had more pressing concerns in the glowy doomlight.

Yeah, I ran. More accurately, I waited for them to all look away, then I crawled of my grassy knoll until I was more then out of sight. Then, and only then, did I stand up and freaking BOLT home.

And now, I just finished setting up a motion-sensor sound system. If something moves in this house, I’ll know. And I'll be recording everything that is said. Here’s hoping I can understand whatever they speak. Heh. Please let me know Horse. Please.

I can set up a motion sensor system. I did already have a defence system in my house, with motion sensing and everything. I just had to wire my mics to the system to record at the same time movement is detected. I also got rid of the annoying freaking beeping that happens every time you open a door. I think. I'm a novice, not a pro. I think its fixed now. At least it did on experimentation. I don't want anything entering the house to know it’s being monitored. Not yet at least.

So thats what mainly happened today. Lets hope shit does not skyrocket towards the fan. I mean, shit is heading airborne, and it will eventually hit some sort of fan-shaped object, but lets hope that happens in such a way that I can clean up said shit. And wow that was a tortured metaphor. I put that fucker on a rack and stretched it out like freaking Procrustes.

Goodnight me, and whoever else is crazy enough or unlucky enough to find this tape. I’m going to  go set up some stuff I don’t want on record. I might go to sleep sometime tonight. No promises about that. Good night!

[Connection Terminated]

[Recording Saved]

[Signing Out...]