It's not like you're real.
"Hello. My name is Mr. Jonathan Pertree, with the U.S. Department of Fictional Realities. I am here to facilitate communications between, ah—” He paused and took another look at his dossier. “—'Equestria' and the United States of America." He looked at the regal mare seated on her throne and smiled professionally. “It's a pleasure to make your acquaintance, Princess Celestia.”
She stared at him. His appearance suggested nothing more than the norm, though Celestia had no frame of reference. He looked to be in his late thirties, muscle starting to run into fat, but still sharply dressed in a three-piece work suit. In one hand he held a folder, stuffed with papers.
His face remained diplomatically calm, seemingly unperturbed by her silence. This silent turmoil was a common reaction by fictionals whenever the government came knocking. He was used to it. The government had acted with uncharacteristic swiftness when it was discovered that works of fiction spawned entire new universes which man could explore and subsequently exploit to his heart's content. Mere months after the first trip to a known property ended in disaster, the government established a legal department to oversee and regulate travel and trade to these realities.
Despite it happening a long, long time ago, a galaxy far, far away was still under a travel advisory.
Celestia cleared her throat, organizing her thoughts. This creature—this man—had walked out of thin air into the great hall of her castle, past layers of impenetrable magical defenses, and requested an audience. The Royal Guard hadn't been able to touch him. Magics halted on impact and charging stallions bounced on impact as if he were made of stone. Even Celestia’s spells had stopped on contact, having no more effect than the sunlight streaming through the windows.
“Oh yes,” he had said by way of explanation, “it's because I'm more real than you are.” This had done little to quell her anxiety.
“Mr. Pertree,” she began, voice betraying none of her emotion, “I apologize, but you must understand that this is—” She motioned with one hoof, trying to conjure a word that encapsulated the whole of her disbelief. “—unbelievable,” she finished lamely.
He nodded, sympathetic smile on his face. “I fully understand, Princess.” His voice oozed like honey, practiced over years of dealing with people and things that didn’t quite exist. “Finding out that your entire existence is a fabrication is something of a shock.” He paused and shuffled the papers in his folder. “I must say that you're taking this far better than most fictionals.”
“Have you seen this often?” she inquired.
He nodded again. “The Department has consolidated over nine-hundred fictional realities. I have personally overseen the addition of two dozen worlds, including several high-profile realities like ‘Magic: The Gathering’ and ‘Wakfu’.” He paused for a moment, then laughed, embarrassed. “I assure you that those are very popular properties. We do apologize for our delay in reaching you, but Equestria was not a particularly high priority reality, owing to a lack of worthwhile resources.”
Celestia felt her jaw tighten and her eye start twitching. Her world was “low priority”? As if it had nothing to offer to this—this United States? “Well, I'm sorry we have nothing of worth,” she replied, her tone icy. She paused as she thought it through. “But how can you use anything we have? Nothing in our world seems able to touch you.”
He raised a hand in supplication. “I apologize. I did not mean to disparage the worthiness of your reality,” he said smoothly, “but you must understand that there are many, many worlds out there and a relatively limited number of officials to oversee their consolidation. As to the question of the metaphysical properties of fictional materials in our real world, I must beg ignorance. Our greatest scientific minds normally speak of ‘morphogenic fields’ and ‘universal wavelengths’.” He shrugged a shoulder then plunged back into the meat of the discussion.
“We have to prioritize realities based on their stability and immediate usefulness. Again, apologies.” He cleared his throat. “Which brings me to the next point of business. As your first point of contact with the U.S. Department of Fictional Realities, I will be providing you with legal counsel concerning your upcoming custody case with Hasbro Incorporated.”
He had never seen a pony's eyes go so wide.
“Custody case?” She spluttered for a moment. “Wh-what do you mean custody case?”
He cleared his throat again as he glanced over his documentation. “Well, yes. Hasbro currently owns the copyright of all ‘My Little Pony’ merchandise and intellectual property, so they're in good legal standing for rights to exploitation of natural resources in addition to revenue from tourism and sale of lands and various other sundry.”
“Exploitation?” Celestia faintly repeated, staring into space.
“However, they've requested rights to market the ponies themselves as merchandise, which opens up an entire legal can of worms about the rights of fictionals vis-a-vis what is essentially slavery.” Celestia started at the mention of slavery, but he waved her down and gave her another comforting smile. “Don't worry, we have the law on our side. Smurfs vs Dupuis, The State of Johto vs Nintendo, Mobius vs Sega… Why, the list goes on and on.” He waved a hand dismissively. “The Supreme Court has given quite a lot of power to fictionals in the pursuit of their own rights, so I do not foresee any problems overturning their claim.
“Further,” he continued, glancing once more at his dossier, “were Equestria to seek protection under the auspices of the United States government, we could clear up this case rather quickly. We would, of course, have to establish appropriate tax rates and rights to natural resources, but the hand of the government is rather light on fictionals, especially compared to corporate exploitation.”
The princess narrowed her eyes. “And if we were to refuse the protection of your government?” He gave her an appraising look. She was surprisingly shrewd for a fictional from a children’s television show.
He smiled again. There was no warmth in that smile. “Well, I’m afraid that the Department of Fictional Realities has limited manpower and resources. We’d be far less able to come to an equitable agreement without some give from Your Majesty’s government.”
Celestia shook her head. “How?” she asked, shocked. “How could you countenance something like this? Slavery and theft from living, feeling creatures?”
Mr. Pertree looked at her, eyebrow raised in surprise. “I'm sorry,” he said, “but it's not like you're real.”
Author's Note
Had a thought about all these 'Humans in Equestria' stories. It's always in ones and twos, never something big. So what if the US government had to weigh in on the problem?
Somehow, I didn't see it going well.
Thanks as always to PegasusMesa for his tireless editing work.
