Twilight Sparkle took a deep breath. Just a few steps. That's all she had to take. Then try and not make a species with billions of beings with really big guns angry at here. Not that difficult, right?
She lifted a hoof to wipe away the sweat on her brow. Okay, just pretend you're walking through Ponyville. A really short walk while passing by a lot of huge tower-like things that look pretty intimidating. Just like Ponyville. Deep breath.
For crying out loud, you are a princess of Equestria! You can do this! She took a hesitant step forward. Then another. And another.
How does Rarity like dramatic build up like this?!
She gazed up at the portal in front of her. She still thought that Celestia should have been the one to do this, but apparently, she was actually somehow more qualified when it came to creatures that valued intelligence as much as these ones did. Celestia has thousands of years of experience! How does somepony with that up their sleeve not have more intelligence than her?!
...nobles...
She could see the details of the portal now. It shimmered from the light reflecting it and was surrounded by a stone frame. It was also purple. That was completely optional to the ponies who made the thing just minutes before, apparently they wanted it to suit her.
One more step and she'd have to touch it. She was shaking with the implications.
Okay. Now just move your hoof forward. Good, let's go further than a millimeter this time.
It felt cold. The color made her feel like it would be warm, or maybe not any difference at all, but she had already been told that this world couldn't control the weather and she was going onto it when it was fall for them.
She had the upper half of her forearm in now. She knew she couldn't keep moving her head back while the rest of her body moved forward, but she tried anyway. She could feel the ground where her hoof had fallen at. It felt like stone, but with pebbles stuck on the surface of it.
Now her nose was touching it. Too late to stop now. She hopped in the rest of the way.
The camera had zoomed in on the portal.
"As you can see, it appears to be a portal. Why i-
"Oh my God, it looks like something is coming out of it! John, we may just have extraterrestrial life coming to Earth! It looks as if it's purple. And... is that a hoof? My God it is! I just don't know what to think!"
This was one of the many reporters in the middle of times square trying to show the world what was happening in Time's Square. The crowds behind the police tape only got louder as they saw more and more of what came out of the portal. It was slowly coming out of it, and then suddenly it just jumped through. There was dead silence once it came all the way through. It was a purple pony with wings and a horn. It only came up to a man's waist, not including the horn. If people had known about magic at the time, they would have noticed that light shimmering all around her that kept her from diseases, toxic air, and translated and magnified her voice along with several other things. It had a surprisingly human face, if you exclude the gigantic eyes, muzzle, ears, and purple fur.
With a determined look, it actually spoke!
"Hello, my name is Twilight Sparkle. My race has managed to find a sentient species that we would benefit contact with, you! Congratulations!"
Dead silence.
"... Yes, well, as long as you don't shoot us then you can go through that portal-" she raises a hoof towards the portal behind her "-and make contact with the first intelligent lifeforms, other than yourselves, your kind has ever seen. At this point, if anything goes further with any form of contact between us, it'll be by your choice, because only beings with the knowledge of what I just said and good intent can go through that portal. So, uh, good luck with the decision making process! You have exactly one of your weeks and any being that can hear what is coming out of my mouth right now can understand the meaning behind it."
Dead silence again.
It gave an awkward smile and slowly backed back into the portal.
"Well, that went well!"
At that point in time, people all over the world just said their language's equivalent of "HOLY FREAKING SHIZNIT, WHAT JUST HAPPENED?!"
"Ahem!"
Everyone went silent at that, letting the man in front of them speak.
Mumbling something to himself about how all audiences were the same despite dimensions, Professor Parks began his little introduction speech.
"Well, I doubt any of you have been able to actually find out what you were called here for other than it being about the recent, ah, greetings, given by Ponykind to Humans so here I am. Every university, institute, organization, etcetera based on science or any academic subject really in either of our worlds have been crying themselves to sleep every night knowing there's a new world filled with a new perspective on their subject out there, not seen by them."
The room filled with confirmations of that statement before being given a scolding eye from the good professor that did absolutely nothing to help his situation. "Go figure, my students and colleagues."
Deciding to just wait for them to quiet down, Dr. Parks took a gulp of his water. After a few seconds he continued.
"Yes, you of all people should know about that. So given the situation, somehow actually being noticed among the politics and diplomacy-," another wave of confirmations but this time with several 'boo's thrown in, "-our governments decided to hold a little get together to trade information. Most of the previously stated facilities 'based on science or any academic subject' were notified and probably threatened to fire you if you didn't attend." A final, much less enthusiastic wave of confirmations.
"And so we are going to let all of you have about half an hour to decide on what to include in a very short five minute summary of what we have followed by a 10 minute long Q and A from each planet. Try and emphasize how far up the scale we would be on in comparison to any of our theoretical *cough* fiction! *cough* ideas of what a completely alien race would have and just how we think our world works. Three ... two .... one .... be you're high I.Q. selves and think of something!"
On three everyone was on the tips of their seats frantically trying to find other people from their planet. On two everyone was holding their hats, sweat forming on their foreheads. On one, many of them jumped up thinking it was a count to one and the whole room just flew into chaos.
Parks, meanwhile, was trying to find his way out of the oncoming blood bath taking his index cards with him and screaming "RUN FOR YOUR LIVES!!!" To any guards positioned in the room. Many people predicted something like this would take place, hence the guards. They never expected what happened to happen however, otherwise they would have had SWAT and half the nation's reserves there. Most of the guards didn't know what Parks what talking about, thinking him mad. They would regret it. Parks was one of the very few people who was able to get out before the engineers started to try and build weapons to make the rest of their planet focus on Engineering, Technology, and Seige engineering/ Tanks. Of course, a room filled with a ton of plastic chairs with metal legs, a wooden podium with a mic, walls, a carpet floor, and a ceiling wouldn't be what you would think a room where lethal weapons would be made. Of course, you would be wrong. You. Would. Be. Wrong.
Parks, was in there for long enough to see a bunch of nerds punching each other in the face on one side, and unicorns blasting each other in the face on the other. He saw pegusi flying in the air trying to get at the few griffons who decided to attend, griffons having the advantage of claws and beaks and pegasi had numbers. He saw geeks strangling other geeks with their fannypacks. He saw two minotaurs, the only ones who had attended throwing chairs at each other. He saw one particular dragon and buffalo headbutting. Of course, he knew who would win the fight in the end. The earth ponies and the dorks. They were the ones smart enough to build the weapons and the ones not so caught up in the fight for the thought not to occur to them.
At that point the guards had found out why Parks had said what he did. Not too long until they would be begging him to open the doors that he was about to blockade. They would be begging him, and he would just ignore them adding more desks to the pile in front of them. None of them knew about the hidden trap door on the stage at the podium that he would come through in thirty minutes after most of the fighting had ended. That was the whole point of it taking a whole half hour. For the fight to end, and for there to be an actual summary on each side to show the others.
He started running for the nearest desk and chair to drag over to the door.
So many screams. And he did nothing. He had even called the police station to warn them to not come. They somehow had listened. He knew there would be several calls to them about the screams. They were the worst part. Made his toes curl and, if he wasn't already a battle veteran, being the headmaster of a University he was, he would have ran for the hills a long time ago. As it was, he lasted twenty minutes before the room was dead silent, as far as he could tell. Of course, he had ear plugs in from trying to block out the screams. They didn't work.
Popping his head out of the square whole connecting to the trapped door and tunnel, he saw the carnage. The unicorns had burn marks all over their bodies, nerds having bloody noses. The pegusi had claw marks all over them and the griffons were swollen in places they probably didn't know they had. The geeks had marks around their necks and ink and lead covering them from when the fanny packs had broke and they went at each other with writing utensils. The minataurs, buffalo, and dragon were the only ones in the room passed out, amazingly. All the fore mentioned conscious creatures had their heads hung in shame. The earth ponies and dorks were the ones who had the victorious grins on their faces. The dorks had homemade crossbows over their soldiers and the earth ponies were gripping metal spears. The room was the bath tub of the blood bath. Without soap. I'll leave you to imagine what that looked like.
Parks jumped out of his hide-a-hole and walked over to the splintered podium. Foreseeing this event, he brought his own battery charged mic. "Congratulations victors!"
Whoops and hollers were heard down the street.
"Security, I am so sorry." He looked over to the curled up guards, the ones who weren't shedding silent tears of horror were all whimpering and mumbling about the fires of hell. The others in the room looked over to them, some of their faces softened, most had a look that just screamed "You were weak!"
"So, I'll let Earth go first, then... uh,"
"Equus," a pony in the front rows answered for him.
"then Equus next."
"Hello students."
"Hello, Professor Rogers."
Oh, the enthusiasm of youth.
"I have been told that you Equus-dwellers know next to nothing about atoms, energy and the basic laws of physics so I have come here to show you the wonderful science of Chemistry! I'm sure you'll find it enjoyable and interesting."
"Yes Professor Rogers."
A student in the front row raised her hand. Hoof. It takes a while to get use to Equus's terminology. She was one he actually recognized; the purple pony princess on the television and disturbing youtube videos.
"Yes purple pony princess."
"It's Twilight Sparkle."
"Fine. Yes purple pony princess of sparkles."
"Not 'of sparkles', just Twilight Sparkle."
"Yes purple pony princess of sparkly twilights."
"No, just-, never mind."
"Yes purple pony princess of sparkles and twilight, I'm aware you ponies are into your strange titles, but what was your question?"
"Oh! Um... I've forgotten now."
*Sigh of frustration* "Alright, anyway the first thing you need to know about chemistry is- what is it pony princess Sparkle of purple twilights?"
"I've remembered what my question was."
"..."
"..."
"..."
"..."
"And?"
"Well, it's just that Princess Celestia is the princess of ponies. Well, I guess all pony princesses are of ponies but, you know what? Never mind, just forget I raised my hoof."
"Thank you purple princess of sparkly twilight ponies for that oh so worth the time question." The relief. "Now, Chemistry- WHAT DO YOU WANT YOU INSOLENT STUDENT?!?" referring to another student.
"What is Chemistry the study of?"
"That's what I was gonna say!"
"Shut up Princess of ponies, purple, sparkles, and twilight!"
"What did I do?"
*Sigh of greater frustration than before* "I'm gonna quit teaching."
"Chemistry is the study of chemistry now sit you're cute little pony butt down now."
The class erupted into murmurs of "Why do I always get the crazy ones?" and "What's his problem?" and "I hate Chemistry!"
"Okay, the first thing you need to know about chemistry is-"
"Okay class, before I ask if there are any questions, I need you to know a few things:
One, everything you know is wrong.
Two, in this room, my word is law. In this building, my word is an execution sentence except in this room. I do not speak much outside of this room.
Three, your pony princesses do not, in fact, raise the sun and the moon.
Four, you will think I hate you before long. This is because I despise you all. As ponies, you might think this not to be true. Give it time.
Five, only 1/4 of you pass my class. The only people/whatever the heck you are called that pass are the people who are better than the bottom three fourths.
Six, screw you all.
And that is the beginning of your first astrology class! I've enjoyed it far more than I thought I would so far. Now any questions?"
One brave griffon in the room raised a quivering talon.
"What is it?"
"Um-"
"Let me stop you there, never say um in my class. Okay, go on."
"... Wh-"
"Stop stop stop. all of you, never ever ask me a question in this class, if you do you will be expelled from this university. Good thing you didn't finish that, eh?"
"Yes sir."
"I like this dude! You are now going to be the first one I ask to tell the answer to my questions! Congratulations, this is a great honor for you!"
The look of horror on his face was priceless to the teacher.
"Uh, thanks."
"Never say 'Uh' either. And 'thanks sir'.
"Thanks sir."
"I really like this guy!"
He never even said his name.
Luna and Celestia were in that class. They were scared stiff too.
"I'm Faith Freeze! You can call me Faith, Ms. Freeze, or miss *fff*. Welcome to biology kids! This is where you learn everything about how living things work! Isn't that wonderful?! Learning all about little critters and plants?"
The students were looking pretty happy and hopeful at this point.
"I've been told that this class is everyone's favorite because of the dissections we get to do and all the videos of lions hunting zebras!"
There were a few zebra in that class. Most of them ran furiously to a trash can like they were the ones with a lion after them, looking a bit green.
"Yes yes, I know, amazing isn't it!"
Cadence was in that one.
"Welcome to Rrobotics lads and lassies! I am prrofessorr Barrclay. Now- Eh! Put tha' down!"
A minotaur in the class had picked up a robotic arm. He carefully put it back down with a confused look on his face. Which is pretty funny on a minotaur.
"Anyway, Rrobotics is a class dedicated to learrin' and usin', tha's rrigh', rrobots!"
"What's a robot"
"Wha'? Did I hea' ye rright lassie? Ye say ye don' know wha' a rrobot is? Well, tha's wha' Ah'm 'ere for! A rrobot is one a 'ose things o'er there."
He pointed toward a robotic arm which he then activated, making it wave at the student.
"AH!"
"Ah, calm down. It won' hurrt ya. It won' do not'in withou' meh tellin' it to. Is jus' some harrdware with a bi' o' software with a contrrol, tha's all."
For some reason, many of the minotaurs in the room perked up while all the other species just seemed ready to pass out.
"'Courrse, y'all 'll be learrnin' more basic stuff beforre we get to this level, first thing you'll be doin' with yer hands er whate'er 'll be some solderrin'!"
Some of the other species perked up and the minotaurs seemed a bit more let down.
"What's soldering?"
"Ah, tha's just some met'lwerrk."
The majority of the minotaurs seemed ready to rocket into the air.
"Hello," the short and thin looking teacher said. He was about 5 feet high and looked to have no muscle mass what so ever.
There was a series of greeting from the class. They were all outside in front of some targets with a table with a ton of pistols on it.
"Yes, good. I'll be your self-defense and arms teacher, most of my students call me the peace maker."
The whole class seemed pretty confused, several held their frontal appendages up in the air.
"Yes, white ripped pegasus, what's your name?"
"Bulk Biceps, SIR."
"What is your question?"
"Why are you called the peace maker, SIR?"
For the first time, the teacher looked something other than puny, proudly holding a face that was rather smug.
"I'll get to that in a second."
The majority of the frontal appendages went back to the ground.
"How about you, white unicorn with the blue hair."
"Shining Armor. How did you're government actually approve for a class on your world's weapons and defense training?"
"If I had to guess, a typo somewhere."
"Oh."
He answered the rest of the questions.
"Okay, since you all seem to be dieing to know, people call me the peace maker for multiple reasons and I'll show you one every day, and for today this is it. Someone time me."
He picked up a pistol from the rack and shot every target straight in the head within 12 seconds, hitting a bulls eye every time. There were 20 human-silhouette targets and the gun had 10 bullets a round.
Everyone in the yard besides the teacher and Shining Armor was cowering behind something somewhere, the majority behind the rack, not knowing what this strange creature with his strange weapon had just done. Bulk Biceps was hiding behind Shining Armor. It looked exactly like what it sounds like.