The computer

by Benuit

Genesis

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It was yet another sunny, bright day in Ponyville. The morning sun beat down upon the residents of the picturesque village, the fillies going to school and strutting about, Rainbow Dash clearing the sky of pesky rainclouds clouds, Pinkie Pie toiling away in her sweet shop, Fluttershy bringing the animals out for a morning stroll, Twilight shelving books, Applejack bringing in the harvest, but something they just couldn’t place gave them the “O MY CELESTIA SUMTIN BAD GUNNA HAPPEN!!!!!!” cliché feeling. Ignoring the ominous feeling, the ponies continued their labour without giving a second thought.

The schoolhouse was abuzz with the combined talking of around twenty fillies, who chatted about. Diamond Tiara flaunting her brand new toys to Silver Spoon, the Cutie Mark Crusaders discussing a cutie mark in painting, until Cheerilee, the schoolteacher said: “Quiet down class, today we will be learning about humans, an ancient race that inhabited this world before ourselves. Their lack of knowledge about the magic of friendship was their downfall in the end.”

The students were silent and aghast. Even Scootaloo, who was normally loud and disruptive, for they had all heard the myths. The gigantic continent destroying weapons said to kill millions, it was said it rained bits of flesh and globs of blood for three days and three nights straight, splattering the overdeveloped chimps in blood and gore. Other legends spoke of metal tubes ejecting aerodynamic spheres that could kill a pony in one shot. War was said to be like entertainment for them, and there would never be a single day of peace when the humans lived. Barren wastelands, radioactive wolves, terror and destruction swept the land. The ancient horses of old spoke of these terrors, and some even said they were forced to carry the chimp's war machines into battle.

Sweetie Belle tentatively asked, “b-but I thought those were just legends?”

“They were, until last month, when we found this.” Cheerilee dramatically whipped a red silken cloth off of an unknown object that none of them had seen before. It was almost a perfect box made of metal, with a curious large and pane of glass attached to it by some kind of shiny tube. It was diluted and stained with dirt and dented in a place, but still enchanting in some strange way.“What is that??” asked the class in unison.

“We don’t actually know, you see-”

Cheerilee’s sentence was cut off by a loud WHOOSH! A cyan blue blur streaked towards the window, shattering it to bits, to the horror of the class. A shard of glass whipped towards Cheerilee, who was sliced by the razor hard fragment. Stumbling backwards, with blood leaking from the wound, she fell onto the metal box, hitting a circular button-shaped object with a strange symbol on it.

“OH NO I’M SO SORRY! I-i-was just practicing a trick!” said Rainbow Dash, who rushed to get a First Aid kit. But then, the window pane… started glowing. "Holy sh*t!" Cheerilee shouted. Realizing what she had done, she clamped her hooves over her mouth, but they paid her no heed, entranced by the glowing glassy pane. Grabbing an oval shaped pad connected to the box by some sort of wire, Sweetie Belle smashed her hoof over a button repeatedly, and glided the oval over the tabletop. By some lucky coincidence a strange white arrow glided over the window pane.

“whoa…”

The window pane, coloured blue; had some strange shapes on it, and each of these shapes had a name. A strange blue “W” was labeled “Microsoft Word”; something that looked like a ball said “Google Chrome”. At this moment Rainbow Dash returned to the room, throwing Cheerilee a band-aid. Just as she was ready to leave, out of the corner of the eye she saw the window pane.

“Hey! When I was a filly I never got to see that!” said Rainbow Dash, throwing Cheerilee an accusing look. “Well, you see, that happened right now! I-I don’t know what happened!” Said Cheerilee as she attached the Band-Aid to her cut. “Yeah, sure,” huffed Rainbow Dash indignantly.v