First Contact

Monday, September 13, 2021

Her coworkers were all out at lunch. The cameras were all turned off. Her sister and the unicorn had gone to another room. This was her chance. The only things standing between Zai and a new world were her own fears.

Would she be okay on the other side? Well, the unicorn seemed to be fine on Earth without any visible exosuit, so the atmospheres and surface gravity must be compatible. Would she walk in on a group of alien scientists? Hopefully not, but possible. How bad could it be? Would she be able to get back again? Well, the portal had allowed travel to Earth once already and stayed open on both ends, so there was no reason for it to change now. Would anyone notice she was gone? Not if she got back fast enough. This could be a scouting mission to prepare for longer journeys later.

Zai slowly walked forward to the edge of the blackness. She looked around at the room behind her one more time. It was still empty. She took a deep breath and cracked her knuckles in preparation. She looked back one more time, just to be absolutely sure. Then, with an almost manic grin on her face, she held her head high and leaped through the portal into whatever lay beyond.

Zai landed with a thud on the other side of the portal and looked around at her new surroundings. Everything was a deep black, studded with points and shapes of light. I'm in space! she thought. That's the Earth below me! She paused, for something didn't seem quite right. If I'm in space, then what am I standing on? And what am I breathing? She clapped her hands once. And how is there sound? Slowly she came to the realization that she was not, in fact, in space.

So where am I? she wondered. This doesn't look like an alien mothership to me. There's no ship at all! This can't be right. But if she wasn't in any sort of spaceship, she had to be in space... She became very worried. There was no way to reconcile what Zai knew about the universe with what she was seeing. Everything she had ever learned said she could not possibly be alive out there. And yet she was.

Zai knew she shouldn't be able to stand, or breathe, or hear. And the longer she stayed there, the more it seemed like she was slowly sinking and the air was getting thinner. She looked around but saw no way to get back to Earth, except maybe to fall onto it from however far up she was. And that would certainly kill her, if she didn't suffocate first. This air is definitely getting thinner. And I'm falling faster, she thought. As soon as the words formed in her mind, they became a reality; Zai gasped for breath as if she were at the top of a tall mountain.

There's no air! There's no floor! I'm in space! Zai thought triumphantly. A moment later, her joy turned to panic. Being in space was not a good thing. Her lungs pulled in vain against the vacuum all around. I'm going to die out here, she thought. And no one will ever know what happened to me. Consciousness fading, she desperately screamed out into the emptiness. If there are any gods out there, hear me! I know I haven't exactly been pious up to now, but I need you! I don't want to die in space! I want to go back to Earth!

Zai opened her eyes and saw a blank white surface maybe ten feet in front of her, featureless except for a row of rectangular lights across the center. Still somewhat lightheaded from her recent experience, it took her a few seconds to realize what it was. That's a ceiling, she thought. So the flat thing pushing against my back must be a floor. She grabbed the leg of a nearby table and pulled herself to her feet, only to be overcome with dizziness and nearly fall over again.

She was in the empty SMAC control room, exactly where she had left from just minutes earlier. It had been just a few minutes, hadn't it? She checked her watch. To her surprise, it showed that only seconds had passed since Zai had entered the portal, as if time simply stopped on the other side. Or maybe it was just her watch that stopped on the other side. It certainly was a strange place over there, first livable and then not. Maybe it cycled between habitability and vacuum, or there were pockets of air constantly moving around, or the whole place didn't exist and she was hallucinating... And how exactly did she get back to Earth anyway?

Nothing Zai thought of to explain it made any sense. The other side of the portal seemed to defy all the laws of physics she had invested so much time and effort in learning. And perhaps the strangest thing of all was the complete lack of unicorns. Could she have gone to the wrong place? Or maybe... what if it wasn't some sort of instant connection between distant places, but instead had some internal length? That was how wormholes worked, wasn't it? And wormholes were permitted by the equations Zai knew.

That must be it. No alternate universes or extra dimensions or anything like that. Just a wormhole, which had to be traversable because someone had already crossed it. So the interior had to be survivable, somehow. She had to try again. But it had nearly killed her the first time... She would try again anyway. Just like the proverbial cat, her curiosity drew her onward regardless of the danger. But unlike that cat, Zai planned on living to tell the tale.

This second attempt would take some preparation –getting ready not physically but mentally. She had to temporarily suspend all of her beliefs about how the universe worked and simply accept how things were without being biased by previous expectations. She couldn't breathe in space –but what if she could? There was nothing to stand on up there –but what if there was? She couldn't move around without something to push against –but what if she could? She couldn't reach the other end of the portal –but she was going to!

She walked up to the edge of the blackness again. Everything will be okay, she told herself. There is absolutely nothing to worry about. I can do this. Then, without giving herself the chance to change her mind, she quickly stepped through to the other side once again. The blackness enveloped her as she stood on who knows what down below. Just don't think about it... So far she was doing just fine; everything worked the same as on Earth.

She took a few tentative steps on the impossible floor. It seemed to stay just as solid as ever. The only problem was that she didn't really know where the other end of this wormhole was. It certainly didn't look like a tunnel leading to a ship or a planet. It looked like outer space, and– No. No thinking about space. She was most definitely not in space. I wish I knew where the other end of this portal was, where that unicorn came from, she thought. And then, inexplicably, she just knew. One of these spots of light all around her was the other end, and she even knew which one.

I have no idea why I'm so sure of this, but that little circle way up there is my destination, she thought. But how to get there from here? This place was strange enough already; Zai hoped there wasn't going to be antigravity or anything like that too. If this place, whatever it is, has told me where to go, then I ought to know how to get there too. Zai listened for any stray thoughts popping into her head, but nothing came to her. That was unfortunate. She wished she could just be there already and not have to figure all this out first.

Zai blinked and tried to make sense of her new surroundings. The constellations of points and shapes all around her had suddenly shifted, and now in front of her was a large glowing circle of blue and green and white. It almost looked like Earth, except the continents were all wrong. How did I get here? I was just thinking about how I wanted to get here and suddenly, here I am. Zai was quite puzzled. It's like this place is responding to thoughts and wishes... but that's got to be nonsense. Consciousness isn't special to the universe. There she stopped herself. This was a difficult belief to give up, but she had to try. What if consciousness is special? Or... what if I'm not in the universe anymore?

But standing in the middle of all this nothingness was still a little bit disturbing, so Zai figured she had better go ahead and enter the other world. After all, she could come back at any time to study this place more. One last experiment and she would be satisfied for now. Here goes... she thought. I want to land on that planet in front of me, in the place that the unicorn who went to Earth left from, and I want the portal to remain open after I've crossed. Apparently the nothingness understood, for she immediately found herself once again sprawled out on a floor, staring up at the ceiling in front of her.

Should have asked for a gentle landing too, she thought as she struggled to her feet. The room around her looked like something one could find on Earth. It was a fairly normal office or lab; the only unusual thing about it was that every surface was made of wood. She took a look at the papers laying on a nearby desk and was surprised to see that she actually recognized some of the work. Is this graph theory? she thought. I hated that stuff in school. All the endless graph parameters, and finding each one takes two separate proofs. Matchings, independent sets, covering sets, cliques, colorings... so many colorings. She cringed at the thought. Vertex coloring, edge coloring, list coloring, fractional coloring, forbidden subgraph edge coloring...

At least the place was deserted, so she didn't have to deal with any unicorns wondering what she was and why she was there. Still, she couldn't shake the feeling that somehow she was being watched. Every time the table creaked or an air current rustled some papers, she jumped and looked around. Zai might have just been paranoid, but then again she was trespassing somewhere she really didn't belong. And the longer she thought about it, the less this place looked like an official research lab; more than anything it looked like a private residence. Not because of any clutter or unprofessionalism –the place was meticulously organized –but just from the small size of it, and how all the writing was in the same ink. But this was where that purple unicorn on Earth had come from, so the homeowner was most definitely not going to be around.

۞ ۞ ۞

It was a beautiful sunny day in Canterlot. Princess Celestia walked down an ornate palace hallway and gazed out a window wistfully, wishing she could be out there. Being co-regent of a large and prosperous land was certainly a good position to have, but it afforded her very little free time. No matter how many diplomats she met with or disputes between the noble Houses she mediated, there always seemed to be something else. Usually the “something else” involved paperwork to sign.

She had just finished with today's Noon Court, a maddening hour and a half of listening to various nobleponies complain about one thing or another and maintaining an appearance of calm. Everypony was welcome to come and voice their concerns, but most ponies who actually worked for a living had neither the time nor inclination to come stand in a long line all morning. Celestia liked the ones who did show up; they were the interesting ones. They brought the legitimate problems, and Celestia was always happy to make accommodations as needed. But for the most part, the day-to-day petty politics of the nobles dominated Court proceedings. The Princess would never admit it, but sometimes she almost wished for some great catastrophe to befall Equestria, just to break up the monotony.

That was one of many reasons she liked Twilight Sparkle and had taken her on as a student. Trouble seemed to follow Twilight wherever she went, even from a very young age. Celestia remembered the day Twilight had first come to her attention, back when she was still just a blank-flanked little filly applying to the Princess's magic school. She had blown the top off the entrance examination –and the building where she had taken it.

Recently Twilight had told her she was interested in creating a portal spell. She had tried to make it sound relevant to her assigned task, studying the magic of friendship, by saying friendship connected ponies and portals connected places and that was somehow the same. The justification was nonsense and it was clear Twilight knew that. But she was glad to see Twilight extending her knowledge of magic, especially by inventing a new spell. If this worked, it would be good practice for the test Celestia had planned for her...

As if on cue, the telltale trail of smoke signifying a letter swirled up and a scroll poofed into existence in front of her. Maybe she's really done it, Celestia thought. Let's see what my star student has to say. She always enjoyed reading Twilight's letters, for they reminded her of life outside the palace, and of friendship, which the Princess had never really had. Not the way other ponies did anyway –being an alicorn, nopony was ever quite able to treat her as an equal.

She had reached the doors to her personal chambers. She opened them with a quick wave of her horn and entered the opulent rooms beyond. The floor was covered in a thick carpet, in sharp contrast to the smooth marble just outside. An enormous window took up most of the far wall, looking out over the castle gardens. Celestia always set the direction of the sun's travel across the sky to maximize the time it spent shining through her windows. She sat down on the overly large bed and unrolled the letter.

“Princess Celestia! This is Spike writing. Something terrible has happened! Twilight is missing, I don't know where she is. And there's this thing in the basement. I've never seen it before, never seen anything like it. And there's a hole in the wall! Not like a regular hole, it's a... I don't know. It's just black. Is that a portal?

“Okay so, panicking over now. I don't think the thing has seen me. Well, panicking not over, but less. So a little while ago I went to Twilight in the lab downstairs and asked if she wanted to get lunch. She didn't so I went to Sugarcube Corner and made sapphire muffins with Pinkie. After a while I figured Twilight might have gotten so involved in her work that she forgot to eat anything again, so I went back to find her and she was gone.

“Do you know what this thing is? It walks on two legs like me but it's not a dragon. It has claws instead of hooves, but I don't think they're sharp. I don't see scales either, but it's wearing clothes so it's hard to tell. So far it's just been walking around looking at all of Twilight's magic notes, but it will come up here eventually, I just know it. Is this thing dangerous? What should I do?”

The note ended there. Princess Celestia wasn't sure whether to be proud that her student had created new magic or alarmed at what said magic had caused. For she did indeed know what that strange creature was, and what its kind were capable of. It was a good thing there was only one of them. But if Twilight was on the other side, alone in that world... Celestia had faith in her student. Twilight would be okay. She had to believe that.

Celestia pulled gently on a small silken cord hanging next to her bed. Elsewhere in the palace, a bell rang, and within seconds a palace servant was dispatched to the Sun Princess's quarters. Celestia opened the door to find a scared-looking young pony already outside waiting for orders. Maybe it was the first time she had been sent to the Princess directly.

“Hello, little one,” Celestia said. “What's your name?”

“W-winter Heart, ma'am. I mean, Princess. W-what are your orders?” The poor filly looked terrified. Celestia smiled warmly in an attempt to put her at ease.

“Well, Winter Heart, I would like you to carry a message to my seneschal, Purple Quill. Tell her that I would like all my appointments for the rest of the day canceled. She'll probably throw a fit –she always does when I reschedule things –but something has come up.”

The young pony nodded and started to turn away to deliver the message, but Celestia called her back again.

“One more thing. If Purple Quill absolutely demands to know where I am and why I'm moving all the appointments around, tell her I'm in Ponyville. This is not an official visit, so you don't even need to tell her unless she asks. That's all for now.”

The messenger hurried off and Celestia shut the door to her suite once again. She needed to get to Ponyville quickly, so the usual royal carriage was out of the question. Flying under her own power was an option, but even that would be slower than Celestia would have liked. And it would certainly attract a lot of attention. The best choice seemed to be teleportation, but to where? Popping out of nowhere in the middle of the town square might be a bit obtrusive; she needed a more secluded location to appear in. Fluttershy's cottage would be a perfect location, except that the sound might scare all the animals there. Sweet Apple Acres would be a better choice, far away from everypony but the Apple family, who needed to be involved anyway.

Princess Celestia sent a surge of power through her horn. The bright glow briefly illuminated the room before it vanished, taking the alicorn with it. Air rushed into the empty space she had left behind, producing a loud clapping noise and sucking a stack of papers off her desk. She could clean up the mess later, or somepony else could do it. That stack had already been signed anyway.

Celestia appeared with a bang of displaced air outside the Apples' front door. She raised a hoof to knock, but the door opened before she could. Applejack had heard the sound of teleportation and come out to investigate.

“Howdy, Princess! Ah never reckoned Ah'd see you here. What can Ah do for ya?”

“Applejack! Equestria has a problem. Twilight has gone missing, and there may be a new invasion on the way. I need you to gather your friends and meet outside the library. Don't go in until everypony is there.”

“Will, do Princess!” Applejack dashed off to find her friends, and Celestia turned and walked toward the library as fast as she could while maintaining proper royal stateliness. As she walked through the town, every pony who saw her stopped and bowed down as she passed. And as soon as she was far enough away, they all got up and started telling all their friends how they had just seen the Princess. News traveled fast in Ponyville, so before long a rather flustered Mayor Mare appeared before her and started apologizing profusely for the lack of preparations for a royal visit.

Finally she reached the Golden Oak Library, where Applejack, Rainbow Dash, Rarity, and Pinkie Pie were waiting. Fluttershy was nowhere to be seen. Pinkie Pie was bouncing up and down with excitement.

“What's in there? Threats to Equestria are fun! Especially when they come with chocolate rain! Will there be chocolate rain?”

“Last Ah checked, Discord was still a block of stone,” Applejack replied. “No more chocolate rain for another thousand years.”

“What is going on, Princess?” Rarity too was curious. “I was peacefully working on my latest design, when somepony burst in and tracked mud all over my nice floor.” She glared at Applejack. “And all she said was 'Twilight's gone; meet at the library'. What kind of explanation is that?”

Celestia sighed. “Well, the truth is, I'm not entirely sure. Spike sent me a letter saying that Twilight had apparently succeeded in creating a portal. She told you all about that project, didn't she?” The four ponies nodded. “Well, it seems that portal didn't go where Twilight intended it to.”

Just then, Fluttershy ran up to the others. “So sorry I'm late. I had this sick bunny I had to take care of. He's doing better now. I hope I didn't cause too much trouble...”

“It's no problem. I was just explaining the situation to everypony.” Celestia continued her explanation. “As I was saying, Twilight seems to have opened a gate into another world. According to Spike's letter, Twilight has gone through and something else has come into Equestria. I want you to capture that something and keep it from reporting back to wherever it came from. Perhaps we can stop an invasion before it even begins.”

Just then, the library's front door opened and Spike came running out. “You're all here! Quick! I think it heard me and now it's coming upstairs!” He left the door wide open as he ran to the safety of the group of ponies.

Rainbow Dash took up a position right in front of the door, ready to charge in. Applejack got out her lasso from wherever she kept it, and Pinkie somehow produced a second lasso. Fluttershy took a step back and looked around nervously. A hush fell over the group as they waited for any sign of movement inside. Finally they heard heavy hoofsteps and a strange being came into view. It walked on two legs and had a mane but no tail, and had small ears and a flat face. Rainbow Dash zoomed through the doorway and tackled it to the ground. Moments later, it was securely tied up and surrounded by ponies.

“Well, that was easy,” Rainbow said. “What's next?”

“Þevor ip kørørgaþom?! Suwnorqøroytid ilv!” The newcomer clearly was not happy. It continued shouting unintelligible phrases in its own language. But then it paused and said, “Deksiwekoytid... Twilight Sparkle?”

All eyes turned to the strange being. Princess Celestia stepped forward and tried asking it some questions, but it seemed to understand nothing beyond Twilight's name. She turned back to the five friends and said, “I leave this being in your care. If this is what I think it is, you must not allow it to return through the portal. Individually they are no stronger than an average pony, but in groups they become fearsome. They are a warlike race, intent on conquering everything they come across. We can only hope Twilight returns to us soon. Good luck, my little ponies.”

With that, Celestia's horn flared once again and she vanished in a burst of white light. The strange being's face took on a look of amazement as it sputtered a few words more. “Þ-þevor?! Þeris li'uwmrekiy...?” Finally it just gave up trying to understand and surrendered itself to the ponies.