First Contact

Friday, September 24, 2021
Meanwhile...

Five ponies walked out into the cool Geneva morning, manes gently waving in the wind. Behind them, their human guide shut the door, and began leading the way off the CERN campus. They soon came to a street corner, where Chryasor had to quickly warn the ponies not to just walk out into the road. Humans' cars were much faster, heavier, and generally more dangerous than the pony-drawn carriages of Equestria.

After crossing the street and walking a little farther, the group arrived at a little glass enclosure with a bench and several posters depicting the city's metro system and schedules for the trams.

“What's all this stuff here? Why are we waiting on this bench?” Applejack inquired as to the nature of their stop. “Twilight told us y'all humans have got all sorts of crazy inventions. Is there somethin' here?”

“...I suppose you could call this a crazy invention. It's pretty normal to us. This is how we're going to get around today –it's a system of trains, just all within Geneva instead of between cities.”

“Ooh, fancy!” Rarity exclaimed. “I heard Canterlot is planning something like this. I get to use one before everypony else! Oh, all those high-class ponies will be so jealous! I'll be the pony they all will want to know.” Rarity looked unsteady on her hooves, almost falling over before she realized the ground was dirty and there was nothing soft around to land on.

The others laughed. Pinkie was looking around frantically, and finally turned to Rarity. “I'm sorry, Rarity,” she said. “I knew you wanted to faint there so I tried to get a pillow, but I couldn't do it.” Pinkie looked quite distraught. “The tingly barrier that's around us sometimes, it's not here. There's nowhere for me to pull things out of.”

“The what now? Ah don’t follow. What barrier?”

But Pinkie never got the chance to explain, because just then Chryasor called for their attention and started passing out little purple slips of paper to each of them. "These are your tickets," she said. "There will be a little box you put them in to validate them once you get on. It should be here in just another minute."

Sure enough, a tram soon pulled up and stopped in front of the glass booth. Pinkie smiled and waved at the few humans who got off; they all looked very confused and hurried off to wherever they were going, trying not to make eye contact. Chryasor entered first and demonstrated the ticket-validating process, placing her paper into the slot provided and immediately pulling it out again, with a small hole punched in one end. The five ponies followed suit, and each took a seat as the tram began to move.

They had gotten on at the end of the line, and for a while it remained empty inside, as the few humans who were commuting then got into different cars than the one they had taken. But after three or four stops, some new humans got on: a mother and her child, a young girl of maybe eight years. She took one look at the colorful ponies and exclaimed, “Pferdchen! Sieh, Mutti!” She grinned widely and pulled on her mother's arm. She looked up with practiced puppy-dog eyes and asked if she could get a pony of her own. “Kann ich ein Pferdchen haben? Bitte?” But her mother quickly vetoed the idea and told her to sit down.

Hearing all this from farther down the car, Chryasor gently nudged the orange pony sitting next to her and said, “The little girl down there likes ponies. Why don't you go say hello? Better make it quick though; our stop's coming up soon.”

Applejack trotted over and, with an elaborate flip of her head, tossed her hat into the air and caught it in her mouth. She did a quick curtsy before tossing the hat back to its usual spot and extending one foreleg to shake hooves. “Howdy, little one. Ah'm Applejack. What's your name?” The human girl smiled happily and started to extend a hand of her own, but her mother snatched her away and held her tightly, eyes wide in fear.

“Sie sind Freunde,” Chryasor said, loud enough for the other humans to hear. They are friends. The mother seemed to calm a little bit but still held her daughter's hand. She allowed the little girl to shake Applejack's hoof, but her daughter's idea to “ride the horsey” was instantly denied. Applejack looked back at Chry, asking what had just been said, but upon hearing the translation she too decided that was definitely not going to happen.

Meanwhile, Rarity was looking out the window, muttering to herself in what seemed to be rhyming verses. Chryasor strained to hear what she was saying, curious but not wanting to actually ask. “What a huge bustling community. Oh Geneva, what you do to me... no, that would sound better switched. What else rhymes... opportunity! There's always opportunity, to... oh, fuzzbuckets, I'll just save this song for the next big city I'm in.”

The tram pulled to a stop, now close to the center of town, and the other humans stood to get out. The young one didn't want to leave, but her mother dragged her along by the arm. She finally exited looking backwards and saying how she would tell all her friends at school about how she met the ponies. Applejack stood by the door and waved.

The next stop was where Chryasor and the ponies got off. “This is the most central downtown stop on this line,” Chryasor said. “I'll give you a quick tour of the area and then you all can decide what looks interesting. We don't all have to stick together either, as long as you can find your way back.” She led the way down the street, pointing out buildings and teaching the group a few important words they might need. The most important word, of course, was “bakery” –this was a European city, after all. And in a country with four official languages and many others spoken, that meant there were actually several words to learn. Not just confiserie, Bäckerei, and panetteria, but also pékség, fırıncılık, so many others.

But they had made it barely a block and a half before Chryasor felt a drip of water on her arm. And then another, right on her nose. She looked up at the sky and sighed. “This wasn't supposed to happen...” she muttered to herself. “Only twenty percent chance of rain, they said. It'll be fine, they said.” She led the ponies onward at a quicker pace and started looking around for a building to go in if it started raining hard.

At the end of the block the road widened out into a roundabout, with a statue in the center of a stern-looking man holding an open book and a cross. “Who's that?” Rarity asked.

“John Calvin,” Chryasor replied. “He was very influential around here five hundred years ago. He doesn't have many followers today, but...” She trailed off, realizing the unicorn was paying less attention to her words and more to the increasingly frequent droplets of water falling from the sky.

“I'm sorry, do go on. But can we please go inside?” Rarity's voice took on a whiny tone. “My hair is going to be absolutely ruined if this keeps up. I can't be seen out in public like that, certainly not in a new city! I don't want everypony's first impression of Rarity to be just some wet, straggly-maned unicorn.”

“Honestly, Rares,” Applejack said, “Ah don't think any of these here humans are gonna think that when they see you.”

“You don't? But still, I can't take the risk.”

“Nah, Ah reckon their first thought'll be more like 'Oh my Princess, she's a unicorn'.”

Rarity glared at Applejack. “Yes, and isn't that unicorn just the most beautiful and elegant creature you've ever seen? That's what I want them to be thinking. Not that you'd know anything about elegance, of course.”

Applejack started to say something back but Chryasor called for their attention first. “There's a place up ahead here that looks good,” she said. “Let's go in there and you can all have a pastry while we wait for this storm to blow over. I'm sure it won't be long.”

The group hurried forward and crowded into the entrance of the small bakery. There was one person at a table in the back enjoying a chocolate croissant, but other than that the place was empty. Most people took their orders to go rather than staying to eat. Behind the counter there were two workers, both fairly young, who stared slack-jawed at the new arrivals to their shop. After a moment of stunned silence, one finally managed to speak.

“Are those... are those the, uh, aliens?” he spluttered out in French. His eyes were still wide, staring at Chryasor as if afraid the ponies would vanish if he looked at them. “I recognize you –I saw you on TV that first day. It was all over the news for a week but lately there's been nothing.”

“Yes, these are ponies and I'm their translator,” Chryasor answered. “There haven't really been any new developments, just me learning how to talk to them. But that's coming along quite well. Anyway, can we get six small coffees? With one of those cherry things there, and...” She had no idea what the ponies might like. “And five randomly selected other pastries.”

“Of course!” He passed the order along to his coworker, making no attempt to help prepare it himself. “Hey, could I get a picture with all of you? This is just so cool.”

“Sure, if they don't mind.” Chryasor turned to ask the five ponies, who had taken over a large table behind her. “Suwþeksil, piŋiwøroytid sril il noyrotsit.” She quickly pulled up another chair to the table as the boy got out his phone. He opened the camera app and held the phone at arm's length, leaning back over the display case to get everyone in the frame. A virtual shutter clicked, and everyone relaxed out of their picture-ready poses.

“Thanks so much! My friends are not going to believe this.”

Just then the other cafe worker walked over, carrying a tray with six little mugs of coffee. “Here you go, ma'am. Have you decided what pastries you want?”

“Oh, I really have no clue,” Chryasor said. “Just get us an assortment of your favorites –whatever you'd recommend to someone who's never had human food before.”

“Okay then, coming right up.” He opened the display case and selected five different items, putting each on its own plate next to the one Chryasor had ordered for herself. “Your total today will be seventeen Euros sixty-eight, please.”

Chryasor swiped a card and then carefully carried the two trays over to the table and sat down. “Well, everypony, here's your chance to try some traditional human fare. Here we have a– oops, wrong language.” She switched back from French to the Equestrian language and repeated what she had just said. She tried her best to describe each of the baked goods in front of them, but these words were not ones she had heard used before, and not ones she could easily guess. And there was no reason why Equestria should even have the same foods as Earth anyway, though they certainly did have something that looked and tasted remarkably like apples.

"What'd you call this stuff again? Coffee?" Applejack looked down at her half-empty mug. "It's a mighty strong brew, but it's good. What's in it?"

"It's made from, well... coffee. It's a kind of bean. We grind them up and put it in hot water, and it turns into that."

"So you mean it's a kind of tea?" Rarity suddenly became more interested. "Maybe it's not that bad after all..."

"Personally, I don't really like the taste of it," Chryasor said. "But I drink it anyway because it gives me energy and helps me wake up. Many people put milk or other things in their coffee to make it taste better."

Applejack had already finished her coffee and moved on to Fluttershy's. The yellow mare had taken a sip and quietly pushed the cup away, disliking the bitterness of the drink but not wanting to make a fuss about it. "Ah think Ah can feel the energy already," Applejack said. "After buckin' apples all day, this stuff could keep me going to buck apples all night too! Ah wish Ah could take a barrel of this back for the family reunion day after tomorrow. We're all farm ponies, and Ah'm sure it'd be a big hit. Just imagine how much more we could get done –startin' earlier, never fallin' asleep on the job..."

"It's not a miracle drug," Chry said. "It just gives you that little extra kick to get started."

"Little extra kick?" Pinkie said incredulously. "I feel like I've been kicked from Equestria to the moon and back, and landed in a cloud full of lightning. I've got so much energy!” She started grinning widely and bouncing up and down in her seat.

“Just what she needed, more energy...” Rainbow Dash groaned. “And speaking of rainclouds, those don't look like they're going away any time soon. I want to get out there and clear them.” She stood up and flapped her wings slowly in an attempt to hover, but didn't even rise off the floor. “How am I supposed to be awesome if I can't even fly?”

“Hey, earth ponies can be awesome too, ya know,” Applejack replied. “Remember, Ah'm the Iron Pony.”

“No you're not, I am! I won three times as many events as you did.”

“Only because you cheated and used your wings. Hey, now there's an idea, a new competition here...”

While those two bickered, Fluttershy turned to the human sitting next to her. “I saw another human in Equestria the other day. Did you bring it?”

“Oh, yes, that was my sister.” Seeing Fluttershy's puzzled look, Chryasor clarified. “Not the one who wandered through on her own. I have two sisters. Did you talk to her?”

“Only a little. She said her name was... um... I don't remember. I'm sorry. I invited her in for tea but I don't think she understood. She just walked off, right into the forest!”

Chryasor nodded grimly. “Yep, that sounds like her. And her name is Phaedriel. She'll be okay.”

“Will she? I've been worried about her. The Everfree Forest is scary. I never go in there unless I really have to.”

“There's no need to worry –she's pretty tough, and she's used to living all alone out in a forest. She's more capable than most people realize. More capable than even she realizes, most of the time.” Chryasor sighed. “I wish there was some way to make her see that she's not as worthless as she thinks. She could be really great if she didn't run away from all her problems.”

“What's her special talent? Surely there's something she's good at.” Fluttershy glanced down at her own cutie mark. “I was pretty worthless too before I found mine. I still am sometimes. I'm such a pushover.”

“A special talent? I don't know really. When we were in school, I remember she was pretty good at a lot of things. But never good enough to be satisfied. Humans don't get marks like you do to tell us when we've found our calling. But who knows, maybe she's already doing whatever she's meant to do.”

“Out there?” Fluttershy still sounded worried. “But what if she needs help? She should live in town –maybe where I do, on the edge. When we get back I should go find her. Oh, but that would mean going into the forest...”

“Really, she'll be fine. Come on, let's see what else there is to show you around here.” Chryasor took her phone out of her pocket and pulled up a local map with popular attractions labeled. “Hmm, there's a museum nearby; that's something indoors to do. But the history of the EU might not be too interesting for you. A local church is having a pipe organ concert... oh, that was yesterday. Well, there are always more bakeries, though I'd rather have an actual event or thing to see. Weather forecast now says... fifty percent chance it'll be like this all day.” The five ponies all seemed to be paying good attention, but she couldn't tell if they were really listening or just staring at the piece of human technology in her hands.

“Ya know, Chry,” Applejack said, “it might be better if we just tried this again some other time. It's real nice of ya to take us all out like this, but if we're going to do somethin' special Ah think it's worth it to make sure everything's perfect. If things we got no control over get in the way, then oh well, we can adapt. Besides, it don't feel right, us leavin' Twilight behind like this. Ah know she said she wanted to stay and do her sciencey stuff, but she's our friend, and she deserves to be here with us. Ah vote we go back, meet up with Twi, figure it out from there.”

There were murmurs of agreement from around the table. “You're sure about this?” Chryasor asked. “There are things to do inside. But if you all really want to go back now, I guess we can. Try again tomorrow, with Twilight?” The ponies nodded. They finished up their assorted pastries, swapping pieces around so they could all try several and find ones they liked. Finally, when nothing was left but crumbs all around, the six friends got up and started retracing their steps back toward CERN and Equestria.

۞ ۞ ۞

Eleven humans sat around a long wooden table. Ten of them were old, white, and male. The last was old, black, and male. All wore speckled green and brown uniforms, their sleeves bearing four silver stars inside a golden frame. The one at the head of the table glanced around to see that the others were paying attention, then stood up from his chair. He sported a crew cut, as did all the men here, but only on half of his head. The other side was a mass of scar tissue, the result of an improvised bomb many years before, reaching down from his scalp across the side of his face. His right eye was nothing more than a blue glass marble, but he wore no patch over it.

“First of all,” he said, “let's all be completely honest here. After all, we all have top-level clearance and we're meeting behind closed doors with no record of us ever being together. We're allowed to be honest in here. So, who do we want to go to war with next?”

One of the other uniformed men chuckled. “Right to the point, I like that. I can see why you were chosen. And you're absolutely right: the economy's not doing so well, so it's our job to make a good old-fashioned military stimulus. Like how the production for World War II brought us out of the Great Depression, or how the Third Gulf War stabilized us after the fracking bubble burst. We need more war!”

Everyone at the table nodded. One of the others spoke up, proposing Russia for a target.

“No, not Russia,” the man at the end said. “We don't seriously want to fight Russia, we just want to look like we want to. Whether we tell the public or not, we've been in a second Cold War for a decade now, and the same rules apply. Mutually assured destruction: we nuke them, they nuke us back. No, we don't want a fight there.

“But we do want the cold war, for it serves a different purpose; namely, to increase our military budget each year even more than it otherwise would. That money is used to manufacture arms, to be used in the hot wars we also manufacture here. And, of course, to pay our salaries. But let them not call us greedy –not completely greedy, that is –because we do give back to our communities. When we make war, we make jobs. Jobs creating the guns and tanks here at home, jobs fighting for our freedom over there.”

One of the others piped up. “Fighting for our corporate profits, you mean. But you know what, that's close enough.”

The one-eyed man ignored the interruption and continued speaking. “What say you all to a war in Europe? We haven't had one of those in a while. I'm sure you're all just as sick of the Middle East by now as I am.”

The reaction to this proposal was mixed, mumbles of agreement and of concern both heard around the table. One of the dissenters spoke up first.

“I'm going to put this bluntly: that's a terrible idea. Our oldest and best allies are in Europe. We don't want to alienate them, certainly not fight them. The Middle East is an easy target; we can just use the whole terrorism thing again. The last twenty years are a perfect testament to how the public will buy any story we feed them. We've cultivated fear and hatred of Islam for so long; why give up that great explanation now?”

“Oh, we can still play the terrorism card,” the first man said. “In fact, I think it would work even better outside the Middle East. We give the impression that our enemies are everywhere, infiltrating even our close allies. If nowhere is safe, that means more fear, which is exactly what we need. The public knows that the Islamic State controls all of what used to be Iraq, and much of Syria and Turkey as well. But what if they also had a presence in, say... France?”

Now one of the other supporters of the plan chimed in. “I think it could be great if we could pull this off. It would become the biggest operation in years, easily. But to start it we'd need the biggest threat in years as well. And why France? There must be better places than that.”

“Negative. France is just the opening; it has what we need right now. Any one of our allies would do, but this is convenient timing and has the bonus prize of Switzerland right next door. Why haven't we heard much from those aliens that landed a couple weeks ago? They must be hiding something, so whatever it is, we want it. But first things first: here's how we're getting in.”

He walked to the edge of the room and pulled down a projector screen, then pulled a USB stick out from one of his uniform's many pockets and plugged it into a nearby computer. At the press of a button, the projector mounted in the ceiling whirred to life, showing the first slide of a presentation.

The ten people still sitting at the table gasped in shock. “Don't you think that's a bit much?” one asked. But their leader was expecting such a reaction and was prepared.

“Overkill, you say? Maybe. But overkill is the best kind of kill.” He clicked to the next slide, and the next. “We want to make absolutely damned sure that we get what we want, what we need. This would do it. Just think about what would happen next –I can't think of a single way this could be bad for us.”

“I can think of one. The President would... oh wait. Never mind. ...I never thought I'd condone this sort of thing, but it might actually work.”

“Are we all in agreement then?” The one presenting the plan looked at each person in turn, watching them nod with varying degrees of reluctance. “Good. We'll want to move quickly to hit this window of opportunity before it closes. The next might not come for a while.”