Engines of a revolution

I woke up the next morning and sat up in bed before rubbing the sleep from my eyes. A glance out the window revealed it was still early judging by light levels.

“Damn alien planet” I muttered, before getting up and getting myself ready to leave for Canterlot. Already I was starting to worry about how the ponies as a whole would react to my appearance. It was obvious from the fact that I was tied to a bed and interrogated that they’d never seen anything like me before. My worry was still present even as I grabbed what I thought I would need including the money Celestia had given me,  a little something to eat on the way and my tablet, which contained about 500 or so songs. At least I had Sam with me to ward off any particularly vocal individuals. Luckily it was still early, maybe equal to around 6 am back on earth. After a while I managed to find my way to the train station, after ordering a return ticket to Canterlot I sat on a bench, listening to music, meaning I could keep to myself whilst waiting for what seemed to be the first train of the day. After half an hour, going by the clock on my tablet, a white, horned pony, female by the looks of it, with electric-blue hair sat down next to me, she also had a pair of headphones around her neck. I noticed her turn to me and say something, but I couldn’t hear her over the music I was listening to. I pulled my headphones off and turned to her.

“Pardon?” I asked in the ponies’ language.

“What are you?” she asked.

“In my language, we call ourselves Human” I said.

“And what does your language sound like, Human?”

“Not too dissimilar to yours.” I said in English “It even seems to be in the same language group” she scrunched up her nose.

“Sounds odd” she said. I snorted

“Your language sounds odd to me” I retorted.

“Hah, fair point” she conceded “so what’s your name?”

“Luke” I said, before patting Sam “And this is Sam, yours?”

“Call me Vinyl” she said. “So what’s a ’human’ doing in Equestria?”

“I came here through no choice of my own” I said “but that’s not important, right now I’m off to canterlot to get myself citizenship and hopefully a job.” I finished with a shrug “but honestly at this point at this point whatever happens? happens”

“Fair enough” she said

“So what are you traveling for?” I asked.

“Oh, I’ve got a music [something] in canterlot” she explained.

“Um, I’m afraid I’m not particularly familiar with that word” I said “care to explain it to me?” she thought for a moment before answering.

“It’s where I play music” she said.

“You play music?” I asked in surprise “what type?” She went to answer, but was interrupted by a whistle, we looked to see a train approaching. When it stopped at the station we climbed into the compartment. Once we got settled and the train began making its way towards canterlot Vinyl turned to me before levitating over her pair of headphones attached to something that looked like an old Walkman. I put them on and immediately began hearing music that sounded distinctly like Electronic music, it could even be classified as Dubstep. I looked at her in surprise before nodding my head and smiling. When the song finished I then took off the headphones and passed them back to her.

“Sounds good, I like” I said “Whilst I don’t create music, I’m partial to a little of this” I then unplugged my headphones and began playing a song through the external speaker, a fast drumbeat began playing. Vinyl’s eyes went wide as the heavy, rhythmic guitaring started. Her ears pricked up at the foreign words and she looked at the device in something approaching wonder. When the song finished she had a spaced out look.

“More…” she breathed. I chuckled

“It’s Industrial Metal” I said, saying the genre in English “Do you live in Ponyville?” She nodded

“I really need copies of some of your human music” she said.

“I’ll be sure to try and introduce you to some more at some point” I said “I’m living in the big house on the edge of the forest” for the rest of the journey we just sat and talked, or talked as best as I could at my current level. She even gave me a ticket to her performance, to which I told her that I’d try to make it, assuming I was free at that time. Eventually the train slowed as we came into Canterlot, a look outside the window confirmed that the steam locomotives were of an 1860s period of design.

“Let’s hope I can get into a meeting with the management of whoever runs this railway” I muttered in English.

“You say something?” Vinyl asked, climbing out of the carriage.

“Nothing” I said “Just thinking”

“Well, I’ll catch you and your pet dog later” She said before walking off. I checked to make sure that I had everything before making my way towards the exit. I’ll admit, I was feeling a little nervous as I walked through the streets towards the castle and I would be lying if I said that there wasn’t ponies blatantly staring at me. I kept my head down and my mouth shut as I walked up the steps to the castle, I was about to enter the castle when two small, crossed pikes stopped me. I looked down to see two ponies dressed in what could only be described as imitation centurion armour blocking my path.

“Can I help you?” I asked.

“Do you have a reason to be walking up the steps to the [something] [something]?” one asked. Before jerking a hoof to another set of doors, that was actually open “The [something] [something] is over there” I looked over before chuckling nervously.

“Sorry” I said, before making my way to the doorway.

“Hey!” They called, I looked over “Just make sure you can keep that wolf under control” I nodded and gave a casual two-fingered salute before continuing on my way with Same close to me, he knew to stick nearby in places we weren’t familiar with. As we entered the castle I found my breath to be stolen from me by the sheer beauty of the architecture.

“Holy shit” I muttered “Gotta hand it to these ponies, they can build a decent castle” I then began walking through the castle looking for some kind of throne room. Eventually I came to a large set of doors guarded by more pony guards. I was about to ask them if this was the throne room when the doors opened and a pony walked out. Already I didn’t like him, he was white with blond hair and he reeked of that “I’m better than you attitude” He saw me and snorted before walking off with his head held high. I watched him walk down the hallway before turning to the open doors ad cautiously peering inside, sat on a throne at the end of the room was Celestia, so I began to make my way inside, once myself and Sam were clear of the doors they closed behind us. After a lengthy walk down the carpet I stopped at the foot of some stairs leading up to the throne.

“I trust you had a pleasant trip” Celestia said in Equestrian. I simply nodded and Celestia stood up before making her way down the stairs and towards a balcony. “Good, then let us get down to [unteermahe]” I followed after her as she sat at a small table and ‘magicked’ a scroll, ink pot and quill out of thin air. I stopped and stared at the items that were suspended in mid air. “Is there a problem?”

“How?” I paused searching for the right word “That” I eventually said, gesturing to the levitating items.

“Magic” she simply said, placing the scroll and inkpot on the table and gesturing for me to sit. Sam simply curled up nearby as I sat on a cushion opposite her. A pony servant rolled over a trolley carrying what distinctly looked like a teapot as I felt a familiar tingle around my head and I heard Celestia talking to me.

“This is your citizenship form” She said “without it, you can’t get a source of employment” she then levitated the teapot. “Tea?”

“Oh, yes please” I said, getting myself a teacup, She poured the tea for me and I added milk and sugar before taking a sip and sighing. “Thank you”

“You are most welcome” she said, smiling before placing the scroll on the table and dipping the quill in the ink pot. “Name”

“Luke Washington” I said aloud. We continued like this until the citizenship form was completed, engaging in the occasional small talk in between. By the time the form was filled in the teapot had been emptied.

“Seems everything is in order” she said “I’ll be giving your home a set address, this can take some time so you’ll receive your citizenship details in about a week. Then we can see about looking for a line of employment” I nodded “Do you have any idea what it is you’d like to do?”

“Working on the railways” I said almost immediately “plus I have a proposition for whoever designs the locomotives here” she gestured for me to continue.

“On my world our railways are at least 150 years ahead” I said ”Steam is a thing of the past, but, we made many advancements that I feel could be seriously beneficial to your railways; Better track work, better signalling, more powerful locomotives, safer coaches faster, journey times and increased passenger comfort” Celestia thought for a moment before responding.

“I will pass on your proposition to the railroad management,” she said. “but I can’t promise anything” I nodded in understanding.

“I take it some higher ups can be a little stubborn at times” I said, she smiled slightly “Well, I believe that just about wraps things up here” I went to stand up.

“Just a moment” she said, stopping me “The scientists examining the ship would like your advice on some things”

“Of course” I said, that reminded me “I would also like to claim ownership over some of the items if you would allow it”

“It depends” she said, standing up. I stood up and woke Sam up before following after her. As we walked out of a side door of the throne room and into an old staircase her horn began to glow. The staircase seemed to stretch down forever

“How deep are we going?” I asked.

“The cave was dug in the center of Mount Canter during the 1st Pony-Griffin Way so that any new weapons were a secret, not even a troller worm could dig its way inside” After a while she looked back at me “I’m curious, how advanced is your world?”

“Advanced enough for the average person to have handheld devices that allows long distance communication and access to the entire sum of human knowledge” I said, she looked at me to elaborate.

I’ll explain when we’re down there” I said “I hate having to repeat myself” we soon reached what I’d mentally dubbed “The Vault” and entered to see the massive container ship, though many of the containers had been removed from the ships and the seemingly endless vault was starting look like a container port. I noticed there was a large clearing where a makeshift laboratory was set up, and ponies were examining the locomotive as well as sever other vehicles. I gestured for Sam to stay and he sat to one side of the doorway like a guard dog. Celestia led me over to the laboratory where a brown pony with a horn  and an hourglass mark on his rear greeted us, or rather Celestia, with a bow.

“Your majesty” he said, for some reason I was able to understand him better than before, something I attributed to the spell Celestia had going “and I trust this is the individual whose planet all of this comes from”

“That is correct, professor” Celestia said “I’m afraid Luke here isn’t totally fluent in our language, so I’ll be his interpreter” the pony nodded before extending a hoof towards me, I bent down slightly and took it in my hand before giving a single shake.

“Pleased to meet you” I said.

“A fascinating accent” He said “you’ll have to show some of us your native language. If you’ll follow me this way” He lead us over to The Pagani, making me smile

“We’re a little confused as to the function of it” the professor said.

“This is what we call a Pagani Zonda, It’s a form of automobile” I said in English, Celestia could still understand, so she interpreted into Equestrian for me.

“What function does this “Automobile” perform?” A scientist asked.

“It doesn’t really have a practical function like a locomotive or airship does, it’s simply meant for fun” Ponies scribbled notes onto note pads after Celestia interpreted for me. I thought for a moment before walking over to the beautifully designed car.

“That doesn’t however mean that it doesn’t have an intelligent design” I said, before pointing to the front “notice how the car is so low, and how the nose is like a sharply angled wedge?” the ponies nodded.

“These are to give it the best aerodynamics possible” I said “this thing is designed for two things: to go fast and to corner fast.” I then walked over to the filler cap and opened it before peering inside. I gasped, the car actually had fuel in it, A full tank. I grinned.

“Is everything alright?” a scientist asked.

“Yes” I said “You may want to clear a path through here, I’ll be able to demonstrate this vehicle in action for you” the scientists began moving tables and vehicles whilst I read through the manual. Even though I’d never driven a car before I had a pretty good idea of how to operate one. Soon a path was cleared and I’d mentally mapped out a course.

“OK ponies, you might want to step back” I said, getting in, the professor was sat in the passenger seat, taking notes “This produces the same power as 800 of your strongest ponies, it’s also very loud” After allowing them time to take a few steps back I turned the key, after a few revolutions it roared into life before settling down into a purr. Ponies began to take notes as I revved the engine a couple of times, getting a feel for it, I carefully put it into gear before easing onto the accelerator. I was barely touching it and it already wanted to run away from me. “Ok, let’s see what you can do” I was in the clear and a seemingly endless cavern awaited me. I promptly mashed my foot into the floor and it shot forth like a racehorse out of the starting gates. The pony beside me let out a yelp, which was drowned out by the beautiful engine roaring like some banshee from hell. I watched the speed climb as I changed up a gear, I could see the cave floor start to go rough up ahead, ‘Time to head back’ I thought to myself. I quickly braked and downshifted before making my way around some large builders, the ground making up a natural racecourse for me. Beside me, the professor was taking notes furiously as I performed hairpin turns. As I turned ready to go back, the tail end started to slide out.

“Shit!” I shouted, fanatically turning the steering wheel to compensate for the slide. The rear of the car hesitated at a 45’ angle, before getting back in line, just missing a large boulder. Once I was in the clear I let out a sigh of relief, before promptly thrashing the engine one last time. There was a clear path to one side of the makeshift lab and I drove down that path, shooting passed an open-mouthed science team and Celestia at over 200mph. I let the car hold at that speed for a few seconds, savouring the sound of the engine one last time before slowing down and turning back. I cruised into the laboratory area before stopping, shutting off the engine and stepping out. The collective group were open mouthed in shock as the professor climbed out and walk around the car

“And that, ladies and gentlemen, is how you do it” I said “Anything else?”