Manics: Thunderball

-Chapter 6-

“I don’t see anything nasty from up here,” Dash shouted from above. “Am I missing something?”

“I don’t think so, Rainbow,” Twilight replied. “Are we missing something, Jordan?”

“Doesn’t look like it,” Jordan confirmed. “The Gouch might’ve come from one of the more isolated areas of the ship, away from the others. So we can breath for now.”

Jordan took a seat on the ground and looked up at the towering ship before him. After only ten minutes of searching- since Rainbow Dash’s help was fast and got the job done, it only took that long- they had found no reason to worry about any more Gouches coming out of the ship… for now.

Twilight and Dash joined him, and Twilight immediately started a conversation.

“So… have you figured out a faster way to get the PRE-C Data?”

“Been thinking about it,” Jordan answered. “But I still don’t have an answer.”

“Well, why not go over the steps again, and see if there’s a way around them?”

He thought about it for a while, and then agreed. “First, get the information. In this case, the entire library selection.”

“Isn’t that the problem?” Rainbow asked.

“Yes, because there isn’t enough time,” Twilight answered. “What then?”

“Then, make a copy and send it to the computer,” Jordan said.

“How does that work?” Twilight wondered.

“I don’t really know,” Jordan admitted. “Somehow, this device copies the needed information and transmits it to the computer, in this case Kat.” He turned to the ponies, who gave him a questioning look. “Kat’s a medical robot, she-“

“A ROBOT?!” Both mares exclaimed.

“Hello! We came in on a ship and you’re head-over-heels for her?” Jordan pointed out.

“Didn’t you just say it’s a robot? Why are you calling it a she?” asked Twilight.

“You’ll find out what I mean eventually,” he said quickly. “Anyway, she’ll actually load the information into our brains. I would already have, but she would still do it to me.”

“Why?” Twilight asked.

“I was getting to that,” Jordan said. “A Manic’s brain has an extra section near the memory portion of the brain that is useful for one thing and one thing only: Body-wide DNA Recoding. What Kat does will stimulate that area. I’m quoting a book I read on it, so stop staring at me like that.” Indeed, the ponies were staring at him in shock that he said something so complicated.

“What does that mean?” Rainbow blurted out.

“Simply put,” Jordan started. “We’ll be able to change our form; turn into ponies.”

Another shocked silence, but this time he couldn’t blame them- it was amazing. Manics changing their form had been credited for successful diplomacy and first contact in the past. This was all because Manics figured out how to use what seemed to be the most pointless section of their brain to their advantage. Then again, humans finally learned to use reason correctly after thousands of years of their history. Didn’t help them much, but it was surprising to some passer-bys, from what he had heard.

“What else can you transform into, then?” Twilight asked eagerly.

“Um…” Jordan scratched his head. “Can’t say I’ve done this before! Looking forward to it… I think.”

“Whaddya mean ‘you think’?” Dash inquired.

“A-a-aren’t we supposed to be talking about how to get the info we need for that!?”

The two question-happy ponies remembered what they were doing and focused. “So… what next?”

Jordan thought for a second, and then realized he had covered everything. “Yeah, that’s it.”

“So… did we learn anything?” Twilight looked thoughtful.

“Ah… no,” Jordan chuckled. He was met with a painful hoof-to-the-shoulder from Dash.

“Why are you laughing?! You made it obvious that this isn’t a joke!”

“I’m sorry, Dash,” Jordan said as he rubbed his throbbing shoulder. “But I’m being honest when I say we’ve figured nothing out!”

“In that case…” Twilight said. She stopped and made a strange face; as if she was questioning what she was about to say.

“What?” Jordan blurted, wanting her to continue.

“Well… I actually have a few questions about your kind in general,” she smiled sheepishly.

“Why do you seem so nervous about it?”

“I… I’m afraid I might ask the… wrong question,” she ran a hoof through her mane nervously as she said that.

“Wrong? What, like bedroom stuff?” Jordan asked. Somehow, he managed to seem nonchalant as he said that- as if it were a normal question.

“U-uh…” Twilight stammered as she began to turn red.

“Aw! Twilight, you’re so cute when you blush!” Rainbow teased.

Jordan, on the other hoof, was being completely serious. He ceased being so when he saw an opportunity to mess with Rainbow Dash for a similar reaction. After pulling his Lightning Rod out of his pocket and aiming it at her, he pushed a few buttons and watched the show… unfold.

POMPF! Dash’s eyes widened when her wings suddenly spread and stood rigid. Knowing perfectly well what it was, her face also reddened.

“Y’know…” Jordan said smugly. “I did read something about what pegasi do when they’re… well… yeah.” He started losing it and wrapped his arms around his stomach as he started laughing. Twilight also joined in on the fun, shortly followed by Jordan’s victim. Dash wouldn’t admit it, but she thought it was a well-timed and hilarious prank. Good! He enjoys pranks! Gonna have to get him back for that one, sometime...

Jordan caught his breath. “Anyway, let’s get one fact about… that… out of the way first.” He grabbed his left forearm, then his right. “Manics get these scars when they get their acaligram- that’s what we call our sort of ‘magic’- when they become teenagers. Besides that, we keep this area covered for pretty much our entire life.”

“Why’s that?” Rainbow asked.

“Remember? This is… that… kind stuff I’m getting out of the way?” Jordan reminded her. “Anyway, that’s all I have to say about that. Do not ask me anything about sex again.” He emphasized the word ‘sex’ by dragging out the ‘x’ sound. Needless to say, this resulted in an awkward silence.

“O…kay then…” Twilight stared at him out of the corner of her eye. “What about your magic, how do you get it to work?”

“First of all,” Jordan sighed. “Let me make it clear that this isn’t really ‘magic’. It’s closer to science. As for how it works, Manics have the mental ability to manipulate certain things found in nature…”

“Like clouds?” Rainbow asked.

“Well, I haven’t seen clouds, but I’ve seen some messing with air and water. My friend, Walker, can summon fire. His wife, Joni, controls ice. Joni’s sister… huh…” Jordan stopped with his hand on his forehead. He was thinking.

He continued after a pause. “Not sure what Gunny does… but I know Kit controls air and the Captain controls earth- dirt and rocks, all that good stuff. Cop controls-“ he stopped, frozen for a moment. The unicorn and pegasus gave him a look, telling him to go on.

“…Controlled water. I don’t know what Malotov’s acaligram is, but he’s… weird… anyway, and you already know what I manipulate.”

“What do you mean, controlled?” Twilight pressed.

Jordan realized that the look on his face told her everything when she withdrew the question, asking another instead. “Ah… um… OH! What do Manics eat?”

Jordan smiled; it was an easy question to answer. “Whatever’s good. We eat what humans eat when we’re on Earth or the newly created Martian colonies…”

“And what do humans eat, then?” Twilight pressed.

“Uh… I don’t feel comfortable answering that question,” Jordan stammered.

“What, do they eat meat or something?” Rainbow joked.

“Honestly,” Jordan sighed. “Yeah.”

The two ponies stared into space after his confirmation. Rainbow’s jaw was hanging loose while Twilight simply stared. Either his answer was still registering or it had registered and this was the resulting reaction. Okay, time to save this.

“Manics don’t depend on meat as much as humans; we’re mostly vegetarian by nature,” he said quickly. It was the truth, Manics only ate meat on certain occasions. Like being on a ship where you ate chicken flavored ramen noodles once a week.

Twilight and Rainbow breathed a sigh of relief. During this, Jordan pushed his hand against his mouth, trying to hold in a laugh. However, his attempts at hiding it were in vain.

“What’s so funny?” Rainbow asked in a low tone.

“It’s weird… how I can kill some mutated creature in front of the entire town, and you two freak out over meat…” he chuckled maniacally.

“Jordan,” Twilight said. “You’re being veeeeery creepy, right now.”

“According to Kit, I have that affect on people. Or… ponies,” he mentioned, before returning to the main subject. “Anyway, I would bet money on me eating any random food you have blindfolded and liking it.”

During this time, he failed to notice a certain pink party pony sneaking up to him. He even failed to notice when she pulled the blindfold out when he mentioned it. His failures at detecting Pinkie were realized when he found himself blindfolded and held in place. What have I done? Nggggh…

He heard Twilight urging Pinkie to stop something. “PINKIE! Don’t give him tha-“ Before he could hear the rest of what she had to say, his mouth was forced open by a pair of hooves and something was shoved in. WHAT DID SHE PUT IN MY MOUTH, AN ENTIRE CUPCAKE? Indeed, after chewing it (painfully) for a bit, he realized it was a cupcake. Except this cupcake was different… it was chocolate, but something was on it… That’s when he felt the burning.

HOT SAUCE!? He thought with some disgust. Eventually, that disgust went away went he realized that, somehow, the hot sauce covered cupcake was tasty. Wow, this is good… He swallowed and gasped for air. The blindfold was removed to reveal the rest of the bearers of the Elements of Harmony were there. Pinkie was giving him a hopeful grin while the others were eyeing her with a mix of shock and disgust.

“Pinkie,” Jordan said. “Would it be so hard to WARN ME next time?! Sure, the cupcake in the hot sauce was interesting, but would stopping to consider what you were doing kill ya?”

“Oh, Jordy, you’re so silly! Of course I thought about it for, like, five seconds!” Pinkie replied cheerfully.

Well, I suppose that would be a record, Jordan thought.

“So,” Applejack started slowly. “Ya… actually liked that?”

“Like I was saying, I would have bet money on me eating any random food you have and liking it,” Jordan shrugged. “No one can explain why that’s a fact, it just is!”

Five ponies stared at him with blank expressions; the sixth was smiling with pride. “Told you guys that it was good!” Pinkie said smugly.

“Let’s just… get back on track,” Twilight said.

“Ah, no,” Jordan responded quickly. “It would be pointless, since we have a habit of getting off track and I’m not equipped with the-“ he grabbed his head dramatically, “-mental ability to keep getting us back on track every time!”

“Yeah, I agree,” Rainbow Dash said. “This egghead stuff is… eggheadish.” That word... for the umpteenth time.

“Yet you understood it all,” Twilight deadpanned, and then turned back to Jordan. “One last question?”

Jordan sighed. “Fine, but please don’t interrupt the answer.”

“What are all doing in space?”

The circle is made

‘round the ever lonely star.

Those friended by Manic

are summoned from afar.

“This is going to be a loooong story,” Jordan warned. He took a deep breath, and began.

“Many years ago, the Manics created what we call The Lonely Circle, or skyl ono. The humans refer to something like it as a Dyson Ring, but it isn’t actually a ring. It’s actually a bunch of artificial planets set in the same orbit. If that confuses you, I’m not surprised, since your world doesn’t orbit the sun. Ours does, though. Earth and Mars in the Sol system- where the human’s live- do, too. We were confused by how your system works when we came into the system, so the feeling is mutual.

“When the Manics started building the ring, the planet they were on was… dying. This caused them to rush, but they were successful. Only… they went too fast and didn’t bother counting; there were too many 'planets'. However, when we encountered the humans about ten years ago, we found out how to deal with this problem: find some friends.

“Ships started going out looking for other races that could become allies. Some agreed, others remained neutral, and a few became hostile. Some ships came back, but others never returned. Eventually, our government stopped directly funding the ships that went out and explored. They thought this would be the end of Manic space exploration, but something happened that brought it back: the portal was created.

“Some crazy scientists managed to find a way to stabilize and created portal units. After tests between Earth and the Martian colonies, they started testing to see if it would work between the human’s system and our own. It worked, and the government became involved after that. Soon, a bunch of freelance captains started gathering crews to explore space for other races again. One of them was my captain, Jast.

“So that’s why we’re here,” Jordan summed up. “We wanted to find a planet with a race that would want to be our friends and join The Lonely Circle because, well, we're lonely, and we want to learn.”

He closed his eyes, cracked his neck, and took a breather. He was surprised by what he saw when he opened them again: several of the ponies from Town Hall were there, and from the amazed look on their faces, he could tell they had been there for most of the story if not the whole thing. Among them was Princess Celestia, who stepped towards Jordan and the original six listeners. Jordan stood up as she began to speak.

“Your kind’s intentions are noble,” she said. “And I speak for my sister when I say we would gladly discuss this matter with your captain. However, there is the matter of the danger your ship is imposing to my little ponies.”

“If they stay out of the way, they won’t be in danger,” Jordan stated.

“Yes, but Twilight and her friends and this group-“ the regal alicorn gestured to the new group of ponies with a hoof-“as well as several of the Royal Guard will most likely be adamant about their involvement.”

“Wait, some of your Guards? The military is involved?” There’s a military?

“Correct. I have also sent word to my sister regarding whether or not her Night Guard will become involved.”

Jordan was speechless. They were helping him? When he had scared the hell out of most of them threatened one of them? Genuinely nice ponies: they don’t care if you look like shit, they’ll help you anyway. And be ponies while they do it.

“Uh… wow,” he said finally. “That’s… really nice of you guys.”

“Now,” the princess said. “Shouldn’t we be getting that data you mentioned?”

“Well, yes, but there’s no way I can work this out in time,” Jordan answered.

“Hmm…” The princess looked thoughtful for a moment. “You said something about a ring, didn’t you?”

“Right,” Jordan reached into his pocket and pulled out a metal ring. The outside of the had seven blue orbs, as well as a single red one. “I would slip this on my finger and after getting the data myself and then-“ he looked at the ring, but then focused on what was through the center.

The ring seemed to be circling Twilight, but was centered on her horn. Wha- no way, that’s stupid. But… still.

“Twilight… you’re the librarian,” he said quietly. “How many of the books have you read?”

“Well, I won’t brag, but almost all,” Twilight giggled. “What does this have to do with your data?”

“I’m asking because Princess Celestia has given me an absolutely insane idea, which I think she’s had figured out since Town Hall.” He looked at the princess.

“Well…” she said. “It was a passing thought… I wouldn’t have given it a second thought if the situation wasn’t, to say the least, dire.”

Dire. To say the least? That doesn’t make sense… “You do realize that neither of us have any idea what will happen?”

“What are you planning?” Twilight asked.

“We’re getting the information… from you,” Jordan said, pointing at Twilight’s horn.

Twilight’s eyes widened with realization. “Oh! Why didn’t I think of that?”

“Probably because I have no idea what would happen,” Jordan said. “Look, Twilight: This idea could work… or it could fail miserably with rather… terrible side-effects.”

Rarity came forward. “Oh, just GIVE ME THAT.” Jordan found the ring was out of his hand and floating in a blue aura of magic.

“I don’t think it’s going to-“ the ring slipped neatly onto Twilight’s horn, “-fit…”

“Um… I think you should listen to… him…” Fluttershy quietly stated. “That is… if you feel like it… I won’t change your mind…”

“Aw, relax Fluttershy,” Dash reassured her. “Twilight knows what she’s doing, nothing’s gonna happen!”

“Right, having your head blown off is nothing,” Jordan muttered.

“What was that, Jordy?” Pinkie asked.

“Nothing, let’s just get this over with,” he sighed. “I’ll turn it on…”

He stepped in front of twilight and crouched down to her eye level, making eye contact. She made it clear that she was ready without words. He lifted his hand to the ring and placed his thumb on the red orb.

“If your head feels like it’s going to explode,” he whispered. “Well, try to warn us.”

“I’m glad you’re so confident in this, Jordan,” Twilight said sarcastically. “Just do it.”

Kinda pushy there, Twilight. He closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and pushed the button.

The blue orbs began flashing, cueing him to back off a bit. He watched as they began to slowly light up on at a time, clockwise from the red orb. On the second lit orb, Twilight’s horn began to glow.

“Jordan,” Twilight asked apprehensively. “Is this normal?”

“How should I know?” Jordan shrugged, also speaking in a worried tone as the ponies closer to Twilight began backing further away.

The third orb lit, and her horn kept glowing. On the forth orb, she shut her eyes tight as the purple glow suddenly became white, encasing her entire body. A crackling and somewhat trance-like sound seemed to come from it, like a louder version of the sound her horn usually made when she used magic.

Time to panic? Time to panic.

She started to lift up into the air, and the field of white got larger. Jordan could still see the orbs light up. The sixth orb lit up, and then the seventh. On the final blue orb, her eyes and mouth shot open, both emitting pure white. Jordan was forced to retreat quickly as the field rapidly increased in size. He came to a stop next to Applejack.

“Does she do this often?” he seemed to shout over the now deafening noise.

“She only does this when we’re usin’ the Elements!” Applejack answered.

Great. Same thing that she does when using a weapon of mass destruction.

All seven blue orbs began to blink. At first they blinked slowly, then it became faster and faster until they stopped blinking altogether and the red orb lit. At this point, the field around Twilight dissipated and she fell back to the ground in a heap. Jordan and the other bearers quickly approached.

“Oh my goodness, oh my goodness, oh my goodness…” Fluttershy began saying those same words over and over again in her quiet-yet-panicked tone.

“Y’ alright, sugarcube?” Applejack asked as she prodded her friend with a hoof.

“That looked like fun! Was it fun, Twilight?” Pinkie asked eagerly.

“Pinkie Pie, what just happened could have been much worse! The fact you found that to be fun is unsettling!” Rarity attempted to reason, only to be confronted with the one single truth about Pinkie: there is no reasoning with her.

“C’mon! Get up, Twilight!” Rainbow seemed to coach her librarian friend.

Jordan knelt next to the fallen unicorn and lifted her head to look at her face. She dazedly opened her eyes to look at him.

“You’re name is Twilight Sparkle, do you remember that?” he asked seriously.

“Yes, I do,” Twilight answered as she got up. “And I remember everything. How did it look? I’m kind of hungry after that…”

“That’s normal, but that doesn’t matter!” Jordan said with a newly found level of joy. He snatched the ring off of Twilight’s horn. “The PRE-C Data’s been sent and you’re head hasn’t been blown off! Today is lookin’ UP!”

A series of unidentifiable sounds came from the ship, and the detached portion that was Jordan’s room. There was an audible clanging sound, then what sounded like muffle gunfire towards the closest section of the ship. He approached the airlock that was closest to the sound with caution.

“Jordan, hat’s that noi-“ Rainbow Dash started. She was interrupted when the door opened. A girl in a plumber-esque cap, a white tee under a green vest-like article, wrapping covering her forearms, and tan highwaters was standing there with a large gun hanging from her right hand.

Jordan took a step forward. “Gunny.” Something’s wrong…

She began to fall forward, on a collision course with the ground… ten feet under the doorway.