Chapter 24: Eat, Drink, and be Merry

It was early in the evening when the group met up for after-work dinner and a little relaxation in the club.

Jeff found Celestia at her room, and they headed downstairs together. As they approached, Chris and Emmy drifted into the hallway as well. Loud music and terrible singing boomed from inside when they approached the door, which had "Club Vox" in glowing, color-changing letters above it.

Celestia glanced questioningly at Jeff.

"Karaoke," he explained. "Good for morale or something. Not much of a singer myself."

"Neither is the dude on the mic," Chris commented, wincing.

Emmy laughed. "You don't want to hear me sing."

"What if I do?" Chris said.

"Trust me, you don't."

Jeff opened the door and held it as they entered.

The music was loud, but not deafening. Lasers and disco lights blazed over the large dance floor, and at the far end was a low stage. On the stage was a man in a T-shirt, assaulting their ears with a dreadful, catlike yowling on the microphone.

Seeing Twilight, Rarity, Marky, and the others sitting at a row of pushed - together tables, Jeff steered towards them.

"-worst thing I've ever heard," Applejack was saying as they walked up.

Sanchez grimaced. "It's pretty rough tonight alright."

"Not usually this bad," Hamilton frowned. "But tonight is something special."

"We've got to stop this," Twilight insisted.

"Go up there and ask him to take the next song!" Rainbow Dash begged. "Anything! Just make it stop!"

Twilight looked at her. "Okay, I'll do it. But only if you come up there with with me."

"Fine. My voice is awesome anyway."

"I'll go up there too," Rarity chimed in.

"We'll all go up there!" Applejack added.

"What?" Fluttershy asked nervously, trying to slip away from the table.

Applejack collared her. "Oh yes! It's gonna be fun!"

"I'd rather..."

"It's not fun without you!"

"But..."

"You really want to stay here by yourself?"

"Well actually..."

"Great! Then it's settled, right after this song we're gonna go and lasso that mic."

Fluttershy sighed resignedly. "How does this always happen to me?"

"Because you're our friend and we won't leave you out in the cold!"

Fluttershy smiled weakly. "Yes that's true."

"You'll be just fine, sugar cube!"

"Anything will be better than this," Jeff groaned.

"It's not so bad!" Pinkie Pie piped up.

The entire table stared daggers at her.

"Just think of it as torture! Right now, I'm pretending I'm a secret agent, tied up in a dungeon and being tormented for information!"

Feedback erupted from the microphone, stunning the audience momentarily. The singer plowed on regardless, weaving an unmatched tapestry of aural suffering.

Pinkie Pie scowled. "Do your worst! I'll NEVER talk!"

Everyone at the table laughed at that.

"Guys? Get ready, I think it's almost over."

As the off-key caterwauling ended, Twilight Sparkle led a charge to the stage.

The current singer raised an eyebrow at the six friends as they converged upon him. "Ponies can sing?"

"Hell yes they can!" someone yelled from the crowd.

The guy shrugged. "Well now I'm curious. See if you can sing as well as I just did! Wasn't it beautiful?"

Suppressing a shudder, Twilight put on her best fake smile, which wasn't very convincing. "It was... astonishing."

"It was very special," Rarity added, smiling demurely.

Rainbow Dash and Pinkie Pie glanced at each other. They both looked like they wanted to say something, but with visible effort they clamped their mouths shut and pasted silly, empty smiles on their faces.

"I can sing a bit more if you want!" He held the microphone up to his mouth.

"NO!" the Equestrians squealed in unison.

"I mean, ah, we wouldn't want you to to tire your amazing voice before the night is over!" Rarity added hastily.

"That's it exactly!" Twilight added, reaching eagerly for the mic.

The man beamed and held the microphone out. "You're too sweet! Have a go at it, girls!"

He stepped away cheerfully, humming out of tune to himself as Twilight took the mic gratefully and led the others onto the stage.

"So... what do we do now?"

"Just sing along, the words will be on your headset. I'll have the DJ put on something you girls know already." Sanchez walked to the DJ booth for a moment, then turned and gave them a thumbs up while a song started playing.

"Huh, Men at Work, interesting choice," McAllister commented as the six friends began singing. "I haven't ever heard this sung by so many girls at once. They're pretty darn good."

"It's like cool, fresh water on a parched throat," Hamilton added, sighing with relief.

Up on stage, Twilight and her friends swayed together.

"Do you come from the land down under?
Where women glow and men plunder?"

"You know," Jeff leaned towards Celestia. "I'm glad we can understand each other, but I was wondering to myself. How is it that you speak English?"

Celestia smiled crookedly. "Well honestly, I wish I could answer, but from my point of view, it feels like you all know how to speak Equestrian, and I've no idea how to explain any of this." She sipped her drink, .

Jeff shrugged. "Heh. I guess I see your point. None of this makes much sense, does it?" He lifted his Coke to his lips and stared at the stage, watching the six ponies effortlessly charm their audience.

"Oh by the way Celestia, I brought something for you," Hamilton said in the pause. He dug in one of his pockets and pulled a out a small white figurine. "I... I wanted you to have this. It's you."

He leaned over and set the little pony down on the table in front of her.

Celestia leaned forward curiously, looking closely at the plastic miniature of herself, complete with golden crown and soft, multicolored mane. She blinked several times, and an odd expression came over her face.

Hamilton looked worried. "I'm sorry, I didn't' mean to... I mean, I didn't think..."

Celestia looked up at him and smiled an odd, crooked smile. "No, it's... it's beautiful. Thank you." She sat back somewhat shakily. "It's just... Well, I don't know how to explain it. It's like seeing yourself in a statue from an ancient foreign temple, or in a cave painting from thousands of years ago." She paused, took a drink of her cranberry juice. "It sort of hit me hard while I was looking at that figure. You really know me. You really know us. And I never suspected a thing before I met you."

"I didn't mean to shock you."

"It's really okay. Just something that takes a little getting used to is all."

"If you don't want the pony, you don't have to take it."

"I'm honored. I'll keep it in my bedroom at Canterlot Castle after this is all over."

Hamilton smiled. "I wish I could see your castle, I've dreamed about visiting Canterlot so many times."

"Once this is all over, you're welcome to come visit anytime. I'll show you around myself."

"Thank you, but you know, already one of my dreams has come true, just talking to you."

Celestia blushed, suddenly at a loss for words. "I, uh, oh, ah... Thank you."

There was a moment of silence, broken eventually by Celestia viewing her ARHUD interface. "Oh, I just got a notification. It looks like my profile page has over one thousand followers now. Is that good?" she asked curiously.

"Your WHAT?" Chris gasped, his eyes bugging out.

"My new page on, what was that you called it Jeff? Social media?"

"Yes, Celestia, that's right."

Chris's gorged eyeballs swiveled jerkily over to Jeff as if they were rusted in the sockets. His mouth hung open so far it looked like he could catch a tennis ball inside. "What? WHAT!"

"Relax Chris, I suggested it to her."

"But this location. Everyone... The world? Here. Coming. Why?"

"She's not telling everything. Just started up a profile, put some pictures... here, have a look. And before you ask, all traffic from this facility is routed via encrypted tunneling to our gateway server in the United States, so nothing will be traced back to here."

Chris's expression was somewhere between dubious and mortified, but he nonetheless managed to look at the site Jeff tossed to his ARHUD.

PRINCESS CELESTIA
AGE: Keep Guessing!
FROM: Equestria
FOLLOWERS: 1.2K

As he watched, the number ticked up to 1.5K. "What the heck? I can see your followers increasing. I've never seen anything like it."

"Oh, Hamilton here suggested I join and make a little video post to... to... what did you call it again?"

"A Brony fan group. Has tens of thousands of members."

"Yes, thank you. So I did. And I just can't keep up at all. I make posts here and there, and most everyone seems happy."

Chris sucked his teeth. "I don't even know what to say anymore."

"Then just relax," Jeff grunted. "The Princesses here found out rather quickly about the way people communicate online, and they wanted to join in. I won't tell them no, and frankly I've decided I want to see what happens and let the future fall where it may."

Chris found himself grinning. "Well, I can truthfully say I'm enjoying how this is turning out. Some of these comments though..."

"There's a lot of arguments about how I look so realistic. Others are absolutely positive I'm the worst fake they've ever seen." She giggled.

"That's not what I meant."

"You mean the rudeness? I'm a big girl, I'm not as delicate as I might appear."

"That's not what I meant either. Like this creep here. He wrote-"

Chris was interrupted by the abrupt and rather noisy return of Twilight and her friends from the stage. Thankfully it was dinner time now, and a human female began singing sultry jazz while the lights dimmed. The enthusiastic but terrible gentleman from before had been safely blocked.

"So how were we?" Twilight asked, sliding into a chair.

"Absolutely fantastic!" Sanchez gave them a thumbs up and a big grin.

"What's for dinner?" Pinkie Pie asked. "I'm famished!"

"Whatever you want," Chris replied, absently. Then louder, "And don't forget. I'm taking you out for weapons training tomorrow."

"Oh yeah," Rainbow Dash trilled. "There's no way I'm forgetting that!"

***

Later in the night, Twilight sat alone on the edge of her bed in her penthouse suite. She touched the reading tablet nearby, considering looking at more human books, but then a message notification blinked in her ARHUD. She brought up the private message.

• Starlight Glimmer: Hello?
  
• Twilight Sparkle: Glims! How are you?
  
• Starlight Glimmer: I'm okay! Wow. This really works!
  
• Twilight Sparkle: Yeah it does! I guess I take it for granted already.
  
• Starlight Glimmer: How is everything over there?
  
• Twilight Sparkle: It's different. So different. But the people here are good. We've been so busy.
  
• Starlight Glimmer: What are you up against?
  
• Twilight Sparkle: We still aren't exactly sure. Something ancient, and evil. Nothing we can't handle, don't worry.
  
• Starlight Glimmer: I'm sorry Twilight, I worry anyway. I've seen some of the things that came out of the new portals here, some are horrible, indescribable.
  
• Twilight Sparkle: What's going on? Are you in trouble?
  
• Starlight Glimmer: No, we've handled everything. Just... If your side is the epicenter, then be ready Twilight. You're going to get the worst of it. I can't even imagine the things you are going to see... Please be careful!
  
• Twilight Sparkle: I'm always careful, Glims. You be careful too.
  
• Starlight Glimmer: Don't worry about me. I'm sorry though, I have to sleep. It's been a long day. I can barely keep my eyes open.
  
• Twilight Sparkle: It's okay. Go to bed. I'm going to do the same.
  
• Starlight Glimmer: Goodnight, Twilight.
  
• Twilight Sparkle: Goodnight, Glims.

Twilight closed the chat window, and stared into space for a long time before getting into bed and turning off the lights.