Twilight Sparkle Gets a Reality Check

by Pyrepinna

Rating: teen
Tags: Original Character, Spike, Comedy, Human, Twilight Sparkle, Slice of Life, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic
Length: 1603

NASA discovers Equis, a land of small, colorful horses and magic. They send a representative over to learn as much as he can. He meets up with Twilight Sparkle and starts to learn from her. But something doesn't make sense to him...

Jordan Zusk is sent by NASA to learn about the new planet that they discovered, which has sapient life! When he gets there, he meets Twilight Sparkle, and he asks to learn from her about their species and their planet, Equis. It goes well, with a few debates, up until one thing comes up. How does Celestia move the sun? Jordan tries to make sense of it.

Rated Teen for some foul language.
Set between the end of season 2 and the beginning of season 3.

Published 2016-08-14 21:30:01 UTC
Last updated 2016-08-14 21:30:01 UTC

Impossibilities

Impossibilities

“It just doesn’t make sense.”

Twilight Sparkle frowned and looked at the person seated across from her. They had been at this table for hours, and she was starting to get impatient. This infernal creature had wanted to know everything about Equestria that she knew. She was happy to teach, ready to share knowledge, but it would have been much easier on her if the person hadn’t tried to contest almost every fact she told him.

“Mister Zusk, perhaps we can skip the debate this time?” she asked, slightly annoyed. “With every point so far that you said was incorrect, I’ve proven it to be true. Maybe you can just record that down for NASA and we can move on? You said earlier that NASA wanted you to get as much information on our species and environment as you could, so they could document it. We are the first ‘alien species’ you guys ever found.”

The human on the other side of the table shook his head. “No, this shouldn’t be possible!” Jordan Zusk insisted, pulling out a smartphone. “I don’t care about how I was wrong before! And NASA isn’t gonna be happy if I come back with false information! By both the rules you set out for magic, AND basic science, your ‘Princess Celestia’ shouldn’t be able to move the sun! And even if she did, your planet wouldn’t be able to sustain life! This is impossible!”

Twilight resisted the urge to facehoof. “What’s so hard to believe about it? She just raises the sun and lowers it!” she said, exasperated.

Jordan shook his head. “Exactly that!” he said.

Twilight suppressed a groan and closed her eyes. “And what, pray tell, makes you so skeptical?”

“How does she move the sun?” Jordan asked, tapping his smartphone.

“Incredibly strong telekinesis,” Twilight answered.

“And that is where this starts to fall apart,” Jordan said. “You told me earlier that the amount of magic needed to levitate something increases exponentially as distance goes by, and that increase is measured over ten meters usually, right?”

Twilight nodded. “Yes, I did.”

Jordan nodded. “And the amount of magic needed is always related to the mass of an object?” he questioned.

Twilight gave another nod.

“Then how do you not see the problem here?” he asked, sighing.

“There is no problem!” Twilight groaned. “Princess Celestia moves the sun around Equis and that’s that!”

Jordan stared at her in disbelief. “You’re kidding, right?” he asked.

“Nope.”

Jordan stood and walked over to the nearest wall of the Golden Oaks Library and started to bang his head against it.

Twilight gasped. “What are you doing?!” she yelled, grabbing his head in magic and stopping him.

Jordan walked back to the table and sat down again. “Good God…” he muttered. “I knew you ponies were behind us in science and technology, but I thought you’d be past fifteenth century theories.”

“Hey!”

Tapping his phone, Jordan pulled a photo up and showed it to Twilight. “Do you know what this is?” he asked.

Squinting at the screen, Twilight saw three circles, one bluish-green, one brown, and one fiery yellow, the brown one being significantly smaller than the other two. “I… no,” she answered.

“This is a photo one of NASA’s probes took of Equis once it got closer,” he said. “The bluish one is Equis, the brown one is the moon, and the fireball is the sun.”

Twilight gasped. “Woah!” she exclaimed. “Why is the sun so big in this?”

“It’s taken from the side, showing Equis in its relationship distance wise from the sun,” explained Jordan.

“But the sun isn’t that big,” Twilight said, a frown creasing her face.

“Wrong!” Jordan exclaimed, startling Twilight. “From our measurements, NASA believes your sun is SO big that you can fit almost two million objects the size of Equis inside of the space it occupies!”

Twilight’s jaw dropped. “That’s huge!”

Jordan grinned. “Yep. It is. And other measurements say it’s about one hundred twenty three million miles away from this planet,” explained he.

Nodding eagerly, Twilight looked at the photo again. “Woah…”

Putting the phone away, Jordan looks Twilight dead in the eye. “How much magical power would be needed to move an object of that size that’s that far away, Twilight?” he asked.

“Simple!” Twilight said, grinning. “It would take…” Her smile fell from her face. “It would take…” Her jaw dropped. “Is there even that much magic in the entire WORLD?!”

“Exactly,” Jordan said. “By that standard ALONE, it’s impossible.”

Twilight looked up at him. “But Princess Celestia is an alicorn!” she exclaimed. “She could have that kind of power!”

“How’d she get her ass beat by the changeling queen then?” Jordan asked.

Twilight gasped in pure shock. “She doesn’t have slaves!” she practically screamed at him. “That’s been illegal for ages, including for donkeys!”

Suddenly, Jordan’s hand found itself implanted on his face. “How’d she get beat by the changeling queen?” he mutters.

Twilight doesn’t answer.

“And how would she keep that power going constantly, twenty four seven?” Jordan asked.

“She doesn’t!” Twilight said. “She raises the sun and moves it like clockwork, every hour another shift!”

Jordan blinks. “That shouldn’t be possible!” he said. “Planets spin on a rotational axis!”

Twilight shakes her head. “Obviously not,” she said smugly.

Jordan looked out the window. “That shouldn’t be possibl- oh.” He grinned.

Twilight frowns. “What is it?” she asked.

“I think I know what Celestia is actually doing,” he said, giggling. “Celestia, you clever, clever bitch.”

“She’s an alicorn, not a dog,” Twilight said indignantly.

Jordan facepalmed again. “Nevermind…” he muttered. “But I think I know what she’s doing. Now, I’m gonna have to fill you in. Gravity is a force that pulls things down towards a large body of mass, but you already know that. But I don’t think you know that gravity can be used to hold things in orbit around objects, as you haven’t realized that the moon orbits Equis and Equis orbits the sun.”

Twilight shakes her head. “No, you can’t be serious,” she said.

“I am and if you want I could get NASA to make a time lapse of your planet in order to prove it,” he said. “Now, normally, this would be a smooth rotation that would work along with the spinning of the planet to create a natural day and night cycle. However, Celestia knows politics. She isn’t moving the sun. No, she and her sister are altering the rotation of the PLANET to make it SEEM like they are. They’re alicorns, and they can do that. It gives them more power and a better public image, but that isn’t the only reason they’re doing it. If she ‘raises the sun,’ it passes over a section of the planet rather quickly, leaving them light deprived, and as such, heat deprived. Now, once she started to do this, that section of the planet would start to freeze over and crops would wilt. Now, am I correct that Equis has industrial magic heating lamps and light lamps?”

Twilight dumbly nodded, unable to speak.

“As it starts to freeze over, guess who sweeps in with a solution?” Jordan continues. “Celestia and Luna! They offer to provide those light and heat lamps so everyone doesn’t die and their crops can grow! Naturally, in such a state, the ponies or whatever creatures are there agree. They start to pay for the lamps. Now guess who has a steady, consistent, and large flow of income? Equestria! It works out quite well for the princesses! So, I don’t think that Celestia and Luna are moving the sun, they’re just altering how your planet spins! It’s a HUGE political power play that works out quite well for Equestria! I must say, your princess is a brilliant pony. I would have NEVER thought of that.”

As her brain processed the information, Twilight slowly became more and more horrified. “W-what?” she stammers.

“Like I said, Celestia is a clever, clever bitch.”

And with that, Twilight fainted, toppling out of her seat.

Jordan looked down at her and frowned. “Oh.” He stood up and grabbed his backpack, and walked out of the room.

Spike was waiting outside. “You guys done in there?” he asked.

Jordan shakes his head. “No, but she passed out,” he said. “I think I broke her.”

“She does that sometimes,” said Spike, sighing. “She’ll be fine.”

Jordan smiled at that. “Oh good!” he cheerfully exclaimed. “I’d best be on my way. NASA’s gonna be wanting to hear from me.”

Spike extended a hand, which Jordan shook. “Bye, ape man!” Spike said.

“See ya, little dude,” he replied. He made his way out to the lawn of the library and typed something on his phone. Several ponies did double takes as he faded away before their eyes. And just like that, he was gone.

Spike watched him go before he turned around and walked to the kitchen. “Twilight’s gonna need tea when she wakes up,” he mutters. He set a kettle on the stove and sat down to wait for Twilight to come back to her senses. As the water heated, he wondered what could have caused Twilight to break this time. He probably would never find out, anyway.

END

Author's Note

This was a thing!
I've had this in my head for a while now and wanted to write it down. So I did, and it turned out something. I don't really know.
But yeah! Let me know what you think of this! And leave a comment if you spot an error. I'll fix it.