Here I sit in Celestia's office, listening to Celestia and myself (MYSELF!) talking. John Sampson is in my head!

'John, did you understand what I said," Celestia asked carefully.

I feel for him but nopony is there. "Your Majesty, I don't think he's here right now," ventured Bud. "Can you tell me how he got in my head?"

"Bud, philosophers could make a life's work out of trying to determine who is in whose head. I don't think it matters because neither of you is complete without the other. As to how you both got there, that's what this story is about. I was hoping that John could help me tell it. After all, he's the one that lived these parts of it." And with that, Celestia settled back to continue the story.

Before lunch ponies began arriving from town. They brought tables, chairs, food lockers, food, kitchenware, tableware, bedding, and all the things it took to make our own little Guard base in the barn. Construction ponies put a private room for John and Fred on one end of the barn and barracks for the soldiers on the other end.

Princess Twilight showed up just after lunch with Spike and plenty of parchment. She found Fred grazing out in the pasture as John leaned against a nearby tree. The sergeant had sent them out there so the townsponies could get some work done instead of just staring at them.

Twilight hailed John, “There you are. Can we talk for a few minutes? I have so many questions and so few answers.”

“Certainly,” John replied, “though I’m not sure how many answers I’ll have.”

Twilight pulled out a list and started from the top, “Where did you come from?”

“I came from a trail through the Big Thicket in East Texas, one of the United States on the planet Terra in the Milky Way Galaxy,” John answered.

Spike carefully recorded his answer.

“Where did you find yourself in Equestria?”

“I don’t know. I came to rather hazily on bare dirt in darkness with Fred nosing me. I smelled smoke so when he wanted me to get up and move it seemed like a good idea. When the sun came up, we were in woods not far from where your soldiers found me.”

“When was that?”

“According to my phone it was June fourth two years ago. Today is July second.”

“What happened to send you here?”

“I don’t have the first clue.”

“Has this ever happened to you or anypony that you know of before?”

“No.”

“Do you know how to return to your home?”

“I suspect that this is my home now because I know absolutely nothing about how I got here much less how to get back.”

“. . . . . . Celestia?” Four hundred years!

“John! How are you?” The Princess looked hopeful.

“I’m confused. Did you say ‘four hundred years’?” Four hundred years!

“Four hundred and twenty two altogether, John. You knew that was a possibility.” Celestia watched John carefully.

But I remember the day she was describing like it was last week! “I remember that day. Twilight had so many questions. Every time I thought she had run out she would produce another page. So I decided to ask some questions of my own.”

“Princess, slow down for a minute please,” John interrupted. “Surely I get a few questions of my own.”

“Uh . . .Okay,” she answered.

“Who and what is the little scaly purple guy? He’s obviously not a pony.”

Twilight looked briefly puzzled, “That’s Spike. He’s a baby Dragon and my number one assistant.”

John smiled and turned toward Spike. “Hello, Spike. Pleased to meet you.”

Spiked grinned sheepishly, “Thank you, John. Don’t mind Twi. She gets kinda obsessive whenever she finds something new and you are the biggest ‘new thing’ she’s seen in a while. She’ll come back down to Earth once she thinks she has you properly cataloged.”

Turning back to Twilight, John said, “Princess, I need to know something about ponies so my answers can have proper context. For example, I’ve no seen sign at all of anything electrical. Do you understand and use electricity? Without that context things like the phone I mentioned earlier wouldn’t mean much to you.”

Twilight sighed, “Of course we understand electricity, John. The Pegasi have complete control of the weather including lightning.”

“What else do you do with electricity?” John asked.

“Well, lightning can make a powerful weapon. But it’s really too destructive to use it around ponies all the time.”

“O. K. Show and tell time Princess.” John reached into his pocket and pulled out his phone. “I was planning to take some pictures but this will be even more useful. This a Centipede Model 61 smartphone. It’s booting for the next few seconds.”

“Oh! Is that a picture of Fred?” Twilight exclaimed. “That’s a very fine picture.”

“Yes it is. But that’s just decoration. If I touch one of the little icons, it can do things for me. The calculator, for example, can perform any mathematical operation that you can imagine. It can play music or store millions of pictures. But the best part, the part that will only work when I am on Terra, is that it will connect to a global network. I can use this network to see and/or speak to anyone anywhere as long as they have a phone too. And I can search the collected knowledge of mankind for answers to any question. That’s every book, magazine, paper, show, whatever that is recorded anywhere.”

“Uh. . . Princess?” No response. “Princess Twilight? Are you okay?” John pleads with Spike, “Can you help? I think I broke her.”

The Princess is frozen with eyes wide and wings straight up staring at John’s hand. Spike waves a claw in front her eyes but she doesn’t blink. “John, maybe you should go somewhere else for a little while. I’ll take care of her.”

As John ducked behind the barn he ran into Swift Trail complete with the biggest grin he had ever seen on a pony. “Oh, John,” she giggled, “You’re in for it now!”

“Swift! Why is it funny that I’m in trouble for hurting the Princess?”

That set off a fit of full laughter from Swift Trail. “Oh My! You don’t know. John, the Princess isn’t hurt, she’s in heat.”

“What the hell are you talking about!!”

“The wings, John, it’s the wings. When a winged pony is ready to mate their wings stick straight up to get them out of the way. It's a reflex. The Pegusi call it a ‘wing boner’. You should know about royal privilege too. She’s a Princess so she can simply command any unattached stallion to service her and he can’t refuse. No pony would refuse anyway. It’s a great privilege.”

“NO NO NO NO ! ! !”

“Why not, John? You check a lot of boxes. Big. Strong. Intelligent. Exotic. Once you get into pony society you are going to have more mares than you know what to do with.”

“Swift, please, there’s something you don’t know about this. It isn’t me that set her off.”

“Who else was there? It couldn’t be Spike, he’s way too young. And Fred was fifty yards away. Who’s left?”

“It was my phone!” John moaned. “I was showing her my smartphone when she locked up.”

“What in the bloody blue blazes is a ‘smartphone’ and how would it do that to her?”

“This is a smartphone,” John replied pulling it out of his pocket. “I was explaining to her how Terra was covered by a global network that let me use this phone to search every library on the planet for the answer to any question when she just froze.”

“Please, tell me you didn’t.” As Swift Trail began to giggle uncontrollably. The giggling degenerated to laughter which accelerated until Swift Trail was rolling on the ground completely out of control.

“What’s so damned funny?”

“Oh, John. I’m sorry but it’s just too funny. Princess Twilight Sparkle has a major book fetish. She spends all of her spare time cataloging her personal library and researching arcane subjects. And you just walk up and show her the ultimate library. And she has a major wing boner for it!” Swift Trail broke down with uncontrolled laughter again.

Several minutes later: “John, it would probably be better if you didn’t tell anypony about this. Twilight Sparkle is a nice mare and doesn’t have a mean bone in her body but it still isn’t wise to offend an Alicorn.”

Celestia said through intermittent giggles, “Oh, John. You did manage to get yourself into some situations, didn’t you. Is Bud in there with you?”

Looking around. Bud? Can you hear me, Bud? “I don’t feel alone but I can’t give you anything more specific than that. She doesn’t answer when called.” Bud, if you can hear me look for a way to talk. We have a lot to say to each other.

Author's Note

This is the seed that grew into this story. I've read several stories of human tech in Equestria and have never been quite satisfied. Then the image of naive, bookish Twilight confronted with the raw power of google entered my mind and I couldn't get rid of it. It's still growing.