Date with the Delivery Mare

It was a normal day, as normal as delivering packages to an alien species could have been.

Brisk adjusted her Amazon branded hat with her magic. The thing was constantly wobbling around her horn as she drove, and while wearing it inside the van wasn't necessary, constantly taking it off and then putting it back on for the sun as soon as she stepped out of the van was far more annoying than occasionally readjusting it to sit back on her dark purple mane. The steering wheel turned, brining the two right side wheels onto the gravel of the sideroad shoulder.

The gas pedal came up without a glow to keep it down, and as soon as the van came to a stop, the turquois aura pressed down on the park button sticking out on the stick from the steering wheel. It didn't take long, the newer vans were all electric, meaning that releasing the gas pedal was the same as hitting the breaks; it wouldn't've rolled away even if she hadn't parked it.

The work was easy, and generally monotonous from start to finish. Despite constantly being under the attention of mostly well meaning humans, the job was oddly lonely. Ten hour shifts were nothing new, but ten hour shifts with nothing but her and a van would have grated on her if it wasn't so new. Dogs were the only real annoying thing, the vast majority didn't know what to make of her, which was admittedly nothing to complain about. It was the angry ones that made her heart race when she heard a bark from around the corner of a house. Nice dog or no, she wouldn't be hanging around if one came running, apparently dogs here couldn't be reasoned with.

That being said, normal day. Her head was elsewhere, tuned out into the workflow. At the moment, that meant being focused entirely on the wild order of the package locations. She used to think that you were meant to count up, but apparently the humans in charge of organizing this little operation believed that numbers had no order, and should only vaguely be related when attached in any sort of pattern. She was glad for the many screens that told her what package she was grabbing, the address, whether it was in a box or an envelope, the works. Though whether or not the info was accurate was also a toss up, so she grumbled as she stepped into the confines of the back of the van.

He muzzle stuck down into a bag full of packages to get a good look as her magic sifted through them. In short order, the package was retrieved and she stepped backwards into the cabin to retrieve the company phone from its stand. The workflow was easy, if a little convoluted. She used the magic surrounding the phone to work the touch screen.

'parked' followed by 'scan package' and then the beep of the package being scanned. Normally that would just lead to the 'go deliver the package now' screen, but instead popped up with a warning that the stop in question required a password.

Her lips pursed, but she prepared a smile and stepped out of the van onto the gravel. It was a moody evening, and the air was filled with moisture that had yet to properly fall from the sky. The short road was down another back road just outside a city center, the fact that it was gravel was subconsciously odd to her, but she wasn't truly paying attention. The house itself was small, condensed to her eyes, but it was filled on the outside with detail and life. Clearly old, and clearly loved. That, or someone who just happened to have a lot of random stuff lying around, an eye for exterior design, and a whole lotta time on their hooves decided to go to town.

Hands.

Whatever.

She trotted up the driveway, passing by a oddly new looking red Buick model. That was a good sign, it meant the customer was actually probably home, instead of the last few password stops she'd done where the customer hadn't even realized it was the option they had selected.

Without deliberation, she stepped right up to the side door, choosing to bang her hoof on the exterior screen door since they tended to be louder.

It was a normal day, as normal as being 'busy worked' to death by a co-op job could have been.

Emanuel's head sat evenly in his left hand as his right maneuvered a mouse around on the base of a laptop sitting in front of him on top of the bed he sat upon. He was slouched forwards, half asleep as the green and white of Microsoft Excel shifted with number and words his glazed eyes didn't truly see. He clicked a few times, and nothing changed.

Working for this company paid a decent amount of money, but it was the most boring nonsense he'd ever seen. If he tried, and he'd honestly considered it, just for the challenge, he never would have been able to come up with something more pointless.

Just counting, resending a document, counting again, and then repeat until he fall asleep or died from the blood desperately trying to escape the torture happening in his eyes, screens will do that. Still, that kind of day was average for him, nothing new, and he bore the brunt of pointlessly staring at the screen for hours a day since the company had basically put him on 'work from home' duty, since he didn't own a car.

Turns out, despite having taxi friends, and being willing to walk into work every day didn't matter to the belt loop, button down people in charge. He chuckled lightly to himself, remembering the poor desk attendant who prayed after seeing him walk into the office after the short hike there through the snow. The screen laid totally forgotten now.

His life wasn't exactly perfect, but hey, nobody's was right? At least he was making some of that sweet, sweet cash moh-neigh. That's more than a lot of people could say.

His head suddenly slid from his left hand as there was a knock at the door. His brain, desperate to do literally anything else, dove into the context of the social contract everybody unconsciously signed when they were born. Three knocks, hard ones in quick succession. That meant that whoever was at the door wasn't going to leave, business or someone who was supposed to be here.

That meant he had to get up, thank God.

He carefully rolled himself to the side, and around his laptop, doing his best impression of a combat roll by flipping off the low bed onto his feet. There was some silly satisfaction in landing evenly, but he was quick to banish the thought as he made his way out of the tiny room, into the hallway, out into the kitchen, and towards the side door.

The side door was pretty much the front door, yes it was on 'the side' but the side was the front so...

Ignoring that, Emanuel was the kind of guy totally uninterested with his safety, so despite there being windows and a peephole, there was zero hesitation before he spun the lock and threw the door open. The tiny reminder that popped into the back of his head that he was in a slightly seedier place in Michigan raised his hackles just enough for him to be prepared for what was on the other side.

A smile, a dark toned, cartoon sized horse, with massive expressive eyes and a mane that must have been the envy of every sub-sixteen teenage girl everywhere. It stepped forwards the moment the door was open and raised a hoof in a way that was definitely impossible.

"Hel-"

"Jesus fuck!" The interaction was cut short as the man's fight or flight instincts kicked in. Two hands went flapping in the direction of the door, it didn't matter which one hit, but the door slam closed in the next instant. He stood there, awkwardly wide eyed staring at the closed door with his heart in his mouth.

"What the fuck was that." He asked aloud, mostly to get try and get the spontaneous anxiety out of his mouth. Was there literally just an alien outside? "Oh shit." His body went cold, "Oh no, I've lost it. I've gone completely insane." In his opinion, there wasn't really a thing called 'completely insane' only versions of social dissidence. Though, reality warping auditory and visual hallucinations were about as close as he figured you could get to proper insanity.

There was another, softer knock on the screen door. It was slower, and very intentional. One could display an amount of information through all forms of communication, and that knock said: 'please open the door, I'm just as confused as you are.'

Emanuel, instead, checked the peep hole. Behind the safety of the door, though it struck out at him that it might not really be that safe, he got a good look. The visual only confirmed what he saw. There was a small horse, a pony, if his memory served correct on general horse terms, with bluish grey fur and a mop of blue and purple mane tied back into a ponytail sitting at the door. She had vibrant turquois eyes, and a horn glowing the same colour. That's where he really got confused, the additional floating Amazon package, and the hat she was wearing answered a few questions, but not... the most obvious one.

"Okay." He mumbled to himself, trying and failing to grasp what was going on. "Okay. Yup. Pony." He did a quick reality check, striking a pose and trying to make the microwave explode with his mind. That didn't work, so he pinched himself and when that didn't work, he tried to come up with twelve random numbers in rapid sequence. That never really yielded any useful information, which was supposedly a good thing.

The bad news was that he was supposedly awake, and there was someone at the door. Even if he was hallucinating, there may still be a person behind that visage, and they were probably as confused as he was due to his sudden lack of sanity. He had a bad habit of just accepting fluctuating reality when he should probably be asking more questions.

So he tentatively reached for the door, holding his breath as he twisted the nob and pulled it open again.

As the door opened, the tiny horse in question stepped away from the door, still smiling a customer service smile that Emanuel didn't think reached her eyes. She had a horse face, so it was pretty hard to tell. "Hi, I'm here to deliver a package?"

The voice was so clear, it made him blink in confusion; it was definitely not a human voice, and not one he could have possibly heard through his mind warping his perceptions. Being asleep meant that he could fool his own reason, but that was out of the window. Human minds were distinctly incapable of spontaneously producing unique experiences, which led him to one particular thought that left him staring out into space.

This was real. She was real.

"Excuse me?" She said, taking a tentative step forwards and leaning down into his line of sight. "I need a password, for this particular delivery. You don't look like an-" She floated the package towards her face, something that made Emanuel's eyes widen with barely controlled 'lack of understanding' "Jamie Sawyer? Is she home?"

Emanuel blinked a few times, and got his words out from under his confusion. "Uh..." It wasn't perfect.

She smirked, and there was a kind of half humored sarcasm that drifted into her alien voice, "What's wrong? Never seen a pony before?" She had an accent, her 'o's came out more like 'uh's that were stretched out just a little to thin to be recognizable.

"No?" He questioned aloud, still trying to grapple with what was happening. His mind had once again presented the fact that there may simply just be an alien outside, but that didn't explain... anything.

"Wel-" Her response was cut off as she scrunched her muzzle. "Wait. Really?"

"Uh-huh." He said, dumbly.

"Oh." The package floated away from her vision as a less sarcastic, non-customer service smile adorned her features, "I understand the door slam now." Can horses even giggle? She did, it was cute, if a little terrifying.

He blinked a few more times, "Sorry about that..."

A hoof lifted from the ground and bent impossibly again as she waved off the apology. "It's no biggie, I get it. It's the first time somebody's responded to me like that though. Ponies have been all over the news for years now, haven't they?"

This is... actually happening, holy shit. He thought, desperately trying to wrestle himself back under reasonable control. "I... try to stay away form the news, and social media, that stuff hurts my head." Moderate success, he didn't stutter, that was an accomplishment for the current circumstance.

"You must have been really under a rock then." She joked, though there was something else in her eyes, interest? Curiosity? How could an entirely different life form have that recognizable spark of curiosity?

Emanuel threw caution to the wind and drew upon his repertoire of social interaction skills, "More like a boulder." He joked, and then, "She's not home, but I can call her, you said you needed a password?"

She nodded, bouncing her ponytail, "Yup, it just means it's an expensive package. I'm not allowed to leave it without it." As she was speaking, her eyes locked onto the phone he pulled out from his khaki pants. More like a brick, it flipped open with a bit of dexterity, and he pressed a few buttons. He wasn't sure if she could hear the ringing, but her ears flicked towards him just after he dialed. Her eyes were still locked onto the phone as she spoke again, "What kind of phone is that?"

"It's a flip phone, never seen one before?" He asked back, mentally ignoring the process of rationalizing the situation.

"No I-" She was cut off by Emanuel heavily tilting his head into the phone, playing it up so she could tell for certain the woman on the other side had just answered. The older woman's voice came from the low quality speaker.

"Hey, Jamie. You got a delivery, Amazon... delivery... person... is at the door, they say they need a password to drop it off."

If the pony was offended by his lack of accurate identifier, she didn't show it, she just took a tiny step forward and said, "It'll be in an email, the one associated with the account she made the order with."

Emanuel repeated the details back through the phone, "She says the password is in an email, the same one you used to order the package." There was a couple of 'hmm's' of deliberation as the woman on the other end of the line worked out what was going on. Luckily it didn't take her long, and the silence ended as the woman said the number over the phone.

"Ready?" Emanuel asked, trying to read the body language as the pony nodded and a flat-screen phone floated up off her back. "4-5-2-3-9-9" As he spoke, he watched as the phone moved slightly in the air after each number, like someone was poking the floating thing. Once he was done, the orange bar at the bottom stopped being greyed out, and the pony floated it over to her face.

"That's it, thanks." She did a few more things on the phone, and levitated the package over to the ground near edge of the open side of the screen door.

Emanuel realized that he should have probably opened the screen door. He doubted that vampire rules applied here, in addition to the fact that if a physics defying pony wanted to get inside, the plastic and metal probably wouldn't've stopped them. She looked up as he opened the door all the way and stepped outside, letting the door swing closed softly onto his shoulder.

She gave him a look as he tried to think of something to say, "Is that all?" He eventually settled on.

"Uh-huh." She raised an eyebrow, "You've really never heard of ponies before?"

"I have..." He said, trailing off, "An unreasonable amount of questions, and feel like I may be going insane."

His non sequitur seemingly caught her off guard, but a mischievous smile graced her features as the phone slipped into a pocket on her high-vis blue vest, and a marker and a piece of paper came floating into vision. "I'll tell you what." She said, scribbling away on the paper, "I know this nice restaurant near Holly, here's my number." She levitated the paper up to him. Emanuel stowed away his panic and grabbed the thing normally, hoping to not offend her. Who knows? What if refusing to take something from a pony's telekinesis was like, illegal? Or something? His internal dialogue was interrupted as she continued, "I've got a shift to finish, but... join me tomorrow for dinner? I can tell you all about myself then." She smiled, waiting for his response.

He dumbly said, "Yeah, sure."

"Great! Text me, and I'll give you the details." Then she walked off. It was only then did Emanuel realize that she wasn't wearing clothes aside from the vest, and averted his gaze to the slip of paper with a particularly strange, not phone looking string of numbers on it.

His brain caught up to what had just happened as she clambered into a long, sleek looking electric van at the edge of the drive way. She didn't close the sliding door, so they met eyes and she smiled and waved as the van drove off.

"Did..." He trailed off. Staring at where the van just was. "Did she just ask me out?"

The moist summer air did not provide a convenient answer, so he did a comedic looking heel turn and stepped inside, forgetting about the woman on the phone, and the package that was outside on the ground. He power walked back to the guest room and sat on the floor against the bed, pulling his laptop down and opening Google.

"Welp." A quick search was pretty much all it took. There was a wide, eye catching banner with 'ponies' and pictures of them sitting on top of the search results page. It was a dot gov website, something federal. It depicted visitors from another dimension, the ponies in question, and outlined a series of details, had an excerpt from their supposed leader, someone named Princess Twilight Sparkle, and a bunch of other almanac'd details about their world and culture.

The entire thing was just over a year old. Apparently the question had been answered, humans were not alone, the multiverse was indeed a thing, and he just totally missed it.

It took getting asked out to dinner by an interdimensional traveler to catch up to the rest of the world.

"God I am thick." He mumbled looking through a couple of digital photo's of their homeworld. Painted hills, coloured skies, it was cinematic as all get out; the castle built into the side of a mountain was pretty cool, but magic was his main focus. Like he'd always suspected, magic was real. Ponies had apparently mastered it, alongside some of the other magical races of their world, and used it to travel here.

Basically, in exchange for trade, technology, cultural mixing, and the permission to found a permanent colony on earth; ponies were providing experts on magic, raw valuable materials that were plentiful on their world, and a whole bunch of food.

Instant transportation meant that infrastructure no longer mattered, and the ponies were all to happy to donate food to the starving peoples around the world. Group of refugees trapped in a warzone? The ponies just opened a gate directly from their world to there, and evacuated all of the innocents. It was the crux of their PR, solving problems with magic that human's couldn't. International borders be damned, who was going to stop the magic winged unicorn that could apparently move their star with her mind. Pegasi were reversing climate change, earth ponies were fertilizing the lands, unicorns were promising all sorts of innovations to their world.

That, and he could think of a massive lists of horrendously powerful individuals and groups alike that would love to technologicasize magic. If humans could figure that out, they'd be masters of their world. It took them less than a couple thousand years to basically shit through their planet's safety nets, with magic, he could see humans making colony ships within his lifetime.

Of the few topics, the one that pertained to his situation the most was the 'pony integration initiative.' Ponies from Equestria, preselected, would come to Earth and just... live earth lives, to see if it was possible. On paper? Possible. This project seeked to prove it in reality.

The mare's face was on the photo gallery of ponies that were apparently living on earth. She worked at Amazon, if he hadn't imagined that. Her name wasn't listed, nor her residence, which was good. Privacy and all that. Despite it, the federal site was masterfully made, and surprisingly open, with none of the 'we can't divulge that information at this time' crap that people in charge usually loved to spout.

"What... Is my life right now." He chuckled, a confused smile coming to his face as he leaned away from the computer. "I mean, sure! Why not, let's..." He pulled open his phone, "Let's do this now." A quick couple of keystrokes and he had pulled open a new text tab with her number in it.

'Hey, this is that guy from your password delivery. I didn't give my name, or get yours. I'm Emanuel.'

He eventually settled on after several iterations of typing. He didn't want to still seem confused as hell, so he went with something simple. There was no immediate response, and Emanuel sure as hell wasn't going to go back to work after something as eye opening as that. So he just... took a breath, and waited. Sometimes it was okay to just let time pass through.