"Tracing the source of our computer errors," Starlight Glimmer said, "revealed a way to communicate with an entirely different world! A world nopony has ever seen or heard of! It's SO exciting!"

Twilight looked up at the front entrance of the Equestrian Data Analysis Bureau headquarters. She frowned. "Hmm. Why don't you start at the beginning?"

Starlight trotted towards the building, only once glancing back to check if Twilight was keeping up. "It all started with our new computing cluster design. It's more sophisticated than anything ponies have ever built before."

"Mmmhmm," Twilight said.

Starlight's unicorn magic opened a door. "After you."

Twilight entered the building, followed by Starlight. Twilight blinked, seeing a familiar face. "Moondancer! What a surprise to see you here!"

The sallow faced, sweater clad unicorn in question rolled her eyes. "I've been working here for a year, Twilight. Don't you keep up with any of your friends?"

Twilight laughed briefly at her own embarrassment. "I...don't think you've sent me any letters lately. How should I have found out?"

A light blue unicorn marched proudly into the room. "From your GRRREATEST and most POWERRRFUL FRRRRRIEND, of course! TRRRRIXXIE!"

Twilight blinked. "Trixie! Are you saying you told me about Moondancer working here?"

Trixie shook her head. "Maybe? Trixie isn't sure. Also, Trixie has noticed that sometimes, when Trixie talks for a while, you seem to stop paying attention."

"I'm sorry," Twilight said. "I guess...sometimes I get tired."

Moondancer rolled her eyes again. "Twilight, I assume you're here about the Interdimensional Computing Interference Communications Project."

"Yes!" Starlight said. "Twilight is here to learn about ICIC." She pronounced it 'ick-ick.' "So why don't you brief her, Moondancer?"

Moondancer sighed. She levitated a large and intricate diagram onto an easel. "As you probably already know, Twilight, designing advanced data processing systems is a CONSTANT struggle against electrical interference. Multiple data lines that are close to each other can interact through both induction and capacitance, causing noise and errors."

"Um...sure! I knew that!"

Moondancer's eyes narrowed. "Did you really?"

"No!" Twilight confessed beneath the heat of Moondancer's skeptical glare. "I had no idea! I know NOTHING about electronics! Spike even has to change the light bulbs for me! And the pegasus part of my alicorn nature makes me a continual static electricity hazard!" Twilight sobbed. "Ponyville's gaming arcade has BANNED me! When it comes to anything electronic, I'm a danger to myself and others!"

"Hmmm," Starlight said.

Moondancer nodded. "Thank you for being honest. Anyway, my point is that signals can leak between the different neighboring bits of a computer, causing errors. We try to design to avoid that."

"But TRRRRIXXIE discovered a whole new kind of interference and data leakage!" the blue unicorn announced proudly. "TRRRRRRIXXIEE achieved what no researcher had ever before accomplished!"

Moondancer snorted. "Trixie pushed several computers together and intentionally overheated them to use them as a popcorn popper."

"Another discovery by TRRRRRIXXIEEE the CREATIVE GENIUS!" Trixie bragged.

Moondancer said, "By moving everything around like an idiot, Trixie bolloxed the cabling and connections. I had to troubleshoot the problems she caused, so we could get things working again."

"But we had PEANUT BUTTER POPCORN to eat while you did it!" Trixie retorted.

"Anyway," Moondancer continued, "I eventually isolated the cause. It was, in fact, an entirely new kind of interference and data leakage."

"As the lead researcher responsible for this phenomenon, TRRRRIXXIEE has named the discovery 'TRIXIE RAYS!' Or T-RAYS for short."

Moondancer levitated another technical diagram onto the easel. "What we have here is an accidental connection to a computer network in another universe."

"Wow," Twilight said. "Amazing."

"Yes, I think so too. We can even communicate, send simple messages back and forth."

Twilight's eyes widened. "What kinds of messages?"

"So far, we can only send and receive text. And our only connection is to a system for posting and commenting on fictional stories."

"Can you READ these stories?" Twilight asked.

"Yes, the stories and comments APPEAR to be in a language very similar to our own Equestrian. But the problem is...the words are similar, but how do we know if the MEANING is similar as well?"

Twilight nodded. "An interesting question."

"That," Starlight said, "is where Trixie made her SECOND contribution to the project."

"Yes," Trixie agreed, "Trixie is a REPEAT creative genius. The BRILLIANT Trixie said, we can write messages in which letters are arranged so that when viewed on a display screen or outputted onto paper, the letters appear to form a shape, even a simple picture."

Twilight said, "Huh."

The blue unicorn bragged, "Trixie's genius mind decided, all we need to do is make pictures of scenes in those stories Starlight mentioned, and then find an excuse to ask the weird aliens if our pictures properly represent the scenes in their stories. And THIS is how we can solve the mystery of the TRUE MEANING of the aliens' words!"

Twilight nodded. "That's a genuinely clever idea, Trixie. I never would have expected...I mean, I'm impressed. So, when you show your pictures to the aliens, what do the aliens say?"

Trixie sighed. "Trixie keeps asking the aliens to look at Trixie's pictures, but the aliens just INSULT Trixie! It's unfair!" She levitated a stack of data printouts towards Twilight. "Moondancer even helped edit Trixie's requests, by replacing Trixie's name with a shorter, simpler word."

Twilight read the top page aloud. "Hi, your story is so creative and inspiring! I want to bring your story to life as pictures or even a comic strip! Right now I am open for commissions, so let's collaborate! We should work together and make this happen!"

Next Twilight read the reply, "GO AWAY SCAMMER! I HATE SPAM!"

Twilight paged through printout after printout. "Wow. These aliens really don't like you."

"Sometimes their insults are even more creative than their stories," Trixie agreed. "But a few of the aliens just keep wanting to talk about spoons and forks."

"Spoons and forks?" Twilight said. "I wonder why. Do you think cutlery has some kind of deep symbolic meaning in their world?"

Trixie shook her head. "No idea. But Trixie is deeply disappointed in those aliens for being so closed minded. Do you know not even ONE of those freaky alien weirdos is willing to collaborate with Trixie?"

Twilight shook her head. "I wonder what happened in that world to make them so hostile."

"Trixie thinks the aliens are just jerks. Trixie is just trying to be helpful, and they're just...SO MEAN!" Trixie wailed. "Trixie wants to hit them. Trixie wants to turn them into flowerpots. Trixie wants to insult them at least, but..." Trixie sobbed again.

Starlight shook her head. "It's against Equestrian government policy to insult alien creatures who live in another world, or turn them into flowerpots."

Twilight blinked. "Really? There's a policy for that?"

Starlight nodded. "It comes up more often than you might think."

"Huh." Twilight remembered a certain magical mirror, which Princess Celestia had classified as 'top secret.' "I guess that does make sense."

"So," Twilight said. "Does this mean your project is a failure?"

Trixie grinned deviously. "Not yet. The Great and Amazing TRRRRIXXIEEE has ANOTHER plan. If those stupid aliens won't let Trixie draw pictures for them...Trixie will simply take the OPPOSITE approach."

Asking for free artwork

Hello I am writing a story about an original character I thought up who is named TRIXIE, she is the prettiest and smartest unicorn in the world and she is so amazing and wonderful her magic shows are the best and if you ever met her you would love her and would someone please draw a picture of her for the story that I'm writing because I would be so very grateful.

TRIXIE THANKS YOU!

P.S. Because I don't know how to receive paintings through the computer, your picture should be a message that has letters arranged to form a shape that looks like something. Please tell me what that something is.

Replies (6)

• You moron, Trixie isn't an original character.
• I don't draw Mary Sues for free.
• What's this stuff about a message that has letters arranged to form shapes? Don't you know what a jpeg is?
• This is from the same user who sent out a hundred spam messages last week asking us to commission her as an artist. I don't think she's very smart.
• Does she live in a wagon because she is homeless and pathetic? Does she know she's ugly?
• Sounds like this TRIXIE is just some LOSER. Why don't you make up a GOOD character instead?

In a computer room late at night, as cooling fans whirred, Trixie ate peanut butter crackers and sobbed.

Now that she was asking for artwork instead of offering to draw it for free, the aliens hated her even more.

And how did someone know she lived in a wagon, and was homeless? Trixie had never told any of the aliens about that!

Were they spying on her? Could they see her somehow?

The aliens must be spying on Trixie through the computers!

Trixie went out to her wagon to get her biggest, best set of hammers, the best for pounding in tent stakes and for smashing things.

Author's Note

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AMAZING artwork by TRIXIE THE GREAT AND POWERFUL ARTIST