The God Particle

Chapter 8: A New Day in Ponyville

Twilight awoke early the next morning and stretched before getting out of bed and getting down from the loft. The first rays of the morning sun were just starting to show through the window. She noticed James was already up and was sitting in the spot where they had been reading the other day. He looked to be rather lost in thought as he stared at something he was holding.

"Good morning, James," she finally said as she walked over to him.

"Oh ... Good morning, Twilight," he said in a forlorn tone of voice without looking up from what he was staring at.

"Is something wrong James?" she said as moved over to him and sat down on her haunches beside him, a look of concern on her face.

"Today is Christmas Day. It's the biggest holiday of the year where I am from ...", he paused for several long moments, the unicorn just watching him and waiting for him to continue. "It happened ... This is all real ... I admit that now ... I don't know how it happened but it did, and I am really here. I accept that now Twilight," he said, still sounding sad.

Twilight just continued to sit next to him and listen... Although she glanced down at what he was holding. It was a photograph with James himself, and several other people on it.

"That's my mom, and my dad. And my sister, and her two children," he said pointing at the different people in the picture, answering Twilight's unasked question. "And that's my grandmother and my grandfather," he pointed again, pausing several moments and sniffing a few times. Twilight could tell he was on the verge of tears. "I should have listened to my colleague Eric ... I should have left the lab that night and gone home for the holidays. I should have at least called them ... Because now I am here ... and I can never go back ... And now ... I'm never going to see any of them again," he could no longer hold back the tears and he started to sob silently.

Twilight looked at him with sympathy and wrapped a foreleg over his shoulder and neck, pulling him towards her until the side of his face was pressed against the warm fur of her shoulder. He buried his face against her shoulder and mane and continued silently sobbing for about a minute while Twilight kept her foreleg wrapped firmly around him. There wasn't really anything she could think of to say that might comfort him. She hoped that just being there for him and letting him cry on her would help him. Finally she spoke.

"I'm sorry, James... I truly am," she spoke compassionately. "But you shouldn't second guess your decision to work late. You could not have foreseen the earthquake. Neither can you know what would have happened if you had not worked late." She wanted to mention the fact that instead of ending up here, he might have ended up dead if a building collapsed on him during the quake or if he fell into a sink hole, or any number of other ways the quake might have killed him. She decided against it though. Even though she was sure he had already thought about it, bringing up something that would remind him that those closest to him might not have even survived the quake would only hurt him more.

He sobbed into her shoulder and mane for a bit longer, her foreleg still wrapped firmly around him as she tried to comfort him. Finally, he lifted his head off of her shoulder and wiped away a few remaining tears as she released him from her grasp. "Thanks ... Twilight," he managed to say with a small smile.

Twilight patted him on the back with her hoof gently. "Come on, lets get ready to go. Rarity will probably have your clothes ready by now. And a lot of the other ponies want to meet you," she said, hoping that giving him something to do would take his mind off of the depression.

James nodded slightly and stood up, wiping the last few tears away from his face as Twilight lead him to the door.

She looked back at him as she opened it. "Oh, I talked to Cheerilee last night. She's the school teacher here. She can't wait to meet you and would very much like for you to give a guest talk to her students on science."

"A guest talk to her students?" James raised an eyebrow. "Sure ... I suppose I can do that. Just ask her what day she wants I guess, since it seems my schedule is pretty free right now. But make sure to give me enough time to gather things together to use for the talk."

"Great! And you are, of course, welcome to take anything from my lab here that you need for the talk," Twilight smiled. "Cheerilee will be thrilled, and I'm sure her students will be too."

James nodded and smiled a bit again as he followed her outside. They hadn't gone very far before before Twilight suddenly stopped. "Oh my gosh! I almost forgot! I have to talk to the mayor this morning! Uh ... I hate to leave you hanging on your own James, but you remember how to get to Rarity's right?"

James nodded. "Yes, I think I can find it."

"Alright. I'll catch up with you later then," Twilight responded as she pointed at a vibrantly colored building decorated with cupcakes and candy canes. "That's Sugarcube Corner. Feel free to stop by there after you are done at Rarity's if you are hungry."

James nodded and waved at her as she trotted off to meet with the mayor. Then he turned around and looked left, then right, and then off ahead of him. He realized now that, in fact, he really didn't remember how to find his way back to Rarity's. He sighed and just started walking forward, figuring sooner or later he would run into someone he could ask, although it was still pretty early in the morning.

He hadn't walked for more than a couple of minutes before he suddenly heard a sound behind him. Before he could turn around to see what it was, he felt something slam into his shoulders and back from above and behind him. He gave a muffled yelp of surprise as the wind was knocked out of him and he was roughly slammed to the ground face-first. In a panic, he quickly tried to push himself up off the ground with his hands, but two hooves quickly pressed down on both his shoulders, pinning him back down with surprising strength. The creature pinning him down spoke.

"Where is she! Did you ditch her somewhere? Where are you holding her? Are you a spy?"

He grunted as he instantly recognized the voice of Rainbow Dash. "Not you again," he groaned and tried to push himself up off the ground again, once more to no avail. "Get off of me, would you?" he said in an annoyed tone.

"Not until you answer my questions!" the cyan pegasus responded, pushing down more firmly on him and preventing him from moving. "Where is she?" she demanded again.

"She had a meeting with the mayor she had to go to!" he responded indignantly, having now given up on trying to escape from her. "And I was on my way to Rarity's to pick up some new clothes!"

"A likely story ... If you were trying to get to Rarity's, you were going the wrong way!"

He sighed again, shaking his head as best he could considering how tightly he was pinned. "You know Rainbow Dash, I've met some crazy girls in my lifetime ... But you ... You take the grand prize," he said exasperatedly as he tried to free himself from her pin again to no avail.

"That doesn't answer my question! And besides, if you think I am the crazy girl around Ponyville, wait until you spend some time with Pinkie Pie. Now, why were you going the wrong way?" she demanded again.

"Oh for god's sake, give me a break, would you Dash? I haven't even been in Ponyville for a whole day yet. Excuse me if I don't know my way around town and get lost easily!"

Rainbow Dash hesitated for a moment as she continued to keep him pinned. "I suppose that makes sense," she finally conceded, but still snickered a bit. "I was wrong about it taking ten seconds flat to put you on the ground. It only took me one second flat!" she giggled.

"It was hardly fair. I wasn't ready and I wasn't expecting it," he rolled his eyes.

"Well, it's not my fault you let your guard down and weren't aware of your surroundings."

"Where I am from, humans don't have to worry about crazy predators trying to pounce on them from the sky!" he retorted. "Now, will you please let me up?"

The pegasus snickered again and finally stepped off of him as he got back to his hands and knees, brushing the dirt off of himself and spitting a little bit of dirt out of his mouth before standing up again and glaring at her, to which she just responded with an innocent smirk.

James shook his head again and sighed. "So which way is it to Rarity's anyway?"

Rainbow giggled a bit again, "Come on. I'll take you over there," she said as she motioned in the opposite direction he had been walking. "But I'm watching you!" her voice became serious again. James blinked and started walking along side her. For a moment, there was just silence between the two. James decided that as long as she was here, he might as well take the opportunity to ask her some questions.

"Do you have aircraft here? Like supersonic ones? When I was out in the woods earlier, I saw something fly over me  at very high speed and it made a sonic boom. But it was also trailing a strange vapor trail behind it. It looked almost like a rainbow."

Rainbow grinned proudly. "That was me. I flew right over you I guess. I'm the only pegasus in all of Equestria that can pull off the sonic rainboom!" she said in a tone that sounded too arrogant for James's liking. He stopped walking and just looked at her oddly. She stopped and looked back at him.

"You don't believe me, do ya?" she finally asked.

"As a matter of fact, no I do not. I don't believe you can break the sound barrier. I see no way you could possibly produce enough forward momentum to do that."

"Come on then! I'll show you! The rest of the ponies don't like it when I do it over town cause it breaks their windows sometimes. So I have to go outside of town, Come with me and I'll show you!"

James raised an eyebrow. "Let you drag me outside of town? So you can beat me to a bloody pulp without Twilight around to stop you like she did last time you tried to pick a fight with me? No thanks."

Rainbow giggled, "That's tempting. But no, I'm not going to do that. I just wanna show you I really can create a sonic rainboom. Now hop on," she said, motioning at her back, "We can fly out there."

He had a surprised look now as his eyes scanned over her over for a few moments before responding again.

"Uh ... Looking at your wings, and taking various aerodynamic constraints into account ... some quick mathematical calculations in my head suggest that ... well ... you wouldn't be able to carry me ... And even if you could, your center of gravity would be so far off with me riding you that you would not be able to land safely ..."

"Oh come on!" she punched him in the side with a hoof lightly, but still enough to cause him to wince. "Have a little faith in my flying abilities. Just get on," she prompted again.

"Oh yeah ... That's just what I want to do," he deadpanned. "Ladies and gentlemen, from the cockpit, this is Captain Dash. Our flight today will take us over Ponyville where we will narrowly avoid crashing into trees and other objects. After that, we will barely miss smacking right into the side of those mountains over there before finally coming in for a landing, in which we will just miss landing on other living beings. So sit back, relax, and try to enjoy your terrifying flight," he said sarcastically.

Rainbow Dash sighed and smacked him with her hoof again. "Just get on!" she said one more time.

James stared at her for a few more moments, sighed in resignation. "This is, without a doubt, the stupidest thing I've ever done in my life," he said as he gave in and started to climb onto her back. "Be gentle ... I've never even ridden a horse before ... Much less a flying one," he pleaded with her.

Rainbow Dash just grinned back at him, making sure he was secure  before taking off into the sky. James closed his eyes and held on for dear life. To Dash's credit though, she was being gentle and being careful not to do anything that would cause him to fall off.

James finally opened his eyes, still amazed that she was actually able to carry him as they flew over Ponyville. Finally, he got up the courage to look down. Even though he was still rather nervous about flying on Dash's back, and of the potential of falling off, he was still interested in the aerial view of Ponyville, which gave him a new perspective on the land. It didn't take long before the town of Ponyville started to thin out and he noticed they flew over a farmhouse with a large barn and a huge apple orchard. He tapped her on the shoulder—since it was hard for them to hear each other with the wind noise from the flying—and pointed down at the orchard below, leaning down close to her muzzle so he could hear her response.

"That's Applejack's family orchard. We can stop there on the way back," she said rather loudly to make sure he could hear her over the wind noise.

He nodded in response, and then resumed scanning the ground below them as even the orchards and farmlands began to thin out into rolling hills and meadows. Every once in awhile, they would hit a few small bumps—areas of light turbulence that caused James to hold on a little tighter. The cyan pegasus wasn't protesting though. He turned to look behind them as the buildings in town were rapidly starting to fade into the distance, become concerned that they were getting a little too far away from Ponyville. He was just about to voice that concern to Dash when she started to circle an open field and begin her decent. He closed his eyes again. This was the part he worried about the most. Even if she had been able to fly while carrying him, he was still concerned that with him on her back, she would not be able to control her pitch at these slower landing speeds. That she would stall out, and crash.

The pegasus swooped down low, spread her wings like an eagle, slowing her decent as she floated on the air just above the ground before landing far more gracefully than James would have thought possible given the previous aircraft carrier deck style landings he had seen her make. For a moment, he didn't even realize they had landed, having felt only the slightest of bumps when her hooves touched the ground. He opened his eyes after realizing they were on the ground and breathed a sigh of relief before getting off of her, looking at her with a look of disbelief.

Rainbow Dash looked back at him for a few moments before giggling a bit. "Well, go on. Say it," she said to him in her arrogant voice again.

He shook his head and sighed again. "Fine ... You were right and I was wrong ... I don't know how you did it without getting us both killed. But somehow you did."

"I told you all you had to do was trust me," she smiled. "Now, I'll show you my sonic rainboom. You might want to cover your ears. I'm gonna make a low pass when I do it."

"Uh ... Ok ... But be careful with the high speed low pass stuff, ok? If you dig a crater in the ground and get yourself killed, Twilight will have my head. That and I don't want to have her worried ... Or have the royal guard after me if she thinks I ran away or something ... So lets try to make it quick and get back to Ponyville soon."

"You're with me. What could possibly go wrong?" Dash responded indignantly.

"Yeah ..." he deadpanned. "Well, how about we get this little air show started so we can get back. Come on and show me."

"Watch and learn ... And prepare to be amazed!" she grinned as she took off into the sky rapidly, quickly turning and flying down range for a distance until she was just a spec on the horizon. She did a knife edge turn and starting heading back towards James again.

James yawned a bit as he watched her coming back, but his eyes got wide as he saw a vapor cone start to form around her. Suddenly the vapor cone expanded and a rainbow disc exploded behind her, followed by a rainbow trail following her. He didn't hear any sound or even wind noise  coming from her, but she was approaching at a very high rate of speed.

"Oh shit ..." he said to himself as he quickly covered his ears, realizing what was going on, still unable to hear any sound He knew that would change soon as she continued to close in very fast. She silently passed him at close range. Then it happened. A split second after she had passed, sound caught up with where she had been. All of the sound of the sonic boom hit him with a shock-wave powerful enough that it threw him off his feet, causing him to hit the ground, cussing again as he got even more scraped up from the fall. He rolled back to his knees and got to his feet, looking off in the distance at the rainbow trail she had left, although he was no longer able to see her since she had traveled so far so quickly.

"That crazy ... she actually did it ... No way, she couldn't have ... But I saw it. And more importantly, I heard it," he said to himself, his mind working overtime to try to figure out how it was possible, but drawing a blank. He saw her—actually the rainbow—make a loop as she turned around and came back towards him. "Shit!" he said as he hit the dirt again, thinking she intended to do another supersonic pass near him. But then she started to slow down and the rainbow trail began to disappear. He stood back up as she continued to slow down and eventually landed in front of him, smirking at him. A few seconds later, the sound from the other direction caught up with her. A second loud crack echoed across the land as the sonic boom hit again.

"Oh yeah! Don't you just love that sound?" she giggled.

James just stared at her for a moment before speaking again. "How did you ... I mean what ... How can you do ..." he stammered and just stared at her.

"You should see the look on your face!" Rainbow Dash giggled at him as he just continued to look at her dumbfounded. "Come on ... say it," she said arrogantly again.

James blinked a couple of times. He sighed. He hated being wrong. He especially hated being wrong twice in one hour. And what he even hated worse, was that it was an arrogant cyan pegasus pony with a rainbow colored mane and tail that had proven him wrong. Twice, in one hour. She looked at him again and her smirk became even bigger.

"Say it," she demanded again.

"Fine ..." he looked at the ground. "You were right ... And I was wrong ... Again."

Rainbow Dash giggled as he acknowledged that. "See? That wasn't so hard was it?" she continued to taunt him.

He rolled his eyes. "I still want my rematch. It wasn't fair that you pounced on me from the sky. You and your one second flat thing ..."

Rainbow Dash raised her eyes at him and giggled "Oh you want to fight? Stubborn aren't you. Don't know when to quit? Alright, even without the element of surprise, I can still take you in ten ... seconds ... flat."

He glared at her. "You keep saying you can. Lets see you back it up," he taunted her back.

She glared at him and backed up a few steps, stomping one of her fore-hooves a couple of times. "Alright, it ... is ... on. Ready when you are. Lets see what you got," she said as she got into a four point defensive stance, waiting for him to come at her.

He glared back at her and circled her slowly trying to hide his nervousness as he, looked for an opening to lunge at her. She didn't offer any however, turning with him and always making sure he had to face her head on. Finally he took a chance and tried to lunge forward and tackle her, but she quickly darted out of the way. He scrambled to recover and get back to his feet, spinning around to try to find her again. Suddenly he felt two forelegs wrap around his shoulders and pull, flipping him over and sending him crashing down on his back. Before he had a chance to get back up, Rainbow Dash was on him, pinning his shoulders to the ground with her fore-hooves and grinning down at him.

"Shit ..." James said, unable to help himself from laughing a little bit when he said it. Thankfully, it seemed to be a game to her rather than actually trying to hurt him.

"See? What'd I tell you. Ten seconds flat!" she taunted and smirked at him.

"Uh ... Two out of three?" he looked up at her.

"Sure. If ya want. But it won't do ya any good," she stepped off of him, allowing him to get back up.

He stood up and turned to face her again—more dirt, scratches and scrapes to show for his efforts. He circled carefully for a few seconds again before lunging one more time. This time she didn't move out of the way, instead allowing him to grab her. He tried to twist her to the ground, but she turned out to be be stronger and better balanced then he thought. After a few seconds, she wrapped her fore-hooves around his shoulders and started twisting back. Soon both of them ended up on the ground, grappling for position and kicking up clouds of dirt as they wrestled. It wasn't long before the dust and dirt settled, finding Rainbow Dash on top, pinning James to the ground again.

"Hah! Gotcha again! In less than ten seconds!"

"Shit ..." he said again, shaking his head and laughing slightly. "Alright. You win. Now let me up," he said, squirming to try and free himself.

She stepped off of him and let him up, giggling again.

James stood up with yet more dirt, scratches and scrapes to show for his little skirmish, although she had gotten fairly dirty as well from the last grapple on the ground.

"Alright, you are more capable than I thought you were," he said. "I still don't know how you did that sonic rainboom thing though, or even how you manage to fly for that matter. Uh ... Do you mind if I take a look at your wings?"

"Not at all, go right ahead," she smiled and spread her wings out for him. She appeared to be quite proud of them.

He looked at them closely trying to take a rough estimate of their size and estimate her wing area before asking nervously, "Can I uh ... touch them?" He wasn't sure if it was an appropriate question.

"If you want to," she giggled.

He reached out and touched them, lifting a few of the guard feathers carefully and examining every aspect of her wings with all the careful detail expected of a scientist that was examining something he had never seen before. He took note of the coarseness of the feathers, flexibility, how much depth there seemed to be to them, and several other things he thought might be useful in trying to figure out exactly how it was possible for her to achieve flight—and supersonic flight at that. He finally finished examining them, backing up a little bit, and looking at her again.

"Fascinating. I'll have to work on this one for awhile. And rework my mathematical estimates ... Thanks for letting me get a closer look at them."

"Not a problem," she snickered. "You know, I guess you aren't such a bad guy after all."

"Yeah ... I'm glad you feel that way ... Hopefully it means I won't have to be looking up in the sky all the time whenever I am outside in case you decide to land on me again ...", he deadpanned.

"Yeah, well ... You spend too much time in the lab doing geeky egghead scientist things, and not enough time doing athletic stuff."

"Hey! It's not like I'm overweight or anything," he protested.

"I didn't say you were overweight. But ya got no muscle on you and you have no stamina. Don't worry though, I'll whip you into shape. Then it might take me fifteen seconds to beat you instead of ten," she smirked.

"Oh ... fifteen instead of ten. Thank you so much for that vote of confidence," he said sarcastically. "Now come on, we need to get back. Twilight's probably already been to Rarity's and is wondering where I am. And now I have to shower or bathe first cause I'm not gonna try on the new clothes Rarity made when I am all covered in dirt like this ... Thanks to you."

"Me? You're the one that wanted the rematch!" she responded incredulously.

"The damage was already done by that time because of the fact that threw me down into the dirt when you landed on me in town."

"Oh ... Right ... Good point," she said as she tried, and failed, to suppress another giggle. "Anyway, don't worry. I got ya covered. Hop on. We'll stop at the apple orchard another time."

He nodded and climbed on her back again. She looked back at him to make sure he was situated before taking off and heading back towards Ponyville. He was still rather nervous about the whole flying on the back of a pony thing. But at least he was getting over his initial concern that she might intentionally try to throw him off. He watched in front of them as he could see the town start to come into view again. Dash continued flying until she was close to the library, where she circled around it once and came in for another very gentle landing.

"Well ... Thanks for the ride I guess," James said as he got off of her back. "I need to take a quick bath and then get over to Rarity's."

Rainbow Dash was just about to respond when Twilight came bursting out of the library door. "Where have you been! I've been looking all ... What in the name of Celestia happened to you?" she questioned, noticing all the dirt, scratches and scrapes on him. Then she noticed Rainbow Dash standing not to far away and that she was rather dusty and dirty as well. She looked back and forth between the two of them and narrowed her eyes.

"You two were fighting ... Weren't you ..." she said more as a statement than as a question.

"Fighting? No," James said defensively. "We were ... Well, we were ... bonding?"

"Uh huh ..." Twilight responded in a tone that suggested she didn't believe him.

Rainbow Dash responded then, "Uh ... Building a foundation of friendship?"

"Uh huh ...", Twilight deadpanned again.

"Uh ... Finding common ground?" James tried again.

"Uh huh ..." Twilight said again.

Rainbow Dash giggled a bit. "Relax, would you Twilight? You worry too much."

"Oh sure," Twilight responded sarcastically. "Inquisitive scientist in a completely foreign world. Flying pegasus pony who according to physics, should not be able to fly ... The two of them getting together ... What could possibly go wrong?"

"Actually everything went extremely well?" James responded.

Twilight finally just rolled her eyes and facehoofed, "Guys and tomboys ... ugh ... Well, you can't go over to Rarity's looking like that. Get in here and take a bath!"

James winced at Twilight's reaction, but quickly went inside, waving back at Dash as he did so. Once inside, he took a quick bath, spending just enough time to wash the dirt off of himself before quickly drying off and throwing his clothes back on, running back out into the main area of the library.

"Ok. I'm ready!"

Twilight nodded and walked towards the door, heading outside again, with James following her.

"So what were you and Rainbow Dash doing anyway?" she asked.

"I got lost trying to find Rarity's ... And Dash wanted to show me her sonic rainboom. So we went outside of town so she could do it."

"That was quick. To get all the way out of town and back in that time?" she remarked.

"Well, actually ... We kind of flew out there," he said sheepishly, causing Twilight to stop in her tracks and look at him wide eyed.

"... Are you suicidal? Or crazy or something? What in the name of Celestia possessed you to do that?"

"Hey, it was her idea!" he said defensively. "She was sure she could carry me. And land safely. I had my doubts ... But she lived up to her word. I still don't know how she did it, but I plan to work on figuring that out."

Twilight started walking again. "Well, I did learn early on when I arrived in Ponyville that if Rainbow Dash says she can do something, she usually can."

A couple of minutes later, they arrived at Rarity's boutique and went inside. Rarity looked up from her sewing machine and smiled.

"Oh there you are, James! I've been so excited to show you what I came up with."

"Hi Miss Rarity. I'm sorry I late. I ran into Rainbow Dash on my way here and got sidetracked with a ... detour to see a one pegasus air show," he apologized.

"Oh please, just call me Rarity. And really, it's no problem at all. It gave me some time to make some final changes. Come over here, please."

James nodded and went over to Rarity as she started to shuffle through some hanging clothes, taking several outfits off of their hangers.

"I have to say, this was rather fun to work on. I've never tried making clothes for a bipedal creature before. It was an interesting challenge. I hope they fit well. If not, I might have to make some alterations."

"You made several outfits? Wow. You've been busy."

"Well, I figured you needed a few to wear around here. And despite what Twilight said, I couldn't resist the urge to make one formal outfit ... In case you have to visit one of the princesses again. Here, try this one on first," she said as she took one of the outfits and used her magic to float it over to him. "I thought some nice earth tones would work well for just wearing around here."

James nodded and took the clothes she handed him and went behind a privacy divider in one corner of the room to change. He unfolded the outfit and looked it over. The material it was made out of felt very comfortable. He wasn't exactly an expert on fabrics, but he guessed it was either 100% cotton, or perhaps linen. The main colors were earthy tones, with the shirt being beige color, and the pants being a bit of a darker brown color. The shirt had a few subtle green threads running through it as well, giving it a faint two tone color. It was obvious she had put a great deal of work into it. He removed the tattered clothes he was currently wearing and slipped into the new outfit. It was very comfortable and seemed to fit well. He came back out from the privacy divider and went back over to Rarity.

She looked him over and walked around him, checking the fit of the outfit.

"Well, it actually looks like it fits very well," she remarked. "That means I won't have to do any alterations. You don't have to try the other ones on since they were all made from the same measurements."

He nodded and smiled at her. "Thank you Rarity. I'm in your debt. It feels really good to get out of those tattered clothes I had been wearing."

"You're welcome, James," she smiled back at him. "Don't worry about any debt. Like I said, it was fun to work on since it was a new experience for me. And of course, you know where to find me now if you need any new clothes in the future."

"Thank you, again," he said as she packaged up the remaining outfits and gave them to him. He took the package and nodded to her once more before moving back over to Twilight.

"Have a good day you two. I'm sure I'll see you again soon enough," Rarity smiled.

"You too Rarity. Bye for now," James said as he and Twilight left, heading back outside.

"So you want to stop and get something to eat at Sugarcube Corner?" Twilight asked.

"Actually ... I kind of wanted to just get back to the library and practice reading. And maybe try to work out this whole pegasus flight and sonic rainboom thing."

"Can't those wait until later?"

"I at least want to get the stuff in my head written down before I forget it."

Twilight frowned a little at that. "Alright ... We can head back to the library then," she said, turning around and walking back with James following.

Once they had arrived back at the library, James found a quill and some paper and started sketching out the approximate dimensions of Rainbow Dash's wings, as well as other details he remembered. He found it rather awkward writing with the quill, often times either getting way too much ink and causing it to run and smear, and other times not having enough ink and leaving parts on the paper that were too light or had no ink at all—which he had to go back and redo The fact that he was writing using the Equestrian alphabet in order to gain additional practice with it didn't help matters either, since he was still rather slow with it. Twilight could see he was having some trouble and that he appeared a bit frustrated.

"Is something wrong?" she asked.

"I've never tried writing with a quill and inkwell before. Where I'm from, we haven't used quills or inkwells for well over one hundred years. We have self contained pens that you never have to dip into the inkwell ... When we write by hand at all anymore that is. Most of the time we write on a keyboard. But I guess I will just have to get used to writing this way with practice."

"A keyboard? What's that?"

"Well, it's like ... a rectangular object that has all of these buttons with all of the letters on it. You write by pushing the buttons with the letter you want. I guess a device like that would not be very practical for ... well, ponies like you though. Since you don't have any fingers to press the buttons with."

Twilight still looked at him like she didn't understand.

"Well... Here. I'll draw you a picture," he said as he dipped the quill in the ink again and got a fresh piece of paper on which he proceeded to draw a crude representation of a standard 101 key PC keyboard. "As you can see, our alphabet doesn't use the same characters that yours does. And we only have twenty-six letters."

"That looks like it would be awkward to use," Twilight commented as she looked at his crude drawing with fascination.

"It takes practice. Once we get good with it though, we can write very quickly with it. I can write about one hundred words per minute. There are people who are faster than me."

"One hundred words per minute? It sounds like this device allows one to write faster than they can actually think about what they want to write," she remarked.

James smiled at that. "That's a very good deduction, Twilight. And you would be right. Sometimes it is a problem. It does allow people to write and send things so quickly, that often times they don't really think very carefully about what they want to say, or how they want to say it, he said as he went back to working on some of his diagrams of Rainbow Dash and her flying.

"I talked to Cheerilee. She'd like you to come talk to her class in three days. Is that enough time for you to get everything together?"

"Uh huh. That will be fine," James said, not bothering to look up from the paper he was writing on, obviously very engrossed in his work now.

Twilight shook her head and frowned as she watched him. Once again, she noticed just how much he was like she had been when she first got to Ponyville—totally engrossed in research and learning. Other than his accidental, and somewhat forced encounter with Rainbow Dash; and his brief meetings with Rarity for clothing, he hadn't really taken any time out to meet the other ponies or try to make new friends. She decided not to say anything about it for now.

"I'll leave you to your work for now I guess. I have some work to do in the basement."

"You don't happen to have a graphing calculator do you?" he asked without looking up from his writing.

"I'm afraid not, considering I'm not quite sure what that would be. I do have some graph paper though if you need it. It's in the desk over there," she pointed with her horn.

"Alright. Thanks. I guess I'll just have to do all these calculations by hand then."

Twilight just nodded, which James didn't see since he was too engrossed in what he was working on. Then she headed down into the basement of the library, sighing a bit to herself on her way downstairs.

James continued to work for about another hour, cursing at himself as he still wasn't able to come up with any aerodynamically plausible way that pegasus ponies were able to fly at all, much less fly with his additional weight on their back. And he certainly wasn't able to come up with with any plausible way for Rainbow Dash to achieve supersonic flight. Finally, he decided to give it a rest since the only thing he was really accomplishing was getting more frustrated with himself and his inability to solve the problem. He put the quill back in its holder and replaced the cap on the inkwell, something he almost forgot about. Glad I remembered that ... Wouldn't want Twilight mad at me for letting all her ink dry out, he thought to himself.

Deciding to work more on his reading skills, he went over to the bookshelves and started browsing around, finally pulling one off the shelves that he thought looked like it might be interesting. He took the book and laid down in the middle of the floor on his stomach, looking almost like a child laying in front of a fireplace reading a book.

A couple of hours passed before Twilight came back upstairs and noticed James laying on the floor reading. She smiled a bit. Then she caught a glimpse of what he was reading. She stopped and winced. Oh no ... I really hadn't wanted him to know about this yet ... He's not going to be ready for it, she thought to herself nervously. On the floor in front of him, was a book with an illustration of two alicorns fighting with each other, along with an illustration of Nightmare Moon's banishment to the moon. On the opposite page, a diagram of Princess Celestia raising the sun and moon.

Twilight hesitated for several long moments. Then she gathered herself together and finally spoke. "So uh ... Enjoying the reading?" she said with a hint of nervousness in her voice.

"Oh ... I didn't hear you come back up," James said as he looked up from the book. "... This book ... It's just mythology right? I mean you don't actually believe any of the stuff in here do you?"

For a brief moment, Twilight considered lying to him and telling him that yes, it was just mythology, and no she didn't believe it. But that thought quickly left her mind. She couldn't do that. She had to be honest with him, whether he was ready—or she was ready for that matter—for it or not. She sighed a bit and walked closer to him, sitting down on her haunches as she got ready for what she knew was almost certainly going to be an unpleasant and heated discussion.