first chapter: [video]

[studere.livejournal.com]

[ The video feed turns on to a rather nervous-looking girl in her late teens, though that nervousness is momentarily replaced by a grin. After all, she finally figured out how to work this thing properly. Figuring something out is always something worth celebrating, at least for Twilight Sparkle.

Still, her somber expression returns. ] I wanted to thank everypony who helped me out when we all first arrived. I've gotten much better at walking since then! Really. [ Because obviously they won't believe her unless she adds in that "really." ]

But... [ And this is really where she looks worried again... ] has anypony been outside today? There's clouds out there, and I am one-hundred percent certain nopony put them there. They're even moving all on their own...!

But nopony else has even mentioned it! Don't you all find this strange?!

[ Twilight bites her bottom lip for a moment, but presses on. ] It's strange enough that the sun and moon can rise without Princess Celestia or Princess Luna, but... do you suppose the patron gods are doing all of it? Raising the sun, and the moon, and moving the clouds... creating the weather...?

[ And finally, a large sigh. ] Really, this is such a strange place.

Comments

[oikoumene.livejournal.com]

Well! For that I can give no concrete answer, only my opinion. But if you are so interested, I would not mind sharing!

[studere.livejournal.com]

[ Oh snap son, DORK ALERT. ]

Oh! I would love to hear your theory. [ GRINNING. SMILING. ACTING LIKE A DORK.

Sudden 180, because hey, LEARNING. THEORIZING. This is what she lives for. ]

[oikoumene.livejournal.com]

Well, in my homeland, we had myths and stories of the gods to explain what we didn't know. Like there is Zeus, king of the gods and god of thunder, Artemis, the goddess of the hunt, and Hades, the god of death. We had a god for everything that we could not easily explain, you could say! I long believed this to be the explanation for all I did not know and was satisfied with that! But I was lucky to have been given a second chance at life where I can see the world two thousand years from when I lived, and I realize that some of the things I attributed to the gods... Well, they did not seem to explain things so well anymore!

In that way, I believe that I have lived in two worlds—There was the world in which I was born a mortal man, and there is the world where I was given my second chance. Yet they are the same place, but the passage of time has changed it so much that it seems like two places that operate on two fundamentally different levels, as you said. So I think of this place and the places others hail from in this way! I think of them as united by being inhabited by intelligent peoples, but the way they may operate is strange and unusual to me. But I take it with interest, for the chance to learn of such fundamentally different places, it's something that I imagine is rarely afforded!

Ahh, I rambled a bit, didn't I? Ha, I apologize!

[studere.livejournal.com]

It's amazing what time and a change in perspective can cause, then.

It must have been hard to adjust to the world after two-thousand years, though. I can hardly imagine. [ Although she knows somepony with a very similar background. ]

[oikoumene.livejournal.com]

Ah, it was not so bad! The mechanics are a bit above me, honestly, but magic essentially filled in the gaps in my knowledge so it wasn't too much of a shock.

Though most of the modern things still baffle me, I must admit!

[studere.livejournal.com]

There's quite a few pieces of machinery here that baffle me, truth be told.

[oikoumene.livejournal.com]

Truly? I have found the accommodations here much more simplified? May I ask what you have had trouble with?

[studere.livejournal.com]

For example, there is this strange box in the welcome hall. . . [ Televisions, how do they work? ]

[oikoumene.livejournal.com]

Strange box... Ahh, you must mean the television! Yes, those things are quite strange! But they show quite a lot of wonders, once you manage to work them. It is how I learned much of the modern world, though I still don't understand how it manages to show moving pictures...

[studere.livejournal.com]

It can do that?

But it didn't do anything when I tried to figure it out. I wonder if there's a book about how to work one...

[oikoumene.livejournal.com]

It truly is a process! Ahh, in honesty, I did not figure it out myself! My Master had to show me how the thing worked. You press the buttons in a certain order and it comes to life! Then these other buttons change what you see.



I believe a book would be best to learn it though, you're quite right!

1/2

[studere.livejournal.com]

[ This is her face at that explanation... ]

[studere.livejournal.com]

[ Aha, so finding a book is the best solution! ]

Yes, I'll have to add finding some sort of book on operating a "television" onto my to-do list.

[oikoumene.livejournal.com]

Apparently there is a library somewhere in this city, but I don't know if it would have such a book, honestly! Perhaps the maids would know?

[studere.livejournal.com]

So there is a library. I'll definitely need to check it out!

[oikoumene.livejournal.com]

As will I! I should hope it's as fantastic as the one that stood in the city of my namesake.

[studere.livejournal.com]

Oh my, you had a city named after you?

A city with a library?

[oikoumene.livejournal.com]

Several, actually! But none were as fine as Alexandria, I must say! And that is partially because of the Royal Library of Alexandria. I am sad to say that I was never able to see it, but from the stories I've heard, it was fantastic!

[studere.livejournal.com]

I know I would certainly love the chance to visit it.

[ Because it is a library. And she is a nerd. ]

[oikoumene.livejournal.com]

You may find that difficult! As I understand, it burned down quite a long time ago. And ahhh, such a shame, too! It wasn't even by accident, but an emperor malicious enough to destroy it.