May 27, 6:40 PM

Yes, take charge! 92%

“It would be a lot easier to stay out of the spotlight,” she began, her voice low and nervous. “Safer, too. No one can hate me if they don’t know I exist. But… I know what I would think. If the person who was running our city didn’t believe in their new plan enough to even show their face, I’d think they didn’t care. Another bureaucrat to rule over the slums from that fancy hotel. Can’t really… deny that I’m better off in here than the people outside. That’s just true.”

Sunburst eyed her. “You’re that confident in my plan?”

She brushed past his shoulder with hers, moving to the glass window. Not much of a view, but she looked out anyway. “I think the time to carefully plan and examine every aspect of what we’re doing is over. We do that, and we can deliberate for another few weeks while we miss our chance to get food in the ground, and we starve. On the other hand… we succeed, and Denver has a chance. Or we’re confidently wrong, and this explodes in my face. If that happens… get yourself out of here, please. You do not get to go down with the ship, that’s my job.”

Sunburst followed her to the window. “For now, I believe your job is to take me to dinner.”

She laughed. She had asked him moments ago, she was not going to get cold feet now. Hooves? “So long as it won’t be a problem for… whatever. Conflict of interest. It’s cool if we go out?”

He laughed, loud and energetic. “The last princess I worked for appointed her husband to army secretary. I’m not even… entirely sure what position I hold right now? Head of the planning commission?”

“Whatever you’d like to call it,” she said. “It isn’t like you’ll be going anywhere once we start.” She grinned, flicking her ear at the complex org-chart he’d scribbled onto every whiteboard. The most important parts of that plan now appeared on a number of printouts as well. More would likely find their way to her wall as they got each one set in stone.

“Court Crystalleer probably… doesn’t mean a lot to ponies around here,” he began, voice distant. “I believe the title equivalent to my role in your human government would be the… secretary of state? And the rest of your cabinet, but I’m hoping those positions get filled soon. It’s a lot of weight for one set of hooves to carry.”

They didn’t eat in the commissary.

Wayfinder could’ve got a private table, could’ve asked them to cook anything she liked. Yet she’d learned very quickly that while her authority on paper extended to nearly anything within the organization, the reality went only as far as her staff’s willingness to enforce it.

So she found it far better to conserve those resources for when she might really need them, rather than spending social capital to get the staff to make some special meal for a date. She needed the cooperation of every staff member for the days ahead.

So their date took them to one of the restaurants near the station, trading in police chits and catering to a largely official audience. The resturant evidently recognized Wayfinder, because they pulled the two of them away from the outdoor seating and into a suite on the second floor, where a different sort of people ate their meals at fine tables. There was even real alcohol at some of them.

Including theirs, though Wayfinder hadn’t asked for it. For once, the dimmer lights were an advantage. Two people, settled in the gloom with music playing and very little to distract them. She barely even noticed when their food arrived, she was too distracted with her companion.

Wayfinder was clearly losing her mind, there was no other way to describe it. How else could she look across the table at a stallion and find her thoughts wandering towards him instead of feeling disgusted.

It helped that he was finally answering her most important questions, granted. “You won’t believe it,” he said, settling an empty glass next to him. “Technically I shouldn’t say anything. But there’s nopony here to check what I’m telling you anymore. It’s just: I have no proof of any of this. If your governments do, it’s probably not going to make it out the other end of whatever’s happening right now. So you’ll have to take me at my word.”

“I’m inclined to do that.” They had a booth. Everyone did, with extremely low benches with high walls. This place evidently brought in the money to try and design custom furniture to be comfortable to their new bodies. Their serving staff had adaptations too: when they brought food or drinks, they did it in teams of two, with one asking as a table with legs to transport it and lids on all the glasses.

“Is that your way of telling me you’re gonna lie?” Wayfinder asked, eyebrow raised. “Come on, I practically learned everything I know from you. I didn’t have anything in those magical textbooks to know they were telling the truth. Just tell me.”

“Well… it is Equestria’s fault all this happened. Not that anypony wanted it to, but…” he glanced to either side. The tables around them were empty, and everyone was thoroughly absorbed in their own conversations. Some of them even wore clothes. Other than a little satchel with a radio for emergencies, she hadn’t bothered. Though if she went on another date, maybe she could ask Ruby for some advice on how to—

“Well, I don’t mean I have any personal connection to what happened. Obviously. We started down this road long before I was born. But…” He slid closer to her, leaning across the table. “All this began from magic. It is a kind of leverage, allowing creatures to exert greater control over their world. If you asked an Equestrian, they would probably tell you that it’s far superior to what you have—not because Earth hasn’t accomplished a great deal, but because magic is self-regulating.”

“Magic,” she repeated. “You mean the force that’s killed… hundreds of thousands of people, essentially collapsed this part of our civilization, and threatens the rest? Isn’t self-regulating very well right now.”

“Well… it never does,” he admitted. “Its production is self-regulating. It derives from the positive interactions of intelligent beings. Our love, joy, friendship.”

Wayfinder opened her mouth to argue, lifting one hoof over the edge of the table. Then she lowered it again, mouth closing just as quickly. She had said she was going to listen. So she shut it again.

“Unfortunately, the one who produces magic doesn’t have to be the one to use it. We… rarely are. Usually it’s expelled into our environment, forming natural currents and sources for creatures with ill intent to tap into. And like your technology, magic is a force multiplier. One being becomes as dangerous as an entire army. A single princess can establish a great nation, destroy one. When one turns to disharmony and is defeated, dealing with the fallout is more difficult for us. Magic is inherent, sometimes an intrinsic part of their nature. So what were we to do?”

“I mean…” Wayfinder glanced out the window. Through the glass, past several layers of real streets and ramshackle favelas, she could barely make out the shape of the jail, all concrete and metal surfaces. “Guess magic means you can’t incarcerate them. Sooner or later they’ll get power and escape. Which means if you can’t reform them some other way, you’d have to execute them.”

He levitated something off his plate: a fork wrapped in noodles. “Which we were unwilling to do. Instead, we found somewhere we could exile our worst offenders, where they would be completely without magic to harm anyone else. It didn’t matter what their powers were, all we had to do was open the door, and we could send them away. Somewhere they would be free to live out their lives, without harming anyone else.”

She nearly dropped her glass. If she were still human, she might’ve lost control of her fingers and spilled wine all over her date. With magic, she could catch it before it left more than a few drops on the wood, calmly twisting it around to settle onto the table beside her. “Don’t say it. Please don’t…”

He nodded glumly. “Before you worry, that part of the plan worked, broadly speaking. Equestria’s most dangerous foes lost their advantages when they arrived on your world. They had no magic to feed on. Most passed harmlessly out of significance.”

“But we’re sitting here right now, on a date,” she said, gently refilling his glass with whatever red stuff was in the bottle. Not the best bottle of wine she’d ever tasted, but considering the day waiting for her tomorrow, she was probably better off not drinking very much of it. “So that means some of them caused… problems? Released the disease?”

“It’s not a disease,” he shuffled closer to her, then abruptly rose from his seat, sliding around the booth to settle next to her instead. He levitated the plate over. It was mostly empty at this point, a few stains of whatever sauce they’d been eating. Probably vegetarian. “I’m nearly finished, I promise! Then you can proceed to disregard everything I said, because I have absolutely no way of proving any of it.”

He levitated his glass, spinning it around. “So. Each time we banished someone, there was a… powerful burst of magic. Stronger than any spell you’ve ever seen. A Starswirl—Clover bridge takes moons to charge, and only remains open for a moment. To the extent that anypony even thought about what this was doing, I’m sure they would’ve explained that the magic had an entire universe to flow into. There would be no time for it to concentrate. Those banished here would absorb a small amount, and the rest would fade harmlessly. Your kind do not require magic to live the way we do.”

“Unfortunately, magic is also self-organizing. It creates emergent behavior. What Equestria failed to see until it was entirely too late: your kind were too similar to ours. The very behaviors that produce magic in ponies also happen to be common in your world. Friendship, kindness, generosity, love… you share those things. Which means with a little magic…”

He levitated his wineglass up into the air next to her, then tilted it over so a few drops spread over the empty plate, staining it red. “Every time we opened that door, we sent a little more magic through. Instead of dissipating into the universe, we believe it clung to the planet and its creatures, concentrating. With even a brief exposure, you likely became able to perpetuate the runaway cycle.”

He tilted the glass again, turning the plate redder and redder. “Nopony could tell you how long it took. Centuries? But eventually, it concentrated in someone enough that it had the power to do something. All it needed was that first little spark, and it ignited. Where we’re living now is the result.”

She stared down at the empty plate, then back up. Half the people on Earth probably wanted to know what he’d shared over a casual date in exchange for nothing at all.

“What’s that look mean?” He pushed the plate slightly away from his seat, looking suddenly nervous. “You seem… is there something… I knew you’d have no reason to believe me.”

She was staring directly into his face. But that was harder not to do, with as close as he’d come. “That isn’t it. I don’t have any reason to disbelieve you, Sunburst. But it doesn’t explain why you’re here. You know why I’m here. Lived here, got infected, doing what I can to survive, generally screwing things up while trying to fail a little less than the other people who happen to be around me.”

She reached towards him with one leg, sliding it down his shoulder. “You didn’t decide to use this universe as your personal Australia. You didn’t know the magic was overflowing and would cause catastrophic mutation in…”

It was as though someone had connected strands of old cable in her head. That was why the animals weren’t changing as much. Magic was like DNA—a self-replicating meme that propagated its own existence. Humans served as the best carriers, so they changed the most. NEM10 was so hard to stop because it wasn’t the virus, really. The magic was already concentrated in people, and the virus was the spark that ignited change, pushing over the threshold.

Which meant… Ruby’s hunt for a cure was all wrong! She had to talk to her right away!

“Way?” He was closer to her than before, eyes down, ears in her direction. Had his foreleg always been around her like that? “I’ve seen that look now. You aren’t the first mare to wear it, either. You’re trying to figure something out.”

“How to save the human race,” she said, flat. “I mean—I won’t be the one to actually do it. But I think I… something you just said.”

She’d hoped to learn more about what brought him of all creatures to Earth, risking his life and maybe never seeing his home again. Yet there was something more important on her mind, something that the rich scent in her nose and the low light and the warmth against her side all overpowered.

“Well?” He asked. Did he not realize? He was right there, no mistaking the warmth rising from his body, the change in his scent. These things weren’t very subtle. It was as though someone had severed that particular conduit from his brain to the rest of him. “If it’s something we never considered.”

“After,” she said. “Want Ruby to… be there.” She was only a few inches from him now. He wasn’t trying to get away from her, didn’t look uncomfortable or start making excuses. “Just kiss me.”

“Oh! Right.” He said it like she’d forgot to carry a digit in a piece of complex math, and she’d pointed it out.

Then he got it.

The result was—not like the last time. Peter wasn’t an idiot, despite what he claimed. But his interests in her went about as deep as his interest in Lance. But this kind of passion went deeper. She felt him in the magic lessons, the desperate nights planning for a failing city, their shared hope to somehow offer the planet a way to survive.

Besides, he wasn’t that bad at math once she pointed out the flaw in his calculations.

The streets of Denver overflowed with ponies. It wasn’t that any of them were excited about her. None of them had any reason to know or care that she even existed, given the previous captain’s behavior. Yet people could clearly sense that something was different, and so they appeared.

She’d prepared for that, with a little help from her boyfriend. There were spells to amplify sound. So she could stand on the steps of the police building and speak to everyone, reading from the words she’d rehearsed in front of Hazel and Sunburst and anyone else in the office who happened to be there. Not very long, fortunately.

A line of police separated the crowd at the base of the steps from the building with wooden barricades. Yet with so many people, there was no real chance they’d be able to stand up to a genuine riot.

Somewhere in a tank far below, Senator Gardner would be watching the proceedings, about to discover if his chosen agent was going to completely destroy the city. Maybe the feds wouldn’t have to intervene at all.

Most of her staff were already scattered into the crowd, gathered with the volunteers. That was why so many people were here: news had spread. They knew at least some of what was coming.

“You won’t know who I am,” she began. “So let me introduce myself. As of about a week ago now, I’ve taken over as the Captain of Denver. Until this moment, this city has done the same thing that every other Isolation Zone was told to do: wait. We’ve been waiting on help from the CDC, waiting on help from the Federal government, keeping each of you trapped here and isolated from your families and friends.

“As of this moment, we can no longer wait. We have plenty for today, but tomorrow that will not be the case. We must do something differently now, while we still have enough time. That means we stop sitting here waiting to be rescued.”

She paused, waiting to see what their reactions would be. Yet she saw only blank expressions, bodies pressing closer to hear better even with the assistance of magical amplification.

“There are too many people to do this all at once. Many of you were brought here from out of state, or were caught here by unfortunate coincidence. Whatever the reason, know that you will be as welcome here as locals like myself. I’m still forbidden by law to let anyone leave. But I am not prevented from improving our lives, or our odds for long-term survival.”

“You’re doubtless aware that our infections have given us biological differences. We will now use those advantages. Each of you have abilities that are probably untapped. If you’ve seen any of the city police manipulating objects without touching them, you’ve seen hints of what this represents. There will be more information forthcoming. For right now, I want you to know this:

“If we do not work, we will all starve. We’ve already developed an… informal economy, represented in precious metals and federal chips. It’s possible we’ll formalize one of those in the coming weeks. For now, I make this promise instead: no one is being forced to help. But anyone who does will be rewarded. You will have a stake in what you produce, better housing, and faster access to city resources. Those who can’t work will not be abandoned.

“Our first volunteers are those related to the agriculture sector. In the next few days, someone from the census will visit each housing district to conduct surveys. Please be honest with your willingness and ability in any areas they ask about. If you don’t wish to contribute, tell them so. But understand this: we are opening new areas. Only those who are helping in our reconstruction and survival will be permitted to live there. If that’s you, then talk to us.”

There were shouts after that, questions. Lots of the ones she expected. What if people wanted to volunteer right then? How would they add new areas if the borders were set? What about people who’d lived in those areas before?

But that was when she stepped off the platform, leaving her staff to make it a reality. Yet watching the first teams taking her volunteers towards the waiting agriculture areas, she could already see they’d made it past the hardest part. No riot. The ponies of Denver were desperate to have more control over their own future. Sunburst’s plan gave it to them.

Wayfinder had to decide…

1. Tackle the prison next.
2. Finish the wild magic spell with Sunburst.