Title:           Project Pegasus-Chapter 3
Author:          Anonymous
Pastebin link:   http://pastebin.com/ZJXtUv2H
First Edit:      Tuesday 8th of March 2016 06:18:01 PM CDT
Last Edit:       Tuesday 8th of March 2016 06:18:01 PM CDT

                Everybody's got rides. What we have here are living biological attractions that will capture the imagination of the entire planet.  We spared no expense. -John Hammond- "Jurassic Park"
 
    The village opened before the pair like a page out of a fairy-tale storybook.  Most of the buildings had thatched roofs and a "off-kilter" style accented here and there with banners and other trappings of the medieval era. Personal effects lay scattered about, abandoned as if the owners had been called away by some mad piper. More than a few toys. The setting was cartoonish but it certainly looked like something intelligent had just been here.
 
  Matt appreciated themed architecture even though he was a computer engineer himself.  He spent his time making sure a new ride's systems would function the way the manufacturer had intended.  What they looked like was Sarah's forte. He wondered if this was what it was like in her home of Marne la Valle outside Paris. An architect like her parents before her, she worked with Rowling and Warner Bros. bringing Hogwarts to realization in her "debut" for Universal Creative. Naturally she was a shoe in for this latest venture.
 
    Here and there, Matt could see other signs of the ponies just going about their business.  Sarah began to explain how these creatures were miracles of artificial intelligence.  Unlike most games, these characters didn't have a set pattern of behavior.  Rather, a set of like/dislike preferences allowed them to make choices throughout their "day"
 
    "We need these characters to have genuine interactions with our guests, the goal of this project is to let the machine do as much of the work as possible" Sarah explained. "Of course, there will be a few humans here and there to keep an eye on things and adjust as necessofary.  They'll be alicorns like myself, naturally.  We call them 'Adminicorns."
 
"Wait a minute, what's an alicorn?" Matt asked.  Sarah explained that when guests first arrive, they'll find themselves in the same form he currently occupied, an "Earth" pony.  "At each activity zone a unicorn attendant will enchant our guests with a pair of wings or a horn if they're called for. On Advanved Adventures especially for Alicorns they'll have to use their both skills if they want to survive."
 
Matt snorted in a decidedly horsey way. "People can get hurt?"
 
 "The human brain needs a little context. Ponies can get hurt. There's going to be people in these ponies and they'll feel a small measure of the pain of being say, roasted alive by a dragon or hitting a tree at a hundred miles per hour. That's for the thrills, the rollercoaster if you will. We have healers, everything works thru the magic system. Every day before the night is through we'll have a battle with Nightmare Moon."
 
"?"
 
"A villain. The battle would be nearly impossible to win..."
 
"Is he a big guy?"
 
"for you. It took ten alicorns to beat her the first time and all the AI ponies died"
 
"She? What was that like?"
 
"A fireworks show with audience participation. We got the smell of burning hair down. I though i was smelling it on the way home that night!"