>With the successful end of the meeting the previous day you really are not quite sure what to do with yourself
>It seems you are free from any real work until the treaty gets sent to you
>Twilight comes down stairs, "You know you can't stay in my house forever Anon, there just isn't enough good living space for you here. And I don't like how you keep your magic staff here, I don't know enough about its magic to know if it is safe."
>She points to your rifle that is leaning against the wall
>"Yeah, I know..." it's frustrating that she kicks you out as fast as she takes you in "I guess I will have to find another place to live."
>You pace about a bit, it's probably better to deal with that later
>You decide to go outside and take a look around town, see if there is anything to do
>the ponies are still suspicious of you, but they were not freaked out like they were upon first introduction
 
>You do actually want a home of your own though
>Those building off in the distance made by your drones the previous day are beginning to look mighty nice
>Using the DAC you examine what kinds of buildings are there
>But upon further inspection of the code the probes use to make buildings they don't look very homey or inviting
>You consider bringing your ship down from orbit to live in that, but it would be embarrassing to crash something else, you decide to leave that as a second option
>You see a very fancy house at the end of one street
>Maybe whoever lives there knows something about making things more appealing
>You walk up and knock on the front door
>"Who is it?" it's a familiar voice, it must be Rarity
 
>"It's the brutal alien monkey come to ravish you in your home."
>No response
>"Nah, just kidding. I'm here to ask if you might consider giving me tips on how to decorate my living space. Got to add a little flair, you know?"
>You stand at the door for a little while
>Maybe she was actually afraid of you
>"Uhhm... Okay, come in I guess." she seems very hesitant
>Good, maybe this pony was actually sensible
>You open the door and walk in, "Hi, thanks for-" she cuts you off
>"Anon, if you want to live here in Ponyville you have to stop acting like such a ruffian." she never makes eye contact with you, always glancing over you, or just looking off beside you
>"I don't plan on living in Ponyville, I actually plan on living in the city that-" she cuts you off again
>"Oh, that city, that city is terrible, everything is so cookie cutter and bland. I went to go to the mountain for a gem run to make some dresses, there's none left you know. Absolutely nothing, no mountain, just metropolis."
 
>"You use gemstones... in... clothing? Actual gemstones?" you increduously say
>She gives you a look like she's about to laugh
>"Of course we do, are you saying you don't use gems for that? And as for selling, if you try to sell gems to us nobody will buy them, it's easier to just go look for more."
>That ties up pretty much any trading that can be done in the form of minerals to Equestria, these ponies must not really want that much when it comes to things you consider to be riches
>"Well gems are rare where I am from, and most of the other places I know of."
>She just gives you a blank stare, as if she doesn't believe you that gems are actually rare where you are from "Well anyways Anon, if you want to live in that ghost town of a city it's up to you, not many Ponyville residents will come to visit you probably."
 
>"Well, if not there, where would you recommend? I hardly have anything ponies value... do I?" you know she is probably right, that place is probably just going to end up being facilities and factory space anyways
>"You'd probably want to live here in Ponyville. There are other places like Canterlot or Cloudsdale, but I don't think you'd fit in there, not allot of ponies are cut out for living there." she seems to be telling the truth
>"What about my items? Do I have anything ponies would want?" trading is really important to you, as it will be the convincing factor the GNU to agree to a treaty
>"That's a toughy Anon." she sits and thinks for a while, touching up on her curly hair in the meantime, "Well I guess the pegasi might be interested in your flying machines, they are allot faster than any pegasus I have ever met. They might be interested in whatever you came here in too."
>That's just what you wanted to hear, this should provide a great opportunity
 
>"Anything else?" you know other types of things would probably be better to trade, the GNU probably wouldn't be interested in giving ships far advanced beyond any race receiving them, even if they were to be used for peaceful purposes
>"No, that's probably it." she turns her back to you and gets to work on making a dress or something
>You speak into your DAC, "DAC take note, pegasus race is possibly interested in ships."
>You begin to leave
>"Oh wait, before you go, I must tell you to look for Rainbow Dash, if you want to get in touch with the pegasi that's probably your best bet right now."
>"Thanks for the information, but what does she look like?" you ask
>"She looks rainbow-y, you will know her if you see her, and her cutie mark is a cloud with a rainbow-bolt."
>That's such a goofy name for a birthmark or something
>"DAC take note, their strange birthmarks are called cutie marks."
>You leave Rarities place to go find this 'Rainbow Dash' she speaks of."
 
>"DAC run an area search on organic life that has similar properties to rainbows, narrow search to pegasi."
>The DAC sends a message to your ship still in orbit, telling it to do an areal scan of anything organic and rainbow-y
>You wait a minute as it initiates a scan
[Negative: resolution too low]
>"DAC, bring ship down to low atmosphere to get a better view, then re-initiate scan." you are really hoping this will work
>In several moments your black-grey ship comes down from its orbit and nestles itself in the puffy clouds, pushing some out of the way
[Positive: 300 meters distant, due magnetic east and closing]
>You see something swoosh overhead, leaving a multicolored trail behind it
>"What are you doing stupid cloud?" she stops in front of where your ship is nested, most of it isn't visible through the cloud cover "Cloudsdale didn't place any orders for more clouds, especialy NOT storm clouds!"
>She tries pushing your ship, as to get rid of it or something and push it out of hiding
 
>"That's not a cloud!" you call out to her
>"What do you know about clouds?" she seems smug
>"I know it's not a cloud because it's my ship."
>"Well who... what are you and what the heck is a ship?" she shakes her head in confusion
>"My name is Anon, I am a human..." you think to yourself at what would be the best way to describe your ship, "It's my flying machine, it's one of the fastest things around."
>"Oh psssh, the fastest thing around." she flies down and lands in front of you, "The fastest thing around, that doesn't even have wings! I'm the fastest thing around!"
 
>"I see, then how about a race around the planet. 2 hour time limit?" you know you will win, but you are feeling extra ambitious "It will be over in a quarter of a second." you know that isn't true, but how would she know, she'd still be desperately trying to even get a grab at a win by the time you are done and doing better things, heck you'd have enough time to probably eat lunch and dick around a bit too
>"Bring it, there's know way you can do it in 2 hours, I'll still win though!" she's really arrogant
>"Oh, and if you lose, you have to bring me to Cloudsdale." she just rolls your eyes
>"Whatever... okay, that's not really much to me though."
>You call your ship down to the ground
>And proceed to get in
>"How will I know when we are starting? I can't hear you say go in here." this is a real concern, your not really afraid of losing but there is always that one in a million possibility
>"If you think that you are so fast, just start after I take off."
>You guess that will work and nod your head in agreement
>You get into the cockpit of your ship, start it up and look out the main windows at her
>She takes off
>You just sit there and make a few calculations
>based on how fast she flew to your ship it should take her over 2000 minutes
>You can beat her
>Your ship is too fast to go around the planet the short way though, the turn radius is too small
>You punch in some numbers to find the best solution
 
>"Sweet." you have a good idea that should work
>You figure you will be able to make the run in an orbit just under the moons orbital radius
>Should take only about a minute and a half for you including landing and take off time
>"As long as I can manage not to make a fool of myself and crash this too, there should be no problem." you say as you take off
>You quickly leave the atmosphere and go for full speed, all the stars you can see in front of you go blue
>You quickly wrap around the planet and land your ship near Twilight's place
>After about 10 or 20 minutes of waiting for her to turn around you decide you are getting hungry
 
>You decide to check your bag to get something to eat
>You still have your Skittles left, and about 10 of your crackers
>"This looks like the last high class human meal I'll be able to get." you say to yourself as you start eating your crackers
>A few minutes pass and Twilight comes outside to examine your ship, she looks in through the front window at you
>You open up the door on the side and she steps in
>"What's this Anon?" she scrunches her face as she looks at all the equipment and other miscellaneous science equipment that is used for the work you should have been doing
>You turn around in your chair
>"It's my ship, it's what I came here in." you continue eating
>"Well why did you bring it down here?" she asks
>"I brought it down from orbit to do a race with a someone named Rainbow Dash, she lost big time, the winner was to be the first to make it around the planet." you proudly smirk at the thought of your easy victory
>"You raced Rainbow Dash!?" she slaps her hoof to her face "Ugggh..." she's mad at you like you made some sort of mistake She's probably not going to give up you know."
>"No." you say, as you can see her coming back
>She's flying slowly and pouting
>She lands and boards your ship
>She rubs her hoof through her main, "I uhh... I guess you win." she's really disapointed at her loss, "I thought you were going to eat my dust..."
>You reach in your bag and throw her the bag of Skittles, "Here you go, you can eat your dust for me."
>She catches it, "Thanks, I guess... Now about taking you to Cloudsdale, you want to go now?"
>She may be a poor at taking a loss, but at least she keeps her word
 
>"So what direction do we have to walk in to get there?" you casually ask, expecting it to be only a relatively short walk
>Rainbow starts laughing
>"You think you can walk there... Ha, you have to fly to get there!" she's still laughing uncontrollably
>You close the door and entrance walkway and prime for takeoff
>Twilight walks up to the command area where you are seated
>"So is this thing all electronics?" she moves her hand over some of the interactive displays
>"Yes it is, at least for the most part." you say as the ship begins to hover up to a height well above Twilight's home
>"Nice, I'm surrounded by egghead stuff..." Dash just looks around at all of the equipment and displays
>"What direction are we going in Dash?" you ask
>"Just start turning left." you turn for a bit "Stop, it's in that general direction."
>"How far?" that's the last piece of information you should need to know
>"I don't know, I'll just tell you when I see it."
>"Well here we go, this can't be that far." you say as you bring the ship beyond the mountains, and then go super sonic.
>"Keep your eyes peeled." you say as all three of you are looking out the front window
>"SLOW DOWN!" Twilight is yelling out to you
>You stop on a dime, you are in a shadow being cast by a large cloud formation
>"Is that it? Is it above that cloud formation?" you look at the clouds intently
>"Yeah it is." Dash replies
>You command your ship to go straight up
>"What are you doing?" Twilight seems concerned
>"Just going up to the floating city above the clouds..."
>"No, THE CLOUDS ARE THE CITY." Dash is furious
>But it's too late, you've already managed to bring the ship through the clouds and you end up busting it through some walkway type structure, you bring the ship to a stop once it comes above the cloud layer
>Rainbow is just shaking her head with a look of disapproval, "Nice move egghead."
 
>You begin to hastily make an excuse for your actions, "Its not my fault your clouds have ecological oddities allowing you to inhabit them.
DAC note that."
>You sheepishly take your ship down and allow it to hover in mid air
>"So I'm assuming I won't be able to walk up there."
>Twilight nods her head, "Rainbow can but we can't."
>You think to yourself about a solution
>"Don't worry about me walking around up there Anon, I'd be more interested in exploring your ship, if that's alright with you." Twilight is trying to read some of the English inscriptions labeling some of the devices
>"Yeah that's fine, it won't really bother me." you turn around and enter some commands on the ships console, locking out any use of dangerous equipment or the ability to move it from its place
>You open up the door and Rainbow flies out and enters the city to the new entrance you made
>"I guess I will need to find a way to make something to let me travel around up there." you mutter to yourself
 
>You begin to look around the ship for something that you can either use to fly around the city relatively freely
>"What are you looking for?" Twilight looks at you as you rummage through some of the storage units in the ships mid section
>You don't find anything
>You start heading to the back corridors of the ship, "I'm looking for something that will allow me to fly through the city, I can't bring the ship, it's too big and cumbersome.", you've never been back here before, there are two doorways, one up at the top of a staircase, and another one at the level you are already on
 
>You go through the door at the top of the staircase
>You try to open the door with the keypad that is linked to it
[Locked]
>You remember that you told the ship to close off any dangerous areas
>You undo the section of the command locking any doors on the ship
>The door opens before you
>"What's back here Anon?" Twilight has followed you up the stairs when you were fiddling with the security commands
>"I'm just looking around the ship for anything that may help with my mobility problem."
>The pony has a curious expression on her face, "Can I come look around with you?"
>"Sure, just... If you find anything that looks like this," you show her what a few various warning symbols look like on the screen of your DAC, "Don't touch it."
>You enter the doorway with Twilight following you
>In the center of the room there is a large metal column with some glowing green light on it labeled [CAUTION: HIGH ENERGY HIGH VOLTAGE; ANTIMATTER REACTOR]
>In the back of the room you see two more doors, one with a staircase leading down, another on the floor you are on
 
>"DAC, map out the safest path to get something to walk on clouds and to get back to the bridge." you are not interested in exploring right this moment
>The DAC complies and shows you a room labeled [Life support, AI, spare part repository]
>"Let's go down to this lower room Twilight."
>"Sure!" she replies eager to explore this strange new contraption that is your ship
>You both go down the stairs and into the room
>You can see a large red lit unit of compute servers and other systems labeled as [AI and life support: CRITICAL SYSTEMS]
>Along the long aisle leading towards it are carefully stored repositories of spare parts
 
>"DAC, what is the part number of the object in question?"
[For what purpose?]
>"Flight"
>The DAC gives you a part list followed by their bin locations
:Grav-panels, 250
:wiring and electrical balance control's, 456
:DAC receiver unit, 45
:Long metal plate type 4, 67
:small pulse thruster replacements, 32
>"This looks perfect." you say to yourself
>You tell the ship to project a hologram of the parts along with their bin locations from the ceiling
>"Twilight, see this images?" she nods her head "You need to find these corresponding bin numbers and get the required number of each item listed."
>"On it!" she says as she happily gets to work hunting for the bins and rummaging for the parts
>You thank yourself for looking through those books in her library the other day, if you didn't know they used the same numbers you wouldn't have confidently asked for help
>Eventually after a few minutes of searching you have all the parts and haul them out to the bridge of the ship
>"So how are we going to assemble these things Anon?" Twilight asks
 
>"DAC, swiss army mode."
[Functions]
:Screwdriver
:Small soldering iron
:Sonic welder
>You try to assemble some of the finer wires that will need to be put into the Grav-panel, but you can't manage enough precision to get them in properly
>You figure you will need something that is better suited for making things
 
>"DAC....auto construct mode." you are beginning to get frustrated, you should be up in Cloudsdale right now
[Searching for terms: Auto Construct]
.
..
...
[None available: searching for devices utilizing construct]
:Self Replicator Probe
>An image of the probe appears as a hologram projected from the DAC
>Twilight looks at it immediately
>"Oh no you don't, you are not bringing one of those things back here, especially not to Cloudsdale!" she gets up and stands atop all the parts you two have gathered and asserts herself "I don't want them adding this city to the list of things they have destroyed!"
 
>"Mined, and not what I was trying to do....damn it." you close out of the window really fast
>Twilight makes a sigh of relief
>"DAC, what would be the most efficient design keeping portability, weight, and stability in mind that can be made by hand or with nearby tools?"
[Processing structures]
[Utilizing ship-board computers for additional processing]
>The ships computer takes over
>You are elated as it is much more powerful at finding solutions than the DAC, as it actually contains an AI
.
..
...
>"Re-purposing heavy Ordinance Artillery Shell Reloading Arms." the ships computer speaks out it's commands
>"What's an Artillery Shell, Anon?" Twilight is curious to everything about your ship now
>"Uhhh, It's a type of part." you say to yourself as you command the ships computer to shut the hell up, she doesn't need to know about on board weaponry
>The computers commands go to being displayed on the DAC
[Opening Ammo rack doors]
>You see a large compartment bay slide open on the ceiling, it conatains many antimatter explosives type shells, you can also see a long spindly robotic arm type structure in the center near the bullet loader
[Prepping high precision automated de-jamming tools]
:cutter
:welder
:solder
:physical tool systems
:scanner
[starting]
>The arm drops from the ceiling and nudges Twilight out of the way by giving her a push on the rump
>"Hey, watch where you are putting your machines Anon!" Twilight gives you a mean stare
>"But I didn't do it..." you say as you watch the arm cut, assemble and move parts around
>You watch the machine come together
>"You wan't one Twilight?" the pony shakes her head no
>"Not really, I don't want to have to look for more parts."
DING*
>A bell type sound rings out and the arm folds up and goes back into the ammo systems and the sliding door shuts behind it
>You can't wait to try out your new toy
 
>"Ship, what are it's controlling properties?"
>The controls are displayed on your DAC
[Device: Flying1]
:Speed control via DAC
:Lean left go left; other controls follow same suit
>"Time for a rest run!" you hop on and start it up
>"You don't have time for a test run, the day is fleeting." Twilight brings up a good point
>You fly out of the ships entry port
>You are happy the DAC recommended the electrical balance controls, it makes this a whole lot easier to use than you originally thought
>You quickly master the device and fly up to Cloudsdale through the convenient hole you made in the bottom of the city
>Rainbow Dash is there waiting for you, "What took you so long egghead?"
 
>"Hey, you're not the one who had to make a hovering device from scratch." you are kinda flustered "Plus a creature on board escaped and we had to catch it."
>"Was that creature you?" she chuckles a little bit
>"No."
>"Sure, whatever Anon." she begins to fly up off the cloud surface, "So what made you want to come here again?"
>"I need to see in whoever's in charge of flight here would be interested in our ships, as a trade bargain." you say as you follow her up into the air on your board
>"Okay, I can take you to the Wonderbolts!" she says as she speeds off
>You fly after her, riding the air like it's a wave on the sea
>You notice all the pegasi staring at you, but you don't really care
>After flying for a while she leads you two a large white marble building with a Greek type architecture
>"Can I walk here?" you ask
>"Well duh, it's stone." she says while rolling her eyes at you, "I thought you were smart Anon."
 
>"And I thought you were fastest thing on the planet." it wasn't that hard for you to make a fitting comeback
>"Hey, nice one!" she says as she turns and walking into the building
>You grab your hover board and strap it to your back where you'd typically strap your rifle and then proceed to follow her inside
>You enter a large atrium that must serve as the buildings main chamber
>All around you are side rooms where you can see pegasi taking tests and classes with chalkboards littered in flight instructions
>"Follow me!" Rainbow flies up to a regal looking office type area
>You opt to take the stairs on your way up
>You arrive with Dash holding the door open for you, you can see a fiery orange maned pegasus filling out some paperwork
 
>"I have a proposition to make. Would you be interested in bargaining some ships of my company's, seeing as how we are now going to be providing you some form of defense. I'm sure we can adapt them to meet your physical standards, and training shouldn't be too difficult."
>She continues to fill out the paper work and only makes an occasional glance towards you
>"Spitfire, an important guest is here to see you." Rainbow tries to help you out
>"Does... uh it.. have an appointment?" Spitfire asks in a stern tone
>"No, he doesn't," rainbow runs up and puts her front hooves on Spitfires desk, "He's not an it either, he's a thing... A thing called a human, and his name is Anon!"
>"Well he still doesn't have an appointment, if you want to schedual one I'd be --" You cut her off
>"I'm here on a mission pertaining to the best interests of your ruling princesses!" you are actually mad, you don't get mad allot, but she deserves a good yelling for snubbing you
>"Why didn't you say so? Have a seat and we'll get to business." she says, she's probably only trying to appeal to Celestia and Luna now though
>"I'm here to make a trade offer." you say
>"What are you looking to trade?" she asks while putting her aviators on to probably avoid eye contact with you or something
>You quickly respond with, "Ships, my organizations are willing to trade ships for residence on your moon."
>"We don't need ships, this isn't some sea fairing organization." she goes back to her paperwork
 
>"No, machines that work for areal defense that would help your country. As of right now you are the only nation accepting our deal. As such making the deal may of made Equestria enemies with any other nations on your world, and possibly off your world. These machines will be very beneficial." you say
>"Really? Do you have any proof of these machines?" she says while still flipping through her papers
 
>You pull up a hologram of your ship
>"How big is it?" she asks looking up from her paperwork
>"50 meters front to back." you say
>You pull up some other ships and show them to scale with your craft, eventually all you can make of your ship is a dot when compared to some of the models Earth has produced for other fleets
>You call up your ship and tell it to fly up to the window behind where Spitfire is seated
>"They seem interesting but I don't think we have any use for your technology. The strongest weapons we posses to defend Equestria are the Elements, nothing is more powerful than that."
>"How about this?" you pull up a hologram of a Tsar bomb going off from the 1900's
>The ship is now visible through the window, you can see Twilight in the front window with her eyes wide and she is saying something
>You can barely read her lips 'I didn't do it...'
>"I'm still not impressed." she says
>"How about how silent they can be?" you offer
>"We have some of the most silent fliers in Equestria." she states
>"Well, is it as silent as what is behind you?" Rainbow Dash interjects
>Spitfire turns around in her chair, "Well I'll be damned." she lowers her sunglasses, "I guess I can take you up on your offer, I'd like one or two to test around with. How soon can you get them to me?"
 
>"If you'll allow use to full use of Equestrian air space I can have three in about two days," you say, "They may be done sooner, it just depends how long it takes for the builders to customize them for your needs."
>She nods in agreement, "When can you get your builders here?" she asks while folding up her sunglasses and placing them on the desk
>"I can have them here now." you say as you tell two of your replicator probes to come to the building
>Two bright flashes can be seen through the doorway followed by some commotion and screaming, you told them to come directly into the building, as it should provide good building space in the atrium
>You tell the probes to be minimally invasive, implement no weaponry, and to try to modify small craft models to best fit their needs and place other restrictions
>"You can get started whenever you are ready, I have to worker Von Nuemann Probes in your lobby that are programmed to have an easy to use visual interface." you say as the three of you walk over to the the railing on the balcony outside the doorway, "There are however some flight restrictions to the ship models, they can't leave 100 kilometers from here, no weapons yet either."
>"I can understand your concerns." spitfire replies
>Down below you ponies are already starting to play with the holographic interface one of the probes is projecting, she 'touches' a hoof to a part being shown in the hologram, the other probe quickly builds it and levitates it showing off all of its properties
>You are very satisfied that these things seem to be less reckless than they were before
>"If you need any help ask one of them to contact me." you say