//------------------------------// // Taxing Apples // Story: Harbinger // by Composer99 //------------------------------// Being a Princess, as Spike was happy to explain at length, was about more than just standing around, looking good in a crown, and occasionally dashing around Equestria to save the day. There was work involved. It wasn’t just about spreading friendship, or going on Cutie Map missions, or taking a few days to go off to Canterlot to make up with your old friends because you feel guilty and that you have to live up to the title of “Princess of Friendship”. The machinery of Equestrian government relied, ultimately, on the Princesses, even if they tended to insert themselves only infrequently and with great delicacy in routine matters. Nevertheless, it meant almost everything required the authority of a Princess behind it. A Princess had to sign off on regular reports of all kinds (Spike thought that reading the reports was optional; Twilight emphatically disagreed). A Princess had to approve changes to municipal codes (here again, Spike and Twilight had opposed views on how much reading was required beforehand). A Princess had to authorise capital expenditures on public works. A Princess even had to review changes to the railway timetables! Spike liked to refer to such paper-pushing as Princess-work. Spike wasn’t sure how Princess Celestia had kept caught up on all the Princess-work during the long years when she was the sole governing Princess of Equestria, especially as the country had grown and expanded, on top of everything else she had to do. (He would never tell Twilight what he thought, for fear that her heart would stop with the shock of it, but he suspected Celestia just skimmed through all the documentation.) Even now, with three Princesses in Equestria and one in the Crystal Empire, the Princess-work just seemed to grow to match the availability of Princesses to work on it. Spike sometimes wondered if that was really the case, or if Twilight just made Princess-work a more time-consuming and difficult process because she was always so thorough about it. Where Spike imagined Celestia or Luna might skim over, say, this year’s Annual Economic Outlook of Agri-business and Related Retail Sectors, Celestial Seaboard Region, Twilight would insist on reading the entire thing, cover to cover, and then making certain she understood the report’s every intricacy, along with any relevant contextual information. Sometimes, she might even look up references, and read them all through, too, or, worse yet, start corresponding with the ponies who had written it. Her other flaw, as Spike saw it, was that she wasn’t always the best at prioritising. It was a bad habit from her days as Celestia’s student, he had decided, when every single reading and research assignment was automatically The. Most. Important. Thing. Ever. But Spike thought that a request for funds to repave roads in Manehattan before the winter set in would reasonably be worth looking over in preference to the umpteenth statistical survey on crime determining that, yet again, Equestria had no ponicides (“only within the bounds of statistical certainty,” he imagined Twilight saying). Twilight, regrettably (according to Spike), ploughed through everything in more or less the order in which she had received it, and every single document that crossed her desk was The. Most. Important. Ever. while she was reviewing it. The bottom line was that when Twilight wasn’t saving Equestria from certain doom, resolving somepony’s friendship problems, reading or writing dense academic prose, or just spending time with her friends, she was responsible for helping keep the wheels of Equestrian bureaucracy spinning smoothly. The problem was, when potential disaster struck, when monsters attacked Ponyville, or when Cutie Map missions came calling, all that Princess-work tended to pile up. It wouldn’t be a problem, Spike often reflected, if Twilight was, well, just a bit lazier about the whole thing. But she wasn’t, and so, as the amount of paper to be pushed crept ever higher, so did her stress levels. It was for this reason that Spike was unhappily anticipating Twilight’s return from her trip to get food from the Ponyville markets. He was sitting in the library, idly holding a comic book that he had been unable to read for the past twenty minutes, and bringing to mind the burgeoning stack in her “In” tray on the desk of her personal study. The castle doors swung open. Spike cringed, expecting to hear Twilight bolting in in a panic. He wasn’t sure whether he ought to be pleasantly or unpleasantly surprised when he heard her humming contentedly. “Spike, I’m home!” she called cheerfully. “Can you meet me in the kitchen?” “The kitchen? It’s not even lunchtime yet,” Spike said to himself. He nevertheless dutifully got out of his seat and jogged to the kitchen. Twilight was there. She had picked up more than a few apples: there was plenty of food. “I guess I should have remembered not to go out shopping hungry,” Twilight said. “I miiiiiight have picked up some extra snacks. But don’t worry, I got you something, too.” “Really?” Spike asked greedily. “Really!” She tossed him a gem-coated pastry. “Mr Cake made it to order,” she explained. All thoughts of Princess-work were banished from Spike’s mind as he wolfed down half of the pastry in a single gulp. “It’s not a bad idea to have a little something now,” Twilight said in between eating an apple. “We’ve got to get to work today.” Spike groaned. Visions of helping Twilight file through an unending pile of Princess-work once again flashed through his mind. “I know, I know, but those consent forms aren’t going to write themselves.” Wait, what? “Consent forms?” Spike asked, confused. “Consent forms. You know, for the cutie mark research? Any magical research involving anypony who’s not legally of age can only be done with the consent of their legally designated guardians – usually parents, but we know ponies for whom that’s not the case. Apple Bloom, for instance.” “Ooookay, consent forms,” Spike said. He thought back to the “In” tray. “But what about – ” “I’m sure whatever it is can wait for a bit. I put this project off for so long already – I really want to get it started while it’s still fresh in my mind. We’ll get through some of our other work once I’ve had a chance to drop the forms off this afternoon.” “You want to have them done by this after – wait, ‘whatever it is can wait for a bit’?” Spike asked, incredulous. He peered at Twilight suspiciously. “Are you sure you’re feeling all right, Twilight?” Twilight giggled, then yawned loudly. “Still pretty sleepy,” she admitted. “But I can’t let that bother me just now. “Anyway, finish up your pastry. Lots to do before lunch!” she exclaimed, her eyes sparkling with enthusiasm. Spike shoved the rest of the pastry in his mouth. It wasn’t the paper-pushing he was expecting, but it was paper-pushing all the same. “I can’t wait,” he muttered. At least the pastry had been delicious. - “Consarn it, what’d I do with that box of receipts!” Her trademark rodeo hat traded in for a set of green eyeshades, Applejack pawed irritably through the piles of paper with the sweep of a hoof. Hearing the outburst from the kitchen downstairs, Apple Bloom looked anxiously at Granny Smith. “Don’t you worry none, sugar pie,” Granny said reassuringly, patting her on the flank. “You know how Applejack gits when she’s trying to do taxes.” Granny eyed the doorway leading into the hall. If things were going about normal, she reckoned Applejack would soon get to talking up a blue streak once she’d realised she’d forgotten about a bunch of – deed suction thingamajigs, whatever she called ‘em. Probably best if Apple Bloom wasn’t here for all that. “I knows ye’ve bin helpin’ me makin’ pies, but why dontcha take a break and go find yer friends?” “Really?” Apple Bloom brightened up. “Thanks, Granny!” She bolted out of the kitchen for the outside. Granny went back to her baking, listening to the pacing upstairs slowly turn into stomping. Apple Bloom had been a big help with the pies, but she weren’t no invalid just yet, and if she had to whip up a pie or two on her own so Apple Bloom could be spared the experience of her big sister realising she had messed up adding up… what did Applejack call it? Quarts of revenue? As Granny recalled, revenue was a fancy word for “bits you got from other ponies”. She certainly didn’t recall storing bits in quart-size measuring cups. Maybe they did that at the bank? Or maybe it was quartz revenue? But they weren’t in the quarrying business, why in tarnation would ponies be giving them bits for quartz? Why were there so many different high-falutin’ words for “bits you got from other ponies”, anyway? Granny Smith paused. “What’d I been thinkin’ ‘bout? Somethin’ to do with Apple Bloom?” she asked herself aloud. She thought in silence for a moment, before saying, “Eh, it’ll come back to me.” Upstairs, Applejack fumed. The receipts were nowhere to be found. “Why oh why do I keep doin’ this to myself?” she demanded. “Every year, it’s always the same. I keep telling myself I’ll start early so this don’t happen, and then things keep comin’ up, and here I am, tearin’ my mane out again.” It hadn’t been this bad before, Applejack recalled. The first year after Granny had relinquished tax duties – following an audit where somepony had realised that the Apples had massively overpaid taxes for the previous three years – Big Mac had taken up the task. One desk and one expensive calculating machine both smashed to pieces later, Applejack had taken over. Back then, though, taxes had been rather simpler, owing to the farm’s relatively modest income. Grunting in frustration as she hunted for the box of receipts, Applejack could no longer fault Big Mac’s temperamental lack of enthusiasm. Since Twilight had become a Princess, and since it had become well known that Sweet Apple Acres was her favourite apple farm, business had been on the up-and-up. They’d finagled a higher percentage from Mr Rich for their zap apple products. But more bits made taxes more complicated, and it was already frustrating enough when you – when you… Applejack looked down at the accusingly blank “Deductions to be Filed for an Eligible Dependent” document and swore loudly. “When you forget a whole steamin’ pile of deductible expenses!” she shouted. Downstairs, Granny poked into a pie with a fork and said to herself, “Knew that was a-comin’.” Applejack inhaled and exhaled loudly, trying to calm herself. Her head was throbbing. “Maybe it’s time for a break. Get some water and something for my head,” she said aloud. Her head shot up with surprise when she heard a loud, insistent knocking at the door. “Apple Bloom, can you get that?” she shouted. Granny Smith’s voice filtered up from below. “I sent her off, and these pies are in a tight spot. You mind?” Applejack scrunched up her face in frustration, and resisted the urge to cuss at Granny. “All right,” she shouted back down, probably sounding more aggrieved than she intended. She trotted down to the door. She was quite surprised to see who it was. “Twilight? Pardon my sounding so surprised, but what’re you doin’ here?” “Applejack!” Twilight said enthusiastically. She had started to reach out to initiate a hug, but stopped upon examining Applejack more closely. “You don’t look too good there, AJ,” she said. Her eyes flickered up and took in the green eyeshades. “Did I catch you at a bad time?” Applejack sighed, relieved at the offered opening. “’Fraid so, sugarcube, maybe I could catch you later?” Unfortunately, if there was a pony who sometimes couldn’t take a hint, it was Twilight. “Oooh!” she said with obvious excitement. “Did you finally get around to registering as a corporation like I suggested? You know that could improve your refunds from – ” “Sorry, Twilight, but we’ve been over this. Sweet Apple Acres is a family-owned business, through and through. Sweet Apple Acres Inc. ain’t, even if us Apples were the only… whaddya call ‘em, ‘shareholders’. Plus there’s all that extra paperwork that I sure as Shamrock apple crumble do not want to be workin’ on when I could be outside doin’ what I love.” “Of course, but you know I’d be happy to – ” “We’ve been over that, too, Twi. An Apple has filed Sweet Apple Acres taxes for as long as we’ve lived here, and I ain’t gonna be the one that stops. I'm sure you could do as good a job or better, but it's a point o' pride - fer me at least.” "Of course," Twilight said pleasantly. "I understand." “So, if you’ll excuse me,” Applejack said, trying to get back to things before she lost her train of thought, but Twilight stopped her. “Wait! I know you must be busy, but I wanted to give you something. It’s about Apple Bloom.” “Apple Bloom?” Twilight produced three thick file folders from her saddlebags. Applejack stared at them. “What. Are. Those?!” she finally gasped out. “Oh, these? They’re consent forms. You have to fill them out in triplicate.” “… In triplicate.” “Yep! One for you, and one for me, and then one more for the IRB!” Twilight seemed immensely proud of herself for the attempt at metred rhyme. “Uhh.. IRB?” “You know – Institutional Review Boa – maybe you haven’t heard of those. Oh, of course!” Twilight gave herself a light facehoof. “Here I am getting ahead of myself. Remember how Apple Bloom got her cutie mark at the same time as her friends? I was meaning to start some serious research on it, but then the whole Starlight Glimmer time travel thing happened, and I forgot. Anyway, I want to get started on it now, so here we are!” She placed the folders neatly at Applejack’s feet. Applejack stared at them with a pained expression. “Uh, I hope you don’t need these done too soon, Twilight.” “Well, I was hoping that maybe Apple Bloom could bring two signed copies for me when I see her for Twilight Time tomorrow.” “T-t-Twilight Time? Signed copies? Tomorrow?” “Silly me! I also wanted to get that started again. I figured we could work something out when she was done her chores for the day. Of course, I have to talk to her and her friends about it first. I was going to swing by their clubhouse after dropping off forms at Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo’s parents. “But if you’re busy with taxes, don’t worry too much about it! I’ve still got to get the grant application in and approved before anything starts in earnest. That’ll be a moon or two, I’m sure. “Anyway, sorry to keep you so long, but I’ve gotta fly. These forms won’t deliver themselves, you know. See you some – help me – time soon, Applejack!” Applejack reared her head back, startled, but Twilight had waved goodbye and taken off before she’d quite finished processing what she’d heard. She stood in the doorway for another minute, gazing at Twilight’s retreating form. “Did I hear what I thought I heard?” she asked herself. She stared out at the sky for a moment longer, then looked down at the file folders. “Well, as long as it’s not taxes,” she said. “Maybe I need a break.” Her stomach rumbled as she smelled the scent of baking. “And somethin’ to eat.”