//------------------------------//
// Applejack: Logging In 
// Story: The Great Changeling Shipping Experiment 
// by Dusky Flower 
//------------------------------//

Applejack could not figure out what to do with the goggles. She was wearing them, a red bodysuit had appeared, so now what?

"Why, ah bet this is just some silly prank. These goggles don't do nothing but put ya in some weird outfit thing, and make yer eyes glow."

As the universe had a sense of comedic timing, it took this moment to start logging Applejack into the virtual world.


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Apples. Apples and apple trees as far as the eye could see. Yep, she was definitely still in Sweet Apple Acres. But wasn't Big Mac out doing his chores just a moment ago? It all just didn't add up.

WELCOME PLAYER NAME HERE PLEASE PLACE YOUR HOOF INSIDE THE PORTAL

Applejack jumped backwards, unsettling her hat from where it rested atop her blond mane.

"Oh hay no!" she shouted, shoving the door open, and she began to gallop down the road.

The portal took this as an order, and turned into a hay-colored pony with no features. It looked like a yellow mannequin.

Looking over to where its quarry had gone, it galloped through the open door and down the road after her.


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Applejack looked back over her shoulder to where the straw-colored, pony-shaped portal was galloping after her.

"No way in tarnation are ya gonna get me, ya hay-portal thingy!" She tried to speed up, but the portal was faster. It leapt right over her, and landed in front of her, turning back into a portal.

Applejack, though she desperately tried, could not stop before she crashed right into the portal.

It swirled around for a moment, then turned into a straw-colored earth pony with a grass-colored mane, a hat much like Applejack's, and a cutie mark of a rope tied around an apple, one end of the string trailing off into a loop at the end.

"Why, howdy there! My name's Haystack, and Ah presume yer Applejack?"

Applejack's face changed from terrified to still-terrified-but-confused.

"Uh, yer right. Ah'm Applejack, mighty pleased ta meet ya and all, but do ya mind explainin' just what in the hay is going on?"

Haystack chuckled. "All in good time, sugarcube. All in good time."