CHAPTER 7
A LIAR'S TALE
"Blah blah blah settlers...blah blah blah Apple family...blah blah blah...Zap Apples?" Scar gave a frustrated sigh and tossed the book aside. Then thumped his head on his pillow and just laid there for a while. The book had been no help at all and just left his as clueless as ever.
Just then, he heard the front door open. "Hey Scar, I'm back!" Ironhead called out. He searched the apartment, eventually finding his brother in their room. "Lemme guess, still nothing?"
Scar shook his head but didn't raise it. Ironhead noticed the book and picked it up. "Ponyville's history?" he asked sitting on his bed and flipping through its pages.
"Yeah." Scar flipped over and faced the ceiling. "I tried asking Pinkie, but she didn't know anything and said I should go ask Twilight. After I took a bath-"
"A bath?" Ironhead raised an eyebrow.
Scar waved the question off. "Don't ask. Anyway, Twilight didn't know anything about light either, so I thought I'd find something in Ponyville's history. Turns out that was a bust too."
"Huh..." Ironhead flipped through the pages some more eventually coming across something that took him by surprise. "Wait, Applejack's family founded Ponyville?"
Scar sat up. "Yeah, Twilight told me."
Ironhead nodded and flipped a page coming across a picture of the original settlers. He didn't recognize any of them, but a caption at the bottom said that the filly in the middle was Granny Smith. Huh...Granny didn't look to bad back in the day...
"We've got no leads at all." Scar said miserably. " And dad said yesterday that Ash and Psych are still the same. None of us are going anywhere with this." He gave a defeated sigh.
Ironhead snapped the book shut and put it aside. "C'mon bro, don't say crap like that." He walked over to his brother. "Nothing's happened yet, so we still got time. Tell you what, I'll go ask Applejack if I can get the afternoon off, so I can help you out."
The seemed to cheer Scar up a bit. "You really think she'd let you do that."
"Eeyup."
Scar gave him a puzzled look. The brown pony realized what he just said. "Great, the Apples're starting to rub off on me..."
"That's cause you hang around them all day." Scar chuckled. "Hey, I never asked; what's farm work like?"
"Eh." Ironhead shrugged. "Pretty OK I guess. I mean, most of the stuff I gotta do isn't really that tough anyway 'cause of my strength. Sometimes, I do some plowing or helping out with the animals or taking care of the fields and stuff. Applejack still won't let me buck trees though..."
"They'd go out of business if they did that." Scar remarked with a chuckle.
"Yeah, the Apples're pretty close." Ironhead continued. "They're all really nice y'know. Big Mac's still trying to beat me at everything. Applejack's little sister's a good kid, and her grandma's really nice too. Applejack's well...she's something alright." he found himself gazing out a window. "I mean, even with the rest of 'em, running the farm's tough work. Heck, without my powers, I'd've quit by now." he let out a hearty chuckle.
"Yeah...I saw her buck apples, fix up the house, man the stall, keep an eye on Applebloom...seriously, even I think that's a lot to handle...but she does it all like it's nothing at all. That pony amazes me y'know..."
"Uh huh..." Scar got up and stretched a little. "Listen, I think it's time I go get this to dad." He held up a soil-filled test tube and opened the room's window.
"Don't fly too low." Ironhead warned still a little mad about what happened a few days ago. Scar just waved him off and took to the sky. Now alone, Ironhead sighed. He picked up the book Scar had and flipped through it some more.
"Apple family huh...?"
The next day...
"Y'know, you guys seriously need a new plow." Ironhead commented as he watched Big Mac struggle while pulling his plow which was rusty and clearly needed replacement. His own plow was the same, but he didn't that much trouble pulling it.
In a matter of minutes, his half of the field was fully plowed. After putting the tools back in the shed, he went over and saw Big Mac still busy with his half. "Hey, you want any help?" he asked.
"N..nope...I'm fine..." Big Mac replied.
The other earth pony shrugged. "If you say so. Listen uh...I'm gonna go get a drink. Just call me if you need some help."
"Will do..."
Ironhead made his way into the house and entered the kitchen. After filling up a glass, he sat down and drank from it, resting from the work he just did.
Just then, Applejack entered the room and wiped some sweat from her brow. "Hoo wee, done with your side of the field already?" she asked surprised to see him.
"Uh huh. Big Mac's only like, half done or something. Maybe you guys should get a new plow."
"Why? You got no problem with it."
"Well duh, I'm the strongest pony in two towns." Ironhead said proudly. Probably in the world too...
All that did was make Applejack chuckle. "Well, yer strong; I'll give ya that. Good thing too; get's a lotta work done 'round here."
"Yeah. So where were you?" Ironhead asked. AJ tilted her head upwards.
"Fixin' up a few leaky pipes." Applejack sat down across the table. "Took longer than I thought."
"Heh, farm work's really like that huh?"
"Well, yeah." Applejack shrugged. "It ain't always this easy, but hey, I can manage. You're doin' awfully well for somepony who ain't used to life like this."
"Eh. Living in Manehatten's not that bad. Really boring, yeah, but not bad." Ironhead lied.
He took a sip of his drink. "Well then how'd a boring place like that make somepony like you an' yer brother?"
"I dunno; we're just different I guess." Ironhead replied with a small smile. "You should've seen my mom and dad's looks when we told them we wanted to leave Manehatten. They actually wanted us to do the same kind of work. Can you believe that?"
"Well, it's hard to think of you two behind a desk crunchin' up numbers and all that fancy shmancy mathematical stuff to be honest." Applejack replied.
"Exactly. I told them I wasn't cut out for all that math and business crap. " Ironhead said continuing to lie and make up stories as he went.
He had absolutely no idea just who he was lying to.
"I mean, Scar and I aren't stupid or anything. Well, we never got any awards or anything in school either." He scratched the back of his head. "We just wanted a more exciting life y'know; Scar especially, and I'm kinda the same as him. My sister-"
Once again, he froze at the last word, and he felt a tiny amount of pain in his chest. "Uh...somethin' the matter sugar cube?" Applejack asked noticing this.
The colt blinked several times. "Huh? Wh-what about sugar?"
"You said something 'bout your sister." Applejack pointed out.
"Oh yeah." Ironhead regained his composure. "My sister's fine with living in Manehatten. I write to her like, every week. Heh, I tell her all the times we tried looking for jobs in other cities. I told her Ponyville's nice; she said if she wasn't so swamped with work all the time, she'd visit some time."
"That's awfully nice of her. You two seem real close." Applejack noted.
"Well, we are twins..."
"Twins? You have a twin sister?"
"Y-Yeah..."
Ironhead's heart was a battleground between the pain of loss and soothing feeling of reminiscing good times with his sister. "Her name's Ironheart, and well, she kinda looks like me; I mean, we got the same eyes and coat. She's a little thinner than me, and she's got a longer and curlier mane."
"We used to all sorts of stuff together a few years back." Ironhead found himself unable to lie any more, not about this. "We'd pretend to be super heroes and fight bad guys and stuff. We this stupid little cart outta wood and called it the Ironmobile and ran around town looking for bad guys. And-and one time, we were trying to get sompony's cat outta a tree and crashed our cart into it. A-and the cat fell and started attacking us. We gave the cat back, but our mom and dad were so mad."
After hearing his tale, Applejack watched as he laughed and thumped the kitchen table as he did. He laughed for a long time and by the time they were reduced to small chuckles, he clutched his chest as his lungs ached. When he finally stopped, he remained silent for a while.
"Dammit I miss her..."
The first bit of truth he had said in a long time.
He was silent once more. After a few seconds, he looked up and just remembered that Applejack was with him. "Uh heh, sorry Applejack. Didn't mean to ramble like that..."
"It's all right Ironhead. Hey, that was mighty sweet of ya to say 'bout yer sister." Applejack said with a smile. "How long's it been since ya last saw her?"
"A really, really...really long time." Ironhead answered.
"Ya really miss her don't ya?" He nodded. "Can't say I blame you. I'd prob'ly feel the same if Applebloom and I were apart."
Ironhead looked up at her. "Yeah; you two look really close. Applebloom kinda reminds me of Ironheart when we were kids. 'Course, Ironheart never complained about not having a Cutie'Mark yet. She's a good kid y'know."
"She sure is." Appplejack mused. "Me, Bog Macintosh, Applebloom, Granny Smith, we're all real close. Granny always told us that fam'ly sticks with ya no matter what. They ain't gonna abandon you or hate ya for who ya are." She bowed her head slightly. "And even if they leave...somehow and some way, they're still with ya..."
The silence that followed was similar to the one after Ironhead spoke. Thinking about her words, he realized that during his time at the farm, he never saw nor heard anything about Applejack's parents. He didn't want to be rude or anything and ask, but he could tell that Applejack's bond with her remaining family was just as strong as his own.
He had lost both his parents and his sister in that incident several years ago. Even to this day, he was still saddened by their deaths especially Ironheart who he was closest to and was far too young to lose her life. But despite the sadness he felt, he was happy with his current life. Equinox, Scar and the rest of them, they were his family now. Even though Ash and Psych never wanted anything to do with the rest of them, he still thought of them as his brothers. He, like Applejack, found joy and peace with the ones with was with right now.
The silence was interrupted when Big Mac stepped into the room to fetch a drink. "Oh, finally done with the field?" his sister asked. Big Mac nodded and took a drink. "That's good. After lunch, you and Ironhead can start seeding-"
"Uh, actually Applejack, I wanna ask if I can get the afternoon off. Scar's still looking for a job, and he asked if I can help." Ironhead said and in came the lies once again.
"Hmm...well, I guess you can. You have been workin' real hard here the past few days. I s'pose you can get the afternoon off." Applejack said doing some thinking. "I hope yer brother finds what he's lookin' for."
"Yeah, me too." Ironhead couldn't help but smirk at that. "Thanks Applejack."
"No prob' sugar cube. Ya deserve it; I'm a go prep up some of them seeds. Bee right back."
With that, she left the two boys alone. Ironhead turned to Big Mac. "Your sister's really something y'know. I don't really know any other girl like her."
"That's AJ for ya." Big Mac said looking at where his sister was. "The farm'd be nothin' without somepony as hard workin', devoted and tough as she is. Not to mention honest."
Ironhead blinked a few times. "Did you say honest?"
"Eeyup." he nodded. "Applejack's the most honest pony I know. You could say that it's her 'element'." he added with a light chuckle.
Ironhead blinked several times as this knew brand of information sunk in. He realized that during their entire conversation, Applejack had been completely honest with him. He was honest when he spoke about his sister, but that was just it. Everything else was nothing but lies.
Secrets and lies...that was his element.
He was too caught up in his thoughts to notice that Big Mac had left the room. He covered his face in shame and smacked his forehead against the table. Before coming to Ponyville, he'd never lied that much before, and just now he lied several times right in the face of somepony who exemplifies honesty more than anypony else.
And the guilt was crushing to say the least.