When adventure finds you
“Here, take this.” said the little foal.
Applebloom looked at the piece of paper the foal had given her. It was weird. I mean, not the piece of paper in itself or the foal, or in any unnatural sense. It was weird only because Applebloom couldn’t understand why the foal was giving her a piece of paper.
If at least what was on the paper could have helped, she would have maybe figured it out, but it was almost impossible to figure out what it was to begin with.
That’s a lie, she was able to say it was a drawing of some sort, because it had clearly been drawn with some color pencils and stuff, but a drawing of what, that was truly impossible to say.
“Thanks.” she replied to the foal, almost by reflex, but with that intonation that was admitting she had no idea why exactly she was thankful.
And it could be argued that being given anything, would it be the most useless and cheapest thing in the world, is always good enough of a reason to be thankful, because somebody, or in this case somepony, was kind enough to give it to you. In some way, it would mean that this somebody or somepony had judged you worth giving you that thing.
It could also be argued that saying thanks without knowing why is a straight lie that is supposed to make the other think you are thankful when you, in all honesty, are just confused.
Nonetheless, Applebloom had thanked the foal but was still trying to figure out what the drawing was. She looked at the foal, but he looked down in return, so that wasn’t really helping.
So she naturally went to everything else she knew to help her solve the case. And one of the clues she had right in front of her was that the drawing had probably been done by the foal who had given it to her. Therefore, the drawing had to be some foal stuff. Thinking a little harder, she found out that foals like adventure and being the best and doing foals stuff.
It wasn’t making any sense. She gave up for a second and asked the foal:
“Excuse me, but… what is it?”
Which made the foal blush for some reason. But at that same moment, her mind found the answer. Foals like adventure, so that had to be related to adventure and the only way she could think of that a drawing may be related to adventure was a treasure map.
This was a treasure map the foal had drawn and given to her. Or maybe he hadn’t even drawn it himself. That wasn’t important. What was, on the other hoof, was that there was a treasure, somewhere, to be found. And that foal had given her, Applebloom, the mission to retrieve that treasure.
“It’s a treasure map!” shouted Applebloom, happy to have cracked the case. “That’s it, right?”
The foal opened two very big eyes, but nodded slightly.
“Oh… hum… yeah. That’s it.” he answered. “That’s a treasure map.”
By Celestia that foal was way too shy. But that was explaining why he didn’t want to go find the treasure by himself. He had to have heard from the great cutie mark crusaders and wanted to give the quest to them.
It was all making sense now and Applebloom smiled at the foal.
“Don’t worry.” she told him, “I will take god care of it. I’ll find the treasure with your map and I’ll bring it to you. Then we will split it.”
She began to go away, when she suddenly turned around and added:
“We will give you ten percent, you know, because we will be doing most of the work and all… that’s okay, right?”
The foal, once again, nodded, which made Applebloom think she should get a cutie mark in negotiations. Before she remembered how it went the last time she had tried that and how upset Applejack had been when she had almost sold the farm for a piece of bread and three beans.
Onto adventure!
Applebloom showed the map to Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo. Then, she explained how she had acquired it, adding only some slight changes like a whole enigma that she had had to solve in order to be trusted and some other minor details.
“You’re sure that’s a treasure map?” asked Scootaloo, who just didn’t want to admit she wasn’t able to read it. “It could be just anything if you ask me, it's so poorly drawn!”
“Of course it’s a treasure map!” replied Applebloom immediately. “A foal gave it to me, what else could it be? Besides, you can see that this line is representing a shore and that thing here must be the town hall.”
Saying that, Applebloom was pointing some parts of the drawing that were requiring quite some imagination to be interpreted as a shore or as a town hall. But imagination was the biggest thing the three fillies weren’t lacking, so they all agreed it was a treasure map and that the couples of lines Applebloom had pointed with her hoof was the town hall, or maybe the library as it could also very well have been a tree.
“But where is the “x”?” asked Sweetie Belle.
“What?” asked both Applebloom and Scootaloo.
“Well, you know… Every treasure map has an “x” somewhere to show you where the treasure is hidden. But I can’t find it.” explained Sweetie Belle.
They all looked again at the map and, in fact, there was no big “x” in red to show them where they should go. But Scootaloo found two little lines that could look like an “x” and decided that it was where they would find the treasure.
It took almost as long to decide where that “x” could be pointing in the real world. The map was very badly drawn, so it was hard to decipher, but they eventually all agreed that the “x” was telling them the treasure had been buried in the garden behind Fluttershy’s cottage.
The cutie mark crusaders didn’t need much more informations to go grab some pickaxes and shovels and make their way to Fluttershy’s cottage, not even questioning why she would have a treasure buried in her backyard.
Just had (add) some pink in the mix…
Pinkie Pie appeared behind Fluttershy’s shoulder and hugged her for no particular reason.
“Hello Fluttershy!” she shouted. “How are you? Are you doing anything? Because I just thought of something that would blow your mind!”
But then, she realized that something wasn’t totally right. Fluttershy was kind of stressed at the moment. In fact, the yellow pegasus didn’t know how to handle the situation anymore. Because at that very moment, she had three fillies in her backyard that were digging holes about everywhere in her lawn.
Of course she had thought of stopping them, and she would have had more than enough means to do so, but she just didn’t know how to ask them nicely first. And as all of her attempts had failed, the three fillies having only understood that it was okay for them to go on, she was feeling very bad at the idea of doing anything anymore. In other words, she was totally freaking out and had lost control of the situation, which in her case meant she was just waiting until the storm would have passed and she could repair the damages.
“Oh, you’re having a digging party. I love those!” simply said Pinkie Pie, acknowledging the situation.
She went to the three fillies and asked them what they were doing and if she could join. That’s how she saw the treasure map and was made aware that there was a treasure to be found somewhere in Ponyville.
And almost as soon as she had seen the drawing, Pinkie Pie understood exactly what it was all about.
“You know, I don’t think there is any treasure in this backyard.” Pinkie told the three fillies.
“There is no treasure?” they all asked her, her hopes suddenly crushed after all that hard work.
“No. You see, that line, here, that’s Ponvyille’s lake and that thing here, that’s the island in the middle. And here is the “x”, you see?” explained Pinkie Pie, showing it all on the map. “I’m pretty sure that this island is the key to find the treasure.”
The three fillies looked at each other, sharing three very big smiles.
It must be said that they had been beginning to doubt the existence of the treasure after a few holes and even Applebloom, who didn’t want to be wrong, was considering that she might have been wrong to think that it was a treasure map, even if her instinct was telling her that there was a treasure to be found anyway.
But now that Pinkie Pie had shown them where the treasure was on the map, the understood that they had just been reading it wrong. And, actually, the idea of having to cross the sea, or, in this case, any surface of water, was making the whole thing more believable as well as interesting.
“Hey, this makes much more sense!” said Scootaloo. “Thanks Pinkie Pie, that treasure is as good as ours now.”
“Yeah, we just need to find a boat. It will be just like if we were to be pirates or something!” added Applebloom, excited at the idea and already imagining herself on a big pirate ship fighting against giant octopuses in the middle of a big storm. “You’re right, nothing stands between us and the treasure now.”
“Well, we will see about that…” evilly said Pinkie Pie with an, well, evil smile on her face.
And then she came back to her normal self and said goodbye to the three fillies, hopping joyfully away under the beautiful sun.
The cutie mark crusaders weren’t sure to know what they should understand from Pinkie’s behavior, but they decided that they shouldn’t worry about it and just go get that treasure before the day was over, and even better, before the afternoon snack as they liked milk and cookies.
So the three fillies came out of their hole, thanked Fluttershy to have let them dig holes in her backyard, to which Fluttershy answered a very unconvinced “You’re welcome” with a very pale and light voice as she was contemplating what was left of her backyard.
And thus, Applebloom, Scootaloo and Applebloom went on their quest to find a boat and cross the lake to go to the treasure island.
The supremacy of the pony navy
This wasn’t as epic as the three fillies would have wanted it to be. Of course, they were on a boat, crossing the lake to go to the island, but their big woody pirate ship wasn’t as impressive as they would have wanted it to be.
The first ship they had tried was made out of paper and, of course, had sunk. So they made a second ship out of paper which sunk too. The third one, for some reason, caught fire before sinking.
Therefore, the three fillies had had to find another boat and finally had to do with a tiny inflatable boat with rows. They had tried to play the game at first, with Scootaloo playing the drum while Sweetie Belle and Applebloom were rowing, but it was just boring and exhausting altogether.
So after a short while, they just let Applebloom blindly row, as she was the only one who really knew how, and waited until the journey would be over.
But what was going to be a boring journey suddenly transformed itself when a bomb, at least a water bomb, exploded on Sweetie Belle’s face.
“What was that?” asked the filly in panic, as her two friends suddenly woke up form their bored state.
Applebloom was the first to see where the assault was coming from, so she shouted:
“Enemy ship starboard!”
“Where is starboard already?” asked Scootaloo.
“Just look!” replied Applebloom, impressed by what she was seeing.
And at some point, it was very understandable, because there was a pirate ship heading right into their direction, bombarding them with water balloons. And piloting the pirate ship was Pinkie Pie, with a pirate hat, a hook and an eye patch, who was looking like she was singing something the three fillies couldn’t hear because of the wind and how surprised they were.
But don’t imagine it was a real pirate ship Pinkie Pie had suddenly found somewhere – not that she wouldn’t have been capable of just that – but it really looked like one. It was probably just a big rowing boat that Pinkie Pie had transformed, adding a ship’s rail, a figurehead, a mast with a sail and a pirate flag as well as, just for the fun of it, a helm.
On the side of her modified rowing boat, Pinkie Pie had written with white paint “P. S. Muffington”, the P. S. standing for “Pirate Ship”. On some occasions, it’s useless to ask Pinkie Pie to be subtle.
After that short description, you might understand why the three fillies were impressed by what they were seeing. Nonetheless, they had to react because of the threat of the water balloons and because Pinkie Pie had clearly the intention to board them.
“To arms!” shouted Scootaloo.
“What arms? We didn’t bring any.” noticed Applebloom with her practical mind.
“To the rows then!” shouted Scootaloo as if it wasn’t meaning they were just going to flee.
But the maneuver didn’t work as well as it should as Sweetie Belle was panicking at the idea of being threatened by a pirate ship, be it piloted by Pinkie Pie, and also because both Applebloom and Scootaloo tried to take on the rows, losing one in the process that sunk into the lake, leaving them defenseless.
“What are we going to do?” asked Applebloom, suddenly panicking too as Pinkie Pie was coming very near and was preparing herself to throw a grapnel onto the three fillies’ boat.
“Well, we don’t have any choice anymore!” very calmly said Scootaloo, taking over her two friends’ fears. “Pinkie Pie thinks she has the upper hoof, but we will prove her otherwise. We have the number advantage as well as a determination that she cannot break.”
Both Applebloom and Sweetie Belle decided their pegasus friend was right.
“We will fight and we will win!” shouted Scootaloo. “There is no way this ship is going to fall into Pinkie Pie’s hooves!”
“No way it will fall into her hooves!” shouted back her two friends.
And they all turned to Pinkie’s ship to face the enemy, fight and defeat her!
The treasure Island
“How did this happen?” asked Scootaloo, tied up to Pinkie Pie’s mast.
To be honest, not one of the fillies would have really been able to answer that question, as there hadn’t been much of a battle. All they understood in the short time it all happened was that they were just swearing that they would all fight to the death and next thing they knew, they were tied up under Pinkie Pie’s control.
“So you thought you could keep the treasure to yourselves?” asked Pinkie Pie, laughing like the pirate she was playing and trying her best to look menacing while she still was smiling and enjoying the game. “This was counting without me, the terrible Pink Beard, the terror of the seven lakes and my great Muffington!”
And saying that, Pinkie Pie was jumping all around her rowing boat, showing off with a wooden sword like she was fighting an invisible enemy.
“Now that your ship has been sunk and that you’re at my mercy, nothing stands between me and that treasure anymore. Today victory is mine!” enjoyed Pinkie Pie, while standing on one hoof over the ship’s rail and standing there in a victory pose for quite some time.
Applebloom and Scootaloo felt angry and upset they had been defeated so easily as well as having lost the treasure they had been working so hard to find. But Sweetie Belle saw Pinkie Pie standing on the ship’s rail near her and did the only logical thing to do in those circumstances: she poked Pinkie Pie who fell into the water.
Getting rid of her ropes due to her wonderful skills, or at least that’s how she explained it to herself, Sweetie Belle quickly went to see if the pink pony was okay, and saw her in the water, hanging to a barrel that had come out of nowhere and shouting:
“No! The treasure was mine! Give me back my ship you thieves!”
Knowing that Pinkie Pie didn’t risk anything, mostly because the shore was something like thirty meters away, Sweetie Belle freed her friends who were cheering for her with all their heart and, together, they took possession of the P.S. Muffington and set sail to the island in the middle of the lake where the treasure was awaiting them.
Actually, they were enjoying the pirate ship so much that they went all the way around the island before finally landing there and moving on into their journey to find the treasure.
And in fact, they saw a treasure chest lying there, on the grass, under a tree that was marked with a red “x”. They went to open it, but Scootaloo stopped them.
“Wait, it may be trapped.”
They spent almost thirty minutes examining the chest to find out where the hidden trap may be, until Sweetie Belle decided she knew how to unlock it safely and opened it in front of her hidden friends who had decided to be careful, just in case.
“What’s in the chest? Is it gold?” asked Applebloom.
“Yeah, what is in it? Is the treasure two tickets to the wonderbolts?” asked Scootaloo.
“Why would the treasure be tickets for the wonderbolts?” asked Applebloom, who was certain that a treasure had to be made out of gold and jewels to be considered a treasure.
But before they could begin to decide who was wrong and who was right on the matter, given that they would have both been wrong but not have accepted it just to be right in the end, Sweetie Belle told them the chest contained only a note.
“There is something written.” Sweetie Belle explained. “It says: You have proven you’re worth of the treasure you seek. If you still want it, come to Ponyville’s inn. Signed, Daring Pie.”
Of course the three fillies were kind of disappointed to not have found the treasure, but they were, at the very same time, very intrigued by the note and that invitation to the town’s inn. So they went back to the pirate ship, made three times the way around the lake, landed again and went to meet Pinkie Pie and find out where the treasure really was.
One final journey in the heart of Sugarcubecorner
When they entered the inn, the three fillies immediately felt the heavy atmosphere. Time seemed to be slower in that place, and everything seemed more serious. The barpony was rubbing a glass with a towel in a very mechanic way, watching them but not looking like he really cared.
And they saw Pinkie Pie, who was dressed like an adventurer ready to go in the deepest jungle or explore some dark ruin. They went to her and sit at her table, waiting to hear what the pink pony had to say about the treasure.
“So, you three made it through the dangerous waters of the lake?” asked Pinkie Pie with a very serious tone.
But as the barpony came and served the three fillies a milkshake each, she joyfully thanked him, breaking the character a little, but coming right to it just after that.
“You have to understand that getting to the treasure won’t be easy. The place is filled with deadly traps and spiders webs and stuff. If we go in there, there is no telling if we are going to be able to come back.” explained Pinkie Pie, not threatening enough as she was trying to look tough while drinking her milkshake and enjoying the taste in a very expressive way.
“But we have to find that treasure.” said Applebloom, as her two friends approved.
“Fine with me.” replied Pinkie Pie, forgetting to use her “serious” voice. “Let’s go find that treasure then.”
It was a little anticlimactic, but the three fillies still followed Pinkie Pie who led them to Sugarcube corner and, more precisely, to Sugarcube corner cave. There, she stopped before a door and said:
“Behind that door lies a whole labyrinth that nopony has entirely explored. You’ll have to be extremely careful as every stone that you step on might be the last one. Some say that ghosts haunt those tunnels, other say that a minotaur lives there. But what we know for sure is that this is where your treasure map says the treasure lies.”
“Isn’t it a little too dangerous?” asked Sweetie Belle, suddenly realizing that the description was sounding very menacing.
“Oh no, not especially.” replied Pinkie Pie, laughing. “Shall we enter the maze?” she asked, lighting a torch.
As all the fillies were nodding, she slowly opened the door, revealing a very dark passage with doors on the sides. A cold wind seemed to come out of it, making it look just like a medieval dungeon.
The four ponies began to explore it very carefully, making sure they wouldn’t trigger any hidden trap and came to the first door.
“Where should we go?” asked Scootaloo. “Is that the right door?”
“Let’s see your map.” replied Pinkie Pie.
Applebloom gave the map to the pink earth pony and the three fillies waited while the mare was trying to find their way in. But as it was taking a little too long, Applebloom finally asked:
“So, is that the right door?”
“I’ve got no idea.” happily replied Pinkie Pie with a smile. “The only way to know is to open it.”
And so, with all the care in the world, they turned the doorknob and pushed the door, revealing a stair that was going down into the darkness.
“Yup, that’s probably it.” said Pinkie Pie, seemingly not noticing how frightening that stair was looking for the fillies.
And the pink pony began to go down, bringing the torch and the torch’s light with her, which led all of the fillies to follow her very closely.
“Stop!” suddenly shouted the pink pony, letting her torch fall, taking the light with it.
They all stopped right where they were, not moving a muscle.
“That step is trapped.” said Pinkie Pie, pointing a step in front of her. “If you step on it, a giant boulder will come from the ceiling and try to crush us. Whatever happens, do not step on it, alright?”
The fillies tried to see how Pinkie Pie could have known that the step was trapped, but couldn’t figure it out. In a way, they even thought that the pink pony was imagining it to frighten them.
Still, they tried their best to avoid stepping on the step, just in case. And they did a pretty good job, until a very sharp sound came to all the ponies’ hears.
“One of you stepped on the step…right?” said Pinkie Pie, whose voice was suddenly worried.
“No.” answered Scootaloo, who didn’t want to admit that she did.
They all heard a big noise above their heads and felt like an earthquake was taking place under their hooves.
“It’s the boulder!” shouted Pinkie Pie. “Quick, jump!”
The fillies looked down, but saw only the darkness. At that moment, they really didn’t want to risk jumping into the blackness, not even being able to see how high they were. But Pinkie Pie shouted once again, very convincingly, that they had to jump to evade the boulder, and even pushed Applebloom. Both Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo looked at each other and decided to jump, followed by Pinkie Pie.
When they opened their eyes, the fillies discovered that they weren’t hurt in any way. So the only explanation was that their fall had been a very short one, but it was difficult to say as the room was plunged into the dark.
“Well, that was fun, wasn’t it?” said Pinkie Pie like she had just came out of a slide. “Maybe we could do it again.”
“Maybe not…” replied Applebloom, who, even if she wasn’t hurt, could feel the effects of her anything but perfect landing.
“I can’t believe it. The place is really trapped!” said Scootaloo, with a mixed tone as she was almost as afraid as she was excited by that discovery.
“Well, I did tell you. But do not worry, we will be fine, just stay near me and do as I tell you.” replied Pinkie Pie with a very comforting smile. “You don’t need to be afraid.”
“I’m not afraid.” said Sweetie Belle, lying
Pinkie Pie told the fillies to wait where they were and then walked away for a moment, coming back right away and taking them with her this time to a wall. There, she pushed something in the dark and a little part of the wall opened, revealing a passage that had its own light.
Each one at the time, the ponies crawled through the opening and found themselves in another room. There was a stair that was leading up to another door, but Pinkie Pie said that wasn’t the way. The room wasn’t big, and was filled with crates of food, mostly apples. Applebloom, following her instinct, went to eat one of them, but Pinkie Pie prevented her to.
“Do not touch the fruits or anything in this room. It might be poisoned…” she explained with a very mysterious voice.
Of course, Applebloom didn’t try to find out if Pinkie was telling her the truth or not.
They all searched the room until Sweetie Belle finally found what they were looking for. There was some kind of enigma to solve on one wall, behind some crate, that was clearly guarding another little opening, a little wooden door just as big as one of the filly.
“The truth is obvious, what isn’t?” read out loud Applebloom.
“I hate enigmas… can’t we just open the door?” asked Sweetie Belle, who was actually just feeling a little uncomfortable being in that room in a not very secure place.
“Don’t!” answered Pinkie Pie. “The door has been cursed. If you don’t solve the enigma, it will burn anypony who tries to open it.”
And to show that she wasn’t just making stuff up, she took an apple and touched the door with it, creating a little blue spark.
“Alright…” said Sweetie Belle, accepting they had to solve the enigma.
But she couldn’t see the answer. Neither could the others. When asked what she was thinking, Pinkie Pie replied:
“Maybe ice-cream…or a pair of scissors. What was the question again?”
Understanding that the pink pony wouldn’t be of any help, the three fillies tried to crack the enigma by themselves. They had to find something that wasn’t obvious, or so they had understood the enigma. They thought of everything they could think of, from a math problem to a pony’s wig and politic, until Applebloom suddenly realized that, in fact, the truth may have been very obvious.
“Maybe the answer is a lie.” she told the other.
And at the very same time she said that last word, they heard an incantation that was very probably making the curse of the door go away.
“Applebloom, you did it!” cheered both Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle.
They turned to Pinkie Pie who was done singing the incantation and told her they had found the answer. The pink pony tried once again the door with an apple, but no spark appeared, proving that the curse had been lifted.
So, finally, they opened the door and went to the other side of the wall, where big piles of gold pieces were awaiting them.
The treasure you were looking for
“We did it!” shouted joyfully the fillies as well as Pinkie Pie, as they discovered all the gold the treasure was made of in front of them.
Sweetie Belle, just for fun, jumped in one of the pile of gold pieces and tried to swim in, which proved more difficult than she had imagined. Scootaloo, very excited, went everywhere to try and find out how much that fortune was worth, but simply couldn’t make up her mind on that subject.
It was quite the sight actually. Even if, in reality, the fact that this backroom where the treasure was in was very little was making it look way bigger than it actually was. It was still pretty impressive.
And suddenly, Scootaloo realized something pretty obvious:
“What are we going to do with the treasure?”
As usual, they hadn’t really thought about it. Of course they had dreamed about it, being rich and famous and everything, but now that they had discovered the treasure, they were just noticing how much they didn’t really care about money. They had always had enough, and there was nothing they wanted to buy with it. In fact, by asking that question, Scootaloo was mostly suggesting that they should probably just leave it there, recognizing that seeking the treasure was more fun than actually possessing it.
But Pinkie Pie gave an answer that they weren’t expecting:
“What we are going to do with it? Eat it of course.”
And joining the act to the word, she gobbled up some gold pieces under the very surprised look of the three fillies. And when they finally understood, they took some of the gold pieces, unwrapped them and discovered the chocolate.
Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle smiled and began what became a race to who would eat the most chocolate pieces.
But Pinkie Pie noticed that Applebloom wasn’t joining in the fun her friends were having.
“Come on now.” she told the filly, “Don’t you want some chocolate? You really wanted it to be gold?”
“No. I mean, chocolate is fine. It’s just…” began to reply Applebloom.
But she stopped there, in mid sentence. She didn’t know what it was just. She had a very difficult time putting word on what she was feeling. By chance, Pinkie helped.
“You’re feeling low because you just realized you didn’t know what treasure you were looking for all along and because you think you still haven’t found the real treasure and that you have missed something very important from the very beginning?” the pink pony asked, revealing an awkward smile at the end.
And that was it. Applebloom’s instinct was telling her that she had missed something very important and very obvious in the whole mess that that day had been. And now, the filly was feeling like that treasure they had found wasn’t the ending she wanted.
Pinkie Pie smiled.
“You know… when you’re feeling down, you should just look up.” she told Applebloom.
By reflex, the filly did look up and saw a trap door just upon her head. Before she could ask where it was leading, Pinkie Pie had taken her on her shoulders and put her up to the trap door so that the filly was actually able to open it and climb through.
And so Applebloom did. She went through the trap door and arrived in a room where there was a bed and a desk. And at that desk was the foal that had given her the treasure map, way before in the morning, before they all went to seek the treasure.
The foal turned his head and saw Applebloom, which surprised him. But he was still the same shy foal as before and didn’t complain. At most, he just stupidly blushed.
“Hi.” said Applebloom, surprised to be there herself.
“Hi.” replied the foal, not sure how he should react to the intrusion.
A little awkward silence ensued. A silence that Applebloom finally broke.
“We found the treasure that your map was leading to.”
“Really?” asked the foal.
“Yeah. It was quite the adventure. We had to fight a pirate ship, and then to go through a whole dungeon. We almost got crushed by a giant boulder and poisoned by some fruits.”
“Really?!?” repeated the foal, not sure if he was being made fun of or if he had missed something really big.
“Yeah…” replied Applebloom.
Another awkward silence ensued.
“What are you doing?” asked Applebloom, suddenly realizing she must have interrupted the foal.
“I was just drawing.” he answered.
Applebloom came closer and saw a lot of pieces of paper covered in drawings. She saw a house on one, and a tree on another one. She liked those drawings, because it was full of colors and it looked very happy and joyful. The filly then looked at the foal again and back at the paper and color pencils, which gave her an idea.
“Can I?” asked Applebloom to the foal, pointing the pencils and the papers.
“Of course.” replied the foal, unconvinced and not sure to have understood what Applebloom was asking him.
The filly began to draw something, which took her a while, making sure the foal wouldn’t see it until it was finished, and, finally, gave it to him.
“Hum… thanks?” said the foal.
And it could be argued that he should have known why he was thankful.
But in all honesty, Applebloom’s drawing was so bad it was pretty impossible to know what it was supposed to represent.
“I’m sorry to ask, but… what is it?” asked the foal.
Applebloom blushed and didn’t want to answer, but suddenly, coming out of nowhere Pinkie Pie appeared, explaining:
“It’s a drawing of you of course, silly head! It means that she likes you. Now come down, there is still a lot of chocolate for the both of you!”
And both the filly and the foal blushed, but smiled at each other and they went down the trap door to enjoy some chocolate, each one with the other’s drawing.
And for some reason, Applebloom felt like she had found the treasure the map was leading to.
THE END