The following morning Twilight and Rainbow Dash flew towards Sweet Apple Acres to convince Applejack to take a week off.
They both knew that this would be a monumental task. The closest Applejack had ever come to ‘relaxing’ was when she had accepted their help with the applebucking season after she nearly worked herself to death.
While they were doing this, Zecora had contacted a travel agent to find a suitable travel plan.
The two friends were heading straight towards Applejack’s house, hoping to find her where they knew her family might help them convince Applejack to take a break.
While over the orchard, they heard the sound of somepony shouting.
“You hear that?” Rainbow Dash asked as she tried to pin point the location of the sound.
“Yes,” Twilight replied, also searching for the source of the noise. “There!” She shouted, pointing a hoof towards a tree that she immediately recognised.
The two fliers swiftly descended, hoping to find out what the problem was. When they finally touched down, the scene they saw greatly confused them.
Applejack was busy crying with her muzzle buried in one of the tree’s branches. The ground was littered with tissues, the same ones that the potentially mentally unstable mare was using to dry her eyes out with. Though that didn’t explain why some of them contained tree sap.
“Ah’m so sorry!” She bawled, blowing her nose on another tissue before letting it drop to the ground below. “Ah didn’t know he was yer ex-husband’s brother!”
Neither of the two had any idea how to respond to what they saw. Luckily Rainbow Dash simply didn’t care. “Hey Applejack!” She shouted with a hoof cupped to her mouth. “What are you doing up there?”
Only now noticing them for the first time, she called down, “Oh, hi guys,” she stopped to dab her eyes with another tissue, “Ah was just apologising to Leafana here fer tryin’ to hook her up with Bloomberg’s brother.”
Again Twilight was completely unable to comprehend why she would even try to get two trees married and merely brushed it off as Applejack’s stress talking. “We need to talk to you. Can you come down here?”
“Sure,” she said in answer before patting the branch she sat on affectionately and said, “Stay strong ‘ol girl…” With no further words, she jumped down from the branch she was on and landed in front of her two friends.
Before she could even ask why they wanted to talk to her, Rainbow Dash spoke up, “Why were you apologising to that tree?!”
Applejack sighed before she said, “Ah told ya, Ah tried t—“
“No!” Rainbow cut her off, “I meant why were you apologising to a freakin’ tree?!” She punctuated her point by thrusting a hoof at the before mentioned tree.
“Because Ah hurt her!” Applejack admitted, “What do ya want me to do, Dash? Jus’ let her suffer alone?!”
Rainbow Dash opened her mouth to try and get her point across that it was a tree that she was apologising to, but Twilight kept her quiet with a Zip It spell. “Listen, Applejack, I’ll get straight to the point. We think you’re busy overworking yourself and that you need a vacation, at least one week long. Zecora is doing her best to help you find a suitable destination. Do you want to go?”
“Hay yeah!”
“I know you want to stay here and work some more, but—“ it was then that Twilight’s brain finally processed the new audio information. “Wait, what?” Sadly it was still furiously working on a suitable reply.
“Ah love Leafana an’ all, but I think she might need some time without me around.” She sighed wistfully as she looked over her shoulder to Leafana. “Ah jus’ want what’s best for her, but she can’t seem to see that. Ah…I think she might need some space.”
With even more information being pumped in, Twilight’s brain overloaded and shut down completely. While it was busy starting up again, Applejack continued, “But jus’ one week, alright? We finished harvestin’ after the whole Flutterbat incident. When Ah get back we’ll start again.”
As she talked, Rainbow Dash kept pointing at the tree with both of her hooves as she hovered slightly above the ground. Even though no words were said, Applejack caught her meaning perfectly well. “Ah know, Rainbow, she needs me. But she might never trust me again if Ah don’t let her learn this lesson on her own.” Rainbow Dash promptly rocketed into the sky, the shriek of the wind substituting for the lack of her own voice.
With her piece said to her friends, Applejack trotted towards her house, having to tell her family about her potential vacation.
Twilight finally came to her senses with a shake of her head. “Well, that was easy.” Just then she noticed she was still using some of her magic to maintain the Zip It spell on Rainbow Dash. Not seeing her close by, she released the spell and immediately cringed as she heard Rainbow Dash’s next words being bellowed from above.
“IT’S A BUCKING TREE!”
“Thank you for your help, Wind Stream.” Zecora smiled as she shook the hoof of the stallion in front of her. “I am certain that this will comfort her as much as a pleasant dream.”
“My pleasure ma’am!” Wind Stream said. He was a Pegasus stallion with a light blue coat and wild looking mane of yellow and white. His cutie mark was comprised of a dark blue sickle moon with two white wings protruding from its sides. “I’ll swing around the day after tomorrow to pick her up!”
With their deal made, Zecora stood up and left the office building. As she walked, she read the brochure Wind Stream had provided her again.
The trip would start in two days where he would pick up Applejack from her house then lead her towards the small airfield just outside of Ponyville. Once there, they would both be picked up by what he called a ‘jet balloon’.
At the mention of the strange name, Zecora had asked him what it was. He had answered with a smirk and told her that it was a revolutionary step in air travel. Thinking back on it, she rolled her eyes, Males. She thought to herself, Always keeping their new toys under obscure veils.
She quickly scanned through the rest, taking note of several locations that Applejack would visit. First on the list was the famous Maretoria Falls in Zebrabwe. Perhaps she should send a message along with Applejack to give to her relatives while she was there?
Zecora had originally picked Zebrica because she had come from there. The cheap prices helped too, of course. She had gotten quite the surprise when Wind Stream had offered to take Applejack for free if he was allowed to occasionally take pictures of her.
Her initial reaction had been to slap the perverted stallion, but as she was about to leave he explained that it was for marketing purposes. ‘Imagine how many ponies would travel with us if the Applejack had travelled with us!’
Zecora had initially been confused as to why a few pictures would be a boon to his company. But she soon remembered that while she had grown familiar to Applejack and her five friends, all of them had saved the world several times over and each of them were personal friends with all four princesses. She had then helped the stallion up and offered him an apology along with a herbal balm for the bruise that was sure to form.
Everything was in place. Now Zecora could only hope that Twilight and Rainbow Dash had been able to convince—
“IT’S A BUCKING TREE!”
She winced at the foul language while mothers immediately covered their foals’ ears in case the verbal onslaught would continue.
Sadly, they still heard the first one. “Rarity, what does ‘bucking’ mean?” a young Unicorn filly, who Zecora recognised as Sweetie Belle, asked the mare next to her. Her head was tilted to the side, as if trying to puzzle out the meaning on her own.
“Oh, well… ummm…” Rarity struggled for an answer. Despite herself, Zecora chuckled at her misfortune. “It means to kick a tree! Yes! Like Applejack often does to harvest her crop.” Zecora thought that she could faintly hear the mare add ‘I’ll get you for this Rainbow…’ in a low growl.
“Oh!” Sweetie Belle said in realization. “That sounds like fun, maybe we could try getting our cutie marks in bucking, we haven’t tried that before!”
As innocent as that was meant — and is — the horror on Rarity’s face combined with the meaning taken out of context was too much for the Zebra. She broke out in unrestrained laughter.