The sun was cresting the barntops of the Apple Ranch, knocking off rooftiles and roasting the cattle gently but unevenly. Applejack was standing on a hilllet, listening to her big brother, NewYork, who'd recently stopped putting a space in his name. Applejack was swaying subtly. They were looking out at a relative crowd of disappointed-looking background ponies wandering aimlessly through the apple orchard.
“Applejack,” said NY, “Could you tell me why we have a slight crowd of Ponyvillians pissing about around our orchard?”
She played it straight, “I kinda told them we had a Tree Kingdom.”
He had to ask, “What's a Tree Kingdom?”
“This is. It's a large apple orchard implied to be filled with fantasy creatures, like dragons, dwarves and the Dal-Eyed Llama,” said Applejack charmingly, then slightly offensively, then euphoniously but apropos of nothing.
“Applejack, I really hope you didn't take these nice ponies' money for this,” said NY.
One of the villagers walked over to the siblings, “Excuse me, but you said there'd be roses. Is it possible to get a refund?”
“I beg your pardon,” said Applejack, “I never promised you a rose garden.” She stared the pony down catatonically, causing her to give in. NewYork watched the pony's Tree Kingdom Exodus disapprovingly.
“Applejack, let these ponies go,” said NY, “Give them their money back and tell them you lied and we can all go back to what we were doing.”
“This is what I was doing,” said Applejack.
“Well, it doesn't look very good for the Element of Honesty to go around lying all the time just to make a quick buck,” said NY, “Anyway, you were supposed to be harvesting these trees before the apples go bad. Remember what Granny Smith told you about apples? You leave 'em too long and they turn into pears.”
“And pears are just apples when nobody cares,” finished Applejack, “I know what she said, big brother, so why aren't you gettin' out there and helping?”
“Applejack, you know I can't,” explained NY, “I'm still aching from yesterday; don't try to get out of this.”
“Then don't get kicked in the dick,” said Applejack.
“Ee-yep,” confirmed NY wholeheartedly.
The humble cowpony threw back another pill and turned the volume up on her MLP-3 player. Her forty-eight hour, drug-fuelled apple-buck marathon [playset available in most irresponsible toy stores] was going swimmingly. NewYork would see what a productive worker she was, come rain or shine. And come they did; in abundance, but Applejack didn't feel a thing.
At some point, she kicked blindly, connecting with something that was definitely not wood. She felt a bovine crunch underfoot.
Applejack looked slowly over her shoulder. She saw a bovine cow underfoot. She'd bucked it right in the teeth. One by one, the cow's teeth fell to the ground. They looked like little white cigars, only shinier. And there's only half a cigar. One by one, the cow itself fell to the ground; it landed with an awkward 'snap'. Applejack pulled out her earphones and looked dejectedly, but lightly, at the limp cow.
“All I ever wanted to do was to please my brother,” said Applejack to the cow, which continued to be in a bad way and didn't really react, “And all I got was this lousy Animal Rights violation.” She stared at the unconscious mammal through eyes as red as Twilight's weird new scarf, trying to think of a way to cheer herself up which wouldn't interact fatally with a strong hit of MDMA and a dime-bag of weed.
Inspiration hit her like a hoof to the teeth. She surveyed the surrounding area carefully to make sure she was definitely alone. The coast was clear, but that's irrelevant. The orchard was clear. Applejack scrunched up her face. After a few seconds, though no one could see, Applejack's left kidney began to glow in fits and starts. Magic crackled through the air as the cow began to glow fiercely. The cow levitated up to head height then creaked forward, starting slow but gaining a bit of speed as it went. Applejack jumped on board and whistled for her faithful hound- Winstdog Churchill. {Earth-Ponies were, of course, forbidden from using Madjick in the Princestral Dictatorship of Equestria except in cases of preventing another Earth-Pony from using the Divine and Plotholean Faculties and, even then, it still incurred the death penalty in most cases [after knighthood, of course].}
An exceptionally polite dust-cloud was thundering towards Ponyville-in-the-Wider-Scheme-of-Equestria. The nucleus of the cloud consisted of an orange pony and a bloodied cow, held together by the strong mooclear force. A small dog was zipping around the epicentre of the dust-cloud, keeping at bay a barrage of beefy concern. Applejack's plan was working perfectly. She'd ridden the malfortunate creature through a large gathering of its peers, appealing to their overdeveloped need to help. Cows are a very polite animal, meaning they all gave chase in a storm of 'are you alright?'s and 'is there anything I can do?'s. Applejack would have felt bad for exploiting this gentle creature's natural tendency to care had she not already taken medication for that before executing the plan.
A crowd had gathered at the edge of the village. The crowd was seemingly in the process of staring death in the face. There was a discussion afoot about which Horsepony of the Apocalypse had come to visit their little home; most assumed War.
“Well, it could be worse,” said Gee-Gee Seinfeld, most decorated jokesmith in Ponyville, “It could be my wife's cooking!” The ponies around her took a brief break from Terminal Contemplation to have a quick giggle at Gee-Gee's zinger.
As the dust-cloud got closer, the crowd could make out the inoffensive, yet violently loud, politeness of cow.
“Well, it could be worse,” said Gee-Gee Seinfeld, most decorated jokesmith in Ponyville, “It could be airline food!” Another laugh well earned.
As the dust-cloud got closer, the crowd could make out the inoffensive, yet violently loud, Stetson hat of Applejack.
“Well, it could be worse,” said Gee-Gee Seinfeld, most decorated jokesmith in Ponyville, “It could be Rainbow Dash.” The assorted ponies made noises of agreement.
Applejack had jumped off the cow and had assumed her position just ahead of the pack. As they neared the border of Ponyville, she swerved left and made it look like she was furiously herding cows with the help of her trusty hound, Winstdog Churchill. The villagers cheered as the tail of the pack passed harmlessly by, leaving Applejack standing in a billowing of settling ground-powder.
“Well, it could be worse,” said Strawberry Swimmingpool, local toaster entrepreneur, 100-meter athlete and unofficial public pool owner, “We could have been stamped into the fucking topsoil.” The gathered ponies didn't laugh; nobody could tell a joke quite like Gee-Gee.
Applejack's brightly-coloured set of friends had front-row seats for her reward. They were listening to the enthusiastic preamble of Boris Johnstallion, Mayor of Ponyville-in-the-Wider-Scheme.
“This brave pony managed to stop a disaster from devastating the west side of our little village. She managed to save the lives of at least two citizens; of course, the Rap wars still wage on, but if the West side doesn't represent, then who will? Still, this pony has rendered us a noble service, and, today, I'd like to present her with the coveted Olympic Bronze Medal, for Services to the Community. Come forward, Applejack...”
There was half a minute's silence before come forward Applejack did; mostly on roller skates; unsubtly, but brightly. Her terrifying speed parted the sea of hue-diverse horses. Gee-Gee Seinfeld, most decorated jokesmith in Ponyville started to say “what's the deal with roller..” before she met with a terminal health-and-safety malfunction. She had only come in the first place to avoid her wife's dodgy 'special lasagne'. Applejack tumbled onto the makeshift award-giving stage while Gee-Gee briefly test drove the idea of living with an Applejack-shaped hole down her centre as a lifestyle choice. Hoof-clapping ensued. it probably sounded like coconuts rolling down a shingled roof or something.
Applejack shuffled, dazed and confused, up to the lectern, softly nudging the mayor to one side. She stared blankly out at the expectant faces of her home village and didn't know what to say. She decided to start with the usual stock speech-opening:
“Four score and seven years ago, I had a dream; a dream of being presented with the coveted Ponyville-in-the-Wider-Scheme-of-Equestria's Olympic Bronze Medal for Services to the Community. Today, I have achieved that dream. The road was long and tough but I pulled through. It took sweat, tears, determination and magic.. … uhh.. the Gathering,” Applejack had aoas {eternally “all of a sudden”} become exceptionally tired; forty-eight hours of drugs, tree-denting and stampede-manifesting had finally caught up with her, “I'd like to dedicate this award to my big brother, who always believes in me. He's the real hero. Brave, strong, tall, handsome- that's why I call him my 'forbidden apple'.”
Every pony in the village square continued to not change their facial expressions. Most hoped Mayor Johnstallion would put an end to this right about now. He didn't need to, as it turned out. Applejack, as slow and fatigued as the plot itself, made her way down to the empty seat between Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy.
“Way to go Applejack!” said Rainbow Dash, loud as her character-design, stabbing at the oppressive silence of the population of Ponyville. The silence, however, didn't break; it was waiting to see if anyone would elaborate on Applejack's weird family thing. Fluttershy offered her coffee, thinking Applejack wouldn't take it- but she did. The yellow pony lit a cigarette as consolation. Applejack stole it from her. Well, she wished she hadn't offered it to her, anyway- but she had.
Ponyville watched on as Applejack drank and smoked. The mayor decided to call an end to the pre-seedings. As was customary, he turned the lectern upside down to signal the end of the presentation [it didn't really stand up as the top was sloped and, as was traditional [and physically necessary], it fell forwards off the stage and clattered into four planks of wood which were to be collected by Solid-Oak Roberts [local furniture expert] and reassembled for next time]. The mayor took his traditional, ceremonial leave by rifling through the crowd and taking his favourite wrist-watch as mayoral appeasement.
The rest of the ponies filed out of the town square [this all happened at the town square- bonus points if you guessed right!] leaving our six ponies and the usual dragon. Rainbow Dash took this as a good time to ask Applejack about help with her new slingshot.
The slingshot in question turned out to be a rubber band of great length. Rainbow Dash had bought it online and intended to wrap it around 'maybe two trees or that statue in the park?'. The statue turned out to be a good shape for it, depicting an ice-skating scene featuring Dictator Celestia about to leap into the unready arms of her sister, Luna, who looked like she was expecting death or serious spinal injuries. The rubber band was hooked over the Dear Leader's neck and the defensive night-princess' fore-hooves. Rainbow Dash was ploughing backwards, stretching the band to its capacity with the help of Applejack pushing against her.
“Are you sure this is safe?” asked Applejack.
“It doesn't look safe,” said Rainbow Dash.
“That's a shame,” said Applejack, gazing pensively into Rainbow Dash's navel before adding “I'm sure Twilight won't be too happy about all of this.” RD gave her best snort of derision [it sounded more like she was attempting to reclaim a drip of snot which had attempted to abseil to freedom from her nostril], she said “Yeah, well, Twilight isn't happy about anything, and she has her own Dragon Butler!” Applejack laughed in sleepy delirium; RD was right; Twilight was neurotic. Applejack's legs started to give way just as a pony pushing a baby-carriage tentatively chanced to pass by the un-safety-conscious affair. RD started to say something just as Applejack's fatigued members gave up the ghost.
THWIP
The rubber band propelled the two ponies at Mach speed, into the baby-carriage, taking it with them, to infinity and beyond. The disembabied pony stared in incomprehension at her now empty fore-hooves. She walked slowly over to the statue and sat on its base, lit a smoke and began to re-evaluate her new existence.
Meanwhile; at the treehouse, Twilight was finishing up her dusting – she only had her bed-area to do. She threw open the curtains to shed light on the extent; watched blankly as two ponies, a fragile-looking filly, and a battered stroller flew past her window at orbital velocity; closed the curtains again and, dropping her duster, sat on the edge of her bed, lit a smoke and began to re-evaluate the stupidity of her friends.