Everything Wrong With: The Assassination of Braeburn by the Coward Dirty Rich
By Dawn Fade

Spoilers

Duh.

“Can ah help you with somethin’ mister?” she squeaked, her high-pitched voice not mixing well with the country accent.

Screw you, Apple Bloom's voice is adorable and fits her very well. Ding. 1.

I adjusted my suit, somewhat offended at being treated so rudely. Of course, all it took was the distant baaing of some sheep to remind me where I was.

That's racist. Ding. 2.

“Truth, huh?” She chuckled. “Well ya came to the right place, dintcha? Yer lookin’ at the Element of Honesty.”

Just once we need to have an Applejack fic without her mentioning that she's the Element of Honesty. We all know. All of Equestria knows! Ding. 3.

“If yer hopin’ to loosen mah tongue with flattery, don’t bother. Ah’ll tell ya whatever you wanna know, but ah’ll do it my way.”

But why are you doing it at all? You literally met this pony two minutes ago and now you're going to tell him about this big thing for no real reason. She doesn't even question his motives before diving right in. Why not? Ding. 4.

You’d know if you’d met him. Kindness and structure and brains all rolled into one stallion, he was.

After seeing the episodes that Braeburn is in, "brains" is not an adjective that I'd use to describe him. Ding. 5.

Sure enough, he had Appleloosa in top-notch shape quicker than you can say ‘buy some apples’!

Ha, ha, Friendship is Witchcraft. Ding. 6.

“Nope. They did somethin’ worse. Dirty looked him right in the eye, unblinking, and said: We’re just travellers looking for home, sir. Not a single troublemaker among us.” Her hooves tightened around the mug and she glared into it. “They lied straight to his face.”

Which they would have done anyway. What, did anypony expect them to say "oh, yeah, I guess we are troublemakers. We'll be on our way." If he knew who they were to start off with, then he shouldn't have let them in at all. Ding. 7.

There wasn’t anything I could say to that. Clearly, the idea of lying was almost a personal insult to her, the Element of Honesty. I made a mental note to watch what I said.

Applejack Element of Honesty cliche. Ding. 8. Also, was he planning on lying to her? What are these guy's motives? Ding. 9.

“Honesty in this family was tradition long before ah came along. The Apple family doesn’t lie. Never has, never will, and y’all better believe that’s the truth.”

Except for the times we've seen you do it in the show. And Apple Bloom, too. Ding. 10.

“His brother Filthy got his big break when he helped start Ponyville, way back before you and me were born. He got in early and made a fortune through our apples. But Dirty missed out. So for all these years, he’s been travelling, lookin’ for his own breakthrough.”

Um... no. Their grandfather Stinking Rich helped found Ponyville. So this invalidates the motivations she gives for him because the events she described happen before he or his brother were even a thought. Ding. 11.

The farmpony nodded again as I set the bottle back on the table. “Oh, he noticed alright. But that was during the Great Derailment, and he was too busy tryin’ to keep trade flowing without the trains to bother with some pesky little gang.”

So why didn't he call for outside help? You know, get some guards for the gang, or some other ponies to help with the train derailment so that he would be able to focus on both, not one or the other. Ding. 12.

“It was in the middle of Dirty’s latest spree, screaming through town and robbin’ good ponies of their bits. The lyin’ bastard was sitting in a bar drinking while his gang trashed the place. The good ponies ran and told Braeburn, and he realised his mistake.”

So did he seriously not realize at all that the gang had gotten bad? That he spent so much effort on the train that this is the first he heard of it? Yeah, I'm not buying it. Ding. 13.

“I’m an independent investigator. I only heard the story a few months ago, from a stallion in a bar. It got stuck in my mind, and I decided to see if there was any truth to it.”

“So yer not a lawpony?”

I chuckled. “Not a chance. I just like to get to the bottom of things.”

She raised an eyebrow, then shrugged. “Everypony has a hobby, ah ‘spose.”

Wait... that's it?! That's the only motivation we're getting for this character? That's so boring. Why not have him... anything else? Make him a family member of the Riches wanting to get the full story on his family member's death from the other perspective. Just having a "he heard a story in a bar and wanted to hear the ending." Ridiculous. Ding. 14

“Hot damn,” I breathed. “Did he really challenge Dirty in front of his whole gang?”

No, the pony who has repeatedly talked about honesty is exaggerating about the lynchpin of the whole event. Ding. 15.

“And they were right. Without the Sheriff, the town didn’t know how to handle the gang. His deputies were just regular ponies, they weren’t made for fightin’. So everypony just tried to buckled down and board up when Dirty hit the streets. They were pretty much imprisoned in their own homes, can ya believe it?”

And no one tried to get out and contact the guard? Or some other police force? Did they completely cut off all communication and trade from the town, which would have still been suspicious? How did nopony come by to take back the town? Ding. 16.

The writing was uneven, as earth pony notes often were,

That's racist. Ding. 17.

Dirty’s head rolled out of it soon enough, and ah personally put a shot straight through it. Burst like a rotten pumpkin, it did.”

Dang, she has a high caliber rifle. Either that or explosive bullets. Otherwise I'm not sure how one shot blew his head up. Ding. 18.

Applejack nodded. “Yer the first ah’ve told, but word got around from the citizens who helped us. No lawponies have bothered any Apples for two years though, so ah think we’ll be fine.” She smirked and placed her mug down. “You’ll be fine too, jus’ so long as ya remember the Red Rule.”

“And what is the Red Rule?” I finally asked.

The farmpony’s expression hardened and she looked me dead in the eyes.

“Don’t fuck with the Apple family.”

Okay, even I have to admit that's kind of epic. I'm taking a sin off. -Ding. 17

Final Sin Tally: 17

Sentence...

Breaking the Red Rule.

(Uh-oh)

Awesome!
And btw, applejack is one of the underdogs.