The Prisoner's Dilemma
Ah flinched when they barged on into my cell. Ah had no idea how long the Ministry of Heart had been holdin’ me, but it was long enough for me to lose track of how long it’d been. Didn’t help that my cell didn’t have a clock or a window in it, so there wasn’t much to judge time by other than when Ah got tired and when my meals came. However long Ah’d been here, it wasn’t long enough to get used to ponies barging on in whenever they felt like it. Ah reckon that’s just part of the whole experience, but that don’t mean Ah gotta like it.
Like always, one of the jailors walked up to the entrance and tossed in a set of chains, then sat back and waited for me to put ‘em on. Ah’d been here long enough to know what that meant. Interrogation time again. Ah put up a fight back when they’d first brought me in, but pretty soon Ah realized that all that got me was a bunch of soreness. Ah got mah pride, but Ah’ll settle when fightin’ ain’t gonna do no good. For the moment, at least.
The guards didn’t say much as they put the chains on me, and Ah got up and shuffled to the door. They ain’t much for talkin’—some of ‘em could give my brother a lesson in not wastin’ words. To be honest, that was mostly a good thing. As long as you kept quiet in your cell and didn’t cause any trouble, they’d pretty much leave you be, other than for bringing meals and dragging you out for interrogations.
The guards led to me the same room they always used with me. Well, maybe it was the same one, or maybe they were all just built to look exactly the same. Don’t reckon it really made much of a difference in the end. It looked like the same simple table with a single candle on it that barely lit the room at all, and two cheap, uncomfortable, government-issue chairs.
The interviewer this time was a mint-green pegasus mare with a blue and white mane. Or at least, something that looked like a pegasus. Ah’d heard talk that the Ministry kept all their interrogaters and such under illusions, so nopony’d know who they really were. She was sitting at the table, looking over the same folder full of files the interrogator looked over every time Ah came in. Ah took a seat and waited for her get started with things.
She let me stew for a couple minutes before cleared her throat and got down to business. “Alright, Applejack, you’ve been here long enough to know the drill. I want to know everything you can tell me about your involvement in the conspiracy to assassinate Twilight Sparkle.”
“Ah already done told you everything Ah know.” Ah shifted around on the uncomfortable chair, trying to find some good way of sitting on it. “And what Ah know is that Ah don’t know nothing about it. Ah’ve been telling you that for Ah don’t know how long, but y’all won’t listen to me.”
“Your account still has several holes in it.” What bugged me most about all these interrogations was how gosh-darned calm the interrogator always sounded about it, like it weren’t no skin off her back if Ah ever got outta here or not. Which Ah guessed it weren’t, for her. Ah was just another prisoner to the Ministry. There were probably dozens of ponies just like me in here. Ah didn’t reckon anypony in the Ministry’d get too fussed over me, and everypony who actually cared didn’t even know Ah was in here.
The interrogator sighed and reached across the table to give my hoof a quick pat as she flashed me a supportive smile. “Look, Applejack, for what it’s worth, I believe you. You did say you have no idea how those weapons got on your cart, right?”
“Exactly. Ain’t got the foggiest notion.” Ah put on my best poker face for that. It might not have been strictly one hundred percent true. Now, normally Ah’m an honest pony, but Ah was pretty sure if Ah went naming names it’d just put mah cousin in the cell next to me. Family’s the most important thing a pony’ll ever have, and Ah wasn’t gonna squeal on mine. Besides, Ah didn’t even know for sure that Braeburn had done anything wrong. For all Ah knew, he was duped just as bad as Ah was.
My interrogator groaned and rubbed her face. “Okay, so you don’t know anything. If it were up to me, we would’ve let you go home a week ago, right after we interviewed you for the first time.”
So Ah’d only been here a week? Huh. Felt like it’d been forever.
“The thing is, it’s not up to me.” She set her hind legs up on the table and leaned back in her chair, using her wings for balance and support. “I don’t think I need to explain the problem to you. The Empress is taking an assassination plot targeted at her student rather personally. She wants answers, and she wants them yesterday. I want to help you out, but you’ve got to help me too. Just give me something, anything I can take to my bosses to show them how cooperative you’re being with our investigation. As soon as we get that taken care of, we can get you out of here and back where you belong. You should be with your family, not languishing in a Ministry prison cell.”
“Ya got that part right,” Ah chimed in. “Ah told you Ah don’t know how many times that Ah ain’t done nothin’ wrong, and Ah don’t know nothin’ about no weapons. The sooner y’all cut me loose, the sooner y’all can get to work chasin’ the real criminals.”
“Hey, I’m not the one you need to convince.” She gave me a friendly little smile and reached across the table to give my hoof a squeeze. “I’m on your side, remember? It’s my bosses you need to convince. With the Empress herself looking over their shoulders, everypony wants to make sure their plots are covered.”
Ah let out a snort at that. “Typical. Always figured there’s a reason the last three letters in bureaucrat are ‘rat.’ Ah can’t go one harvest season without somepony from the Ministry of Agriculture coming by and getting all up in my mane. Ah don’t care if some zebra alchemist has whipped up some fancy new fertilizer everypony’s swearin’ by, or some unicorns made a fancy cider-squeezing gizmo—Sweet Apple Acres has always run just fine doing things the old-fashioned way, thank you very much.”
She let out a groan at that. “You think you have it bad? Try actually working in the government. We probably would’ve cleared this whole thing up days ago if not for everypony either trying to claim the credit for busting the conspiracy against Empress Sunbeam’s students before it got too far or else pinning the blame on somepony else for letting it get as far as it did. Most of my bosses don’t do anything to earn their paycheck except make it harder for me to do my job. Most of them haven’t even done any fieldwork, because important ponies never do fieldwork.”
“Ain’t that the truth.” Ah snorted as Ah thought back on the last Agriculture Ministry worker they’d sent out to my farm—a chubby, soft-taloned gryphon who couldn’t spend five minutes out in the sun without sweating like a pig. “Ah swear, ain’t a single employee in the whole agriculture ministry that’s done an honest day’s work on a real farm, and yet they got it in their head that they know more about farming than Ah do.”
“The joys of dealing with the Empire.” She got up and stretched her wings. “I swear, I never would’ve signed up if not for my parents being in the service. Still—well, you know how it is. When you’ve got a family legacy to protect...”
“Eeyup.” Ah reached up for my hat, only to be reminded that they’d taken it away when they locked me up. Ah swear, if there was so much as a single stain on it when Ah got it back, there’d be Tartarus to pay. “Spying might not be anything like apple growing, but the way Ah figure it, family’s the same no matter what.”
“You’re right about that.” The interrogator sighed and slumped down into her chair. “Whenever I wasn’t sure about going into the family business, I just reminded myself that there’s nothing in the Empire more important than your own family.” She paused, and a fond, distant smile popped up on her face. “I’d do anything for them.”
“Same here,” Ah agreed without a moment’s hesitation.
She studied me for a moment after that, then nodded and dropped a hoof into her saddlebags. “Dunno if you’re hungry, but I’ve got an extra bag of apple chips. I’d eat them myself, but on top of everything else, the bosses have been getting on my case for eating too much ‘junk food.’ Like it’s any of their business what I eat.”
When she passed one of the bags over to me, Ah opened it up and went to town. Sure, they were cheap mass-produced apple chips that didn’t have a quarter of the love and care that went into what we made back at Sweet Apple Acres, but apples hadn’t been on the menu once since Ah’d been locked up. Ah’ll take what Ah can get. “Thank you kindly. Don’t seem right to take food from a mare without knowing her name.”
The mare briefly set aside her own bag to offer a hoof to me. “Strumming Heartstrings, nice to meet you.”
Well, maybe it was nice for her. Regardless, Ah gave her hoof a good shake and decided to ask a question of my own. “So how’s it gonna work out from here?”
“Straight to business, huh? Good.” She chomped a couple of her chips before she carried on. “So here’s the deal, Applejack: I need something from you to get the bosses off my back, and the Ministry off yours. Hay, it can even be confirming something we already know, so you don’t have to worry about implicating anypony. You could even just give us the name of that cousin of yours we picked up right after you. The one you’ve been protecting.”
My jaw dropped at that. They’d known all along? Ah suppose Ah should’ve known. Everypony always says the Ministry of Heart knows everything worth knowing.
Dangit, Ah’d just spent a week in jail, a week away from my family, for nothing. My shoulders slumped in defeat. “It ain’t ... don’t get the wrong ideas, Braeburn ain’t a bad pony. He just kinda gets caught up in things sometimes. He’s one of those types where as soon as he meets a pony he wants to make friends with ‘em.” Ah sighed and shook my head. “When you’re that nice, sometimes you end up making the wrong sorts of friends. The type who aim to take advantage. This time he fell in with a real bad crowd, and before he knew what the deal was he’d gotten himself up to his neck in trouble, and me along with him.”
“Alright.” Strumming pulled out a notepad and a quill. “Why don’t you start from the beginning?”
“Alright then.” Ah took a deep breath, and got to it. “It all started when Ah opened up my front door to find out who was pounding on it like a hammer working a bent nail...”
Soon as Ah opened up the door, Braeburn grabbed me and hugged me hard enough to make me start worrying about my ribs. “Well howdy, Applejack! How ya doing?”
“Braeburn?” Ah extracted myself from the hug as quickly as Ah could without being rude about it. Braeburn’s a nice stallion most of the time, but he’s a touch too excitable for his own good. Reminds me of this one pony Ah met over in Quarry Junction, though he wasn’t quite that bad. Once Ah was free, Ah gave him a slap on the back. “Well look at you! Ah didn’t figure Ah’d see you for a while yet, what with you settling down in ... what was that place again?”
Ah should’ve known better than to ask, ‘cause as soon as Ah did he reared up and took a deep breath before belting out “Aaaappleloosa!”
Ah swear, ain’t no other pony in the Empire who can get that worked up over just saying the name of his hometown. Ah mean, Ah love Ponyville and all, but that don’t mean Ah gotta shout out its name every time it comes up.
“Yeah, there.” Ah rubbed my ears and waited for the ringing to die down. You deal with Braeburn enough, and you’ll get used to him being so ... well, the way he was.
“Well it is the best little town in the Empire.” He grinned and smacked me on the back. “But that’s enough about me, I ain’t seen you since the last reunion. How you been? How’s Granny Smith and Apple Bloom and Big Mac?”
“Ain’t much changed with Granny.” Ah did a quick check to make sure she wasn’t listening in, then dropped my voice. “You know Granny, she’s made up her mind about how she liked things way back when she was a filly, in the days of old queens Luna and Celestia.” Braeburn and Ah shared a little chuckle at that. “Mac’s about the same, likes things all quiet and such. Apple Bloom’s growing on up, though. T’hear her talk, she’s gonna be getting her cutie mark any day now.”
“Ain’t that always the way with kids? Always in a rush to get their cutie marks, but don’t know the first thing about how to actually go and get ‘em.” Braeburn gave the farm a quick once-over. “Looks like old Sweet Apple Acres is doing as good as ever.”
“We’ve been doing just fine.” A bit better than fine, but Ah ain’t one to brag. “More interested in how you’re holding up. You mentioned you were thinking of starting up a farm down in Appleloosa back at the reunion. Ah ain’t never known you to quit once you got a notion to do something, so how come you’re on my doorstep instead of tending your own trees?”
He hesitated for the moment, then took off his hat and couldn’t quite look me in the eye. “My trees will keep for a bit. I—uh—I need a favor, Applejack.”
It didn’t take long for me to guess at why he might be here. Starting up a new orchard’s a hard thing to do. Ah might not be all that fond of carrots, but the one thing they’ve got going for them is that it’s faster to start a farm with ‘em. Apple trees don’t just pop up overnight; you’re gonna be waiting years before you’ve got enough full-grown trees to make a living off of. It’s part of why keeping the family farm up and running was so important—taking over an orchard with full-grown trees was twenty times easier than starting one up from scratch.
Ah tried to think of the nicest way to bring it up, but Ah ain’t never been one for beating around the bush. “How you doing for bits, cousin?” Sweet Apple Acres wasn’t rich, but we weren’t poor neither. Big Mac did most of the fancy mathematics on our finances—once you start getting into all the government subsidies and incentives, it just gets downright messy and confusing. All Ah really needed to know was that whenever we needed some new equipment or wanted to go on vacation, it wasn’t a problem. Which also probably meant we could spare a bit to help out family in need.
Braeburn immediately shook his head. “Ain’t money, Applejack. I’m fine on that. Great, actually. Friend of mine got me a job doing deliveries for this shipping company. Ain’t fancy, but it’ll put food on the table until my orchard gets running. Though ... well, that’s part of why I wanted to talk to you, actually.”
“That so?” Ah opened up the door and led him inside—Ah had a feeling this was gonna be a bit long of a talk to be having in the doorway. “Take a seat, Ah’ll get us some cider.” Ah made a quick stop-off in the kitchen, then came back with two mugs of the stuff and passed one to him before taking a seat in Granny’s favorite chair. It might be her chair, but she wasn’t here, and it was her favorite because it was the coziest chair in the house. “So why don’t you tell me more about this favor you want?”
“Ain’t much to it, really.” Braeburn stretched out on the sofa, idly swirling his cider. “You see, the guys paying me for these deliveries are usually dealing with stuff a bit outta the ordinary. You know, the kinda thing you can only find out on the frontier. Right now, Ah got a cart full of fruits off of the prickly pear cactus. Ain’t never cared for ‘em myself, but the folks paying me think they’ll be the next big thing in Canterlot.”
Braeburn ran a hoof through his mane. “The only problem is that you’re talking about a desert plant that’s used to being in the desert. Means we gotta store ‘em in special conditions, and the barrels have to be sealed up until we can get ‘em into the storehouse. If the barrels get opened up, all that humidity and moisture could get in there and ruin the whole set.”
“Ah’m with you so far.” Needing to seal up these cactus fruits in airtight barrels sounded like a bit of overkill, but Ah didn’t know much about how desert fruits worked. Apples could be awful particular about how you stored ‘em though, and Ah reckoned it made sense that a fruit that grows on a cactus out in the desert might not appreciate too much water. “So what’s the favor you need from me?”
“Well...” Braeburn shuffled about in his seat, and took a long pull of his cider. “Mister Cause told me that the last shipment ran into some trouble with the health and safety inspector. Apparently, he didn’t much care for being told he couldn’t have a look at the food we was bringing in and insisted on opening up all the barrels, even after the delivery guy tried to explain that he’d spoil the fruit if he did that.”
That got a sympathetic flinch outta me. “Can’t imagine his bosses were happy about that.”
“They weren’t.” Braeburn shuffled on his hooves. “Why do you think they needed to hire me?”
“Figured as much.” Spoilin’ a whole load of cargo is a pretty good way to lose your job as a delivery pony. “So you wanna make sure the same thing don’t happen to you? Makes sense, though Ah don’t reckon its too likely.” The health inspector couldn’t check every load of food coming into Canterlot without slowing traffic down so much the city would probably run out of food, so he usually only checked one out of every twenty wagons or so—enough to keep everypony on their toes while still letting folks into the city without too much trouble. Not to mention he probably got an earful over ruinin’ somepony’s cargo.
Ah frowned at Braeburn and tried to tie it all together. “Alright, so where do Ah come in? Ain’t much Ah can do about the health inspector.”
“You do enough business in Canterlot to be a familiar face,” Braeburn answered, shooting me a hopeful little smile. “I figure they’re more likely to go after somepony they’ve never seen before than somepony they know always has good produce.”
Gotta admit, he was right about that. Ah'd been selling my extra apples in Canterlot for years now—there’s only so many apples a small town like Ponyville can eat. Ah preferred dealing with ponies face to face, especially since it usually got better prices, and Ah usually got to see them enjoying what they bought. Still, when a good apple tree can put out more than six hundred apples a year, and you multiply that by several fields’ worth, it wasn’t hard to figure out that Ah was gonna have way too many apples to one-at-a-time every single one of them.
It had been a long time since any of the health inspectors had taken a look at my apples. Like Braeburn said, they knew who Ah was and that Ah only ever sold good apples. No reason to waste everypony’s time and money checking out somepony they knew did honest business. So long as they didn’t have a reason to think the way Ah did business had changed, there weren’t no reason to check my cargo out.
Still, it didn’t quite sit right with me. Ah mean, the reason Ah could always breeze through the health and safety regulations is that everypony knew Ah was an honest businesspony, and Sweet Apple Acres was a quality name. Except now Ah was gonna be using that name and reputation to do somepony else’s business, not my own. It just didn’t sit right with me, letting everypony think all the cargo was mine when some of it wouldn’t be. “Ah don’t know, Braeburn. Just seems a little fishy, doing things that way.”
Braeburn’s ears drooped, but he gave a slow, resigned nod. “I getcha, Applejack. You gotta do what’s right for your business. I’ll find a way. Shoot, the odds I’ll get pulled over for a cargo check aren’t that high anyway, I’m probably worrying over nothing.”
“Probably.” Ah quickly turned to my cider and focused on that for a bit. Whenever you tell Braeburn no, he gets this pitiful hangdog look about him, like somepony just kicked him in the gut and took away all his birthday presents. Made me feel like a right mule for turning him down when he needed my help. What kinda mare was I, putting business over family? That ain’t the Apple way.
Ah groaned and gave into the inevitable. “How many barrels of this cactus fruit do ya have?”
Braeburn’s face lit up like a firefly dancing with a junebug. “Just half a dozen. It’ll be no trouble at all.” He got up and wrapped me in another one of his bear hugs. “Thanks, Applejack. I owe you one. I mean it; anything you need, anything at all, you got it.”
Normally Ah would’ve just waved that off—family don’t have to worry about debts—but then Ah remembered that the sheep and cattle pens were due for some cleaning up. “Tell you what, Braeburn, stick around a couple days. Help keep everything running smooth while Ah’m in Canterlot, and we’re square. Fair deal?”
“Sounds more’n fair to me.” We swapped a hoofshake that nearly turned into him trying to hug me again.
Ah grinned at him. “We’ll see how fair you think it is once Big Mac works you for a couple days.”
Braeburn chuckled at that. “Ah guess we will. Thanks again for helping me out, cuz. You won’t regret it.”
The trip into Canterlot weren’t nothin’ interesting. Visiting the capital was real exciting the first couple times Ah’d done it, but by now it was just another business trip. Like Braeburn figured, Ah didn’t have any trouble with the health inspectors. They just nodded when they saw me and let me march my apples right along.
After that, it was just a quick trot to the warehouse district to unload everything. It was getting late in the day by the time Ah made it there—it’s a pretty long walk if you hoof it all the way from Ponyville, especially with a cart full of produce. Ah could’ve taken the train, but that would’ve added an extra round of loading and unloading everything, not to mention Ah would’ve needed to pay for the train ticket, a cargo storage fee, and then Ah’d have to rent a wagon in Canterlot to actually deliver the apples. Walking’s free.
Besides, hoofing it gave me an excuse to stay overnight in Canterlot. Ah might be a farm girl at heart, but that don’t mean Ah can’t appreciate the big city a bit. Ah’d figured that out when Ah spent a bit with my Aunt and Uncle Orange in Manehatten. It was a lot of fun, helping out with their shipping business and all. Let me see what life was like outside of the farm, even if at the end of the day it just reminded me how much Ah loved Sweet Apple Acres. Sometimes a pony needs a change of scenery like that. Now Ah knew that Ah farmed because Ah loved it, not just because it was what Ah was raised to do.
‘Course, Ah needed to make my deliveries before Ah started thinking too much about what Ah’d do with the Canterlot nightlife. No sense in counting my chickens before they hatched.
Delivering the apples went smooth as ever, other than needing to stop them from taking Braeburn’s barrels along with mine. Ah didn’t expect any trouble, since we’d done this particular song and dance plenty of times before. Ah come here pretty regularly to sell off all my extra apples, so there weren’t no need for any haggling on the price or such.
That just left Braeburn’s delivery. His barrels were going to a different part of the warehouse district from where Ah normally did business. There were actually a pretty good number of warehouses in Canterlot, mostly clustered around the train station. Since every railroad in Equestria connects back to Canterlot, the capital’s pretty much the central hub for all of the rail travel in this part of the Empire. You could find a warehouse in Canterlot for just about anything a pony would want to buy.
Naturally, Ah was used to doing business with the places that specialized in storing food. Ah’d figured Braeburn’s barrels would be going someplace nearby, but the directions he’d written out for me weren’t pointing anywhere Ah was familiar with. As Ah followed them, Ah couldn’t help but notice that Ah was headed for the shabbier part of the warehouse district. Granted, it was only shabby by Canterlot standards; ain’t no way the Empress would tolerate a bunch of run-down eyesores of buildings in her capital.
Ah pulled my cart up in front of the warehouse and knocked on the front door. “Howdy. Anypony there? Ah got your shipment of cactus fruits waiting out here.”
Ah was about to try knocking again or check if the door was unlocked when Ah heard the sound of several bolts clicking open, and then the door opened up just enough for me to see a pair of eyes glowering out at me suspiciously. A male voice growled out from the shadows. “You don’t look like our description of Braeburn. Who are you?”
“Name’s Applejack.” Ah extended a hoof, which was completely ignored. “Ah’m his cousin. Since Ah had business of my own in Canterlot, we figured just one of us could to go into town and handle both the deliveries.”
Mister Suspicious chewed on that for a bit, then grunted. “He was supposed to deliver the goods himself, not send somepony else.”
Ah was getting just a mite annoyed with all of this. There weren’t no reason to make such a production outta dropping off a couple barrels full of fruit. “What’s it matter who drops them off so long as they get here? You want your cargo, so how about we stop flapping our jaws and you come on and get it. Got better things to do than sit here shooting the breeze with somepony who won’t even show me his face.”
That got me another grunt outta the fella on the other end of the door, and then he shut it in my face. Ah could hear some muffled conversation going on behind it, though Ah couldn’t make out a word of what anypony was saying. After a bit the door cracked open again. “You didn’t open any of the barrels, right?”
“Ah sure didn’t,” Ah assured them. “Kept ‘em sealed up tighter than a jar of pickles, just like you told Braeburn to.”
“Good.” The door closed again, but this time it opened up a couple seconds later, and several ponies filed out and headed for my wagon. One of them, a big earth pony fella with a dirty white coat and short-cut red mane, stopped in front of me. Once he spoke, Ah knew for certain he was the one Ah’d been talking to before. “Once we get the goods in storage, I’ll have my ponies give it a quick inspection. As long as everything’s in order, there won’t be any problems. Like you said, who does the delivering is less important than the fact that it gets here.”
“Best news Ah’ve had all day.” For a minute there Ah’d been afraid the whole job was gonna go belly-up and Ah’d be left trying to explain to Braeburn how things had gone wrong for him. He didn’t say anything about it, but given that his orchard wasn’t up and running yet, he probably needed the bits from this job pretty bad. Delivery work usually isn’t the kinda job a pony takes ‘cause they just love running all over the place hitched up to a cart.
Ah took a look at the ponies unloading Braeburn’s barrels. They seemed to be having a time of it; Braeburn and Ah had found out just how heavy them cactus fruits was when we’d first loaded them onto my cart. Lucky for us, Big Mac had been around to help out. The ponies offloading my cargo didn’t have anypony close to his size, though. In fact, most of them looked a bit on the weedy side for professional teamsters, and between that and all the trouble they were having with the unloading, Ah was starting to suspect they weren’t proper unloaders at all.
Would be just my luck to get stuck with an unprofessional operation like this. Ah ain’t a stickler for doing everything just so, but there are right and wrong ways of unloading cargo. At the rate they were going, somepony was gonna end up hurting themselves or dropping something. Ah might not care too much for their boss’ attitude, but Ah still had my professional pride. “Hey, y’all need any help unloading?”
“They can handle it,” their boss grumbled at me. “Just stay out of the way and let them do their job. The sooner they finish, the sooner you can get paid and get out of here.”
That had been why Ah was ready to help in the first place. Waiting for the amateurs to get the job done was gonna take twice as long as it would if Ah showed them the ropes real quick. Ain’t like the trick to carrying heavy stuff is all that complicated. Besides, Ah’d be doing them a favor in the long term by showing them how it’s done.
Ah wasn’t in the mood to argue it though, even if Ah was right. Instead, Ah just sat back and watched as they slowly and painfully tried to work it out on their own. They did at least seem to be figuring out the best way to get the barrels out of the cart and into the warehouse through trial and error as they went along. Ah swear, their boss must’ve just grabbed the first two ponies he saw without so much as a thought to whether they could properly do the job.
They were getting the second-to-last barrel out of the cart when the inevitable happened. One of them lost his grip, and instead of gently rolling out the back of the cart and onto his partner’s back, the barrel tumbled right out. A lot of Canterlot streets have a bit of a slope to them on account of the city being built on a mountain, so pretty soon that barrel was rolling downhill, picking up speed as it went. Instinct kicked in as soon as Ah saw the barrel rolling down the street, and Ah chased after it. It was getting late enough in the day that the streets in this part of town weren’t all that crowded, and what ponies were around seemed more interested in getting outta the way of the runaway barrel than in lending a hoof.
The warehouse staff were right on my tail. Ah’d nearly caught up when the barrel came to an abrupt stop, courtesy of a lamppost. The barrel wasn’t exactly a high-quality one made outta the best wood money could buy, so the impact split it open and popped the top off. That’s when Ah got a look at what Ah’d been carrying, and it sure as hay weren’t no cactus fruit.
Ah pulled out one of the items, a crossbow that looked fancy enough to be worth a whole lotta money and heavy enough to be all kinds of dangerous. “What in the world?” It wasn’t the kinda weapon a pony could run around with in the middle of Canterlot without facing a whole lotta difficult questions and certainly not the kinda weapon anypony should be sneaking barrels full of into the capital. And Ah had a buncha barrels full of the things sittin’ in the back of my wagon, after Ah’d snuck ‘em right past the Guards. What in the hay was goin’ on here?
Something heavy and hard smacked me in the back of the head an instant later. In hindsight, Ah probably should’ve gone on guard once Ah realized that Ah’d been smuggling weapons to some ponies. Ponies trying to sneak a bunch weapons into the capital weapons generally ain’t up to anything good. Probably would’ve figured it all out, if Ah’d been just a bit faster or they’d been just a bit slower. Didn’t help that they knew what their cargo was, while Ah’d needed a couple ticks to figure it out.
That smack scrambled my brain pretty good. It didn’t knock me out or anything, but there wasn’t too much fight in me when they grabbed me and dragged me back to the warehouse along with their lost barrel. By the time my head started clearing up, they’d already gotten me inside the warehouse and outta sight.
“Horseapples,” one of them groaned, frantically pacing around the room. “We are feathered, we are so feathered!”
The leader of the trio let out an annoyed growl. “Quit your whining and keep it together, Whisper. We got the goods, and ain’t nopony gonna call in the gendarmes on us. Ain’t like we’re the only ones who’d lose out if the law started poking around and seeing what they can turn up.”
The twitchy one, Whisper, took a couple deep breaths and seemed to settle a bit. “Yeah. Right. Like you said Chestnut, everything’s fine.” He took another couple breaths, then looked down at me. “So what do we do with her? Geeze, Mr. Cause is gonna be pissed when he finds out about this. We are so...”
“Chill, Whisper.” The big guy grabbed him and shook him. “Freaking out on us isn’t going to make this any better. Let’s just take her to Cause and let him figure out what to do next.”
While those two were busy arguing, Ah was still shaking off the effects of a kick to the head. The world wasn’t spinning no more, and while Ah still felt a little woozy, Ah was more than good enough to make life difficult for these bushwhackers.
Ah rolled around a bit to get a good angle. Ah couldn’t get up on my hooves without giving myself away, but that still left me plenty of options. Ah settled on my old standby and set my forelegs on the ground. Ah couldn’t buck anywhere near full strength when Ah was coming up from the floor, but after years of apple-bucking, even a weak buck outta me was something most ponies wouldn’t like. On a good day, one buck from me could leave hoof prints in solid wood.
Just to be safe, Ah also picked my target carefully. After that, it was just a matter of waiting for the right moment. That didn’t take too long to come around, and once it did, Ah up and bucked Chestnut right in the ... well, in the chestnuts. Ah don’t care how big and tough a stallion is, there ain’t a one of them in the world who’s still in a fighting mood after taking a hit like that.
Chestnut went down like a sack of potatoes, whining and moaning all the while. Ah got up to my hooves and faced off with Whisper and his silent buddy. They was already looking nervous, so Ah decided to help them along. “Word of advice, idjits: next time you try and foalnap a mare, y’might wanna tie her up.”
Ah took a quick look around the warehouse. The inside was a lot shabbier than the outside, with junk strewn all over the place without any thought for neatness or organization. There were even a couple spots where the floor had been torn up, leaving chunks of concrete littering the floor. From the looks of it, somepony was trying to make a secret tunnel into the caves under Canterlot.
Ah paced around the room, keeping a wary eye on Whisper and his buddy. Ah kept on talking—Whisper looked twitchy enough that Ah was pretty sure Ah could rattle him without trying too hard. “You see, if you don’t tie up your prisoner after you nab ‘em, you leave yourself open to all manner of unpleasantness. Like this!” Ah knocked one of the loose bits of concrete into the air, then did a quick about-face to buck it straight into the nose of Whisper’s silent buddy. In the contest between high-speed concrete and a pony’s nose, concrete wins every time.
That just left Whisper himself, and by now he was looking more nervous than a cat in a room full of rocking chairs. “S—stay back!” He quickly pulled one the crossbows out of the barrel and pointed it at me. “I’m warning you!”
Ah might’ve been intimidated by that, if not for one problem. “You are aware that crossbow ain’t loaded, ain’tcha?”
“Huh?” He stared down in confusion at the very obviously loaded crossbow, giving me more than enough time to handle him just like Ah’d handled his two friends.
Ah took a minute to make sure there wasn’t any fight left in them, then took a moment to pronounce final verdict on the matter. “Idjits.” Ah was halfway tempted not to report them to the Imperial Guard, since that’d mean admitting they’d managed to get the jump on me for a bit. Only halfway tempted, though.
Ah’d turned around and was headed for the door when a crossbow bolt planted itself into the wood in front of me. Ah looked back and saw a unicorn stallion standing on the other side of the room. He had a pure white coat and a long, wavy golden mane, but most of my attention was focused on that big crossbow he had pointed at me. One that he’d already reloaded.
Ah played it cool, keeping a close eye on the fella. He was staying as far away from me as he could without leaving the room, making sure Ah couldn’t close in on him the way Ah’d done with Whisper. “Ah’m gonna guess you’re the brains of the little operation, since you’re the first one I’ve seen who looks like he actually has a brain.”
The unicorn smirked and nodded, his eyes never leaving me. “You guess correctly.” He spared a disdainful glance for the ponies on the floor. “Goodness knows somepony has to do the thinking. I’m afraid you haven’t come visiting at the best time; if you had shown up during one of our meetings, you would see that things are usually a bit more professional around here. Sadly, our best and brightest aren’t the ones assigned to watching the warehouse in off-hours.”
“Kinda figured that part out on my own.” Ah spared a glance down at the idjits, who were slowly getting back up now that they didn’t need to worry about me hitting them again. “Mind telling me why Ah’m getting foalnapped and held at crossbow-point?”
“I hardly think the crossbow needs an explanation, after what you did to my acolytes.” He frowned down at the idjit trio. “As for the foalnapping, I have no idea why they did that, and I suspect I won’t like the answer.”
Of the three, Whisper seemed to be in the best state to answer. “She saw the weapons, Mr. Cause! We had to do something to keep her quiet!”
The unicorn, Mr. Cause, sighed and shook his head. “And you decided on openly committing a major felony instead of just asking her to keep it quiet and offering a few extra bits for her trouble because...?”
Whisper slumped down. “I didn’t think of that.”
“I’m wondering at what point you did think, Whisper.” Cause turned his attention back to me. “Well, clearly we’ve started this meeting off on the wrong hoof. Just Cause, pleasure to meet you. I’d offer to shake your hoof, but...” He hefted his crossbow by way of explanation.
“Applejack.” Ah frowned at him, despite the charm he was pouring on. Well, if Ah’m honest, because of the charm. Don’t ever trust a pony who’s trying to charm you while pointing a lethal weapon at your head. “And for the record, Ah’m a law-abiding citizen, so if you tried to buy me off Ah would’ve told you to take your money and shove it.”
“Pity.” He carefully walked around his three downed helpers, giving them enough room to get up on their own without blocking his line of fire to me. “I should also point out that if you tried to go to the authorities, we would have more than enough time to drop off the map. It would be a waste of a perfectly good base of operations, but given the alternative...” He trailed off and offered a slight shrug. “Really, if you contact the Guard you would be the worst off of us. My associates and I will be able to make a clean getaway while you’re finding somepony to listen to your story, and if you tell them what happened, the Guard would probably arrest you for smuggling illegal weapons into Canterlot.”
That gave me cause for pause. Sure, Ah hadn’t known that Ah was carrying weapons, but that might not be enough to keep me from getting in trouble. At the very least, there’d be a whole lotta pointed questions about what Ah’d been up to.
That almost tempted me to just walk away and let the whole thing drop. Almost. The thing was, much as Ah didn’t like the idea of having trouble with the law, Ah liked the idea of what these fellas would get up to with six barrels full of weapons even less. The only reason Ah could see for sneaking that many weapons into Canterlot would be if they were aiming to kill somepony, or a lotta someponies. Ah didn’t want that on my conscience.
Ah met Cause’s eyes and looked for the nearest bit of cover Ah could run to. Ah didn’t like my odds of getting there before he could shoot me, but Ah dang sure wasn’t gonna just stand there and make it easy for him. “Sorry, but Granny didn’t raise no cowards. If Ah end up with law trouble on account of reportin’ you, Ah reckon Ah’ll just have to buck up and deal.”
Ah half-expected he’d just put a crossbow bolt into me as soon as Ah said that, but to my relief, he didn’t do anything of the kind. Instead he just kinda smiled and nodded. “I can respect that. I might still have to kill you, but you have my respect. And really, if we respect each other, we should be able to find a better way of sorting this whole mess out. Hiding bodies is so terribly inconvenient. I’d rather turn you into an asset.”
“An asset?” Ah repeated incredulously.
“Quite so.” He shifted his stance so the crossbow wasn’t pointing right at me anymore, but he could still bring it up at a moment’s notice. “Thus far you’ve shown intelligence, determination, and a strong moral center. Those are all qualities my organization could use. It seems like your main objection is that you think we’re up to some nefarious scheme, so let’s stop threatening each other, and I’ll explain exactly what we’re doing. I expect you’ll be more than happy to help, once you realize what I intend to do.”
Well, somepony was awful impressed with himself. Ah didn’t reckon Ah’d be too quick to join in on some kinda murder plot, but Ah didn’t see the harm in letting him flap his jaw for a bit. If nothing else, it’d give me more info on what exactly Ah was dealing with when Ah went to the gendarmes. And anything that bought me more time to find a way outta this whole sticky situation was a good thing. Ah was pretty sure that if Ah turned down the tour he would’ve put a bolt in me right then and there, and Ah really didn’t wanna get myself shot. The smart move was to play along with him until I got a chance to rabbit. “Alright. Say what you’re gonna say, and Ah’ll hear you out.”
“Smart move.” Just holstered his crossbow at his side, though Ah didn’t have any doubt he could get it back up in a jiffy if Ah got ornery with him. “So let’s talk this all out like civilized ponies. I assure you, once you understand the situation you will be more than willing to join me.”
“Reckon we’ll see about that.” So far all Ah’d heard outta this guy was a lotta talk about how he was gonna win me over, but nothing to back that up. Talk’s cheap, especially when you’re dealing with somepony who seems awful fond of the sound of his own voice. “First you better tell me what you’re up to and why Ah should trust you, ‘cause right now all Ah know is that you’ve got more illegal weapons than anypony with righteous intentions oughta have, and you lied to me and my cousin to get ‘em here. That’s two pretty darn big strikes against you.”
Just turned around and led the way deeper into his warehouse, trusting me to follow behind him. His three flunkies were watching his back anyway. “I apologize for the deception, but sometimes we need to resort to trickery to achieve our goals. I assure you, everything I have done is ultimately for the greater good.”
We went down a couple staircases, heading down into the tunnels. “Wonderful. How’s about we stop dancing around and you lemme know what’s what already?”
“I could tell you...” Just paused in front of a heavy security door. “But I think it might be a bit faster if I showed you.”
He undid the locks and the door slowly ground open, revealing a large chamber underneath the warehouse itself. Compared to the shabby building above us, this place was all kinds of fancy. What caught my eye wasn’t the silver candlesticks or all the gems and precious metals worked into the floor in some kinda intricate pattern, though. It was the big ole tapestry sitting up on one of the walls.
The tapestry itself would’ve been enough to get everypony in the room in a Ministry of Heart cell for a long talking to. pictures of Nightmare Moon standing triumphantly over the Empress’ body tend to do that. Horseapples, I was really in it now. “Y’all are Nightmare cultists?”
Just stepped up to the tapestry and looked it over with a faint smile on his face. “I suppose they would call us that, yes. I’m not terribly fond of the term myself, though. It has a rather negative association with madponies who want to unleash eternal night and doom all life on the world, and I assure you I have no intention of doing that.”
“Right...” Ah didn’t buy that for one minute, but Ah ain’t one to burst a crazy pony’s bubble. Most folks crazy enough to think joining up with a mad alicorn who wanted to destroy the sun was a good idea weren’t the kinda folks who responded rationally to criticism of their beliefs.
The cult leader either didn’t notice how Ah wasn’t buying what he was selling or he didn’t care. Instead, he just kept right on talking. “Our support for the restoration of Luna as the rightful ruler of Equestria is more a matter of logic and reason than religious fervor. The tyrant and usurper Sunbeam Sparkle must be removed from power, and Luna is the old queen’s rightful heir. Surely you cannot support the Empire’s evil and oppressive policies? How the basic and freedoms of all ponykind, and every other race, have been stripped away?”
Truth be told, Ah always had figured the Empire was just a bit too big for its own good. Ah’ve always been of the mind that the best kinda government is the kind that doesn’t make life hard for everypony living under it. Might be that the Ministry of Agriculture helps out a lotta ponies, but for me they’ve just been a pain in the flanks since the day Ah started working Sweet Apple Acres. Ah don’t need some government worker telling me how to make my farm more efficient, it was my farm. If Ah wanted to make my cider by hoof instead of running it through some fancified machine, that was my business and nopony else’s.
“Ah, yes, I know the look in your eyes.” Cause smiled to himself, walked up to my side. “I’ve seen that same look on so many other faces. The look of a pony who hates having their choices taken away from them. Because that’s what the Empire is all about—taking away everypony’s right to choose, then telling them it’s for their own good.” He made a grand, sweeping gesture with one of his hooves. “I’m sure you know your history, Applejack. You’re a smart mare. I’m sure you know that back before the Empire, the earth ponies actually got to choose their own leaders. Not just a tribune who was allowed to advise the Empress, actual leaders.”
“Ah know it.” Ah felt just a bit of family pride as Ah added. “One of my ancestors was nearly the Chancellor of the Earth Ponies at one point.”
“Exactly.” Just Cause grinned and slapped me on the back. “I knew you would understand. We used to have freedom and democracy, but ever since Sunbeam took the throne all we’ve had is her Empire running things with cold, uncaring efficiency. Always looking at the big picture. It doesn’t matter if things are bad for some ponies as long as the Empire as a whole is better off.” He paused, and let out a bitter snort. “Of course, it’s a lot easier to say that when you’re not the one losing out so the rest of the Empire can be better off.”
He turned and pointed to each of his companions in turn. “Chestnut and Walnut lost their jobs in the mines ‘cause it was more efficient to have a machine do it. Same for Whisper, because it was more efficient to use zebra tooth repair potions for most of the things a pony used to see a dentist for. My family lost everything we’d spent centuries building up because the nobility was inefficient.” He scowled something fierce when he mentioned that; Ah reckon it was a sore point for him.
He put a hoof on my shoulder and looked me in the eyes. “Trust me, if the Empire keeps going the way it has been, one day they’ll decide they don’t need you anymore either. They’ll find some way to let one pony run a farm that normally takes ten workers to handle and not even think about the fact that it means nine out of every ten farmers are out of a job.”
He stepped back and waved his forelegs to encompass the entire room. “That’s how the Empire works. What the little pony wants—all your personal desires and freedoms—are completely irrelevant. The only thing that matters is keeping the Empire running at maximum efficiency. It serves no purpose other than sustaining its own existence and crushing however many ponies it needs to in order to keep itself functioning. And anypony who doesn’t go along with that gets a visit from the Ministry of Heart.”
Ah’ll say this for Just Cause, he knew how to make a real pretty speech. His followers seemed to be hanging on his every word, and even Ah had to admit he had some point about how the Empire wasn’t perfect. ‘Course, Ah’d known that long before Ah’d ever met the stallion. Saying the Empire ain’t perfect is about like saying the sky is blue. Ah don’t reckon even the Empress would argue the system was flawless. What Ah wanted to know was exactly what Just had in mind for fixing it, beyond putting Nightmare Moon on the throne. Pointing out problems was a lot easier than figuring out solutions. “So what’s your plan?”
Just grinned to himself, apparently taking that question as a sign that Ah was open to signing on with him. “It’s simple enough. Soon we will free Luna from her prison, and she will lead the liberation of Equestria from the tyrant who murdered her sister and seized the throne. Until that day arrives, we must lay the groundwork for her return, both by recruiting new members to the cause and ... taking care of a few problems.”
“Ah take it that’s what the weapons are for?” Ah shot a look at Just’s crossbow, hanging from his side. “Taking care of a couple of those problems that happen to be pony-shaped.”
“Yes,” Just answered matter-of-factly. “As the bars of her prison weaken, Luna herself has found a way to contact me. When last we spoke, she gave me a dire warning. There are six ponies who have the potential to destroy everything that she has worked for—to deny Equestria the freedom it deserves. They have to be removed before Luna’s return.” He hesitated for a moment. “I admit that I don’t like the idea of being an assassin, but when you weigh the lives of six ponies against the liberation of Equestria from the tyranny of the false empress...”
“Sucks to be them,” Chestnut concluded.
Oh. Well ain’t that just dandy. Bad enough they had to be crazy evil cultists, but now they were planning a buncha murders too. Ain’t no way Ah could go along with something like that, even if Ah agreed with the rest of what Just Cause was planning on. As it was, Ah just needed to figure out how to get away as fast as Ah could.
Soon as that thought popped into my head, another one took its place. Worrying about my own neck was all well and good, but if these fellas were planning on doing some murdering then Ah wasn’t the only one in trouble. Ah oughta at least try and find out who they were after so Ah could see about warning them somehow. “Right, so who are these ponies you’re after? Some kinda government officials or something?”
“Not exactly.” Just frowned and tapped the weapon at his side. “Though Luna, in her wisdom, has not revealed all their identities yet, only the ones known to our enemies. If we attempted to remove one of the six and failed, we would only inform the Empress. As it stands, the only ponies Luna has warned me of are a schoolteacher and Twilight Sparkle, the Empress’ student.”
Oh, ponyfeathers. Ah didn’t know much about the Empress, but Ah figured it was a pretty safe bet that if this Just fella took a shot at her personal protégé, he’d be in for a world of hurt. Him and anypony else who’d gotten themselves mixed up in it. One thing was for sure, Ah definitely wanted to be the one to warn the gendarmes about this—if they found out Ah was mixed up in this business in from somepony other than me, Ah could be in for a world of trouble.
That just left figuring out how to get outta there. Ah was probably gonna have to pretend to sign on with the cult—Ah was pretty sure the ‘join us’ offer had come with an unspoken ‘or die’ at the end of it. Ah’m an honest mare, but Ah’d gladly tell a couple fibs if it was the only way to get outta getting killed for nothing. Besides, nopony would be able to warn the Empress about the loonies who were planning on killing her student if Ah died here.
“Alright, fine.” Ah tried to fake as much sincerity as Ah could. “You made a good case, Ah’ll see where you’re going with this. What do Ah have to do?”
Normally Ah ain’t a very good liar, but in this case Ah did have one thing going for me. Namely, that Just Cause really wanted to believe he could win me over by just talking at me for a couple minutes. Lies always go down a lot easier when the other pony wants to believe ya. Just grinned and threw a foreleg over my back. “Excellent. Welcome to our numbers, sister. We won’t be able to arrange a proper initiation until our next meeting, but I would be more than happy to have you stay as my personal guest until then. I insist.”
Oh, well that’s just swell. Ah suppose Ah should’ve guessed he’d take some kinda precaution against me pulling exactly what Ah was trying. He might wanna believe he’d talked me around, but he wasn’t an idiot. Ah thought about trying to talk my way outta spending a couple days hanging out with Nightmare cultists, but Ah couldn’t see any way of doing it without making myself look suspicious. Ah could try saying my family would be suspicious if Ah didn’t come home, but he’d just tell me to write ‘em about being busy in Canterlot or something. Ain’t no way he was letting me loose until he was sure Ah was one hundred percent committed to the cause.
Considering all that, Ah didn’t have much choice but to go along with what he had planned and hope Ah could find a way outta this before Ah got in too deep. Pretending to join the cult was one thing, but Ah wasn’t gonna pledge my soul to Nightmare Moon just to keep up the charade. Ah was kinda attached to my soul and had better plans for it than feeding it to Nightmare Moon, or whatever it is Nightmare cultists do.
Before Ah could ask any more questions, Ah noticed Just Cause’s minions were busy lighting the candles and generally tidying up. Seemed a bit odd for them to be doing that, especially when their boss had been talking about heading home just a bit ago. Cause must’ve picked up on my confusion, ‘cause he decided to explain what was going on to me. “I was preparing to commune with Luna’s spirit when you arrived. It seems a pity to waste all that preparation, especially when I have a new sister in the faith to introduce to her.”
“Er ... yeah.” Ah was starting to wonder if Ah should’ve just admitted Ah thought they were a bunch of loonies, and took my chances on fighting it out. Ah should’ve known that lying would just end up dragging me into deeper and deeper trouble. “So y’all can just call up Nigh—er, Luna whenever you want and have a chat with her?”
That got a smile outta him. “Oh, it’s a bit more complicated than just that. I would suggest you find somewhere comfortable to take a seat.”
It didn’t take long to figure why he said that. Well, Ah guess in a manner of speaking it did take a long time, ‘cause all the prep-work he and his acolytes had to do fer this ritual musta taken at least an hour to get done. Candles had to be lit, a whole buncha complicated symbols had be written all over the floor, and there was enough incense burning to make my nose itch something fierce. While his flunkies were busy doing all of that, Just Cause was busy painting himself up with just as many weird symbols as the fellas had put on the floor.
By the time all that was done, my head was starting to feel a little fuzzy on account of all the incense they’d been burning. Just Cause stepped up to the circle and started chanting in some language Ah didn’t know, though there was enough about it that sounded vaguely familiar that Ah could guess it was one of the Old Equestrian dialects. Guess it figures you’d need to use some old-fashioned language to talk to a pony who’s been locked away from the world for a thousand years.
He’d been at it for a while when Ah felt something suddenly change. There was something standing in the middle of all those runes now. Not a proper pony, but definitely some kinda something, dark and shadowy. Big, too. Though Ah couldn’t really describe it—just lookin’ at it hurt mah eyes. Ah couldn't even start to make out the whole thing, but Ah felt it as much as Ah saw it, and way more past that. It just being there about knocked me back like a breezie in the wake of a dragon's breath; Ah don't think it could stop itself from doing whatever it was doing even if it wanted to. Can’t say for sure if he’d really called up Nightmare Moon or just deluded himself into thinking he had. Don’t reckon it matters all that much—whatever he’d done, he’d gotten something nasty as all get out to show up.
The dark presence in the circle spoke to him. It was in the same ancient speech he’d used to call it up, only when the creature talked it was a lot louder and deeper. Dust shook down off the rafters with every single word. More than that, the way it was talking sounded wrong. Nothing Ah could put my hoof on, just ... wrong.
The more Ah listened to Just Cause chatting away with Nightmare Moon or whatever it was, the less Ah wanted to be there. Dang it, Ah’d just been trying to do a favor for my cousin! Ah hadn’t asked for any of this! Ah’m a simple farmer, not some kinda monster-slaying demon-hunting superhero or something.
Ah wanted outta there so bad, Ah’d started edging towards the door before Ah even realized it. The good news was that Just and his three flunkies were so focused on that thing in the circle that they didn’t even notice me trying to make a getaway. Only problem was, the creature itself had a perfect view of me. Ah’d just about made it to the door when Ah suddenly felt it focus in on me, and Ah froze on the spot. Then it talked at me. “Eilikríneia foréas Applejack! Skóto̱se Applejack, mou ypálli̱loi!”
Ah didn’t have the first clue what any of that meant, but Ah recognized my name, and the rest of the words didn’t sound all that friendly. That suspicion was pretty quickly confirmed when Just Cause pulled his crossbow and the others went scrambling for whatever weapons they could find. Ah bolted for the door. I felt a hot line of fire across my flank as a crossbow bolt nickedme, but Ah’d take that in a heartbeat over what could’ve happened. Ah ran up the stairs as fast as Ah could; between the freaky monster thing and the fanatical cultists trying kill me, Ah darn sure didn’t wanna be there anymore.
As Ah ran for it, the creature’s shouts followed me up. “Dákry i̱ sárka apó ti̱s ostá! Férte mou ti̱s diakópsei kranío!” My knees went weak every time Ah heard its voice, but Ah dug down deep and forced myself to keep running.
Ah got up the stairs fast enough to set some kinda record and ran for the door outta the warehouse. It was locked up tight, so Ah gave it a couple good bucks. Much to my surprise, that didn’t work for once. Guess it figures they’d have a good strong lock on their warehouse when what was inside would get them all killed very dead.
Dangit, Ah had to get outta there! If those guys caught up with me, Ah was dead. Or maybe something worse, if they brought me back to that thing they’d called up. Empress above, it had known my name! If Ah never saw that creature again, it’d be too soon. Ah ain’t a pony who scares easy, but the mere thought of them dragging me back to that thing in the other room... Ah don’t know what it was, but it weren’t nothin’ I ever wanted to see again. Think Ah’d rather just go down fightin’.
Ah desperately searched the warehouse for another way out, but the closest Ah could find was an open skylight. Not ideal, especially since Ah had no idea how Ah was supposed to get up to it, but ‘any port in a storm’ ... Ah hopped up onto the nearest couple boxes, then made a desperate leap for the exit. Ah managed to get my forelegs through the window, and did my best to find some way of pulling myself up. Problem was, there wasn’t anything around to grab hold of other than the window itself. Ah gave that a try, but the glass wasn’t strong enough to support the weight of a full-grown mare trying to pull herself up.
When Ah saw the glass cracking, my grip slipped and Ah tumbled back down into the warehouse. Ah hit the floor hard enough to knock the wind outta me and needed a couple seconds to get myself back up. Shame Ah didn’t have that much time to spare. Ah heard hoofsteps on pavement, and a second later there was a crossbow pointed right at my face.
The only bit of good news was it was Chestnut the lackey carrying it, not Just Cause. In fact, Ah didn’t see hide nor hair of the cult leader. Ah wasn’t gonna complain about that; as long as Ah was up against his three moron followers, Ah had a chance. Just needed to figure out a way to turn things to my advantage.
Chestnut grinned and waved the crossbow in my face, clearly savoring the moment. Guess he took that kick to the chestnuts a little personal. Ah decided to stall for time. “Don’t suppose there’s any way Ah could talk you outta this?”
“Not happening, farmgirl.” He shot me a nasty smirk. “I was hoping I’d get to kill you. The fact that Just says you’re one of the six we’re after is just icing on the cake.”
Wait, Ah was one of the six ponies the Nightmare cult wanted dead? But that didn’t make a lick of sense! Ah hadn’t done anything to make them get ornery with me up until today, and from the sounds of things, they’d been aiming to kill those six ponies for a long time now. Besides, Just wouldn’t have bothered with the whole recruitment song and dance if he’d known he was gonna kill me anyway. It just didn’t make a lick of sense. The only explanation was that the Nightmare had said something about that while Just was talking to it. The thing had known my name, after all. Ah just didn’t have the first clue why she’d be out for my head.
Didn’t look like Ah’d ever find out the answer either, if Chestnut had his way. He slowly lowered the crossbow from my head, settling it right over my guts instead. “Tell you what, I’ll give you a choice. You wanna die quick and painless, or slow and painful?”
Ah was about to tell him to go buck himself, assuming he still could after Ah'd done so much damage to his down-below, when somepony else spoke up from behind him. “Really now, sir, that’s no way to talk to a lady.” A pair of hooves covered in blue fabric grabbed the thug and promptly introduced his head to one of the nearby crates in a manner that looked all kinds of painful.
By the time Ah’d gotten back on my hooves and started figuring out what was what, Whisper and the other one were down too. Ah got a good look at my rescuer and did a double-take. It’s one thing to read about the Sapphire Guardian in the papers, and a whole ‘nother thing to actually be rescued by her in person.
The Guardian brushed her hooves off, then took a quick look around the warehouse while she secured the three acolytes. Or at least, Ah think that’s what she did. It was a little hard to tell with that mask covering her face. “Were those three the only ones, or are there more?” Huh. Ah’d always kinda figured the Guardian would have one of those deeper heroic voices, like you see in hero movies. Not something quite so ... elegant.
Silly of me to be worrying about that right now, though. “There’s another fella in the basement, or at least Ah think that’s where he is. They’d also called up some sorta creature that’s serious bad news.”
“Lovely.” The Guardian headed down the staircase, and Ah followed behind her for lack of a better idea of where to go. Ah figured the safest place in the warehouse right now was next to the trained superhero, so that’s where Ah stuck to.
We got down to the secret basement room, only to find it completely deserted. The only sign of life was a whole lotta papers that were burning up on one of the tables. Ah rushed over and stomped ‘em out as quick as Ah could. Ah had no idea what all the paperwork was, but if Just Cause thought it was worth burning, then Ah figure it was probably worth saving for the gendarmes. “Looks like the leader rabbited once things went pear-shaped.”
“Pity.” The Guardian took a quick look around the room, and froze when she spotted the Nightmare Moon tapestry. “Oh dear. Well, I imagine the authorities are going to have quite a few questions for you.”
Ah leaned back in my chair, met Strumming’s eyes, and shrugged. “Reckon you know the rest of the story from there.”
“Pretty much, yeah,” the pegasus interrogator agreed. “Wish you’d told us the whole truth a bit sooner. It would’ve saved us a lot of trouble and yourself a week in our cells.”
Might be she was right, but Ah wasn’t gonna apologize for trying to protect my family. Speaking of... “Braeburn’s not gonna get in any trouble, is he?”
“As long as your story checks out, he should be fine. We probably won’t even need to take him into custody, assuming he doesn’t try lying to us.”
Now hold up just a minute there. “Y’all said you’d already grabbed mah cousin! What’s this about not needing to even arrest him?”
“Oh, that.” Strumming waved her hoof dismissively. “I lied. Well, half a lie, and half an educated guess. A guelie? Liess? Whatever. Anyway, I was pretty sure you were protecting your family, and your grandmother’s too old for revolution, your sister’s too young, and your brother doesn’t fit the profile. Same thing for your aunt and uncle in Manehatten. So cousin was the most likely suspect, especially with how broad and vague that term can be.”
Ah wasn’t too happy about that. Not one bit. “You lied to me!”
Strumming snorted and rolled her eyes. “Oh, like you’ve got any room to complain. At least I lied to resolve a threat to the Empire’s safety and to help deal with a problem that could get a lot of ponies hurt or killed. And to get you out of prison. I think I can live with that.” She shot a little glower my way, though there wasn’t too much heat behind it. “Your lies didn’t help anypony, they just made things worse for you. As you might have noticed, we really don’t appreciate it when ponies think they can lie to us. Tends to hurt your credibility and make us think you’ve got something you want to hide.”
Complaining about me lying was real rich, coming from a Ministry of Heart spy who probably lied every time she opened her mouth. For all Ah knew, they had Braeburn sitting in the next interrogation room over and had somepony pretending to be him. “Ponies are allowed to have secrets,” Ah grumbled.
Strumming answered me with an uncaring shrug. “Anything a pony would want to keep secret from the Ministry of Heart is doing something they probably shouldn’t be doing in the first place.” She got up and stretched the kinks outta her wings. “Assuming we can confirm your story now that we actually have it, you should be alright. You’re not one of the bad guys, just a farmer who got caught up in the middle of things. Just give us a day to check it all out and set up a time and place for you to swap with the Free Mind we’ve got doubling for you. Oh, and don’t mention being in our jail, or let anypony know that the Applejack they’ve been talking to for the last week or so was a changeling.”
“Ain’t like Ah’ve got the option of saying no to any of that,” Ah grumbled.
“You could try, though I really wouldn’t recommend that. We might have to bring you in again, along with whoever you talked to.” Strumming reached into her saddlebags and pulled out a candy bar, then tossed it to me. “We might’ve cleared you, but you should still keep you nose clean for a while. We don’t like having to pull the same pony in a second time. Especially since we only do changeling replacements on major cases. Your life would get all kinds of inconvenient if everypony knew you’d been arrested by the Ministry.”
“Don’t worry, Ah ain’t planning on making waves.” To be honest, Ah just wanted to go home to my family and try to forget that any of this had ever happened.
Strumming grinned at that. “See, that’s why I told my bosses you were a smart one. I’d say ‘see you around,’ but I’m actually hoping we never see you again. ‘Cause, you know, that would mean you’d gone and gotten yourself in trouble, and you really don’t wanna show up on our repeat offender list.” She paused, then tapped a hoof to her chin. “Although actually, we are gonna keep an eye on you for a while. We haven’t managed to snag Just Cause yet, which is really getting my cousin worked up. Since he did try to kill you, it’d be smart to keep an eye on you until we get him.”
“Ah won’t complain about it.” Ah’d probably feel a bit better about having Ministry ponies watching me if Ah believed they were actually worried about my safety. As it was, Ah had a feeling they’d be there more in the hopes that Cause would show up and they could nab him than outta any concern for me and mine. Cause was right about one thing: sometimes the Empire cares so much about the big picture that it lets the little pony get squished underneath it.
Strumming opened up the door outta the interrogation room and tossed a casual wave back to me on her way out. “So long. And don’t forget, we know what evil lurks in your heart.” A faint smirk crossed her lips. “The Ministry does have a cool motto, doesn’t it?”
“Heard better.” Against my better judgment, Ah got smart with her. “And if y’all are so good about finding evil, how come you didn’t figure out Ah was just fudging things to keep Braeburn safe? And how come you didn’t know about them cultists?”
She paused in the doorway and looked over her shoulder at me. “We always find out the truth eventually. Like Just Cause is about to find out, nopony can hide from us forever. He might be able to hide from us for a bit, just like you managed to lie for a bit, but the Ministry always wins in the end.” She walked out the door and tossed out one last line right before locking me in. “Oh, and be sure to eat that chocolate I gave you before it gets all gross and melted.”
“After spending a week in jail, Ah ain’t likely to forget it.” Ah took a seat, and for lack of anything else to do while Ah waited to be escorted back to my cell, Ah got to work on that candy bar. It was pretty tasty, at least. Sometimes you gotta stop and appreciate the little things, even when the big things stink to high heaven.
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Things just got real.
Ministry of Heart, one of those reasons why sometimes it's a good idea to topple a cruel monarch to begin with.
so there seems to be two factions here. those who want luna healed, and those who want nightmare moon.....
glad to finally see the flaws of this system. for starters, far, far too easily could it all go to a very ugly place, far too easily. it would only take miss sunbeam one mistake, one moment of neglect for corruption to slip in. and as restrictive as this society is, the corruption would spread like a plague in a city.
the changeling thing is......... i am divided on it. though it is clever and would work in most cases, i do not know if it would work with the apples. they are far too tightly nit for no one to notice if applejack is behaving rather off. though i guess a week at most would be before they went full on suspicious.
the other thing is that in Celestia's society, there could never BE a rebel group for the nightmare. while not as advanced or large, Celestia did not have to worry much about rebels. sunbeam clearly does and greatly so. worse yet ones being manipulated for ill intentions.
that is the primary difference i predicted i think. celestia has bridges to her people and, no matter the tier you hve in society, you could experience celestia or hear from word of mouth her benign nature. sunbeam has no bridges to her people and thus only those of the higher tier benefit and could even attempt to know her.
celestia once teased two bakers for waiting on her hoof and hoof, treating her like royalty. this shows just how connected to her people celestia is when she views being treated as royalty as something trivial and nothing more. this would create a connection between her and the cakes, and they would tell stories of how she teased them about basically treating her like their ruler.......... sunbeam would be incapable of this. she would view it as weakness and be blind to the benefits.
i do not comprehend how that nightmare cultist could detect if applejack was a potential bearer though. nightmare moon could not sense a connection after all. though i could understand them figuring out that twilight sparkle or sunset shimmer might have such a connection.
story is definitely getting better though i do question some of these ideas. it needs to balance out things sunbeam would realize, as a character, as threats, and things you know as threats but sunbeam wouldn't herself...... voice my examples of that already so will not outright repeat.
either way, so far so good.
Why does everypony hate this Empire so much? What's wrong with the bureaucrats pushing ponies in a specific direction, a direction that benefits of society?
Let's look at Applejack's example. Currently, the Empire is pushing innovative ideas for improving cider production using machines, aka a modified version of Flim and Flam's machine. It can be shown that when the machine is properly used, it will give equal to or superior quality results, faster, with less horsepower.
Even if the Empire did not push farms into using that machinery, it could very well be the case that some farms would use the machines. These farms would profit more than those who did not use the equipment, because of their increased cider output. These successful farms may very well push their demand into other farm's cider markets, creating competition where otherwise none existed. The non-mechanical farms likely would not be able to keep their prices low enough to compete with the mechanical farms, forcing them to become mechanical as well to survive, or find an alternate methods of marketing their products.
By pushing the machines directly onto the farmers, the Empire is essentially saving farms like Sweet Apple Acres from a financial shortfall sometime in the future. They are also increasing cider production, benefiting the consumers. Sure, it's a bit heavy-handed, but it seems to help their society more than it hinders.
5096149 It sounded like Nightmare moon somehow found out ahead of time, and told the cultists when she saw her. Previously she was keeping it secret from them to keep them from giving it away.
I've seen lots of stories with Celestia in charge and nightmare moon cultists. Usually she talks to them in dreams.
5096285 its kinda hard to imagine she could figure it out at all.
i have seen similar stories but the ones that were good rarely had them capable of making rebellions over it. like in past sins, the cultists were few and their capacity limited. they could never move the people against celestia. here however, they could.
This just got even more interesting.
well now your emporess has pretty much made the elements manifesting agianst anyone but herself impossible. so hooray for that.
5096224
probably because most of the readers are American, and are programmed to have a fetish for Democracy?
/me is trying to start shit
I appreciate the irony of Nightmare Moon's goons bringing one of the six Element bearers they are supposed to kill in front of her as a newcomer joining her cause.
She must've been so mad.
I think I have a new favourite word!
Bloody 'ell! Haven't seen those in a while. Whelp, they're always fun to have around. So, apparently, Luna isn't fooling around. Not really surprising considering Sunbeam is probably, unlike Celestia, an unknown variable for her; all the more reason to watch out and prepare better.
Using changelings to cover up imprisoning somepony?
That is devious. And cool. And evil.
Ministry of Heart indeed.
rlv.zcache.co.uk/goodthink_approved_button_badge-r086f67cbd18442c8a5d5d5cd4be70c89_x7j3i_8byvr_324.jpg
5096472 nope. i know there is threats in democracy too. however with her the problem is that it is quite easy for things to go wrong with her little society.
5096224
There is a problem with that. It is not sustainable. I'm all for innovation and growth, but this is equestria we are talking about. So maybe every farm would be able to output more with less workers. There are two possible negative scenarios that can result from that. The first comes from the workers getting new jobs and the second comes from the workers not getting new jobs.
If you have ten farmers on one farm which then gets the machines that replaces nine of them, you then have nine farmers who may get their own farms. We are assuming that this happens to every industry. If you suddenly increase your total farm output by 10x, then you have ripe conditions for a huge population boom. (Still assuming this happens to every industry). This turns into a positive feedback loop and in less than three centuries you would have severe problems handling such a massive population. Unless you have a space program that can suitably disperse massive amounts of a population to other habitable or terraformed worlds, something would happen to stop the growth. Massive pandemics, enforced birth control, or some other thing that leads to massive loss of life.
The flipside is if you have farmers (workers from all industries) who lose their jobs and do not get new ones then you have a case of a few supporting many. This is rather like the US right now. From what I understand, jobs are hard to get because we have this ever increasing efficiency that is outstripping our demand and population growth leaving less work to be done to support the population, leaving so many unproductive bodies.
You could just have Celestia's Equestria where you have a sort of stagnation that fully uses the population to support itself without much change in population or technology over the centuries.
The best version of events I think is a slower, more natural development of both tech and therefore population in which you have a slowly increasing population with technology that does not outpace it. Here you have a case of demand growing to the point where ten workers is not enough to meet the demand from the farm, so then you have the wilful embracing of methods and technology and workers that does not result in lost jobs but still allows growth and development. I suppose this means that I am a supporter of laissez-faire economics with anti-monopoly and anti-overdevelopment laws that would prevent natural tendencies towards one of the first two cases. ie nobody is allowed to use methods that would let them simultaneously sell at extreme undercutting prices and lead them to lay off their workers, thereby causing other competitors to use like methods to keep up leading to a vicious cycle of either overpopulation or overly high job competition.
So, Core Deep, I think it is wrong for bureaucrats to push ponies to adopt new tech because it is in fact not good for a society. It tramples individuals and has long term nasty consequences. It is a government's duty to ensure the prosperity and safety and the freedoms of their subjects and to do otherwise is to do the wrong thing. So, while farms (and other industries) may remain financially competitive, the act of the Empire forcing these developments will only lead to dissatisfaction, extreme societal stress, resource conflicts and either tyranny, loss of life, or economic fragility.
5096987
That...is pretty thorough. You pretty much countered everything I could have said before I said it.
Thanks for the insight, I...have a lot to ponder now.
Well, this seems about right for the "Phoenix Empire", given Sunbeam's personal philosophy we see in The Lunar Rebellion. Gosh she is awful. Too bad even in the "real" timeline she isn't likely to die horribly.
5096987 let us also not forget somethign even more important. the earth ponies nurture the land with their own magic by working it. less earth ponies working the fields and the land, less of this nurturing energy is transfered and the harder and harder it takes to make more food.
that seems the primary difference between out world and this one. in our world human labor is not enough for farming. in equestria earth ponies working the fields might be far more efficient than mechanical labor and creates a more sustainable land in the long run.
Oh shewt, AJ. You really went and stepped in it. I also love that it was Rarity who saved her. Makes me wish the canon AJ could've seen that happening.
Also, Braeburn! Yaay Braeburn! Nothing bad better happen to him! *Hugs*
I literally cheered when I noticed that mint green Pegasus eating junk food was definitely Strumming Heartstrings. I love connections to other stories. Plus, she's awesome
5098014
That leads us down a rabbit hole concerning magical technology and what it takes to make life flourish on Earth and in Equestria that can vary depending on a given author.
5097269
I feel oddly proud of the dozens of minutes that I spent writing that. It seems that I made someone take a one-eighty on their opinion which is a legendary feat in most cases.
I also spent some time on how to progress the society of an extrasolar colony but that doesn't really matter.
A fun chapter... Well, maybe not so much for AJ. No talk of her being recruited for the special mission just yet I note. I wonder if she's going to get much choice in the matter... Governement mandated friendship with Twilight as part of her parole...
5096224
It's a bit of a tangent, but the Cider Squeezy had at least one fatal flaw in the episode in which it appeared... It wasn't even remotely cost effective. To rent the machine alone would have run Sweet Apple Acres out of business, and yet it could be significantly out-produced by hiring a handful of day laborers. You can automate most any job, but if your machine costs as much as a Lamborghini to replace low-wage workers then you shouldn't have bothered. Add that it was designed and built by a pair of ponies who were proven to cut corners at the drop of a hat in order to achieve the appearance of success, and I suspect it was something of a lemon waiting to break down as well, but that part is just speculation.
So one can imagine how if a government buys into something like that and then mandates its use, they can actually undermine the efficiency they were striving for, and it may take a lot longer to be revealed.
Absolutely wonderful chapter. So many new developments and some great characterization for Phoenixverse Applejack.
Just Cause is somewhat troubling to me. He seems to be the Phoenixverse version of Blueblood. I don't really like having a possible Blueblood as a villain. I prefer stories where he's more of a bumbling but well-meaning fop or even something of a heroic figure (his treatment of Rarity being a front to deter gold diggers). That said, he does have significant depth and plenty of potential. I like how his backstory ties into Sunbeam's gelding of the noble class (hard evidence that it was not painless).
Changelings working for the Empire was surprising but not completely unexpected. Sunbeam seems very much the type to follow the philosophy "don't throw away what you can use." While we don't know her method of control, I'd imagine she's pragmatic enough to have coerced the changelings with promises of food and safety. Much like how most Chrysalis redemption fics use the overwhelming love present in Equestrian society to turn her to good. There's a possibility of them siding with Nightmare Moon upon her return but I highly doubt it.
Braeburn's attitude leads me to believe he knew what was in those barrels (or at least knew it wasn't fruit). The nervousness, the desperation, his whole demeanor stank of deception. That said, I don't believe he's in deep with the cultists and is probably just misguided. As Applejack pointed out, Just Cause's grievances with the Empire were genuine and his argument quite persuasive. Braeburn has never been the smartest of ponies in any incarnation so the likelihood of him being swayed into helping a cause without fully understanding it is quite high.
My God... Sunbeam has brought bureacracy to Equestria... she really is evil.
And that does not bode well for those wannabe assassin's... Prepare for a Sunbeam tier goosh goosh fella.
We've seen she's treated gryphons and other species.And as far as buffalo go, I'd imagine that she has reservations.
Are the Kickers still around> Sunbeam doesn't strike as one for nostalgia or sentimentality over Shadow... but as far as they go, in her world of "much is given, much is expected" A pegasi war clan is probably worth its weight in gold
5098804
You should, really. That's an impressive analysis of what might otherwise have been a minor detail.
And apart from Sunset and Twilight being forced to work together on a school project by Empress Sunbeam, I am still having trouble figuring out what kind of role Sunset is going to have in the long haul of this chapter. I just hope she does not become a villain later on in this story, or is not already one in secret.
Applejack...assesination attemp? Huh...
Oh bloody hell, Braeburn...what have you gotten yourself (And your cousin) into?
Wait, chageling replacements?. I guess things really are different in this universe.
It says 'CapTital'
I see Braeburn is the silly apple pony in this AU. Silly Braeburn.
And shame on you Rarity for stealing AJ's chapter.
Can I assume Strumming just got the same flashback story we got, including the bit about AJ being known by name to the Nightmare and that she's one of the six ponies on the cultists' List? That seems like an important detail, should put AJ on Sunbeam’s List as well assuming she wasn't already. And I don't really see AJ being turned against the Empress by the events of this chapter, she was quite clearly aware that being caught up in smuggling weapons was bad in and of itself and it's hardly Sunbeam’s fault that AJ got herself into the mess she was in.
I'd love it if, after Applejack becomes an Element bearer and therefore an integral part of Equestria's national defense, she gets the opportunity to "honestly" tell Sunbeam that she and her empire can BOTH kiss the orangest part of her ass.
I really love this story and its really interesting seeing how things play out in a more industrialized Equestria. Sunbeam (to me at least) sounds way too much like some sort of robot (If that's what you were going for then great), she just doesn't register as a living being with a personality to me. That said I haven't read the story that came before this one so I may be missing something.
P.S. The broken Greek was cringe-worthy (don't get me wrong the scene was still fun to read
) but I'd suggest using an English to Greek thesaurus or dictionary next time 
6329864
Ah, so that was the language. I can understand why the author used Greek, but I would have chosen at least another Germanic language. However, I am not the author, so my opinion has no real weight.
This is where I stopped. Some Applejack accent in dialogue is okay, but when it’s placed in narration it makes the story unreadable.
Carrots are a biennial crop (planting to harvest = 2 years). You’re smart, you plant some every year. That way you have some to harvest every year.
Even minature apple trees take 3 years to start producing & longer to reach full production.