As the Apple Falls
Bright afternoon sunlight glistened off the apples in Applejack's basket. She carried the thing up a hill and under the shade of branching trees.
Sighing contentedly, the mare squatted down before a series of tombstones. She placed her basket down to the side, plucked a fruit from it, and bit into the delicious treat.
"Scrmmmfff... mmmm..."
She savored the tasty morsel in her mouth... then took a second bite.
Swallowing...
Smiling... ...
...she faced the stones and the names on them.
... ... and she spoke.
"So... mrmmff..."
Another bite.
A wink.
"... ... ...here's how things have been lookin' up. Mrmmmfff..."
"Here ya go!" Applejack slapped the last of the apple baskets onto the floor of the open train car. She wiped her brow and stepped back from the edge of the depot's platform. "Whew! Reckon I should become steam-operated like them metal engines of yers?"
"Ha! If only!" A workstallion made a count of the baskets, secured them, and hopped out of the box car. "Why, if we just had twenty duplicates of you to run the rails and pull our cargo, we'd have no need of steam engines period, Applejack!"
"Awwww shucks. I ain't that strong."
"Yeah. And I'm half donkey!" The stallion slid the box car door shut with a grunt. Fastening it, he turned to look at the mare over his shoulder. "I didn't know Barnyard Bargains shipped to Trottingham!"
"We ain't workin' for Barnyard Bargains anymore!"
"Whoah, wait. Really?" The stallion blinked. "Y'all branching out?"
"More like switchin' business partners." Applejack smiled proudly. "Let's just say tradition ain't so snazzy if it can't handle a curve every once and a while."
"Heh! If you say so! I sure hope it's a rich venture for you farm folk!"
"Oh..." Applejack tipped the brim of her hat and returned to her wagon. "...only the richest!"
"Our latest harvest's gone off without a hitch," Applejack said, staring at the verdant orchards past the stones. "All this time, I was buckin' the trees clean... hopin' against hope that we'd find a buyer out there who would be interested in our produce. Well... turns out a buyer found us. And what's more—he's deliverin' on every promise. Why, just two weeks ago..."
"Aaaaaaaaaaand there..." Applejack stacked the last of many, many golden bits onto the edge of the kitchen table. "...that makes twelve."
"Twelve?" Apple Bloom looked up at the table with a scrunched muzzle. "That looks a heap more than twelve."
Granny Smith cleared her throat. "It's twelve-hundred, darlin'."
"Oh." Apple Bloom winked hard. "... ... ...buck me!"
"Apple Bloom!" Applejack gnashed her teeth. "Watch yer muzzle!"
"Uhhhhhhhhhhh!" The little filly turned tail and scampered up the stairs. "I-I've got some homework to do! See ya!"
"Hrmmmm..." Granny Smith smiled. "I'm surprised she didn't immediately ask for a raise in her allowance." She turned to wink at Applejack. "That's what yer Pappy did the first time we hit it big on cider season."
"Reckon her lil' mind's just blown." Applejack gulped, turning to look at the stacks of coins collected tableside. "I dun blame her. Mine is too."
"He actually delivered..." Granny Smith's muzzle hung over. "Bits payment in advance. Every coin of it. Right on time." A gulp. "No interest deducted. No nonsense. No nothin' except for a whole lot of somethin'."
"Is... is this really too good to be true, Granny?" Applejack asked. She reached forward but kept her hoof a safe inch or two away from the money, as if afraid it might melt spontaneously. "Is this really happenin'?"
"You once got together with yer friends and fired a rainbow shotgun at Nightmare Moon," Granny Smith drawled. "Why's this gotta be so much crazier?"
"Cuz it's stacked up on our kitchen table, guldurn it!" Applejack looked feverishly at her elder. "Wh-what if a stragglin' band of purse-nabbers randomly migrate onto our farm?"
"Get that gold fertilizer into a safe hold! Pronto!"
"Right!" Applejack hollered out the window. "Big Mac! Go fetch a shovel! Quick!"
"Wellllllll..." Applejack blushed slightly, leaning back against the basket of apples. "Of course we didn't just leave it all in the ground. Heheheh... after all..." She coughed sideways and threw a humble glance at the tombstones. "...the earth is meant for far more respectable tradition."
Clouds wafted overhead. Birds chirped and Winona barked in the distance.
Applejack breathed it all again.
Leaning forward, she addressed the stones: "If you must know, Twilight Sparkle lent a hoof in the matter. She and Rarity helped me escort the money to the First National Bank of Equestria. There, we made the family a brand new savings account! Twilight did all the numbers. Long and short of it—over time—we stand to earn a small percentage of increase to our deposit! Can ya believe that? And that isn't the last of the good ideas we seized up on. You may be happy to know that Big Mac and I came to an agreement over gettin' help with apple-buckin' from outside the farm. More like a halfway compromise..."
Stats
Page generated in 0.032 seconds
Total duration
936 users online
2,517,270 hits today, 2,139,894 yesterday
FIMFiction
My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic Fanfiction
Designed and coded by knighty & Xaquseg - © 2011-2024
Follow & Support Us
Support us
SubStar
Chat!
Discord
Follow us
Twitter
MLP: Friendship is Magic® - © 2024 Hasbro Inc.®
Fimfiction is in no way affiliated with or endorsed by Hasbro Inc.®
Get plenty to go to be able to save, and given care, it will grow. Get only just enough to break even, and its been demonstrated one way and prooven another, that the first fail causes savings to be dipped into, or if exactly breakeven, a loan taken out, which means given exactly the same income, means you are now in debt and going down. But paying a breakeaven income is too high given people seem to survivee on less. Or dont. But then, they dont pay taxes except for sales, so to those pushing money its not a loss, its less thn a loss, and therefore a win.
Every line that comes out of that aged muzzle is amazing.
Granny's got a good point.
derpicdn.net/img/view/2017/6/21/1467699__safe_screencap_apple+bloom_applejack_big+macintosh_the+perfect+pear_spoiler-colon-s07e13_animated_boomerang+%28tv+channel%29_digging_gif_pony.gif
Gonna be interesting to see Stu slowly grow on AJ from her perspective.
I love that they never had a bank account before, and their first instinct was to just bury the money.
They buried it in the ground!?
There's a thing you can put money in to keep it safe.
They have special passcoded locks on them.
You know, those big boxy things that keep valuables safe.
,Jeezums.
Who is? You is, Applejack.
Ah. I think a certain pegasus that we all guiltily hate is about to show up. >.< Darnit. Naawwww, I can’t pretend to be upset. I’m actually super curious about how that all goes down. All the stuff we didn’t get to see, from Dashie’s perspective. And, of course, especially about what, exactly, happened while Dashie was off in Las Pegasus, that led to their breakup. I’m guessing that AJ finally realized that Stu wasn’t going to replace Rainbow in her heart, and came clean with him about her feelings.