To Love and Cherish

http://www.fimfiction.net/story/65546/to-love-and-cherish

It's always one of the sad facts that with as much content that flies through the site, many hidden gems end up staying hidden. I do want to commend you on an incredible piece of work you've created here. It was touching and thoughtful and so very evocative. I could really see that thousand yard stare, and smell the Zap Apple jam, and feel the midsummer heat of the kitchen. I honestly found it impressive how much world building you were able to accomplish with so few words, implying so many things while not leaving the characters or past events feeling ambiguous or unsupported. I rarely felt lost and wondering how you arrived at a certain conclusion or why the characters ended up acting or reacting in a specific way, a testament to your character building and how well you stayed in character (with a few minor exceptions I'll put down later).
Overall, the concept is great and the very thought of exploring the 'Bloom-Belle relationship at a distant point in time is both intriguing and unique. This pairing isn't done nearly often enough and taking it that far down the timeline is a novel concept in-and-of itself. When I first started reading this I was worried that the characters would end up generic mature ponies that you could place anyone into and have it make just as much sense, as extrapolating years and years gives plenty of freedom for characters to grow and change in any conceivable fashion which leads many authors to revert to stereotypes. I'm thrilled to be pleasantly surprised by your characters. Both 'Bloom and Belle were full of character, life, traits, quirks that all fit perfectly into canon and fanon. So many things felt right about this and I want to applaud you for an excellent job.
If you don't mind taking a few criticisms, please keep reading. Otherwise, do skip down to the last paragraph and take the review above at its face value, because this was an absolutely fantastic piece.
For all I said above, there were a few things that ended up being rather unclear to me. Some of these barely affect a thing and might not need to be even mentioned as it has no bearing on the story, others might need a little clarification. The first is the issue of the timeline, where we are in terms of time. Obviously we are decades in the future of where the show is set, but how far is unclear to me, and therefore Applebloom's age is unclear. We open with jars of zap apple jam being handed off Appleseed to take to his mother. I can only assume that he's the grand-nephew mentioned later, meaning he's Applejack's or Macintosh's grandson, but that doesn't necessarily give a great reference point. If he's, let's say, 8 and his mother is, let's say, early 30s, that would probably place the first generation no more than mid sixties and 'Bloom would likely be in her mid fifties. That timeline is flexible since we're not given much to judge the age of Appleseed, but it begs to ask the question where are the grandparents? Moreover, Applebloom doesn't appear to suffering from any of the effects of advanced age, which is fine, but to that it sounds like she's not quite that old. It left me wondering slightly "when" we were.
To go along with that, I was a little confused as to what "Unicorn Cortex Degeneration" was. If Applebloom and Sweetie Belle are in their 60s or later, then that could very easily be the Alzheimer-like equivalent. If they are younger, then it becomes an un-expectable medical condition that changes my outlook on how Applebloom is handling it. While neither choice is wrong, or make less sense, ambiguity leaves me questioning what the choice means.
Following on the time line, the penultimate paragraph mentions the latest foster-filly. I was left wondering who's kid this was. Was this a filly 'Bloom and Sweetie adopted? I can't really imagine placing a foster child in the hands of a someone with a degenerative mental disease. This is no slight on the two of them nor saying that they couldn't be excellent parents, but its irresponsible to take that sort of risk. So then is it Appleseed's foster sister? Why adopt after you know you can have your own? I do understand there are reasons to do so, and I don't intend to disregard those choices, but it leaves questions to the reader as to why. I have to question it because it feels the same as saying "and then Spike landed carrying the day's load of apples". It comes out of left field, unsupported and leaves me wondering "Wha?"
I do want to commend you for keeping Applebloom's character so well without resorting to making everything nigh-on unreadable in a full on southern accent. Pretty much all the grammatical issues felt like they were part of the character, like they were what Applebloom would say. That being said there was one spot that I couldn't make work in 'Bloom's voice.
It holds her steady and safe when I cannot, soothes her when I am miles away
It only really stood out to me because everything else was done so well. I read it and reread it and I couldn't fit it into her voice. There's a distinct diction change, and its a very pretty line, very poetic. I just can't hear Applebloom expressing it that way. There's also a period missing at the end of the sentence.
Again, please don't take any of this to say that I didn't enjoy reading it. I absolutely adored it and I can only offer my praise and thanks for sharing it. It is truly a work of art and I do hope you are proud of it, because you should be. As for my opinions, everybody has them and you are more than free take or disregard the comments as you see fit. I do think there are some questions to think about and I hope you will look through them.
Regardless, I wish you the best of luck in what you do.
-Duskrider