Applejack Gets Lost

by MagicS


Next Stop

Applejack walked through the beautiful grove with nothing more than a look of contentment on her face. It looked like she had just walked into the definition of spring itself with all the of the colorful, blooming flowers surrounding her. Numerous squares of flower patches were separated from each other by small, white, picket fences. Applejack trotted down the dirt paths between them, taking in the sights and scents. The whole garden was arranged in a square grid of one hundred separate little patches that Applejack could see, each fenced-in square held its own type of flower.

Roses, lilies, carnations, petunias, sunflowers, and so many more that Applejack couldn’t name. Wherever it was that she was now it wasn’t hard to guess what the local community must’ve revolved around.

It was peculiar to her that she didn’t see any ponies tending the flowers at the moment, perhaps they were on a break. But there hadn’t been any guards or outer fences blocking her from coming in here at all either. Maybe the local area was just that peaceful and they didn’t worry about thieves or anything else happening to their flowers.

“Wonder where the town is? Or if there even is a town.” Applejack thought out loud to herself. “Guess it could just be a couple of ponies that take are of all this.”

Applejack continued walking by the flowers, at the far end of the garden from where she had walked in a line of birch trees stood flanking a dirt path. It was the only sign of civilization around so she figured she might as well take it instead of wandering aimlessly.

The scent of flowers was almost overpowering even just walking down the tree-lined path. Everything around here was so bright and colorful, she saw a swarm of pink and blue butterflies fly overhead, it was simply the prettiest place she had seen in a very long time. It almost made Applejack want to whistle along as she walked and see if any songbirds responded.

With a second more of walking the path opened up into another section of little gardens, it was far smaller than the previous one, only twenty individual gardens separated in four rows of five but with the same small white fences built around them.

To Applejack’s eyes there didn’t seem to be any difference in the types of flowers here. But what was different was the cozy looking house situated at the far end of the garden. It was practically picturesque with the stairs leading up its porch, the spotless white paint, flower-printed curtains in the window, and the single red brick chimney along the side.

“Well isn’t that just about the nicest looking house I’ve seen.” Applejack said as she walked down towards it in-between the gardens.

She saw another path that led off somewhere behind and to the right of the house but she wanted to see if there was anypony home here first.

The boards of the stairs creaked as she walked up them, if anypony was sitting in the living room they’d have already heard her coming but naturally Applejack still knocked on the door. She could hear a pony moving around in there so she put on her best smile to make for a friendly greeting.

“Coming! Just a minute!” A light and honey-sweet voice called out from inside the home.

Applejack stood there and waited as she heard the hoofsteps finally make it up to the door. She could hear that it wasn’t locked as it swung open, revealing a light-brown mare with a wavy mane and tail that had numerous daisies thrown about inside it. She wore a green apron and looked at Applejack with warm, golden eyes.

“Well hi! Welcome to Gold Daisy’s home!” The mare friendly said to Applejack. “Gold Daisy is wondering what brings you here?”

Applejack was a little confused at what she just said but decided to tell this mare why she came by.

“I was just walking through and I wondered if there was maybe any town or place I can rest at for a bit? I’ve been stuck on the road for a while.” Applejack figured it was best to cut things short.

“Oh, but of course, this house is on the outskirts of the town, Botanica. Gold Daisy goes there for gardening supplies all the time. It’s only a short walk down the path out behind the house.” The friendly mare told Applejack.

“Thanks a lot, pleasure meeting ya.” Applejack tipped her hat and waved goodbye to the mare as she went back down the stairs to the porch.

“You’re welcome, Gold Daisy is happy you stopped by!” The mare waved back at her.

Now Applejack was still a little confused and weirded out by how that mare kept referring to this “Gold Daisy” pony as if they were right there but she decided not to dwell on it. Maybe the mare was just a bit weird and if Applejack could live in the same town with Pinkie Pie then she could deal with something as trivial as this.

Applejack walked down the path that she had seen earlier now, a short ways along it the birch trees started to thin out and the land around her opened up. Rolling green hills stretched out on either side of the path, Applejack saw a number of buildings and houses spread out all over the place. She wasn’t sure this exactly qualified as a town but it was pretty. Each building seemed to have at least one or two flower beds and gardens around it. Most of the homes had plenty of room between each other, like family farms that had their fields right up next to each other. Except instead of any crops it was all healthy green grass and flowers. Applejack was thinking of leaving the dirt path and taking a walk through the hills but thought better of it, some ponies might not appreciate her just walking onto their land, even if this seemed like a really peaceful and friendly place.

So she kept walking, looking at the sparsely populated town with the infrequent houses and buildings situated along the way. At some points if she looked out it almost seemed like there was an ocean of flowers, they had been so thickly planted.

Near the side of the dirt road she was walking on a big stallion was watering some of the flowers. He was a bit of a beige color and wore tattered farmer’s overalls. When he saw Applejack coming he nodded politely at her.

“Hello there.” Applejack said back to him. “Lovely place you’ve got here.”

“Big Moonflower thinks so too.” He said, giving her a smile.

Applejack almost stumbled a bit but kept walking. “Uh, yeah.” She said, a little unsure.

Do these ponies not like talking about themselves or something? Applejack thought as she kept walking through.

There was a cottage coming up on top of the next hill on the right side of the road, not only did it have the same white picket gardens behind it but dozens of potted plants and flowers decorated its front. It was a lovely two-story home with a deep red double door and the same immaculate white paint as the others. While Applejack was walking past it the front door opened and two mares walked out, carrying baskets.

Applejack almost did a double-take, the mares were twins. Bright yellow pegasi with leaf-green manes. The only differences between them were their Cutie Marks, one had a camellia and the other a poppy, and one had her mane just a little bit shorter than the other.

As they walked down the brick path from their house that led to the dirt road they spied Applejack and waved hello to her.

As polite as ever Applejack waved back. “Howdy you two. Having a nice day?”

The mare with the camellia Cutie Mark and slightly shorter mane nodded in answer. “Morning Spritz and her sister are about to go enjoy a picnic.”

The poppy Cutie Mark sister happily smiled along. “Summer Shower is looking forward to spending some quality time with her sister.”

Applejack blankly stared at them for a few seconds. Now it finally clicked for her.

“How come y’all are talking in the third person?”

The two sisters tilted their heads at Applejack in the exact same way.

“Morning Spritz talks as Morning Spritz talks.”

“Summer Shower also talks as Summer Shower talks.” The longer maned sister nodded eagerly as she spoke.

“Right, so that pony who lives back down this road a ways is called Gold Daisy? And that big stallion watering flowers on the side of the road is named Big Moonflower?” Applejack asked the two of them, trying her hardest to not roll her eyes or show any other signs of exasperation at the way ponies around here communicated.

“Yes, Gold Daisy and Big Moonflower are wonderful ponies, Morning Spritz and her sister talk and have lunch with them all the time.” Morning Spritz said.

“Summer Shower thinks Big Moonflower likes Morning Spritz.” Summer Shower said, grinning at her sister and nudging her in the side with a wing.

Morning Spritz blushed and pushed her sister away. “Please!” She covered her face with a wing and started to trot away.

Summer Shower giggled and waved to Applejack. “Summer Shower enjoyed meeting you, goodbye!” And then she went off after her sister.

“What a kooky place.” Applejack said as she finally allowed herself a shake of the head when the sisters weren’t looking in her direction anymore.

The apple farmer continued back on her walk down the dirt road, it was slowly going up a hill now, she took in the sights some more, spotting a lot of new flowers that she had never seen before and waving at whatever ponies she saw off in the distance. She hadn’t spied any sort of hotel or place she could rest her hooves yet but that wasn’t so bad. Weather was good enough where if worse came to worse she could just camp out outside. Although Applejack may still have actually been on the outskirts of the town, or the main part could’ve been over the hills somewhere.

But as she crested the hill all her worries were for not, just down a little bit was the town proper. A small circlet of buildings and a few outliers that made Ponyville look like Manehattan. The whole town was ringed by a fence covered in flowering bushes with a large white arch with roses and vines woven around it built over where one would walk in.

“Just gets prettier and prettier, it’s almost weird.”

Applejack made her way down into the town, walking under the pretty arch and taking a look around. A fountain with stone flowers spraying out water stood in the center, the buildings circled around it looked like an assortment of businesses and supply stores mostly for farming and gardening materials. She did see one flower shop that was actually selling some of the many flowers that were produced here.

It took a few more minutes of searching and walking, and a few awkward hellos and conversations, but eventually Applejack did find what passed for a hotel around here. It was a small bed and breakfast close to the opposite end of the town from where she had come from. Applejack could see another pretty arch that she would walk through tomorrow on her way out of town.

“Howdy, good day to ya.” Applejack said to the inn-keep as she stepped inside.

“Good day to ya ma’am. Flytrap welcomes you to his inn.” The older purple stallion said in reply.

Applejack almost said something cheeky like “Say thanks to him for me” or something like that but decided to just smile nicely and get a room to sleep in for the night.


The next morning Applejack walked her way out of town, taking things slowly to enjoy the pleasant scenery a little more before she ended up at whatever her next destination may be. The arch at this side of town was covered in hydrangeas, Applejack smelled a few before walking past it. But as she did something in the corner of her eye caught her attention.

A tiny sign had been placed in front of the arch. Applejack was sure the other arch had nothing like this around it so she took a peek to see what it said.

Hello Our Lovely Guests, Welcome To Botanica!

The Ponies Here Refer To Themselves In The Third Person

Just FYI, Please Enjoy Your Stay And Our Beautiful Flowers!

Applejack sighed. “I hate signs.”