Applejack tilted her hat back. “You ready to do this?”
Maud gave a silent nod.
“Begin!” said Rockhoof.
Tendrils shot at Applejack, but she throttled into a gallop. Maud’s attacks missed her by inches and then by feet as Applejack picked up speed. Maud remained rooted while her eyes traced Applejack even though she only appeared as a blur to Maud.
“Go, Maud!” Pinkie cheered before pausing to cough.
“Take it easy, Pinkie,” Spike cautioned.
“She’ll need the encouragement,” said Dash. “Applejack is a top contender.”
Pinkie grinned. “Good to hear you saying nice things about somepony else, Dashy!”
“I’m just stating the facts.” Dash kept her focus on the arena. “Applejack has all of us remaining beat in speed.”
“Even you?” Pinkie gasped.
“Probably.” Dash glanced at her wings and then back at the arena.
“Wow! Then this will be a super match!” Pinkie widened her grin, but when she turned her attention towards the fight, the edges of her smile wavered. Right, Maud?
Applejack serpentined toward Maud. Shadow crashed down all around her and splashed back up when it hit the arena’s tiles. It quickly retracted back to Maud and shot out again. When Applejack was within yards of her, Maud started blasting tendrils of shadow out in Applejack’s general direction.
Applejack sidestepped a strike, swung under another, and swerved to avoid a third. This continued until she was in striking distance of Maud. She reared back a foreleg and launched it straight at Maud’s head. A wall of shadow rose up to block, but Applejack drove her hoof into it. The shield rippled like water and then fell apart with the consistency of mud. While it glooped onto the ground, Applejack struck Maud with enough force to send her tumbling across the arena.
~~~
“Get the transfusions going,” said a unicorn with a line of stitches and a red teardrop for a cutie mark. His horn glowed, securing himself and the two stretchers in front of him to the cart as it rocketed across the desert.
Two ponies lay prone on the stretchers, both stallions, one a lean yellow specimen and the other was large and red. Both bore cutie marks related to apples. Both were covered in gauze in various areas and tubes ran from their upper legs to bags filled with various liquids. Two new bags had just been added. Their crimson contents snaked down into the stallions’ veins.
The EMT looked at the two other technicians in the ambulatory cart. “Monitor Braeburn for seizures and Big Macintosh for blood clots. Stability is our priority.”
“Yes, sir,” the other technicians responded. Training kept the voices at an even keel even as they sped along, keeping two professional heroes from the brink of death.
~~~
“Ooh!” Sugar Glider winced. “That was one heck of a blow!”
Vinyl blinked at Sugar and shook her head. “Right, I would have said the same. After Maud’s last fight, she looked to be quite a challenge, but Applejack managed to pull through and land a solid hit!”
Rather than taking advantage of knocking Maud off her hooves, Applejack remained where she was. On the other side of the arena, Maud took a breath and got back up on her hooves. Applejack’s attack had left a clear indent on her right cheek, but she just stared at Applejack and summoned some tendrils to her side.
She was about to launch them when Applejack called out, “What the hay was that?”
The tendrils wavered and sunk back into the black pool under Maud.
“You may be Pinkie’s sister, but I’m her friend, so I know how hard it was for her to get through your Talent.” Applejack jabbed a hoof at Maud. “So how come I can dodge and break through it like it was a rotten barn wall?”
Pinkie’s pupils shrank. “Oh no…”
“Well,” Sunset kept her voice low and smirked, “seems like our class is just filled with idiots that don’t know how to use their Talents right.”
Maud let out a snort and charged. Applejack stood her ground. Maud lashed out with wisps of shadow, but Applejack wove around them. Maud drew close and drove a hoof at Applejack’s head, but she parried it and bent Maud’s leg out of the way. Rearing back in a blur that should have knocked off her hat, she bent forward at the same speed and slammed her forehead against Maud’s.
“Oooh!” Sugar Glider and a fair portion of the audience winced.
Maud staggered back, blood trickled onto her muzzle. Her shadow wavered under her, and, while her eyes remained straight, her blinks had increased from intermittent to sporadic.
Applejack’s head was just slightly reddened. “That knock some sense into you? If you ain’t prepared to throw everything down, then you shouldn’t have bothered to step into the ring in the first place!”
“Maud!” Pinkie cried out with, her eyes a bit sharper now and her blue irises a bit more brilliant. “Just focus on the fight! You can do it!”
“Hmm.” Maud glanced in Pinkie’s direction and then back at Applejack. Without another word, she rushed forward. Applejack jumped back when Maud swung at her, but shadow burst off Maud’s leg and struck Applejack with an uppercut.
Applejack flipped backwards and managed to roll in midair so she landed back on her hooves. A bit of blood dripped from her lip. She wiped it away and glared at Maud. “That’s more like it!”
Applejack rushed at Maud. Maud responded in kind while also shooting shadows up from the ground at Applejack. A few managed to crash into Applejack, but with eyes trained for moving at high speeds, she was able to spot them seconds before they struck and step aside just enough to take out a significant amount of the blow.
Just as she came within striking distance of Maud, blood spurted from Maud’s head. One of Maud’s legs caught on the other and she went into a tumble. Before she could hit the ground, Applejack burst forward, allowing Maud to fall onto Applejack’s side rather than the stone. She was out cold.
“Dang,” Applejack sighed. “Us Apples really can be hard headed sometimes.”
~~~
“Prep the operating room,” said a mare clad in a white coat.
The mare oversaw nurses and other hospital staff trot through the intersecting halls. Those under her listened and made their way down one hallway while others came in the opposite direction.
“Tools are sterilized,” said one of them to her.
“Okay, make sure we keep the blood pressure at stable levels and get those bone fragments out as quick as possible.” She looked over Big Macintosh’s legs. Like the EMTs, her training kept her calm, but she had to wonder how a villain had managed to cause so much damage. The damage resembled something more akin to an attack from a rabid beast.
~~~
“Um… winner, Applejack?” said Sugar.
“I guess so.” Vinyl gazed down at the ring and watched ponies carry Maud off. “Guess these first few matches have been such a rush we forgot that pacing yourself is important too.”
“Oh, right.” Sugar paused for a second and thought. “That last match must’ve really taken it out of Ms. Pie.”
“Both of them,” Vinyl added.
~~~
“Oh Maud!” Pinkie sniffled into Maud’s chest. Maud sat up in bed and stroked Pinkie’s mane. “You were great out there, especially at the end!”
“Thank you.” Maud took a breath and stilled her leg. “I wish I could have gone further for you though.”
“I’m just glad you got everything cleared up in the end,” said Applejack. She had a few bumps from the fight, but nothing a quick examination by Redheart could not fix. “When it comes to a fight, you can’t let other things get to you, especially when you’ve got family to think about… least that’s what my brother always says.”
“Big Mac is pretty good with his words,” Pinkie giggled.
“Yeah,” Applejack chuckled. “Just you wait, once I win this thing, we’re gonna have quite a shindig at Sweet Apple Acres!”
“I can’t wait!” Pinkie cheered.
“Yay,” said Maud.
~~~
Some miles outside of Appleloosa, where the dry desert started to yield to a bit more grass, a deep orange earth pony arced down from the sky, sending up a cloud of dust when she landed. She stood still for a moment, but the ground and shrubs reverberated around her. A second later, she exploded off the ground and crested through the air once more. Sweat flew off her, but she knew she had a long way to go.
Apple Cobbler
Talent- Bound: Through Earth Pony magic, she’s able to gather up energy and unleash it through her legs. This allows her to cover great distances in record times. She’s never been to a big city, but it’s likely she could clear some of Manehattan’s tallest buildings in a single bound.
Landing again, she took a breath. Canterlot was still just a silhouette, but she continued on her way. Applejack, though she did not know it, was awaiting her.