Rainbow marveled at the penmanship, the story was written with a lot more care than the stupid notes at the beginning of the journal.
She took a deep breath and began to read.
My name is Macintosh Apple.
Rainbow rolled her eyes. Seriously? He was going to start like that?
I was born and raised as a farmer in a small town called, Ponyville. It was a nice place, friendly ponies, good farming, all in all I had a nice life.
But one summer there was a drought.
We had dealt with droughts before, but this one was going on for far too long. The pegasi in town couldn’t seem to get enough clouds to make rain. Eventually there was a fresh shipment of clouds in, and they scheduled a huge storm.
My younger sisters and I spent the entire week leading up to the monsoon preparing the farm. We cleaned up loose branches from the orchard, strengthened the barn and farm house, and put any loose tools inside.
Rainbow was getting bored, this was seriously dull. Why on earth did he write THIS down?
She sighed, maybe it got better from there.
The day of the storm arrived, and the storm came faster than we expected.
My Granny Smith was still outside, she had gone into town to pick up some supplies for the storm and hadn’t arrived home yet.
Lightning was splitting the sky, thunder made the house shake, rain was coming down in waves.
And my sister wanted to go outside.
“Miss. Jackie Apple, you ain’t going outside, and that’s final.” I said, stepping between her and the door.
“But, Macintosh, Granny Smith’s out there. We gotta help her.” She was always stubborn.
“Applejack, Sis, Ah understand, and Ah agree, but Ah’m gonna be the one ta do it. Ah promised Ma ‘n Pa that as long as Ah could, Ah would keep y’all safe.” I said, looking between my two sisters, who looked hurt when I brought up our parents. “Now, Ah’m gonna go find Granny Smith, and y’all can stay here.”
Rainbow slammed her head onto her bed and groaned. “Ugh, he writes his dialogue in his accent. Why?” She looked back at the book, and before continuing with the story, she muttered, “This might get old really quick.”
I galloped hard through the rain, searching for the green coat of my grandmother. After about two minutes I saw one of the most gut-wrenching things that I have ever laid eyes on.
Granny Smith was coming through the woods as fast as her walker would allow her. As I galloped towards her, I saw a streak of lightning split the sky, and the top of the tree above Granny Smith. Time seemed to slow down to a crawl as the thunder made my ears ring, and I saw a particularly large branch begin to fall.
Granny Smith saw it too and braced herself for the impact of the flaming limb. However, before it reached her it became hung up on another tree and it fell out of the way.
I rushed to her and picked her up, putting her on my back as I took off for home. It occurred to me that the trees would all be very dry and I looked over my shoulder to see the tree that was struck, burning, as well as the trees nearby. It became a race, not against time or the storm, but the fire.
I went as fast as I could, determined to keep Granny safe, but the fire was faster, I could feel the heat at my hooves as the fire got closer, and then the house came into sight. I knew that there was a wide enough clearing between the orchard and the house that it shouldn’t catch, but there was still a way to go.
I was nearing the clearing, I was almost free.
Just a few more- BOOM!
Lightning struck one of the trees near me and it began to fall. I could see it as I ran. I also saw that I couldn't avoid it.
I pushed against the ground as hard as I could, running faster than I ever had. My head, then my shoulders, and Granny Smith made it out fine. I thought that the tree must have fallen slower than I thought it would.
I was wrong, as I could soon feel it landing on and pinning my leg to the ground. It took me down, Granny Smith flew off my back, and it slammed my head into the ground.
Just before I blacked out I could see Applejack rushing out of the farmhouse, galloping full-speed to where Granny Smith now lay.
Then everything went dark.
"Wait." Rainbow said to herself, looking up from the book, "He dreamt all of this? He actually blacked out in his dream?" Skeptically she returned to the book.
I awoke in a hospital, and I wasn't sure that I even wanted to know why I was there. Luckily I wouldn't have much time to think about it, as I heard the door creak open.
I didn't even want to look and see who it was.
"Hey, Mac..." it was Applejack, and she sounded worried. I just grunted as a response. "How're ya feelin'?"
I opened my eyes and stared at the ceiling. "Numb." It was true, for some reason I couldn't feel much.
She laughed at my answer, "Well, Ah'd expect that, with all of the painkillers they filled ya with."
"Painkillers?"
"..."
"Sis, wha' happened ta me?" I demanded, my eyes still locked on a ceiling tile.
"Well Mac..." I heard her shuffling her hooves on the floor. "When the tree fell on ya, it broke yer leg." I expected as much. "And, well, they couldn't save it." She finished.
I couldn't understand, my leg was gone, what could I do? Questions like that rolled through my mind. Then something happened.
I died.
Macintosh Apple was no more.
My entire life, minus a few months in Manehattan, had been devoted to the farm. I did everything that I could for the farm, the farm was all that I was.
Now, everything I could do for the farm had been taken from me. I couldn't buck apples anymore, I couldn't haul the cart anymore, I couldn't run the cider press anymore, I couldn't pull the plow anymore, I couldn't be a farmer anymore, I couldn't be Big Mac anymore.
I closed my eyes and sighed, I could feel my sister's worry as though it were a weight pressing against me.
When I opened my eyes I asked a simple question. "Granny Smith?"
"She... She caught pneumonia and is down the hall."
"Ah wanna see her."
"Not yet, Mister, ya protected me durin' the storm, an now, Ah'm protecting you. Ya ain't fit ta go anywhere jus' yet." She said, putting a hoof on my shoulder to hold me to the hospital bed.
"Then at least tell me how she's doin'." I requested.
She hesitated, that wasn't good. "Not well, but the doctors will know fer sure tomorrow. Right now, ya got a visitor." Then she turned to the door and called, "Applebloom, he's good ta see ya." Then she turned back to me and whispered, "Try an' go easy on 'er, she's been through a lot."
My little sister poked her yellow face in through the door, her ears were tucked back and her red bangs were hanging low on her face. I could feel the pain in her eyes as she looked at me.
I gave her the most sincere smile that I could, and her ears perked up slightly. She walked into the room and hopped up on my bed, I then pulled her into a large, firm hug, where she broke into tears.
A few days later, I was let out of the hospital with a mission, learn how to walk again.
After a few days I had learned how to walk, using an old table leg as a peg-leg. I had tried to work, but as I had expected, I couldn’t do much. I finally got to the one job where I could actually be useful; running the stand.
As I worked the stand, it got more business than usual. Mares would line up, all of which were sympathetic, but I didn’t care.
Granny Smith never got any better, in fact, she died. The shock from losing my leg and my grandmother developed into clinical depression.
My depression worsened; as the realization, that I really couldn’t do anything on the farm anymore, set in. I knew that I wouldn’t ever really be a farmer again.
“Hmmm...” Rainbow Dash mumbled to herself, “Kinda sad.”
Then she began to think about what this would be like for him and eventually she realized that for one of the Apples to lose their legs would be like her losing her wings.
That made her feel sick. How could a pony live like that? The thought made her shudder.
As the weeks progressed, my family learned to function without me. Some cousins came from all corners of Equestria to help my sisters get the farm back to running condition, leaving me to run the stand. Eventually I decided something, the only way for me to conquer my depression was to do leave.
I made plans in secret, not allowing my family or anypony in town know what I was doing, elaborate planning and digging heavily into my private bank account, finally had my plans in place.
I was completely ditching my old life as a farm-centered earth pony for a life on the sea. I did research on sailing, navigation, and anything else that would help me on my adventure. I had bought a small ship and a train ticket to the sea port where it was docked to gather a crew.
“How much money does Big Mac have in his bank account?” Rainbow wondered to herself. “Ships cost a lot, does he know that?”
She shook her head and returned to her reading.
The day before I headed out I went through town, gathering the supplies that I needed, some hair dye, some cooking supplies, and a lot of rope. I slept in my bed one last time; waking up early, writing a goodbye note to my family, dyeing my mane and tail black, and heading out for the earliest train that I could get a ticket for.
I walked through the fields of my childhood one last time, before I caught the train, never to return.
As Rainbow Dash read the last of the chapter, she shut the book with slight disgust, “Maybe it will get better as it goes on, ‘cause this stinks.” She said, putting the book down on her nightstand and replacing it with the Daring Doo book that she was reading earlier, getting lost in her favorite literature until she fell asleep.