“This is really too much,” the lanky unicorn swooned in the desert heat, her magic levitating a dainty fan full of priceless Wonderbolt pegasus down. “Is it always this way with you?” Her back was against the solid wooden door of an old warehouse, far outside Dodge Junction. To her left stood a solid orange Earth Pony, decked out in a billowing brown duster that hugged her muscled flank just a little too unfairly. The entire ensemble was capped off with a tanned cowboy hat resting on a blonde mane tied up in a ponytail. “I thought I had my fill of this adventuring business at the Airship depot.”
Applejack smirked, her eyes glancing over the scene before them. Roughly a dozen armed unicorns in black uniforms stood in a semicircle around them, each with their horns glowing a sickly green color that stung the eyes. “Sorry there, miss Fleur De Lis. Can’t say Ah’m entirely as down ta Earth as my heritage would lead you to believe.” The unicorn snorted her disapproval. “Now don’t be like that, Ah got this under control.”
“I would hardly call a Marexican firing squad under control, Applejack,” Fleur hissed, her priceless fan wavering as she pressed up against the mare, much to her own displeasure. “How do we even get out of this?”
“Past experience? Dumb luck.”
Fleur sighed, her head drooping low. “I should have never let Fancy Pants talk me into this. I could have been enjoying caviar in Canterlot right now!”
Applejack’s steely eyes unfocused a moment as she turned to her companion. “Caviar? Ain’t that raw fish eggs or something?”
Fleur’s face twisted into something between disgust and confustion, “I-i-i-It is not!”
“No, it totally is,” one of the unicorns said, before he was quickly shushed by the others.
Applejack grinned. “Ya see there? Fish eggs.”
Fleur made as if to argue, but all her mouth could do was come up with some unintelligible garble as her tongue reeled in disgust against her will. As she struggled to keep her revolting appendage from absconding from her mouth, and the contents of her lunch from reflexively following suit, Kicks McGee was stealthily checking the door behind them for weak points. Bucks McGilligan was performing a song and dance, expertly flowing the duster around Applejack’s legs to hide his brother’s good work.
“Hoo wee, I didn’t know you types could talk!” Applejack ragged, a smirk playing on her face. “Who knows, y’all might have some use after all!”
“Silence, prisoner!” The only unicorn with the good sense to wear a helmet shouted, obviously playing the leader of his squad. “You are to remain still until the Qu-”
“Yeah, sorry, but I got other things to do. Fleur, please duck if’n you please.” Applejack hadn’t needed to give the order, it seemed, as the lanky unicorn soon doubled over as she wretched out her lunch in front of her. As the assembled squadron of unicorns reeled in disgust at the display, Applejack got her boys to work. In a flash of strength and cunning, the farmer’s hindlegs rendered the door behind her off it’s hinges. Instead of flying back, however, the door instead kicked out from underneath, the top of the door lurching forward toward Applejack, Fleur, and the group of unicorns.
In a mess of screams and scrambles, the unicorns began to shoot wild magical energy every which way but helpful. However, Applejack sprung into action, grabbing the tail of her accomplice with practised gusto and dove under and to the side of the collapsing doorframe. Fleur could only yelp and gargle as she was suddenly and unceremoniously ripped from the spot she had just come to terms with dying at. Applejack took only a moment to look back as the heavy door slammed into the ground with a thud, effectively taking out a number of the unicorns with it. However, as the dust settled, the unicorns in black gear that had been dispatched soon turned a glossy black, revealing changeling exoskeletons to be sticking out from under the wood.
“Just as I suspected!” Applejack grunted with a satisfied smirk. As the undamaged changelings started to make sense of their situation, Applejack turned with a smirk on her face. At least, right up until she was faced with the intense glare from a very posh and very real and very angry unicorn.
Fleur’s breath smelled not unlike some forgotten sand pit as a piece of broccoli refused to be removed from her teeth. “What was that!?”
With an infallible smile, Applejack kicked her legs into gear. “Quick thinkin’! Now it’s time ta be quick movin’, if ya like! I doubt them changelings are gonna be mighty pleased with you standin’ over them like that!”
With no immediate words in her mouth, Fleur only hissed at Applejack as the mare dove into the full warehouse. She was about give the mare what for, until a very real bolt of green energy blasted past her snout, the excess magic off the changeling’s burst causing a small amount of hair to grow across her nose. Now wearing a very convincing lip warmer, Fleur whinnied and took off running, faster that Applejack would ever give a pony credit for.
“Applejack! You horrid, ungrateful, wretch of a pony! If I get my hooves on you—”
“Gotta catch me first, sugarcube!” Applejack yeehaw’d her way through the old wooden boxes, her eyes scanning for further danger from the changelings. It made sense that her old foe would be after her, even now. It was just something that screamed of adventure, to have some easily evil foe with faceless armies come after you. Sure was absolutely certain that Rainbow Dash would have killed to be in her position. “Quick, over here!”
“Oh sure, like anywhere is safe in this dusty old building!” Fleur cried out behind Applejack, her graceful frame doggedly attempting to keep pursuit behind the farmer. “They’re so many more of them than us, and my magic isn’t used to shoot bolts! It’s to... It’s to–” Fleur cut herself off, skidding to a halt and looking about wildly. “Oh no! I’ve lost it!” she screamed, her eyes looking worriedly back from where she had come. “I have to get it back!” However, as she was about to turn about, a revoltingly familiar sensation came from her flank as she felt her tail get a hefty yank from behind. “You!” Fleur cried, her eyes glaring hard at Applejack. “How many times must I tell you never to grab me there!”
“Well, keep a move on, then! It’s much more polite than grabbing the mess that comes out the back of your head. ‘Could cause injury,” Applejack stated simply, adding a small smile to the remark for free. “Not that there’s much to harm up there.”
“Excuse me!?”
“Changelings, sugarcube.”
Fleur gritted her teeth as the pony in the duster took off running, and followed suit quickly. “How are we even going to find this Manger of the Sisters, anyway? This place is gigantic!”
Applejack laughed, her tail being the only thing Fluer could see as she rounded bend after bend. “Guess it’ll come down to dumb luck. Y’all alright back there, girl? Yer lip warmer’s looking a bit depressed.”
“Oh yes, quite fine. Nothing gets a girl revved up for some archeology like looking down the barrel of a horn and running clueless inside a warehouse where you’re being gunned down by mustache growing freaks.”
“Whatever floats your boat, missy!”
Fleur’s face twisted, a single cheek blowing up with air as she attempted to chew her tongue. “Sarcasm, you uncultured swine!”
“Ah’ll have you know Ah got plenty o’ pigs at home more cultured than any of you Canterlot Elite back home on the farm,” No matter the insult, no matter the whine, that insufferable earth pony had a quip to go with it, and it was wearing thin on the model’s patience. Applejack’s attention went skyward as she noticed some of the changelings had dropped all pretense of a unicorn special operations team, or USOT, and had gone airborne on their chitinous wings.
Fleur was about to open her mouth to protest something like her hooves starting to hurt when the lights went out.
“Aaaah!”
“Whoa there!”
A crash. A buck.
“That doesn’t go there!”
“What doesn’t what now?”
A flip and a latch.
“Ugh, really, can’t a girl get kidnapped without sexual innuendo?”
“Wait, what?”
The lights flickered back on as Applejack found her charge in the middle of a group of changelings attempting to tie Fleur up. However, what the they hadn’t seem to expected was the six or so unconscious changelings surrounding Applejack. “Y’all wanna try running that by me again?” Unfortunately, the lights flicked off again.
And by the time they were on again, Applejack was at the center of about ten more unconscious changelings, and standing across from a mirror image of herself. “Yer serious?” A quick buck quickly dispatched the remaining changeling. “Fleur?” she asked aloud, looking around her. Luckily, the lanky model was no worse for wear, just a few ropes tied around her legs and muzzle. Approaching her, Applejack smirked. “Well then, as much as I like the peace and quiet for a change...”
Quickly setting to work, Applejack released the bounded unicorn with experienced hooves, dejectedly removing the muzzle with a show of great disheartenment.
“Oh ha ha, very funny, Applejack,” Fluer chuckled hoarsely. “You should be a comedian.” Magic flaring, the unicorn brought her fan up to her face, fanning it mercilessly. “And now what do we do? Wait for more changelings?”
Tipping her hat, Applejack looked around the warehouse for any immediate threats. “Naw, shouldn’t be much of a problem now. Ah think Ah handled them fairly well.”
“Really?” Fleur asked, her eyes sharpening. “This whole warehouse, and you think you got them all.” Applejack turned her back to the unicorn, her eyes peeled across the floor.
“Ah reckon not all of ‘em, but I handled quite a few of them. It’d be foolhardy to try ‘n charge me now.”
Fleur’s eyes flashed a malicious green as she approached Applejack silently from behind. “Yes, I guess you’re right, Applejack.”
“Ah know Ah’m right,” Applejack smirked.
Bucks McGilligan had a bet with Kicks McGee on who could knock out Chrysalis first. A bet he happily won as Applejack’s hind legs connected against the lanky unicorn’s face with a satisfying crack. With a spin, Applejack looked down at the prone form of the changeling Queen with a smirk. “Ah’ve been waiting a long time to do that.”
Galloping over to a displaced crate, she pushed the lid aside and looked in. Muzzled and tied up, the real Fleur grunted as Applejack quickly took the muzzle off. “Applejack, you horrid... why’d you let them put me in a box!”
“‘Cause it made me smile,” Applejack smirked. “Plus I got their leader good. Ah think it’s safe now.”
“So now we have to find the Manger of the Sisters in a giant warehouse.”
“Ah reckon not.”
Fleur’s face fell. “You’re kidding. All this work and danger and you’re not going to look?”
Applejack chuckled. “Nah, don’t need to. Look what you’re lying in, Fleur.”
Looking down, the mare quickly realized she had been placed, rather gently, on top of a rather old looking manger meant for two. “Oh you have got to be kidding me.”
Applejack grinned, tipping her hat. “Dumb luck.”