Trixie wasn’t exactly sure where she was as she came to. She recognized what it felt like, but it took her a minute to remember the word.
Bed. She was in a bed.
Her eyes flew open, and bright light flooding in through the window above her newfound resting place promptly blinded her.
A few moments later, she was acclimated to the light and took in her surroundings for the first time. She was in a wooden room, sparsely furnished with a single chair, a book shelf, a curtained window, and a orange haired stallion with green eyes and a ten gallon cowpony hat.
“Oh good! Ya’ll are awake!” He exclaimed as Trixie’s eyes came to rest on him, “I never got to welcome ya’ll properly yesterday!”
Trixie looked on, rather stunned.
“What are you doing in Trixie’s room?” She asked quickly. It seemed that some of her arrogance had returned with rest… that or just her third person speech patterns.
The cowpony looked confused. “Who’s Trixie? This is my room! ‘Brought ya in here when you passed out last night. Ya’ll looked mighty tired, thought you could use a bed.”
Again, Trixie looked somewhat stunned.
“Y-your bed?”
“That’s right.” The stallion grinned.
“… where is Trixie?”
“Who?”
The blue mare sighed. “Where am I?”
“Oh, you’re in Aaaaaaapaloosa! The greatest little frontier town this side of… well the frontier!”
“… the frontier?”
“Eeyup.”
“Trixie is in the middle of nowhere?”
“Well… not RIGHT the middle. We’re a little north of center, but yeah, we’re pretty close to the middle.”
Trixie could not believe what she was hearing.
You put me among hicks and dust? she directed her thoughts at Princess Luna, This is your ‘fresh start?’
With a heavy sigh, Trixie turned her attention back to the stallion beside her.
“Trixie never caught your name…”
She was suddenly yanked out of bed as he grabbed her hoof and began shaking vigerously.
“The name’s Braeburn! Pleased ‘ta meet ya!”
Trixie’s eyes were spinning in their sockets by the time he let her hoof go free. She took a moment to clear her head by shaking it before resuming the conversation.
“Now, might Trixie ask where her cape has gotten to?”
“Ya mean the rag ya’ll were wearing when you got here?”
She sighed.
“Yes. The ‘rag’.”
“Well if’n I recall correctly… yeah, we put it out to be washed. Washboard probably has it. You could go ask him if’n you want it back.”
“Washboard…”
“Yes ma’am, takes care of all the laundry for th’ town.”
“Uh-huh…”
“Oh, that reminds me!” the stallion exclaimed suddenly, “I haven’t given you the tour yet!”
“Tour?”
“Yes ma’am. Everypony that visits Appleoosa gets a tour!”
“And how many ponies visit you?”
“… uh… Lesse… this year?”
“Sure.”
“What month is it?”
“August.”
“okay… that makes…” he seems to mull it over for a moment before exclaiming, “None!”
“Wonderful…”
Trixie trotted with Braeburn down the town’s central and only road. To their right was the sheriff’s office, which had been the first stop on their tour. They had also visited the salt lick (Appleoosa’s local bar), Washboard’s Washboards, Horseshoes and Wheels (guess what they sold), and an assortment of other houses.
Trixie was tired of all the dust.
How do they stand it? she wondered, They’re out in the middle of nowhere. How do they work? What keeps them going?
“And now,” Braeburn announced, “We come to the final and most important stop on our tour.”
They were walking up a rise. Trixie assumed that whatever they were supposed to be looking for must be just across the hill.
“The suspense is killing me.” Trixie muttered in a flat, sarcastic tone.
“Aww, don’t be like that. This is really important.”
The hill gave way to a view of the last thing Trixie would have expected to see out here.
Green. Green as far as the eye could see, with only a single, well-trodden path through the center to break up the endless sea of life that stood before her.
“This here, is our apple orchard. We’ve been a town for two years now, and all of our efforts, everything we’ve done, has been for this.” He motioned to the landscape in front of him with a hoof.
Trixie was, she hated to admit it, at a loss for words. Her jaw hung slightly agape as she gazed at the stunning display of these cowpony’s efforts.
Braeburn just grinned like an idiot.
It took Trixie a moment, but eventually she managed to form some words, her third-person speech patterns slipping in the process.
“That’s… amazing.”
“Isn’t it?” Braeburn sighed, “I planted the first tree… right over there.”
He pointed to a place off in the distance before chuckling a bit.
“Only then did we realize that it’d be smarter to plant them closer to town. So we planted the next couple here by the hill. Every day, with every shipment of saplings, the orchard grew closer and closer to that first tree. It was our goal you know… getting it this big. Our final tree came straight from my family’s farm back in Ponyville.”
“Ponyville?”
“Mmhmm.”
Braeburn’s gaze was a little distant, and his words were filled with nostalgia. It made sense to Trixie how he could be so happy all the time. Everything he could want was right out here.
Maybe this was a better place than she had though at first.
Maybe I can live here… Maybe it isn't all that bad of a place...
With a strong gust of afternoon wind, a tumbleweed blew straight into Trixie, bowling her over. On the ground she huffed a sigh.
Maybe not.
It was all Braeburn could do to not laugh.
“And this is where you can stay.” Braeburn said as the two ponies trotted up to a small, empty house on the edge of town. They had spent the better part of the day traversing the town in order to see all the sights, now darkness was coming fast. “Wash got you some sheets n’ stuff for the night, and there are candles at the general store if’n ya’ need them.”
“Trixie thanks you for your hospitality but… well…”
Brae looked confused.
“Somthin’ the matter?”
“Trixie… I-I mean…” the blue mare sighed, “I can’t pay for any of this.”
This seemed to confuse Braeburn even more.
“Pay? I never asked you to pay. We’ll be providin’ for you till you can her your hooves back on the ground. That’s how it works out here. Nopony comes to Appleoosa with any bits to their name. so go on in, make yourself at home.”
He smiled warmly and turned to head back to his own house.
“G’night.” He called over his shoulder.
Trixie watched as he trotted away, seemingly without a care in the world.
“Good night.” She called back before heading inside her new home. She took a look around. There were three rooms, a bedroom, a kitchen, and a little living area.
No bathroom.
Trixie assumed there must be an outhouse somewhere and shuddered at the thought.
“So what do you think?” spoke a voice out of nowhere.
Trixie jumped in surprise, her reaction met with a soft chuckle. Princess Luna stood behind Trixie. Trixie looked rather startled.
“What are you… when did…”
Luna grins, “We're a princess, we can come and go as we please.”
Trixie sighed. That made sense she supposed.
“So,” Luna began, “How are you liking your new home so far?”
Trixie looked incredulous. “why here? Why of all the places in the wide wide world of Equestria would you put me in this dirt hole?”
Luna sighed.
“We could throw out countless idioms. ‘beggars can’t be choosers’ ‘don’t judge a book by its cover’” she snickers on the last one, “‘don’t look a gift horse in the mouth’… but we’ll be frank with you. This is the only town that will have you. All other towns will turn you away. We know it isn’t perfect, but nothing is. Just do your best okay?”
Trixie nodded slowly.
“Alright… Fine, I’ll stay…” then she added under her breath, “for a while…”
Luna looks content with this answer, “Good. Now get some sleep. The sun is up bright and early out here, and the ponies up even earlier. You’re gonna have to do some real work, you up for that?”
“Well, actually I…” but Luna was already gone before she could finish. Trixie sighed.
“Some benevolent princess… The middle of nowhere… don’t judge a book by its cover….” Trixie trotted off to her new room, and promptly fell asleep.
Luna stood on her balcony that overlooked the greater part of Equestria, her face now quite a bit more serious than it had been during her conversation with Trixie.
“We hope she’ll be alright…” She murmured to the night air.