Applejack stood in the middle of the room, shifting uneasily on her hooves as she waited for her father to come in. Should she stay where she was? Could she sit down? What was he going to say? What would he do? Thoughts like this buzzed around her head non-stop for the few seconds she was alone, reaching a high peak when Redstreak came in and closed the door behind him.
They both stood still for an indeterminate length of time, likely only seconds, and simply looked at each other. Redstreak scowled whilst Applejack shivered, and then she jumped when he jabbed a hoof towards her, too.
"You're sure?"
Nod.
"How?"
"H-home test kits."
"They all come up positive?"
Nod.
"Make sure ya used 'em right?"
Nod.
"Why didja have sex in heat?"
"...wasn't just sex-"
"Why didja make love with Macintosh when y'all were in heat?"
"Ah wasn't! Not at first..."
"An' what the heck's that supposed to mean?"
"It came on the next mornin'! Ah was a week early this year."
"So ya were. Still cuttin' it fine, dontcha think?"
"Ah-Ah didn't think-!"
"Naw, that much is plain to see!" The stallion was fuming, his voice trembled as he spoke, and Applejack cowered in fear as he stood and shook so much that she could practically feel the floorboards wobble.
"Get over here, Applejack."
"Daddy-"
"Get over here."
"Daddy, please!"
"Now." His right forehoof thudded into the floor, the muscles in his leg bulging. Somehow he seemed huge now, huge and terrifying, and Applejack couldn't see her Daddy anymore, just a fuming monster that looked like him.
Is he...is he gonna...?
She gulped. She couldn't even think "hit"; that word and her Daddy didn't belong in the same sentence together. The very idea froze her to the ground with how wrong it seemed.
But his command could not just be disobeyed, and fear or no fear, she had to move. One hoof, then another, slowly she walked towards him, lead in her belly and at the end of each leg, until finally she sat down before him, like a criminal awaiting judgement.
His hooves flailed into the air above her, and then came swinging down as if in slow motion. Applejack flinched back, knowing all too well there was no escape... but did she need an escape? All of a sudden he wasn't scary anymore, and his hooves had only flown into the air as an outlet of exasperation. And they weren't now flying towards her in slow motion, they were actually just sagging slowly. And now he was hugging her! And then she cried again, partly in relief, mostly for shame of ever thinking her father would hit her.
"Heavens above, AJ. What've ya gone an' done to yerself?" She could tell from his voice that he was crying too, and as he hugged her close she felt a few teardrops fall on her head. She said nothing, but he didn't really expect her to.
Several minutes passed like that before Redstreak spoke again, and when he did, his voice was still choked with emotion.
"Make no mistake, AJ: Ah'm still furious right now. It may not be everypony's way, an' ultimately it's yer own decision how y'all live, but Ah've told the pair o'y'all time an' again about waitin' till yer older before doin' that. Best thing in mah opinion is to wait until yer married, cuts out a whole lotta potential problems. Like, fer example, gettin' pregnant when yer still only sixteen, fer Celestia's sake!" Now that they had both dried their tears somewhat, and Applejack at least was feeling calmer, it was time for the rant to begin.
"'Cos by the time ya get married, yer hopefully old enough - or at least mature enough - to not make mistakes, early estrus or not!" There was no denying that, despite having talked about it beforehand, Mac and Applejack hadn't precisely practiced "safe sex", whatever one’s opinion on contraception.
"An’ here’s some more stuff ya didn't consider: what this'll make ponies think about the both of ya. An' worse: what they'll think o'yer foal."
"Our foal? H-how come?"
"Think about it AJ: besides us, how many ponies hereabouts know y'all and Mac ain't really brother an' sister?" Much as she tried, Applejack could not name a single pony.
"Exactly. Nopony knows. An' they'll think the pair o'ya was bein' incestuous."
"But we weren't! We ain't!" she spluttered.
"Ah know that, Applejack. Ah know, you know, Mac knows, yer Mama an' yer Granny know, an' that's it."
"But we can tell 'em all the truth!"
"Some ponies'll get the message, sure, but ya won't manage to tell everypony at once. An' by then ponies'll have started the rumours about ya. An' by then, there will always be this stigma attached to ya both: "there goes Applejack and Macintosh, didja hear how he rutted his sister and she liked it? Them inbred hicks've even got a foal now, ain't that just disgustin'?""
"No!" Applejack could already imagine some of the less pleasant ponies in town saying things just like that, albeit more snootily.
“That little foal’s life is gonna be Hell, Applejack. Hell. They’re gonna be called a freak, a bastard, they’ll be stigmatised like you an’ Mac, nopony’ll want to be their friend in school, adults’ll look at it in pity or disgust–”
“But why?! Why would anypony act like that? T-to an innocent little foal?!” Applejack felt sick, scared, and endlessly stupid for the life she had unwittingly bestowed upon her barely-even-there-yet child.
“It’s herd mentality; y’all know how Ah’ve said: “A pony’s smart, but ponies are stupid”?” She nodded. “Like that. A pony can be kind, but ponies can be cruel as sin. On their own, pony to pony, ‘most anypony would probably come round to seein’ things like how they are. But after they’ve already heard other ponies’ stories an’ formed opinions based on what they’ve heard? Forget it.
“It won’t even matter to some ponies that y’all ain’t related by blood, either. S’far as they’re concerned, just bein’ raised as brother an’ sister is as good as the real thing. Ah’d have been tempted to agree with ‘em at first, frankly put.”
“But not now?” Applejack asked, meekly raising her eyes to meet his again. Her father chuckled and smiled a little.
“Ah guess y’all were a little distracted with whatcha had to say after yer first, ah, confession…” His smile faltered but stayed put for now. “But Ah’m pretty sure that was the message we were puttin’ out.”
“…thanks, Daddy.” She too dared to smile a little now, a sight which could always make Redstreak feel better, even if only a little. He sighed, pulling her close once again.
“Listen, AJ: no matter what kind o’mess either of ya get into, Ah will always love ya, an’ so will yer Mother an’ yer Granny. We’ll figure somethin’ out, together, like we always have done. Now,” he said, glancing at the clock and at the ever-darkening sky outside the window, “Ah think it might be best if y’all go to bed an’ get some rest. You’ll be feelin’ pretty drained right about now, am Ah right?” It may have been as much the power of suggestion as anything else, but Applejack did suddenly feel very tired, and loosed a loud yawn into Redstreak’s chest.
He nuzzled her head and gave a final squeeze, then lifted her to her hooves and sent her towards the door.
“Send in Macintosh, would ya? Gonna be havin’ some words with him, too.” Something about the way he said it made Applejack pause before she left, and she turned around uneasily.
“Yer not gonna… give him into trouble, are ya?”
“If he’s lucky Ah may only knock his teeth in.” His grim smile told her that this was just about as likely to happen as the moon suddenly turning pink, but Macintosh was clearly in deeper than she was, for some reason. She left, passing on the message to her coltfriend with a sleepy hug as she went by, and watched as he went in before climbing the stairs to her room.
“So what’d ya say to him?” The adults, a pale Pink Pearl, a reticent Redstreak, and a greener-than-usual Granny Smith, were once more seated uneasily around the kitchen table. Redstreak had just finished telling the others of his talk with Applejack, and took a second or two before answering his wife’s question.
“Mostly what Ah told her, ‘cept Ah added a little about him bein’ the older, not to mention bigger, of the pair and that he should’ve had more sense and restraint. Got him to go into more detail about them bein’ together an’ stuff, how things… came to be. Didn’t have the heart to really go hard on him or nothin’, colt’s just as unhappy as his sister. As his fillyfriend, Ah suppose Ah should say.”
"So… now what?”
"Ah have no idea.”
Nopony said anything for several minutes, each thinking to themselves about what had happened, and of any way they could fix it.
"Ah remember stories about this sorta thing," Granny Smith sighed eventually, shaking her head. "Horror stories, each o'them. Silly young fillies swooped up by some heartless stud's philanderin', ijit colts who always thought with the wrong head..." The old mare could be surprisingly blunt about her words when angry or upset, and now was no exception.
"Ruined their damn lives, each an' every one of 'em! Too young to be parents, too much responsibility, no chance of usin' their youth like they oughta, all the nasty whisperin' an' pointin' when folks thought they weren't lookin'." She sighed again, looking very old as she leaned back in her chair and groaned from the effort.
"Things are different, now, sure, but that just means they got different problems 'stead of the old ones. Bastard foals got treated hard enough back when Ah was a filly. 'Magine how an "inbred" bastard foal's gonna get treated..."
"Are we absolutely sure this foal would be treated wrong?” Pearl exclaimed, causing the other two to jump. “Ah may not have lived here as long as the both of y’all, but Ponyville's the nicest darn place Ah've ever been! Sure, there's a few annoyin' ones, but the ponies here are the friendliest bunch o'folks Ah know!"
"But yer forgettin', child," Granny Smith said with a sad smile. "Ponies hereabouts might be nice, but that don't stop 'em gossipin' an' spreadin' lies if they don't know any better. A few choice words by some jealous varmint, an' the whole town'll be in uproar fer years. Not everypony'll get the whole story, n'matter how hard we try an' tell 'em."
"An' all the while, that little foal'll be gettin' the worst of it..." Pearl finished, now seeing the way of things herself.
"Eeyup." Redstreak's simple affirmation was glum, resigned, sounding just as defeated as they all felt.
There had to be something they could do, some way they could protect their children whilst also protecting the newest addition to the Apple family. To think that, instead of signalling a happy time for them all, as any new foal should, this poor child only seemed to herald hardship and heartache, trials which they would not be able to shield it from during its all-important formative years. The funny thing was that Pink Pearl had often wondered about having another foal herself, and giving Macintosh and Applejack a little brother or sister, but instead...
And then an idea came to her.
"What if," she began, hardly believing what she was about to suggest, "what if it weren't Mac and AJ havin' the foal?" Mother and son both looked at her, neither yet understanding.
"What if, rather than those two havin' a foal, it was..." Pearl reached out a hoof and placed it on Redstreak's. "The two of us instead?”