The first thing Applejack felt as her consciousness began to return was a chill all over her body. Deep, piercing, it felt like she had fallen asleep in the orchard on a winter's day. She didn't open her eyes immediately, instead trying to wrap her legs around her for warmth, trying to keep away the cloying light around the corners of her eyelids. Curiously, and frustratingly, the very motion instantly sent lightning bolts of pain up her shoulders and spine.
The pain took her by surprise. It felt like she had slept on her legs wrong, pins and needles giving way to a dull ache that echoed the one building behind her temples. She clenched her eyes tightly closed, placing a hoof to her forehead and massaging it in calm, slow circles, while she waited for the feeling to return in her extremities.
Applejack tried to remember the previous night. The ache in her head and limbs, combined with the empty feeling in the pit of her stomach, made her feel like she had had a bit too much cider, but she couldn't remember having drunk even a single glass.
Beginning to be irked be her traitorous body, she tried opening her eyes. It felt like the light seeping through her eyelids was blinding, and she half expected the stabbing pain in her head to increase from the too-bright light. Thankfully, she was spared any further pain, as the light didn't grow any brighter. In fact, for a brief moment, she wasn’t even sure she had actually opened her eyes at all. But as her eyes adjusted she realized that what had seemed like an intense burning light was actually pale and dark, it was merely her sense that had been playing tricks on her. At first her surroundings were bleary and indistinct, but as she blinked and rubbed at the sleep that had built up in her eyes, she began to resolve the shadowy shapes of objects in the distance, lit by nothing more than the faint pinpoints of the Stars dancing far overhead.
She slowly twisted her head on her neck, testing her muscles. They feel a bit sore, but the migraine that woke her seemed to be receding quickly, so she was grateful for that at least.
Well... I ain't sure how I got here, but I better head home. It's a mite late, and I'll betcha dog collars t' donuts Apple Bloom is takin' advantage of me not bein' there t' put her asleep.
She slowly, gingerly, gritting her teeth against the dull ache that she felt in each joint as she began to put stress on them for the first time, rose to her feet. She took a few, shambling steps in a full circle, taking stock of her surroundings.
It was difficult to make out anything in the moonless night, but then, there wasn't much to see. It looked like she was in a huge plain, without any trees or hills that she could see, save for the black outline of distant mountains that blocked out the starry sky.
As she completed her circle, she felt something soft yet firm brush against her hoof. She bent down to examine it more closely, and she felt her muzzle graze the top of a familiar piece of fabric.
With the barest hint of a smile, she took the brim of her hat in her teeth, and, with a brief toss of her head that her muscles complained about afterward, flipped it atop her head.
There. Things are lookin' up already. Now... which way is home?
She looked around again, her eyes slowly starting to adjust to the darkness.
Huh. Applejack felt a sense of unease gnawing at the corner of her thoughts, but she shoved it back down. Coulda sworn she was full last night. I reckon she must've set already. Must be near time for Celestia to raise the sun.
That uneasiness started to return, as she pawed at the ground. It was hard and cracked, like it hadn't seen rain a some time. The air smelled odd too, dry and stale and somehow dead. Applejack gulped.
That must've been one barn raiser of a cider I drank. It almost feels like Appleloosa around here, but I ain't seen no cactuses.
She paused for a second, then mentally corrected herself.
Cacti.
She had to come to the conclusion that she didn't have the foggiest idea where she was. Hopefully it was just the darkness causing the area to look strange and unfamiliar to her, and not that she was well and truly lost. That just wouldn't do at all. The way she saw it, she had two choices. She could either set up camp, maybe build a fire, and huddle up until the light made everything clearer, or she could pick a random direction and start walking until things started to look more familiar.
She had almost settled on the former, something in the cold breeze set her hair on end, and she never was the kind of pony to stand still and let life happened.
She figured north was as good a direction as any, so she found the big plow, followed its limb to the north star, and headed off, keeping her eyes close tot he ground to avoid tripping over anything. Luckily, the ground seemed as smooth and free of debris as where she landed, so she was able to make good time without stumbling.
The unnatural smoothness only added to the uneasy feeling that had been biting at the back of her mind ever since she woke up.
---
She wasn't sure how long she had been walking, but the sky hadn't gotten any lighter. The thought had occurred to Applejack that perhaps she had been out longer than the few hours she felt like she had. She stared the notion and its nonsense down mentally. She wasn't sure how the moon could have gone from full to new in a single night, but thinking about it too hard gave her the heebie-jeebies, so she decided to concentrate as best she could on putting one hoof in front of the other. The menacing black shadows of the mountains drew nearer with each step.
After a long, silent, shivering while, the ground began to take on a diffuse gray quality. Applejack realized that she couldn't see her breath hanging in the air in front of her nose anymore, and, looking up, the stars began to wink out, one by one.
The sunrise couldn't have come soon enough for Applejack. The terrain was beginning to get rougher, the vast desert rising slowly up to meet the mountains ahead of her, which she could begin to make out in more detail under the growing light, their snow-capped peaks as barren as the ground around her.
She decided that she deserve a breather, but sitting on her hindquarters and idly chewing on a piece of tumbleweed she had come across shortly before only served to let her thoughts catch up with her.
She was now certain beyond the shadow of a doubt that she wasn't anywhere near Ponyville. She wasn't in Appleloosa country either, she was certain. The ground didn't have any of the same majestic red color that made Appleloosa look like it had been painted by Giants before pony reckoning. Instead, it looked grey, colorless, drained. As far as the eye could see, the only color she could make out was a dull green of sage fighting valiantly against the encroaching white of the snow on the rim of the mountains. Even the sunrise seemed pale and tired, and the sky, though cloudless, had barely a hint of blue in it.
Applejack shivered, even though the air had already warmed considerably, and weighed her options. In the growing daylight she could see the desert stretched on for as far as the eye could see, broken up only by the mountains that cut a swathe through the landscape. Looking closely, Applejack could make out the dark scar of a canyon cutting between two peaks, promising an easy passage to what lie beyond.
As good a path t' take as any, I reckon. Applejack spit out the tumbleweed, which had turned bitter in her mouth long ago. There's nothin' but desert on this side of the mountains, maybe it'll be greener on t'other.
Truth be told, she wasn't too sure of her own reasoning. But the notion gave her a small glimmer of hope, so she steeled her sore legs, and trotted off towards the ravine. If nothing else, she hoped to find a stream to quench her thirst.
---
At least she was right about the stream. Technically, in any case, though the slow trickle seemed more mud than water. Applejack's throat was parched from the dry air, but she knew better than to drink from water that dirty, lest she planned on spending the next day or so curled in a ball, clutching her stomach. Looking beyond where the stream spilled out into the rocks and dirt at the mouth of the canyon, she could see nothing but dark shadows and steep cliffs. Perhaps she'd have better luck upstream, maybe she'd even be able to find the source. Plus, the shade would be a welcome respite from the sun which, though barely over the horizon, was already beginning to beat down on her back and flank oppressively. At least she was glad to still have her hat, though she felt a bit naked in the wilderness without a strong lasso by her side.
She made her way up the dark ravine, between walls that started out gentle, but quickly gave way to steep, hard rock. At first the sound of her hoofsteps echoing off the canyon walls was the only sound she could hear, but as the walls narrowed and she found her hooves more and more falling in the damp of the stream, even that sound was muffled.
The silence was eerie. Applejack's ears were constantly swiveling as she walked, trying to make out the slightest sound of a bird, a fish, an insect. But the canyon was seemingly as dead as the desert beyond.
Rounding a corner in the ravine, she paused. In front of her the ground was littered bit boulders and debris. The going from here wouldn't be easy, and she was beginning to wonder if she had made a mistake following the water, if she would have to turn back and try and find a different way through the mountains. She sat on her hindquarters and took her hat in her hoof, fanning the sweat off her brow, when she suddenly became aware that her ears with both pointing with intense focus in the same direction.
Her tail began to whip on its own accord, as her brain processes what her ears had already taken note of.
She had heard... something.
She tried to slow her own breathing, though her heart was beating so hard she was sure it was louder than the stream behind her. Without moving a muscle, she tried to peer into the deep shadows, to see if she could make out any movement, but the shadows were as still as ever.
There! She heard it again. Perhaps it was just a pebble giving way far down the ravine, but that voice that had been keeping quiet in the back of her head was screaming now. Hoofstep, it was screaming, and danger!
She gulped, and yelled right back at the voice. Then, she slowly, cautiously, her tail sweeping rapidly back and forth, rose to her feet.
Carefully, meticulously placing one hoof in front of the other, she inched down toward where she had heard the sound, just around the bend she had just passed. Her flanks itched at the absence of her rope, or anything that would give her some measure of defense around whatever had made the sound. She swallowed hard, and poked her head around a rock to look down the ravine.
She couldn't see anything. She suppressed a shudder from a cold breeze that wound it's way up the canyon, it's walls blocking out the oppressive sun and any measure of warmth it provided.
Applejack's nostrils flared, and her tail began swishing from side to side again.
Something in the air, something in the wind, smelled wrong.
She felt it in her bones, though she couldn't say why the wind should unnerve her so. The Voice in the back of her head was jumping up and down now, flailing its hooves.
Run! it said. Danger, run!
For once, she felt like listening to the voice.
She felt more than saw the movement in the corner of her eye. No, that's not right, not movement. Lack of movement. Her nostrils flared again and her eyes went wide, but she still didn't move a muscle. Even her tail was holding still and stiff, too afraid to work out its agitation.
There.
The stream.
The trickle of ice cold water was slowing down, then stopping. Spiderwebs of pale, dark, impossible ice began to cover its surface., radiating from the banks and rocks.
Looking up, she saw flowers of frost beginning to blossom on the rocks and cliff sides. Her breath caught in her lungs, chilling her to the core. Even the little voice didn't dare to speak up as icy fingers of terror climbed down her spine.
The hoofsteps drew closer.
Applejack ran.
She bolted up the ravine, away from the wind and the hooves winding their way up the canyon, away from the cold and the frost. At first she almost lost her footing on the hard, suddenly slick ground beneath her. Then her hooves gained purchase, and she bolted.
She left over rocks and boulder, leaping this way and that, from the top of one to another as she scaled the debris-strewn canyon. Every instinct in her shouted to get away. Her legs and lungs were already burning, but she couldn't stop, not even for an instant.
It was then she heard the cry.
It sounded dry and raspy, like the wind over a field of dead, dry leaves. And it was close. Close enough she could swear she could feel its cold, fetid breath on the back of her neck. Close enough that she couldn't help herself but twist her head to look behind her.
It wasn't close, but it was there. And it had spotted her. She wasn't sure what it was, it looked like mist and wind and ice, more vapor than solid matter. But it had a horse's head, and hooves. It was bearing down on her like a Winter's storm, but Applejack was fast.
She bolted up the hill, rubble crashing to the canyon floor below her as she dashed up it. She had almost made it. The lip of the canyon was a hair's breadth away.
Then the ground turned to solid ice beneath her hooves.
She slipped.
She lost her footing.
She began to slide back down the hill.
Her legs scrambled for purchase , but only succeeded in freeing more rubble that skidded downhill with her.
The creature was at the bottom, its pale, lidless eyes watching her hungrily, a cold ice storm wrapped around it like a cloak. Its maw wide open, icicles for teeth gnashing hungrily.
She closed her eyes, gritted her teeth, and prepared her hind legs to give out one, swift, desperate buck.
Suddenly, the world around her exploded.
Heat. Intense heat. So close she felt like her cheeks were scorched and her sides burning. She felt something warm splash against her face, smelling like the bottom of a neglected well. Then, as suddenly as it came, the heat dissapated. The wind died down. The world was silent again.
Silent, that is, except for her beating heart. And the trickle of water as the ice melted and the stream began to flow again.
And the sound of hooves far, far overhead.
Applejack struggled to catch her breath, and opened her eyes, looking frantically overhead at the source of the hoofbeats, ready to bolt again if they turned out to be more of those... things. But the air was warm again, the sunlight peeking over the ridge above her spreading it's warmth to the ground below Applejack's hooves. And, in the light of the sun, she could see three silhouettes.
Three pony-sized silhouettes. Squinting, two of them looked odd, unusually bulky. But the one in the center was unmistakably a pony. And, judging by the clear shape of a horn outlined on top of its head, a unicorn. As she looked up at them, she could see them looking down on her. The two shapes on either side of the unicorn pointed their forelegs toward her and, with them, some strange kind of tube with a flared end.
Their body language was cautious, but not aggressive. The unicorn, on the other hoof, looked more puzzled than anything else.
Their stances echoed Applejack's own feelings.
Easy now cowgirl. Applejack finally began to feel like air was actually reaching her lungs again, and her heart had finally stopped its do-si-do. They did jus' save yer life. Least you can do is show them some good ol' fashioned Ponyville gratitude.
She gave them a wave, and while the two bulky shapes seemed to tense up, the unicorn waved back. Applejack could see the glow of a horn, and before long the end of a rope was levitated down to her. Applejack stood back up, her legs only slightly shaking, and watched as the rope coiled itself around her midsection, and tied itself off in a bowline. Then, with a bark that Applejack could almost make out, the two ponies dropped their guard, and as one began to tug on the rope, hoisting Applejack up the steep hill. Though Applejack had earlier almost run up the steep hill under her own power, now it was all she could do to keep her legs beneath her as they pulled her out of the ravine.
As they drew nearer, the sun no longer blinded her, and she could make out details. The two bulky shapes turned out to be a gray earth pony mare and pale blue Pegasus stallion, their profiles distorted by what looked like oversized water tanks strapped to their backs. Connected to them by a series of hoses and valves were the tubes she had seen before, strapped to their forelegs, their trumpet ends singed and blackened and slightly smoking.
They were dirty and ragged, wearing patched-up and well-worn coveralls of an olive drab. The unicorn, a pink mare, didn't carry a weapon other than what looked like a machete in a sheath at her side.
After Applejack had been hoisted fully up, and she was able to regain her composure somewhat, the two ponies with tanks on their backs deferred to the unicorn, who seemed to be in charge. The unicorn looked at her with equal measure confusion and annoyance, holding the gaze for a good while before speaking in a low, soft rasp.
"Been a long time since we found a survivor. Even one without the good sense to move silently during the daylight." She shrugged. "Well, today's your lucky day. We're taking you back to HQ."
Applejack just stared, not entirely sure what she had just said. Turning her head, she saw the gray earth pony glaring at her, a wicked scar that crossed half her face marring one eye. Applejack just blinked.
There was something familiar about the pony, but she couldn't quite put her hoof on it. The other pegasus, she could see, was scanning their surroundings alertly.
"I, uh..." Applejack swallowed hard. Somehow her throat had turned to parchment, but she pressed. "Where are we?"
"In deep horseapples if we don't hurry." She turned to the pegasus, who snapped to attention.
"Nothing yet, ma'am." His eyes were still betraying a hint of anxiety, though the rest of his body was still and alert. The unicorn nodded.
"We may be lucky, it may have been a straggler. Bolt, you take point. You need a tip-off?"
The Pegasus, Bolt, nodded, and the unicorn walked around behind him. Her horn glowed momentarily, then she touched it to a metal plate, slightly protruding from the back of the tank. For a brief moment, the blue glow spread to envelop the tank, then dimmed. Bolt nodded in thanks, turned around to give a brief salute, and then spread his wings and leaped to the sky.
The Unicorn turned to Applejack and, with a shake of her head, gestured for her to follow. She did, and the earth pony took up the rear.
Finally feeling moisture return to her throat, she spoke up one more time.
"So, uh, how far from here to Ponyville?"
The unicorn just gave a short, mirthless laugh.