The familiar sound of anger filled their ears once again. By this point it had become all routine to them, to the point where they would need to plan an escape route with their plan in the case of inevitable failure. This was one of those times where they needed it. Sometimes the mob just stood and watched as the cons fled the town. But other times, like this, they would not settle for less than driving them out of town on foot. The brothers couldn't even afford to bring their machine with them.
That is, if they hadn't sold it long ago just to keep their business running.
The long-past joy of scamming a quick bit off of some unknowing townsfolk, the satisfaction of counting the money they had scammed from a whole town even, would never again be felt. After that day. That one day would stick in their brains for the rest of their lives. They had gone over it in their heads multiple times. With every failure they had experienced, it all started there.
They had planned it out so well. They were just a simple family with a huge orchard. It would have been a snap to buy them out. Strolling into town with their machine, they won the immediate attention of the cider-deprived group. They couldn't have been luckier with their arrival. They went over their infamous song-and-dance routine, then made their move. Their motive: take the family's entire orchard. They had planned for some reluctance, so they devised a cider-making competition. After a good old-fashioned upset, the brothers beat the small family by about twice the quantity. However, the crowd didn't seem to like this at all and refused to pay them. Within minutes, they shifted their machine into high gear and retreated like the cowards they were.
They won, but they lost. Such an interesting paradox to think about.
This was no ordinary family, after all. After this experience, they were their sworn enemy. The Apple Family. A mere mention of the name only brought back horrible memories. And the memories they had made since then were no better.
The two con-ponies had not been successful anywhere in weeks, maybe even months. It was almost impossible to gauge the time since their defeat. It felt like years to them. Their youthful appearances were still there, but they only felt depression.
Back at their base of operation, if it even deserved to be called as such, the brothers went over their most recent failure. Only these words were necessary: "Same as last time, just failure." They had been doubting themselves quite a bit recently. Nothing they did was working, and they had lost almost everything at this point. They had on them the closest thing to a bounty anyone could have. Worst of all, though, they were flat broke. Almost every town across the land had heard of them. They knew the names well.
Flim and Flam.
They would never again make a quick bit off of anyone. They were too well-known, or rather, infamous, to be accepted in any town anywhere. The thieves, the robbers, the con-ponies. Anything related to this was an accurate description of the brothers. For every shimmering light of hope they saw for their business, it quickly became swallowed up by the darkness of defeat.
However, one light shined brighter than the others, and Flim and Flam were saving the best for last. And at this point, it was the last.
They had made their base of operations out of a small shack they had found deep in a secluded part of the woods. It wasn't much, but they probably wouldn't have done any better anyway. It was noticeably old and run-down, but thankfully, it was spacious enough to the point where they could live comfortably. Or rather, comfortable in the sense that they weren't being pursued by yet another angry mob, as the case had been for quite some time. Every scheme they devised was born in this shack. Every success they had, as well as the failures, were thought up in here. It was pretty much all they had left. Their fancy machine they used to make their grand appearance, the one townsfolk all across Equestria identified as the symbol of the con-ponies' arrival, had been sold away. They had to keep themselves alive with what they had, and for weeks, they slowly dropped into complete poverty.
And they had hit rock bottom.
The two knew that they had to put their past behind them here and now. They had planned for a day like this. They had nothing left, except the decrepit shack, their cider-creating tools, a limited supply of food, a few furniture items, and the clothes on their backs.
Flim pulled out some various ingredients from a cupboard they had kept closed for this very occasion. They worked for hours, mixing the ingredients with their stashes of apple juice. Throughout the night they tested each batch, looking for one that would get a satisfactory reaction out of both of them. Anything tasting even decent would be a miracle to them in this state. The sun passed under the horizon line, leaving the world around them in a shroud of darkness. Lighting their only lantern, Flam turned to his younger brother and watched as he tried batch after batch with less than mediocre results each time.
"Do you think we'll ever make a batch good enough?" he said after a long bit of silence. Flim, taking a look outside, stared off into the unforgiving darkness. Turning to Flam, he replied:
"There has to be one batch. We saved these ingredients for some reason. One combination has to work. At least one." The unsure tone in his voice completely gave him away. He really had no idea anymore whether or not this plan would work. The ingredients he was saving in the cupboard: had it all been just false hope to them?
They had remained devoted to their profession for this long, planning this scheme perfectly. There was no way it could possibly fail. If it even got started, that is.
After a few hours, the faint glow of the moon began to light the world around the shack. They had been working since sundown, and if they had to take a guess, it was well around midnight. The two had decided to work until they could not stay awake a moment longer, but at that point, the effects of sleep deprivation started to get to them. Feeling almost defeated, they decided to try one more combination before continuing the next morning.
When it was done, they both took a sip at once. They stopped for a moment. They wondered if it was just their imagination: had they really created something decent for once? Thinking it was only part of the lack of sleep they were getting, that their mind was playing tricks on them, they began to feel a little bit of happiness from the experience anyway. Setting the batch aside, they walked over to their beds and climbed in to sleep for the night.
However, the thought of actually having made a successful batch kept them awake. As tired as they were, they subconsciously felt they had not only a working recipe, but - dare they believe - a masterpiece. The minutes went by. Neither one could stop thinking about the batch. As if by some cosmic coincidence, they rose simultaneously to take another sip of the batch. They grabbed their glasses, drank the contents, and set them down all in almost perfect sync. They looked down at their empty glasses, then at each other. They knew immediately, the old feeling of joy returning to them. They knew at once that they had succeeded. After months of falling into their financial abyss, they had begun their rise back to the top.