//------------------------------//
// Leaves 
// Story: An Apple By Another Name 
// by Sky McFly 
//------------------------------//

Time passes slowly when you’re the last pony in Equestria.
I mean, it always passes slowly at Sweet Apple Acres. Our laid-back, relaxed, “no worries” way of life is kind of a source of pride for the Apple family. But ever since everypony I’ve ever known up and vanished, time seems to have slowed to a crawl. Sometimes I don’t reckon time’s even passing at all.
But I know it is. As the months pass, I watch the apples grow big and red until Apple-bucking season, when I harvest them just like every year. Without Granny Smith, Big Macintosh, and Apple Bloom around to help take care of the crops, I’ve been doing it all myself. It’s a lot of work for one pony, but it’s not like I have much else to do with none of my friends around anymore. 
It was around the time that the Running of the Leaves would have been held, had there been any ponies around to run, when I decided to go into town again. Occasionally I would go into Ponyville, to keep it looking nice. In my spare time I would sometimes pull the weeds that crept into the streets or fix up some of the buildings that had fallen into disrepair. I suppose I also just liked visiting the familiar buildings and imagining the bustling, busy town Ponyville had once been.
On this day I walked alone through the empty streets, the sound of my hooves on stone echoing around the abandoned storefronts. It was a beautiful day. If there had been any ponies in Ponyville, they all would have been outdoors buying and selling wares and enjoying the warmth of the sunshine and the occasional cool breeze. This would have been a perfect day to take Apple Bloom into town to sell apples. But she was gone, along with everypony else.
I wiped away a tear.
I wasn’t in the mood to pull weeds today. Instead, I left the outskirts of Ponyville and headed out into the countryside. I didn’t feel like returning to Sweet Apple Acres just yet. I picked up speed and trotted past the fields surrounding the farm until eventually I found myself entering the White Tail Woods.
I could remember running through these woods, side-by-side with Rainbow Dash as the autumn leaves fell around us. The Running of the Leaves felt like only yesterday, but it must have been months, maybe years, since then.
I sped up to a gallop, blinking away tears. I could almost imagine that Rainbow Dash was just feet away, her hooves beating in time with mine. I galloped faster and faster, as if by running fast enough, I could bring back my friends.
My hoofbeats got louder and louder the faster I ran, until the sound of the pounding filled my mind and all I could think about was the rhythm of my hooves. The vibrations must have spread to the nearby trees, because as I passed them, leaves began to rain down around me. Soon I was surrounding by the orange, red, and gold of leaves flickering like flames in the dappled sunlight that streamed through the trees.
I couldn’t stop.
If I slowed down, I would have to think about how beautiful the world was. I couldn’t bear to think that wherever my family and friends disappeared to, they were not experiencing this beauty. I didn’t want to make the realization that I was the only pony left to appreciate the world I lived in. I wasn’t ready.

I returned to Sweet Apple Acres only when I couldn’t muster up the energy to run any more. I made it about halfway across a field before I collapsed from exhaustion into the warm earth, gasping for breath and shaking with sobs.
I don’t know how long I lay on the soft ground, wondering why I should even try to get up, but the sky was streaked with the orange and magenta of sunset by the time I dragged myself to my hooves and headed back toward the farmhouse.
Before going inside, I turned to look at the fields and for a brief moment I thought I glimpsed—
But it couldn’t have been. It was at the far edge of the field, and the light was bad at this time of day, and I blinked once and it was gone. To be honest, I wasn’t in the sharpest state of mind to begin with. I had to have imagined it, because if I believed that I could have seen something so impossible, I would have to accept that I was losing my mind. I knew it would probably happen eventually, what with being alone for so long, but I just wasn’t ready to come to terms with the possibility that I can’t trust my own brain.
So there’s no way that in the fading evening light I could have actually glimpsed a familiar flash of color, or the silhouette that could only belong to another pony.