//------------------------------//
// Chapter 13 - Applebuck Season 
// Story: The Cosmic King 
// by Theyellowninja13 
//------------------------------//

    I quickly rolled out of the way just in time for a piece of a building to hit where I was a second ago. I looked up at my opponent, quickly trying to think of a way to beat it without any unnecessary deaths or pointless destruction. We were battling a giant chimera. And when I say giant, I mean GIANT. I looked as big as the Empire State Building from my world’s New York. The chimera was a goat, with bat wings and a rattlesnake tail. But the most interesting thing about it, was the fact that I could see raw magic, which looks bright purple, running through it’s veins.

“So you’re not really evil, you’re just unlucky enough to fall into a pool of raw magic and get mutated. You’re just in a lot of pain.” I had sympathy for the creature, so I would go easy on it. I was cut out of my thoughts when I heard some screaming, and I looked to see the pre-CMC huddled together, about to get crushed by some falling debris.

I quickly ran over and punched the debris into dust before it could hit them. I looked down to make sure they were alright, but I noticed something wrong as I looked at them.

‘Where’s Applebloom?’ I said to myself. Nonetheless, I picked up Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle and started running away from the battle with them to make sure they wouldn’t be harmed.

“Will my sister be okay?” I heard Sweetie Belle ask.

Scootaloo answered before I could. “I’m sure she’ll be fine, she’s got Rainbow Dash with her. Right Connor?” I just gave a small smile.

“Yep, Rainbow wouldn’t let Rarity get hurt.” Sweetie Belle looked relieved at that. I kept running, not using my full speed for fear of hurting them. Before we got to the safe area, I heard another cry for help.

Never being the one to not answer a cry for help, I looked over to see Applebloom about to be crushed by a rock the chimera threw at Rainbow but missed. I was about to put down the two fillies to save Applebloom, but when Sweetie Belle screamed, I looked in the air to see another rock heading for right where we’re at.

My brain suddenly started perceiving everything fast enough to make everything look incredibly slow. I calculated that I wouldn’t be able to get out of the way of the rock to safely put down Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle, and then run fast enough to save Applebloom. I wouldn’t be able to run quick enough to save Applebloom without severely hurting the other two fillies with my speed. I calculated many other solutions, but I couldn’t figure out how to save all three without severely hurting any of them.

I knew Applebloom would have a 85% chance of surviving the rock, so I turned off my slow-mo vision and crouched down, putting Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo underneath my chest, and bracing my back for when the rock hits it.

I kept an eye on Applebloom, and was surprised when a red blur ran by and put itself over Applebloom right before the rock hit. Before I could figure out who it was, I felt a sharp pain in my back, as the other rock hit, and snapped my spine (and the rock). I stayed in the same position for a bit, my body paralyzed, before my spine snapped back and I got up, picking up the two fillies.

After checking to see if they were okay, which they were, I put them down, and they ran over to the safe zone up ahead, yelling their thanks as they got away as quick as possible. After they disappeared from sight, I ran over to where Applebloom was, and removed the rubble.

When the rubble was gone, I noticed a barely conscious Big Mac, covering a shivering Applebloom with his body. I noticed that his side was pretty banged up. We shared eye contact for a second, before he nodded and passed out. I picked up Applebloom, and scanned Big Mac’s body.

“Don’t worry Applebloom. It’s a nonlethal injury. He’ll be okay.” I whispered to Applebloom, who was crying into my chest. I quickly started running to the safe zone, putting down Applebloom once we got there. After making sure she was okay, I ran back into the battlefield.

Once I got there, I caught Rainbow, who was sent flying away by the chimera. I put Rainbow down before running to Twilight. “Twilight! Do we have word on when the elements will be here?”

When Twilight looked back at me, I could see she was getting exhausted. “Yes, Celestia said that they would be here in at least three more minutes.” She tried using her magic again, but it sputtered out, and she fell to the ground.

“Twilight, take this. It’ll restore your magic.” I handed her a blue potion, which she looked at suspiciously, before drinking it. When she finished downing the bottle, she stood up and started using her magic again.

“Thanks Connor. Now can you help us stall the chimera?” I just nodded before flying up to it’s face.

“Hey ugly! Get a load of this!” It was about to roar at me, but I threw a recently made flash bang into it’s face. When the flash went off, I flew down to catch Rainbow, who was also blinded by the flash bang.

“Whoa. What was that?” Rainbow asked when she could see again.

“It’s a special bomb I made. It’s called a flash bang. Here, take some of these and throw them at it one at a time.” I handed her five flash bangs, and she just nodded before flying off.

I flew over to the chimera’s feet, and lobbed some glue grenades, causing it’s feet to stick to the ground.

We kept on stalling it, ‘till Celestia arrived with a chest. We all ran over to her, and we opened the chest to grab the elements. After getting into formation, we launched the elements’ power against the chimera, who was quickly brought down to normal size.

After several minutes of trying to get the chimera back to it’s home in the Everfree, I returned to see a worried Applejack and Rarity. When I landed, they both looked slightly relieved.

“Connor! You have to help us! I can’t find poor Sweetie Belle!” Rarity said, overdramatically.

“And I can’t find Applebloom either!” AJ said, rather worried about her sister.

“It’s okay. I found both of them earlier and brought them to the northern safe zone. But Big Mac is a bit wounded and we need to bring him to the hospital.” AJ looked more worried at that.

A few minutes later found me waiting in the hospital waiting room, with AJ and Applebloom. Twilight came in through the doors, and walked over to our group.

“How’s he doing?” She asked.

“He’s still in the ER. But he’ll be okay. It was a non-lethal injury.” I responded.

“You don’t have to wait here with us Connor.” AJ said.

“I feel like I should. I should have tried to find a better way to protect Applebloom, Sweetie Belle, and Scootaloo.” I said, looking down.

“It’s okay Connor. You tried your best.” AJ said trying to cheer me up.

“I didn’t try my best. I could have prepared beforehand. I could have practised using Cosmic energy to alter the environment. I could of tried to learn how to make portals farther away from me. There is so much I could have done if I had more practice with my powers.” I snapped my fingers when a thought came to me. “Of course! I can just train! I could exercise to make myself stronger. To make my powers stronger! Next time, I might be able to carry entire groups of ponies to the safe zones!” For the first time since before I got my powers, I felt… good about myself.

“Good thing you made those safe zones Connor. They really do save lives.” Twilight said. I’m glad I made safe zones too.

The safe zones are five different zones I made around Ponyville about 6 months after I arrived. There is one in each cardinal point of the town, and one in the middle. The doors to them are underground, which the only way to get to is to go through an almost indestructible house. The safe zones themselves are so sturdy, they will be there for as long as this universe is here. They contain a food synthesizer that can create any kind of food and water. They also have been made to be bigger on the inside, containing enough rooms for every creature on the planet. All the rooms are around the same size, and they adjust to fit the size of the creature living in the room. They have a state of the art defense system, and they have rooms for almost any activity, incase of a large amount of time passes before it is safe again.

I’m shaken from my thoughts as the doctor comes out of the ER. “Big McIntosh will make a full recovery, and he should be fit enough to leave tomorrow morning. But he should refrain from doing any physical activities for at least 3 weeks.”

“3 weeks! But applebuck season is in two days!” AJ exclaimed.

“I’m sorry Applejack, but if he were to do any serious physical activities, than his wound might open again.” AJ looked down at this.

I put my hand on her back to offer moral support. “It’s okay Applejack, if you need help, I would be glad to help, and I’m sure the others would also love to help.”

AJ looked at me with a small smile. “Thanks Connor, but I’m sure I could harvest all the apples on my own. After all, it’s in my name.” I just returned the smile.

“Well, I got to go, it’s getting pretty late, and I need to recharge the energy I used in the fight.” I got up and left the hospital, thinking on my way to my house.

‘I feel so different than who I was before I got my powers. I’m more depressed than I’ve ever been. I feel incredibly lonely. No one in this universe could understand what I’ve been through, and what I’m going through. I’m in incredible pain trying to contain my powers, I’m forced to see things I don’t want to see. I haven’t even slept in over a year. I can’t sleep knowing that I can’t dream, and can only have nightmares. If I were to try to sleep, I’d just have night terrors. Instead of sleeping, I just cry silently all night. I even don’t know how long I can last without sleep.’ I looked up to notice I arrived at my house. I sighed, before entering my house, and sitting down on my couch. “Distan, I wish you were here. You would probably say a joke or something. You always knew what to say to cheer me up. I can only imagine what you and my family are going through. You were practically my brother.” After I said this, I put my head in my hands, and started crying.


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I quickly spun around, hitting the target behind me in the head before blocking a bow to my side. I spun around again, blocking an energy blast with my staff. I felt the energy go into the staff, which I then slammed into the ground, sending me up into the air and sending a shockwave of energy all around me, knocking out all the targets. I landed on my feet, before shrinking my staff to it’s smaller state, and putting it in the slot I made for it in my arm.

I snapped my fingers causing the simulation to disappear, and I grabbed a cup of water before wiping the sweat off my head. Yesterday, I started training myself, both with and without my powers. Today I was working with a staff I made that can shrink into a more carryable state, and it has a variety of functions. It can absorb energy and fire it off. It’s made of the same materials as my arm, so it is very hard to break. It contains other weapons in it, so I could quickly turn it into a spear, or spiked club, or even a long sword.

I was about to enter another training simulation, when I heard my doorbell ring. Normally it would take a long time to get to the door. I would have to go through my underground lair, before entering the elevator, and then arriving at the secret elevator entrance I found in my house that leads to the secret lair that was already built under my house before I got here, then I would have to walk over to the door. But since I could, I created a portal in front of me, which I jumped through, and landed right next to my door. I opened my door to see Twilight waiting there, looking rather nervous.

“Connor, I need your help…” She started.

“Applejack’s being stubborn, and is trying to harvest all the apples by herself, and is ignoring reason, as well as harming ponies.” Twilight just stared at me, wide-eyed with her mouth about to say the unspoken word she was going to continue with.

“How did you know?” She ask, confused.

“Applejack mentioned applebuck season coming up the other day, and Big Mac was hurt, so I remembered the episode where this happens.” Twilight had a relieved look on her face when I said this.

“So you remember how to get her to see reason. What is it?” Twilight asked desperately

“Well it was a certain event that she did that caused her to see reason. I’ve been in my house for the past few days, so I don’t know the most recent disaster Applejack created.” I take a few steps outside, closing my door before walking with Twilight.

“Well, as far as I know, she has just sent Rainbow Dash crashing into my balcony.” I cringed at the fact that there is still more to come.

“Well, there is still more to come. But just because I was wondering. Have you tried reverse-psychology yet?” Twilight looked confused.

“How would that work?” She asked, trying to think of how it would work.

“You know how you keep on telling her that she needs help?” She nodded. “Well, what if you dare her to try and harvest apples with help. Say something like ‘I bet you can’t ask for help harvesting all these apples’ or something like that.” Twilight just stopped walking when she realized that.

“Did it work in the show?” She asked, starting to walk again.

“It wasn’t used in the show. I was just curious to see if it would work. She’d usually be smart enough to not fall for it, but she’s too tired to think completely rationally.” I just shrugged. “It seems like common sense to me.”

“What’s common sense?” Twilight asked. I just stopped in my tracks, giving her my ‘what?!’ look. Then when I thought about it, it made sense that ponies wouldn’t know what common sense is, because they don’t usually use it.

“Common sense is like not doing stuff because you know that you shouldn’t. Have you ever thought about putting your hand...hoof into an open flame?” I asked Twilight after we started walking again.

“Yeah, but I never acted on it.” Twilight answered.

“Why not?” I asked, trying to get her to know what common sense is.

“Because I knew it would burn me.” I gave a small smile.

“That’s common sense. It might change in different societies. But a lot of the time it’s similar.” Twilight looked deep in thought at this.

“So is common sense the reason why you don’t show affection like ponies do?” Twilight asked, almost making me stop in place.

“So you noticed that.” I stated.

“Yes I have. Whereas ponies nuzzle each other, give lots of hugs, and seem very social, you seem to not like to give hugs, or to nuzzle anypony, and you don’t seem to like large crowds.” Twilight pointed out.

“Yes I suppose that’s true. But that’s my personality, not common sense. Besides I don’t have a muzzle or snout so I can’t nuzzle. I bottle up my emotions so I don’t lose control of my powers, so I’m not very emotional. And I never did like large crowds. Probably because I was reclusive before I got my powers. I only had one friend besides my family. We were practically brothers. Although I did actually have two older brothers.” I said, with a hint of sadness in my voice.

“Do you want to talk about it? I read that talking about things that distress you can help that pony.” I chuckled a bit.

“If you want me to.” I shrugged. “Both of my brothers are older than me. My oldest brother was the smartest out of all of us, but he was also a jerk. My other brother and I got along great though. Kinda like you and Shining Armor. Except without the weird nickname thing.”

“You know Shining?” Twilight asked excitedly.

“Haven’t met him. But he did appear in the show a few times. Oh by the way, I suggest visiting him sometime in the future, because he’ll have some news for you. Try a bit after we try to solve a mystery on the train.” Twilight looked confused at that.

“What news?” I just shrugged again.

“That’s for him to tell, not me.” Before either of us could say anything else, we arrived in the part of the apple orchard AJ was in. As we were walking up to her, she was about to hit her head on a branch, which I quickly disintegrated before she hit it.

Twilight spoke up first. “Applejack can we talk?”

“What’chu want to talk about?” I sighed in relief, glad that we didn’t have to go through the stupid almost deaf thing.

“Rainbow Dash dropped in to see me today.” Seriously Twilight, you’re starting with that?

“That’s quite neighborly of her.” I sighed, knowing what’s coming next.

“Yes, except that she crashed onto my balcony after you launched her into the air.” AJ looked down at this.

“Oh, yeah. I wasn’t feeling quite myself this morning.” Twilight walked up to her.

“Because you’re working too hard and you need help!” AJ looked angry.

“Nothin’ doin’, Twilight. I’m gonna prove to you, to everypony, that I can do this on my own!” AJ started to walk away, but I spoke up and stopped her.

“Applejack, why are you being so stubborn?” I asked her, genuinely concerned.

“Because I’m capable enough to do this all on my own, and I don’t need help!” She replied, making me sigh.

“Applejack, I bet you can’t harvest all these apples with help. I bet you’re so chicken, you can’t even bother to ask for help.” I said, hiding my smile.

“Don’t you use none of your fancy psychology on me Connor!” I flinched back. How did she know? She should be too tired to realize what I said. AJ started to walk away. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I got to go help Pinkie Pie.” I managed to prevent her from hitting her head once more.

Later, when walking around the town and meeting up with Spike, we were called down to a medical tent, to see all the ponies who ate the tainted muffins. “Oh, no. What happened?” Twilight asked.

“It was a mishap with some of the baked goods.” The nurse replied.

“No! Not baked goods. Baked bads.” Pinkie pointed out. I grimaced at how she looked.

Before Twilight and I went to go and try to stop AJ again, Spike offered us some of the muffins. I took one, curious of how they would taste.

The second I swallowed a bite, I immediately fell to my knees, clutching my stomach. As I try to refrain from puking, my skin turns a shade of green and I was having troubles holding it in. Before I could puke, I shoved my right arm into my torso, pulling out my stomach. Once it was out, I felt much better and stood up, looking at the puss green organ. I destroyed the organ, allowing myself to regenerate my stomach back.

After waiting for Twilight and Spike to get over what I just did, we left Spike to keep an eye on things, and went to Sweet Apple Acres to talk to AJ again.

After unsuccessfully convincing Applejack, and thankfully not offending a donkey, we walked back to Ponyville. We were there when a bunny stampede, no joke, went through Ponyville. I had to refrain from laughing at the idea of a ‘horrifying’ bunny stampede.

“All right. Enough is enough.” Twilight said with determination in her voice. We went back to Sweet Apple Acres again, but this time I was just wondering why I was following Twilight around like this. Maybe I’m just here to provide support for Twilight.

“All right, Applejack, your apple bucking hasn’t just caused you problems. It’s overpropelled pegasus, practically poisoned plenty of ponies, and terrorized bushels of brand-new bouncing baby bunnies. I don’t care what you say, you need help.” Twilight said to AJ, using lots of alliteration while doing so.

“Ha! No, I don’t. Look, I did it. I harvested the entire Sweet Apple Acres without your help. How do you like them apples?” Right after she said this, Big Mac just popped into existence right next to her. I flinched back, trying to figure out how exactly he did that.

“Uh, how do you like them apples?” He said, gesturing to several more orchards of apples. After noticing this, AJ passed out.

After waking AJ up, Twilight went about convincing AJ to get help, which she succeeded in. Later found all of our friends helping harvesting the apples. While the others were getting one tree at a time, and Twilight was picking all the apples from an entire orchard, I was picking all the apples from several orchards at almost the same time.

“How about y’all take a little break?” I heard AJ’s voice call out. I quickly put away all the apples I had picked up, before running back over to the group. “I’ve got some fine apple juice waiting for you.”

As we all walked up to the table, AJ started talking again. “Girls…” She was cut off by my glare so she corrected herself. “And Connor…” I stopped glaring and gave a little smile. “I can’t thank y’all enough for this help. “I was acting a bit stubborn.”

“A bit?” Twilight jokingly asked.

“Okay, a might stubborn. And I’m awful sorry. Now, I know the town gave me the Prized Pony Award, but the real award is having you six as my friends.” After she said that, we all began to drink our apple juice at the same time, which turns out is a pony custom, similar to clicking drinks together.

Rainbow spoke up after a few seconds. “Whew! That applebucking sure made me hungry.”

At this time, Spike walked up. “And I’ve got the perfect treat!” He said holding up the evil muffins. Right as he held them up, I burnt them all to non-existence in front of everyone. Right after I did that, everyone looked at me.

“What? Those things made me destroy a perfectly good stomach.” After I said that, we all started laughing, except for Spike who was looking sad.

“Why did you do that Connor? They tasted so good.” I kneeled down to almost his height, and put my hand on his shoulder.

“You know what tastes even better?” I said with a smile. After a second, I held up a big emerald I found earlier. “This emerald. Too bad I can’t eat it. Do you know anyone who can eat an emerald?” I asked in a joking manner.

“I could eat it!” Spike said excitedly, which then I give it to him and he starts to eat it, as we all walk into the sunset for some reason.