Connor
“So how old are you?”
“Old enough to be your older sibling.”
“So you're like my older brother, right?”
“No, I’m like your babysitter for your parents.”
“But don't older brothers and sisters do that?”
“You will not drop this older brother thing, will you?”
It was early in the morning, and Connor and Scootaloo were out walking a path that was all too familiar to Scootaloo. Since she was in the morning classes of school, she had to get up early in the morning. Her mom and dad had already left for work before the two of them had come down from her room, but to Connor's relief, they had already left some breakfast for them in the kitchen. Hay was going to have to be an acquired taste for Connor. He had tried to eat it, but only made half way through it before giving up and eating the rest of his breakfast of fruits and (to his surprise) eggs. On the way to the school house outside of town, Scootaloo had continued her nonstop questioning of her new babysitter. As the school house came into view, Connor took the opportunity stop Scootaloo's questions to say his goodbye and when he should pick her up after class.
“Alright looks like we're here. So I’ll see you after school?”
“Yeah, see you later!”
“When should I pick you up again?”
“We get out of class at around lunch time.”
“Okay, so around noon, then.”
“Yep, bye Connor!”
“Byyyeee.”
He waved his hoof as Scootaloo disappeared into the building and the school bell rang. Though, the bell ringing sounded a little strange and when he looked up at the bell tower attached to the school he saw four pink legs standing underneath the bell. He stared stupidly in confusion at the spectacle before turning around and prayed to whatever god ruled over this world that the abnormality would be fixed and go away.
Now that Connor had a few hours to himself, he wanted to get more acquainted to his new body; especially in the use of his wings. He found himself a quiet spot for him to sit down and perform his tests. If he was going to be living here, basic use over his wings was a must. He had spotted some Pegasi using their wings as a form of manipulating objects as well as using their hooves to pick things up. He chose to start with his wings first before trying to learn how to pick things up without fingers. He reached back and extended his wing to full extension. With both hooves he poked, prodded, and pinched his wing to get a feel for them and to train his mind on how to sense his wing.
It was weird for him. His wings felt like a second pair of arms that were located around the lower part of his shoulder blades. After poking one wing he grabbed it and maneuvered it in all directions to see just how flexible it was. He pushed it back and up, pulled forward and down and everything in between. The joint connected between him and his wing seemed to work off of a ball and socket joint to allow for maximum mobility. He let go of his wing and tried to move it around without the help of his hooves. He stretched it out and rolled it around before returning back to neutral position and stuck his wing straight out from his body. If he had to be honest, his wing looked like the wing from a F-14 Tomcat fighter jet. Even when he tensed up his wing, the tendons and muscles around his wing joint created this natural blending between the leading edge of his wing to his body. He gave his wing an experimental flap and felt it provide some lift. The idea of flight did seem possible in theory, however flight was a little lower on the list of things to learn right now. You got to learn to walk before you can run, as the saying goes. He performed the same experiments and tests with his other wing then practiced a little of manipulating them on their own without help. After spending time on using his wings, he tucked them back comfortably into his sides. Another thing he had learned while testing them is that his feathers felt like hairs down his arms.
The next thing he wanted to practice was how to run on four legs. At that time, he had only walked everywhere he went. So running was the obvious next step in progression of faster travel. The idea of galloping seemed simple on paper, but for 18 years of his life he had learned how to move on two legs. So learning how to gallop was going to be much harder in practice. But the only way he was going to learn was through practice. He stood up and began walking first, slowly picking up the pace. Before long he was trotting at a brisk pace and figured he could make the jump to galloping. As soon as he brought his hooves together, they got tangled up amongst themselves and his mind panicked and reverted back to default trying to catch himself with his non-existent arms and hands. His chin hit the ground hard and his rear stuck up in the air. He heard a few snickers from passersby and flushed with angry embarrassment. After picking himself up and untangling his limbs, he set off to try again. It was going to be a long process of trail and learning from his errors.
~~~
the school bell rang again signaling the end of morning classes once again. Fillies and colts of all colors and kinds filed out of the front door and scattered to play with their friends for the day. Scootaloo was standing at the gates waiting for a specific jeans blue pony to come and pick her up. She looked back into the class room at the clock that hung on the wall. It had been five minutes since the bell rang and Connor still had not shown up. She was about to leave on her own when she spotted Connor running up to her.
“Finally! I was wondering if you were ever going to show up! Where were you?”
Connor paused to regain his breath before speaking, “I was, huff, exercising, huff.”
“Exercising? For what?”
“Uhh, just to, stay in shape,” Connor was not going to reveal his true motives for running to Scootaloo. It already looked out of the ordinary that a pony his age did not know how to fly, let alone have a cutie mark. To his relief, Scootaloo simply shrugged and accepted the answer before making her way down the road away from town.
“Hey, where are you going? Town is back that way.”
“Well, the crusaders and I are having a meeting today at our club house and our club house is this way.”
“And what does that have to do with me?”
“You said that you were going to join the cutie mark crusaders! So I was going to show you our club house and some of our members.” Scootaloo turned to face him with upset eyes, like she was preparing to cry.
Connor put up his hooves defensively, “Alright, fine. Lets go see the clubhouse.”
“Yes! This is going to be awesome! Trust me, your going to love it!”
Scootaloo ran off with Connor following behind her. Connor had been practicing running for the last few hours and he had gotten most of the essentials down. He could run at about 85 percent of full speed without tangling up and falling down. He still made a few mistakes here and there, but it would suffice for now.
A little ways down the dirt road, the pair made a turn down another dirt road and followed the path until they reached an apple orchard. The trees were tall and thick with bright green leaves. Large, brilliant red, apples hung from each branch and the pattern continued for every tree they passed. Who ever was in charge of this orchard took great pride in taking care of their crops.
They entered the farm through a white archway with a wooden apple plaque hanging in the middle. There was a giant, bold red barn in front with a home integrated in it at the back. A few pens were around with various farm animals in them and a chicken coop near the entrance to the farm. The pigs in the pens were rolling around in the mud and a cow slowly chewed on some hay in its mouth. A dog slept lazily on a bale of hay near the large barn doors. The dirt was well traveled and compacted to a hard surface after so many years of walking on it and carts rolling across it.
Scootaloo made her way to a section of apple trees surrounding them with a purpose in her step. She looked over her shoulder and called out, “Come on, its this way!” before taking off into the orchard. Connor was a little hesitant, but followed after her; at least to do his job in looking out for her. They strode through the trees until they made their way into a small clearing with seemingly random items scattered about and a well built tree house in one of the many apple trees. Connor felt the paint job didn't quite match his expectations a club house for a group called the crusaders. It looked like it was painted with either the idea of peaches or salmon in mind, not adventure and excitement.
“Here we are! This is the cutie mark crusaders' head quarters and club house!”
“Isn't that the same thing?”
“No! One is more awesome than the other.”
Connor rolled his eyes and shrugged and didn't argue any more with the filly's logic.
“Now, I want you to meet some of the other members of our club.”
She turned back to the tree house and put a hoof to her mouth and called out, “Okay guys! Go ahead and do it!”
Connor's eyes followed up to the doorway where she was shouting at. A few seconds passed then a rhythm and beat song started playing from inside. It was a nice beat and had this outdated cool vibe that was considered the standard of cool back in its day. He cocked an eyebrow up wondering if he was to expect pyrotechnics or flashing rave lights next. After a few seconds of the song playing, two fillies came flying out of the tree house yelling “Hiiiyaah!!” and “Waaaahhhh!!!”. However, it looked like they miscalculated the distance between the ground and the doorway because the amount of airtime they had threw them off and they crashed and tumbled on the ground. Connor stood there looking at the spectacular display trying not to laugh at them.
“Oooowww, I think I sprained a hoof.” The white unicorn filly sat up and lifted a hoof.
“Scootaloo, I don’t think being 'Stuntponies' is going to get our cutie marks.” The yellow filly with the red hair and bow spoke with a southern accent while she held her head waiting for her eyes to stop rolling around in their sockets.
“Oh come on guys! It was an awesome idea! All we needed was an explosion or something for when you leap out of the door way like an action hero and practice a whole bunch of times.”
“What exactly were you planning on doing in the first place?” Connor had this dirt eating grin on his face and still had one of his eyebrows raised.
Scootaloo rolled her eyes, “The plan was, when we got here and after the song played for a little bit, Sweetie Belle and Apple Bloom would burst threw the door making fighting poses while an explosion of awesomeness happened in the background. Then they would land and roll and pop back up again fight off a whole bunch of bad guys before ending with a cool pose!”
Connor couldn’t help but laugh at little at the overenthusiastic plan. Their ideas of grandeur were similar to those of his own that constantly plagued his mind on boring days. They were so crazy, that it just had to work. The difference being, he never acted on them because they were just that; ideas. But youthful naivety always made even the most impossible things sound legit.
“So are these the other members of your club?”
“Oh yeah! That's Sweetie Belle,” the white unicorn filly waved energetically with her good hoof.
“And that's Apple Bloom with the red bow.” The yellow filly with red hair smiled happily, “Howdy! Welcome to sweet apple acres farm and the cutie mark crusaders head quarters.”
“Thanks, I’ve been finding my first visit entertaining.” Apple Bloom tilted her head to the side as if trying to look around Connor. He wasn't sure what she was looking at so he craned his neck around to look behind him. There was nothing that was out of the ordinary; apple trees rustled gently in the air as the sun shone brightly down on the land. The barn and main house was barely perceptible through the trees. He turned back around to Apple Bloom, “What are you looking at?” he questioned.
“Your cutie mark. Scootaloo wasn't kidding when she said you didn't have one,” Apple Bloom had gotten up to get a better look at Connor's side. He ruffled his feathers and readjusted his wings anxiously. This strange cutie mark was brought up again and he had no idea what it was supposed to mean. He didn’t like not knowing.
But before he started making questions Sweetie Belle, the white unicorn, beat him to it, “How come you don’t have your cutie mark? Did you not try anything when you were young?” She had a look of concern on her face and Connor quickly tried to reassure her.
“No, no, I did. It's just complicated right now. Um, how do I explain this...” He racked his brain trying to think of a way to explain in a way that they would accept without asking too many questions. While he did that, the three fillies were gathered around discussing what to do with Connor.
“You were right, Scootaloo. He really doesn’t have his cutie mark.”
“Of course I’m right. That's why I think we should invite him to join the crusaders!”
Sweetie Belle gave a skeptical glance, “I don’t know. He's a lot older than the rest of us. Are you sure this will be alright? I mean, he probably has other important things to do besides go crusading with us.”
“But that's just it! He's staying at my house right now and my mom and dad have him as a foalsitter. So we can use him to help with our crusading!” Scootaloo said excitedly.
“Yeah, your right,” Apple Bloom put on a mischievous grin, “We could use him to help out with some of our next ideas to get our cutie marks. And who knows, maybe he'll get his cutie mark as well while he's helping us.”
“Yeah!” Scootaloo threw a hoof in the air in triumph. However, Sweetie Belle put a damper on the excitement when she brought a fact they had overlooked.
“Um, we don’t have any more ideas right now. The last one for Stuntponies we just did today was the bottom of our list we made last week.”
“Oh,” Scootaloo slowly fluttered down to rest on the dirt and all three stood there trying to plan their next move. Connor, who had been listening to the entire conversation, took this time to interject and put in a suggestion.
“Tell you what, why don't you all go back into your head quarters and make up another list and I’ll play the guard protecting the entrance.”
All three kids cheered, “Yeah!”
“You can be our body guard to our secret base or something!” Apple Bloom shouted.
Scootaloo agreed, “It will be awesome!”
“It would be like being a famous movie star or singer!” Sweetie Belle added.
“Alright then, Connor,” Apple Bloom stood up as straight as possible like a general about to give his orders, “You are to guard the front entrance to our secret base with your very life! You are to, by no means, let any intruder enter unless we tell you to.”
Connor half rolled his eyes and played along, “Yes ma'am.” Apple Bloom, Sweetie Belle, and Scootaloo beamed and took off to their tree house giggling all the way and discussing what kind of adventures they should do next. Connor used this opportunity to lay down on his back and rest his head at the foot of the ramp leading up to the tree house to relax. He figured this little distraction would last a few hours and make his current job easier for a while.
He ran a hoof through his hair. He could feel that it started couple of inches above his eyes and ended at around the top of his neck. He was glad that he didn't have hair going all the way down his neck and ending at his shoulder blades. It was less maintenance he needed to do to keep his hair in check. He put his hooves behind his head and stared up at the sky before letting his mind drift away to do its own thing. He thought about home a lot. He missed the ability to pick things up with his fingers and he would love to be able to walk on two legs again. He dreamed about food and all the good stuff he was going to miss. Pizza, burgers, sushi, bread, mashed potatoes, bacon; the list went on. While on the topic of food he drifted over to what ponies in this world would eat. He knew about hay, apples and vegetables, but what else did they eat? Was it all just organic food? Did they have any other poultry here in this world like eggs or cheese? What was considered fancy food? What was considered fancy in general? Did this world have any kind of clothes to wear? His mind trailed off after that thought and he went back to the biggest thing he missed from his home; his motorcycle. The twist of the throttle, the pop of the exhaust, the exhilaration from a perfect upshift into the next gear to go even faster, the danger of going around a corner so fast you could almost touch the road with your knee. If he thought hard enough, Connor could hear the scream of the engine at 15,000 rpm as he screeched down the road. At the thought of speed, he questioned as to what ponies did to get their fix for speed? At that thought, did this world have cops, too?
“Apple Bloom!!” Connor was pulled out of his thoughts as another pony approached the tree house. He raised his head slightly and rolled a little to his right to peer past the ramp to see who was coming. An orange pony with sun blonde hair and tail and wearing a stetson cowboy hat was making her way to the tree house with Apple Bloom, Sweetie Belle, and Scootaloo still inside.
“Aaaah shirt,” he cursed in his head. It was one of the ponies from yesterday that he had insulted. If Connor was fast enough and sneaky enough, he could possibly get away without her noticing. But part of him wanted to stay and try to apologize for yesterday. He hesitated there while his mind fought to pick a choice as this pony slowly approached. His mind couldn't come to a decision quickly enough and he was almost completely in view of her, so he gave up and chose to face the angry wrath of this pony.
Applejack approached the tree house and noticed a blue figure at the base of the ramp up to her sister's club house. It shifted and peered at her with a single eye like it was deciding to run away or stay. A few more paces later, she recognized that it was the blue Pegasus they were searching for since yesterday.
“You!” she angrily pointed accusingly at him. Connor gave a pained expression before sitting up to shrug, “Me.”
“What in tarnation are you doing here?!”
Connor glanced up briefly in thought before answering, “Uhm, playing guard to this club house.”
Applejack paused in her anger trying to understand the answer he gave her. It was too matter-of-fact to be a lie, but why would he be a guard for her sister's club?
“What do you mean 'You're playing guard'?”
“Well, I went to pick up Scootaloo from school and she brought me here to see the club house and introduce me to the rest of the members; that being Sweetie Belle and Apple Bloom. And then they asked me to be a guard to their 'secret base' while they think up new ideas for-”
“Applejack! What are you doing here?”
Apple Bloom had come out of the club house to see what was going on down below. “Apple Bloom!” Applejack was relieved to see her sister safe, “Come down here! Do you know this pony?”
Apple Bloom looked puzzlingly between Connor and Applejack, “Yeah. that's Connor, our secret base guard.” She walked down the ramp and over to her big sister. Applejack pulled her sister closer and placed herself defensively between her and Connor.
“You get off this farm right now, you hear!” still glaring at him, “I’ll let twilight know where you are and then she can take care you.”
Connor stared back blankly still sitting on the ground, “Why do you want me off the farm? I haven't done anything wrong.”
Connor was trying his best to maintain his poker face. The last thing he wanted to do was make this older sister mad. But he knew a possibility was here somewhere in this encounter and he wanted to capitalize on it. Maybe he could get work here on the farm or something if he positioned it correctly and could calm her down to agree with the proposition. It was worth a shot, but first he needed to convince this pony to a reasonable state.
“I don’t want you anywhere near my sister. How do I know that you won't be some kind of bad influence for her? I mean, we found a guard unconscious outside in the hallway when you left, and a guard doesn’t just knock himself silly in the middle of a hall.”
“Fuuuudge, you had to go and bring that up, didn't you; thanks.” Connor broke from his poker face now to put a hoof to his temple and express his exasperated frustration, “Okay, yes. That was a mistake. But that was an extreme situation and I was in an irrational state of mind. It's not something I do on a regular basis. Besides, I’m one of the better examples from the world I come from. There are far worse people than me.”
“Sure, I bet you are the gleaming example of a perfect pony.”
“no, I don't consider myself to be perfect; I am far from it. I’m just saying, you could have gotten someone worse.”
“Uh huh. How about the next time I turn around, you are gone and off the farm or I’ll have Big Mac escort you off the property.” Applejack turned around and ushered a confused and nervous looking Apple Bloom back to the farm.
“Why do I have to go, sis? My friends are still there.”
“I’ll tell them they need to go home and can come get you later. Right now, you have chores to do.”
“Aaaaaww.” Apple Bloom moaned loudly and sulked off back to the barn with Applejack close behind. If Connor still wanted to seize this opportunity, now was the last chance.
“Wait!” he called out. Applejack shot a glare over her shoulder. Connor almost gave up on the idea, but he pushed through.
“Uh, Applejack right? Uh, how about I stay on the farm and, work on it?” This was going to be tough to convince her of this.
“Why, in the whole world of Equestria, should I let you work on the farm?” Applejack had stopped to face Connor again demanding a good explanation.
“Well since you don’t trust me, wouldn't it be easier to keep an eye on me if I was always close by? So if I step out of line, you can correct me at moment's notice. Plus, the work will keep me busy during my stay here. And you can always tell twilight whenever you get free time, uh, not to sound like I don’t want you to tell her where I am.” Connor was sweating a little as he watched Applejack for any signs of disagreement.
Applejack glared at where Connor was standing, but behind her eyes she was honestly considering his offer. It did sound like a pretty reasonable idea. She could keep an eye on him while twilight worked on fixing her portal to send him back. Everything seemed to work out in her head, she had every advantage she needed. But there had to be a catch somewhere. There had to be something that he wanted in return.
“Why should I give you a job on my farm? There has to be some kind of catch to this, right?”
“A catch?” Connor couldn't believe what he was hearing. He had tried to give Applejack every advantage he could think to her and she was wondering if he was trying to play an angle in the deal. He sighed exasperatedly, “What I'm trying to here is,” he threw his eyes to the sky as he prepared himself to swallow the hard pill called pride, “, is say 'I’m sorry'. I didn't mean what I said before and I want to make it up.”
Applejack continued to glare but turned around for a moment before answering him, “You have three minutes to meet me at the barn to start working.”
With that, Applejack continued walking Apple Bloom back to the barn, leaving Connor, Sweetie Belle, and Scootaloo there at the tree house.
“Hey Connor,” he turned to look up and see Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo at the railing peering down with saddened eyes, “Does this mean you wont be staying at my place any more?”
“No Scootaloo, I’ll still be there. I just won't be your babysitter any more. I’ll have to explain to your parents but I think they will understand. Are you going to be alright while I’m working?”
“Yeah...” Scootaloo cast her eyes down on the railing.
“Come on, don’t be sad Scootaloo,” Sweetie Belle comforted.
“Yeah, I’ll still look out for you. Just not all the time. Can you promise you won't get into too much trouble while I’m away?”
“I guess. Do you promise to come back to my place when you're done working?”
“Promise.” Scootaloo brightened at the thought of having her foalsitter/older brother coming back home tonight. With Scootaloo looking better, Connor ran off to the barn before he was late.
~~~
Applejack had Connor following behind her as they walked down one of the many paths into the orchard. They were carrying a few wooden buckets with them for apple collecting which took a few minutes to set up since Connor had no idea how to carry them. Applejack had explained briefly on what Connor was supposed to be doing, so they were headed out to continue where she left off. Applejack stopped at an apple tree and set her baskets down beside it before turning to instruct Connor on proper bucking technique.
“now when you buck apple trees you have to do it just so, alright?” she reared back on her front legs and kicked the apple tree to demonstrate a proper buck. The tree shook violently and the apples fell down into the waiting buckets. Applejack came back looking proud of herself for another excellent demonstration.
“Does that make sense?”
Connor rubbed his chin with a hoof, “I guess? It looks simple enough.”
“Good, I will be over there if anything happens,” Applejack picked up the full buckets of apples to deposit them into a cart before moving off to another tree to continue the process of bucking trees.
Connor walked over to another apple tree still full with apples and set his buckets down near the base like she did. He glanced up at the gleaming apples still hanging in the tree. He pondered on how he should try to kick this tree because trees from his world did not move when you kicked them. He could try to do it like Applejack just did with both legs, or he could try using a spinning back kick like he had always trained with. He picked his spinning back kick as his weapon of choice as it was the one he was most familiar with. He stepped back from the tree and got set in his stance. He took a few practice spins to judge his distance and get the technique down before setting again for his actual strike. He stepped forward and spun to generate as much kinetic energy as possible before planting his three hooves firmly on the ground and firing his rear left hoof at the tree as hard as he could.
CR-SMASH!! the tree shook hard and the apple fell, but he smashed right through the bark causing it to splinter into shrapnel. He cringed in shock and put a hoof to his mouth, amazed at the damage he had just caused to this tree.
“Sshhheeeeeeet! Fooooog did not mean to do tha- HRRNNNGGHHH!!!” A lasso came sailing through the air and wrapped around Connor's neck before a powerful tug yanked him backwards and onto his back.
“What in the world did you do?!” Applejack came running over to assess the damage done to her beautiful tree with the lasso rope trailing behind her. Connor struggled with his fumbling hooves to get the tight rope off his neck.
Applejack whipped around, “I didn't say 'Try to kick the tree down' did I?!”
“Hang on! I didn’t mean to!” Connor eventually got the rope off him and stood up to defend himself, “I thought the trees were a lot stronger than that! It takes a lot of force to do that kind of damage to a tree in my world! I swear, I didn't know it was that easy to break them!”
Applejack collected her rope and slung it around her, “Sure you did.”
“I’m sorry?” Connor threw out the offered apology hoping it might get him back in somewhat good graces with Applejack. The apology sort of hung in the air for a little bit before slowly fluttering to the ground between the two.
Applejack stared at him unconvinced, but it did mean something to her when he said 'sorry'. Applejack may be a stickler for past mistakes, but she was willing to forgive them if somepony was willing to try and fix them. Fluttershy had been working with Applejack to learn forgiveness with discord, so I guess this was an extension of those lessons with Connor. But Applejack was still working on that.
“I’ve got my eye on you.”
Connor could see a long first day of work ahead of him and he could feel he was going to become very familiar with that lasso.
