• Published 4th Dec 2013
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Appledashery - Just Essay



Rainbow Dash lives an exciting life and is swiftly becoming the most daring, awesome pegasus in all of Equestria. She would gladly give it all up, though, just to confess her love to Applejack.

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It Took a Village...?

"Is it just me...?" Lancie leaned forward, staring down past Rainbow Dash's flapping wings. "Or did this landscape get considerably more..." His stone tears drooped. "...boring?"

"'Less freaky,' you mean," Rainbow droned. Her eyes scanned the treetops below. Row after row of dense, bountiful oak trees blanketed the landscape. "If I didn't know better, I'd say I was flying over a little piece of home."

"I rest my case," Lancie muttered.

"Oh hush." Rainbow glanced left and right. "I never would have expected something like this west of the Griffon Barricade. Heck... even the Everfree Forest makes this place look tame by comparision." She tilted her head up, looking further northwest. She saw the forest breaking up slightly, giving way to steep valleys and—beyond that—rolling hills with sporadic vegetation. "It's not so much wild as it is... wooly, I guess."

"Gush over it all you want," Lancie said. "I've learned never to trust any landscape that is... average."

"You'd rather my tail get chased by hungry hungry hydras all day?"

"No, but a modicum of pizazz is certainly nothing to sneeze at," the statue said. "Especially when making a piece of earth look interesting."

"Dude, do you even hear yourself at times?" Rainbow smirked slightly. "You sound as if the world is a place that's built."

"Hmmm. Imagine that."

"Whoah..." Rainbow suddenly braked in mid-air, staring straight down. "No friggin' way."

"What?" Lancie asked, blinking his granite eyes. "Did I strike a nerve?"

"Hardly." Rainbow plunged swiftly. "Hold on."

"Guh!" Lancie struggled to do as he was told, nearly slipping out of the mare's saddlebags. Soon, the pair dropped below the treeline, landing where they were surrounded by leaves and shadow. "Honestly, Sparky, couldn't you have done your business back at the last major stone we passed by?"

"Shhhh... look!" Rainbow pointed ahead.

Lancie craned his neck. "Huh... now that is curious."

Three two-story wooden buildings stood in a circle, accompanied by a barn and several supply sheds.

"Now..." Rainbow Dash slowly paced forward. "...since when did anyone or anything build pony-sized houses in the middle of a forsaken land filled with banished monsters?"

"Well, if that isn't the question of the hour."

"Lancie, I'm serious." Rainbow gestured at the constructions as she came closer. "Have you any clue what this is all about?"

"No, Sparky. I've been gone for an awful long time. And you? Well, you've been dead."

Rainbow did a double-take. "'Dead?'"

"Well, what else do call what you are before you're born?"

"Shhh..." Rainbow snuck closer. Swallowing hard, she tilted her head and called out: "Hello?!?"

Silence. Leaves shifted and tree branches swayed overhead.

"Hello?!? Is there anypo—... anybody there?"

Again, no response.

Upon closer inspection, Rainbow could see overgrown grass and weeds covering the clearing between the buildings. Vines hung out a window where the glass had been shattered countless ages ago. The barn doors were partially crumbled, collapsed within their frames.

"It's worth mentioning," Lancie's quiet voice pierced the still air. "That several millennia is a long time for something... or somethings to take their swing at sentience." He gestured limply at the structures surrounding them. "Maybe someone out here took a page out of the griffons' and ponies' book?"

"Maybe..." Rainbow paced forward, glancing left and right. "...or, perhaps, the griffons erected their Barricade a tad bit too soon."

"Meaning...?"

"Meaning... several eons ago..." Rainbow gulped. "...maybe some unfortunate mares and stallions got stuck on the other side. I could totally imagine them getting by for a few centuries at least... living in the small pockets of this land not stomped over by monsters."

"That's all very fascinating, Sparky," Lancie droned. "But do I have to remind you of a certain sick filly waiting at home while you ramble on and on about theoretical history?"

Rainbow looked over her shoulder. A freckled, orange face stared out of one of the many windows. "No." She frowned. "No you don't."

"Then what's with the sudden tourist trap visit?" Lancie mused. "Shouldn't you be whisking off like a windblown feather to dragonville?"

"Lancie, if there's civilized life out here," Rainbow said, "Then perhaps they might know a thing or two about the dragons, and they could help me figure out the best way to approach Big Boss' lair."

"I'm pretty sure whoever lived here wanted to avoid the dragons."

"Maybe..." Rainbow squinted at the clearing, then spotted a clear path leading due west, lined with partially collapsed fences. "...or maybe they were doing just fine."

"What are you looking at?"

"Answers, I hope." Rainbow took wing and flew along the path. "This shouldn't take too long."

"Sparky, even if you find more structures, what do you hope to find out?"

"Anything," Rainbow said. "Out here, we're on our own, and if I wanna get the shards from Aatxe, then I wanna make sure I can do it the safe way... the smart way."

"Unnnngh..." Lancie slumped back in her saddlebags as she glided along the path. "Oh, how I loathe tutorials..."

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