Tales

by geopol

2

Tales

by

George Pollock, Jr.

II. Out of the Gate: Applejack and Pinkie Pie

Never thought I'd be a grandmare. Just didn't think it would happen. I certainly never planned on it.

I had a friend named Applejack when I lived in Ponyville, and her grandmare was still alive when I was there. Her name was Granny Smith. She was really old and slow and arthritic. And it really showed in her face and her white mane. I remember looking at her and thinking, "How old is she?" But I never asked. You just don't ask that of a mare, you know.

A.J. – that's what we called her – and her grandmare were earth ponies, and you know that earth ponies don't live as long as us unicorn and pegasus ponies. A.J. was only a few decades old when she died, and that was generations ago. More than I care to remember.

She made Sweetapple Acres the top apple operation in Equestria. That was the family orchard. Her older brother, Big Macintosh, helped her, but she was the driven one. Her grandkids – no, her great-grandkids …

No, wait …

OK …

I've lost track of how many "greats-" there've been now. That's the thing about being mystical, like we unicorns are. Same with pegasuses. We live so damned long. Queen Celestia is millennia old now. Earth ponies think our near-immortality must be great. But if we make friends – really great friends – with earth ponies, we're damned to watch them die. Over and over again. Nearly forever.

Sometimes I think immortality – or anything close to it – is overrated. By a lot.

Anyway, A.J.'s descendents run Sweetapple Acres now. If I had a sugar cube for every apple it's sold since A.J. ran the place, I'd need a thousand barns for them. Maybe more.

So I guess A.J. knew what it was like to be a grandmare.

I mentioned Big Macintosh – we called him "Mac." He ended up marrying a mutual friend, Pinkie Pie. Talk about opposites attracting. Pinkie was a bubbly, fun-loving, party-pony … well, airhead. But a good kid. Always came through in a pinch. Always.

Mac, on the other hand, was quiet and reserved and sounded a little, um, slow. If you know what I mean. When he and Pinkie said they were getting hitched, I took A.J. aside in private and asked her whether she thought the marriage was a good idea. I said I really didn't want to sound rude but that Mac seemed "slow," like I said. What about their kids, I asked.

A.J. said it was OK. Mac wasn't "slow, she said. He just didn't say anything if he didn't have anything to say. And he wouldn't say any more than he needed to. She told me, "There ain't nothin' wrong with Big Macintosh. He ain't 'slow.' If anythin', I'm afraid the kids'll take after Pinkie. But the kids'll be fine, Sugar Cube. I know it."

I guess they were. Mac and Pinkie had seven of them. Mac always was a hard worker.

I once asked Pinkie – as tactfully as I could – why they had so many kids. She just giggled and said that "being with Mac" – if you know what she meant – was a lot of fun. She enjoyed it. A lot.

And I said I enjoyed being with books a lot, but that sometimes, I put them down and closed the covers.

So she said, "Huh?"

And I said, "Never mind."

They were both earth ponies, so they've been gone for generations, too. But their kids – and grandkids and great-grandkids and so on – ended up being as prolific as they were. After all these years, I think at least half of Ponyville can now trace its ancestry to Mac and Pinkie. Thank The Steed that so many other ponies came to Ponyville to work as Sweetapple Acres grew. It helped deepen – and spice up – the gene pool.

And can you imagine? I was in Ponyville when it was a village. I mean, you look at that skyline now, and you can't believe it. Sometimes, even I can't. Canterlot is the political center of Equestria, but Ponyville is now the economic engine that drives it.

And I think A.J. would have been proud to know she helped make that happen.

Comments

[Mad Hatter]

Well, this just might be the first fic where Earth Ponies die young compared to the Pegasi and Unicorns. Can't say I think highly of them being underrated like they commonly are.. Personal opinion aside, this is pretty good. Only thing off from a technical standpoint is Twilight's lack of verbosity. Finding long words in a dictionary and excuses to use them always seems to help.

[Straker]

Not entirely into the notion that AJ died after only a few decades. Seems odd when Granny Smith lived so darned long...unless AJ wore herself out I can't imagine Earth Ponies not living as long as most humans. Also it seems Twilight wasn't as perceptive of the intelligence of others or she was unaware of the axiom that one's silence does not indicate the ratio of one's intelligence.

[Darkentrophy]

4236961
It's worth bearing in mind that this was originally written during the first season, long before FiMFic was a thing. There was no timeline for the characters besides the thousand years Luna had been in the moon for. In some ways this was good; it allowed for a lot of diverse interpretations of Equestrias history and discuss, but it also means they're hopelessly out of date in terms of canon through no fault of their own.