They ate dinner quietly before moving to retire. Their movements were a bit stiff, heavy with a combination of numbness and relief. Willow took Sunflower off to a room of their own, leaving Applejack and the girls to a second bedroom. Applejack moved for the bed and flopped onto it heavily. She closed her eyes and settled into the softness, ready for the sweet embrace of sleep.
The sudden presence on her back was not in the schedule. Applejack perked an ear back towards it. "S'that you, Apple Bloom?"
"Maybe." That voice was certainly Apple Bloom. Another presence was felt at her left, then her right. She was surrounded by small warm forms. "We need ta talk."
Applejack sighed softly. "Don't suppose this can wait until morning?"
"Nope." Apple Bloom scooted up along Applejack's back and hugged around her neck. "We need ta talk. Ah don't remember pa much... but ya do, right?"
Applejack's head sunk to the cushions, eyes closed and breath becoming more labored. "Ah don't really want to talk about that..."
"Wrong answer." Apple Bloom softly nipped at Applejack's left ear. "Ah deserve to know pa, the good pa, not that thing in there. What was he like?"
Applejack went silent, but Apple Bloom and the other Crusaders would not give her peace. Sweetie Belle sat up beside her. "You know you haven't done anything wrong, Applejack."
"Haven't I?" Applejack frowned, but her eyes remained closed. "Y'all are here, instead of home. Y'all are missing school. Y'all are always in very real danger. Ah didn't stop any of that. The farm only has one pony working it. Poor Big Mac's all alone, suffering while we do our best ta throw our lives away. Yer just foals. Ah'm the adult. Ah shoulda stopped all of this, but ah didn't. Y'all have done more rescuing than ah have. Maybe y'all would be better if ah wasn't even here."
Scootaloo gave a soft pfft. "If you weren't here, we would be in big trouble. You're big and strong and smart too."
Apple Bloom softly bonked Applejack on the head. "And mah sister. Yer the best Apple ah know, and yer doing yer darndest for us and ah ain't blind ta it."
Sweetie quickly bobbed her head. "Uh huh. You're great, Applejack. Everypony needs help sometimes. Just because we had to rescue you sometimes doesn't negate all the times you saved our flanks."
Applejack rolled over, forcing them all to quickly scurry to not be squished or thrown off. "Do ya really wanna know, or are ya just askin' ta get me talkin'?"
Apple Bloom bobbed her head fiercely, though Applejack couldn't see that. "Yes! Tell me about pa, and ma. We may be far away from home, but it's also right here." She touched Applejack over her heart. "Tell me about home."
Applejack cracked a little smile, and began to tell tales of the farm, from before there was an Apple Bloom. Their triumphs, and their failures. How they worked as a family. "Poor Big Mac. He used to talk more, ya know? Their passing didn't rest easy with him. Ah don't think he's... depressed... but ma really could draw the words outta him, and with her not around, well, maybe he just don't have nothin' to talk about."
Apple Bloom reached up and put a hoof on Applejack's cheek. "Ya can cry, ya know."
Applejack frowned a little. "Ah do cry, on the inside."
Sweetie Belle crossed her forelegs. "That's not the same."
Scootaloo stuck out her tongue. "Why are we telling her to cry? Crying's lame anyway."
Apple Bloom reached over to swat at Scootaloo. "Like ya never cried before! Go on, Applejack, we're here for you."
Applejack softly thumped the bed with a hoof. "Ya shouldn't... have ta be here for me... I should..." It was becoming too much, a tear drilling its way to the surface with a painful stinging before it ran free. "Ah'm the adult. Ah have ta keep it together! Ah have to get y'all home... safe... but yer not safe. Yer not safe at all!" Her head sank to the bed and the tears flowed more freely. "Y'all saw things y'all shouldn't ever have ta see, and I wasn't there to stop it, or to protect ya. Ah was too busy laying in a bed while ya risked life and yer heads."
Scootaloo wobbled a hoof. "It wasn't that bad."
Sweetie rolled her eyes. "Oh sure, being chased by Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon when they want to kill us instead of just make fun of us wasn't so bad."
Apple Bloom shook her head. "Ya done forgot they changed their minds. They were gonna brand us instead."
Scootaloo snorted. "Twist with a sharp candy cane was pretty awesome really. She looked like she knew how to use it!"
Applejack cringed at the tales of the visions the girls encountered, and could hold back no longer. She began to bawl under Apple Bloom, loud and lost. The girls quieted and gathered close around her, comforting her with their presence and soft strokes of their little hooves. "Sis?"
Applejack perked an ear, the tears slowing a little as she stopped bawling. "What?"
Apple Bloom tilted her head. "What did ya see, when ya were tied down to tha table?"
Applejack cringed. "Ah... Ah saw all of ya. Y'all looked so scared. Y'all were so lost. Ya kept running around in circles, and running into terrible things. Just running. The doctor, he... He told me it was my fault. If y'all were raised right, y'all wouldn't be busting into no place and running around wild."
Scootaloo thumped the bed. "We had to! For you!"
"Fer me..." Applejack's voice was thick with defeat, and she lay there still. "Ah thought it was some kinda trick, that it were some kinda lie... But it wasn't. Y'all really did go through all that."
Apple Bloom smiled gently. "Maybe, but ah'd do it again, fer my big sis. Yer family, and ya done been mighty good ta me." She prodded Applejack in the shoulder. "And don't tell me otherwise."
Sweetie Belle raised her hooves up. "You've been my sister before! I didn't forget. You're a great pony, and a great sister."
Scootaloo tilted her head. "When's my turn?"
Apple Bloom snickered softly. "Yer getting it right now. Applejack's all our big sister right now." She flopped down onto Applejack and hugged her tightly. "And ah couldn't ask for a better one." The girls joined in the hug, and the sleep that had been denied Applejack came gently to whisk her away, a fragile but real peace settling over her troubled heart.
When Applejack was deeply asleep, Apple Bloom sat up and looked around. The other two were awake as well, and she quietly gestured for them to follow before she slipped from the bed and moved for the door. They gathered in the hallway outside the room and Apple Bloom sagged against the door. "That was rough."
Sweetie smiled brightly. "We did a good job."
Scootaloo wobbled a hoof. "I'm not sure I get it, but she looks better now."
Apple Bloom let out a slow breath. "We really need ta get home. Ah don't want too much more of this kinda excitement."
Scootaloo tilted her head, growing all the more confused. "What's wrong? We've handled everything that's come at us. We're doing great! It's exciting, not scary."
Sweetie raised a brow at Scootaloo. "Exciting can be very scary. I'm with Apple Bloom. We need to get home, not here."
Scootaloo shrugged. "Well alright, but saying it doesn't make it happen. We're stuck here for now."
"Fer now." Apple Bloom sat up. "Let's focus on gettin' to Viljatown, and reachin' Twilight. She'll get us home. She has ta."
Sweetie nodded firmly. "No more jobs. No more distractions. We're not adventurers."
Scootaloo looked displeased, but nodded. "Fine. No more adventuring... besides what we have to."
Sweetie pointed vaguely northwards. "I'm sure there'll be plenty we have to do. We don't need extra credit."
They all nodded at one another and slipped back into the room, settling for sleep.
In the other room, Sunflower sat with his mother. "Tell me about dad."
Willow scowled. "You were the only good thing about him."
Sunflower shook his head. "That can't be true. If you didn't like him, you wouldn't have been with him, and I wouldn't be here."
Willow pointed at the bed. "You should be sleeping." Sunflower didn't budge. She sighed softly. "Is this something you must know?" He nodded firmly. "Very well. Because I love you." She scooped him up and sat him down before herself, hugging him in soft paws. He began to purr as she spoke. "He was a handsome cat, young and full of grand ideas. Like someone I know." She softly tickled at Sunflower's sides, making him squirm, but he was listening and struggling not to laugh.
"We met at a social event, a dance. Several purrsian families were there. I think I was the victim of matchmaking elders." She clucked her tongue against sharp teeth. "We hit it off fairly quickly. He had grand ideas of starting a trade enterprise, and I was swept along with his trade goods, helping him get from place to place. I became skilled at driving the beasts, on both two and four legs. He began letting me do the bartering, and I did so. Things were good and happy, until I began to show."
Sunflower perked an ear. "Show?"
Willow patted her belly. "With you, little one. You were making your mother fat, as little ones do. Your father balked at the news. This wasn't in his plans at all. I said it was a sign we should be done with it and be married, he disagreed. He fancied himself a fine slice of meat, and wanted to become wealthy enough for a collection of cats, not just me. Rather than risk being tied to me alone, he cut loose, and vanished one evening."
Sunflower frowned. "I... could have sworn I saw him."
Willow tilted her head. "You never saw him. How would you recognize him?"
Sunflower shook his head. "I dunno. I just thought I did. Was he a bad person?"
Willow frowned with thought a moment. "If I put aside his ambitions, and his faithlessness... I suppose not. He was a good person, mostly. He let his ambitions get the better of him." She tapped Sunflower on the nose. "Never forget to cherish what you have in your paw before chasing after something else."
She hefted him up and carried him to the bed, setting him down on its softness. "And never forget you are a worthy cat, who can do what he sets out to do, so long as you keep your priorities straight."
Sunflower did not seem appeased, claws unsheathing into the bed. "But... the girls don't need me. They're going on an adventure, and I'm just... part of it, not part of them. They like me... kinda... like a friend, not a boyfriend, and I abandoned them! I ran off when they needed me. And then they had to rescue me, I was so embarrassed..."
Willow softly ran a finger down under Sunflower's chin and raised it up to face her. "You go to your saviors tomorrow, and you thank them. Then you offer to do something special for them before we leave the city." She drew out a few gold coins and handed it to Sunflower. "Take this. Get them something delicious to eat, and some pretty things to put in their hair. They all have such lovely hair."
Sunflower gave a slow nod. "Will that make them like me more?"
Willow smiled. "Don't force it. Be a good friend. It may grow into more, or not. Enjoy your time with them, even if it never grows into more than friendship, it should be treasured dearly." She held out an empty paw. "As I said, don't forget to value what is already in your paw. There is no shame in being rescued by a girl, especially a pony girl. They are a fierce lot, and are used to protecting their males."
Sunflower gave a little smile. "I'll make our last day here super special."
Willow nodded. "Do exactly that. They'll want to be distracted and entertained. Be there for them. Now, time for bed. I love you, my dear kitten."
Sunflower bounced to his paws and kissed Willow on the cheek. "Love you, mom."
Aw. Some pretty high-level feels up in here. Apparently when you heard that AJ cries on the inside you took it as a challenge.
Y'all are or perhaps y'all'r
y'all have...y'all would be better off
5969291 Fixed! I hesitated a lot starting this chapter, but it came out well once I got to it.
5969314 I think you got the characterization right, and that's no small feat for a scene like this.
After a psychological gauntlet like that, some bonding and decompression time is definitely a good idea. The party has come out of this stronger, and the Crusaders have learned their lesson about side quests. Those are all well and good for people with nothing better to do, but not for extraplanar refugees.
Sunflower, meanwhile, learns the finer points of courting ponies. Or some less blunt points, at the very least. It's unclear whether he'd be willing to follow the Crusaders to Equestria, but at the very least, he'll be able to apply those lessons later in life and be a better cat than his father.
The use of "their own" twice in the same sentence is cumbersome. Change that last part to "leaving Applejack alone with the girls."
Shouldn't that middle part be "you wouldn't have been with him"? Does he not know that his parents have split up?
Didn't she say before that he'd run off in favor of a younger, and richer, purrsian female?
Also, while not an error, this disproves my idea that her last name changed from "Leaf" to "Longtail" due to divorce.
He just "thought" he did.
All the feels.
Lose one sanity point.
5969366 With the coming of the dawn, the typos melted away.
No more adventures.
No more adventures.
No, more adventures!
5969432 Hah, the power of the comma!
5969447 Sometimes it's there, other times it's not: the comma chameleon!
I just want to cuddle up with one of the girls and hug her this chapter is so sweet.
Scootaloo is first choice.
Harts Fire
5969399 This is a chapter that needed to happen. After a place like Restful Oaks, it's inconceivable that the group wouldn't be carrying some heavy burdens that would need to be worked through. Just one chapter of that is the bare minimum, I'd say, as this had them doing what absolutely had to be done in terms of letting out the anxieties that that place dredged up for them.
For Applejack, this really brings up issues that remind me of her story with regards to getting her cutie mark. She knows exactly where she belongs and what she's supposed to be doing; that she isn't there - which she perceives as failing in her responsibilities, regardless of the reasons why - is clearly eating her up inside. All the more so for the fact that her little sister and her friends are in a position where, no matter how hard she tries, she can't keep them safe, and that her attempts to do so have usually ended up with her being severely injured as a result.
What the CMC did here was remind Applejack that there's a reason why she keeps ending up so badly that she needs to be rescued; it's because she's the one that keeps throwing herself into severe danger for their sake. In fight after fight, she's taken on the worst opponents and put herself into the most dangerous positions so that Apple Bloom and her friends don't have to, and she's paid the price for it more than once. That she needs to be rescued isn't a sign of failure so much as it is a sign of how much she's willing to suffer so that her little sister doesn't have to. This scene was essentially the CMC saying "we know what you've done for us; thank you."
What struck me as notably absent, however, was any of that same pathos on the part of the Crusaders themselves. Admittedly, they weren't the ones who were captured in that place - this chapter seemed dedicated to soothing the mental wounds of those who were - but it's hard to believe that they aren't about reaching their wits' end. They've resolved to keep their focus on getting home, and no more adventuring (much to Scootaloo's chagrin), but I'm still struck by just how much these children are keeping it together in the face of such constant threats to their safety.
Sweetie Belle has been showing signs for some time that she's reaching her limit, and Apple Bloom seems to be following suit. Only Scootaloo is enjoying the situation, interpreting it more as excitement than fear. That's entirely in keeping with their personalities that we've seen so far, but I keep wondering, at what point do they need somepony to comfort them when they finally can't take it anymore?
Having said all of that, I'm glad to see that Sunflower isn't nearly as traumatized as I would've thought. Notwithstanding his daddy issues, he seems to have taken everything that happened there to just be embarrassing, as though they caught him chasing a cricket. Even with regards to his father, I'm surprised that he took everything his mother said so well - I was really expecting him to say "so the reason dad left was because of me?" That's one of the classic ways that children from "broken homes" tend to internalize all sorts of bad things, because they perceive that they ruined their parents' lives somehow and so subconsciously make bad decisions to punish themselves for that.
Of course, Sunflower did have some pathos - which was very well done, in that it was proportional to the degree that someone that young was able to appreciate not finding favor with members of the opposite sex - regarding how things were shaping up (or rather, not shaping up) with the girls. Sunflower is quite aware that he's just a passenger on their journey, and he doesn't know how to change that.
In that regard, his mother's advice isn't wrong; in fact, her telling him to take them out and treat them is probably the best thing that he could do for them at this point. But there's still an undercurrent to her advice that bothers me a little, and having ruminated on it some, I think that it's as follows: she seems to keep warning him to prepare for failure, at least where romance is concerned.
Now, I can't discount the value of this advice. You should prepare for the worst. But she's not telling him to likewise hope for the best, at least not where the fillies are concerned. She does believe that he can do anything he puts his mind to in general, but with regards to the girls, her advice tends to be the same thing over and over "if it happens, then it happens. If it doesn't, then treasure that at least you have their friendship, if not their love." Even her advice about how to treat them to a day on the town seemed more like advice on being friendly, rather than being romantic (though there's room to interpret that as going the other way).
To put it another way, she's not offering any romantic encouragement; it's all cautionary tales. I'm not sure there's ever been one point where she's said "you absolutely have what it takes to be an alpha cat with a pride of your own; those girls would be lucky to have you." That's not the same as squashing his dreams, to be sure, but dreams can die just as much from a lack of nurturing as being stomped on outright.
Which, now that I think about it, might be a clue to how Willow thinks of the entire situation: as being doomed, at least insofar as Sunflower's romantic aspirations are considered. Maybe it's because she doesn't think he has what it takes to be an alpha male, maybe it's because she knows the girls are inevitably going to want to leave Everglow (and soon), or maybe it's because she's still very keen of her own broken heart when her mate left her and she doesn't want her son to go through that and so is trying to dial back his burgeoning crush. But either way, most of how she's acted with regards to Sunflower's feelings for the other girls makes sense if you think of it as her trying to cushion a forthcoming, inevitable blow.
Poor Sunflower...it seems like this is going to end with his heart broken three times over.
Ah
Perhaps the CMC have gotten their cutie marks in typo eradication?
5969632 Given Willow's own bad experience with romance, she might just be so jaded as to not believe in "true love" or whatever you want to call it. She isn't encouraging Sunflower to find a permanent relationship because she doesn't believe there is such a thing. Although to give up after a single failure implies that she was pretty fragile as a kitten.
Just one possible interpretation.
5969632 Willow is a wounded cat, and a survivor. She doesn't want her boy to go through what she did with such wide, innocent eyes. Better that he hit the ground, which he must be doomed to do, as gently as possible and not be broken to pieces as she once was. The girls are perfectly lovely, but they, as you point out, want to go home, and are clearly NOT looking for romantic partners. This leaving the fact that they're ponies, not cats, out of it. That could be seen as a positive, considering how poorly Willow gets along with her fellow felines.
The girls have channeled their terrors in different ways. Scootaloo is riding the high, taking this all as an amazing exciting thrill ride. Even when she couldn't fly for a moment, she went with it, and is proving herself to be one hell of an adventurer for it.
Apple Bloom is doing her best to be the leader of the group, but she's clearly gotten over seeing it as innocent play time, and she's looking forward to getting home, where it's safe, and the worst thing you can expect from Diamond Tiara is mocking laughter, and not butcher knives. Oh how innocent she seems now.
Sweetie Belle has firmly decided that Everglow sucks. There's not much more to it. If there was a raging inferno with a portal to home on the other side, she'd probably dash through it and hope for the best. She loves her friends dearly, and they're keeping her sane and supported, but she wants home, like now. She'll never whine at Rarity when she needs help with a dress again.
5969748 I don't think that there's enough to credibly push that theory - Willow seems somewhat standoffish as a mother, I'll grant you (though less so after this chapter), but if she honestly believed that romance was a lie then I can't see her being as supportive as she has been of her son's desire to win over the girls. She can be cold, but she does love her son, and letting him throw himself wholeheartedly into (what she perceives to be) a doomed, painful enterprise isn't something I can see her doing.
5969850
Maybe she thinks that males toying with females and then moving on is the natural order of things, and the best Sunflower can hope for.
5969909 I prefer to speculate while making as few assumptions as possible, and keep what assumptions I do make fairly grounded; what you're positing seems like it's reaching a fair bit from what we've actually been shown (and told in the comments).
It should be: I became skilled at driving the beasts because she's talking in the past tense.
7718897 Fixed!
5969632
You right some of the longest comments I’ve ever seen..
9405229 I'll take that as a compliment.
I only wish I had the time to keep doing that now, but lately all of my effort is going into writing my own story, which ironically is a direct sequel to this one.
EDIT: Deleting the original comment and replacing it with a copy set in the correct chapter. Sorry about that!
9405251
I’ve been looking forward to that one eversense I started reading this one. Looked at it three or four times, and I am now noticing that it’s written by a different author
9405638 It's my own spin-off, following Lex's adventures. I hope you enjoy it when you get there!