The Apple Thief
It was another sunny day at Sweet Apple Acres. The orchard was filled with apple trees, there was a gentle breeze, and Celestia’s sunlight was beaming down on everything. Applejack gave her next tree a hard buck. Apples dropped from the tree and landed in the wooden basket below. Applejack wiped the sweat off her brow.
“Hoo-wee!” she sighed. “Apple Bloom, can you take this one down to the house?”
“Sure thing, sis!” Applejack’s little sister replied.
She managed to get the basket on her back and slowly trotted towards the house.
“On second thought, Maybe I should take that?” Applejack asked.
“Nah, I got this,” Apple Bloom replied.
Applejack smiled as her sister walked away with the basket. She went over and picked up an empty basket and trotted on over to the next tree. She placed it under the tree and prepared for another buck. She reeled her hind legs back and gave the tree a hard buck. She heard the apples land in the basket. However, when she turned around, she only found apple cores in the basket. She gasped and her eyes widened.
“What in tarnation?” she exclaimed. “Something’s been eatin’ mah apples!”
She picked up one of the apple cores and inspected it closely. It had very peculiar bite marks surrounding it, not like any bites she had seen before. There were so many questions going on in her head. What had been eating her apples? Why would they leave the cores in the trees? How did nopony see them?
“It aint bats this time, that’s for sure,” she said to herself. “So what is it then?”
Her question was half answered when she heard something take a large bite. She swerved her head around to find one of her trees rustling. Soon after a single apple core dropped to the ground.
“Oops,” a voice said.
Applejack raised her right eyebrow, curious to find her culprit. She trotted on over to the apple tree. She decided to go behind it to see if she could spot her apple thief, and sure enough she did. Her mouth dropped at what she found. She spotted a very strange and peculiar creature resting on a branch in her apple tree. It wasn’t a bat and it wasn’t a pony; it was a fox. A red fox with black ears and green slanted eyes was casually resting on the tree branch, twiddling a fresh apple in it’s paws. It opened it’s mouth to take the first bite.
“Hey!” Applejack yelled.
“Hm?”
The fox closed it’s mouth and looked down, noticing the young farm mare.
“Oh hello,” the fox greeted. He sounded rather young and Applejack could tell it was a male. “Lovely day isn’t it? Not a sour grape in sight.”
Applejack cocked her head at his statement. She shook her head and focused back on the thieving fox.
“What do you think yer doing?” Applejack asked.
“What am I doing? I’m sitting in a tree, talking to you. I don’t see what else I would be doing,” the fox replied. “Though I would love to explore an old ruin and hopefully discover a mysterious artifact. That would make for an interesting adventure book, wouldn’t you agree?”
“I mean what do you think yer doing with mah apples?”
The fox in the tree turned and looked at the apple in his paws, then back at the irritated farm mare below.
“Your apples?” the fox wondered. “I found them first. Finders keepers. Snorers sneezers.”
Applejack stared blankly at the fox. He was getting more random by the minute. She wasn’t going to let his strangeness get to her though.
“Yer not from around here, are ya?”
“What gave it away?” the fox asked, sarcastically.
“Look, this here is private property. And unless you intend to pay for those apples, I suggest ya get out of here.”
“Pay for them? With what? My soul? My body? I’m sorry, but I’m saving myself for when I find a mate,” he joked. “Would you like to be my mate? Then I can pay for these apples.”
Applejack grumbled. “Ya know what I mean! With money! Bits!”
The fox cocked his head at Applejack.
“Bits of what?” he asked.
“Just bits.”
“Yes, bits of what?”
“You have to pay with BITS!”
“Bits of what? Bits of a shattered crystal? I haven’t come across one yet, but I’m sure something can be arranged.”
“Ya gotta pay with money called BITS!”
“Ok, I hear you. But bits of WHAT? You’re not making sense here.”
“Oh, I’M not making sense?” Applejack scoffed.
“Applejack?”
Applejack turned around and noticed Apple Bloom staring at her with her head tilted.
“Who are you yelling at?” she asked.
“I’m tryin’ to get this here fox out of our tree. He’s been eatin' our apples,” AJ explained.
“A fox has been eatin’ our apples?”
“Apparently. C’mere. He’s up there,” AJ explained, pointing to the tree.
Apple Bloom walked over to the tree her sister was at to see what she was talking about. However, she didn’t have the reaction Applejack was expecting.
“Uh, AJ, there’s nothing up there.”
“Huh?!”
Applejack turned her head around and her eyes shrank when she noticed that the fox was gone.
“What the? But he was right there!” she stammered.
“You sure about that, sis?”
“Yes I’m sure. You know I never lie.”
“I know. It’s just strange that you would find a fox in our trees.”
“Believe me, I’m just as confused as you are. But don’t worry, I’m gonna take care of this pest.”
“If there is one,” Apple Bloom teased.
“Just go get mah lasso,” Applejack ordered. As soon as she was gone-
“What a cute tiny pony.”
Applejack gasped and swerved around. She found the fox lying on a new branch in another tree, tossing the same apple around in his paws. Applejack trotted on over to the other tree.
“Is she your daughter?”
“No, she’s not. She’s mah sister.” she grumbled.
“Yeah, I kind of figured. You look way too young and pretty to be having kits.”
Applejack was taken back by this, she could feel her own face turning as red as the apples the fox was eating. First he stole her apples and now he was complimenting her? More questions raced around in the farm mares head.
“W-what?” Applejack stammered.
“Or whatever small ponies are called,” the fox finished.
“Flattery won’t get ya nowhere. Especially after what you’ve done.”
“What is it I’ve done?” the fox wondered. “There are no centaurs on the moon.”
“Don’t play du-wait what?” Applejack decided at this point that it was useless to try and make sense of this creature. She rubbed the bridge of her nose and looked up at the fox. “I don’t know where you get at, wandering into mah orchard and eating mah apples and claim them to be yours.”
“But they are mine. I have proof if you want to see it,” the fox interrupted, pointing to his stomach.
“Well obviously not the ones you’ve already eaten!” Applejack sighed. “Look, I’m not sure where ya came from or how things work there, but here in Ponyville, taking somepony’s apples without paying for them is called ‘stealing’. And that makes you, a dirty thief!”
“How dare you! I just took a bath this morning!”
“What? Alright, fine, that makes you a ‘clean thief!’ better?” she grunted.
“Thank you. But doesn’t it seem kind of ridiculous?”
“What does?”
“This whole scenario. Paying for food and all. Doesn’t it seem a little silly if it means starving? If one is hungry, then they should eat whenever they want. It’s bad enough that they’re starving, you don’t need to pour salt on the wound by making them pay for it. If they want something, then they should get it themselves. I am one of those ‘ones.’ I am merely surviving.”
“Surviving?!”
“Yes, surviving. I must do what I can to stay alive, just like you.”
“You and I, are not the same. I’ve worked really hard to farm these apples, and I’m not going to let a thieving fox like you steal them from me!”
“Applejack!”
AJ turned around and noticed Apple Bloom running with her lasso in her mouth. She turned and made sure the fox was still in the tree, which he was. She glared at him while her sister got closer.
“Don’t move!”
Applejack turned and faced her sister.
“I got yer lasso!” Apple Bloom chirped.
“Thanks, sis.”
Applejack started swinging her lasso around with her tail, ready to wrangle some fox.
“Now it’s time to-”
Her rope dropped to the ground once she found the fox was no longer in the tree.
“What?!”
She looked all around and noticed all the other trees were empty. Nothing but leaves and apples on all of them. This didn’t make sense at all. Applejack looked down at her sister, who had her right eyebrow raised at her big sister.
“He was right THERE!” Applejack yelled.
“Sis, are ya sure the heat isn’t getting to ya?”
“I’m not making this up! There was a fox in the tree, eating all of our apples! There are apple cores in the basket over there! Go look for yerself!”
Apple Bloom trotted on over to the basket to see what her sister was talking about. Once again, her reaction was not at all what Applejack was expecting.
“Applejack, I don’t know what yer talking about? These apples look fine.”
Applejack’s eyes shrank as she ran over the basket. Her jaw dropped when she found that the basket that was supposedly full of apple cores was now full of fresh, uneaten apples.
“W-What the?” Applejack stammered.
“Maybe it was Discord playing pranks again?” Apple Bloom suggested.
“What? No, he’s off somewhere on a trip with Fluttershy.”
“Oh, ok...Well, I’m just gonna go ahead and take these apples back to the house,” Apple Bloom said.
As she trotted back, Apple Bloom thought to herself, I think sis needs a vacation. She seems a bit over-worked again.
AJ’s mind was in circles. First the fox speaking in random quotes, then the apple cores suddenly turned into freshly-bucked apples, and to top it all off no one could spot the fox but her. She rubbed the back of her head and began to fan herself with her hat, hoping to blow the heat away. Something didn’t sit right with her.
“You lose again.”
The farm mare turned around and, yet again, found the fox. Only this time, he was walking out from behind one of the apple trees.
“You’re really bad at hide and seek, aren’t ya?” he teased.
As the fox walked out from behind the tree, his whole body was revealed. Applejack covered her mouth when she noticed that the fox did not have just a single tail... There were three long, wavy, and bushy tails on the young fox. Applejack couldn’t believe her eyes.
“What are ya?”
“Well I’m obviously no ordinary ‘thieving fox.’ Nor am I a talking umbrella. Just a simple fox spirit. I’m called Kichiro. It was a pleasure to make your acquaintance, whatever your name is,” the fox introduced.
The three tailed fox took a large bite out of his apple, juice spilling from his lips. Applejack shook her head and started to swinging her lasso again. The fox known as Kichiro noticed this.
“Huh?”
The lasso was thrown, flying right towards him. Kichiro jumped back and tossed his apple into the air. The lasso wrapped around the apple and was brought back to Applejack. The farm mare caught the bitten apple and growled at the three-tailed fox.
Kichiro chuckled nervously. “Sayonara!”
With that the fox bolted off.
“Get back here!” Applejack yelled as she ran off after him.
The fox laughed as he evaded in and out of the various trees and made sure to avoid the raging farm mare at all costs. He ran and jumped between trees until Applejack lost track of him. She panted and growled to herself. It was bad enough that she had a new pest problem, but the pest itself was something that she had never seen before. She didn’t even know how to comprehend this situation.
“Applejack, c’mere!” Apple Bloom yelled in the distance.
Applejack’s ears perked up. She raced back to the apple house and found her family in the kitchen. Apple Bloom was near the bucket she had recently taken in.
“Sis, we’ve got a problem!”
Applejack looked in the bucket and noticed that it was full of apple cores again, all with the same fox-like bite-marks.
“I knew it!”
Outside, Kichiro was resting behind one the trees outside of Sweet Apple Acres. He peaked his head around the trunk and looked back at the farm. He couldn’t help but form a curious smile as he gazed back at the apple’s house, barn, and orchard. He chuckled to himself, very amused with his first encounter.
“That was fun.”
Kichiro got back up and began to walk away from the acres and ventured deep into Ponyville.
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Love it so far (especially the part of the illusionary trick) can't wait to meet the otherrs
Thanks for the "Talented" part.
very intresting they way you did this is a hell of a lot better then what i did
8190164 Then what you did?
8190840 i did a Zoroark who is a fox but i think you did it better
8190847 Oh Ok.
I can see this going in an interesting direction, and you captured the character of kitsune pretty nicely. Speaking of said fox, Kichiro is cool so far! He's an interesting character for sure, but his personality is that of a textbook trickster; you did him quite nicely. Make sure he doesn't lose his character.
That said, the flow between some sentences in this first chapter kind of irked me. Here's an example:
Just these sentences being separated by periods and explaining their individual actions feels robotic and a little rushed, as if they only exist as scene transition and not the actual plot. Try transitioning between sentences with commas followed by conjunctions. I personally would have structured this paragraph as follows: "Applejack gave her next tree a hard buck, causing its luscious red apples to be released from the grasp of its branches, and into her basket where they would await the final stages of their harvest. Her hard work under Celestia's warm sun prompted the hardy mare to wipe sweat that had begun to soak her brow." That's one way to put it, but you do you. It's nice to tell a story, but presenting the setting makes it more enjoyable rather than rushing through the plot. A story has more value when the world it takes place feels alive.
Speaking of commas, they're an invasive species in this first chapter. There're tons of places where there's a comma where a period should be, and by consequence, there's a good bit of comma splices. Example A:
That comma between 'worry' and 'I'm' should be a period, unless you wanted to say something like 'But don't worry, 'cause I'm gonna take care of this pest.', then it would work. Two complete sentences can't held together by a comma; that's a comma splice.
One more little nitpick, beware of how you use ', and'. I just explained comma splices, but this transition is meant to circumvent that. Example: 'Barry went to the store. He bought milk' could also be written as 'Barry went to the store, and he bought milk'. Using ', and' is really meant to connect two complete sentences that go together contextually(or not. Your call), but using it to list subjects and predicates is always ok.
Despite my grammatical issues so far, the first chapter is promising in terms of story. It sets up enough to catch my interest, but so much that it's pretty much spoiled for me. I'll have to read the next chapter to see more, but keep this up! Let's hope Discord doesn't start to get jealous of a three-tailed fox!
Good concept, felt like it was trying a little to hard to make the fox quirky and charming, but overall solid.
This. This is how a fix with kitsune should be made... and I love it~
Wonderfully done, loved the antics the fox pulled with Apple Jack.
This review is brought to you by the group, "A for Effort".
Name of Story: The Four Foxes
Total Score out of 10: 9
Pros: Solid syntax and an appealing idea; plus no errors as far as I can see... You had a good editor. I've also never seen a story with a prompt like this before, so you get extra kudos for creativity.
Cons: A lot of "She"s and "Her"s. You should try and cut down on the pronouns, and instead find ways to combine sentences and use different starters. It becomes a little droning to see three simple sentences in a row start with "She," so you lost a point for that.
Additional Notes: Pretty darn good work here, from what I see. I hope you continue the quality work, but keep in mind those pronouns.
i.postimg.cc/SxRx6HQP/You-don-t-say.png
You know, I could totally see an exchange like this happening in the show proper.
I find it easier to lift my left brow. It takes me a couple of moment to get my right eye brow up