Death of Mother Nature Suite

by Cynewulf

VIII. (B) Go North, Young Mare

“So, you’re telling me that the map is active again?” Applejack asked.

Twilight nodded. The others were late, which wasn’t that surprising. Fluttershy lived a bit of a ways out of town, Rainbow Dash was hard to find, and Rarity was in and out of town. Applejack arriving before Pinkie had been the only odd thing, but even Pinkie was starting to mellow with age. Mellowed in that she only three a party every few days instead of trying to force them into every hour physically possible, but it counted.

“It’s been, I don’t know, ages. But it’s a live again, inexplicably alive, and honestly this is an absolute royal-decree situation because I’m not sure when we’ll get another chance to study this phenomenon again.”

Applejack sighed. “Figured you were gonna say something like that. Also figures that I just got a bit more leeway with the farm and my time. Who is it calling?”

“Right now? Come look.” Twilight gestured towards the circle of thrones, and they walked together.

Applejack had been summoned via letter early that morning. More specifically, a letter had dragonfired into thin air about a foot in front of her nose out in the orchards and almost been trod upon by her brother as he struggled with some machinery. It had been a busy and altogether frustrating morning.

Mac had taken over command and she had taken the quickest of showers before striding along into town with a scowl.

The table before her was indeed alive again. It glowed, and immediately she saw who it was calling out to. Herself, Twilight, and Fluttershy. She blinked, squinted at it, and then shrugged.

“That’s a strange combination, if I say so myself.”

“Oh? What makes you say that?”

Applejack clicked her tongue and leaned against one of the chairs. Rarity’s, by the look of it. “Well, just sorta spitballin’ here, so bear with me. But we’re all friends. I love all y’all, you all love me. Just wanna say that and set the groundwork.”

“Sounds right to me. Thank you for saying so. It’s always nice to hear it out loud.”

“Glad to do it, sug. Anyhow, even sayin’ that, it’s obvious we tend to break up into different shaped parts when we scatter. Me an’ Dash tend to go together, right? Rarity and Fluttershy. You complicate it all, on account of bein’ everybody’s friend and never developin’ that kinda inner-circle preference? Ain’t sure what to call it.”

“You were all my friends at the same time, and so nopony had seniority,” Twilight said.

“There you go. That’s why you wear the crown,” the farmer’s daughter said with a grin. “But that trio of you, me, and Fluttershy? I love her and you, but that’s a strange threesome to head, ah…” she glanced down. “Huh.”

“What’s that?”

Applejack felt like her stomach had simply dropped. North. North along the path her dreams had taken, north towards whatever that other Applejack needed to find so desperately.

Not the Crystal Empire, not its Imperial Center and the warm valley that kept the snow at bay. North of that, past it for leagues and leagues. Her mouth felt dry. The trio of symbols kept going until it hit the end of the map, and then the map changed. It was as if it were on a scroll, and their whole view shifted northwards to lands she had seen on no map.

“The hay is that?” she mumbled.

Twilight shrugged. “I mean, I know… Kind of. I’ve never seen it do this!” As Applejack looked, she caught a manic grin on the Princess’ face. “This is totally new! Stars, Applejack, what does this mean? Aren’t you thrilled?”

“I’m... “ Applejack worked her mouth for a bit. “I ain’t, ah…”

“Oh, I think I know what’s going on here. That’s… yes. Henosia.” Twilight was bending over the new part of the map, taking it all in with glee. “I’ve seen it on some older maps before, but don’t really know as much about it. Nopony in Equestria does! Oh, I’m excited! I’ll write everyone!”

“Everyone,” echoed Applejack, flatly, not entirely there.

Twilight continued to fawn over the tiny ghostly country that the table had created. Applejack split her attention between Twilight and the source of her glee. Mountains, she noted. Mountains and deep valleys, dark forests and snowy hills. This Henosia looked to her to be a harsh land, the kind of place that hard and stern sort of ponies lived in. This wasn’t a farmer’s land. Too rocky, too angled. Not enough room. She guessed you could terrace it, but…

“I mean, well, not everyone obviously! But certainly a few ponies! Like Princess Celestia, for instance, and Luna too. Maybe Cadance, since I remember her mentioning it once. Why did she mention it? I forgot. I should ask her about that…”

“Right,” Applejack said, not listening in the slightest.

She bent down and saw a tiny village in the lonely northern forests of Equestria, as the Cutie Map sometimes did, as she drew closer, the details came more and more into focus. She saw a small subsistence farm and hills beyond it that felt familiar in a way that was almost sickening. Part of her wanted to look for a painted bridge that crossed a small gorge but she did not, no--she could not look for it. Either it would be there or it would not be there, and both things were unacceptable. They both felt like madness.

Twilight was still talking excitedly. “And I’m sure the city that it’s pointed to is the capitol, or has some official there, and we can talk to their rulers and establish official contact and there’ll be an embassy and Celestia will be so happy! Unless maybe we used to have one but then we lost contact, and we’ll be reviving an old alliance or something, and maybe that’s what the map wants! Or--”

Applejack nodded numbly. She looked up to where her cutie mark sat with the others. It rested over a tiny pinnacle, a great tower rising above a miniature city, all of it on a great rocky expanse without much in the way of a flat approach in any direction. She saw then, with a soft gasp, that it was a city suspended, perched upon a series of peaks. The ground here was not merely rocky but was in fact made of great mountainous thorns of white that interlocked above an abyss, and below she saw rushing water.

Her heart skipped a beat, and she was for the briefest of moments, there upon the walls. She felt the wind rake her mane back and claw at her coat. She felt it pick up the duster and send it flapping behind her, and she felt it roughly tear her hat away.

With a mute cry she turned to try and catch it, only to find herself in Twilight’s Palace of Friendship, in old Ponyville made new again, with no wind and no city and no rushing water below.

She shivered. The cold in the wind stayed with her, chilled her core.

“--Though, now that I’m thinking about it, if we had ever had contact in the form of an embassy, wouldn’t we have made some sort of… record…? Applejack, are you okay?”

Applejack startled, lowering her stance as if to run or fight. Her turn was so fast she almost capsized and hit the floor of the palace shoulder first.

“Y-yeah, I’m fine. Don’t you worry none,” Applejack said creakily. “Just… kinda got lost in thought there.”

“Oh. Oh! Yeah,” Twilight flushed. “Sorry. I kind of got lost in thought myself, there. I’m just so excited!”

“For travel?” Applejack said with a smirk, trying to remember how to act like herself. “Strange, if you ask me. Don’t you travel an awful lot, bein’ a princess and all? I thought you were in Griffinstone just a month or two ago.”

“Oh, I was. And it was great,” Twilight said. “Remember how disappointed I was when I couldn’t go with Dash and… who was the other one? Was it Rarity?”

“No, there was one like that, but I think that one was Rainbow and Pinkie.”

Twilight hummed. “There were so many, weren’t there? Dozens, I think.”

“At least,” Applejack replied. “At least that many, maybe more.”

Twilight sighed, and smiled a loose, goofy smile as she sat down in her chair and sprawled out. She still seemed bouncing with energy, but Applejack thought she would save the rest of her spiel for the Princess. “It was fun, wasn’t it?” she asked Applejack.

Applejack moved to her old seat and stroked the side of it with a hoof before sitting. “Yeah,” she said with a growing smile. “It was pretty fun. Adventurin’. Seein’ new folks and new places, solviin’ problems. Jus’ bein’ us and bein’ young.”

“Do you ever miss it?” Twilight asked.

“Sometimes.”

“I miss it a lot.” Twilight shrugged, and looked back down to the map. “I just… really, really miss it. I’m not unhappy,” she said quickly. “Not at all. I like my life. I love being able to help ponies, and I love being of use to Celestia and Luna. I even started liking some of the pomp and circumstance after a few years.”

“But you miss bein’ young and havin’ adventures left and right.”

“I do. We still do things together, at least. I mean, you five accompanied Starlight and me to Saddle Arabia this year, and at least a couple of you will probably be there with Celestia and I when we pay a visit to the Dragons. I’m thinking Rainbow is a definite candidate for that one.”

“And every now and then, we solve a friendship problem for old times’ sake,” Applejack said, smirking as she tiped her hat and relaxed. “You know, get folks to play nice and apologize, teach ‘em how to share, keep the world from explodin’ into war and famine. Just for old times’.”

“I would never have made it this far without you girls,” Twilight said. Her smile slipped a bit. “Never. Not in a million years. I may not have made it at all if it hadn’t been for you. I think about that ledge in the Everfree a lot.”

“I do too, from time to time.”

“I’m actually very glad that Fluttershy was summoned by the map,” Twilight said, and rested her head on her hoof. Her brow furrowed. “I see you and Rainbow quite a bit, and Rarity and I have dinner in Canterlot when she comes up to check on her shop, so at least once a month if not more. Pinkie is somewhat unavoidable, not that I wish to! But Fluttershy sometimes gets lost in the cracks. Even if nothing good besides that comes from this, having a chance to spend time with Fluttershy will be worth it.”

Applejack smiled. “You know, you’re the kind of pony who would see that right off the bat.”

“You think?”

“I know,” Applejack said firmly. “A lot of ponies start out with few friends and never get the hang of it. They just trudge along and exist. But you, Twi? You took to folks like fish to water. I think you always just needed a tiny push.”

“Maybe so,” Twilight said. “It’s kind of you to say, if nothing else.”

“And for the record, I’m pretty excited to see Shy myself,” Applejack said. “It’ll be nice to be on a real adventure again.”

But even as she said it, she felt the wind chill her again.

Comments

[ponygrad]

It's so nice to see everyone mature in a healthy manner. That's probably how a g5 would treat them. A bit older, a bit wiser, a bit calmer.

[SIGAWESOME]

[Yami Vizzini]

Hooboy... things may be getting in motion now....

[Ice Star]

Some nice character exploration here and introspection on the part of Twi and AJ.