A Mangled, Scrambled, Slice of Life(That Was Overcooked, to Boot!)

by SpectralUnicorn

You Can Take the Mare out of the Country...

It was inside a tree house, a house made out of a tree, that Applejack found herself. Specifically, finding herself waking up far earlier than the studious unicorn she had to mimic for a day. With a hearty yawn, she was up and ready to go at 5 in the morning. “Perhaps I should tend to my library!” the orange ersatz unicorn suggested to herself out loud, remembering she was Twilight Sparkle.

She galloped to the main library room, where a purple dragon was snoozing away in his basket bed. Not Twilight trotted over to wake him up like she did with her little sister. She said, “Giddup, time for workin’!” She then remembered that Spike wasn’t Apple Bloom. Too late. The baby dragon rose slowly, perhaps passive-aggressively.

“Uuuughhhhgh, what is it, Twilight?!” Spike snapped, while in a haze. “Why are you up?!”

Applejack scrambled for an excuse, trying to suppress the Southern accent. “Uh, well, I feel that we must, um, you know,”

“No, I don’t. Why do you sound like Applejack?”

“Ha ha! Really? Ah-I hadn’t noticed…sorry about waking you, I guess I just couldn’t…sleep!”

“…Oooookay. G’night!” and Spike promptly collapsed into a ball of snoring, purple scales.

Applejack took a sigh of relief. No further need to try to bluff her way out of questions from Spike, she thought. She decided that, when in Twilights’ hooves, read a book! One in particular caught her eye. “The First Beer, huh.”
It kept Applejack awake as Spike slept. It told of a little girl who evades her older sister and coerces her sisters’ friend and older brother into buying a case of beer for her. While reading all of this, Applejack couldn’t help but feel that if Apple Bloom were to run amok like that, she’d beat her little sister like a mother from Dark Ages. Thankfully, the farm mare knew she raised her sis right.

Before the fake librarian knew it, it was 9AM. Spike was just awakening, and getting some cereal. Fake Twilight was ready to face the dragon head-on. She trotted in, offering Spike a nonchalant “Gooood morning, Spike!”
Spike looked back at her and responded, “Applejack, why are you in Twilights’ house with a cone glued to your forehead?”

Well that didn’t take long for the dragon to notice! She did look mighty silly, she thought to herself. She had an orange paper cone with lines on it adhered to her forehead to simulate a unihorn. She also had her hair, which was typically in a ponytail, fixed to fall down off the sides of her face, à la Twilight Sparkle. Applejack cleared her throat, but couldn’t think of something to say, so she told the truth, sort of. “Spike, Rainbow Dash” earth pony Twilight explained with a wink, “ain-isn’t here right now.”

Spike just put the milk carton down and sighed in response. “I didn’t ask about Rainbow Dash. I asked why you’re trying to act like Twilight.”

He didn’t get the hint. Time to tell the truth. “Okay then. Spike, come close.” She gestured the dragon towards her and whispered her predicament in his ear. Celestia or no Celestia, she was not a damned liar, she was the Element of Honesty. Not that she felt like sharing it with the world right now. In fact, she felt tense at rebelling against the Princess’s orders, no matter how inane they may be.

“So Twilight’s acting like Rainbow Dash right now?”

“Yup. I mean, indeed.”

“Huh. But why would the Princess make you somepony everypony knows can’t use magic?” Spike pondered.

“It beats the bu-perplexes me too.” Applejack concurred, making sure to keep up the façade nonetheless.

“Welp, better go on about our day! You know,” Spike was clearly preparing a way to exploit the situation, “Twilight usually takes me to Sugarcube Corner for lunch!”

“Heh, suuuuure she does!” The orange mare shot the ultimatum down immediately.

“Actually, she does, I mean, you do.” Spike was happy to play along. “I mean, who else works so diligently to organize all of her books? Or rather, the ones she’s not organizing with her magic.”

Low blow. Well, the argument was convincing, entirely true or not. Spike pledged to labor endlessly until noon, in which the fake unicorn would try to help, adverse to laziness and all. She even helped organize some books, hoping that Twilight wouldn’t mind the spit on the books.

After finally putting the last book in, called Mouths of Holding: The Earth Pony Immune System, Replacement Twilight and Spike wandered off to the lively center of Ponyville, where Sugarcube Corner, and all of its’ tasty treasures, lie.
Before they could get to downtown, however, they noticed a randomly-placed wooden fence in the distance. In front of that fence were three familiar-looking ponies, the one on the far right was a large, crimson stallion with a farmers’ build. He was leaning against the wall with a stern expression on his face, while looking away from the other two, with his forelegs crossed. The middle one, a mare with her pink mane in a ponytail under a familiar Stetson was darting her eyes from side to side, both bashfully & nervously, all while crouched on the ground. She had a hardly touched can of beer in front of her. The last one, a filly, had a six-pack of beer in front of her, holding a can in her hoof, coupled with a look of serene satisfaction.

“APPLE BLOOM!” exploded Applejack, fed up with the acting, rage pouring from her ears like a magma plume.

No notice from the three, though. They couldn’t hear the mare yearning to get medieval on her little sister because they were too involved in their deeply philosophical conversation.

“Yup,” the filly said.

“Eeyup,” the stallion forced, still not looking at his little sis.

“Mmmmm hmm,” the pink-haired look-alike uttered in agreement.

Applejack quaked the ground beneath her with each step she took towards her immoral little sister. Spike followed tentatively, not wanting to be in the crossfire of this.

“Eeyup,” the curious foal concurred, with her older sister standing over her.

“Nope!” Applejack grabbed her sisters’ foreleg with a vice grip found only between the jaws of the strongest crocodiles.

Neither she nor Apple Bloom were even sure if the orange farming pony would even have a sister after today. Big Mac wasn’t sure of it. Fluttershy-as-Applejack was frightened for Apple Bloom. Spike could only hope she’d live after Applejack was done with her.

Wait, live! Spike saw his brief life flash before his eyes as Applejack stormed towards his general direction. She stopped in front of Spike, handed Spike Twilights’ wallet(Celestia was thorough) and flatly said, “Enjoy yourself.” Spike took the wallet, knowing that Applejacks’ day was kind of ruined with her having to impale her little sister. She stomped past Spike after that, Apple Bloom in tow and on death row.

“Man, poor Apple Bloom.” Spike mourned to the ponies left standing. “She really Guess she’s pretty bucked! She must’ve squeezed an orange in Applejacks’ eye, huh?” Big Mac & Fluttershy-posing-as-Applejack just shot daggers at the pun-lobbing dragon. “What is this, wooden fence of the living dead?! At least humor me!” The daggers got sharper. Spike, realizing his callousness, tried to make amends. “...who wants to go to Sugarcube Corner with me?” he offered, holding up Twilights' wallet.

After a minute, the stallion responded. “Count me in,” Big Mac accepted. “I could use some cream puffs after Apple Bloom took us through all that!”

“Yeah. I’m-I mean,” Fluttershy was scouting for her motivation. “Ah’m comin’ with you! Ah’d bring Apple Bloom, but, uh, Ah think she’s had enough!”

Everyone had a good chuckle at that joke. Big Mac then joined in. As they turned towards Sugarcube Corner, beer out of their systems, a single rainbow steak shot towards the base of an upside-down funnel-shaped tower, from Sugarcube Corner.

“Yeah, Rainbow Dash is Pinkie Pie today,” Spike responded, deadpan. “Princess Celestias’ orders.”

“Wait,” Big Mac said. “So is that why…” As Big Mac pointed towards her, Fluttershy nodded. “And…” she and Spike nodded. After a minute of absorbing all of that, the crimson stallion remarked, "Welp, you can take the mare out of the country, but you can't take the beer out of Apple Bloom!"

Everybody busted a gut at the joke. “Let’s order them creampuffs!” Flapplejack proclaimed, good moods finally showing themselves. And so they merrily walked to Sugarcube Corner, with no need to pummel anyone ever showing up.

Comments

[LeJokstereerre]

... ... ....

[pahnazd]

this is getting better with each chapter

[Lazygamer313]

HA, poor Applebloom, she gets the punishment while every onepony ditches her and leaves to grab treats . MAN, why didn't I read this sooner?!?