Vanish

by Mr Mlp

The Chores

Granny Smith woke up to the sound of three little fillies laughing in the hall. With sleep in her eyes and she slowly trudged out of bed and shuffled out of the room preparing to get ready for the inevitable struggles of the day. Big Mac did the exact same, dreading the pile of work need to be completed. Of course the younger ponies were just as chipper and energetic as the day before. They to made sure they were properly equipped with the mental and physical abilities to help out on the farm.

When they all were fixed up to begin they met up together just outside the door of the barn. "Now scoots and sweetie this is your first day out on the farm, so I want ya'll to be careful out there."

"Yes granny smith!" The two called out. "Alright now applebloom you know what to do. Scoots I want you to help Big Mac with bucking down some of dose apples."

"Oh sweet!" Scootaloo then quickly sped up to Big Mac as they went to their designated area. "And sweetie I want you to help me with squashing apples into apple cider."

"Do I get to try some?" "Heh, sorry kid but no." In the distance applebloom could hear sweetie sighing deeply. She went down to the animals, grabbed her basket, and feed the chickens. She knelt down to feed her favorite chicken who was affectionately named Gloria. "Isn't this going to be such a great week Gloria?" The chicken just tilted its head in confusion. "Oh don't look at me like that, with the amount of time we have together is basically doubled even tripled we can do so many things!" Gloria gazed blankly and then returned to her own food.

Applebloom ignored that and continued to feed the other animals. Second was the pigs, then the cows, and after many different species she was finally done and moved on to the toughest job on the entire apple family farm. The sheep. What made it ever so difficult was one specific sheep that hated her with all of its guts. Somehow every time she would enter the pen it would conspire with the others and get every sheep to purposefully avoid her like the plague. This compared with the fact that she had to shave the coats on every single one of them made it a living nightmare.

She told Granny how much she despised this part of the job, but Granny would always make her endure the hardship. With her usual determination she tussled with them, barely one by one shaving the white fur. Then came the final showdown against the devious sheep named Jester. With all her effort she tackled it and got the soft fluffy fur off the diabolic and frankly mean sheep. While it was one of the most painful things she would have to get through the pure euphoria knowing she had completed the task was unmatched.

At the end of the day she still knew Granny would have given her the task if she knew she couldn't do it. She loved Granny for the amount of trust and belief she put into her. Remembering this allowed her to get back to her work with twice the energy she had before.

---

Meanwhile scootaloo was learning the delicate art of bucking down apples. "How hard do I get to buck Big Mac! Just point to the nearest tree and I'll get all the apples down in no time flat!" "Eeyeah, nope."

"What?!"

"You will be catching the apples as they fall from the trees."

"You gotta be kidding me right?"

"Nope."

With severe dissapointment she slid a basket next to the tree and watched the apples bounced on the ground as she tried to catch as many as she could. Afterward they placed the rest into the basket. "Can't you at least let me buck down a few?"

"Nope."

"Come on! Just a few. It'll make me a stronger pony anyway."

"Nope"

"Can I pay you?"

"Nope."

"Will you say anything besides nope?"

Big Mac paused for a second, but then recovered and replied with a simple "Nope."

About an hour of awkward silence and the noises of fresh fruit landing on the ground had passed. This truly sucked. Rather than spending the whole day with her friends she was forced to work with one of the least talkative ponies in exisitance. Big Mac was simply in his own mind and going through the motions like any old day. Scootaloo sighed heavily and when the sound had reached his ears he had realized the boredom that she must be going through. Having sympathy he attempted to strike up a conversation.

"Say scoots, what do you normally do during the day." Scootaloo immediately perked up. "I love to ride my scooter around town, hang out with Rainbow Dash, and practice my flying skills."

"That's nice." They fell back into uncomfortable silence again. Big Mac expected the conversation to last longer. Feeling bad for a second time he gave it another shot. "How may scooter tricks do you know?"

"Oh I know a lot, like a whole lot! I started to use my scooter about two years ago and I've already learned so much from it. I think I've learned over 50 tricks by now. I even ride it often through ponyville. Most of my tricks have come just from riding through the town during the day, but I've also gotten to know quite a fair few from different ponies. Believe it or not I learned a trick from derpy!"

"Woah."

"I know right. The other ones you may or may not know. My absolute favorite tricks have come from my..." Scootaloo came to a hault in her speech cutting off the rest of the sentence from escaping. "You okay scootaloo?"

"Yeah... I'm fine, just thought of something that's all."

"It's about your parents isn't it?"

Scootaloo took in a deep breath. "Yeah." She didn't want to continue on with the subject, but Big Mac felt the need to pry. "Are they gone?"

"Well... yeah. They've been gone for a little while. My dad used to ride on his scooter all the time when he was young until he got into nature and stuff. Once my father and mother got married since they both were passionate about nature my dad abandoned his scooter. Before he passed he taught me a few tricks. I do miss him a lot, but I've cried enough tears over them. I had to move on eventually."

They stood still for a bit letting the gentle wind blow through their manes. Big Mac breathed in and spoke. "Do you want to buck down a few trees?" Scootaloo's face exploded with interest. "Really?!"

"Eeyup!" Scootaloo raced to her first tree turned back, lined it up and shot her hooves backward with all of her might. The tree shook, but nothing was coming down. "That's okay, eventually you'll get it." She bounced over to the next one with just as much enthusiasm. "Hey scoots."

"Yeah?"

"I know what it's like to not have your parents around, keep fighting Scootaloo." Scootaloo gave a soft smile and struck another tree hearing a tiny little apple find its way to the ground.

---

Sweetie Belle walked into the kitchen with Granny Smith. They each had their own equipment for squeezing apples into cider. "Alright sweetie first we're gonna peel the skin."

"Alright, then we squeeze then right?"

"Excatly. Lemme know if you need any help." Sweetie got to peeling and squeezing and it actually was quite satisfying. Knowing that your effort was contributing to something lots of ponies loved was a great feeling. She was actually having fun getting the juice from the fruit. She was getting into the groove. She got so much into the groove she was humming a little tune while she worked.

Then her little tune progress into a soft singing and then full on jamming out. "Woah! Settle down there youngster!"

"I can't help it, im enjoying this to much."

"Well it's a lovely singing voice that you have."

"Thank you granny!"

"You ever think about showing that talent of yours with the world?"

"Not really, I just kinda do it. I do find it fun, but not really something to show off."

"You might find it very fulfilling to get yourself outhere like that dear. If I had a voice like that, heck I'd be halfway across Equestira singing my heart out to a huge crowd."

"Yeah..."

"If you like to do it sweetie don't be afraid to do more with it."

"I'll think about it."

"Good."

They individually went back to their squeezing until sweetie Belle decided to strike up another chat. "What do you think applebloom is doing right now?"

"If I know that youngling she's working very hard right about now. She probably moved on to her most dreaded chore of the day."

"What is it?"

"Feeding the sheep. She hates it so much." Granny let out a small chuckle.

"Why do you keep letting her doing it then, it sounds terrible."

"Because she can handle it fine. I'm proud of her you know. She's done more work than her own sister when she was this age."

"Wow."

"Yeah I know. I'm tuff but fair on her. And I got many more years with her to be even tougher. It's for the best, and I love her dearly for what she does. Even for your crusaders thing. I've noticed she's been kind of a leader for you two. Just don't tell scootaloo that."

"Your funny Granny Smith."

"Why thank you! Now this apple cider ain't gonna make itself."

---

Each one of them sluggishly came into the living room after the success of the long day... well except for Sweetie Belle. They each plopped down on the couch, while granny sat in her chair. They then breathed out fully understanding they could really relax. However, the sweet sweet tranquility of it all was shattered by a loud knock on the door.

Granny instructed the crusaders and Big Mac to stay on the couch. Upon opening the door the image of Lyra was seen. "Hey um, I woke up this morning today and I found that Bon Bon had gone missing, so please if you find her please contact me." Lyra and Bon Bon had been dating for at least 5 years and were known as ponyville's cutest couple. To find out that Bon Bon had gone out and dissapeared was a kick in the stomach. They could not have compared to the amount of pain Lyra would be feeling at that moment. "I've been searching since the morning. Me and Carrot Top have been hanging up missing posters as well... but I've searched everywhere... I was hoping she was just out or something and didn't leave a note, but no... its only been a day, but I already miss her so much..."

The tone of her voice was broken. She was broken. Her body language, eyes, voice, and dimmenished color all told the same story. In a delicate soothing sound granny spoke. "I'm so sorry to hear that Lyra. We will be searching. Don't worry. Do you need to come inside and chat for a bit?"

"No, I have more missing posters to hang up. Thank you for the help though." She waved goodbye and drifted off the apple family property. Granny returned to the 4 still awaiting on the couch. "Did ya'll hear any of that?" They all nodded. "Sweetie Belle, Applebloom, and Scootaloo, go to your room. Me and Big Mac are gonna discuss plans for tommorrow. We'll see you in the morning."

The crusaders silently walked up the stairs and into the room. "I feel bad for Lyra..." Sweetie said in a soft tone. "Yeah," applebloom agreed. "Do you think we should do something to help?" Scootaloo asked. They pondered this question for some time and came to one conclusion. "Yes."

"How are we going to do that though?" Sweetie questioned hoping for a quick answer. "Well I suppose we should start with asking around if anypony had seen her." Scootaloo and sweetie both liked that decision. First thing in the morning they would go out into ponyville.

Nopony said a word.

"Well now that we've got that settled, what do you girls wanna do tonight?" Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle both looked at eachother and smiled. "Scary stories!" Applebloom rolled her eyes. "That's way to cliche!" And so they laughed, talked, and played whatever they want for the rest of the night. They were so into it that none of them could hear the screams that lied awake in the night...