This story is a sequel to Monsoon Season
When you're a filly, there isn't much point to seeing Homecoming as a holiday. Apple Bloom knows exactly how it works: you have to clean everything, make a big meal, there's a lot of adults talking around the dinner table -- so it's basically like every other day, except with extra chores and special plates. Homecoming is when you're supposed to be with your closest family, and she lives with them. She doesn't wait for Homecoming so much as she waits to get through it, or just... waits.
On Homecoming, you seek out your closest family.
Babs is spending Homecoming on the Acres.
Why?
(Part of the Triptych Continuum, which has its own TVTropes page and FIMFiction group. New members and trope edits welcome.)
Now with author Patreon, SubscribeStar, and Ko-Fi pages.
Cover art by GroaningGreyAgony.
I'm very excited for this! Or, I'm excited in the metaphorical "wrapping myself in a blanket with a warm mug of tea and getting cozy for this story, cuz I know it's gonna be a good one" way.
I'm looking forward to the rest of this one! A story about homecoming is perfect for the Thanksgiving mood. And I'm super invested in the Crusaders in this verse
Lotta analysis from Apple Bloom! Cool!
Ship? Why else is Apple Bloom the usual landing pad?
Is Babs moving in, too?
Or is this just her asserting her independence, given her cutie mark?
Find out next time, same time, same channel!
I'm going to want more Apples kneecapped by the end of this, aren't I.
& yet, somehow this doesn't apply to baths.
Well well well, look at that. A new story that match the season and centered around the Apple family in a holiday. Color me interested.
Sweetie cooking is a weapon in itself.
Scootaloo when The Secret get revealed to everyone and is remembering that exact moment: "Wait a minute..."
Added to the Tritych Continuum Rebooted the "Year 4" folder
Typo corrected
That was a good chapter goodluck with the rest of the story.
Well, with Sweetie still a member of the Crusade at that point, it would have transitioned rather rapidly into "Cutie Mark Fire Brigade, Yea!"
‘Home is the place where, when you have to go there,
They have to take you in.’
--Robert Frost, The Death of the Hired Man
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For saddest Frost poems, there's that and Home Burial. And maybe Maple.
I am worried about Apple Bloom here. I hate to say it but she needs to experience a bit more loss in her life to truly understand just what this holiday sounds like it is about. I wonder if talking to her sister about her issues would help? Then again there are plenty of real world people who hate the holidays with their families and try and avoid them at all costs.
Intheresting. This is where it starts to mean something for a child too busy to stop and think.
Oooh more progress on the Scootaloo situation, combined with Babs "Brooklyn Rage" Seed herself? Intrueging.
Looking forward to how this Estee story goes as always.
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No, she doesn't. Go back and reread the subtext. Apple Bloom hates Homecoming because of who isn't going to be there. Everything else is just her making up reasons to justify how she feels.
Also, you have to cross a river, there's only one very small boat, and you have a sack of corn, a chicken, and a fox...
That's a privilege of hosting the dinner. Everyone else just gets one night and expresses incredible envy. (Source: Have helped prepare Thanksgiving dinner for about thirty years.)
A thought the royal sisters would find very familiar, if for very different reasons.
It's kind of touching. Touching at a very high speed, but Scootaloo seeking out a friend/sister in spirit to land on speaks to a sort of bond that would be far more heartwarming if it weren't so back-bruising.
And here's our inciting incident. Apple Bloom's about to have her horizons expanded whether she likes it or not. Looking forward to the experience.
(Also, legal terms for the chapter titles. Interesting. Bloom's certainly only thinking in terms of her own benefit at the moment. We'll see how that shifts.)
This needs a genre tag. Maybe Slice of Life and Drama?
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*nods* That one's on me. (I was wiped yesterday.) Thankee.
Nice to see scootaloo and Applebloom at least taking again. Still wonder what happened to scoot’s parents, but I am also curious to see how this progresses and what happened to make Babbs come to Ponyville.
My gut says there is a divorce on the horizon for Babs' parents.
Either way, we have Babs who isn't with her family for some reason, AB the orphan, and Scootaloo who has been essentially abandoned. There might be a lot of drama under one roof, let's hope Miranda isn't called in.
Ah, classic postal delay with an upcoming holiday. At least they didn't have a pandemic slowing everything down as well.
Well, poor Babs, that two minutes must have been awful 😖.
I am guessing the letter is very short on details as well... You don't send your kid away for a holiday if everything is going well at home. At least it wasn't because she ran away.
Now... it's time to rest what family really mean.
I am not worried about the amount of food available thought.
Having been that traveling minor before I can empathize with Bab's anxiety about meeting family at the far end of a trip who you didn't directly communicate the plan to.
There is something off about the plan to send Babs if there wasn't a negative reply. there is something off about sending Babs for Homecoming at all. I think we are getting hints about some drama with the line:
at this point I'm predicting relationship problems. though there is the interesting nature of Babs referring to them as "The dobbins". I'm unfamiliar with the term and google provides no references even as slang outside of it being a last name of some folks.
Also these chapter names.
I'm going to try and predicts some future ones. I'm going for:
Plaintiff
A Priori
Ad Hominem
Cui Bono
and Erratum
Possibly In Situ
Good to see the noble language of Gesture has reached the Crusaders. They've learned a lot of things from their activities. (Like if they asked Miranda about careers in law enforcement, she would most likely manage to burst a blood vessel.)
*giggles for fifteen minutes straight*
Hey.
Hey Scootaloo.
HEY SCOOTALOO.
HEEEEEEEEY.
And this sort of crap is supposed to make Dulcinea a nicer pony how? She's the local face of bureaucratic fuck-ups and it's making her angrier than she usually is.
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Dobbin is generally a term for old horse iirc
The Akhal-Teke is a horse breed from Turkmenistan. Very interesting choice.
I have to love Babs effectively recreating the post-mark canon Crusade... though without ponies whose destiny is to help others find theirs, it's no wonder she's having retention issues.
Oh dear. Let's hope that won't come back to bite. And while I'm at it, I'd like a million dollars.
That may turn out to be important...
Flawless timing on Dulci's part in providing more substantive evidence. As Applejack noted, she did her part.
And so the stage is set. Looking forward to seeing what the performers do next.
The exact same thing happened with us when some relatives visited. We got their letter the same day they arrived, unannounced
.
I do not believe they've ever actually listened to that signal.
Nice to see another story with the new and improved reformed crusaders. ICR if Babs Seed has a different characterization than canon and therefore is more redeemable. I'd imagine that Estee has a deeper angle on the character in store.
Looking forward to more. Thanks Estee!
Hmm, things seem to be making this the "CMC Finally Get Their Marks" story or "CMC Reunite"?
And youch, Scootaloo is getting so many pokes from Babs just not knowing stuff.
I wonder about the Dater filly. Is she just trying to be more adult now that she's got a mark? Or does her mark relate to communication or something? Hmm.
Not sure if that's good or bad timing for the letter to arrive, but at least it's here, and nice speech from Applejack!
----
Typo:
yet/ > yet? [I assume?]
Babs is being set up as an 'independent' kid here. :coughs:
Although her description of her (so obvious) version of the Crusade was great, as was her exasperation at her 'graduates'. ^^
Why do I think Scootaloo will blurt out the Secret at the worst time now?
That was a good chapter.
11423187 I'm a-hoping for the "CMC reunite" ... them being broken up like this just feels so wrong to me
11423274 Pretty sure Scoots isn't in the know ... and that AJ, BM and the rest are putting extra effort into keeping her ignorant.
...how did I just notice this?
1) Malus is Latin for apple
2) In Geesed!, chapter 4 there's this
, and the words are in Latin, so Latin = author's substitute for Menagerie's Griffonant.
3) Apples have roots in Protocera?
👍
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However look at where Scootaloo was born she was born abroad and not in Equestria. Plus if she traveled with her parents extensively when she was younger there is a chance that she became subconsciously aware of the secret. A recent author’s blog talked about the Secret and how it is handled outside of Equestria and it was alluded to that this could be a way the Secret could be outed. This could be used as a soft reveal where Scootaloo outs it to her adoptive family and now they must react to someone who has no business knowing about it and has no part in it and now must be told to keep quite about it.
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Had a non-relatives version happen last year at the convenience store I work at that's part of a chain. Store management didn't get any emails or other warnings that our parking lot (and by association those of others in the chain) was/were getting 8(!) charging stations for electric cars until the very day the diggers showed up and broke ground.
I've generally got nothing against such things. But the parking lot wasn't too big to begin with, several spaces already get occupied by a delivery truck 1-2 times a night (therefore limiting where employees can park), and it took a damn-near YEAR for the chargers to be finished and usable. With customers asking me again and again in the meantime when they would be functioning and I had no answer, no one did. Plus one idiot peppered me with questions about how they would work when I had no freaking idea and wouldn't take, "I know nothing. I know nothing! Call me 'Jon Snow' because I know NOTHING!" for an answer.
I wonder how important this is gonna be, either for this story or for Glimmer.
Babs is really interesting. She actually successfully got some ponies to get their marks, but for some reason hasn't established her own. Her method of finding and pursuing already-extant interests or skills to build on makes way more sense than the Crusaders' plans. I was concerned for her when AJ just spoke so bluntly about her not being invited before the letter came in. That would be so upsetting if it'd been me. I probably would have run away back to the train if my relatives had yelled at me like that. Even though AJ meant well. I was lost momentarily when she was speaking about how it's not her fault-- part of me thought she might have been talking about Babs there? But then I re-read it and saw the references to her job and stuff, so I figured out it was Dulci instead.
Thanks for the update, Estee! I like Applebloom's growth and Babs' character with her way of speaking is entertaining to read.
I think this is the first Apple to Apple contact we've seen post fosse.
Ouch. Looks like Babs will be staying a bit longer.
That escalated quickly...
Parents that don't know parenting just don't want to deal with their daughter attitude. Gotcha.
Well, that will help relation between Apple Bloom and Diamond Tiara. (Sarcasm) Let's see how this goes when they are back in school, I am sure things will go oh so well.
Babs seems to always find ways to screw over AB even when she is not trying.
Oh Babs...
This story, as is traditional for an Estee fic, is quickly acquiring additional moving parts. I almost cannot wait to see them all fit together. Or, as is rather more likely, collapse under their own weight untop of the plot at the climax. The house of cards crumbling.