Apples For Thought

by I had no idea

Chapter 1

The warm rays of sunlight shone upon an abandoned dirt road, unused by critters or sentient beings. Once it was used as a small trade route between the capital of Equestria, Canterlot, and a small farming community. Time, and the invention of railroad systems rendered it useless as it is now. Early in the morning, the waking animals would greet the new day with various sounds.

This time, however, the road was quiet. Not even the usual chirping and various forest noises could be heard. Slowly, the silence was broken by a sound constantly getting louder: the stomp of hooves.

If anypony would have watched (they didn’t) they could see a blue-coated unicorn mare trot from Canterlot, burdened with the task of not getting her mane sweaty. Some would instantly recognise the Legendary Lulamoon, and get punched in the nose for reminding her of a less succesful time of her life. Others would name her as the Great and Powerful Trixie, which undoubtedly suited her tastes more.

She wore nothing, aside from a pair of saddlebags, and a disgruntled look on her face. This has not been a good week. Canterlot—no, never, there is just no chance she would try something again that ended so… displeasingly. She looked even more annoyed, until she came across a battered road sign. Disregarding the fact that it was left unattended for nearly a decade, the writing on it was still legible, stating what would await Trixie if she continued further down this road.
Ponyville.

She grumbled a bit, memories stirring, but then her expression changed from mildly irritated to anxious, and a bit nervous. In other towns, she’s gotten roses or loud, gleeful cheers from her fans, not… bears. Even if her "Trixie is better than you” show was met with disapprovement, or loud booing, she could always leave the town with her possessions untrampled. Unclawed. Unmaimed. Un… ripped-to-splinters. Just like this time in Canterlot- nothing would go her way.

She turned her thought process to more pressing matters. Going into the town would be a big no- there were always sore losers, who could not accept that Trixie once bested them, and therefore gained eternal superiority over the fools- no, they had to come back for rematches. And lose. And make a scene. And force her to drop her freshly ordered daffodil sandwich, and run towards the nearest town exit, dodging objects from a range of tomatoes to anvils. ("Never going back to that smithing town, by the way.” she thought.) That aside, the food she managed to bring with herself was running out, and she certeanly won’t eat anything growing in a lowly forest like this. Not after that whole incident with that fruit. Not that her almighty stomach coludn’t handle it, but having the colour of her eyeballs change to black made it very hard to appear benevolently superior, and more like making an impression of having two slices of eggplant in coffee instead of eyes.

Maybe she could get something to sate her growing hunger from the outlying farms and houses. All in all, there were hard-working ponies, whose time was taken up by their farms and couldn’t come to see the most amazing showmare in Equestria. No, scratch that, make it the most amazing showmare north of Macintosh Hills! And south from there, the second best in the world, (although she would never admit it openly) bested only by an amazing earth pony, who could sing a duet with himself, whilst riding an unicycle, juggling, and solving advanced mathematical problems. While she could sing as well as the next mare, that would not be enough to actually impress the audience; also, she kind of had enough of the advanced mathemathics part when she recited theorems and definitions for a whole week if somepony asked her a question. Perish the thought! This is a time of action and positive thinking, not apathy. She readied herself mentally for the ’task’ ahead.

"Well, Trixie is quite sure she could get her hoof on fine cuisine.” she claimed out loud. The trees surrounding her seemed unconvinced.

"Why, Trixie could even… ask nicely.” she said with a shrug, shivering at the thought. She paused for a moment. "Of course… Trixie is the best at asking nicely! They will plead for Trixie to take their meager food!” The unicorn was smiling now. Her ego reassured, she made her way towards the dreaded town, and the promise of dinner.

___________________________________________________________________________

As she continued her journey for about an hour or two, the trees began to disappear beside her. They were slowly replaced with emerald-green grass, and bushes of various sizes and colours. Trixie noticed some large buildings.

"Probably barns,” she pondered "because I am pretty sure I see orchards beside them. At least I think they’re orchards.” She gave the objects in question a more thorough look. "They’ve got to be orchards. They are too symmetrically spread over the hills to not serve any purpose.”

She chose one of them at random, embraced by a small wooden fence, and made her way towards it. She tried to arrive gracefully and elegantly to the entrance, but her stomach made her hurry more than it was to her liking.

"Come on, Trixie, you came for a bite to chew, not to have yourself chewed out for being so... straightforward.” She knew far too well the tendency of local residents to enter lecture mode.

Nevertheless, she stopped for a moment when the small fence ended in a rather large, sturdy-looking gate with the words "Sweet Apple Acres” painted upon them. Apple, apple, apple... Trixie had a faint feeling she was supposed to remember something important related to apples. Was she allergic to it? No, the Great and Faultlessly Perfect Trixie had never let mere food rule her! She could even digest bronze! But... what could it be then? Is she supposed to remember...

Then it dawned upon her.

Orange coat, a cowboy hat, heavy accent, and an apple-themed cutie mark. Owner of this very farm, as advertised by fliers. The pony, who was involved in both life-shattering incidents that happened with Trixie; but truth had to be told, she was a passive participant in her downfall: first, she inevitably fell for challenging the Magnificent Trixie, and the second time... well, she was more of an onlooker, with an ocassional expressing of opinion, but mostly cheering for her friend...

TWILIGHT SPARKLE.

Twilight Sparkle, that evil, evil enchantress! The champion of humiliation! The incarnation of magic! Worst of all, she had no notable faults, or at least none known in Canterlot. Trixie’s contacts there could not come up with any dirt on her, but some of them, whom attended a garden party with her nemesis, claimed she did evil dances, specifically, the "Calling of Tirek”, a dance used in ancient times to contact the necromancer. Others would say that she was just very bad at dancing- which seemed more likely, and acted as a soothing balm for Trixie’s wounded ego.

Trixie shook her head. These mares are still in Canterlot, so it’s useless to think what would they do if they saw her entering the farm... but she could get a semi-revenge by sating her hunger with Apple... What was her name again? Apple Slicer? Appleleaf? Whatever it was, it does not matter... the point would be eating her apples, which she would never willingly just give away for Trixie.

The unicorn inspected the wide space spanning from the barn to the orchards, looking across the fields with an expectant eye, hoping for somepony to spot. She nearly gave up, when she noticed a moving red blur near the trees. That should be a pony living here... or the apples here grew to a ridiculous size, and they only advertised the farm because they needed to feed the rogue apple with somepony. "By the night stars, hunger is making me silly. I need those apples, quick.”

As she trotted towards the redness, she could slowly see it was a stallion, a rather large one at that. He seemed to be too busy to notice the blue mare, harvesting the apples, nearly in constant movement from tree to tree, giving a well-placed kick, and then moving to to another.

Trixie slipped out of her saddlebags, and finally managed to slow down to a calm and collected pace, when she approached him. She put up her fake smile no. 13 (her favourite), and greeted the stallion.

"A nice day to you, good uh... farming fellow.” she began.

The stallion raised an eyebrow. "Howdy.”

Trixie stopped next to him, giving a thorough inspective look from hooves upwards... and upwards... and upwards... She started to feel a bit discouraged.

"By the swirling mane of Celestia, this guy is HUGE! What did they feed him, disliked family members?!” she thought. Sure, he seemed nice, and was rather handsome, even by refined tastes as Trixie’s, but the fact that he had the build to be your two best friends at the same time seemed a bit off-putting.

Distracted by this train of thought, she completely forgot the speech she prepared earlier, and blurted out her usual routine.

"The Great and Powerful Trixie demands that you give her an apple!”

The stallions' raised eyebrow quickly descended into a frown. "Nnope.”

"Uh, Trixie means” she stammered. "that a strong, and handsome stallion like yourself wouldn’t mind giving a poor damsel like Trixie an apple, would you?”

"Eeyup.”

"Umm... is that an "I’ll give you an apple.”?”

"Nnope.”

Trixie hang her dejectedly. She didn’t want to resort to this.

"Would you be so kind to give me an apple, please?” she pleaded.

"Nnope.”

Trixie was getting annoyed. "Then let me pay for them.”

"Nnope.”

"Then I’ll perform, just for you! You could see wonders beyond your comprehension, just for a meager apple!” The mare was quite angry at this point.

"Nnope.” The stallion seemed unfazed.

"FINE!” By now, she was shouting each word at the top of her lungs. "Then I’ll work for that accursed apple, doing whatever you need of me, and just try, no, I double-diamond-dog dare you to say no one more time!”

The stallion stood silently for a few moments, considering this. "Mmkay.” he finally said.

Trixie huffed. "Well then! Trixie already told you her name, so hurry up and tell her yours! Or did you just grow on a tree, and fell down one day?” she added mockingly.

The stallion looked at her with genuine surprise. "Howd’ya know?”

The world spun around Trixie. "Sweet, merciful Celestia, he IS an apple! I can’t even...” Then she noticed he was grinning. A farm pony! Grinning at her! Laughing at her! Making her look like a fool in front of every...tree. Trixie calmed down. Nopony was here besides them, so this little slip-up will not be known. She cursed herself again for not being able to think clearly while being this hungry. The stallion, seeing that she didn’t play along anymore, bowed a bit, and introduced himself.

"Ah’m Big Macintosh.”

"So, Big Macintosh,” she looked at him impatiently, "What would you have Trixie do?”

"Simple.” he stated, "Just pick’ em apples from ’ere,” he pointed to a larger tree, "to Ol’ Rooty. Then ya’ll get some dinner.”

It was Trixie’s turn to raise an eyebrow. "Is that all?” She lit up her horn—only to be interrupted by a quick poke on it.

"No magic.”

Trixie blinked. "Whuh..?”

"No magic.”

"But it would be perfectly safe!” Trixie argued.

"No magic.”

"But it won’t affect the taste!”

"No magic.”

"But—”

"No. Magic.” he said, his voice sounding final.

"Okay, okay, fine!” Trixie accepted defeatedly.” Geez, hold your horses! Kicking them’s fine, right?”

Big Mac nodded. "Eeyup.”

Trixie smiled. She could feel her confidence return. "Hah! Be amazed at the Great and powerful Trixie’s harvesting skills!” She walked up to a tree, and kicked it... with her front hoof. Not even the leaves budged on the tree, which was a feat itself, because a warm gust fiddled with all the leaves within the orchard, shuffling them gently. It seemed as if her kick made the tree more resilient. There was a poorly repressed snort coming from behind her. She felt her cheeks redden. She tried again with greater force. Nothing happened. Again! Nothing. Again! Not an apple stood harvested. She turned towards the red stallion, who was openly laughing now. Trixie glared daggers, scimitars, spears at him, until he finally stopped his laughter. He took a few steps, and produced some baskets from a pile, that somehow completely eluded Trixie’s attention until now, and put them under the impudent tree. He turned from it, and with a swift kick, he made all the apples fall down at once.

"Right, right, I knew that,” Trixie said hurriedly, trying to recover some of her dignity.

"Well then,” Big Mac spoke up "Ah’ll be over there, doing mah part of the job.”

"Trixie will manage” the mare claimed, regaining her composure.

The stallion nodded and left for his chores, Trixie watching him getting out of earshot. Then she turned her attention back to the trees with a smug look.

"Now, impudent greenery, prepare yourself! It is my turn to shine!”

Comments

[That_one_guy]

Oh, Trixie, how far you have fallen.

[EhPacha]

Big Macintosh is having so much fun with this

[Seether00]

The story is fine, but the formatting needs to be fixed. What is wrong with the quotation marks?

[I had no idea]

1484603
What is wrong with the quotation marks? Please tell me.

[Seether00]

1485617

All the opening quotation marks look like they are on the bottom of the line. The closing quotes are fine. Maybe it is the parser, but it looks terrible.

[I had no idea]

1485950
I wrote the whole thing in a text editor, then just copy/pasted it, and added italics where needed. I guess quotation marks are srewed up with the program... I'll look into it if it can be changed. Meanwhile, I just manually changed it

[Pegasister131]

"How'da know?" I officially like + now

[Aiovas]

I like it

[I had no idea]

Chapter is up . Warning for those weak at heart: it may contain traces of Trixie being awesome. If you can't handle it, please keep your defibrillators in check.

[Causal Quill]

Earth pony magic being earth and nature magic, unicorn harvesting might affect the taste, and more importantly it could plausibly harm the fertility of the orchard.

[SuperChaosKG]

1484096

Look at the bright side. At least she's not working on a rock farm.

Yet.

[SuperChaosKG]

This chapter made me lol. An achievement that earns you a track.

[OmniFox]

"Then I’ll perform, just for you! You could see wonders beyond your comprehension, just for a meager apple!” sounds like a sexy dance to me.

[ILurvTrixie]

disapprovement,
Disapproval?

dodging objects from a range of tomatoes
dodging objects ranging from tomatoes

won’t eat
wouldn't eat

Is she
You use was a few lines before it, so the is seems to be a tense slip. Was would work here too.

are still
were still

by refined tastes as
tastes as refined as Trixie's

Trixie hang her dejectedly.
hung her head perhaps?

'Hey! It's that Trixie story again! Man, I love reading this story when I find it in the Trixie Stories listing'
'Hey Brain, why don't you actually Fav the story instead of just thumbing it up?'
'...Brilliant!'