A Cold Coyote Calls
Equestria, the greatest land in the universe. Where ponies thrive and live together in peace and harmony. We have the most stable of societies, and the most advanced of technologies. We have unicorn magic to help us with difficult tasks, and flying pegasi to get a job done fast.
What good is all of that, if we can’t all share in it?
People often overlook Earth ponies, Unicorns and Pegasi always say that we’re just as important, but I know what they really think. They have these special abilities that allow for amazing things, and they sort of forget about us. What good is extra strength in a world where everything is accomplished with little to no strength?
The only thing we Earth ponies have, is farming. It’s part of who we are, we know the land, and the land knows us. Farming was always the thing that set us apart from the rest, we could grow crops like no other, and were the sole source of Equestria’s food supply, until they took that away from us too.
My name is Big Macintosh, I used to be an apple farmer, one of the biggest in Equestria, in fact. Had a nice sized family owned farm right outside of Ponyville. I had two sisters, which I held very close to me, since my parents died when I was very young. Thankfully they were too young to really remember our parents, and it didn’t hurt them as much as it does me.
Granny Smith, my grandma, took us in after our parents passed so suddenly. She was sort of like our mother growing up, and made sure we had a warm house to sleep in, and food in our stomachs. She always did right by us kids. Like all ponies though, she started to get older, and a lot of the responsibility of taking care of the farm and my sisters fell on my shoulders. I never minded taking care of them though, I just loved them so much.
The older of my two sisters, Applejack, was one of the most successful ponies in Equestria, at least in my eyes she was. She was best friends with Princess Twilight Sparkle! She was the Element of Honesty, one of the six Elements of Harmony. She even saved all of Equestria on multiple occasions, and she could make a mean apple fritter.
Then there’s Applebloom, the youngest one of the bunch. She was always trying to come up with a new scheme to get her cutie mark, or getting into some sort of mischief. I was always a softy, and never punished her when she got in trouble, Applejack always made sure she learned her lesson. There was one time I got pretty upset with her though, when she was writing fake and malicious articles about other ponies in a newspaper. I couldn’t stay mad at her though, she was just too darn cute.
I didn’t realize that all we really needed was each other until it was too late. Now I’ve got none of them left, and I get to live with the fact that it’s my fault that I’m here and they’re not. I deserve everything that’s happened to me for what I did, and I’ll never forgive myself. It seemed like the right thing to do at the time, but you have to understand what it was like for us.
I should probably start at the beginning, the point where the farm business started to go downhill. This is where the new technologies and magic in Equestria found it’s way into the farming industry, and made it impossible for a farm like Sweet Apple Acres to compete. They could make almost four times as much cider, with the same quality.
I can still remember our first bad year, it was the first year that we didn’t turn a profit, and actually lost money at the farm. We’d had a couple that we had broken even on before this, but we’d never actually lost money. It was a pretty big blow to my morale, and I know it hurt AJ, even though she’d never say it.
We couldn’t afford to buy any new special equipment, and most of it required magic anyways, a luxury we didn’t possess. I really didn’t know what to do, I guess I was just hoping, praying, that we would have a good year, and maybe be able to catch up.
That hope was nothing more than a fool’s wish, I knew there was no way we were going to be able to make it. We were damned to this new life of poverty, and it didn’t seem like there was anyway out.
Believe I thought long and hard about what I did. It wasn’t done on an impulse, I thought it out, and at the time, it really did seem like the best, or really, the only thing to do. I know that it was wrong, but the more I think about it, the more I can justify it.
Granny Smith was on her deathbed, she had a mighty high number of diseases, and she needed a lot of medicine just to stay alive. Medicine really isn’t cheap either, especially when you have to take as much as her.
Applejack and Applebloom, well, they were starving, hoping to get just one bite of food any chance they could get. I know Twilight Sparkle, or any of AJ’s other friends would have helped us, but we still had our dignity, and I didn’t want to lose that.
We’d finally reached our breaking point. We had no food to eat, no water to drink, and no money to live off of. The one thing we had was our farmhouse over our heads. Even though that’s something, it’s not enough to live with.
I had one bit left, besides the farm, that was all I had left to my name. I walked into a general store in Ponyville, I just wanted to buy something, anything. I thought maybe buying something would help me feel like a normal pony again. That I could just waltz into a store and buy something, without worrying about the money.
The only thing they had that I could afford was a small box of four 12-Gauge shotgun shells, so that’s what I bought. I had a gun at the house, I thought maybe I could go hunting, and get a nice meal for the family, it had been so long since we actually had a meal.
It was getting dark, so I headed back home, and placed the shells in a dresser drawer in the living room when I arrived. Then sat down in a chair. I don’t know what all I thought about that night. I just sat in that chair, and thought about whatever came to mind. The only thing I remember from then is that I never took my eyes off of that 12-Gauge shotgun, just hanging there on the wall.
I must have fallen asleep there, because I woke up halfway fallen out of the chair. Little to my surprise, there was no smell of breakfast being cooked, no sounds of laughter from an excited little filly to welcome my waking mind. Just a quiet, old, depressed apple farm.
My eyes instantly locked onto that 12-Gauge shotgun, just hanging there on the wall. It was really early morning, and it was raining. It was the kind of morning that if you listened carefully, ou could hear a cold coyote call way out in the wilderness.
Applebloom and Applejack slowly, draggingly, walked down the stairs, just hoping they’d be welcomed with a feast fit for a king. When there was no food to welcome them in the kitchen. I could hear Applebloom’s cries, stabbing at me like that dirty, driving rain right outside our rundown farmhouse..
My brain was bleeding, and there was only thing on my mind. Salvation. There was a way to save us all. My eyes were now locked on that 12-Gauge shotgun, that I was holding in my hooves, which now contained the four shells I had bought with my one, last, bit.
Applejack, Applebloom, and Granny Smith all walked into the living room, and I heard them saying things like “Mac, are you ok?”, “What’s wrong, Mac?”. I wasn’t concerned with what they were saying now though. I had figured it out, figured out how to make the cries of starvation from my beloved sisters go away.
It was so simple.
I turned to them, not taking my eyes off of that 12-Gauge shotgun that I was holding in my hooves. I said only but eight small words, “I’m sorry it has to be like this.”. Then I finally moved my gaze to the eldest of my sisters, Applejack.
As I watched a tear roll down her face, I clenched the trigger on that 12-Gauge shotgun, that I was still holding in my hooves. I could feel one single tear running it’s way down my face.
Next I turned slightly to face the younger of the two sisters, Applebloom. I couldn’t watch this one. As I held my eyes shut as tight as I could, I clenched the trigger on that 12-Gauge shotgun, that I was still holding in my hooves. I felt one more tear, run it’s way down my face.
Then I turned to my dear Granny Smith. She looked at me and said only but one small word, “Why?”. I clenched the trigger on that 12-Gauge shotgun, that I was still holding in my hooves, and again, I felt one more tear, run it’s way down my face.
Finally I turned to face the barrel of that 12-Gauge shotgun, that I was still holding in my hooves, and clenched the trigger one more time. As I did, I felt one, final tear, running down my face. My gaze was no longer locked on that 12-Gauge shotgun, that was laying on ground.