> At the Gorge
>  by Jordan179
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

> Chapter 1: To the Gorge
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Applejack was only twelve, when her life changed forever.

She was walking with her parents beyond the Southwest Fields.  This was technically still Sweet Apple Acres, but the hills rose too high here, and the ground was not well enough watered to make it worthwhile to plant apple trees; and it was too far from the main farm to make it worthwhile to plant anything else.  The soil was stony, and the same river that drained the whole Vale of Avalon and flowed south of Ponyville upstream cut deeply through the hills, making a gorge hundreds of heads deep.  

There was no practical way of drawing water from the river here; aside from the length of the required hoist, the river which was so gentle at Ponyville here raced between its narrowed banks and battered itself against granite rocks.  River barges plied the stream no farther downstream than Ponyville for that reason; no boat could have lived in this white water, nor could any unfortunate Pony who happened to find herself its captive.

A rope bridge had been built here over the gorge, many decades ago by Dawnflower "Sew 'n Sow" Apple and her husband Acorn "Pokey" Oaks, as a quick way across to the Everfree from the White Tail Woods, at a time when it had seemed easy to expand the Acres further into the forest.  The grant didn't actually cover the land this far south, but if they found any more useful exotic fruits on the southeastern side, it would be at most only a very technical violation of national parkland to take their seeds, and see if they might be grown on the northwestern.  If they found any varieties even half as good as Zap Apples, the family might become not merely established, but seriously wealthy.

Ambition betrayed them.  All Pokey found this far south was his death, at the claws and teeth of a manticore.  The grief-stricken Dawnflower gave up on the attempt to harvest the Deep Everfree.  Greenie had been lucky to have come back from the forest with Zap Apples and her life; the family had since been content with what they could find in the relatively safer near parts of the woods, or grow on their own land grant.  

The bridge remained.  The creatures of the Everfree showed little interest in using the structure.  It was too light and narrow to comfortably bear the weight of most beasts large enough to threaten a full-grown Pony, and besides, most predators with any brains feared Ponies.  They had weapons, traps, teamwork and magic:  a beast which preyed on Ponies would have a short though interesting life.  Even the things of the Everfree were wary of trusting their lives to anything of Pony manufacture.

Time passed.  Green Apple, Dawnflower's eldest daughter and the discoverer of the Zap Apples, was now a bewitchingly-beautiful mare in her own right.  She met and married Black Smith, and they took to calling themselves Green Smith and Black Smith Apple, uniting their names as they had their persons in wedlock.  Greenie had many daughters and sons by her strong metalworking husband Blackie, and her eldest daughter was Melanie Rose -- "Melrose" -- Apple.

More time passed.  

Melanie had a certain solemn, sober beauty of her own -- not the flamboyant marehood of her mother, but enough to attract the attention of her second cousin, Tangelo Orange, when he came to Ponyville from Manehattan.  He had come to negotiate a deal with Melrose, now mistress of the farm, for Zap Apples, and he wound up negotiating with her entirely another sort of contract.  It had been an arrangement unexpected, but one much to the mutual delight of the two cousins.

And the fruits of this deal had been two decades of marital happiness, and their three children:  Macintosh Apple, who had his maternal grandfather's strength already apparent in his sturdy sixteen-year-old frame; twelve-year-old Applejack, who frisked happily between her parents, her disposition normally as sunny and sweet as the most delicious of apples, but with a kick to her like the hard cider after which she had been nicknamed; and little Apple Bloom, only a few months old, who had been left behind at the farm in the capable care of her Aunt Apple Leaves.





Applejack was sweet, but passionate, and in her passion full well capable of anger.  She had come home from school angry that day, because she had quarreled with her friend, the precocious eight-year-old Rarity Belle.  It had been over something silly, she saw that now, a matter of a costume Applejack had insisted on putting together herself for a school play, which Rarity had told her -- in front of her schoolmates -- was "dreadful."  That audience had included Landscape Carrot, her best friend in all the world, somepony whom she had hoped to impress by showing him that her many talents included costume design.

Unfortunately, these talents manifestly did not include costume design.  Applejack's concept of a costume suitable for Merry Apple, heroine of the First Albionic War of over a century ago, was both historically-inaccurate and downright ugly, as even its creator might have realized had she not been blinded by her own creative pride.  Rarity's sin had been to tell this to Applejack -- at first trying to do so constructively and gently -- but Applejack had seen through Rarity's politeness and demanded the truth -- doing so in not entirely polite terms on her own part.

Rarity, despite being but two-thirds Applejack's age, had fire of her own to match her friend's, and that fire rose up in response to Applejack's angry words.  Before long, the two fillies were screaming at each other, right in the midst of the schoolyard, with the rest of the students of Ponyville's one-room scholhouse staring on in fascination at the argument.  And Landscape was there, at one point trying to calm them down and being shouted at by both of them.  At that point, Landscape had wisely left the two angry fillies and moved back to a safer vantage point.

When Applejack had realized that Rarity had gotten her to turn on Landscape, she had gotten even madder.  Her feelings for 'Scape were complicated, in a way that she had never experienced toward any other Pony.  Sometimes he was just the pal he had always been to her since they had been really small, barely more than foals.  Sometimes she felt stirrings of something else, something that she knew had to do with the ways her body and mind had begun changing.  She had a good idea what it was she was feeling for him, too, but she had no idea how to express herself without giving him and everypony else all sorts of wrong ideas.  But she did know that driving him away was a very bad idea, and in that moment of fury she blamed Rarity for this outcome.

But Rarity did not blame herself at all for this situation.  And no more than Applejack would Rarity back down.

Had they been anything other than Ponies, indeed anything other than Equestrian Ponies, the two stubborn fillies would probably have come to blows.  However, they were of a relatively gentle species, and came from a culture which mostly abjured the aggressive ue of force.  Applejack was a natural scrapper, but her mother had taught her that it was wrong to strike first save in mortal peril; and Applejack very much wanted to do right rather than wrong.  Rarity was not easily intimidated, and she had a dark side to her nature that ran deeper than the equivalent in Applejack's sunny soul; it also took more, though, to drive her to violence, and she was well aware in any case that the four-years older Applejack was her physical superior.  Thus, neither of them resorted to the use of their hooves.

What they did, instead, was to continue their shrieking quarrel a bit longer.  Then Applejack, tired of the whole thing and aware that their teacher Fair Play, drawn by the noise, was about to intervene, simply said "Yer wrong," snatched up her costume, threw it into her saddlebag, and marched away from Rarity, giving her one last contemptuous flick of her tail that stopped just short of touching her.  She trotted right to the edge of the schoolyard and opened up into a canter as she hit the road to Sweet Apple Acres, ignoring the rising cries of Fair Play, who had just realized that Applejack was openly leaving the school.

Normally, Applejack was far more respectful toward a legitimate authority.  But right now, there was a cold fury deep in Applejack's heart, which she did not want to unleash anywhere around anypony else -- especially not at fragile, kindly, loving Fair Play, who only wanted the best for her students.  Not at Rarity, whom Applejack even now remembered was really her friend, rather than her foe.  And certainly not at gentle Landscape, who was the best friend she had ever known.

Applejack maintained a brisk trot toward Sweet Apple Acres, gradually dropping her gait into a walk.  By the time she actually saw the Northwest Orchard rising up around the bend, she was walking slowly and thoughtfully.  Her anger had slowly drained away, and she was going over the points Rarity had made about what was wrong with her costume, thinking about them as rational objections rather than provocations to rage.

And the more she did so, the more her thoughts trended toward a certain unpalatable, and even upsetting conclusion.

But she had to check to be sure.





Big Mac, who was working in the North Field, caught sight of her as she approached on the main road.

"Yore out of school early," he observed.  "Anything wrong?"

"Had a fight with Rarity," Applejack told him.

"Fair Play sent you home?"  Big Mac asked, raising one eyebrow.

"Naw," said Applejack, "but Ah have to figger out something 'fore IAh see her again."

"What do you need to figger out?" Mac asked.

"If'n Ah was right," Jackie said.

"Well, if'n yew need help, Ah'm here," Mac said.  "Grannie n' Gramps are in town shopping.  Maw and Paw are makin' the rounds in the South Fields, Ah think."

"Thanks," said Applejack, nodding.

She made her way to the farmhouse.  As Big Mac had intimated, it was deserted, save for Apple Leaves, snoring in the living room next to the equally-somnolent foal, Apple Bloom, who was dozing in her crib.

Applejack left her aunt and her baby sister alone.  She had no wish to explain herself again, to somepony who might understand her less than did her big brother.  She walked upstairs to her room.

When she was there, she spread out the costume on her bed.  She examined it from every conceivable angle.  She squinted at it, as if to see every possible detail.  Then she stepped back and looked at the whole effect.

Then she sighed.

"Durn it," Applejack said.  "Rarity was right."

She sighed again.

"What do Ah do now?"





Applejack left the farmhouse as silently as she had come, bringing with her the odious costume.  When she left the house she went in the opposite direction from the one in which she had arrived.

On the northern side of the farm Sweet Apple Acres was warm and inviting, with only token fencing between the farm and the rest of Ponyville.  From Ponyville came only friends and neighbors -- at worst, busybodies from some level of government, all fired up to tell the Apples what they could or couldn't do with their property, until Granny Smith showed them the land grant from Princess Celestia, which gave the Apples the right to do pretty much anything with Sweet Apple Acres they wanted, short of raising armed rebellion against the Realm, as long as they continued to ward the Vale against "that which might come out of the Everfree," the duty they had faithfully-executed now for some ninety years.

The southern side of the farm was different.  Here, Sweet Apple Acres directly bordered the Everfree; here "that which might come out of the Everfree" would first make its appearance.  Here, generations of Apples had raised high stone walls, thorn hedges, and wooden stockades, in a maze of defenses whose main purpose was to present as unfriendly and unappetizing as possible an appearance to anything which might consider coming out of the Everfree and menacing the Apples.  Here, there were ropes and tripwires and telltales to let them know if anything had already entered.

No passive defenses could possibly keep out the monsters of the Everfree.  Sweet Apple Acres was a working farm, not a military base, despite the weapons the Apples stockpiled in their house, and the fact that the typical adult Apple was a more formidable combatant than the typical member of the Day Guard.  In fact, it was quite common for Apples to join either the Day Guard or its Night Guard counterpart, especially the elite Night Watch.  But the farm normally lacked numbers sufficient to actually hold the defenses.

So it was necessary for the Apples to occasionally patrol the southern side of the farm, to make sure that nothing had breached those defenses.  It was routine work for them, and they were woodscrafty enough and the terrain so well-known to them that it wasn't actually all that dangerous, not if one stayed on the inside rather than venturing beyond the defenses.  But it was work best performed with a partner, in case one did get into trouble, and their parents usually did this job together.

Applejack was only searching for her parents, not for monsters; all she had to do was keep reasonably alert and she should be safe enough.  Her mother and father had taken her on this route before, because the Apples believed that it was best for children old enough to be trusted in terms of fundamental common sense to know the lie of the land and the layout of the defenses, in case they might have to enter this zone for any reason.

Because Applejack wasn't actually patrolling, she could move much faster than her parents.  Thus it was that, after a relatively short time spent walking the path, she came upon her mother and father.

She saw her mother first, looking around them, remaining alert for danger.  Her mother's light brownish-peach coat and deep red mane were easy to spot, as was the brown Stetson hat she always wore.  She was compact but very muscular.  Her saddlebags were stuffed with practical supplies for the Near Everfree, and a machete -- useful multi-purpose weapon and tool in the hell-forest -- dangled by her side for quick and easy access.  Melanie Rose Apple looked practical, and competent, and to her daughter's prejudiced eyes also the prettiest Pony in the world.  Melrose was somepony born not to complain about problems, but to quietly and unassumingly solve them.

Her father bent to the ground off the side of the path, examining some sort of traces.  Tangelo Orange was longer and leaner than his wife, with a strong but wiry build that spoke of his great agility.  His wife was stronger, but Tangy was faster, and though born and reared in the brick and concrete warrens of Manehattan, over the last two decades he had adapted well to life on the farm.  He was almost fifty, but powerful and healthy, still in the prime of his life.  Applejack thought him the most handsome stallion she had ever seen, both in his appearance and his kind intelligence:  it was obvious to her why her mother loved him.

They were the most good and honorable, the best and bravest Ponies whom Applejack knew, and she utterly worshipped them.  She considered herself incredibly fortunate to have parents like that.  They loved her, and she loved them in return beyond all measure.

She took a quick glance around to make sure that there was nothing dangerous nearby, then called out happily to them.

"Maw!  Paw!" she cried.  "Ah'm so glad to see you!"  She ran over to them.

"Applejack?"  said Melrose in surprise.  "What are you doing home so soon from school?"

"Ah had a fight with Rarity," Applejack confessed.  "And Ah think Ah was in the wrong.  What am Ah gonna do?"

"You can tell me all about it in a moment," Melrose said calmly.  "First, Ah've gotta see what Paw's found."

"I think these were Bushbullies," Tangelo said in his unmistakable voice, with its hint of the 'th' sounds being clipped off into Sea-Pegasus 'd' sounds, a trademark Manehattan dialect for Ponies of all Kinds.  He straightened and pointed.  "Look at the claw marks on that tree.  Territorial claim, and see those long hairs they rubbed off against the bark?  A pack of them -- but then Bushbulllies always travel in packs.  Well, according to the books, anyway.  I haven't ever for-real seen Bushbullies in the field."

"Ah have," said Melrose.  "When Ah was just a filly -- not much older than you, Jackie --" she commented in an aside to her daughter.  "They're more of a bother than a real danger to Ponies bigger than little children -- Jackie here would be a bit more than they'd care to handle.  Any Pony beyond foalhood can just kick them into next week.  A full-grown Pony could stomp 'em, though it's kind of mean to do that, as they don't really prey on Ponies.

"They're natural vandals -- spoil crops, wreck tools, chew through ropes, that kind of mischief."  Melrose continued.  "Little furry things, smart for critters -- they can even talk and understand Equestrian, something-like.  We just got to find them, scare them a bit, make 'em know they ain't welcome on the Acres.  If'n we don't, they'll mess with the apple trees."  Her voice grew grim on that last sentence.  Like all the Apples of Sweet Apple Acres, Melrose took apple trees very seriously.

"I see," said Tangelo.  He fussed with his blue neckerchief -- a habit of his while thinking.  "Well, it doesn't sound as if we'll need any heavy weapons for this," he said.  Maybe a couple of crossbows with net-bolts, capture one or two of them and give the rest a warning, then drive them all back into the Everfree.  Shouldn't even need to really hurt them."  With that thought, Tangelo Orange unwittingly displayed the deep decency of his species.  Farmers of many another race would not have cared if they hurt destructive vermin, even talking vermin.

Melrose nodded.  "Ah'm with you on that."  Then she turned to look at Applejack.  "All right," she asked.  "What was yore fight with Rarity about?"

Applejack told her.





"Ah see," said Melrose.  "Well, seems to me that you and Rarity have some makin' up to do."

"We said such terrible things to each other," said Applejack sadly, her ears drooping.  "Do you think she'll want to forgive me?"

"I don't see why not," Tangelo said.  "After all, you'll be apologizing to her, and it's not as if she didn't say some pretty hurtful things herself ..."

"But what she said was true," Applejack pointed out.  "Ah was in the wrong."

"Well yes," replied Tangelo, "but Rarity was rude in the way that she said them.  There were nicer ways she could've told you about your design mistakes."

"She shouldn't have to," Applejack said.  "She was my friend, and she was just telling the truth."

"Jackie," said Melrose seriously, "Tangy and Ah are both pretty honest Ponies, wouldn't you say so?"

Applejack nodded in total agreement.  "You're the best!" she exclaimed.

"Right," said Tangelo.  "We always try to tell the truth, especially to our friends.  One of the reasons I got out of the fruit trading business and into the production end was that I got tired of the way you have to sometimes shade the truth when dealing with suppliers and buyers, especially when you're dealing internationally.  I didn't like that at all."

Applejack beamed at her Paw.  He was so amazing in his integrity!

"But," Tangelo added, "You can be honest without being brutally honest, if you see what I mean?  Be nice in the way you say your truths, and other Ponies will be more willing to believe you.  Don't word them to hurt, unless that's the only way to get them across."

Melrose nodded.  "Ah always try to be honest, but Ah also always try to be nice as well."

"That," said Tangelo, "is what Rarity did wrong.  And I'm really kind of surprised she did, because she's always seemed to me to be a very polite little filly."

"Well," Applejack said.  "Ah didn't really want to believe what she said.  So Ah might have been maybe a bit stubborn.  And gotten mad at her first."

"Oh, you might?" asked Tangelo, grinning.  "Just a bit stubborn?"  His eyes twinkled at his daughter.

"Yeah," admitted Applejack.  "Ah was a plumb fool."

"Don't be so hard on yourself, sugarcube," said Melrose, nuzzling her daughter.  "You've just got the Apple stubborn streak.  Ah have it too, as yore father can perhaps tell you ..."

"Oh, perhaps," laughed Tangelo, gently bumping his wife's cheek with his own.

Melrose giggled.  "... and mah mother, Granny Smith has it in spades, and Ah know her mother Great-Granny Dawnflower did too, cause without it we never would have got Sweet Apple Acres in the first place.  So you see, it's not always a bad thing!"

"And maybe I'm a bit stubborn too," said Tangelo, "cause I kept after your mama until she agreed to marry me.  And if I hadn't you wouldn't be here, Jackie, so being stubborn can be a definite good thing!"

All three of them laughed together.

And suddenly, Applejack realized that she was happy again.  Her parents always had that effect on her.  She supposed that it was because they loved each other and loved her as well, and she could never be unhappy for long when surrounded by so much love.

So they ambled along the rest of the patrol, finding signs of various tests upon the defenses and the tracks and scats and other marks of various animals, and they were a happy trio, all together, Apples to the core, even the one of them who had been born an Orange.  And everything was right with the world.

Until they drew within a couple hundred hooves of the Gorge.

And they heard the screams.

And they looked at the bridge and realized that one of the two main ropes had snapped clean through, and the other one looked none too strong.  The deck was dangling from the secondary ropes.  And, dangling from the single remaining main rope, and undestandably screaming in stark terror, was Rarity Belle.

The three Apples exchanged a quick glance.  Then, as one, with no need for any further communication, they sprang forward and galloped for the bridge.
> Chapter 2:  The Moment of Decision
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

At that moment, a gap greater than the gorge yawned wide:  history hung with that bridge, everything poised on a knife-edge.  It was true that, had Rarity Belle plummeted into the abyss, there were other candidate Generosities waiting in the wings; just as if Applejack had fallen, another Honesty would have emerged.  Celestia played a long game, and thse two young Ponies were but two of many pawns awaiting promotion.  Still, they would have been lost -- and the time was fast-approaching when every hoof and horn and wing on Earth would be needed to fight what was seething on the other side of the dimensional barriers, lusting to consume all Light and Life.

Melanie Rose Apple and Tangelo Orange were fundamentally-simple Ponies; they grew and sold fruit, recking neither of millennial strategies nor of Cosmic destinies.  They could see no farther than their own horizons.  They were simple -- but they were good.  And the honest hearts that beat in their breasts would not let them stand idly by and watch an innocent young filly perish, while they might by action save her.  this was not what they were, it was not what they wanted to be.  They were brave and decent Ponies, and by their nature were compelled to act.  And so Rarity Belle would live to see the sunset, and the way of the Changelings to Reconciliation be eased, and one day her ki-rin children would fly over Canterlot.

Tangelo was, of course, not thinking in any such grand terms as -- with one final encouraging look back at his wife and elder daughter -- he flung himself out over the gorge to seize the remaining rope of the bridge firmly in one powerfully-hooked foreleg, his muscles straining and tendons taut, reaching out with his other foreleg to begin sliding down the rope toward the terrified, squalling eight-year-old filly, so desperately clinging to the lowest point of that hempen rope as if it was life itself to her -- because it was.  One day Rarity would be a powerful being, for whom a mere gorge would hold little danger -- but at this moment, she was but a helpless child, close to madness from fear.

"Hold on, little filly!" Tangelo called out to her as she clutched the rope.  "I'm coming ... I'm almost there!  Just a little bit longer ... just hold on and you'll be all right!"  His green eyes shone with determination.  They were good eyes, honest eyes -- eyes one could not help but trust.

He was, to little Rarity, the perfect picture of paternal reliability.  Rarity was raised by a loving father, and she would throughout her very long life to come be amenable to soothing from a strong male.  At this crucial instant, Tangelo succeeded in calming her just a little bit -- enough that her pinpointed pupils widened slightly; widened, and focused on her would-be savior, making his way hoof over hoof down the rope toward her.  Rarity was still terrified, of course.  But for now, she was once again sane.

"What -- what do I do?" the little Unicorn squealed.

"Hold on to the rope tight, till I grab you," said Tangelo.  "When I've got a firm grip, wrap your forelegs around me, so you don't slip.  Got it?"

Rarity nodded, her eyes fixed on him with renewed hope.

"Good girl."  Tangelo's tone was calm, even as he closed the distance.  

Tangelo had reached Rarity.  One questing foreleg stretched out and grasped the filly's small barrel, pulled her toward him.  She let go the rope and practically scrambled up Tangelo's back, realizing even in her ultimate fear that the last thing she wanted to do was block Tangelo's vision or impede his ability to climb back up the inverted arc of rope.  She was still only a child -- but a very intelligent one.  She settled around his neck and shoulders.

"Halfway home now," Tangelo told her.  In truth, he did not like the way the rope had yanked as they had shifted positions; there had been a tearing sound and a sickening give to it that spoke unpleasant volumes about what was probably happening within its hempen twists.  It would definitely need replacing when the Apples rebuilt the rest of this bridge.  It was going to fail --  he knew that.  He just hoped it would fail when he and his passenger were off the bridge and well clear of the end.

Doesn't have to hold long, he reminded himself.  Just long enough.

Tangelo began climbing up the rope toward Melrose.  This was more difficult than had been the way down; he was going up the gradient now, and while Rarity was only a small filly, even her young weight was by no means inconsequential in such a situation.  One foreleg anchored Rarity solidly in place, while his other three limbs gripped whatever parts of the ropes they could to keep him from falling and enable him to progress, hoof-suckers and telekinetic fields alike working at their utmost capacity.

He looked up at the cliff-edge.  Melrose had wrapped herself around the anchor post, eyes closed in concentration as she focused completely on her self-appointed task, forelegs embracing that crucial wooden cylinder as if it were the barrel of her beloved husband, hind hooves digging into the ground to set herself firmly.  Not even her farm-grown Earth Pony strength could hold that bridge for long if it gave way, but while there was life in her, she would not abandon Tangelo.

Closer to the cliff edge, little Applejack, aware of her inability to help in any useful way and not wanting to do anything to distract and thus imperil either her father or her friend, watched in mingled worry and admiration.  She knew she was witnessing something heroic:  something like the stories she and Landscape read together in their tree-house, but infinitely greater because it was happening before her, it was real.  Surely her father could not fail?  In the stories, the heroes never failed.  And they were almost back to the edge now ...

There was a ripping sound.

Melrose's eyes opened wide in horror as she saw the rope begin to give way, one after another of the strong strands that composed it snapping, the frayed ends springing clear, further weakening its structure.  She was a farm-filly, she was familiar with ropes and loads, and she knew all too well how catastrophically sudden might be the failure , how lethally-dangerous the suddenly-freed end to any mare unfortunate enough to be at the striking end.

She also knew that this rope was the only thing holding her husband back from plunging into the gorge, hundreds of feet to his death.

She had only a moment to decide.  Being who she was, she really had only one possible choice.

She moved so fast that everything seemed to happen at once.

The rope snapped.

In the instant of its snapping, before the end had time to convert its tremendous potential energy to kinetic energy, Melrose Apple was upon it, teeth firmly grasping the far end.  Still, the stored energy was immense; Melrose merely made of flesh and bone.

A true horse would have died instantly, the system of rope and teeth working to snap the spine at its neck as if the breaking bridge were some horridly-elaborate gallows.  Even Melrose but barely survived -- her muscles were torn and her neck terribly wrenched, in ways which under other circumstances might have given her medical problems for the rest of her life;  though in that transcendent, adrenaline-fueled moment of self-sacrificial love, she did not -- and never would -- realize this.

But the High Eldren had crafted well when they made the Earth Ponies.  Their natural magic was turned toward toughness, the telekinetic reinforcement of their bodies, so that they could survive hurts that would have slain any lesser beings.  And the Apples of Sweet Apple Acres were among the strongest of Earth Ponies.

So it was that, instead of being flung back a corpse, Melanie Rose Apple clung to the rope, with all the strength that love and stubbornness alike could grant her.  She held the rope in her bleeding mouth, hooves dug firmly into the ground, the muscles and tendons of her already-injured neck bulging before the tremendous task she had set herself.  Neither pain nor fear showing on her brownish-ivory freckled face, for she was in a place now beyond such concerns.  In her expression was nothing but concentration, and an utter, almost-inequine, determination.

In that moment, she was beautiful beyond measure, but her husband was in no position to appreciate this.

For when the rope had snapped, a wave had rippled down its length, a wave which had almost bucked Tangelo into the gorge.  With his own Earth Pony strength, he had just managed to hold on, but little Rarity, a mere filly and a Unicorn at that, had slipped from his grasp.  She would surely have fallen, had not Tangelo managed to reach down with one foreleg and catch her, with a tenuous hook of one cannon around another.  Tangelo dangled from the rope by one foreleg, Rarity dangled from Tangelo's other foreleg by her own -- sobbing, terrified, her fine mind useless in its ultimate madness.

And, for all her strength, the turf beneath Melrose was giving way.  Grip as best she might, inch by inch, she too was sliding toward the abyss.

Tangelo's hind legs scrabbled for purchase on the rope above, while with all his might he willed that his hoof should continue to hold Rarity's, to preserve her from an early doom.  One hind leg hooked the rope, and for a moment he had a better position, enough of a grasp on the rope to permit him to use his full strength.  He looked up, and met the fearless brown eyes of his wife as she slipped closer and closer to the cliff's edge.

He, too, faced a decision.  If he let go of Rarity, betraying the innocent young girl whose life was literally within his grasp, he could grasp the rope with all four hooves and scramble to safety before Melrose was forced to let go of the rope.  Or, he could ... but who would catch Rarity?

He looked to the left, and saw the green eyes and golden mane of his daughter.  Those eyes were so much like his own!  Not merely in coloration, but in the look in them.  Applejack was scared, but she was not letting that fear rule her.  He knew that she rarely would allow her fear to overcome her, that she would be brave through all the challenges of life.

He was sorry, now, that he wouldn't be there to help her surmount them.

All his life was coming to the point of decision, and there was really no choice, for Tangelo Orange was no more a coward than was his wife.  He had helped load tons of fruit, he knew well the principles of force and momentum involved in this action.

He fixed Applejack with his gaze, inclined his head toward Rarity, then back at his daughter.  His meaning was obvious.

Applejack nodded.

He swung Rarity back.  All through this Rarity had been whimpering.  Now her voice rose to a keen of terror as -- and this was something Tangelo had not planned -- her grip loosened and she began to slip down his cannon.  He had only one chance at this now -- if he tried to hold on to her past this she would now surely fall -- so with all his might he contracted his body as he swung her forward.

His face was contorted into a snarl of sheer determination as he threw Rarity at Applejack.

The maneuver was not executed perfectly.  He had hoped to toss Rarity onto the cliff edge, with Applejack there to grab her and keep her from rolling back down.  Instead, Rarity was released on an arc which would have merely slammed her into the cliff just below the edge, meaning that she likely would have slapped into the rock and then fallen to her doom.

Applejack was too fast for that.  Barely even considering her own danger, she flung herself half over the edge and caught Rarity in her forelegs, her every muscle straining with the effort of hauling up Rarity's deadweight up from one of the most awkward possible lifting positions, hind legs gripping the ground as best she could to prevent both of them from plummeting down the cliff.

Rarity's eyes had been squeezed tight shut in an atavistic desire to shut out a terrifying world.  Now, feeling and smelling the familiar presence of her friend, she opened her eyes, and in a sudden desperate hope clutched with her forelegs, scrabbled with her hindlegs, helping Applejack save her, as both fillies struggled toward safety.

Tangelo saw that Rarity had a good chance, now.

Then, of course, he looked at his wife.

Melrose was almost at the edge now, the rope slipping to the end of her muzzle, now held only by the relatively weak grasp of her forward teeth, her jaws unable to engage their full leverage.  Her mouth was streaming blood; lips and tongue obviously flayed by the rough hempen fibers.  Her eyes were clenched tight, her legs set rigidly, her hooves holding her firm against the full weight of both Tangelo and the bridge itself.  Even as he watched, he could see her slipping further toward her own doom.

"Let go!" he shouted.  "Melly, let go!  You can't hold it any more!  The ground's giving way! For Celestia's sake, let go!"

At that, she opened her eyes.  Her look was neither of fear nor sadness, but one of utter, implacable determination.

Was it his imagination, or did those eyes seem to be faintly glowing at that moment?  Possibly, for in the next moment she gathered herself together, made one great effort, and somehow dug her hooves deeper into the ground.  And she hauled back on the rope, and -- impossibly -- began to pull them both back toward safety, exerting from her feminine form a strength of which no stallion should have been capable.

For a moment, it seemed as if Melrose had the power to defy reality with the force of her love.

For a moment.

In the next moment, the edge of the cliff cracked under her hooves.  The immense strain, suddenly released, snapped both Melrose and Tangelo into the gorge.  There was no time to react, no way for either of them to save themselves, or one another.  Neither of them could reach any object with which they might avert their fall.

The looks of helpless despair on the faces of her parents, as they fell into the abyss, would be seared into Applejack's brain; would haunt her nightmares over the long decades and centuries of her life to come.  She could only wish that she had seen no more; but it was reality, it was Truth, and Applejack could not avert her eyes from the rest of their fall.

So, watching with equal helplessness, Applejack saw her mother smashed against the cliff face halfway down, her purposeful reaching for a hoofhold suddenly and sickeningly converted into a hideously random motion as life was dashed from her frame.  She saw her father's hopeless reaching out to his wife as he saw her demise, then his dreadful relaxation, his resignation to his fate as he fell the rest of the way to the stream.

She later heard from her grandmother Greenie that, at terminal velocity, a water surface might as well be solid ground, that only extreme skill permitted a survivable dive from hundreds of heads to its surface, and even then one was likely to be injured.  Greenie knew this because, for a time, she had made a specialty of diving into water from a barely safe altitude, as a daredevil performance.  Understanding the physics of a Pony's impact into water had been for Greenie in that career a literal manner of life and death.

Applejack did not need to be informed of this fact.  For she saw the sickening impact of Tangelo against the surface of the stream, the way that his body broke and rippled in a manner most inconsistent with any survivable dive.  He went immediately down A moment later the mercifully-unconscious and probably already dead body of Melrose Apple splashed into the stream after him.  Strain as she might to see, still half hoping against all reason -- she did not see either of them surface.

With that sight, Applejack was filled with a sudden angry strength.  Not gonna let Rarity fall, she thought.  Not gonna let it all be for nothing.  And, with a surge of effort which would leave her muscles aching for days to come, she hauled Rarity over the edge of the cliff, both of them rolling away from the chasm, Rarity clinging to Applejack with a frantic need for safety.

"Applejack, I'm  so sorry!"  Rarity cried.  She, also, had seen what had happened to Applejack's parents, and knew full well why they had perished.  "Sorry ... sorry ... sorry ..." she repeated again and again between convulsive, heaving sobs.

There was nothing Applejack could possibly say.  There was nothing she cared to say.  Something she had almost thought impossible had happened, and the world was wrong, and would never again be right.  She could not hate Rarity, her friend whom she had just saved from death, for having been the accidental agent of this disaster, but she did not at this moment want to look at her.

Nor did Applejack have the energy, really, to care about Rarity.  Or herself.  Or anything, really.  There was no emotion in her; she had gone horribly numb at her core, in a way she had never felt before in her young life.  It was not sadness, and certainly not happiness.  It was like nothing she could put into words.  

Rarity's desperate apologies meant less than the wind down the gorge, or the sinister sighing of the stream at its bottom, which had now claimed two lives which had been very dear to her, back a few minutes -- or had it been a hundred years? -- ago, when Friendship and Love and Life had still been ideas which had meant something to her.  Now, they all meant nothing.  The world meant nothing.

Nothing mattered, least of all the lump of equine flesh lying on her side who went by the name of Abigail Jacqueline Apple.  At that moment, had somepony picked her up and pitched her off the cliff to follow after her parents, she might not have fought to preserve her life.

There was nothing she could do to make this better.  There was nothing anypony could do to make this better.  Nothing will ever be better again, she thought in her ultimate despair.

All Applejack could do was lie there, eyes wide open in horror, and regard her mother's brown Stetson hat, which some vagary of the wind, like the vagary of life which had happened to claim her parents, had chosen to relinquish from the abyss and give back to her.

The first minute of the rest of her life had begun.
> Chapter 3:  Ripples in the Stream
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Applejack spent the next week in a fog.

She felt completely numb -- or miserable:  she was no longer sure quite which, as deep despair had become but her natural state.  Whenever she tried to probe her own feelings, she touched a darkness within which made her want to fling herself off the same cliff that had claimed her parents.  And Applejack still wanted to live -- thugh she wasn't entirely sure why she wanted to live, any more.

Sometimes, someting would set her off, and she would weep:  she wasn't even sure of the reason; it was just something she had to do, so she did it.  Often, she wuuldn't even be aware that she was crying until her vision blurred,  and she felt the tears rolling down her face.  Even then, she felt not so much so much sorrow as she did a great emptiness at her core.

Waking up was generally bad.  She'd come half-awake from vivid dreams; always about her parents, and always of one or two types.  Sometimes, she would dream her parents alive, playing with and comforting her.  She'd wake briefly happy -- and then remember that the dream was a lie, and her parents were dead.  Other times, she would dream of their deaths -- and wake to the horrible awareness that the dream was naught but the Truth.  In either case, she would awake sobbing -- but quietly, as she didn't want her kin to hear her weakness.  She told herself that she had to stay strong.

She went through the motions of living.  She wiped her tears (she was careful to do this after ne embarrasing encounter in which Big Mac saw them still on her face and wiped them away for her) and set out before dawn, as usual to do her morning chores.  She saw no reasn why her sadness should stand in the way of being useful; she certainly didn't want to be mollycoddled by what remained of her family.

Applejack liked doing her chores, anyway, and all the more so now.  Doing chores was safe and sane and secure, and she knew she was doing good and helping her whole family.  She knew how to do chores, there were no terrible surprises in them, merely a simple set of motions which had to be repeated to get the job done.  She didn't have to worry when she did chores.  She didn't have to think when she did chores.  Not having to think was now about as close as she could still come to happiness.  Or at least to relief from the pain.

The only problem was that now she made mistakes in her chores.  She rarely had before; so these mistakes bothered her, the more so because it was Big Mac who caught them.  These mistakes were never in how she did the chores -- even at twelve, Applejack was an experienced and capable farm-hoof, at any task not requiring great physical strength -- but, rather, in realizing when she should stop doing a particular chore.

She felt really stupid when she did this, because messing up like that could waste supplies or even damage the trees, which latter result would be from her point of view close to blasphemous betrayal of the life forms which were the source of their support, and which had no choice but to trust in the Apples to nurture and defend them.  

Normally, Mackie would have scolded her for these errors.  Instead, he just looked at her sadly, which was far, far worse.

Big Mac himself didn't seem to be doing all that well.  Applejack could see that in those rare moments when the fog cleared temporarily.  Big Mac had seen the bridge break, and the start of their parents' fall, but he had been too far back to witness their final horrible plummet into the abyss.  He had run down only in time to hold Applejack and weep with her as they sat by the brink of that dreadful gorge.

Since that horrible moment, Applejack had not directly seen her brother cry again, but there were times when he would look away, and his shoulders would shake, and later she could smell salt on his face.  Most of all, he was ale, his face drawn with strain and -- while he had never exactly been a chatterbox - he had become incredibly taciturn, rarely saying anything beyond "Eeyup" or "Eenope," and those only in response to direct questions.  

It was very obvious that he was in pain, but Applejack could do little to help him -- it was all she could do to keep herself from completely breaking down.





For a couple of days, Applejack kept going to school.  

School was sort of a chore, something she had to do, and try to do well, in order to be a good filly.  Her father Tangelo had always emphasized the importance of getting a good education tp success in her future adult life.  Her mother Melrose had agreed with him on this matter, and it seemed even more important to Applejack not to let her parents down, now that they were ... gone.

Unlike her future friend and leader, Applejack was not and never would be a natural scholar.  Jackie did not actually enjoy complicated books, and most of what she would read as an adult would either be light fiction, or directly-related to running apple farms.  Applejack was always to have great respect, verging on awe, for true scholars -- into which class she loyally, if inaccurately, placed her father, on the strength of his upper-class Manehattan education and legacy of a trunk-full of old college texts -- but she lacked the mental orientation to love learning herself.

Withal, Applejack was both highly-intelligent and very determined, and while she was not enthusiastic about schol, she could endure it well enough to gain good grades by dint of determined effort.  Applejack was not the sort of student of whom teachers dream, but she was a good girl and steady slogger, who could always be depended upon to do her assignments, competently and on time.

But now, Applejack found it almost impossible to pay attention to what her teacher was saying.  She could hear the words perfectly well, it was just that they seemed meaningless, irrelevant to any of her concerns.  Try hard as she might, she simply could not bring herself to care about the lessons.  What did classical literature or mathematical equations matter in a world in which her parents had been so suddenly taken from her?  She felt guilty for thinking this -- she knew it was weak and self-indulgent -- but the thought had been conceived, and its reality was undeniable truth, whether or not she was wrong or right in thinking so.  She would not make trouble -- respect both for legitimate authority and for the needs of other Ponies in general was deeply engaged in her soul -- but neither could she bring herself to pretend to care enough to participate.

So she sat, numbly and quietly, while the words of her teacher, Play Write, buzzed over her head, meaning no more to Applejack than the buzzing of the bees outside the window of the one-room schoolhouse in which she sat.  Sometimes, she tried to take notes, but she later found them to be mere jubmles of words and phrases Play Write had uttered, completely out of context and bearing little resemblance to an effective outline of any useful lesson.

Applejack was now, however, very good  at rote copying.  Given that sort of assignment -- and her teacher's problem was now getting Jackie's attention long enough to actually give her the assignment -- Applejack could copy it perfectly, withut error or pause, as if she were some sort of pantograph, rather than a twelve-year-old filly with a thousand-hoof stare.





Play Write understood how to teach school at a rural schoolhouse.  She had, after all, been doing so for the last three decades of her life, ever since Smelly Rich, the son of Stinking Rich and father of Filthy Rich, had hired her fresh out of college, thirty-two years ago in 1458 when she had been but twenty-two years old and out of funds.  She was fifty-four now, and had spent three-fifths of her whole life teaching in Ponyville, tempted to stay by the generous funds the Riches provided to ensure that their children enjoyed a first-class education in a rustic little town.  It was safe to say that, to the extent of her potential. she had well and truly mastered her profession.

Play Write knew her curriculum, and how to bond with a class of often poorly-motivated rural students, and get them to care sufficiently about her good opinion that they would accept her leadership.  She was no great educator, but she was a highly-competent teacher.   She felt responsible for her students, and paid attention to their conditions.  And she knew full well that something was very wrong with Applejack.

She knew, of course, of the deaths of Melrose Apple and Tangelo Orange.  There was no way she could avoid hearing the essential facts of the story, in a town as small as Ponyville, especially given that both Applejack and Rarity were her students.  It was extremely obvious to her that Applejack was in shock at the sudden death of her parents.  Being a fundamentally-decent and caring mare, above and beyond her role as a teacher, she wanted to help the heart-stricken young orphan.

So she did the responsible thing.  On the second day of observing Applejack's clear trauma, she spent a message to Mrs. Green Apple Smith, Applejack's Granny Smith, asking to meet with her regarding the condition of her grand-daughter.

It was not without some trepidation that Play Write dispatched this request.  For Play Write and Greenie Smith Apple did not get along very well.

Play Write had been born to a declining family of the Fillydelphia gentry -- the set that now called themselves the "Mane Line" because they had built their country houses along the railroad northwest from the city.  But Play Write's family had lost their fortune to a series of bad investments before they had been able to build a country home, and Play Write herself had grown up unable to support herself in the style of which she had expected.  

She had failed to make a wealthy match, and in consequence had found herself with little respectable choice, given her own education and talents, save to become a schoolteacher.  She had been lucky to get an offer in that regard as generous as that made by the Riches.  But -- despite her often-painful knowledge of just how far she herself, a Play of the Fillydelphia Plays, had fallen by becoming a mere rural schoolteacher -- she still considered herself the social superior of the population of Ponyville, even of the Riches, her benefactors.

Play Write was not obnoxiously-arrogant in her expression of this belief.  Among other things, she could never have succeeded as a small-town schoolteacher while openly-despising the town whose children she taught.  Beyond that, her very concept of proper conduct required social modesty; to engage in a gaudy display of one's claimed superior status was, by her lights, terribly declasse.

Instead, the quiet air of class she exuded had an uplifting effect on the young and burgeoning town of Ponyville, and on the two generations of schoolchildren who came under her tutelage.  It gained her the respect of the adult townsponies as well, and hence Play Write's words were well-heeded by the leaders of Ponyville Society -- such as it was, back then.  Most of them sensed her social superiority, and courted her approval.

The problem was that Green Apple Smith was not among her admirers.  Greenie had been born to the Apples a century ago when they had still been Pilgrim-Ponies, wanderers searching for a new home.  They had found that home here, on the last lake made by the Avalon before it plunged into the Muddy through that same gorge into which her daughter and son-in-law had recently fallen.  They had founded Sweet Apple Acres, and around them had grown Ponyville, originally as a huddle of houses around the Acres' river landing.  They predated the town, they predated the Riches, and they knew it.

The Apples were fiercely proud, with a pride that saw Play Write's own upper middle class manners as mere pretensions.  They were anachronisms, leftovers from the Equestria that had been before the age of steam and industry, misfits in the new world of urban sophistication.  They were anachronisms even in their own home town, which had grown from a mere river landing to the home of fashionable families such as the Riches and the Silvers.  They were mere country bumpkins.

Yet they were proud, and here in Ponyville they were respected, and Play Write knew that the town's respect for the Apples ran deeper than their respect for the Riches, and certainly deeper than anything she could earn as a newcomer -- and newcomer she was, even after three decades of living here, because her roots were planted back in Fillydelphia.  Play Write paid tribute to their social standing, much as the necessity bothered her, because if she hadn't, Ponyville would never have respected her.  Even the Riches respected the Apples.

It was easier than it might have been because most of the Apples were fairly nice Ponies, and they treated her with respect in return.

Greenie Smith, on the other hoof ...

... Well, she wasn't openly rude to Play Write.  Greenie generally avoided being rude, save to those she specifically disliked, or members of groups she specifically disliked, and those were mostly farmers of and traders in other fruits, whose trade associations she not unjustly suspected of working to try to increase the popularity of other fruits at the expense of her own apples.  And even there she had made exceptions, most notably for her son-in-law Tangelo Orange.  But then, rudeness wasn't the problem.

Rudeness, Play Write could have dealt with, and dealt with in such a manner as to show that she was the better Pony.  Rudeness, Play Write could have met with class, and grace, rising above it and making Greenie look like a mannerless hick by comparison.

Which, Play Write knew, Greenie Smith Apple well grasped, which is why the old Apple mare never used such tactics against her.

Instead -- and it bothered Play Write to even comtemplate this -- what Greenie did was treat her as if she were a rather naive and spoiled rich child of the city, who lacked the common sense of a wise old farm mare, such as Greenie herself.  This worked with all the prejudices of the native Ponyville Ponies, and in such a way that it was all Play Write could do simply to keep her own temper.

But she knew she must try this time.

For the sake of little Applejack.





They met at the Ice Cream Shop, a good neutral location for them both.  Play Write came in first, then had to wait a good fifteen minutes for Greenie to show.  Play Write wondered, while she was waiting, how Greenie had such a good natural sense of negotiating tactics, given that she was after all nothing but an old farm mare.  Play Write had wanted Greenie to meet her at the schoolhouse:  her own natural place, and one where the surroundings would have impressed upon Greenie the social importance of the schoolteacher.  Instead, Greenie had sent back a note stating "Ice Cream Shop.  Be there 4 o'clock sharp," and nothing more.

And then, Greenie was late.  Obiously on purpose, thought Play Write with annoyance, and for the same reason I might have done it.  And because I called for the meeting, I was either summoning her or supplicating her.  And if she tells me where to meet, and when to be there -- and then she's late -- that's as much as telling me that she's in charge, the rustic boor.

But when Greenie showed up Play Write gave her a big smile, as gracious as any she would have given to another Pony on the Mane Line when she had been a young maiden instead of an old maid, and said "Mrs. Apple!  I am so glad that you could be here."

"Hello, Miss Play," said Greenie. "Ah'm sorry for the lateness in the hour.  Things're a mite out o'kilter at the Acres, what with ..."

And Play Write saw the look of anguish in those orange eyes, and realized to her own horror the nature of her own mistaken assumption.

"I am sorry, Mrs. Apple," said Play Write.  "I had no idea that ..."  She had no good idea how to finish the statement.

Greenie focused her gaze on Play Write.  "A mother shouldn't have to bury her own daughter," the old farm mare, who for the first time in Play Write memory, was finally starting to look her true age of almost a century, simply said.  "Nor her son-in-law alongside."

Until that moment, Play Write had not really considered in detail how Greenie must have been feeling.  Greenie had borne four daughters and some sons, to be true, but Melanie Rose had been her firstborn and her favorite; and she had by all reports gotten on well with Tangelo Orange also.  It had not been only Applejack who had been bereaved.  Greenie and Blackie and Big Mac must also have been devastated.

"I'm sorry ..." Play Write said again helplessly.

"'Tain't yore fault," said Greenie, "none of it.  Just is, and nothing anypony can do about it, that's all."  She blinked back something, which may have been a speck of dust in her eye, then said "So, Miss Play.  Fer what did you want to talk to me about Applejack?  She been bad in school?"

"What? --" asked Play Write, momentarily confused.  "No!  Oh no!  She's not causing any trouble, not in particular ..."

"Then what do you want to talk to me about?" Greenie asked.

"Well ... she's being good ... it's just that --"  Play Write took in a deep breath, regained her composure.  "It's just that she doesn't seem to be really there in my class any more.  I mean she is physically present, of course, and she does her very best to do her assignments but ... I think she's very badly depressed.  Well past the point where she can be expected to participate.  It's not her fault ... I think she's emotionally shocked by what's happened to her I don't think she can concentrate on school right now."

"Well, yes," replied Greenie, leaning in and speaking slowly, as if to a not very bright foal.  "Her parents just died.  She's sad.  What would you expect?"  She leaned back and frowned.  "Ah just didn't know it was this bad ... Ah hoped that she would be happier in school, like ... well, never you mind."

"It's not just sad," Play Write said, desperate both to explain what she meant and to regain control of the conversation.  "I think she's medically depressed.  She needs expert help ... she could get it at the new hospital, I could speak to the doctors, arrange for treatment ..."  As soon as the word was out of her mouth, Play Write realized the mistake she'd made, but it was too late to take it back.

"She don't need treatment in no hospital," said Greenie flatly.  "She ain't sick.  She's sad.  She just needs to grieve, and heal. Takes time, that's all."  She sighed bleakly.  "Takes time for all of us."

"But professional --"

"Jackie don't need no professional help," reiterated Greenie.  "She needs to be among her own, and work, and go on with life.  Ah'm not going to put her at the mercy of strangers."

"It's not like --"

"Really?" asked Greenie.  "How much time have you spent in the funny farm?"

Play Write gaped in indignation.  "None, of course, but --"

"And you didn't like me insinuating that you had," Greenie pointed out.  "You think it's one thing if some poor dumb farm filly needs help from the educated doctors, but quite another thing if yore own well-born self was to be in such a situation.  Ah don't want to turn Jackie into somepony who needs to lean on other ponies, especially strangers.  Besides," she said, "Ah've heard that some nasty shenanigans sometimes go on in those places -- Ah trust mahself and mah family to take care of Jackie better'n that."

"I was thinking of a perfectly respectable --"

"Then jest yew go on perfectly respectin' it," Greenie said, her accent thickening.  "Ah'll take Jackie out of school for a while, let her rest up on the farm with some light chores for a while.  See how she feels in a week or two.  If she ain't getting any better by then, Ah might consider sendin' her to one'a yore professionals."

"Prompt treatment --"

"Ain't needful," Greenie pointed out.

Play Write winced at the mangled grammar.  "I think --"

"Yew've told me what yew think, and Ah've told yew what Ah think," Greenie said.  "Ah've said how it's gonna be.  That's closed."

Play Write had no choice but to accept Greenie's decision.  While Applejack was obviously troubled, she was not actually delusional, nor was their any evidence that she was a threat to herself or anypony else.  It would be difficult to get a judge to commit the filly in such a case, and nigh-impossible to do so against the wishes of her guardian and grandmother by blood, who was also one of the most influential mares in the region.





So it was that Granny Smith pulled Applejack from school, and she did indeed assign her light chores -- both to keep the depressed filly occupied, and because there is almost always some work worth doing on a farm.  At the same time, the other Apples -- including various of Applejack's uncles, aunts and cousins who had shown up to help out Greenie and Blackie in their time of need -- kept an eye on Applejack, making sure that she slept, fed and cleaned herself regularly.  And of course they conversed with her in friendly fashion, even when the traumatized filly barely acknowledged their presence.

It was by no coincidence that this program -- light physical and mental exercise coupled with supervision and verbal therapy -- was essentially the same thing that the "professionals" whose help Play Write had urged on Greenie would have done for Applejack at one of the better mental hospitals of the day.  What was more, though they did not talk of it much, the other Apples were quite aware of the risk Applejack was at of suicide, and somepony kept an eye on her at all times.  As has been intimated, the Apples were no stranger to sanity-shattering tragedies, nor the equine wreckage such left in their wake.

So it was that Applejack gradually healed.
> Chapter 4:  Wading Back Ashore
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

At first, Sweet Apple Acres was as much a blurry fog-world to her as had been school.  Other Ponies told her to do things, and she did them, mechanically and without complaint.  Sometimes she found tears running down her face, for no reason she could understand.  Sometimes the fog would thicken to utter blackness, and she would be aware that time had passed, without her having had any awareness of passing duration.

One day, she was out with Mackie in the South Central Field, not so far from the main house, when she saw something really peculiar.  Her mental fog seemed to thicken, which at first she didn't notice because it had been an unusually-foggy day to begin with, and Mackie had stepped a few paces away for a moment.  A cold breeze blew over her from the direction of the Everfree.

And, suddenly, Applejack knew that somepony was watching her.

She turned toward the direction from which she felt the regard.  She saw a thicker patch of mist, and in the mist there were two glowing golden lights.  Ashmoment later, the mist parted slightly, and she could see they were the eyes of an older filly, a girl of around fourteen or fifteen.  The strange filly was an Earth Pony, with a coat gray as the fog; and long flowing yellow hair.  Applejack wasn't exactly sure why it looked so much as if her golden eyes were actually glowing.

Applejack felt a great curiosity, one of the first strong emotions to have moved her since the loss of her parents, and she somehow leaned toward the strange filly, though she moved neither head nor body.  Abruptly, the fog between them was gone, though the fog elsewhere all around both of them seemed to have thickened, and she could no longer see her brother.  But Applejack could plainly see the strange filly:  a muscular, stocky young mare with perfectly-normal golden eyes.  She could make out the Cutie Mark on her flanks:  a magnifying glass.

"Thou'rt almost on my side now," the gray filly said.  Her voice was soft but clear.  "Yet thou still do breathe.  'Tis passing strange."

"We're both south o'the River," Applejack said.  It was like a conversation in dream.  And she suddenly realized she was not sure where she was; she could not see the her brother, or the sky and when she looked down she could not even see the ground, or the base of her hooves, and for all that she could feel through her hooves she might as well have been standing on fog.  The sounds and smells of Sweet Apple Acres; even more shockingly she could feel its life around her no more.

"I have crossed partway the River so far," the filly said, "and am passed beyond Life.  I fain would reach the other shore, but cannot while my duty here is yet undone."

"Mah parents fell into the River," Applejack informed her.  It was easy to speak of in the dream; the pain would come when she awoke.  She knew this from bitter experience.  "They left me here, alone."

"Oh ..." the gray filly said.  "Tis thee."  She leaned forward, sniffed Applejack.

Applejack returned the gesture.  The strange filly smelt of herbal soap and, oddly enough, burnt omelette.

"Who are you?" asked Applejack.  "How come Ah've never seen you 'round these parts before?  Kin we walk together a while?"

"Mine own name is of scant matter," the gray filly replied,  "and I should not draw thee onto mine own paths; I have drawn thee too far down them already.  'Twould be wrong to do this to find a play-mate, though I have made that mistake before and shall again, I fear.  And I think thou hast a great wyrd amongst the Living, from which 'twould be treachery against mine own High Lady if I were to reave you from your proper path untimely."

"Ah -- Ah don't understand" Applejack confessed.  "Ah'm just a young filly.  Ah don't even know your High Lady."

"Thou'rt a young filly now," the strange gray filly said, "but I ween that thou shall wax with the passage of the years.  Know this, however."  She leaned forward, and her eyes now most definitely glowed with an eerie intensity, and her voice seemed to at once come from very far away and be overwhelmingly powerful.

"Thou'rt not and never shall be alone.  Thine own parents have not forsaken thee.  They do always watch over thee from their side of the Rivers, and do whatever lies within their power to aid thee, and that power is greater than thou might imagine.  For the hearts of heroes are strong, and heroes are what Melanie Rose Apple and Tangelo Orange were, and still are!  Great was their deed, greater than even they did or thou dost realize, for when they did succor Rarity Belle they struck a mighty blow upon the Hinge of Fate itself.  Ye twain shall be among those to liberate mine own High Lady, and thus the echoes of that deed shall resound down the centuries to come.  And ... more than this I must say, even though thou shalt not remember what I say now clearly, but know it only in the back of thine own soul.  But know this, and know this well -- thy parents did not die in vain."

Applejack did not fully understand what the strange filly had said, but it felt as if a great load had been lifted from her heart.

The strange filly blinked, and her eyes were again normal.  "What tidings did I bring?" she asked, which was strange as she should have known what she just said.  "Were they happy?"

"Yes," said Applejack.  "Thank you."

"It is good that they were such as to gladden thee," the gray filly said.  "Now come!  I shall lead thee back fully to thine own side of the river."

"We're on the same side of the River," Applejack pointed out, though she was not sure exactly which river the strange filly meant.

"Indeed -- and that should not be.  Thine own side is the shore of Life.  I must dwell on this islet between Life and Death until my appointed task is done.  Only then may I cross over to mine own eternal Release."

And, abruptly, Applejack was certain that the one with whom she held converse was long, long dead.

"You can bring me back home?" Applejack asked her.

"I can find the way for thee."  The gray filly smiled, and it was not frightening at all.  "I am very, very good at finding things.  Now, please come.  Thou shouldst not long here linger.  'Tis perilous for those who do still breathe.  Let me but find thine way."  She closed her eyes in concentration.  She opened them, and her eyes and Cutie Mark both flashed golden.  This was for but an instant  and then her eyes were once again normal. 

"This way," she told Applejack, and trotted off in ... a direction.

Applejack could not properly describe the direction, but she could follow Ruby.  And she did trotting along behind Ruby's streaming two-toned yellow mane and tail, bouncing as it did with Ruby's own gait.  For a moment it seemed as if all was void saved for Ruby's mane and tail, and then for another moment Applejack was forging forward against resistance, as if she were wading through a river; but Ruby was leaving a wake for her, enabling her to make progress.

Then she was standing once more with the strange gray filly, but now they were definitely back in the South Central Field of Sweet Apple Acres.  Applejack felt the warm earth under her hooves; smelled apple trees all around; heard the hoofsteps of her brother Big Mac upon the turf.

The fog was lifting, but it was still thick toward the Everfree, where the gray filly stood.  And Applejack realized that the strange filly had brought her back ... all the way back to Applejack's home, from whatever strange place was her normal home.

"Thank you," said Applejack softly.  "Thank you for bringing me back.  Ah'll never forget ..."

"Thou shalt forget, mostly," the strange filly said sadly.  "For we have passed unto here through Lethe, and the breathing do not much remember what hath passed on my side, an they have touched those waters.  I am still with thee, which is why thou dost still remember, but I must soon depart -- and when I do, then thou shalt forget."

"Forget everything?" Applejack asked in dismay.  For there was one thing in particular, that she very much wanted to remember.

"Yes," answered the other filly, nodding.  "Unless --"

"Unless -- ?" asked Applejack expectantly.

The strange filly sighed.

"It doth breach the usual rules, but I do like thee, Abigail Jacqueline Apple.  So, please do attend.  If thou dost wish to remember one particular thing, think upon it very strongly, as I do depart.  Thou mayest remember that one thing, an thy will be strong enow.  That wilst thou then remember, thou perhaps imperfectly, as if recalling a dream.  The rest, I fear, shall be lost.  Dost thou ken?"

"Yes," said Applejack.  "Thank you fer giving me the chance."  She began to concentrate on a certain thing the gray filly had told her.

"Fare thee well, Applejack," said the strange gray filly.  "I have always been and always shall be a friend to those of thine house; when we meet again, therefore, we shall meet as friends.  And I shall see thee again, in times to come ...

As she said these words, the gray filly deemed to draw back into the mist -- or did the fog extend itself to engulf her, or even form from her?  Appelejack could not be certain, but the fog enfolded her, and her outline faded, until all that there was of her was two glowing golden eyes ... and then there was not even that.

The strange gray filly was gone.

Applejack heard Big Mac coming up behind her.

"Come on, Jackie," her brother said calmly.  "Follow me."

She turned around and looked up into his sad green eyes.  "Mackie," she said.  "Ah've learned something."

He started in surprise.  "Jackie?"  he asked her, vioce thick with some emotion.  "What did yew learn?"

"Mom and Dad are dead," she told her brother.  Her eyes welled with tears.  "Ah saw them fall.  They're really and truly dead.  They ain't comin' back."

Mackie's own eyes glistened, and he put a hoof gently on Applejack's withers.  "Ah know, Jackie.  Ah know that."

"But Ah'm still alive," Applejack said.  "And Ah gotta keep on living.  Life is good."  She felt the wetness running down her cheeks.

"Us both, Jackie," Big Mac said, stroking his sister's mane.

For a moment Applejack simply leaned against her brother, enjoying his comforting presence, and then she pulled away and looked up urgently into Mackie's eyes.  "There's more," she said.  "It's important."

Big Mac looked down at her questioningly.

"They still love us," Jackie said, "And they're watching out for us, from their side of the River.  And they try to help us, best they can, which is more than you might think, because they're heroes, and the hearts of heroes are strong."  She looked at her brother solemnly, and then she smiled, though the tears were flowing.  "They didn't die in vain, Mackie.  They did something great.  They're heroes."

"Jackie," Big Mac said, and reached out to hug her tightly against him.  "Jackie ... Ah was ..."  He pulled back and smiled down on her.  "Welcome back, Jackie.  Ah'm so glad yore back, at last."

"Thanks," said Applejack.  "Ah'm glad to be back."

"How did you know all that?" Big Mac asked her.

Applejack thought about it.  There was something about a filly ...?  Or was she a filly?  She couldn't remember anything about her, not her name nor where she'd met her, nor even really what she'd looked like.  Except ... for some reason she had a strong image of fog, and in the fog a pair of golden glowing eyes.

And that was all.

"Ah don't know," Jackie said slowly.  "Ah don't rightly know."  She smiled at Big Mac.  "But Ah don't reckon it matters.  Kin we go home?  Ah want to tell Grannie and Gramps that Ah'm back, and that Ah'm sorry for being gone."

"Well ... I got this chore ..." Big Mac thought for a moment.  "Ah guess it's okay this time.  Let's go, Jackie."

Her step was light and her tail high, for the first time in days, as she walked back to the farmhouse with her brother.
> Epilogue:  Onto Life's Road
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

it was more than six weeks since Applejack's parents had died, and since she had come all the way back from wherever her soul had been wandering.  Her kin had watched with happy approval at the speed with which she had recovered from her depression.  She was still sad, of course -- she would still be sad about the death of her parents until the day she herself died, they knew, when she thought on it -- but she was no longer paralyzed by grief, and that was really the best they could hope for.  She was now clearly sane.

Which was why, when one day she sat down at the dinner table and solemnly, seriously told her grandparents and brother that she had decided to visit her Orange kin in Manehattan, they took her quite seriously, and did not attempt to oppose her on the grounds of her age.  At twelve, Applejack already had a fundamental maturity and responsibility about her that most Ponies would not have at twenty-two:  this aspect of her character had strengthened considerably since her loss.  In the past month and a half of her life, she had grown up rapidly.

There were families that would have refused to let her leave anyway.  They would have feared the corruptions that might come to a filly on the edge of marehood, out alone in the big wide world.  But her grand-parents knew that Applejack had common sense and grit, and a firm moral character.  She would not do anything stupid, nor bad, and in Equestria in that era, there were few Ponies who would be evil enough to physically assault a filly on the road.

Greenie and Blackie, who had fought monsters when they were Applejack's present age, did not consider the perils of a trip to Manehattan to visit relatives to be all that truly terrible.  They had been born in the last century, and the soft over-protectiveness that would grow in Equestria in the next century, in the Second Age of Wonders, was entirely alien to their character.  They were if anything pleasantly surprised when Applejack announced her intention to make the journey by road.

"This is mah idea," she told her grand-parents, "and Ah'm robbing you of help on the farm, which is the part Ah feel bad about.  Ah shouldn't ask you to pay mah way by railroad as well.  That'd be just takin' advantage of you."

"Ah don't really mind so much," said Blackie, looking fondly at his grand-daughter.  "You sure you want to walk?"

"Aw," said Greenie, "it ain't no great trek to Manehattan, no more'n three hunnert twenty leagues or so.  In good weather, t'aint no more'n month's walk for a healthy filly like her.  Why, when Ah was a Pilgrim-Pony, Ah used to walk at least twice that far every season save winter, when we'd make a long camp."

"What about food?" asked Big Mac, worried about his little sister.

"Ah'll give her some vittles to start with," Greenie said, "dried cheese and hardtack, stuff that'll keep on the road, and Jackie -- ?"

"Yes, Granny?"

"-- Yew should be able to do chores for yore dinner at inns and farms and the like.  Jest be careful -- if the Ponies look seedy, find someplace else.  And make sure that other Ponies have some idea who you are and where yore goin', and that yore an Apple and have kin who'll come lookin' for you.  Yew should be mostly safe."

"Yes, Granny," replied Applejack.

Against her protests, each member of the family chipped in some money as well, wadded in with washcloths and put down deep in her saddlebags.

"Now don't go flashing that around," Blackie said, "jest take out one or two in advance when yew need to buy something, and do it where nopony can see what yore doing, best to do it at the start of yore day.  Most Ponies are good, even the rough ones yew might meet on the road, but there's no sense providin' temptation to those who might be thinking about doing bad, if'n yew get mah drift."

"Yes, Grampa," replied Applejack.

"An' don't buy no fripperies, with that," said Greenie.  "That's fer vittles."

"Yes, Granny," replied Applejack, nodding.  "Ah know better'n that."

"Course you do," said Greenie, smiling at her.  "Yore a good girl, and a smart girl."

Blackie was feeling poorly that morning, so he stayed inside the farmhouse to watch little Bloomie, who was just at an age when she was toddling around energetically attempting to find ways of destroying herself.  Greenie and Mackie saw her off at the gates of Sweet Apple Acres.  Greenie looked proudly at her grand-daughter setting out into the wide world on her first big journey; Mackie mostly just looked sad, and a bit worried.

Jackie looked back at the farm as she reached the first turn in the road.  She could see Greenie and Mackie, leaning against one another for comfort.  She knew she was causing them some grief by leaving like this, and she felt bad about it, but she knew she had to tell her Aunt and Uncle Orange how their kinsponies had died -- that they had been heroes -- and find out for herself what the big city was like.  

She sensed, somehow, that she had a bigger destiny than Sweet Apple Acres -- she'd had a dream in which somepony with a pair of glowing golden eyes had told her this -- and that she had to reach out for it.  She hoped that she wouldn't have to leave the farm behind forever, but she greatly feared that this might indeed be the case.

Her best friend, Landscape Carrot, wasn't there to see her off.  He'd be at his own farm.  They'd already said their goodbyes, in the treehouse that Blackie and Mackie had built for them years ago, the place where she and all her friends had so often met to play together.

Landscape bothered her sometimes.  He was still the bestest best friend she'd ever had -- somepony who always wanted to take her exploring, whether the woods and hills, or the worlds of other times and places in books; gentle and caring and courageous and funny.  Yet sometimes she felt uncertain around him, as if something was changing, shifting the ground on which they stood together.

She hoped they'd always be friends.  She didn't want to be tied to him, but she didn't want to lose his friendship forever.  At their last meeting, they had promised to write one another, and they had hugged goodbye -- a long, intensely-emotional hug that, halfway through, had started to feel a bit strange.  Not bad -- it was always good to hug Landscape -- but strange.  Kind of like she was on her Cycle, though she wasn't.  

Irritable?  No, that wasn't the word for it.  She had no words for it, save ones that certainly didn't apply to her, because she wasn't into mushy stuff like that.  But she knew that she was glad of Landscape's friendship.  He had been a great comfort to her, in the weeks after she had once again wakened to the world of Life.





She was now passing the Carrot Garden, the farm of Landscape's family, and she looked toward the farm-house, hoping that she might see Landscape.  But he was not there, though she could see his younger sister Golden Harvest working in one of the front fields.  Golden Harvest, also known as Carrot-Top, was also one of her friends.

"Hi, Carrot-Top!" Applejack called out to her.  "Ah'm leaving for Manehattan!"

Carrot-Top walked over slowly toward her.  "Ah know that," she said.  "'Scape told me.  He's sad you're leaving."

"Ah'm sad to be leaving too," Applejack admitted.  "But also happy!  Ah want to see the big city, and it's been a long time since Ah've seen mah Orange cousins.  This is going to be a great adventure!"

"Well, Ah hope you have a good time," said Carrot-Top.  She looked a bit sad herself, ears slightly drooping.  Then she smiled slightly.  "Good luck!"

"Good luck to you too," replied Applejack, and hugged the younger filly.

Then they parted, and she was back on the road.





She was round the curve of the road from the gates to the Carrot Garden, when she heard a familiar voice.

"Hi, Jackie."

She turned to see the familiar light-yellow face of Landscape Carrot, topped by his two-toned green mane.  Gentle, dark green eyes looked into her own.

"'Scape!" she cried with delight, and smiled.  "Are you here to see me off too?"

He shuffled and looked embarrassed.  "Yes," he said.  "Maybe a little bit.  Um, Ah made up a little package for you, for the road.  Some biscuits, a little jelly, and -- well, a little letter I wrote which you can read later on, at the bottom."  He handed her a small cloth bag.

"Why, Landscape, you didn't need to do all that!"

"Not that hard," he said.  "Oh, and Ah drew you a map.  Ah did a little research on the route, the safest roads, the best towns to stay at.  That's in some papers next to the map."

"Why, thank you!" said Applejack, and she really meant it, too.  Landscape was good at maps.  His map would probably be of considerable help to her.  She put the little bag into her larger one.

"You're welcome," said Landscape.  "Well -- Ah guess this is it.  Ah won't be seeing you for months after this -- if you come back."

"Oh, 'Scape!"  she replied.  "Ah --"  She fell silent.  Another filly might have told Landscape 'don't fret, of course I'm coming back,' but the truth was that Applejack wasn't exactly sure if, or when she was coming back.  And Applejack hated to lie -- especially to a best friend.

He opened his own mouth as if he were going to say something, raised a hoof and stretched it toward her -- and, suddenly, they were hugging, holding each other in their forelegs, clinging to each other as if they never wanted to let go.  They pressed their cheeks, the sides of their necks together.  They said nothing -- neither of them knew exactly what to say, at a moment like this.  She felt a strong, inchoate desire, and wondered if he felt it as well.

Then they released one another, still touching gently.

"Ah'll be seeing you, Applejack," said Landscape.  "Yore mah friend.  Ah'm never going to forget you -- no matter what."

"Same here, Landscape," said Applejack.  "Ah'll be seein' you -- friend."

And then they broke apart, and Applejack trotted off down the road, moving rapidly, because she feared  that if she did not the accumulated force of her family and her best friend would pull her back, and that would be shameful failure.

So the twelve-year-old Applejack left Sweet Apple Acres and Ponyville behind, and set off on the road to Manehattan, and to discover her destiny.

And if a pair of glowing golden eyes watched her, from some grove of trees well-protected from the Sun, Applejack did not notice.