The Duel
The stallion standing at the door of Sweet Apple Acres was tall, broad-shouldered, grey. His hooves upon the ground sent out echoes which any Earth pony in the entire town could hear. Applejack wasn't quite sure whether he could tone it down if he wanted to be stealthy - if somepony with that arrogant cast in his eye ever actually wanted to be stealthy.
He looked down at her, eyes brimming with contempt at first. Then, as he contemplated her further, very slightly less contempt. He catalogued her, piece by piece. Orange coat. Three-apple Mark, gained a mere two years ago. Present on the premises of Sweet Apple Acres; indeed, answering the door thereof. To those who knew the pedigrees of the Earth ponies, and more than that, those who kept that knowledge up to date, it wouldn't be hard to work out who she was.
"Applejack," said the stranger. (The magic pulsed from his hooves, adding to and strengthening the Cornucopia Effect that allowed the farm to grow so many apples, and of such high quality; as was only polite for a visiting Earth pony. As a matter of sheer arrogance, his aura audibly - presumably deliberately - overpowered even Big Mac's).
"Yes?" she asked hesitantly.
The stranger nodded, his deductions confirmed. "I is Igneous Pie," he said, with a slightly distracted air - surely, in his mind, everypony who counted would know who he was*.
Unicorns and pegasi were not included among "everypony who counted". Most Earth ponies were; and any who maintained a farm this size certainly Counted.
"I has come to get Pinkamena."
Applejack frowned. She knew who Pinkamena was, of course - Pinkie Pie, the brightest and happiest mare in all of Ponyville, though by all rights she should have been a mental and emotional wreck, the way her family had raised her. Particularly her hard-headed, strict father; a stallion who saw value only in the tools of Earth pony magic, whose emotional, physical and mental abuse had come close to breaking Pinkie, until she had run full-tilt from the only home she had ever known into an unknown and uncertain future, certain only that what was ahead could not be worse than what lay behind. Pinkie - who had no feel, no talent for Earth pony magic, born into a family for whom that was everything, a family incapable of recognising that she, somehow, impossibly, had something else instead. (There was something wrong, so very, very wrong, with his grammar, the cadence of his words; Pinkie had mentioned that they had hardly ever spoken Equestrian at home, but Igneous spoke like a stallion who only ever spoke Equestrian to customers, and that rarely. Part of her mind wondered what other language he and Pinkie shared - but she knew she could never, ever ask Pinkie that question either).
Applejack knew Pinkie's father's name, had a description from those shattered, those shattering tales. He stood before her.
"I is come to take her home," said the stallion. "She is stupid, and lazy, but she is my daughter, and I is respons-"
"You're her father," said Applejack.
"Ah," said the stallion, almost smiling. "She is talk about me?"
"Yeah," said Applejack, anger edging into her voice. "There's a lot she said. And I listened to it all. And then I listened to the parts she didn't say. And here's what I say to you - there ain't no way you're leaving with her."
The stallion raised an eyebrow. "...you is knowing she is a lot telling lies?" he asked. "I is been raising her right, even when she is stupid, and lazy, and -"
"And y'never thought that maybe she was doing all she could?" asked Applejack.
The stallion blinked, surprised at anypony actually standing up to him. For a moment, the magic pulsing from his hooves took on a distinctly angry tone*.
*Halfway across town, Bon Bon winced and then had to spend several minutes trying to explain to Lyra that no, her lyre had not hit a sour note just then.
"Miss Applejack," said Igneous gravely, "my wife is good mare. Pinkamena is my dauther. And any daughter of mine has strong feel. This is truth. Pinkamena is hide it on purpose, even when I is punishing her, so-"
It was at this point that Applejack's hoof struck Igneous' jaw.
...it was not one of Applejack's better ideas. It was like punching granite.
"You is listening too much to my daughter's lies," said the stallion, after a moment. "You is young. You is learn better when you is grown. Now you is tell me where Pinkamena is, and I is going to teach her not to lie to good Earth pony family like Apples."
"Ah wouldn't give you th' time of day," snarled Applejack.
"I is see," said the stallion. "Then I is ask somepony else."
He turned away. Towards the town. In the general direction of Pinkie. And, in that moment, Applejack saw the shape of a future. For one particular pink pony, it would likely be a very short future indeed. "Wait!" she called out.
And the stallion turned to face her, frowning slightly. For one moment, just a single instant, Applejack could try to avert that terrible, terrifying future. She said the first thing that came to mind, the first thing that could give her any sort of legitimate claim on this stallion.
"You soured our apples," she said.
The stallion contemplated her words, and nodded. An angry burst of Earth pony magic would do at least some slight damage, and while it could be fixed - with time, and attention to detail - it was true that he had inadvertently given the Apple clan a fair amount of extra work. He had been in the wrong, and he acknowledged it. "I is pay you back for trouble," he said. "Few large gems is fair."
"No," she said. "No gems. You go home and leave Pinkie alone."
The frown wasn't slight this time. "Miss Applejack," he said, "I is not do that. I has responsibility. Pinkamena is daught-"
"Then Ah'll duel you!" yelled Applejack. "Round the back of the farm, Right now. I win, you leave Ponyville forever."
The stallion studied her. A teenage filly, Marked but a few years ago, against a full-grown and experienced stallion, one of the most powerful Earth ponies of their generation? The Apples weren't a weak clan, but even so, he had no doubt how the duel would end. "And when I is winning," he said, without a hint of doubt in his voice, "you is telling me where Pinkamena is."
"First to yield loses," said Applejack.
"I is not have time to waste," said the stallion. "We is holding duel right now."
"At th' back of the farm," said Applejack. "We'll set up a fosse where nopony goes by."
The stallion nodded. The farm was Applejack's territory, and the location would give her a not inconsiderable advantage. But he was confident, and rightly so. He conceded on the location to save the time of arguing over it. "Yes," he said. "Show me where."
The fosse - a large pit in the ground - kept both ponies out of sight of any casual passers-by - not that there would be any, at this remote end of the farm, near part of the Everfree itself. The criss-crossing branches of the apple trees kept away the eyes of prying pegasi.
Granny Smith, she had no doubt, would have some sharp words for her later, when she got back from the market*.
At that particular moment, Granny Smith and Big Macintosh were rapidly packing up the Apple stall and hurriedly telling several unicorn and pegasus customers that they were closed, there would be no more sales today.
Applejack was up to her barrel in sand and sinking fast. Igneous was standing on a firm circle of solid bedrock which all of Applejack's best workings had completely failed to make the slightest change to.
"Yield, Applejack," he said, bored. "I is louder."
"Never!" said Applejack.
Igneous twisted a hoof, and Applejack sank a little further. "Yield," he insisted.
Applejack muttered something defiant from under the sand.
Igneous twisted his hoof again, and now the only part of Applejack that was still visible was her ears. "I has been very careful, Miss Applejack. I has done nothing is going to hurt you permanent. Yet. I is not required, by rules, to be very careful. I is can stop. Is you want duel to first blood? I is can do that. Is you want duel to never able to work again? I is can do that, too. Yield, Miss Applejack, or I is have to do something to you which you is not liking."
He lifted his hoof, and allowed Applejack to escape the firm grip of the sand, just enough to gasp in a few breaths of precious, life-giving air. "Yield," he said.
"Never!" gasped Applejack.
Applejack tried to wriggle, to bring her hooves in contact with the ground. But the granite encasing all four legs had no give, no movement, and not all her desperate, silent screaming could encourage it to loosen its grip one iota - not with his continual, consistent Voice urging stability, non-movement, inescapability. Blood ran from dozens of small cuts over her body, her left eye was too swollen to open, and significant portions of her hide had been sandblasted. Literally.
"Yield, Miss Applejack," said Igneous, for the thousandth time.
"Never!" she said. "You yield!"
"I is can break your legs," said Igneous. It was not a boast. It was a simple statement of fact, fact they both knew to be true. "Just little twist in the granite. I is can prevent you from ever harvesting apples again." Igneous shifted his weight slightly, and suddenly Applejack could feel the sharp points of several diamonds pressing into the skin of her legs. Some of the cuts on her sides twinged - she knew exactly how sharp those diamonds could be. "I is can do worse. Is you wanting duel to death? If I is knowing from start, I is winning that too, by now. You is must yield, Miss Applejack, and I is make problem of Pinkamena go away at once." He paused for a moment, then added "Is good for you. When you grow up, you see."
Applejack spat in his face.
He reached up one hoof, and wiped away the offending spittle. "...I is think I know what is on going," he said. He placed all hooves firmly on the ground, and a moment later, Applejack was entombed in granite, only her nose, ears, and hooves not in direct contact with the rock - allowing her to breathe and listen, but precious little else.
"I is not understand all modern frippery," he said, with the tone of one who considered pegasus flight and unicorn magic firmly in the category of 'modern frippery', "but I is hearing it is sometimes thought - less than totally wrong - to be letting mares to lust after other mares."
Applejack's angry denial was inaudible, the granite holding her mouth firmly shut.
"My daughter," continued Igneous, "has good parent. But she is not herself good parent, no?. She is lazy, manipulative. She lies, and worse. She will be eat your food and give nothing back. She will be steal your money and spend on fripperies. She is affront to all that be good and pure in the world, and she is ruin both you and your farm. In time, you is going to wish that you had yielded. But I is respect your family, even if I is not respect you. Because your family, and because your farm, I is not kill you, I is not stop you work on farm. And you is not yield until I do. And even if I is kill you, it is not helping - you is not provide directions if you were dead, and maybe your brother, your grandmother too angry over you dead. So, because of you farm, Miss Applejack, and because you is good family... I yield. And when you is discover what mistake you is make, Miss Applejack, you is come and find me, and I is take Pinkamena off your hooves again, and I is deal with her proper." And, with that, the stallion turned and left.
When Big Macintosh and Granny Smith found her, Applejack was still encased in granite. It took all of them, working together, a full three hours to talk the rock into letting her out again. She never explained how she had got in there.
The farm had a bumper crop that year, of apples with a slight hint of tartness to add a tang to their sweetness.
Pinkie Pie was never told about any of it.