Lightmare Night

"Light Flow! Are y'all there?!"

His ear twitched responsively as the unmistakably annoying call of somepony orange floated up through his window. His closed window.

Dumb apple pony sure could yell...

The monotone black color of his room brought him a needed cool head as he looked up from one of his few Necromancy novels. Familiar anger was already beginning to boil over at the merest of interruptions to his valuable reading time, and he had half a mind to let it.

Orange Hooves might not be so keen on bothering him so much if he were to lift open his black-tinted window to throw the book down into her big dumb mouth.

Of course, he would settle for yelling at her. He would never throw a book, the very thought was just... disgusting.

His deep and attractively contemplative frown took on a more normal purpose as he stood from where he was seated at his low desk. He bet he knew what the raving rant of the apple pony would be about; it wasn't hard to guess given the day.

He swore: if he went to the window to address his lesser, and she simply wanted to prattle on about something that he couldn't care less about, he was going to...!

His angrily dramatic hoofshake stopped in the middle of the air as his growing sneer lost some edge.

He... didn't know what he'd do. He would probably just tell her to go away.

His hoof fell to the carpeted floor with a soft 'whump', and he glared at the less-than-satisfying material with a new, growing petulance as his pointedly squared shoulders sagged.

Ever since he had gotten his cutie mark, he had been trying to act a little more grown-up, and in a different way than he usually did. Sullen, introspective ponies were cool and all; but they weren't exactly world leaders.

If that was even something he wanted to do.

He blinked, then shook his head to dislodge the annoying claws of doubt. Now wasn't the time to revisit the ever-shifting question of his morality, now was the time to dance a familiar dance of aggravation.

He trotted frustratingly noiselessly across his carpet to the side of his window, and lit his horn with as much flourish as he could put into the action.

Sparkling, overwhelming red power surged from his fount: gushing and seething to be loosed upon his enemies! His eyes glowed with power, and electricity leapt in wild arcs from the fur on his hooves! The shining corona of light that loosed from his magnificent and incredibly long horn was almost too much to bear, even for his own eyes!

It was too much to control...! He couldn't hold it in any longer...! He swept his horn to the target of his task, leaving a screaming void of pure strength glimmering in its wake. The unfiltered, raw magical power flowed along his magical pathways in intricate lines, forming the basis of the most powerful spell he knew...!

A sputtering red light glowed into existence around the window's handle, and haltingly opened it to its edge after pausing jutteringly in the middle for a moment.

Faint exhaustion crept in on the edges of his chest as the dim, red light around his horn went out, and he took a breath that definitely wasn't even that deep.

The window got stuck sometimes, that was all. It was kind of heavy, too. He had sort of.. worn himself out.. earlier...

He wasn't blushing, there wasn't anypony to see and there wasn't any proof.

Leaving the incredibly difficult task behind him, he took a step forward and let his head poke out of the open portal. His eyes were instantly accosted by everything he'd been hoping to avoid today, and disappointment with the world at large grew within him.

The entire neighborhood looked as if it had been attacked by a giant spider; but instead of doing something unobjectively cool like eating somepony or destroying buildings, it had just left cheap, fake cobwebs hanging everywhere.

Similarly, Ponyville had geared up its largest pumpkin patch to supply at least one disgustingly orange gourd to everypony in town. Under each streetlight, by each door, even in odd places along the roadside.

Safety hazards, if anypony cared to ask him. Those mockingly carved expressions were an eye-sore, too; especially with the dumb orange glow behind the smiles and frowns.

Dusk was falling, and as cool as the time of day was, he couldn't get too excited about it as his eyes fell to the worst sight in the world. There, standing on his blissfully normal lawn, was Applejack.

Of course, she was wearing the most terrible costume he had ever seen, too. A brown, patchy, full-body suit that stopped at her neck and hooves, and seemed to be full of what he guessed was straw from her family's farm. A similarly ragged and torn hat sat perched on her head, and he was going to go for the rudest thing to say and guess that the material sticking out unevenly from under it was also straw.

'Cause it looked unwashed, or something. Actually, maybe that was an insult he would keep it himself; it wasn't so good.

Even through the dirt smeared over her face, he could see the revolting excitement written plainly on her face. The orb in her chest shone with light behind her costume, and it twirled and spun as her tail actually wagged. Her little white dimples crinkled and faded as she smiled gleamingly up at him, and he had to choke back a cough as what must've been disgust welled up in his throat.

She was... she was just so ugly, all the time. He could barely stand it. She was lucky he could tolerate being around her whenever she bugged him.

A recently practiced sneer rose on his face as he glared down at the eyesore. "What're you dressed as, Orange Hooves? You look like something that crawled out of a trash can!"

He managed a good snide tone, but the actual insult could use some work. It had really sounded way better in his head and on paper, since he had already known what she was going to dress up as beforehoof.

The question was redundant, but the mocking would always be fresh.

His weakly targeted shot seemed to have no effect, as Applejack simply rolled her eyes in an insultingly practiced fashion and stared up at him with a smirk that made him reconsider his recent vow to books. "Aw, come on now. Don't you give me none a' that talk; y'all know darn well ah'm a scarecrow."

Her eyebrow quirked as her sentence trailed away, and an expression that was more exasperation than real puzzlement replaced her smirk. "Why'd y'all even say somethin' like that anyhow? You were there when ah was helpin' Granny put it together."

Her eyes narrowed, and he instinctively shied away from the window a little as the expression wore into his face. "Ah thought y'all were gonna try to start bein' nicer, Light Flow. Do ah need to get Granny to have another chat wit' yer mom?"

Sweet heavens above, her accent was particularly thick today. Did she have to try to slur her words so much, or was it a conscious effort to be more true to her costume? Couldn't she just... not?

And for that matter, how dare she threaten him?! He had half a mind to find the heaviest thing in his room and chuck it straight onto her dumb straw head. If she was a real scarecrow, then she'd be totally fine, right?

Whatever the opposite of righteous fury was filled his body, and his face froze in a grimace of concentrated violence. With full intent on harm, either with hooves or words, he leaned his head out of the window. He sucked in a large breath in preparation for a string of curses or some other such vile sayings, and opened his mouth for-

"Sorry, Orange Hooves..." He muttered meekly as his eyes drifted slowly away from the sight of the widening smile on Applejack's face.

Tartarus damn her, he would find a way to get her back.

What must've been a belly laugh rumbled across the mostly empty street as warmth gathered in his cheeks, and he focused his sights on a particularly interesting shrub across the street as his face lowered into his hooves. "Ah knew you'd see it mah way!"

"Yeah... yeah.." He muttered again in response. He didn't even care if she heard, he just wanted her to go away. Why was she even here, again?

Unluckily, the thought must've crossed her mind at the same time as it crossed his, as her voice continued humorously into her next topic. "So, yer comin' with me on the hunt, right? Ah know yer mom got you a costume!"

The intense flush that flew to his head with dizzying speed was completely ignored as he stood straight up on his windowsill, and his gaze flew from where it was counting branches to focus on a dumb, smiling, orange face. "How did you know that?!"

The words flew from his mouth faster than his head could tell him to not, and a gasp rose in his throat as his hooves flew to his mouth and he tumbled backwards into his room. The pain of landing on his back was miniscule compared to the sheer mortification that curled his hooves and tail to his body as another round of laughing floated up through the window.

"Ah knew it!"

He silently moaned in embarrassment as he smacked himself in the face with both hooves, and kicked his back legs out into the air. What was wrong with him? Couldn't he ever do anything even remotely intelligent?!

He had to hide. Forever, if necessary.

He slid his hooves off his face and rolled over from his back. He turned to the window and lit his horn with far less imagination than before, before shutting it in a burst of red light as quickly as he could.

Faster and easier than he'd ever done before, actually. Something to note for later, after he dug a hole to the center of Equus where nopony could find him and force him to go on the Nightmare Night Hunt.

He turned again and catapulted himself into his neatly made bed. He would curse the extra effort to remake it some other time. He wiggled to the head of the bed, and lifted the black sheets over himself. He curled himself and the sheets around him into the tightest ball he could manage, before firmly shutting his eyes.

Complete darkness consumed him, and he couldn't even think about how cool that was. He just had to wait, and hope beyond hope that nothing bad would happen. He would be fine, surely. There was no way that Applejack would-

A firm knock at his closed door. "Light Flow!"

Her normal soft call of his voice, but laced with the edge of something very dangerous. It was the kind of tone his mother got when he said something too villainous, or broke something, or hung around inside too much.

It was the tone that preceded bad things.

He was going with Applejack, wasn't he?

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

He normally liked it when he was right.

"Nightmare Night, what a fright, give us something sweet to bite!"

The annoyingly high-pitched tones of a nearby group of foals curled his lip in his favorite mixture of anger and bitter disgust. He swept his furious gaze to the nearby porch the noise had come from, and glared with as much vitriol as he could muster at the three fillies standing there.

A mermare, a firefighter, and an especially insulting princess. Terrible costumes overlaid on terrible children with puke-green and eyesore-pink orbs in their chests.

They all clutched cloth sacks in their hooves, and they were looking down into them with unfortunate glee written clearly on their faces. Collective jollity and giggles rang out amidst the cacophony of similar activity already in the air as they looked up at each other, before stowing their packs away and running across the dressed up lawn.

Right across the side of it, like hooligans. Children were the worst.

"Light, aren't y'all gonna hunt fer at least a house?"

And at his side, the worst child of all.

He fixed his eyes on the scarecrow looking questioningly at him, and scoffed as throatily as he could. He swept his head away from the sight of her, and closed his eyes in a perfect pout. "You may have gone behind my back to force me to come along, but I will not be participating!"

Even though he was also in costume. A costume that his mother had forced on him, and that he hated very much.

A black and red cape with a high collar sat tied around his neck, coming down to just above his back hooves. There was supposed to be more to the costume, but he had ditched the fake teeth and mask in a bush as soon as his mother wasn't watching him. The cape was all he could tolerate; because, at the very least, most capes were cool.

Stupid Nightmare Night. Stupid costumes. Stupid Applejack. Stupid him for letting her nag him along!

A push at his side sent him unexpectedly reeling, and he let out a very dignified yelp as he stumbled sideways. The attack on his person was met with a betrayed, open-mouthed glare back at its perpetrator: a frowning Applejack.

"What was that for?!" He yelled as he took a steadier step back toward where he had been standing. Applejack resorted to physical abuse far too often, and he was sick of it. One of these days, he was going to tell!

Instead of apologizing or at least looking sorry, Applejack just rolled her eyes before resting one of her hooves on top of the other in that stupid way she did. "Yer too high strung, It's just Nightmare Night!" She quirked her eyebrow at him. "What's yer problem, anyway? I've known you fer over a year, now; and y'all've never told me why you hate Nightmare Night so much."

Her question fell on deaf ears as he pointedly turned away from her. Staring instead at the darkened, crowded, disgustingly dressed up Residential District of Ponyville wasn't much better than staring at Applejack, but ignoring her did make him feel better.

Though, he couldn't help but peek at her from the corner of his eye as she groaned in frustration and stomped her hoof, shaking the cloth sack on her back.

"What's there to even hate?" Her hoof lifted, and she swept it in the air in front of her, likely beseeching him to gaze upon all the things that wouldn't help her point. "We get to dress up in fun costumes, we get to eat a lotta candy, we get to tell scary stories;" She let out a scoff of her own as she executed a patented eye-roll. "heck, I reckon this should be the kinda night you love!"

"And look!" Her point turned to him, and he hurriedly swept his eyes back to something random. "You say y'all can't stand it, but yer standing here in a costume the same as the rest of us!" Yet another scoff made his way to his ears as his mouth began to open in shock and rage. "Ah think yer just doin' that denial thing."

Denial..? She was saying he was in denial?!

Oh, she was in for it now... Half-completed vampire costume or no, he was about to do a very good impression of some kind of raving lunatic.

In as quick of a motion as he could manage, he spun on a dime to face Applejack's mildly startled expression. He had been hoping she would jump back or something, but he supposed slightly widened eyes was acceptable.

He swung his hoof in a semi circle around him, hopefully sending his cape fluttering into the air behind him. "Look around you, Orange Hooves!" He began in a grand tone. "Look at everything around you; really look at it all!"

He paused for a moment as Applejack continued to stare at him with an unamused stare, until she eventually rolled her eyes and turned her head in a circle. After a hopefully thorough examination of the sights, she turned back to him and shrugged her shoulders. "What? It's just regular Nightmare Nigh-"

"Exactly!" He shouted, cutting off the last redundant part of her sentence. He turned around, away from Applejack's bemused face, and towards Ponyville proper. He pointed his hoof towards the first offensive thing he saw: a window that was covered in a large piece of carboard cut into the shape of a bat. "Cheaply made, badly designed, monotone 'frights', everywhere you look!"

"How much terror do you think that bat shadow strikes into the average foal? How many times do you think a filly will walk by tonight, see that window, and fear for her life?!"

His question hung in the air for a second before Applejack's halting and confused response followed. "Well... Ah'm not really... Ah think yer missin' the-"

"Look!" He cut her off before she could finish second-guessing him, as he pointed to the next offensive thing: a stallion dressed in what looked to be a wizard costume, walking with a foal dressed in a cardboard knight costume. "Look at these ponies! Tell me, what could possibly be scary about a mage and a templar?!"

Other than the historical tragedies, of course; but Applejack wasn't as smart as he was, so she probably wouldn't get that angle.

"Well... Ah think I remember from history class about some kinda ruckus-"

"And there!" He pointed away from the badly chosen example as quickly as he could, to the sight of a large wooden bucket on the side of the road. A few foals were lined up beside it, and one had their head submerged in the water. "Bobbing for apples! What's scary about bobbing for apples?!"

The presence of a hoof on his shoulder was only felt for a second before it was pushing him around to face its owner. Applejack's face was a collage of mixed apathy and irritation, and he could feel his rant wane in the absence of captivation. "Alright, first of all;" Her voice was much like her face, only less ugly and more focused on the irritation. "If'n you wanna say somethin' about apples, we can turn this to a different kind a' discussion."

Her eyebrows narrowed, her head tilted, and her pupils somehow managed to shrink as her voice became unmistakably dangerous. "Don't'cha reckon?"

He hated when she lorded her physical superiority over him. She could destroy him, and they both knew it; which was what drove his heavy swallow and shaky nod.

He should have known better than to use anything that involved apples as an example.

Applejack nodded once, and stepped back from where she had been standing uncomfortably close to his face. She took a deep breath as her eyes closed, before opening them and continuing in a more even tone. "Now, second of all, Y'all's point's gettin' lost, so why don't ya just skip the drama and say what y'all really wanna say."

His expression soured as the words registered. She wanted him to skip the drama? That was far and above the best part, why did she want to skip it?

The protest rising in his throat died instantly as Applejack frowned again, and his mouth was left hanging half open as his next thought halted.

Fine, he would skip the drama.

He shut his mouth with a 'clack', and cleared his throat as he drew himself up. Applejack had taken a heavy hammer to his wall of pomp, but he could manage a bit of posturing with some effort. It would be hard to find the same eviler-than-thou tone that he had before, but he would manage.

He swung his hoof into the air again, though this time just for the added flair. "My point, as you so thoughtfully asked, is that Nightmare Night is a sham!"

He ignored the immediate and expected eye-roll from Applejack's direction, and continued with a half turn to a nearby house. "Nothing in Nightmare Night is scary! Bats, spiders, pumpkins and costumes; none of it inspires terror! There's no soul in any of it! It's just all the same, lame stuff!"

He pointed at the terrible decorations on the house, and turned his face to Applejack's. "Where's the darkness? Where's the death, and the destruction? Where's the gore?!"

He stomped his hoof as he turned away from the insulting home. "It's nowhere on Nightmare Night! Nopony thinks kids can handle real terror, so they dumb it all down and ruin it for everypony everywhere!"

Fire danced in his eyes as he grit his teeth, and glared upwards at the nighttime sky. The moon hung up in the middle of the sky, with that dumb silhouette on it that was supposed to be some kind of god or something. "If Nightmare Moon were real, then she'd probably burn the whole holiday altogether! I know I would!"

That'd show all the dumb ponies everywhere ruining the concept of fear. It'd serve them right.

Ugh, he was just so mad, now. He just wanted to go home and plot terrible things he'd probably never do. His chest was tight with rage, his jaw was tight with rage, his eyes were tight with...

He was going home.

"I'm sick of this!" He announced as loudly as he could as he swept himself around. "I'm done with this, Orange Hooves; find yourself somepony else to hunt with!"

His evil and brooding march away from the nagging scarecrow was interrupted before it could even begin, as a sudden, insistent tug at his cape drew the string tight around his neck. The sudden force elicited a strangled choke from him as his hooves continued walking past the obstruction, sending him falling onto his butt.

The pressure cut out, and he breathed a blissful breath of free air for a moment before he swiftly and accusatorily turned to see his aggressor with a large frown on his face.

Applejack, of course; who else? She was standing there with a dumb standoffish expression; his cape bunched at her hooves. He hurriedly swept it towards him, and let the somewhat stretched fabric gather together in his hooves. "W-What was that for?!" He yelled as menacingly as he could manage while hugging the bundle of his cape to himself.

Capes deserved respect, and Applejack didn't seem to know how to show it.

Applejack simply scoffed in response before taking a menacing hoofstep towards him, which he scooted an equal distance away from. Which one of them was supposed to be the violent sociopath, again?

Applejack narrowed her eyes before lowering her head and speaking nearly as loudly as he had been earlier. "Y'all ain't bailin' on me, now! Ah ain't got nopony else to hunt with, mister; so yer comin' whether y'all like it or not!"

His eyes widened in... not fear, as Applejack lowered her head to grab at something. But his cape was still wrapped around himself and bunched in his hooves... so...

A surprised and slightly pained yelp tore from his lips as his butt received a painful yank. He fell onto his back, letting the cape fall out of his hooves, as Applejack took one firm step away from him with his tail firmly clenched between her teeth.

"Are you insane?!" He screamed at the clearly insane pony as he struggled to right himself, before promptly falling sideways onto his face as another quick jerk swept his hooves out from under him.

Applejack paused for a moment as she took hold of his tail in the crook of her hoof, freeing her mouth. "Big Mac's at home takin' care of Apple Bloom, Granny's runnin' the Apple's Nightmare Night attraction, and ah think you'll recall that ah ain't exactly swimmin' in other friends."

Her hot glare was darkly shaded and silhouetted against the orange-shaded night sky, and he could feel a real shiver run down his spine as even the lesser lighting seemed to suck itself out of existence around her as she uttered one last sentence.

"Y'all's it."

He didn't know what was scarier: the mangled country grammar, or the fact that she was putting his tail back in her mouth- ow!

His fur itched painfully as another tug towards some unknowable goal left him literally dragging behind his tormentor. Another, and another; was Applejack really just going to drag him to wherever she wanted to go?!

He wouldn't stand for this indignity, he was a vampire! Well, he was a Necromancer; but right now he was a vampire.

As another unsurprisingly strong pull forward left Applejack hopefully momentarily winded, he took his opportunity, and struck! He braced himself against him back, lifted his back hooves into the air, and kicked out as hard as he could!

His stubby leg barely cleared any distance at all, and fell far short of ever reaching the pony with a firm grip on his behind. His entire back half crashed painfully to the ground, before another tug added insult to injury.

He sucked in his lip as he tried not to have what would definitely be a murderous breakdown, and internally conferred with himself on the possibility of a physical escape. Tug. Yeah, he was pretty sure he couldn't get Applejack to put him down even if he did hit her.

That left one option.

He smacked his hoof against the ground, and ignored the immediate pain as he raised his voice to its highest and most authoritative volume. "Orange Hooves, I'm telling you right now to put me down!"

No response, she just kept walking firmly ahead with her face forward. New tactic. "If you don't let me go, I'm gonna tell your grandmare!"

Nope, still probably not listening to him. Time to try whatever popped into his head.

"I swear, you'll pay for this! In blood! And Guts!"

"I know where you sleep at night!"

"You're the worst friend I've ever had!"

"Your face is... um... dumb!"

"Ponies are staring!"

"I don't even like candy!"

"Come on, my mom bought me this cape, and you're getting it all dirty!"

Everything he said fell on completely deaf ears, and Applejack simply continued as if he hadn't said anything at all. He crossed his hooves over his chest and pouted in anger as something unmentionable welled in his eyes.

He didn't want to go hunting...

Dumb apple pony...

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There was a knock at the door.

Putting your box down and answering it brought what was likely one of the most interesting sights to be seen on that particular Nightmare Night.

One brown little colt in a cape that was almost too long for him, with his lip wobbling and his eyebrows furrowed, struggling to get his words out through his tightly clenched jaw.

"Give... me... candy..."

Just behind him: a very stern looking scarecrow burning a death glare into the back of his head.

A very odd sight to see, even in this town. You've just moved, and you're not used to something so weird, so it's obviously a little startling.

That's Ponyville, though. Odd things happen all the time, especially around that little brown colt with no bag to put candy in.

Maybe that's why you were reassigned.

A 'Day' On The Farm

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"Light Flow? What'ch'yall doin' over there?"

Oh no.

It was that voice again. That horrible, terrible voice that never failed to grate and tear at his nerves. It was a day to regret whenever he happened to hear it, and today was no happy exception.

It was fresh and chipper and full of disgustingly cheery pep. It was the kind of voice reserved for the most happy, high-energy members of the worst dregs of vile, contented morning ponies.

Happiness and jollity, eugh. Did she just have no awareness at all?

Light Flow just didn't know what that pony was thinking, sometimes.

The rough bark of the tree he had taken shelter behind to na- rest, scraped uncomfortably against his fur as he sidled up against its side. His face pressed scratchily against its trunk, and his hoof creeped closely around its curve.

He was probably gonna have to take a bath sometime later, as loathsome the time taken would be. While he didn't especially mind the presence of dirt, his mother certainly did; and tolerance down that bumpy road was especially low as of late. Certainly not helped at all by the circumstances that had roundly brought him to this catastrophe in the making.

Speaking of: why was this happening to him? Why couldn't it have happened to his neighbor, or any of the ponies at school? They all seemed pretty happy in their lives, why couldn't they deal with a terrible, disfiguring tragedy?

He couldn't help it; the anticipation was killing him. The tuned call of pitched birdsong in the sweet country air should have been a blaring warning siren to his ears, but he flaunted sense, and cautiously peeked his head just out from behind his cover. Stupidly.

There, not ten hoof-steps away, surrounded by apple trees for what seemed like miles, facing directly towards his branched barricade: a disaster walking on four orange hooves.

No..

The noise that came instinctively from his throat maybe wasn't as cool or masculine as he'd have liked, but it was better to focus on throwing his head back behind his protective apple tree. A cover that was less than half effective as before now that she'd definitely seen him.

Dumb, dumb, stupid, stupid, idiot he was! Hiding behind an apple tree... that was like jumping into water to avoid a shark!

"Light Flow, git' yer hide out from behind that tree where I can see it! Y'all ain't slackin' on my watch!"

It was the voice of Applejack; the pony ever marked his cruel tormentor. How had she found him, when he had so carefully covered his tracks? They were in the exact middle of an orchard, and she'd come to the exact tree he'd been hiding behind! He had to get away, now; before she made him... talk to her or something.

His hoof came away from its lean on the towering surface along with the rest of his body, as he took a measured step back into a turn. Despite any rational measure of sense, his head found itself tracking upward on first instinct: to one of the many canopies of green leaves and red fruits above him.

An angered Applejack was like a wild animal on the hunt; and there was only one way out that he could see. Running wouldn't help, even with all the fruited obstacles; he was going to have to climb this tree.

His eyes scanned the sheer wall of bark; picking the structure apart with punity and calculation. He had never climbed a tree before, but it was looking like today was the day to learn. New skills and bettering himself and all that. Escaping, too.

Ugh. Today was turning out to be so much worse than he'd thought. The morning had made out to be so promising when he'd found that dead bird on his lawn. 'What a lucky break', he'd thought. 'How fun', he'd thought.

But then, of course, his mother had caught him sneaking to his room with it. A stern talking to about the line between fiction and reality had been the bitter side dish to the loss of his new research subject, followed by a prompt ban from the house for the day.

Oh, but it had only gone downhill from there. Down and down and spiraling down the needle-covered slide to the howling depths of Tartarus; and he only had himself to blame for the starting shove.

Sitting there on his lawn mourning the dead bird had seemed such a boring time, so what had he thought to do? Where had he thought to go? What had been his grand, master plan?

'Hey, what's Applejack up to?'

How long would he spend spiraling into apparent insanity before a volcano would seem like a nice place to spend time?

Well, he could bemoan all the choices he had forgone in favor of torture later. Right now he was under siege by the forces of fruit and southern sayings, so he should really get started on climbing that-

"Light Flow?"

A hoof: laying on his withers with only the hint of an accented warning to accompany it.

"Tree!" He yelped as the nervous energy of fear carried him forward off his hooves. Pain flashed like a blinding light before his eyes as his snout took a hard impact against the aforementioned traitorous tree, and a deeply wrong feeling seized his body as his head stayed strangely stuck.

His eyes drifted open from their pain-induced squeeze as he gasped dizzily, though his world was entirely shaded in unhelpful browns and greens.

Who and where was he, and what was happening?

Okay that joke wasn't very funny, especially to his dazed mind. He could use a lesson in tact, one of these days. Why in the world was he just hanging off the tree, though? Had something gotten...

Oh. Oh sweet heavens.

He bit back a horrified gasp as he braced his hooves against the unyielding wooden prison holding him captive, and a slight, testing tug brought sobering verification to his named nightmare.

Pressure in the form of pointed resistance above his eyes. His horn had gotten stuck in the tree!

This was it. He was having a living nightmare, and next would be the part where the world exploded and he died horribly. There was no worse thing that could've happened; no, this was the worst possible thing.

A firmer brace and a firmer tug left little doubt as to what had happened, as tiny splinters served as the grotesque confetti heralding his horn's freedom. The immediate loss of a squeezing feeling in his gut that he hadn't even noticed was yet more tactile feedback, though even greater was the feeling of promptly falling onto his behind.

The butt pain didn't matter, though; how was his horn?! His hooves leapt up to nestle into his mane, gently creeping towards and around the space where- for all he knew- his horn could've sat chipped and broken.

No blood... maybe some wood chips in his mane.. was his horn always just there?

His eyes leaped and fought against their limits at his eyelids, while his hooves frantically searched every redundant inch of his forehead and its surrounding areas. The entire world around him sucked itself self-consciously away to leave him in somber privacy for pre-emptive mourning.

His horn was broken! No, he was being paranoid; it was perfectly fine. Touching his hoof to the surface sent back nothing but happily pleasant feelings ending in an unbroken point. Not even any scratches, though he should really get to a mirror for an in-depth check.

He was fine, everything was okay. Everything; except for one country thing.

The subtle sound of snickering dropped his expression from panicked concern to annoyed anger, and he whipped his head around to its source just behind him.

Out of the corner of his eye: it was her. Lanky and freckled and orange and- urgh, so dumb! Golden blonde pigtails around either side of her neck like the most stereotypical goody four shoes in any children's novel, with the reading comprehension to match. Hoof raised to cross across her obviously grinning mouth: what did she think she was laughing at?!

Fury the likes of which the world had likely never known filled his veins with the urge to aggrieve, and he kicked himself onto four hooves to spin around with prompt decision.

He locked his angry brown eyes onto puke green shades full of mocking mirth. "It's not funny, Orange Hooves!" He screamed, before lifting one hoof to point at his still-sore head. "Do you even know what a big deal that was?! I could've been seriously hurt!"

He pouted, and stomped his hoof back to the even, grassy ground in a deliberate contradiction as Applejack's own limb raised to scratch at her hay-like mane; showing a toothily grinning smile that said nothing of regret. "Aw, don't y'all get yer precious lil' horn in a twist, now; was just a fall'n'a scrape."

His mouth fell open in an offended gape as Applejack let out a peaking, squeaky chuckle. Her voice had been breaking more recently; and as cute as that was, it didn't undercut that she had just called his horn small!

His horn was well within the average for a colt his age! Applejack should know better; that was just being a bully!

Why was he even friends with her- augh!

He had barely worked enough steam to really blow his lid before Applejack was already moving briskly on, though the insufferably enraging laughter in her eyes didn't do much to abate. She regarded him with plain, disgusting ease in her air, as her eyebrow fell to leave a one-sided quirk. "Now, about all that work y'all said you'd help with."

Both eyebrows down now, but she was still smiling. "How'd that go? Looks to me like y'all been havin' bout as much work done as a plow in a snowdrift."

Oh, yeah.

Anger simmered into wisped smoke in a near instant as his expression smoothed into chagrined indifference. His eyes drifted away from Applejack's smugly smirking face in a way that most certainly didn't have any relation to the crawling feeling in his gut. "Right, the uh- the chores. That I.. definitely, absolutely was going to help you with... Uh-" He coughed out something that could have been a laugh as his mouth rose in an uneasy, lopsided smile. "I'm uh- Of course I certainly already..."

His eyes flicked back to Applejack's big orange target of a face. Not smiling anymore. His stammering leapt up another notch of uncertainty as his tail instinctively pressed down between his legs. Not good, he was showing prey instincts. "Well, you see! I was- I was just taking a quick rest-"

Her jaw clenched. Bad word, bad word! Recover, quickly! "No, wait- Orange Hooves, you see that I- I would never just- I-I'm a model worker, I'd have you- uh.. I- I-" His stammering skyrocketed into a whole other level of frantic as his body tensed in an urge to run that he'd never be able to deliver on, as Applejack just stood there. Menacingly.

One eyebrow crept slowly upward, much unlike her previous quirk in its skeptical burn. It was too much. Her patented stare of dry derision capped the excess on his abnormally low pressure tolerance, and with what he could have sworn was an audible 'crunch': something broke in his head.

"I- I- I- I- I- I-" he stammered, stuck on one relentless word like a record with a bent needle. His jaw formed each single syllable on automatic reflex, despite the frenzied pounding he was applying to his behind-the-scenes vowel lever.

Why, oh heavenly why could he not just come up with one good excuse?! He sprained his hoof. There, now say it. Just tell her: 'I hurt my hoof and I was taking a short break.' Why was he still not saying it?! Was it that hard to just stop saying 'i' you idiot?!

It was no use, he was stuck; and Applejack was shaking her head at him while he experienced a full system crash. Her eyes closed, and she let out a mixed bundle of sighed mutterings that he didn't quite catch. '..Buncha hooey...' or some such thing, it could've been.

Regardless, none of the embarrassment or fumbling could have changed what came next, as Applejack approached him casually and terrifyingly. Though his head was pretty firmly stuck on internally screaming in fear of the apple vendor who undoubtedly wished him harm, his mouth continued to persistently skip: as if just continuing for the sake of persistence itself.

Though, it was hard for the habit to keep perpetuating itself when Applejack firmly shut his runaway face with her hoof.

"Alright smooth talker, let's get on and get you to work 'fer a change," she said dryly, before reaching to pull his ear down painfully so that he was staring wide-eyed and lopsidedly up into her eyes. "And don't you even begin about thinkin' you can run off again. I'll be watchin', y'hear?"

The clear 'I will hurt you' tone in her voice promised to brook no argument or bail, and nodding his agreement seemed the only real action given that her hoof had a death grip on his precious implement.

Innuendo that would've usually made him blush to think about seemed a little stale given he was staring the pony in question in the eyes. He could giggle about naughty bits later, when there was less of a chance that Applejack could actually kick him there.

A precarious and instinctive lean forward from the insistent grab was thankfully cut off as his ear was promptly released on probation. Applejack seemed pleased with his wordless compliance, though it was a little hard to really focus or care about what she was feeling as he rubbed his bruised ear cautiously.

A flick here to there, and everything seemed fine. Applejack was so rude; first he'd hurt his horn, and now she'd hurt his ear, too. How much more abuse was he going to suffer at her brawny hooves today?

Applejack had turned to trot briskly away, and though he made to 'get on' to following her, he felt safe enough to mutter an indeterminate, foul curse at her unfortunate name.

One orange hoof stopped mid-air, and his body halted the beginning of a disgruntled lumber forward. "Y'all say somethin'?" Her voice floated out over her shoulder, though she didn't turn to look at him.

That might've been scarier.

"Nope! I- uh, I didn't say anything, Miss!" he stumbled out through a wavering jaw and a shaking, mid-air hoof. The 'miss' might've been laying it on a bit thick, but he didn't think he could've stopped it from coming out if he'd cared to try. It was just a frightened reflex of weird respect, so that he could avoid a cuff around his already aching ear.

He never should've come here, Applejack was even testier than normal. Maybe it was his fault for trying to weasel out of something he'd already promised to do, but it was still basically uncalled for.

Okay, fine: he was being a real donkey's donkey, sure; but violence was never the answer. He was so gonna tell as soon as she left him alone.

Regardless of plans made to betray, it looked as though Applejack bought that he was scared and obedient. Which he was, to be fair. Her halted hoof that may have been ready to whip around into his jaw set itself passively on the ground, and he breathed a silent breath of relief as she continued off into the rows of trees without another word.

He could run the other way...

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

"I know y'all ain't spacin' out on me while I'm explainin' what you're gonna be doin' here!"

What was he doing here, truly? Was it too late to run away?

Light Flow's hooded eyes drifted back to the exasperated face staring pointed little daggers at him. Eyes like beautiful little green jewels, he'd say on a good day.

Eyes like acid and lasers, today.

"Hmm?" he hemmed questioningly, as he blinked lethargically. Such a subtle sound, but it made Applejack's face turn so red. Little white freckles colored grey on cherry, kinda like ice cream.

Ice cream'd be good right now, as would anything else in any other place.

An orange hoof flew up to impact heavily against flushing fur; self abuse brought harder than he thought was probably safe. His immediate look of genuine concern melted away as the hoof fell to reveal smoldering eyes that spoke much of their owner's feelings.

"Now, Light. I'm gonna say this real slow-like for you. You got that?" she ground out through the grinder that her teeth had become. He didn't say anything, and he didn't need to, because she was already moving on: placing one hoof tersely on the rim of the wooden basket they sat on opposite sides of.

"I'm gonna run around buckin' apple trees, right?" She paused with a meaningful look. It was easy to see that meaning was something of pain, so a complacent nod was the answer he found. Her head bobbed once in tepid response, though her eyes stayed on him. "Now, all's you gotta do is run around after with this here bucket," she tapped the rim of the ball-sized bucket again, for emphasis. "-and gather up all'a apples that'll fall when I do. Simple as simple can be."

Quite simple enough, he'd heard her the first time, after all. "And then you want me to empty my bucket into one of the bigger buckets in the wagon?" He turned from Applejack's shameful display of an explanation to the harnessed wagon that sat in the clearing behind them. Surrounded on all sides as they were with determinably spaced apple trees, it was a wonder Applejack had known where she'd left the darn thing.

Following her as she'd turned and twisted through the monotone walls of brown was a challenge in itself, though Applejack navigated the endless space with seeming ease. It was a short trot to return to the spot where Applejack had first brought him to help with the day's work; though he hadn't run very far back when she'd first gone to find the smaller basket, so it wasn't too surprising.

She should have known better than to leave him alone, anyway. Sure, he was the one who suggested using a smaller bucket as a facilitator, but it was more her fault for falling for the obvious trick.

But, in the end: he hadn't been able to find his way out of the orchard, and she'd found him, and now he was back where they'd started. A big fat oh well.

Regardless, he turned back to where they were both sitting in front of a bucket a little less than half their size, and to Applejack's pleasantly surprised face. "Well, yeah, actually." But all too quick: pleasant surprise turned to accusing suspicion, and he recognized the tilt her head took as a familiar stand-in for a pointing hoof. "...So you were listening the first time."

He cast his eyes aside, to the very interesting apple tree he'd been studying out of the thousands around them. "To be fair, I never said I wasn't listening," he said distractedly. A butterfly flit into view, before perching on the side of the monolithic provider. "You just decided to start again, for whatever reason."

In retrospect, he wished he had been looking at Applejack: because then he wouldn't have flinched so hard at the loud smack that rang out into the calm, country air. A cautious peek away from the fluttering wildlife afforded a view of a wrinkled frown and an angry red mark perched above heated green eyes.

She sure did know how to express, didn't she?

With a frustrated sigh and what was probably a great deal of control on her part, Applejack stood up. "Les' just get to work, already. Ah can wring yer neck later once we've chewed through some'a this harvest." she groused, as she stretched her legs out behind her.

Perhaps in spite of himself: his bored eyes were immediately drawn to watch the muscles in her thigh flex and contract. Strong, thick tendons moving like beautiful clockwork beneath tightly pulled skin; the action spoke so loudly of her physique that the entire world deafened around him for a moment as he stared.

But it was only a moment that he spent unabashedly staring at Applejack's legs. A hot and carefree moment that ended abruptly with the realization of a heated flush on his face, and a dense fog swirling around his head. He coughed to hide a heavy swallow as he stood up, and busied his traitorous mind with lighting his horn to bring the basket up to his side.

Applejack had a nice form, that was all. It was respectable, commendable, even. She worked hard for a living, it was easy to tell. The work she put in was admirable, and he was impressed with her.

That was all.

Anyway, Applejack was trotting away to the cart with an askew glace shot over her shoulder at him, but he turned away in favor of inspecting the bucket that floated just in front of him. Painted white with red lines... of sturdy, Apple family make... not too big, as he'd asked; though it was still a little heavy in his magical hold. He'd adjust, probably.

He spun it around its axis in the weightless grip like a ball, though regret set in quickly as the motion flashed a feeling of world-turning nausea behind his eyes. He stumbled blindly forward, though kept the basket floating just in front of him: stopped in its foolish spin, now.

Holding something with your magic and spinning something in your magic were two very different things. Easy to forget, sometimes.

"Don't you wear yerself out a'fore we even get started, now. We've got a heck'n a half'a work ahead of us." Applejack called out from behind him, and a glance her way showed that she was done with whatever fiddling she'd been doing with the cart. Though, uneducated as he was in cart maintenance, she could've just been standing and staring at it.

Not too like her, though. She may slow down, but she'd never just stop.

"If I wear myself out, can I go home?" he shouted back at her as she made her way to a nearby tree. Her pace stopped for a moment, and what he could see of her face from this distance scrunched in consideration for a moment, before settling into a thin line.

"No, now get yerself over here."

Slave-driver. Just because he showed up on a harvest day didn't mean he was free to put to work. Maybe he could talk Big Macintosh into starting a union with him?

Dreams of fair pay and fairer treatment danced in his head as he made the trip to Applejack's side, bucket in tow. She was staring up at the tree she'd chosen first, though it was probably just to occupy herself. Kicking trees didn't exactly require calculus.

He let the bucket settle to a rest on his back as he came up to her side, and joined her in looking up at the tree. Imposing, like all trees were. Brown and dirty, though far from unhealthy; it was a bit thought-provoking to consider their different standards of wellness. From the corner of his eye, he could see Applejack shooting off a side-eye of her own. "You ready fer a bit'a honest work?"

The easy drawl of her accent was, as it always was, grating to the cycling point of charming. He sort of resented the implication that his work wasn't honest, though. There was plenty of consideration in reading books and thinking about dead things! It took real focus and real work to keep a level head, sometimes. Why, just the other day, he-

He was glaring at the tree now, which Applejack must have taken as some sort of confirmation. "Alrighty then," she muttered lowly, before taking a sudden quick turn onto her forelegs.

He barely had time to snap out of an internal rant that had barely come into its own, and to appreciate the beautifully bunching cords in Applejack's coiled thighs before they were shooting out like twin cannons into the hard flesh of the tree.

The dull thunk at such a short range was rattling in a way that was never easy to get used to with his constitution, and it was a struggle to keep his head from wobbling as the sound seemed to reverberate down through his ringing bones.

The impact set the great green behemoth groaning and toppling in protest, though Applejack obviously wasn't anywhere near strong enough to actually knock over a tree with just a buck. Branches rattled, a couple leaves fell away from the quiet cacophony of their brethren, and with the audible snapping of stems: a dozen little red raindrops began to fall.

As Applejack quickly began to run away- hey!

Wide eyed and staring after the retreating traitor, he was left alone under the shroud of red projectiles; which he stared up at with so much fear.

His basket suddenly seemed so inadequate, as he grabbed quick hold of it, and held it up in front of him like a shield. He clutched onto the little wooden bowl as panic began to beep loudly in his ears, and the first of the fruity rocks descended toward him.

He regretted everything.

'Clunk' Hey, there was one in the bucket! 'Donk' Ouch, there was one on his head!

A sweet symphony of hollow impacts and pained exclamations sang into the quiet country air as he swung his dipping basket from side to side, hopelessly hoping to randomly catch any of the many offending projectiles pelting his pelt.

Donk Donk Thunk Donk Donk Donk Bonk Thunk Donk Donk Donk Bonk

It was over in less than a moment, as long as it'd felt. Apples didn't fall forever, no matter how much his body stung and bruised for it; and at the end of it all, he stood in a minefield of stemmed bombs, groaning and holding three apples in his bucket.

Three out of the however many that had fallen. A terrific score, if he were playing golf.

His will was battered and bruised, and so was his body, and his brain kind of hurt from the impacts of apples against his magic: but he had survived.

A hoof: laying on his withers like a blanket over a burning fire.

"Not bad 'fer 'yer first time catchin', farmcolt. Now hurry: pick up those you dropped, 'an put 'em in the cart a'fore we hit her again. We're burnin' daylight."

Maybe he wouldn't be surviving for long.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Applejack was insufferable.

He already knew that, but it was nice to get some reinforcement on that idea.

He had known Applejack was a chatty pony for just about the entire time they'd been friends, but it had never been as bad as this. She just talked non-stop while they worked. About the work itself, about her day, about him, about how bad he was at catching apples, about how much better he could be doing- that was particularly insulting.

But, given that he was barely keeping pace even in his absence of mediocrity, he couldn't really find the rights to stop her. As much as he wished he could.

"-over your head. It's near enough impossible 'fer a greening like 'yerself to catch 'em all in one go, so that's the best way to keep 'yerself from gettin' too hurt."

She was getting worse on her slurs, and the pantomime of holding a bucket over her head was a bit much. "Is there any way to avoid the hurt altogether?" he groaned out as the bucket shook in the air above him. He was barely managing to trudge slowly along after her at this point; after... who knew how many trees.

His body hurt, and he wanted to go home.

Applejack paused mid-buck, her hooves already coiled up against her body. She stared meaningfully up at the sky for a straining second as she seemed to really consider his question, before apparently finding a succinct answer in the clouds. "Not unless you get real fast all'a sudden."

Her hooves shot out once again, and his eyes sagged as the routine feeling of deep impact rumbled through his skeleton. His head and his bucket raised tiredly in near automatic response, and he braced himself for the umpteenth time that day.

Thunk Donk Donk Bonk Bonk Bonk Donk Donk Donk Thunk Donk Donk

Ouch.

A scoff rose over his shoulder as his head fell back to the ground to stare forlornly at the little red spheres scattered everywhere. "Light! Y'all only caught two that time! I've seen fritters in an oven that tried harder'n you!"

That familiar orange hoof came to rest on his withers again, and Applejack's voice came back with... just a tinge of concern. "Are y'all even tryin' anymore? You throwin' down the towel?"

The tiny glimmer of emotion behind the gruff taskmaster act put a momentary pause to what he'd been about to do; but as he pursed his lips in thought, and his pelt itched with the many bruises he'd already suffered, the pause found itself outvoted ten to one.

The bucket that was not quite satisfyingly heavy with the weight of apples fell to the ground as his magic willingly gave out, and Applejack barely had time to make a noise that was undoubtedly indignant before he was following down after it.

The ground looked very comfy today.

One hoof under the other: he bonelessly flopped down onto his back, and- though the slight impact left him a little dazed- he petulantly spread each of his limbs out on either side of him in a rough star.

Of course, his tail thoughtfully curled over his stomach for modesty's sake.

The full-body throb of pain he received for his prompt efforts was next to nothing compared to the repeated rediscovery of gravity he'd been suffering through, and it was more of a relief than anything to finally rest his head down with a tired sigh.

The ground wasn't as comfy as it'd looked, but it beat the stuffing out of standing.

His eyes had long since closed, but his ears perked to the sound of hoofsteps rounding around his body to stop at his head; as well as the voice that followed them. "...Y'all makin' some kinda joke, sugarcube?"

Boy, where'd that touching concern go? Now Applejack just sounded mad.

Opening his eyes to Applejack's upside down face was an immediate surprise, before he remembered that he was in fact upside-down, and Applejack wasn't smiling at him. No, that was a very big frown she wore.

Oh well. She could get as mad as she wanted.

He turned his nose up- er, down at the clear aggravation on Applejack's not-smile with a huff. "I don't recall making a punchline, Orange Hooves." His pre-emptive gaze snapped up to watch as her mouth immediately opened for a rebuttal. "-and I'm not the punchline, don't even say it."

Her mouth closed.

He continued with a quiet feeling of victory in his chest, though his face stayed steadfastly proud and dignified. "What you see, Orange Hooves," If he'd not been lying directly on his back, he would've made some kind of sweeping gesture. "-is a pony taking their stand against your blatant and unfair mistreatment!"

As Applejack's jaw worked up and down in what he was interpreting as shock and awe, the words as he spat them came to settle on his mind. "By laying down, of course," he added after a moment of thought.

That was more of a joke than anything, but it seemed to be the final cord on the cannon that was Applejack. "Wha- mistreatment?!" she sputtered, as her face took on that familiar shade of apple-red.

Thematically appropriate though she was, it wouldn't stop his protest. "Yes!" he announced loudly and triumphantly. "We've been working for hours on end with no rest! I'm through with you treating me like I'm some kind of workhorse, and I demand that I have a well deserved break this instant." He hit the ground with the side of his hoof for startling emphasis; not caring to wince as his battered body bruised in protest.

His piece said, he allowed him and his argument to rest. Though... as he watched Applejack stammer and sputter for more words she couldn't find, it was just a bit harder to forget that she was literally towering over him.

With her big, brawny hooves at perfect positions to stomp and smash his face in.

Maybe he shouldn't have worked her up quite so much? She was just a step away from violence in the best of times, and today certainly didn't pass that bar...

He had only just curled his hooves in to begin a cautious wiggle away from the farmpony when she apparently found the words that'd been hiding from her, stopping his escape with loud punctuation. "Hours- Workhorse- I- Light, we've been workin' for an hour!" she shouted, which was absolutely unnecessary given that her upside-down head was right above his.

Only an hour, though? That didn't seem right... "Um... really?" he questioned, perhaps not quite as loudly as he'd meant.

He flinched as, in response, one of Applejack's hooves shot up, nearly vertically towards the sky. "It's not even noon yet!"

He followed the point above and across the long distance of sky where he could see- with the sudden aid of his hoof over his eyes for shade- the sun, hanging just beside the apex of the world above them.

Let's see... It'd been nine or so when his mother had banished him... forty-five minutes to sit around and then get to the farm... ten to fifteen or so for talking... ten or less for hiding... ten again for the preamble...

And then an hour of work. Maybe around 11:30 for the best rounded estimate?

Hm.

Maybe he didn't quite have the court case he'd thought.

With just a bit less victorious enthusiasm effusing him, he turned his head back to Applejack, whose face had gained that familiarly insufferable arch again. One eyebrow over the other, didn't she ever get tired of that? One day, her face was just going to get stuck like that.

"Well... um..." he started shakily, as his eyes darted about the surroundings. No escape in sight as far as he could see. His gaze wandered back to Applejack. "...I don't suppose Big Macintosh has been feeling unappreciated at work lately?" he finished with an uneasy, questioning smile.

Applejack just shook her head at him.

"Ah reckon there's never been a sorrier sight," she sighed, reaching to offer a hoof to his prone form. He scowled heavily at the offending limb, and the thought of batting it away immediately came to mind.

How dare she? Here he was: taking a seat in abject protest against tyranny like the most ordinary of heroes, and she would just invalidate his efforts with simple courtesy? Spitting in the face of brutalized laborers everywhere; acting as though his martyrdom was a mere matter of choice. Which of them was the villain-to-be, again?

Soft, loose dirt rubbed messily into his fur as he lamely rolled over, and took hold of the orange olive branch offered to him. "I still think I deserve a break," he muttered as Applejack helpfully leveraged most of the work of standing him up.

Taking the action in stride despite having put in her own pound of work, Applejack just snorted and rolled her eyes; as she often did in his direction. "Sugarcube, we've been workin' full pelt for an hour now, and we've barely covered half an' less the work I coulda done by myself. Y'all don't need a break."

He hemmed a deriding hum in his throat as he came to a stand after his useless tumble, and his eyes trailed the connecting line of their hooves. Muddy, dirty brown running down to meet toned, chipper orange. Beautiful contrast.

"Yeah..." he trailed for a staring moment, before the uncertain line he'd left off caught his attention like a hook. "..Um, oh, uh- y-yeah right, Orange Hooves." He coughed out what might've been reasonably mistaken for a laugh. "You expect me to believe you can do the work of two ponies by yourself? That's a little conceited, isn't it?" His scathing tone was a little tame compared to his awful ordinary, but roughly tugging his hoof away from Applejack's grasp was a decent stand-in for bite.

Or, at least, it would have been if her grip hadn't suddenly tightened like a vice around his hoof. The pressure was nearly a pinch of sudden pain, and he flicked a startled gaze up to emerald eyes glittering with the spark of challenge.

Oh no. Oh crap.

"Is that a dare?" she said, as a frighteningly familiar smirk began to grow over her face. It was a face that usually preceded either humiliation or pain, and sometimes both. It was the smile she'd worn when she'd tried to prove that it was possible to bungee with plain rope, and jumped off the roof of her family's barn.

It was the smile she'd worn again when- with her hind-leg in a cast- she'd taken offense to his saying that apples as a projectile wouldn't be strong enough to break through solid wood.

Only she'd be crazy enough to buck with a dislocated leg, and only he'd be dumb enough to assert something that he didn't know anything about.

This was one of those moments, and he was only realizing it now.

"No! No! It's not a dare, I never said that!" he yelled as he desperately jerked his hoof away from the pony who he'd forgotten had a tendency to always test whether one of them was wrong; no matter how dangerous the attempt was.

His hoof stayed firmly stuck as the crazy pony with far more all-body strength only tightened her grip, and deepened her grin. "Naw, I think ah heard pretty darn well what y'all were sayin', there." Heavens above, she was becoming shark-like. A shark with incredible strength and very expressive eyebrows.

Holy Goddess help him, she was going to jump off the barn again. Or something suitably crazy and dangerous; either way, he didn't want to be anywhere near it.

His rear only just freed from the grip of the earth fell once again as he literally scrabbled to release his hoof from the time-bomb he'd been attached to; when, quite suddenly: she let go. His world turned, and without even the opportunity to curse her for tricking him, he fell floppily back.

Rude.

He stared dazedly at the beautiful blue sky for a moment as the absurdity of the situation raced to catch his speeding imagination. It was pretty serene in the midst of the deafening sirens screaming in his ears to run away from the impending explosion. Peace in the fire; it gave him a quiet moment to think, and just stare.

Puffy white clouds beyond green canopies closing in, and he knew he was probably overreacting. Applejack had a tendency to overdo, sure; but rarely did it stack up to barn hopping. Besides: that was an activity she'd adamantly sworn off of doing as she'd hopped one-leggedly around.

It wasn't even that big of a 'dare'. All he'd done was imply that she wasn't that good at her job, which- wow- was amazingly hurtful now that he'd had a peaceful moment to think about it.

Best to apologize, or at least imply that he was too big of a jerk for anything he'd said to matter.

He levered himself up with his hooves behind him to catch the tail of a turn as Applejack marched away from him. Probably a bit late for apologizing, as she shot a look over her shoulder.

"Watch." was all that cocky grin said, under the freckled white ash falling from expansive fields of orange wheat burning green. That metaphor was a bit obtuse, and maybe a little too poetic for its own good; but it was as apt as he could manage to describe the sheer, reckless abandon on her face. She was heading towards an apple tree, but it could've been a cliff for all that it would daunt her.

He... was a little star-struck, honestly. She was... It was always panic-inducing whenever she got like this, but still... admirable. His heart might've even skipped a beat.

His breath drew back to a bate as Applejack slowed, and her rear hoof shot out to kick the rim of his discarded bucket into the air. It flipped over itself in the air to miraculously land directly on the small of her back; and- as though she hadn't done anything at all- Applejack quickly resumed her brisk pace towards the comparatively tiny tree.

His throat was a little tight all of a sudden, and a heavy swallow didn't do much more than add to the block.

A careless show of extreme dexterity, for no obvious reason other than needless, showy brevity. Or, in less intelligent meanings: just because it was awesome.

His muscles groaned in underused protest as he swept himself to a more proper seat on his butt, though his eyes stayed firmly locked on the retreating form that so captured his attention. It was a bit like watching the precedes of a play in its action, though with less play and more anticipatory action.

She'd done so many crazy things because just he'd said she couldn't. Spelunking a well, spending a whole week in the orchard, creating a raft out of apples; who knew what she could do next? She could walk over and kick that tree down and it wouldn't be more than par for the course.

Applejack was all about competition, and she had just arrived at her next one.

He should've just done his chores.

Arriving at the tree: Applejack just stared up at it for a moment. He obviously couldn't see her face, but for drama's sake he was imagining that she wore a descriptive frown of intense contemplation. The kind of look that a mathematician might have to stare at a complex equation.

His widely staring eyes caught a quiet shuffle of her hoof on the grassy ground; and his perked ears managed to just eke out the whispered sigh of 'alrighty'.

The urge to speak up was rising quickly; to just call the whole thing off. Admit that he was wrong, sorry, and compliant: in that order. Say that she didn't have to prove anything to him, that he was an idiot, and that she was...

He swallowed, and Applejack sprung into motion.

On a seeming dime: she spun on one hoof to orient her back towards the tree, and raised her haunches in her ordinary textbook demonstration of the beginnings of a hearty buck. Except, as her thighs flexed and her hooves shot out towards the tree, and he felt his head rattle from the impact twenty hoof-lengths away: she didn't follow through as she normally would've.

As tradition usually dictated: Applejack would've let the buck hang in the air a moment, stepped back, and stood in some such optimal spot under the falling deluge of fruit. The fruit would fall down to land mostly in her basket, as she leaned and moved slightly to catch as many as she could. He'd seen her do it plenty of times before; though today she seemed more fond of leaving him to his own self-styled torture under the attacking trees.

While she stood back and watched and laughed.

This time, though: Applejack seemed intent on preempting the apples, somehow. Nearly the instant he was sure the buck made impact: Applejack was already moving; pigtails rising up off the tight cords of her neck as she twirled her back half out of the air. She stepped back; the motion leaving her standing slightly flush, breathing a little heavier, and staring directly up at the tree.

Her hooves didn't stay idle: carrying her energetically around the tree in two quick passes, her head tilting and turning and focusing; and he caught the blurry picture of a hard-edged squint on her face. Just staring and pacing in what little time she had left.

Correction: the no time she had left. One daring little fruit paving the way ahead of its many twins; emboldening the entire crop until a dozen or more were falling in a scattering shower of fibrous payloads. The sun-sparkling red apples were a catch to the eye as they seemed to float towards the ground; and his teeth ground harshly into his lip from the anticipation. There was no time, she wasn't going to make it.

Applejack moved.

Like a greased springboard: she leapt into the air. The color orange was a blur to his focused eyes as Applejack seemed to stretch out through the open space before- in a show of the most insane thing he'd ever seen her do- curling nose over tail into a tensing, spinning ball mid-air; while the bucket on her back continued to fly on in a straight line without her. His jaw dropped open in further disbelieving astonishment as- like time itself was slowing for her- one orange hoof crept out of her tightly curled spin to impact against the bottom of the bucket, sending it even higher.

It flew up, then spun down in an arc after her; three grouped apples inside and securely rolling against the weighty motion of it.

Like a beautiful orange meteor: Applejack landed to a crashing crouch on all fours, and pushed herself up to a proud stand. The sun shone through the dappling leaves like a fabricated backdrop, making her twin pigtails shine like gold and shading Her face as it stretched in a quiet, triumphant smile.

He hadn't imagined or written it: her cheeks were flush. Though her nostrils flared wide from the exertion, her chest rose and fell steadily in quick, strong motions. Tired, but not exhausted, and still undeniably ready. Her shimmering emerald eyes were still alert, focused into the bigger picture, and stoic in their uneasy jittering.

Her muscles were still tense, still tight and flexing as they shone with sweat in the beating sun; waiting for the next act as the bucket fell in a curl through the air towards her.

He was on the edge of his seated butt, barely able to breathe through the excited spectacle taking place in front of him. Applejack was fit, sure: but he'd never known she was so purely athletic! It was like he was watching his own personal gymnastics routine, for just the low price of his already low dignity.

He'd gladly pay that and any actually worthwhile sum to see her move like that again.

What was next? Would she kick the bucket into the air again as it landed, to spectacularly catch more apples as they fell so slowly towards the cold, hard ground? Or- Or would she make a mad dash to catch each one in counted sequence, as she'd memorized from her careful inspection?

Could she- Would she- What would- How would-

The bucket landed with a hard thunk directly onto Applejack's once-proud head, and the apples so emphatically caught tumbled gracelessly out around her face. The cacophony of falling fruit hitting the ground that followed was deafening to the ear, as an ecstatic smile stayed naively frozen on his face.

The scene seemed to... stick for a... long moment, as both actors failed to react. He, still staring straight forward and smiling like he'd just won the lottery; and she, standing exactly unchanged from her previously triumphant stance.

Slowly, like a receding tide: his smile slipped down, one side at a time. His tense and bunched shoulders followed not long after, to match the small, creased frown he now wore instead.

The tentative silence that... he was pretty content to just let sit was rather unfortunately broken by a quiet rattling as Buckethead nodded her bucket-clad head. "Eyup, ah reckon I had no idea what came next," the bucketed voice said, the noise floating muffledly under and out of the wooded prison.

He pursed his lips and nodded along with Buckethead, and leaned back as he touched the tips of his hooves together. He thought for a moment, tapping and touching his naturally hard tappers together; pondering as many things as there were apples strewn on the ground.

He opened his mouth once, then closed it. He tried again a moment later, to similar effect.

"Yeah," was all he managed to say after a few more false starts. He sniffed, and pressed his mouth into a firm line as he stared up at the pretty blue sky, and anywhere else that wasn't Bucketjack.

The birds chirped and sang, the beetles clicked and buzzed, and somewhere, certainly: The Holy Princess sneezed as two different ponies gave fervent prayers for the very same thing.

"Well, you get to work pickin' up all these apples," said Applebucketjack, still standing stock-still with her signature bucket on her head. She directed her hoof in an especially random direction. 'Ah'm gonna go find Big Mac, an' work out th' harvest numbers."

He nodded, and though she couldn't see it: the bucket pony seemed to get the silent idea. Like a stoic knight, she turned and woodenly walked in what he estimated as the straightest direction directly away from him. Not at all where she'd previously pointed a few seconds ago.

All without taking the bucket off her head.

He stayed sitting for a long moment, still staring at the peaceful blue sky above him; before, with a self serving groan of effort, he stood up onto his hooves.

Walking around and levitating single apples into the big bucket in the cart was even easier than he'd thought, and it didn't take long before sixteen slightly bruised apples were well and accounted for.

He was content with the work, even as he turned and left the cart holding the large, half-full bucket sitting next to its completely empty twin behind. He was still content, even as he took what was probably fifteen minutes but felt like thirty to find a break in the treeline, and the path back towards the front of the farm.

He was content, even as he trotted his way home for an afternoon of sitting in his front yard and staring at the sky.

Thinking as little as possible about the two hours he'd spent at the farm.

Hearts And Who Cares?

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Hearts and Hooves Day was a disgusting representation of most of the things he hated about society and other ponies in general. It was undignified, unnecessary, and absolutely telling of the lengths that ponies would go to overprove and oversell their overplayed feelings. Like a giant show of inherently humiliating pretenses that flew directly in the face of anything truly genuine.

These were all the things that Light Flow told himself as he stood in the middle of the bustling Ponyville market, out on a shopping trip for a present the day before said horrible day.

It was an average enough day; discounting the shopping rush of ponies just as late as he was for the holiday. The sun shone as it always did, ponies haggled and yelled when the haggling inevitably didn't work, and in the exact middle of it all: stood he.

If he looked out of place- stormy eyed and miserably frowning at each and every little thing that dared to catch his eye- then it was only half as much in place as what he felt. If the holiday meant that love was in the air and loose pockets were sewn into saddlebags, then he was quite consciously a miser with frugality on the mind.

Light Flow sighed, and hung his head low as a pony brushed past him roughly for the seventeenth time since he'd decided to mope in the middle of a marketplace intersection. He didn't know why or even really how he'd ended up there, but for all he could remember the street had been empty when he'd stopped to rethink things for the fifth or so time.

He didn't know what he was doing here. Well, he did,- he actually didn't like that expression very much now that he was thinking about it- but he really didn't know why he hadn't just given up yet. Oh, he'd given the whole idea a nice college try, certainly; but he was really thinking now that this of all things maybe deserved to be filed away in a dusty old corner as one of those unmentionable things called a mistake.

Or maybe he really just wanted to curl up and pass out in the soft solitude of his cottage so he'd never have to see a kissing couple ever again.

"Light! Over here! I think I found somethin'!"

He didn't know if it was the thought of his warm bed that made his eyes drag more than usual, but it was a certain kind of painful to blearily turn his eyes to the source of the cheery call in his direction. He knew who was calling him, of course; he'd hardly stopped thinking of different ways to get rid of her all through the day.

A little yellow filly wearing a bright red bow in her apple-red hair. A cute, rounded face only just beginning to gain hints of definition; standing heads shorter than everypony around her, but miles higher in pure enthusiasm.

Apple Bloom. The small town's resident little sister to the resident farming family: who had only needed the short eight years of her life to establish herself as a general nuisance.

Seriously. He'd heard off-hoof comments from total strangers from time to time.

The little force of occasionally destructive nature stood pointing at the offensively brightly painted stall in front of her while very cheerily staring in his direction. It was quite the cute sight: given that she barely stood tall enough to see over the fairly low counter.

Now that it was time to think about it: how had she seen him through the crowd? Not that he'd given thought to how the crowd was a convenient hiding place- it was just a little miraculous, is all he was saying.

Good eyes, just like her sister: he'd guess.

His eyes drifted back to his front as Apple Bloom called his name again, and again for good measure. Probably waving her hoof all helter-skelter in the air; as oblivious to how it made her look as all children tended to be.

What could he distract himself with, just to have these last few moments away from the brutal chatter?

Ponies of all colors streamed out on either side of him, breaking off in any available direction, or getting lost in the mess that was hoof traffic on such a chaotic day. The souls only he could see shimmered like a vast undulating lightshow, somehow tethered through mortal coils to the earth below. A rushing river of life; each flame on their own little journey of personal significance.

Would it really be all that difficult to duck out and sneak away? Apple Bloom wasn't allowed out to the Everfree, so she wouldn't be able to follow him home.

Probably not. Eagle eyed Apple Bloom was sure to notice if he left now. Especially since- as he see could from the corner of his eye he'd purposefully angled to be able to look at her- she was beginning to jump up and down in place, to the attention of multiple ponies around her. Even if he retreated home, she was likely to just ignore the rules and follow him.

And as much as he was loathe to admit he had feelings: he truly didn't think he'd be capable of living with himself if Apple Bloom got lost in the cursed forest.

Not like he'd live long when her family caught wind.

The internal debate was over and the floor was cleared; consensus overwhelmingly demanded that he not ignore the filly in citation of a fear of having his bones broken.

So with a heavy heart and heavier thoughts of violence: he raised his head, and turned to the shouting, jumping, waving filly. The crowd was thick, but most ponies in Ponyville were pretty polite, so it didn't take more than a few muttered apologies to get him out of the storm's center.

He'd left home today comfortably draped in his cloak, as was basically a necessity; but he couldn't help but feel the burning stares of the million slighted ponies he'd left behind without his hood on. He'd argued against the proposed notion that he go the day without it pulled up, but he'd soundly lost that fight. It was 'creepy and weird,' apparently.

Apple Bloom had a very good influence when it came to subjecting him.

He left the crowd behind with creeping tendrils of shame and worry on his neck, but he managed to keep it off his tired face as he trotted towards the filly as wearily as he was wary.

He came up shortly to the side of the stand colored very pink and blue, and let his sagging eyes wander over little shelves and stands full of what looked to be intricate little statues. His eyes flicked up to the smiling unicorn shop pony who'd apparently painted her stand to match herself, then down to his side: to the glimmering auburn eyes fixed on him.

"Well..." he muttered, staring down at the little statues again. "-what's all the fuss about?" He let his hoof shuffle out of the confines of his cloak to poke at a statue of a dolphin leaping out of painted water. There were a lot of them of that particular design, actually.

His eyes briefly caught on that smiling visage behind the stall again, and the pink, spinning, flashy soul within her chest. The same painted colors of the stand she stood behind.

A lot of dolphins, and a lot of ego.

His attention was caught out of accusations and negativity by the exact opposite force contained within one slightly peaky voice. "Well, I was talkin' to Miss... uh-" Apple Bloom's voice faltered and stopped, and he turned to see little yellow cheeks crinkled in apprehension, and her mouth gaping in a lasting syllable.

He stared at the uncertain face of his young companion while she stayed stuck on extending that expletive, before turning to look meaningfully at the moderately more strained face of the named 'miss uh.' She caught his eye, and after a moment: his meaning. "Sea Swirl," she supplied earnestly, in a markedly less haughty tone than he'd expected.

"Sea Swirl!" Apple Bloom shouted almost instantly after, making the two of them jump. "I was talkin' to Miss Sea Swirl, and she was tellin' me all 'bout her little- what'cha call 'em- statueits!" In the deluge of words that came from Apple Bloom's mouth following her embarrassment: he could only turn to watch just in time to see her screw her eyebrows together, before confidently nodding as she said the wrong thing.

He frowned at the mangled word, and filed a mental note away to ask her sister how she was doing in school. "I think you mean 'statuettes'," he corrected the filly, to which she frowned back at him.

"That's what ah said."

He stared unamusedly at the eight year old's honestly puzzled face, before rolling his eyes and returning to the stand. "Which one?" he asked with a lilt of finality, as he scanned the expanse of apple-sized figures set on black stands. Lots of dolphins, a couple miscellaneous animals, a...

He tilted his head, and lit his horn to levitate the... was it a dragon? Red and scaly, and standing intimidatingly at exact scale to the nearby rabbits and birds. Not quite as intimidating as history would have ponies believe, apparently.

He'd never seen a dragon before, living in the backwaters of Ponyville: but he guessed this was what they typically looked like? He should really pick up a book on the subject; it was honestly a little shocking in the moment to recognize his lack of knowledge on the subject.

Strange how he'd never been interested until now.

He turned the little statue around in front of his face as he admired it from each angle. Very nice craftsponyship; it was obvious this was a passion. The details were meticulous and the... wood? It looked- felt- smelled like painted wood. The wood was smoothed and sanded.

No price tag to be found. That meant one of two things.

Apple Bloom spoke again while he was busy scowling back at the indeterminably priced roaring face. "Yeah, ah thought these were real nice to look at, and ah found one that Applejack'd really like!"

He turned away from his childish staring contest to see a little statue held aloft on a little yellow hoof. He set the probably expensive dragon down, and focused more intently on the little statue as it raised into a red glow.

A guitar. A guitar? A guitar. An acoustic guitar.

Well, unless he was missing something big and exciting, he didn't really see the appeal. It didn't look to be anything overtly special, on first glance. Even as he turned it around and around, and even upside-down to check the underside of its stand: he couldn't see anything particularly distinguishing.

Did it play music? Was it a music box? Was it a secret weapon? Did it shoot lasers?

Wrong on all fronts, it was just... a guitar. As well made as the rest of the statues, sure, but still just a guitar.

He frowned, and let the guitar drift away from his face. "Okay, why this? Applejack doesn't play guitar," he said, turning to stare incredulously at the filly. Did Applejack want to play the guitar or something? She'd never seemed the musical type to him, and if she was and he'd somehow misjudged her: then her and her beefy hooves would probably be more fit playing the drums or something.

Like the child she was: Apple Bloom leapt up to snatch the statue out of his magical grasp; completely ignoring his gasp of surprise and following angry stare as she turned it around and around in her hooves as she inspected it. "Well, she don't play anymore, but she told me once a long time ago 'bout her gettin' lessons an' such when she was real little."

He blinked emptily for a moment, before leaning in to squint suspiciously at the figurine. "Must've been really little, since she never told me about it," he muttered as he glared at the instrument, as if it was somehow responsible.

He felt a little betrayed, to be honest. That seemed like the kind of thing a pony would tell their best friend at some point over a bit under eight or so years. Was she ashamed? Was she bad at it? Neither of those things were great reasons to just throw the hobby away. Certainly nothing to hide.

Maybe she was famous or something. Hiding her talent to live the simple life of a farmer after suffering through an early childhood of stardom?

Nah, not Applejack. Way too big of a lie for her.

Even as his glare grew more heated, it would've been impossible to miss the way Apple Bloom's face softened, and fell. "Ah think she said it was mom who taught her how..." she murmured, as very obvious mist began to cloud her eyes to follow the clear sadness in her downcast voice.

The turn in emotion happened so quickly, he nearly missed his que to react at all. It would've been easy to just let the small cloud of sadness fester, unnoticed. As it was: he was still staring harshly at the guitar statue before the situation eventually registered, and his eyes went wide; his neck protesting with a pang as he did a literal double-take.

Apple Bloom's soul, normally shining bright red and bouncing with inexhaustible energy, was beginning to dull and tire before his eyes.

Apple Bloom was sad. Apple Bloom looked like she was about to cry. Applejack wasn't here to cheer her up.

What in Tartarus's name was he supposed to do with a crying eight year-old?!

Okay, don't panic. He had plenty of time to think of a solution. Let somepony else handle it? Think of a better solution.

This was exactly why he didn't like children. They were like little ticking time bombs of indeterminate emotion, and any little thing could set them off. Falling down, off-hoof comments by strangers, off-hoof comments by close family friends: they would just cry for anything. They were also loud and whiny, besides. And annoying. Messy.

Unfortunately, as much as he wished otherwise: thinking up insults wasn't helping him or Apple Bloom. When would that talent finally yield something useful for him?!

The thought of action was threatening to become reality, and a nervous, petrifying energy was spreading like stone through his hooves as he instinctively stepped away from the now-sniffling filly. Every emotion he had was leaning towards getting him far away from the very thought of comfort, but every measure of sense he had was fighting with horrible contradiction to make him stay and attend the child you idiot.

Why weren't ponies ever easy?!

He bit his lip to hide a heavy swallow that he half-wished would somehow flush him away, and turned to shoot a pleading look at the shoppony who could probably provide better cheer to his practical family than he ever could.

The pony whose name he'd already forgotten was staring at Apple bloom with a similar wide-eyed apprehension- as was customary for a sniffling filly- but as his eye caught hers, her face turned down in a silently venomous glare. She jerked her head towards the obvious tragedy in the making, as if he couldn't see the problem already thanks very much!.

Now he was being judged by a stranger.

He seethed a breath in through clenched teeth, and sent a prayer to still-unknown gods. Stars help him if he was going to out himself as the social pariah that everypony who knew him already knew him as.

He threw a quick glance over his shoulder to make sure nopony else was watching, before taking a cautious step towards Apple Bloom. She looked up with curious eyes tinged with tiny flecks of tears as he sidled up to her side, but he covertly averted his eyes as he painfully stretched his hooves toward her.

This was going to hurt. This already hurt.

With a groan of embarrassed effort and a quiet gasp of sudden surprise, he pulled the impromptly sad child into the most awkward embrace he had unfortunately ever known.

She was small enough in comparison that she mostly fit under the wide spread of his cloak, and short enough that his head could comfortably rest on hers, though her bow was tickling his chin a little. The spot where his hooves circled around her tiny midriff was warm and fuzzy, as ponies tended to be. All in all: the ill-fitting side-hug wasn't actually too bad.

Though the guitar statue she still held was jabbed into his side kind of painfully. Oh well, he could rue his inanimate aggressor later, when he wasn't in public.

"There... there.." he managed to grind out in the most natural tone he could manage through the pain of every one of his muscles rebelling at once. He was fairly sure his face was making new expressions by the second. "I'm... I'm- here, for... you?"

Oh, how had it come to this? She'd seemed perfectly fine in the morning, if a little insistent about asking him a million and one questions about cutie marks: but she'd calmed down eventually. Then it was just the hours of fruitless shopping, where she'd been nothing but exactly happy the whole time throughout!

How quickly melancholy could strike, paving the way for regret to set in.

He could relate to her sadness, of course. It wasn't that far in the past when he'd been....

The thought shut down mere seconds into its infancy, and it was locked into a box that was then thrown into a deep hole that he paved over with the comfortable sensation of contact.

He was coping, even a year now after it had happened, but he still didn't like thinking about it.

Stars, how had it come to this? He knew. This was all because he'd thought, against every reason he'd thought to leverage: it would be anything even close to an approximation of a good idea to buy Applejack a Hearts and Hooves day present.

If he could go back to a week ago when he'd had the crazy idea, he'd bludgeon himself to death with the nearest oversized book.

"Um.. Light?" A muffled voice floated up through the curtain of his cloak, thankfully providing an easy out to the trap his thoughts had fallen into. In lieu of actual words that might've cost effort to make, he hemmed a questioning hum as he shifted his head around on hers.

It must've tickled, because a muffled laugh reverberated through his chest along with the pressure of two tiny hooves pushing him away. He let the filly's head rise up out of the probably comfy prison he'd subjected her to, and stared down with a questioning frown at the... smiling face?

"Not that I don't like hugs, but... ah thought you really didn't?" The bright tone of Apple Bloom's voice was nearly as confusing as the general lack of tears rolling down her cheeks, and all he could manage to do for a moment was blink owlishly as a response.

Um... Wasn't Apple Bloom supposed to be really sad... or... something?

He bit his lip as he slowly pushed Apple Bloom out to hoof's length, as she blinked down at his stiff hooves. Her soul was bright red and bouncy again, as if it had never slowed in the first place. His tongue flicked out over his sore lips as he cast a skittish glace to the shoppony still watching the two of them: where he received a quirked eyebrow and a shrug.

Okay, it was weird.

"Uh..." he started uneasily, struggling to keep his eyes from darting around nervously. It was so tempting to just drop the child and run. He finally managed to center himself on the sight of Apple Bloom's face, though the haze in his head told him his cheeks were beginning to flush. "I- I was... um... comforting you?"

His tongue felt like it was swelling in his mouth, and his face was threatening to curl into very strange shapes. It had been a long time since he'd been this embarrassed. Maybe not since he was a foal, and he'd followed a stranger that had looked like his mother home.

Apple Bloom seemed to ignore his red face and sweating brow, thankfully, as she just smiled carelessly at him. "What for?" she chirped brightly; not even giving him a chance to open his mouth and answer before she was giggling happily and pushing him away.

He sat in a sort of daze as Apple Bloom jumped to her hooves from where he'd pulled her down for a hug, turning promptly to the shoppony that was also staring at her kind of widely. "So, we can buy this, right?" she said, stretching to jam the guitar statue that she held up into the vendor's view.

If he'd been a little less taken aback, he would have told Apple Bloom that it was rude to shove things into ponies' faces like she was very excitedly doing. But as it was: his mouth was stuck in a strange little 'o' shape, so he settled for just thinking it. Like he did just then. Yes, very good on that discipline, Light Flow. Excellent role model.

Apple Bloom's lean into the shoppony's face became more and more insistent as the statue maker struggled to say anything other than a drawn-out syllable of confusion; cautiously tilting on her own lean as her eyes darted behind her. But of course, the further that the pony leaned back, the more Apple Bloom leaned forward; until the little filly had practically clambered right onto the counter in her seeming efforts to make the poor vendor as uncomfortable as possible.

It was very interesting to watch, seeing as what's-her-name could have simply pushed the filly away at any time. She was much bigger and much older and just generally completely in the right for doing so. But instead of doing the intelligent, correct thing: she was letting herself be subdued; by someone half her size, no less.

Was this because of Apple Bloom's overbearing, childish energy, or because the other pony was overly shy? She hadn't seemed the sort, but maybe his ability to read ponies was rusting? He hadn't gotten a great look at her soul, and now it was hard to because of her retreat and Apple Bloom pushing in on her, so maybe there was something he'd missed.

He'd been slacking on his soul reading, anyway. To be honest: seeing them everywhere he went for so long had made the ordeal a bit plain, and he'd been a little less enthusiastic than he normally was about the whole thing as of late. It was such a vague science in the first place, anyway; sometimes it was harder than usual to get himself psyched.

Maybe it was time to reorient himself? Give greater emphasis to that part of himself? Soul first, face later?

Maybe.

With the refreshing thought of self-improvement, he let himself come out of his haze; standing up. He turned to brush his hoof along the edge of his cloak to get rid of any possible accumulated dust, while he simultaneously lit his horn.

He'd lost some cool points there, he could admit, but hopefully he was about to gain them back.

As Apple Bloom's grin began to edge into the realm of manic, and her hoof teetered on the edge of falling: a red glow shimmered suddenly around her waist. He grit his teeth as inconspicuously as possible, before heaving the advancing filly off the stand, and away from the terrified pony huddled in the back of her own stall.

He huffed and puffed, and his horn shone and sparked with desperate light as he directed the filly's descent toward the ground; eventually setting her down to a rough landing onto her hooves beside him. The light around his horn sputtered and died, and he gasped out a very fatigued breath as his head hung from the exertion.

Apple Bloom was shooting a dirty, pouting face his way, but he let it wash off his back. He'd wanted to give the impression of effortless mastery, but that might've been a bit too much to ask of his aching head. He really needed to work out. Maybe another thing he'd have to reorient himself on. Oh, all sorts of new goals today; how convenient.

With a collecting wheeze: he raised his head authoritatively, and did his best to return the glare the filly was throwing him. He sent a silent apology to himself, before lighting his horn again, and wrenched the little statue out of Apple Bloom's hooves.

He ignored the head pain, the indignant cry, and the filly that came jumping at his side: to hold the statue high in the air where everypony could see it and not touch it. He shot one last childish leer at the child that was literally dogging his heels, before turning his attention to the statue maker. His eyes softened as he took in the thankful smile on her face, before he cleared his throat, and drew in a sharp breath.

"I'd like to buy this, please."

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"So, are those 'statueit" things supposed to be that pricey?"

At hearing the voice, Light Flow's weary gait stopped in the middle of a dragged hoofstep, as his entire body seemed to sag.. He glared openly at the familiar worn dirt path under his hooves, before speaking to address the lightly curious tone.

"No. No they are not."

His only immediate response was a silence that he didn't bother to check was heavy or not; instead restarting his dragging trot from where it had stopped. The pitched call of birdsong in the afternoon country air itched at his ear, and it flicked in irritation.

"Well, why'd you suppose Miss Swirl charged you so much?"

He stopped again, despite a little voice in his head that said he should just keep walking, and turned his head to the source of the voice. Apple Bloom stared from behind him with a genuinely curious tilt to her head, though her sincerity did very little to ease the unintentional sting.

He tried not to glare back at her, he really did, but however naïve her intentions were: his purse was a lot lighter than he'd expected after today because of her. The thought and the lack of weight to his very meagre savings gnawed at him, grinding his teeth from the gravity of it.

He already pinched just about every bit he could, and here he was just throwing money around like it was nothing because Apple Bloom had pissed off some dumb gift seller.

However stormy his expression was, Apple Bloom either didn't notice or didn't care; because she just continued to stare at him so thoughtfully and so thoughtlessly. It must've been the blessing of youth. Or ignorance. Both? She had a little of both.

Whatever it was, it really just made it exceedingly hard to stay outwardly mad. Oh, his mind rebelled at the thought, certainly; clawing and grasping at the receding tide of intermittent rage in a desperate attempt at perpetuity, but he just couldn't quite muster up the energy.

He just couldn't stay lastingly mad at an Apple.

Slowly: his brow raised, and his jaw eased. He sighed, closing his eyes for a moment; eventually easing them open again. What tension he'd felt in his shoulders for the beginnings of a shout bled off; leaving a dragging, tired feeling in its place.

"I don't know, Bloom." He tried to keep the melancholy that swept over the fire from entering his voice, but the sickly words as they fell off his tongue still dripped with it. He frowned at himself; not staying to see her reaction before he was turning around and continuing on his way down the path to Sweet Apple Acres.

The country air was nice. He didn't stop to enjoy it often enough; even now living directly in the country.

It was a quiet moment after that: full of the sweet sounds of swaying and chirping; before the patter of tiny hoofsteps came racing up to his side. A weight bumped against his legs in a sudden impact; sending him staggering forward and to the side in an uncertain moment, before he regained his walking balance and managed a half-hearted glare at his pint-sized aggressor.

Apple Bloom, the excited little kid she was: kept his pace as she'd latched onto it; smiling up at him with undampened cheer from her place glued to his side. "Well, it sure wasn't nice a' her, huh?" she chirped up at him.

If the bright affection in her voice hadn't managed to make his heart flutter as it very much was, the openly joyful laugh that she loosed as she good-naturedly bonked her head against his side would've. He uttered a wordless syllable of confusion as the child ran out in front of him energetically, not stopping to look back as the universally pleasant sound of giggling floated back to him.

His gait slowed to a halt as he was left staring after the retreating form of the child, before she eventually disappeared beyond the distant shape of a white gateway. The threshold to her home. Home. Her home.

He blinked. Then again. And a third time for good measure, before he realized he wasn't actually thinking anything. He shook his head roughly to kickstart his tired brain, moments before a full body shiver crept down his spine to his tail.

The electric sensation leapt off the ends of his hooves, biting his heels and making him start forward in a nervous jump. Walking- as he so often found- helped him acclimate to the clime of his thoughts, and diving into the well of his emotions was less of a chore than it would've been as he started back down the path.

Well, what was there to realize? He didn't like children, as a rule. Their mannerisms and general naivete were sickening, and contact with them in any form was unpleasant to his palette in every way.

But...

He liked Apples.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

He'd long since passed through the familiar white archway heralding his arrival to the farm before he found Apple Bloom. Passing the house and the barn with no clues; it was a resoundingly boring period of walking through the same-y sights of apple trees and not much else before he'd caught a whisper of noise on the sweet air.

Sounded like a voice. Sounded like a female voice.

Four ponies it could've realistically been, and he knew he wouldn't be following Big Macintosh's voice, so naturally: he followed the pitch to its source. He could've left well enough alone and gone home at that point, but he'd taken on a certain amount of responsibility when he'd gone shopping with Apple Bloom. Anything less than hoof-delivering her straight to her house or her guardians would've been reckless and frankly unconscionable.

Not for nothing: since her guardians were the three scariest ponies he could count besides Her Royal Highness Herself. He'd probably be more comfortable pissing the Goddess off, actually. At least She'd make his death by incineration fast.

And so it was with thoughts of a slow and sound beating that he followed what became more and more evident to be voices. Trees and trees passed in every direction as he navigated the maze, and gradually: the voices started to identify themselves.

As the indeterminably fictitious force of fate would have it, he came up just behind the clearing the voices emanated from, helpfully and completely hidden by a particularly large tree. He couldn't at all see who was in the clearing- though he already knew it was Apple Bloom and Applejack- and they couldn't see him, either.

They were chattering at each other about some business or another that he couldn't really understand because he'd missed the start of the conversation, but the opportunity was not lost on him. If he wanted to, he could've very easily eavesdropped for as long as he liked, before eventually revealing himself, and pretending as though he'd only just arrived.

It was a nefarious plan he contemplated as he stared up at the formidable oaken giant. Yes, the exact kind of thing a true evil paragon would leverage to unearth some juicy blackmail or some such opportunity. Nopony would ever know, and he'd have the unforeseen advantage in any race it would afford him. What depths of gossip and secret sayings could he unearth if only he just took the time to spy. Such a simple act of delightfully unjustly subterfuge.

It was entirely and completely dastardly.

"Hey!" he called as he trotted loudly out from behind the tree, because he had honestly never been that good of a villain. His sudden entrance stopped the conversation between sisters in progress, and drew both sets of varying attention to him as he approached.

Applejack stood next to a half-full bucket of apples at the clearing's subjective opposite, thankfully not seeming angry at him for once. His eyes flicked down to take a peek at her soul, and sure enough: the reddish hue and measured pounding that he had taken to view as a sign of anger wasn't present in the dark golden orb.

It was time to get back into that habit.

Apple Bloom sat just across from her, leaning on the bucket of apples; now looking his way with bright eyes and visible excitement, because she never seemed to not be.

"Well lookie who decided to show up! Figured Apple Bloom'd left you too lost in yer own dust to find yer way here." The apparently instinctive tease that Applejack threw his way was tempered by the laughter in her eyes and the easy smile she wore. She leaned back on three hooves as one came to tip her recently ever-present hat up, letting the laughing lines of her orange face shine in the sunlight.

He stared for a moment, before old reflexes kicked in, and he averted his eyes from the beautiful sight. "Just because your Grandmare calls me a shut-in doesn't mean I'm dumb enough to forget where you live." The steady drone of his own unamused words helped to distract his wandering mind, and by the time he looked back: the particular sunbeam that had caught on Applejack's face had moved on, and she didn't look quite as pretty anymore.

Though it was only quite. It still made his heart race a little to stare directly at her, even as her face turned down in a surprisingly genuine frown. "It doesn't? Well, somepony's gotta break the bad news to Granny, then; don't ya think, Apple Bloom?" she said in inspiringly mocking tone, turning with exaggeration to her named little sister.

Apple Bloom, for her part, seemed to have caught quickly onto the joke; though she couldn't quite manage to stop little giggles from escaping out of the turned corners of her mouth as she did her best to nod gravely. Her best was still snickering a little, though.

Applejack sighed, and shook her head in insultingly obvious mock disappointment. "Darn shame it is 'bout yer competence an' such. Cryin' shame."

The jokes at his expense were obviously funny to the Apple siblings, but he had never found an especially large joy in laughing at himself. He settled for rolling his eyes instead, before waving his hooves in the air as he mimed an exaggerated laugh that ended in a completely stoic frown.

Hah hah look at Light oh he's such a mess let's all point and laugh for the nine hundredth time in seven years.

Applejack seemed just as fazed by his antics as ever, as she just blew a scoff out of the corner of her smile, and waved her hoof at him. "Yeah, yeah: 's all real funny, and we can stand 'round laughin' all day and again, but then ah'd never finish the chores."

Some of the pure humor in her eyes bled out as she fixed him with a more serious, daring look. A challenging look. "Reckon' you got somethin' else on your mind, 'sides."

Okay, the way she was smiling at him was getting a little creepy. The first rule of talking with Applejack was to always keep a safe distance from her, so he took a measured step back before responding. "I... I'm not entirely sure what you mean," he said warily, inwardly making plans to escape if things got hairy.

Though, he didn't think there had ever been a time when he'd managed to successfully run away from Applejack.

While he really didn't know what she meant, Applejack certainly did: as was evident by the predatory sparkle in her eye as she openly leered at him. Her smile as it stretched across her face was- very worryingly- both knowing, and accusatory. "Well, the way I hear it: you've got somethin' for me."

He swallowed heavily as Applejack's tone turned uncharacteristically sly, and her eyebrows jumped as her head tilted just that little bit. "Some kinda... present? For the holiday?"

How did she know that? Who would have-

His somewhat fearful seethe turned rotten in a single second of realization, and the situation seemed to blacken to his eyes as he turned to stare disappointedly at the forgotten third party of the conversation. Apple Bloom seemed oblivious to her sister's violently forward advances on him- as well as what was happening at all- as she seemed preoccupied with playing around with the apples in the large bucket.

"Apple Bloom!"

One apple went bravely flying into the air as she jumped to her hooves, and oddly threw her head in every random direction in a panic. "What?! What?! I was payin' attention, I swear!"

As she found few clues to the shock behind her, below her, or above her: she eventually landed on him and his angry frown. Realization seemed to dawn over the loudmouth filly in a gradual turn, which ended with her rubbing her neck with a sheepish smile.

"Er... whoops?"

The apology that wasn't really an apology wouldn't turn back time, and neither would throwing an apple at the child who had ruined his surprise. He knew that, but wow was it difficult to resist the urge anyway.

It'd be so satisfying just to hear the bonk. Not like it hadn't happened before.

He was eyeing a particularly ripe looking fruit on the ground when Applejack's face tilted into his field of narrowed view, waving her hoof to get his attention. He let her draw him from his violent urges to petulantly focus on her tilted frown.

"Now now, ain't no need to throw blame 'round. No shame in buyin' a Heart's n' Hooves gift, and while y'all shouldn't go 'round spoilin' surprises-" Applejack emphasized that part heavily as she tilted her head back to Apple Bloom, who nodded along penitently, before tilting her head back to him. "-it's near enough to the day that it don't really matter much."

"But-" His interjected shout was quickly cut off as Applejack pressed a hoof to his mouth in an effective shush. His eyes crossed to glare at the orange limb before focusing in on the pony in his personal space as she shook her head reproachfully.

"Uh-uh. Ain't no use for buts 'cept fer sittin' an'..." The next word seemed to stall on Applejack's lips as she started momentarily. She must not have thought that saying all the way through. Oh, was that a blush on her cheeks? There was certainly a bashful, red glow to her soul.

Applejack's eyes flicked to their corners, to about the spot where Apple Bloom was sitting and watching with a tilted head. He caught her stare as she returned, and met her with a slowly quirked eyebrow.

Well? What else were butts good for, Applejack?

Whether she was embarrassed about nature's call or the nasty, she seemed perfectly chagrined to have alluded to it in front of her little sister. So chagrined that she actually averted her eyes from his as she coughed, and tried to hide her quickly rising blush in front of a hoof.

"Well... There just ain't no use for 'em." she muttered, as she seemingly tried to brush her flush away. A gesture that, surprisingly, seemed to actually work for her. She coughed again as the last of the red on her face amazingly swept away, and stomped her hoof onto the ground as her expression hardened.

Tried to, at least. He didn't really see the hardness of her glare blinded as he was by his own smug smile. Did this wonderful occasion of embarrassment call for some lofty mocking? Oh, it just might've.

The first humming snicker was so sweet, and it only got better as he added one, then another two; aided by his raised, pointed hoof at Applejack's dumb, steaming face.

Was it foalish? Yes. Was it funny? Yes.

Unfortunately, he didn't get to laugh like that for long. He never did. Applejack only suffered his mocking for a few short moments before she rudely swatted his hoof out of the air, all the while glaring sharp daggers at him. She ignored his quiet exclamation of pain as he cradled his stinging hoof to his chest, and rolled her eyes around her glare.

"Yuk it up, mister. Just give your present here an' get on to gittin' on. Some of us have work to do."

Well, brutalizing or not: she sort of had a point. He was here, and she knew, so there wasn't much reason to wait. Tradition had never really mattered much to him, anyway; he had just been more upset about the breach of trust.

All forgiven in the wake of seeing Applejack squirm, though.

A small smile worked its way onto his face even as he nodded his assent, just because he couldn't quite forget her mishap. "Alright, alright. You win, I'll give you your present and 'get on'."

The snide tone for her weird saying probably wasn't necessary, but he was feeling a good kind of vindictive. It wasn't every day that Applejack was the thoughtless one. He'd mark a notch for this one, alright.

He hummed an amusing little song to himself as he lit his horn, which Applejack only glared harder for. She could try to murder him with her eyes all she wanted, but it wouldn't change the past.

The saddlebag hidden under his cloak clicked open with a 'click', and he grasped around inside sightlessly for a moment before the ethereally tactile touch of wood brushed behind his eyes. Found it; now for the moment of truth.

The little statue raised into his cloak to render him momentarily indecent, before it fluttered back down to his fur as a brown little acoustic guitar floated into sight.

He held it purposefully to the side so that he could get as best a profile he could get for the reaction; watching raptly as Applejack's eyes widened, and her pupils dilated just that little bit. Her eyebrows softened, and her muscles unclenched. Her frown didn't bleed or jump away for a smile, but it did fall open just slightly for a pure little expression of surprise.

Oh, how he loved this. Applejack was so honestly expressive; she was an excellent muse for watching facial tics.

He tilted his head to the side a little to catch a tiny little tightening in her jaw, and her barely opened mouth drifted fully closed as her throat contracted, and swallowed. A suddenly dry throat? Holding back tears? Beautiful.

His eyes flicked down to her soul to see a blue sheen over the golden coloring, even as the color itself brightened, and the orb began to pick up spinning speed. Souls didn't really change their color so brazenly, only adopting different sorts of external hues. If he wasn't remembering wrong, a blue-ish tint to its general shine meant some kind of sadness.

Thankfully very standard. It'd be much harder to identify if sadness was red or something.

His eyes drifted away just in time to catch the corners of Applejack's mouth as they twitched, and curled up at their very ends. Not a full, displayed smile: but perhaps more meaningful. Such a genuine expression of emotion that it independently moved her muscles to react.

If he wasn't completely insane and seeing things: Applejack liked her present. Score one for him.

"Well, don't that just beat all..." she muttered in a quiet echo, as she lowered to a seat, and her hooves gently raised up toward the floating statue. That was his cue to lower it towards her in kind, and to firmly place it into her outstretched hooves.

He held on perhaps a second too long to enjoy the contact, but he let it go as Applejack began to pull the statue towards her, to stare down at it with quiet eyes.

He felt almost like he should've said something. 'Here you go', at least. But.. as he silently watched the subtle crinkling of wonder in the corners of her eyes, and the.. feeling on her face as she tilted it this way and that...

Maybe some moments were just private.

After a long couple of moments of just staring, Applejack chuckled softly. Her eyes raised up to fall on him with softness he rarely ever saw from her, and a purely simple smile. "It's real thoughtful, Light. Real thoughtful. How'd y'all know?" Her voice wasn't choked or hoarse, and she didn't look anywhere close to crying, but she didn't need to. The plain gratitude was all there; on her face and in her voice.

He'd had his doubts, he really had. But it seemed like Apple Bloom had known better after all.

His eyes skipped for a moment to catch a glimpse at the child, and a vague urge to groan in frustration rose in him as he only saw a misshapen lump topped by a red bow in the bucket of apples.

He'd say thank you later, as was polite: but he'd be very reticent about it.

But for now, it was time to be reticent for Applejack. He put on his best face of nonchalance as he eased into a sideways lean, and kept his eyes breezily searching their corners. "You know... I just.. heard a tip that uh... guitars might mean a certain something to you. Thought it'd be cute on your nightstand, or a shelf, or something."

A soft chuckle made his eyes instinctively dart down to its source, and he blinked as he saw Applejack staring down at the statue with a smile.

Her eyes... The lines of her face, usually so hard when turned in his direction...

She was so soft. So uncharacteristically open... He had unfettered access to look at her soul at any time he wanted, but... he couldn't remember many times he'd seen her in such an unguarded way.

He felt a little dirty.

In as quick of an instant as the motion took: Applejack's head tilted back up to him, eyes and all. He blinked once in abject surprise as they stared at each other for that moment, before his brain caught up to what he'd been doing, and he was suddenly aware that the warm feeling on his face wasn't the country air.

He quickly averted his eyes for his own sake as he tried in what was probably vain to fight his blush away, and swallowed.

"It- It's really no big deal!" he blurted, feeling far less breezy than he had just before. "I just- I thought it'd be nice, you know?! I- I mean- I know I don't normally get you a Hearts and Hooves Day gift, but- I- I just thought- maybe just for once, I-"

That insufferable guffaw. A hale and hearty laugh from the chest, deeper than any tone he'd probably ever be able to manage. He cringed bodily away from the noise as he tried to keep his eyes firmly down, very much away from the sight of Applejack doubling up in laughter as she so often did when he so often humiliated himself.

It made him want to tear his ears off and eat them; just, if anything, to occupy the nervous energy that picked at him.

Applejack could only laugh at him for so long, and she luckily hit that point a bit before she usually did. She came off her high of humor with a breathy sigh, and even though he was staying well away from looking at her: he could guess she might've mussed with her hat a little. It was a habit of hers. Not that he took particular notice of her habits.

"Aw shucks, Light. Yer the act that jus' keeps goin'! Gettin' all worked up over just a little gift." Her tone was teasing and airy, but he didn't really see the joke in it. A Hearts and Hooves present was...

Okay, probably not that big of a deal. He used to buy his mother holiday gifts, after all, so it wasn't sacred or anything. But this was the first time he'd ever bought anything for Applejack! Didn't that deserve some kind of... notice or something?! Didn't it have due meaning to it?!

Wasn't it... Wasn't he...

Should he not have bothered?

The subtle sound of hoofsteps brought his over sensitized system fading out of its depressive nosedive, and his eyes snapped up to stare into two close pools of green just before his withers felt the weight of a hoof.

A smile barely seen under the glittering jeweled eyes filled with mirth and tease. "C'mere, sugarcube. I can see where 'yer head's goin', and ah think it's well past time 'fer a hug." Her voice was knowing and friendly, but not oppressively emotional or suggestive. All it implied was simply that: a friendly hug.

He could feel the wave of sudden, moody sadness that had taken him beginning to break on the rocky shores of the suggested motion. A smile was already threatening to muscle in on his perfectly cultivated expressive sulk, and the heady sigh he blew through it as his head lolled did little to stop the consuming tide of camaraderie.

A hug didn't sound so bad. Even just between friends.

He hardly even tensed as he let himself fall onto his haunches, and pulled Applejack by her hoof into him. One hoof came up around her warm midriff before he could think about it, and his second only barely hesitated to follow suit as he felt a similar grasp wind around his own extremities a moment after.

Initiative, look at him: and with barely any reluctance. Maybe the holiday was getting to him?

He could test whether he was under the influence of mind-altering love chemicals in the air some other time; right now, he just wanted to enjoy the rare embrace.

Stars, was she always so warm? Were all ponies like that? Was it supposed to feel so nice? He didn't exactly get many chances to get touchy-feely with.. anypony, really; especially now that he was...

A finely tuned sense of danger alerted him to the mood-affecting thought before it could even dare to have an infancy, and he discarded it with burning urgency. Had he overtly tensed? He didn't feel any noticeable change in the hug, so probably hopefully not.

He let his head shuffle down from where it was laying on the somewhat coarse strands of unruly braid hair, to squeeze his eyes shut and smother himself in the familiar salted scent of sweat and faint apple shampoo.

It was fine. He was here, in the moment, in a very comfortable embrace with his best friend. Applejack was his best friend, and she was all he needed. No need to think about other things long past; the present was all that mattered to him.

It didn't even have to go any farther than that. He was content with the way things were. Could be. Was.

Was he?

Sure he was.

As much as he didn't want it to, the hug had to end eventually. He murmured discontentedly as two hard hooves that felt softer than they were gradually drifted off their hold on his back, and a smiling voice whispered in his ear that it was time to let go.

But she was so warm.

He took one last deep breath that ended in a fatigued sigh as he let his hooves fall away. Away from his best friend who he could never just ask for a hug.

He leaned back and tried to mumble some kind of thanks through his frown, but he wasn't sure the noise even cleared his throat as more than a cough as he instinctively tried to stare anywhere else but the pony pulling away. Pulling away from the hug she never offered because he actively told her not to.

Did good villains deny themselves this much?

"Hey." As much as he kind of didn't want to look at Applejack, he couldn't very well ignore her. He was kind of curious- did her voice sound a bit warbly?

He cautiously dragged his eyes to Applejack's face still only a little more than a hoof-length away, where she was looking a little... red? Was her face a little flushed? Was that subtle flick of her eyes a bit bashful?

His semi-ashamed stare grew slightly bewildered as Applejack rubbed one hoof over the other in a nervous gesture that was showing on her face. "I.. I think ah might have a little present 'fer you, too." she said- yes, that was a little waver in her voice!

Well, his mind was absolutely rampant with speculation, now! Applejack looked positively full to bursting with some kind of nervous, embarrassed anticipation; one could only imagine what scandalous thoughts lay behind that tinted face and vinegar eyes-

It happened so fast. So chaste. So quick. One leaned motion in then out like it had never happened at all. Shameful, expedient escalation in a single second of weakness.

In one moment, before his tired mind could register: Applejack had kissed him on the cheek.

His brain caught up. Synapses fired. Nerves reconnected, and feeling came rushing in. His vision faded and everything cut out for a moment as the world spun on its axis; and when it came back his face was burning.

In a flash: he slapped a hoof over the warmest spot on his face, as if anypony there hadn't just seen what had happened. But... but what if somepony else had seen? Big Macintosh, Granny Smith, a random pony lost in the apple fields- his life loved making nonsensical, terrible things happen to him!

He spun his head in every direction he could think of, hurriedly eliminating every hiding spot that made sense. Trees, clouds- oh, a pegasus could have seen it! That slacker Rainbow Dash just loved to spy on ponies for her little pranks; maybe she'd upgraded to blackmail?!

His ears burned with growing embarrassment for every tree marked as non-suspicious and cloud double-checked as benign; it was only when he was absolutely sure the environment was completely real and pony-free that he turned back to Applejack.

Her face was a half-embarrassed, half-amused mishmash of contradictory emotions that still somehow resulted in a weirdly brazen half-smile. Her eye pinched self-consciously in on itself, and it was easy to tell she was somewhere on the verge of bursting into laughter or tears. Her soul, likewise, seemed almost stilted in its motion, to his eyes.

She had kissed him. She had kissed him and he didn't know what to do or think and it didn't look like she did either.

He could only imagine what he looked like right now; all he could manage to tell through the heat on his cheeks was that his mouth was moving. Moving: but not quite making any sound even though he knew he was trying pretty hard to say something?

Oh, no: he knew why nothing was happening. He didn't know what to say.

"Um..." That was a good start! It lit poor Applejack's face with an awful anticipation, and it gave him even less time to think of what to say! Nice going, idiot! Lead your best friend on when you know very well that you're too dumb to speak!

His eyes flew once more to his environment; wasn't there anything that could give him some clue as to respond? Trees: he could hit her with an apple for a quick getaway! No, that was awful; what was wrong with him?!

Everything and nothing he hadn't already checked ten seconds ago; little remained for him to draw on, so where did he go from here?! Time was running out; it'd been too long since he'd said anything and the little creases in Applejack's face were beginning to smooth over in a long stretch of disappointed sadness- what was he supposed to do when somepony other than his mother kissed him?!

His desperation peaked, his eyes stopped; landed on the one thing of any substance in the endless expanse of too much green.

Red on yellow with auburn eyes sitting in a bucket of fruit.

Apple Bloom: sitting half concealed with her hooves on the rim of the apple-filled bucket, staring with a wide, curious gaze that seemed locked on the two ponies in front of her. Young. Impressionable. Absolutely no idea what was happening.

The day's events flashed in a snap before his eyes, and worse: a lifetime worth of moments spent too much like this one.

Apple Bloom, barely five years old: watching from behind as he pushed an unsuspecting Applejack into a lake. Laughing right along as a soggy and dripping Applejack threatened to tie him to a branch by his back hooves.

Apple Bloom, six and a half: staring and listening over a plate of cookies at her family's dining table as he'd loudly announced that he hadn't brought any presents with him because he didn't believe in Hearth's Warming Eve.

Apple Bloom, seven and change: learning for the first time through observation what happened to a stallion when he forgot a mare's birthday and showed up late to a party without a present.

The day after, when he'd apologized with sincerity through his non-blackened eye to a slightly remorseful Applejack who had been allowed her first drink of cider the day before.

Today: when he'd swallowed all pretense of unfeeling, and forced himself to give uncomfortable comfort in a time he thought had been dire.

A lifetime setting bad examples for every situation; hadn't he thought he could do better?.

What would it look like to those big, curious eyes if he socked Applejack in the jaw after she'd kissed him; just because it was what he once would've done?

What example did he want to set?

His breathing hitched another mantle as he tore his eyes away from the tangible mirror into his life of mistakes, to instead focus on the worsening regret on Applejack's face. Twisting away from any smile; falling into a horrible little clenched frown of guilt.

Applejack had kissed him. Because he'd bought her a present. Because he... because he...

He could hear his heart; he could hear his breathing nearly sped to time with it.

What would the Light Flow who'd bought that gift say?

What did he want?

"-thanks."

The one-syllable word spat itself out of his mouth before he'd even thought to begin, and it came out in the dull, ugly monotone of his blank, dumb stare.

The instinct to regret and panic jumped with force onto his shoulders, and the primal desire to hide was so immediately violent in his mind that the scruff of his crest folded: leaving his head at an upwards angle and him gaping at the near horizon.

Why did he say that? Why did he say that? Why, for the love of the stars and the moon and the writhing fury of the heavens above: did he say thanks?!

This was it: the breaking point. He'd done so many terrible things to Applejack over the course of their lives, but this took the most diabetic and sugary cake that Pinkie Pie would die to get her hooves on- cake of them all!

Applejack had kissed him, and he had said thanks. Drop the pretenses: the love of his life had kissed him and he'd said Tartatrus-damned 'thanks!'

He was an idiot. He was the crown prince of fooldom. The duke of dope. The minister of mindless dumb stupid idiot things.

He was going to have to move away. Leave Ponyville behind and start all over somewhere else for the second time in his life. Stars, he couldn't even look at Apple Bloom, now. Real good example of romance for the kid, there. Idiot.

Eventually, though he knew internally that there was no recovering and that he was sure to shortly receive the most uncomfortable recompense he'd ever imagined: his body regained enough feeling for him to crane his neck back down.

Well, Applejack looked confused. To be expected.

Creased brow, erratically blinking eyes full of wanting confusion, mouth hanging open and almost forming words, head slightly shaking from side to side in disbelief, general air of a lost connection to reality.

It was the complete package of a completely uncomprehending pony.

He could barely blame her: he was right about there as well.

Could he run? Should he run? No, that was dumb; he had to wait to see what happened.

So, without any clue on how to make his way out: he waited. Waited for the few moments of quiet left in his life as Applejack seemed to double take in extreme length, while he knew his expression as mostly completely dead to the world.

He certainly wasn't going to make the first move- he'd already made the first move for the holiday, and this was the rotten place it'd landed him- so, the only tenable thing to do now was to wait. He would sit like a good little boy, and let Applejack's prevailing sense of social know-how lead him somewhere he could stand again.

He trusted her; even if to kick him in the teeth and tell him to get far away from her. At least it would be better than the awkward.

"You're... welcome?"

The response almost didn't register, and it seemed not to for the pony who'd spoken, either. Even as the words landed in that tone of clear confusion that had turned a sentence into a question: Applejack's voice held that slight edge of monotone reflex that his had. Barely any thought behind it at all.

He blinked; once, twice.

Wait, he'd taken note of her tone and all: but what had she just said?

You're welcome.

Kiss. Thanks. You're welcome.

He... didn't know what to do anymore. He hadn't known very well what to do in the first place, but now it was somehow even worse.

Where had it all gone wrong?

A bird chirped, somewhere; the only sound in an otherwise completely quiet little apple orchard. A veritable void of interaction of any kind, pony or no: completely at odds with the solemn presence of two perfectly capable adults and a small child.

It was bewildering, in a way, that between the three of them: only the small child was showing any signs of life at all.

A small child sitting in a tub of apples because she'd been pretending it was an ocean: staring and periodically checking between what might as well have been two different sides of a very lost, confused, and slightly scared mirror.

Both in front of her, but farther away: Light Flow; the family friend that had always been sort of like a highly irresponsible pseudo big brother. He'd shown up at their farm earlier in the morning than she'd ever thought possible for him, and essentially foalnapped her away for a day of shopping under the nearly belated pretense of 'bonding.'

Closer: Applejack; her big sister who she'd helped Light find a Hearts and Hooves day present for. Applejack had always seemed completely uninterested in the holiday, but that was more or less why she'd thought Light's seeming advance was so exciting, and why she'd let him take her along.

Apple Bloom turned for what felt like the tenth time since the silence had started, to look again at Light Flow: who still had yet to say or do anything after Applejack had, for whatever reason, merely supplied the pony with whom she'd kissed a generic platitudinal response.

This was, of course, after Light had responded to said kiss with a simple thanks.

Back to Applejack, and then again to Light Flow. Two gaping mouths intent on their immobile course, and four red cheeks shining through fur. Light hadn't moved or changed at all since he'd said his extremely dumb thing, but it was more surprising that Applejack had taken to mimicking him after her blunder.

Now they both just stood there staring dumbly at each other, not saying anything.

Apple Bloom shifted slightly to lay her head down on her hooves on the rim of the bucket; her face falling as she pouted in frustration.

How was she ever gonna get the two of them together if they both froze up at a little kiss? Was she the only one here who knew anything about romance?

She sighed, and let herself lean back enough to begin a sink into the bumpy embrace of her vast apple sea. Once more charting a course for the sunken treasure of McIntosh onboard the exclusive submarine Bloom. Her crewmates signaled their readiness, and with the warning blare of a siren: she left the world above behind.

Sometimes it felt like she was the only one with any maturity around here.

The Enthralling Story Of Light Flow The Very Cool And Accomplished Necromancer

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There once was a stallion who none knew, yet was known as Light Flow all the same. He was dark, brooding, mysterious beyond unbelieving beliefs, and held an impeccable sense of intrigue around him at all times. He was enthralling in ways nopony thought was possible outside of dramatic readings of macabre prose, and he showed in it his every action.

His past was veiled in a shroud hidden by a curtain of deceit constructed from the very fabric of trickery. Where he went, misery sprung from the weeping hearts of the masses left behind in his wake, yet none would live to spread tales of said misery or whether anypony's heart was actually weeping. It was hearsay, though not sprung from lips. Rumors about the stallion simply cropped up, as though the very soil of society itself was growing the fetid ideals with which the stallion held about himself, mysteriously.

As Light Flow was such a dark, brooding, mysterious pony for whom the word mysterious was itself created to describe him by those he left behind, he very often found himself the subject of nopony's scrutiny, which was exactly how he liked it. He so often despised the company of other ponies in any form that it bordered on a persisting, debilitating complex; though, if there actually were such a complex, it would only be prescribed to ponies as notable and intrinsically incredible as Light Flow, which is just about impossible.

He was a unicorn, and his horn was massive. Veritable inches beyond any recorded horn length throughout history, as though his stunningly good looks and impeccable fashion sense weren't enough to distinguish him amidst the faceless masses of regular, workaday ponies. His horn was actually so large, it had to be classified as a deadly weapon, and he was disallowed from bringing it aboard any moving vehicle or into crowded areas.

It was a good thing that Light Flow, the dark, brooding, mysterious, intriguing pony who constantly draped himself in the most chilling robes of the umbral shadows themselves also happened to be an incorrigible rogue. He followed no rules, and stayed out as late as he wanted on any day of the week, regardless of whether or not it happened to be a school day. He lived to flaunt rules like that.

There was somehow even more to this nighttime devil for whom the concept of a devil was created by ponies he left alive, which he hardly ever did, and certainly not without horribly maiming them first. Not only was he a criminal of the highest degree simply for his status as the most dangerous creature alive, he also held complete control over the very ebb of the ephemeral forces of the concepts of the ideals of life and death themselves, mysteriously.

Yes, it was true that Light Flow was a Necromancer. The highest caliber of such, and without peer in this or any era. He was actually so incredible at Necromancy, he discovered that every single other pony's research into the art was fundamentally wrong, and that they'd all made a logical error on the first page of their thesis.

That was the sort of mistake that Light Flow, the incredibly intelligent ~~foal~~ stallion who knew more words than anypony else on the planet, deridingly scoffed at. He was perspicacious, and incredibly pernicious to those who were vacuous.

As it was that Light Flow was so smart and wise and intelligent that he redefined the lost art of Necromancy and brought it into the public eye which subsequently began to bleed from their retinas because of the sheer fear they felt, he happened to receive much prestige.

~~The bad kind of prestige, which was exactly the kind of prestige he~~ It was notoriety that Light Flow achieved, because he was notoriously bad, and cool, and ponies feared him for the very illegal things he so often did.

Light Flow, the criminal mastermind, sought to create his own empire in the ashes left behind of Equestria's sad, pathetic dust. He wanted to topple the bourgeoise elite and bury them alive because that was a terrible way to die, and they deserved it. Yes, he wanted to see everypony on the top of the government dead in a hole, or maybe burned to death, because that was also a pretty terrible way to die.

So, he set into motion the terrible deeds which he would perform without even a single thought as to whether it was morally objectionable, because he was dark and brooding and didn't care about morals. With his army of the dead and long-since damned, he staged a full-frontal attack on Canterlot itself!

The bodies piled high that day, and the sweet smell of blood was ripe in the air as the mud ran slick in the absence of rain. For each faceless peon wearing the gold standard that fell, Light Flow gained another soldier for himself as he simply raised their mindless corpse, forcing them back against their former comrades as said former comrades' eyes widened in shock, fear, and disgust. Then they died.

The walls of the great city sitting on the ~~Canterlo~~ Canter mountain were razed in an hour, leaving the vanguard obliterated and the citizens behind them defenseless. Light spared none, for each innocent murdered in cold, rankling blood would only gain him more allies. His ability to raise the corpses of the dead ensured he would never run out of soldiers for his own cause, as well as being incredibly cool.

He marched on the palace, the guards falling and crashing to the ground like pathetic waves from a weak storm battering against the sandbags that were Light's forces. Not long after, the prize of Light's conquest appeared.

Princess Sol Celestia, clad in full golden armor and wielding a ~~massive greatsword~~ ~~spear~~ ~~mace shaped like the sun~~ ~~two interlocking swords~~ ~~sigilwork pistol~~ ~~conveniently powerful magical artifact~~ weapon.

She was nothing but a dull gleam next to the total encompassing darkness that was Light Flow, and his very presence could and would blot out the sun itself. The stallion known legendarily as The Walking Shadow wielded a massive scythe constructed completely from the spines of those he'd murdered in cold blood, because the spine was one of the strongest and most flexible bones in the body.

With the Princess' weapon completely outclassed by the sheer magnificent concept that was Light Flow's incredible bone scythe, the two of them clashed. Over and over again did they clash, and each and every time was their clash so ground-shaking and star-shatteringly intense that it could only ever be described by the intensity of the word clash.

The lands turned to slagged sand from the heat of Celestia's invocation of the sun's fury, though never did it even graze Light Flow, who could move at the speed of a shadow. For never did the sun touch a shadow, only trailing behind as it fled to safety. So it was with their battle, and with that fact realized, there could only ever be one logical victor.

It was Light Flow, standing over the former Princess's cold, dead body, who was the inevitable and completely obvious victor. He sneered down at her unmoving corpse with contempt, and ridicule, and hatred. His sneer was, itself, so putrid and vile that her closed, dead eyes began to miraculously spring tears, as though She feared him even from beyond the grave. As she should have.

The Princess was dead, and Light Flow had won. He would forever be known as the shadow who had eclipsed the sun. The dead rose to walk among the living, until the living were no more. None would ever stand up against Light Flow, and in his immortality, he would find eternal joy in smothering the joy of others.

Light Flow was happy.

And Light Flow, the eleven year old colt holding a pencil in the grip of his magic, was just as happy.

He let himself slump back into his cool, black chair with a sigh, as the light around the floating pencil flickered and dropped the implement to his black desk.

His head twinged from the drawn-out exertion of writing, and he only then realized it'd been hours. He groaned in weariness as he rested a hoof on his head, and took that moment to lean forward to inspect the paper in front of him.

His eyes scanned over the words- the saga he'd written. Each and every paragraph dripping with flair and intrigue, just how he liked it. There were a few places in the sea of even scrabbles where he'd crossed words out, leaving large black lines that looked ugly next to his writings, but it was probably fine to leave it as-is.

Though, he made a mental note to himself to try and find out whether Princess Celestia had historically wielded any specific weapon. He'd become a bit uncertain at that part.

Whatever, it barely impacted the story, so it didn't matter. Not like anypony would ever see. He loved the things he wrote, but if he ever showed them to anypony, they'd probably be too stupid to realize just how well-written it was. Their tiny brains just couldn't comprehend his greatness!

He was such an incredible writer.

An Account of Terrifying Elderly

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"Can't y'all jes' wait outside?"

The exasperated voice floating out from the front of the orange pony trotting on four orange hooves had the colt rolling his eyes even as he was walking—even though his mother had told him that was dangerous. Whatever. She wasn't the sardonic gesture police. He'd do what he wanted while she wasn't around and couldn't lecture him for it.

"No, I cannot 'jes' wait outside. That's undignified—not that you would know,'" Light snarked back, making extra sure to put mocking emphasis on the stupid accent she had. Of course, then he felt a little stupid, trailing after the farmer in the middle of an apple orchard. Mocking accents was fine and fun on its own, but he had to be careful of the degree of separation between irony and sincerity.

Villains were never sincere. They lied at every turn, and their environment had to reflect that.

It had been a whole five minutes since they'd passed through the disgustingly sincere gates to the Apple family orchard, and they were just then coming up on the filly's house. Twenty minutes earlier, the stupid little orange eyesore he knew as Applejack had rudely sought him out on an otherwise perfectly dreary day, taken him by the hoof, and demanded that he play with her. Like a tyrant.

He'd only gone along with her because he respected that sheer defiance of niceties. Otherwise, he was furious and enraged and he made sure his mood and expression reflected that.

Unfortunately for his startlingly venomous grimace, Applejack wanted to go to her house first to get something she'd forgotten, so his face was kind of starting to ache from holding the expression long enough to set a passerby ablaze with it. Kinda hard to walk right with how his soul-piercing gaze was starting to fuzz, too.

He was not going to just waste a good lour, and it did not mollify him to set the glare on the backs of the filly's dumb, double ponytails. No matter how hard he squinted, her hay-like hair just would not set fire.

Maybe if he used a match.

His 'friend' went silent after giving a hefty sigh at his response, and Light certainly wasn't going to readdress her, so they spent the rest of the short walk in silence. Boring, utterly demeaning silence.

When they came up to the front of the relatively towering building amidst the apple trees some longer-than-short time later, he'd nearly mentally talked himself into turning around and just leaving the ugly mule to her own devices. Wasn't like he'd even get anything out of this interaction.

Stupid, ugly mule. He really should've just... gone home. He didn't know why he was sticking around. He didn't even want to play with her, and he certainly hated even looking at her.

With her... stupid, dumb green eyes that gleamed in the light like worthless, overpriced emeralds. Dumb, orange fur that reminded him of the scent of cinnamon and pumpkin patches. Her coarse, hay-like hair that blinded him every time it caught the sunlight. The color complimentary red apples on her flanks that... did not make him jealous at all.

He hated it all. And her. He hated her and how beautiful she was. It made him sick to his stomach. She was just so-

Something yanked at his ear, and he let out an indignant—yet dignified—cry of pain as he teetered back on his still-moving hooves and nearly toppled over. The pressure eased, letting him right himself to set a furious glare on the frowning orange monster as he rubbed a hoof over his poor, bruised ear. "What was that for, you jerk?!"

Applejack—brawny Orange Hooves—gave a nonplussed huff and rolled her eyes- what? How dare she mock him?! "I was talkin' to you, and you were zonin' out like a dog in a crab apple field." She shook her head while he started at her odd simile, scoffing at him as if... as if he was scoff-worthy! "Don't you ever pay attention?"

Light snapped out of his stupor of thinking about crab apples, readjusting his glare back to its full, acidic force as he stomped his hoof into the dirt. "I do pay attention, just not to the trash that trash like you talk about!"

The smug satisfaction that rose in his chest at Applejack's hooked grimace almost instantly died as she jerked her hoof forward and- ow!

His legs failed him as most things often did, sending him back onto his butt as he cradled his now aching horn in both hooves. Muffling a curse into his lip out of sheer, spiteful defiance to let her hear him in pain, he barely eked a cringing eye open to watch as his aggressor turned with a snort, casting another glare at him before she ascended the stairs of the short porch towards the half-open stable door.

She swung its bottom open, turning to rudely grumble at him. "Jes' wait out here a minute, an' try not to boil over!" With that, she turned and walked inside, shutting the bottom of the partitioned door as he glared after her.

Oh, and she probably thought he didn't hear her murmur 'ya half-baked black pot,' but he happened to have great hearing! All villains did—they had to in case somepony tried to assassinate them!

He was the only one who'd be doing any assassination, thank you not so much.

He waited in silence for a moment, still holding a hovering hoof to his... still aching horn while he hugged the other to his chest. After a moment, his grimace fell into a sneer, and his voice raised into his most obnoxious high tone. "Wait outside, Light. Don't boil over, Light. Don't strangle me to death on account of being so mean and dumb, Light."

He let his hoof fall and pushed himself to stand, well underway on devising new circuitous insults as he hurriedly trotted up the short set of stairs, pulling the stable door open with an overblown snort and slamming it behind him.

Stepping into what appeared to be the Apple family's unsurprisingly simple foyer, his eyes hurriedly darted about the room, cataloguing every bit of minutia he could. Table in the middle on a shaggy, boring rug. Lamp full of lightning motes in the corner, because the Apples were archaic. Shuttered window. Book nook in the wall—the Apples could read? A disgusting amount of family pictures on every surface, all full of ignorant, smiling fools.

Across the room was a staircase that climbed around the corner and out of sight.

Light Flow, the dastardly villain who came in uninvited, stared at the possible entryway to further schemes for a moment before he jeered at it. Holding his head up high, he turned away, trotting to the right towards the eye-high saloon doors that separated the room from another.

His life didn't revolve around Applejack! He didn't need to go trotting after her like a lost puppy!

Now, it was well past time to go snoop through her house!

Pushing the saloon doors open daringly, without care for the potential consequences, he strode into the adjunct room with confidence! He sought out the points of detail in the new room, searching for fallibilities. Flaws to exploit. Structural weaknesses.

Bookshelves—a table on a rug—another stable door leading out to the left—a normal door leading in on the opposite wall—more stupid pictures—a rocking chair on which sat a-

Oh. A mare.

Light stopped short, adopting a surprised expression that quickly fled into a small, wide-eyed frown as the evidently very elderly mare, resting on her rump with her quilt-covered hindlegs hanging over the edge of the plush rocking chair, peeled two auburn eyes open through a mountain of bags.

For a moment, Light was honestly stunned.

The mare—Applejack's grandmare?—was, just maybe, the oldest-looking mare he'd ever seen! Her skin was less comparable to skin than it was to a very large, very unfitting bag that a mare had been poorly draped in. Like... a sagging mound of wrinkles that had mutated and started walking. Like a picture drawn by a bad impressionist!

If that picture had also been drawn with, say, a tightly pulled white topbun and a faded, orange shawl spotted with little sewn apples. A very homely appearance all together with her peachy, orange-speckled fur, he could say.

Either way, the elderly mare's appearance was disgusting and nauseating, to say the least.

She'd opened her eyes the moment after he'd barged into the room with vim and vigor, and as his confidence turned to apprehension, her barely-recognizable wrinkled scape of a face split in a well-worn smile.

"Well, what a pig-pickin' surprise!" The mare's voice was like scraping balloons if those balloons were also wrinkled and inexplicably country, setting Light further on edge as she leaned gently forward to the tune of creaking bones. "Yer' Applejack's angry lil' new friend I been hearin' about, ain'tcha?"

Light watched for a moment in well-guarded apprehension to see if the mare—or walking corpse—would rise from her chair—or fall into her grave!—but she only scanned her saggy eyes over him once or twice before settling back into her creaking seat. It seemed as though she wasn't a threat, but that didn't mean she wasn't a weakness.

He could exploit her, probably. Loved ones were always weaknesses. All he had to do was... um...

...something—he'd figure it out, alright!?

Any plan began with confidence, he knew, so he made a show of straightening and threateningly firming his chest, tossing his head and adopting his most aggressive expression. "We aren't friends, I'm merely using her as a means to an end!" he announced grandly, stamping his hoof into the floorboards and making the house tremble.

It was a thoroughly intimidating display, such that the mare had to hide her obvious terror behind a façade of laughter. She was clever, he'd give her that much; rocking back in her chair and easing her head back with a wheezing cackle of a chuckle as she slapped a hoof to her quilt was an ingenious method of throwing him off.

Not that he was. He was perfectly in control of every situation ever. Ask anypony—if they manage to answer through their trauma-induced screams.

Light remained totally firm and stern, not welling with frustrated tears as the mare's laughter died out, and she fixed a disarmingly coy leer on him. "Izzat right, you lil' bent fiddle?" She rocked back on her creaky chair, chuckling—wheezing—again as she reclined very conspicuously calmly. "Why, I'm tremblin' in my horseshoes. What kinna ends you been anglin' 'fer?"

She was mocking him. Oh, she thought she was safe, did she? She thought he was just some little foal, did she? She thought... oh, she thought there was no way he could ever hurt or dismay or startle her in any way.

She felt safe, did she? Oh, well Light was feeling pretty safe, too.

He didn't have to cow to the pounding in his head, and he didn't have to let the tears fall. He didn't have to run away and cry into his pillow, and he didn't have to stomp his hooves and throw a tantrum. Fine. If he had to take this seriously, then fine. He would.

He was Light Flow, and he was going to be the greatest villain of all time.

He could handle one old mare.

His eyes darted to the left—the way he'd come in, a dresser, some pictures—then as far right as he could look—a tattered scrapbook on a small table on a rug, another saloon door, and... bingo.

Nearly in the corner of the room beside an open window, there sat a sickening sight if he'd ever seen one. A very traditional shrine dressed up in all the typical finery that ponies devoted to... ugh—Princess Celestia.

A small, round table holding a shallow bronze bowl in which sat a single, rosy red apple, above which hung a glossy, black and white portrait of the great Goddess Herself. The photo's frame was well adorned with faux-golden chains of interlocking loops and intermittent little suns—prevalent and visible because of how blindingly they caught the sun beaming in from the open window.

The shrine was more than well maintained, it was immaculate—picturesque, even. It literally looked as though it'd been ripped from the religious nut's manual for looking like a mindless zealot. He'd seen churches with less mindful artistry than this! Well, no he hadn't—he'd probably catch fire if he set hoof in one—but the hyperbole stood.

It was a concoction of pure and total goodness, and with the addition of the twin vases holding leaning sunflowers—the usual offering—on either side of the table, Light had himself some devious ammunition.

It was an obvious object of faith—devoted faith, even.

He turned a sly eye to the old mare laying back in her rocking chair, once more seeming content to nod off to her incessant old age music—creaking wood. Hah. Not even looking at him. The confidence of her lifespan was an unsightly thing, indeed. Enfeeblement was no merit.

Time to break this old hen apart, feather by feather.

Light Flow, the cruel master of all ages, stood taller, lifting his chin and taking a breath as he closed his eyes with a smug smile. "I'm actually glad you asked! My first plan is to tell Applejack about all the evils of Princess Celestia and the Solar Faith!"

The rocking chair creaked once more, then went silent.

Light—feeling ever so victorious—kept his curled grin as he opened his eyes to see the elderly mare stood straight in her chair. Gone was her expression of placid toleration; the mare now leered at him through harshly squinted eyes, almost leaning out of the chair with how rigidly her hooves were set on its railing.

Hm. Actually, even through all the wrinkles and sagging fur, her frown was kind of... stark. Eh. Who cared?

The elder's elder only stared at him for a moment, while her expression grew... somehow less recessed. Her furrowed brows, beginning to twitch ever so slightly, were kind of popping out of the wrinkled canyon of her forehead, which... seemed more weathered than ravaged all of a sudden. Weird.

"Now, that ain't no way fer' a colt to be speakin' in this house," the mare suddenly spoke, far less kindly than she had before. Light knew a thing or two about animosity, and the matriarch's solid, stony tone—bereft of whistling breeziness—was somewhere between clenched jaw and clipped words. Clear and concise, but simmering with heat.

Pfft. Like he cared! He didn't!

Light let out a fearsome chortle, tossing his head grandly and brushing his mane aside to accentuate his mighty horn—his weapon. "I'll speak however I want, wherever I want!" He lowered his hoof to his proudly puffed chest, taking a step to look the mare right in the eye. "I don't just mindlessly listen to orders like your dumb grandfoal!"

That had her oddly chiseled jaw grinding. "Y'all better learn some manners a'fore I clip that rotten stem a'yers and throw that sorry rear over this here knee." The elder gave a huff as she settled back, keeping her glare with its growing spark on him as the end of her frown hooked up in a snarl. "If'n yer' parents ain't 'round to do the teachin', then ol' Granny Smith ain't afraid to lay it all out."

The grumble—the increasingly warning grumble—fell on deaf ears as Light snorted dismissively, waving his hoof about his head as he turned. "Yeah, alright. I'm so scared of the hundred year old mare in the comfy chair!" He put on a dismissive show of trotting a few steps away, turning over his shoulder to sneer at the decrepit fossil. "I'll just be over here for the next hour while I wait for you to get up."

In his own humble opinion, it might've been one of his best taunts—all the way up there with the time he'd told some dumb foal to do a backflip off some playground equipment. How he'd laughed when they'd landed on their forelimb and it went pop. This was almost as good, and he probably wasn't even going to get grounded!

Very soon now, he'd be in perfect position to...

...do whatever he was trying to.

He had to stop and think to himself about himself for a moment, though it was only a moment before an odd, anachronistic sound compelled him to turn around to the mare. It was... a chuckle. An honest, decidedly unearnest chuckle from the previously termed decrepit fossil who was... smiling at him. At his insults.

Light's ever-present frown deepened with confusion as his jaw worked for an answer, finding none except the possibility that the old hen had just gone batty. What else was there when faced with such startlingly venomous words? He must've driven her insane with rage, or something.

Served her... right?

While Light tried to reconcile the oddity, the old mare continued to chuckle—no, it more resembled a cackle. "Aw, izzat right?" she spoke with a coy tilt, settling more snugly into her chair and smiling wide as though she'd won all the world and more. "Y'all think ah'm jes' a feeble ol' mare who can't do nothin' to some quick 'n feisty youngin' like you."

The mare went silent save for her smile, and her... there was kind of a disconcerting glimmer in her eye. Just... something about those interestingly piercing auburn depths that screamed... danger? Daring?

Fire?

Light blinked, and for a quietly concerning moment, the mare just didn't seem all that... old anymore. It was eerily as though she wasn't small and hunched from age, but from poise—the terrifying tension before the leap. Her skin was saggy and wrinkled, but it wasn't loose, it was tight on her straining flesh—straining with flexing muscles.

Her devil-may-care grin was reck-flaunting and spoke of dangerous acts, more suited to an adrenaline junkie than a kindly old grandmare. The spots and creases of age that marred her face shifted in the changing light of his mind, appearing once more as nicks, scrapes, and scars. That gleam in her eye was...

...dauntless.

Light didn't feel all that safe, anymore. Actually, he felt kind of worried.

His mouth fluttered open—weak and uncertain—to give some response that... didn't come.

And thankfully, it didn't have to.

"Liiiight!? Where'd y'all... oh."

The obnoxiously childish cry for his whereabouts from the other room trailed off as the saloon door pushed open and a familiarly white-freckled face poked through. Relief fluttered in his chest as their eyes met, and—no. Not relief, sorry, it was anger. He was angry that she was...

...here to deflect attention away from him. Yeah. How dare she.

Applejack's mouth hung open for a moment as she stood in the doorway, flicking her eyes between him and her grandmare until they settled on her grandmare and she walked the rest of the way in. "Um."

Her uncertain address of her grandmare didn't even warrant a glance from the elderly mare, still... staring at him. Light's own freaked out attention drifted from the mare to meet his... acquaintance's gaze again as she stepped towards him, looking more than a bit conflicted. "I guess... y'all met mah granny, and..." Her creased gaze trailed to her grandmare. "...Granny, y'all met Light."

For another few moments, it was silent, even from the now-halted motion of the rocking chair. Light continued to fidget and eye Applejack's grandmare nervously, the named elder continued to try and succeed to smother him with her sharp gaze, and Applejack... just stood in silent concern between them.

Until the oldest mare in the room opened her mouth.

"Well, welcome on into the party, Applejack!" The old mare suddenly exclaimed, drawing her grandfoal's attention while she... did not take her eyes off Light. Still, she continued to address her family loudly, fondly, and somewhat aggressively. "Why, I was jes' about to show yer' lil' friend here one'a mah best tricks!"

Her eyes dropped to a lid—a smug lid. "He was practically beggin' fer' it."

With that terrifying sentiment, a disconcerting chorus of creaking and cracking filled the air as the mare began to rise— and at the door, Applejack faintly blanched.

"Oh—granny, y'know you don't need to go to all that trouble!" his friend chattered with flagrantly put-on brightness as she leapt forward with a tellingly grave expression, hovering apprehensively at her grandmare's side as the elderly mare waved her off with a murmur.

The mare's ascension reached a peak as she kicked her quilt off to flutter to the floor, revealing a cane at her side and the bony sight of her hindlegs which hobbled as she slid off the chair onto the floor—without the aid of her cane.

Applejack, pacing around her cautiously with one outstretched hoof like she'd somehow fall down at any second, quickly darted to retrieve the hooked length of carved wood, holding it out to her grandmare with a worried frown.

But the old mare waved her off with a chuckle. "Aw, never you mind, little apple. Y'all know ah don't need that darn thing." With her grandfoal fended off, the elderly mare straightened—somehow appearing even less elderly as her creaking limbs quieted and she steadied. "You just sit back an' watch yer' old granny while she shows why there ain't a foal on Equus can talk down to this farmer."

Applejack's jaw drifted open in consternation for a moment as her grandmare took a step forward, oddly... rolling her bony shoulders and flexing out her hindlegs which gave more than a few unflattering snaps and creaks. Finally, as her elder showed no signs of listening to her own anatomy's shrieks, the filly's head hung forward with a sigh and she turned to set the cane back onto the chair's side.

Light watched the entire spectacle in quiet shock and fascination, no longer entirely sure why he was even here as Applejack cantered over and plopped herself down at his side. Oh, he was sitting, too. When had he done that? This entire thing was spinning out of control.

He didn't think there was any way to get it under control. At this point, he was just hoping he'd get out of here undamaged and punishment-free. Screw being a good villain—he just wanted to go home.

He watched the old mare in front of them for another wide-eyed moment as she continued to stretch out somewhat obscenely, before leaning over and catching his frowning acquaintance's attention with a whisper. "What is she doing, exactly?"

The orange filly's ear perked to listen to him, then she sighed in the other direction and shook her head dismissively. "Just... watch, an' applaud when she gets all the way up." Light blinked in bemusement at that nonsensical statement, though he barely caught another quiet murmur. "Not like she'll settle down, anyway."

He was getting a bad feeling. Kind of like the sicky butterflies in his stomach had finally choked and died, and now acid was bubbling up around them. There must've been a word for that feeling, right? Was it indignation?

Whatever it was, it only intensified as the old mare in front of them seemed to finish her stretches, and she...

...began to tilt back.

Over the course of just a few seconds, the extremely old-looking mare who he'd reckoned was days from a cold grave gradually lifted her hooves from the ground. Up and up they went as her back fully straightened, her barrel pushed out—clearly defining the pulling muscles underneath— and her back legs wobbled then held strong and firm.

The overpowering noise of creaking bones rubbing against each other and unoiled joints popping only seemed to spur the old mare on, holding her forelimbs out on either side of her for balance, brazenly exposing every inch of her unbelievably toned physique until... until...

She was up. Standing upright on her hind legs like... he couldn't even hope to do. He'd tried once, and it'd made his hips hurt so bad. He could still feel the phantom stinging in his bones, and staring at the mare with her forelimbs cocked on either side of her flexing hips just... he couldn't even imagine.

He'd called her old. Now she was standing twice as tall as him, and he felt dumb. He felt... like a jerk.

And that was weirdly... unsatisfying.

Light's gaze fell from the mare in a desperate bid to.. to hide that he was welling, okay?! He hated crying, but he was, because he'd been shown up. Utterly. Everything he'd said had just been dashed to wimpy dust. He'd been rebuffed, and he'd been humiliated.

He lost.

A sharp fweet pounded on his eardrums before he wincingly pressed his ears back to muffle the whistle, and looked up to see the old, victorious mare grinning at him. He blinked warmth out of his eyes to flick a glance to Applejack, who... looked uneasy? Grim?

The feeling was getting worse.

His fear was very unfortunately mollified when the old mare's creaky voice drew him back to her, still grinning. "An' fer' yer' edification, lil' sprout," she chuckled, deepening as he gave a double-take at the... word he didn't know. She paused for a breath, lidding her eyes cockily as she hummed. "—ah'm actually a hundred-forty-three."

Light's brain exploded.

Or, more accurately, something short-circuited, and Light was left gaping blankly for words as the filly beside him let out a shudderingly weary sigh. Meanwhile—though Light could hardly process it—the unfathomably old mare let out one last wheezing cackle before she began to... tilt... back..?

Her back bent inch by inch while her hindlegs stayed solidly rooted, and as her forelimbs gradually reached out behind her, her shape began to approach something like a half-circle. All the while, and as her stomach fluidly rippled in the light, the air filled with a myriad cacophony of flesh twisting and bones cracking—but never snapping.

Nothing did. Everything... every part of her just... yielded to the mighty force of her dexterity and sheer will to continue bending. Down and down until, with a subtle click, one of her forelimbs made solid contact with the floor.

And her hindlegs lifted from the floor. Her second hoof came down, she gave an audible groan of exertion as she rose... and in the span of a single blink, her hindlegs came up, and her back straightened.

He'd experienced this before, reading about a funny phenomenon involving two pictures held side by side. In one eye, he could see how she'd been—upright, her forelimbs on her hips—and in the other, he could see her now—upright, her hind legs crouching on the air above her.

Two impossibly similar pictures, but all he could see were the differences. Burned into his vision like a brand.

She'd gone from standing upright to standing upside-down. She was doing a hoofstand.

The mare must not have been mortal. He'd been tricked. He was in the presence of some otherworldly demon.

To say he could physically feel the embarrassment creeping up the back of his neck may have been an understatement, because as the slightly wobbling back of the mare—flexing and tensing such that he could swear her entire skeleton was on display—gently relaxed, and the mare's head where her hooves should have been curled forward until they were eye to eye, Light genuinely thought he would crumple into himself like a sinkhole.

The mare, her gleaming auburn eyes still twinkling with smug satisfaction, let out her latest and greatest wheeze, showing every one of her pearly whites. "Age ain't nothin' but a tally, youngin', an' I think ah'm winnin'!"

There would never be another moment as singularly sobering as this one. There was genuinely no point in acting superior, because he'd never be able to beat this mare... at anything. She literally towered over him.

He felt small.

He felt like a child.

Sudden tremors rumbled through his rear as the filly beside him suddenly began to clop her hooves raucously to the floor, cheering with whoops and hollers as her grandmare cackled on and thanked her. Whatever. He was deaf to their merriment. Who cared. He didn't.

He only had eyes for the floor. Probably where worms like him belonged.

It was where he continued to look as he stood, ignoring whatever his friend... or whatever said as he unsteadily trotted forward until he could see the edge of a raised eyebrow where hooves should've been. He kept his eyes off her as he tried to raise his voice, but it really only came out as a whimper. "Sorry, ma'am. Thank you, ma'am."

If the old mare said anything, he didn't hear, and if his friend was looking at him, he didn't see. It was hard enough just to hold it together in the room, and by the time he pushed through the saddle doors on his way to the front, the tears were beading on his chin.

He exited the Apples' cursed abode with its demon granny guardian with some semblance of his typical thought, though he could hardly put venom behind it. He hardly even felt it.

But he was right.

Nothing good ever came from spending time with Applejack.

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Applejack looked after the brown-furred colt she wasn't quite ready to call her friend with some apprehension as he left in a rush. He was up to her Granny and out the door faster than she could really say much about, leaving her wondering what in tarnation had happened before she'd come in.

A'course, knowing her Granny, and knowing Light as she was getting to, it probably wasn't something very pretty. She didn't see any marks on him, though, so Granny probably hadn't hooved him a ticket for some new teeth.

She glanced back to her Granny with a frown, and just like her, it only took a moment for the mare to stop frowning and start smiling. She nodded her head towards the door—an awful awkward motion, what with her standing on her front hooves and all—and clicked her tongue.

"Aw, g'wan an' get 'im." The affectionate twang had Applejack smiling even though she didn't really feel like it, darn it. She stood, anyway, already turning to go trot after that weirdo she only kind of liked when her Granny's voice rose. "You whip that colt into shape, little filly, 'cause he needs it if'n he's ever gonna be part'a this family."

Heat rushed into her cheeks as she whirled around to her cheekily grinning grandmare, protesting as soon as she picked her tongue up off the floor. "Granny! That ain't- that's-" She ended with a frustrated grunt, still feeling like her cheeks were on fire, and finally settled for just turning and trotting through the door.

While her Granny just laughed out after her.

Just like her, it was. It all almost made her forget that Granny Smith would be sore for days after this.

She wasn't a young mare, anymore, no matter what kinda age-defying stunts she pulled. And no matter how hard she or Big Macintosh tried, and no matter what they said about little Apple Bloom needing her Granny for as long as possible, she'd just been so... reckless since their parents passed. Like she... like she was trying too hard.

Like she was trying to make up for it, or something. Or... no... nevermind.

The whole thing just...

...made her sad.

Stereotypical Side Stories

by JinxTJL

Lightmare Night

A 'Day' On The Farm

Hearts And Who Cares?

The Enthralling Story Of Light Flow The Very Cool And Accomplished Necromancer

An Account of Terrifying Elderly