Descent
Horseapples.
Applejack let her eyes bore into the old, stripy wall-paper across from her, before scrunching them shut and dropping them into her hooves. Short, sharp breaths scratched and whistled through her teeth, which became more and more bared by the second.
How in the hay had she let this happen? She let out a groan, dropping her hooves to the end of her snout. Hadn’t Twilight said making a list’d stop them getting all disorganised and shambolic and all them other fancy words that even Rarity wouldn’t use to talk about her farm.
Another groan rattled through her throat. And she just had to get suckered in by it all, all Twilight’s promises of how much time they’d save and how much they’d streamline their production costs, or whatever it was she’d told Big Mac when Applejack had raised an eyebrow at her. She twisted her muzzle. It was Twilight’s fault for not using normal words!
It was Twilight’s fault for talking her into this.
It was—
Her eyes shot wide. For the first time in a little while, she heard the sound of her own breath rustle across her hooves. Something clenched in her gut that definitely weren’t from the smell of tonight’s cobbler, and she bit her lip. Had she really just—
She shook her head.
No.
It weren’t right to blame Twilight for this, or anypony for that matter. Applejack blinked away the sudden heat in her eyes. Twilight was just being a good friend. Hay, she was just being Twilight. And Big Mac had every right to say eeyup to something that’d save the farm money, what with him being the one sorting through that mountain of papers upstairs…
Applejack pushed her bottom lip out a little, shaking her head again.
Still, none of that really helped her at the moment, did it?
She put her hoof to her chin. And kept it there, tapping away, despite the little itch running across the back of her neck.
Nah, she couldn’t think like that. This was Sweet Apple Acres. She let out a little chuckle; there had been a reason why they’d needed those lists in the first place…
Now…
The barn? Didn’t that need repainting?
Suddenly, all she could see was Pinkie Pie at the top of a very tall ladder, adding the last little touches to a giant picture of herself on the side of the barn. Far below, Applejack stared up at it all, her eyebrows furrowing for a second. Granny’d probably not take too kind to this… but on the other hoof, it was mighty kind of Pinkie to finish the job for her. She let out a grin, and Pinkie sent back her own, twice the size.
Her taps got just a little quicker. The fence?
Applejack felt something slap against her back, wet and slimy and trickling over her cutie mark. She span around, and found Apple Bloom staring back at her with those big, soft eyes and that wide, innocent smile that only a little filly like her sister could pull off. Only this time, her teeth were wrapped around one of their paintbrushes, drops of white slicking off the end of it.
AJ turned back to the fence, saw that it was all white, and looked back as her sister with narrowed eyes. She grinned, and moved a hoof towards her own brush…
Her teeth stood on end, and she finally rubbed the back of her neck. The pigs?
Apple Bloom stood in front of her, and all of a sudden AJ felt her smile split and her jaw hang open. AB just stared up at her, blinking and wincing as little trails of gunk wandered near her eyes, with apple cores and cabbage leaves and little bits of old pastry and that green stuff nopony wanted to know about coating her fur.
Applejack put on her warmest smile. Bending down, she told AB that a nice, hot shower was waiting for her…
Her eyes darted from the crinkly-but-still-holding-together wallpaper to the floor that not even Granny’s eyes had spotted so much as a speck of dust on.
Applejack sighed. Horseapples.
“… Hmm-mmm-mmm Cutie Mark Crusaders…”
Applejack’s ears perked up, a grin stretching through her cheeks.
“… do-do-do who we are!”
She almost slapped herself. Why didn’t she think of that before!
Applejack got to her hooves, practically skipping down the hall to where that sweet little voice was wafting out of.
Of course Apple Bloom’d have something they could do together. Applejack smiled. She could help her little sis out with that essay she’d heard AB grumbling about a couple of days ago, or go through some of them math problems she was always being set—the simple ones, anyway—or they could just go through the inventory, as Twi called it, and make positively sure that they’d done everything!
AJ stopped. If there were a mirror nearby, she’d have given herself a good, long, hard stare.
Was she going crazy, or something? Was she trying to work that filly until she couldn’t stand anymore?
She shook her head.
Apple Bloom was a smart little cookie. She should’ve remembered that, what with all the times Ms Cheerilee’d had the pair of them walking away from those parent-teacher evenings with big, wide grins and springs in their steps, and with her looking to make sure AB got an extra-big slice of desert and a couple of chores taken off her list.
“… na-na-nah-na-na-na cutie marks!”
She let out a silly little chuckle, and set back off after the voice. Maybe they could just toss around that old hoof-ball? That’d still be something, right?
Applejack trotted through the door to the living room, and didn’t have to look hard to find Apple Bloom. She lay spread out on the rug by the hearth, her scrubbed coat practically shining with the fire behind her, muzzle buried in that little colouring book her friend Sweetie Belle’d gotten her last week.
Applejack looked up, and brought one of her hooves down a little harder than she really had too, and smiled as AB looked up.
“Howdy, Apple Bloom.”
She was sure she spotted her little sis’ eyes light up for a second or two. “Applejack!” AB leant down and grabbed her book in her teeth, turning it around as she trotted closer. “’ike i’?”
Applejack looked away from AB’s smiling eyes, and down onto the picture. She’d heard Rarity gabble on about that Blueballs feller, or whatever his name was, enough times last year to know a fairytale wedding when she saw it. Apple Bloom’d done a real good job with it, though. Everypony’d been coloured in, right up to the lines but not even a whisker too far, and she’d made sure that no two ponies next to each other shared the same colours. She’d even made Princess Celestia’s mane look like it was moving.
And in the middle, she’d given the prince a deep red coat, and big green eyes that looked down all soft and happy at his princess, who AB’d given a light yellow colour, except for the pink on her mane. And her cheeks.
Aww…
Her smile wobbled for just a moment. AJ let out a little chuckle. “Yep, and I know two other ponies who’d like this very much,” she said, running a hoof through her sister’s mane.
If anything, Apple Bloom grinned even wider, and AJ was sure she was going to have to shield her eyes, before it disappeared again. “Wait…” AB carefully placed her book on the floor, and she looked at AJ with an eyebrow wandering upward. “What’re you doin’ here, big sis? I thought you said you’d be out all afternoon?”
With those big eyes staring at her, AJ had to really fight to not itch her neck. “Well… that’s the thing, Apple Bloom.” She took a moment to look out the window. “I think I’ve finished all my work for today.”
Now those eyes sparkled and shone like some sort of gemstone. She got a real good look to decide that, too, as AB leapt right up to her. “Really?!”
“Yep.” Applejack smiled as her sister landed. “And I was wonderin’ if there’s anythin’ you wanted us to do together…”
Applejack couldn’t help but smile a little wider as her sister scrunched up her muzzle, rubbing a hoof along her chin. And then again as Apple Bloom’s hoof sprang free, and she raised it high above her head.
“I’ve got an idea!” AB beamed at her big sister, and it only shrank a little as she let out a tiny chuckle. “But it’s gonna’ have to wait ‘til after dinner. S’that gonna’ be—”
“COME AND GET IT, WHIPPERSNAPPERS!”