Oh! Hey there, Sugarcube! What are you doin’ out here? Come to get some apples right off’n the trees? Well, y’ain’t gonna find any better’n these here on Sweet Apple Acres. Now, I ain’t never seen you before, so I figure your new to these parts. Here, I picked these here apples this mornin’ and they’re as big and juicy as you could ever hope to find anywhere else. Sink your teeth into them and sit a spell. It’s a might hot today an’ I need to take a break anyway. My name’s Applejack, by the way.
Whoo doggies, kickin’ them trees has right wore me out this evenin’. Let’s sit here under this here tree and cool off. I sure do love summer, but it gets mighty hot an’ roamin’ about the orchard all day can plum tucker you out. It’s nice an’ cool under here. I could about go to sleep. Is this the first time you’ve ever been on a farm before? Ah, city feller, huh? Ain’t nothing wrong with that, don’t blush. Some folks are meant to be from the city an’ others from the country, I reckon.
The country? I like it out here. It’s nice an’ quiet an’ there’s lots of room to do what you want. People don’t pry too much, which is good, I think. I’m guessin’ you’re headed to Ponyville? It’s a right good town. I’ve got a lot of friends there. It’s also my main market for all these apples and some other crops we grow here on the farm.
We? Yeah, my family. There’s a few of us. Big Macintsoh is my older brother, Apple Bloom is my younger sister, and Granny Smith is my granny. She’s a bit too old to help with the farm but she still does a lot of things to help. She’s the only one that knows how to make zap apple jam, although I think she’s teachin’ it to Apple Bloom.
Huh? Y’ain’t never heard of zap apple jam? It’s special. Real special. I ain’t got any at the moment or I’d let you try it. The only other family member is my dog, Winona. Now where’d she get to? Hmmmph. She’s been getting’ a might bad for wanderin’ off on her own. She likes to root around the compost heap for food or sometimes go into the Everfree forest. She drags the darndest things out of there sometimes.
Let me tell you the story of how I got Winona. Really, she’s Winona the second. Kind of funny naming her after the original Winona, but maybe I’m just not bright enough to come up with another name. Big Mac named the first one. I was willing to just call her Dog or Collie, being as that’s what she is. Well, let me tell you while you finish them apples up.
So, me an Winona, the first one mind you, was good friends. She was the best partner a pony ever had. We used to corral cows an’ sheep an’ all manner of other beasts together. She was pretty smart, always pickin’ up on the things I needed her to do and doin’ them real quick like. We used to enter rodeos together. Heck, she helped me win the lasso competition by roundin’ up the calf that was runnin’ around on its spindly little legs. We were a good team. Well, time moved on, like it does, and she got too old to rodeo properly anymore so I retired her.
It was a pretty good life she had goin’ on. She wasn’t taking her retirement as an end to work. She’d dash right up and help me do all manner of things even though she was supposed to be takin’ it easy. Sometimes I’d march her back to her little house and tell her to sit tight and take it easy.
Well, just like Winona II, Winona liked to nose through the compost heap.
Compost? Oh, well, if the wind blows the right way you’ll catch a whiff of it. It’s foul smellin’ but it’s a necessity here on the farm. We use one of the old fields to keep it, one far enough from town that folks won’t see it or smell it if it’s a windy day. We gather up all the cut grass and leftovers of a harvest and pile it up in that old field. Not only that, but we have an outhouse that backs up to it. Yeah, I know. It’s a little gross, but there ain’t no better fertilizer than manure. We empty it into the field along with all the manure from the cows and chickens and pigs. We also dump our pesticide barrels in there. It raises a big stink, but come spring when crops are tryin’ to grow it really perks them right up. They’ll grow big and tall like an old oak tree in half the time it normally should.
Ya’see, the heap gets hot. Real hot, especially on days like this, but it’s normal to see steam riin’ up out of the thing in the middle of winter as all that mess decomposes and breaks down into its base parts. That’s what we slop onto the crops to get’em to grow. Works wonders, I tell ya.
Anyway, so one night I’m out late and workin’ when … well, let’s just say I had to go an’ getting’ back to the house was goin’ to be a might tricky. So, me an’ Winona high tail it to the old outhouse. I’m in there doin; what I had to when I hear Winona start up a barkin’. She had better hearin’ than I did and I expected some old raccoon or possum or somethin’ had snuck out of the Everfree and was nudgin’ through the heap. I don’t think nothin’ of it, when I hear somethin’ trompin through the heap a heck of a lot bigger than a raccoon. Winona starts growlin’ and barkin’ up a storm. All the while, I’m just tryin’ to hurry up so I can see what it is she’s so upset about. I was figurin’ it was a timber wolf or somethin’ like that. Now, that old outhouse bein’ made of wood meant that they’d probably tear it down in a minute or two and use it to make themselves bigger. Timber wolves can regenerate with wood, usually livin’ wood but I’ve seen’em use planks before so I was tryin’ to get out of there quick like.
Winona runs off, I expect tryin’ to drive it off. I start hollerin’ “Come back here, Winona! Don’t go after it!” cause them things would eat a little dog like her up. It’s about that time I hear her yip and whine. Somethin’ had got a hold of her and good. I knew that sound. She only made it when a bull had stepped on her tail or somethin’, which meant she had just got hurt. I hear it again for a second and then it just goes dead in the middle, like something had made her go quiet all of a sudden. I’d started cryin’. She was my dog and a close friend of mine, I had to make sure she was okay an’ I was certain she’d done been killed by those darned old wolves. I kind of forgot myself and come bustin’ out of the outhouse, not carin’ what was out there anymore.
It was too dark an’ I couldn’t see anything. I started hollerin’ for Winona but all I could hear was somethin’ movin’ through the compost heap.
Hold on a minute. Did you hear somethin’? WINONA! WINONA! Darn. I really gotta make her mind better’n this. She’s getting’ too frisky. Anyway,
So I grit my teeth and start walkin’ through the heap. The corn stalks from the recent harvest had made it walkable, but a couple of times my hooves sank in weak spots and covered me in filth up to my knees. I’m stompin’ through that black stuff and hollerin’ for my dog when I hear something move out in front of me. I stiffen up and a chill runs through me. Somethin’ ain’t right. Something definitely wasn’t right. “Winona?” I called out, scared out of my wits when this … thing comes slithering’ through the compost like a big old snake.
The thing pops its head out of the trash an’ its mouth is nearly as big as me. Needless to say, I’m scared to death and freeze. I see it has lots of legs, like a big old centipede except its body is see through, yaknow not completely, but like a bowl of apple jelly. Sometimes Granny likes to put apple slices in jelly an’ you can see’em floatin’ around in it? Well it was like that. I scream an’ start to run when I see Winona lookin’ at me from inside its jelly snake body. She’s wigglin’ like she tryin’ to get out but I could tell from the look of her eyes that she was dead. Part of that thing now. I turn an’ run, my legs ain’t never moved that quick in my whole life an’ the whole time, that thing is chasin’ me. I can ehar it getting’ closer, its big mouth full of rotten corn stalks and bones of other animals it had been eating servin’ as its teeth and chompin’ away at my rear end.
Somehow I get out of the heap an’ turn to see if it’s still chasin’ me, it was. The thing rose up on its hundreds of legs and made this squeal like a pig and a wolf mixed tryin’ to howl. I about gave up when it howled like that. It flat scared me to death. I just kept runnin’ though and spotted the manure cart on the hill just a short distance away. I knew that thing was gonna eat me if I didn’t try somethin’. So I ran as fast as I could to that cart, that monster right behind me.
How I got there first, I’ll never know. That thing was quicker than lightnin’ and I think maybe it was toyin’ with me. Or maybe it like, absorbed Winona and got her memories? I like to think the old girl slowed that thing down just enough for me to get ahead of it.
I get behind the cart and duck out of sight, waitin’ on that monster to catch up to me. I hear it getting’ close and I jump up, rearing my back legs up and puttin’ everythin’ I have into one hard kick. The cart goes flyin’ catching that thing square in the chest, one of the steel handles come loose and cut into its neck somethin’ fierce. I walk around to it, rearing up to stomp that metal railin’ through it, cuttin’ its head off.
A funny thing happened. I looked back at the thing, obviously hurtin’, and see this look come across its face that I just can’t describe. I just couldn’t finish it off. So what do I do? I end up knockin’ that cart off of it and taking care of the damn thing. I named it Winona, after my dog, and I’m glad you’re here. I’ve already fed it Big Mac, Apple Bloom, and Granny Smith and it’s been goin’ into the forest for food. Sometimes it brings out things as big as a bear inside its see through belly. I just knew it would be a matter of time before it ventured into Ponyville. Maybe after you, I can find something else for it to eat.
Whoa, Sugarcube. Don’t you be getting’ up and tryin’ to run off. Now, I got my rope here an’ I done told ya I was a rodeo champion. If’n I have to, I’ll buck you right hard with my back legs and a lifetime of kickin’ trees has made’em pretty strong. You just sit still. Ah, here comes Winona now.
Author's Note
Another story inspired by Joe Lansdale. THis one is heavily borrowed, but I added the MLP touch to it and changed it up enough to be its own work.
