A Web of Secrets

A Web of Secrets
by Kec

Chapter 1: Weaving the Web

It was a fine fall day in Ponyville, with a gentle breeze and warm sunlight sweeping the land, and ponies were busy attending to their daily jobs. Rarity was sewing at her boutique, hoping to fill a large order for one of her newest designs. Twilight was organizing the library with Spike for the hundredth time. Rainbow Dash was on weather duty. Fluttershy was tending to her animals. And Pinkie Pie was hard at work helping the Cakes. Ponyville was a shining example of the strong work ethic that enabled productivity and prosperity.

And nowhere was this work ethic more obvious than on the Apple family farm, where Applejack and her siblings were busy clearing out the apple harvest. Applejack went from tree to tree, placing buckets in just the right spots to catch most of the apples and then bucking them down. Apple Bloom was trailing behind her older sister, grabbing all the apples that didn’t land in her buckets and tossing them into the cart. And Big Macintosh was pulling the apple cart from place to place.

Or at least, he was supposed to be.

Applejack wondered where her brother had gone. “Big Mac?” she called nervously, looking around to see where he had run off to. Eventually she saw a tree with a large red figure leaning against it, and the sight filled her with frustration. How dare he lay down and rest in the shade while she and Apple Bloom were hard at work?! She broke out into a gallop towards the sitting figure of her brother.

Big Mac adjusted his yoke nervously and quickly stood up as the hoofsteps behind him grew steadily closer. He was halfway through pulling all the apples from the East field when he stopped for a rest, to prepare to finally have some time alone. Was anypony around? He felt like he was alone, and had nearly removed his yoke, but his peace was cut short when he saw his little sister running towards him. He swiftly pulled down the orange cloth and adjusted the prongs.

"Big Mac!" yelled Applejack, approaching the large red stallion with fury in her eyes. "Ah don't know why yer slackin', but there's work left to be doin'! Ain't like ya to try'n doze off during chores." Big Mac thought he heard her mumble something about Apple Bloom’s work ethic, but he let it go.

"Alright, alright. Ah was just...restin' mah back,” he quickly lied. “Lemme get up and ah'll get back to pullin'," he said, exasperated, adjusting his yoke again.

"Good," said Applejack triumphantly. "How about Ah do half the buckin' today, and you hitch up to yer cart an' bring half the apples back to the barn, an’ we do the rest tomorrah. Might be a little easier on yer back. Sound good?" she inquired.

Big Mac responded with his trademark "Eeeeeyup."

But to him the prospect didn't sound as good as Applejack had meant it to. As strong as Big Mac was, working on the farm wasn't as easy for him as it was for Applejack or anypony else in his extended family. Apple farming was the ambition of every Apple...every Apple but him. He wasn't exactly about to complain, of course, since Applejack might inquire about him slacking. And while he dearly loved his sister, there were some things he felt were better left hidden.

As the day dragged on, he couldn’t help but return his thoughts to one echoing word. Family. Big Macintosh thought for a while as he walked. Was a pony really defined by how well they lived up to their families’ expectations? Everyone respected him and Applejack as strong workers and proud Apples who kept their farm running and all of Equestria supplied with apples. But who said he needed to work with apples, just because it was expected of his family?

Big Mac hung his head low and pulled the cart slowly, letting the wind whistle softly around him. It was best not to think about those things while he worked. But he knew that since he was suppressing it, he would be up all night thinking again.

Rainbow Dash was flying around, practicing her awesome stunts and tricks in preparation for...something. She honestly didn't know what she was preparing for, only that she enjoyed the feeling of flying, so it didn't really matter anyway. She decided that she would attempt a triple spin with a lead in to a banking zig-zag and then a rolling swoop up into her signature Sonic Rainboom! But for now, she would just practice the triple spin. No sense wasting her energy this early into her practice session. Well, that, and she had also been banned from performing a Sonic Rainboom within city limits by the Mayor after the shockwave last time.

As she swirled through the air, she had both an overhead view of Ponyville to see what was going on in the town and the opportunity to pass other Pegasi to listen in on gossip, and she did both. Just today she had witnessed the Mayor talking to several construction ponies, and had heard from Ditzy and Cloudchaser that they were planning on building a new playground for the younger ponies. Maybe she'd be able to convince the Mayor to add in some stunt flying loops.

The sun was setting, and she was headed home when she noticed a flash that caught her eye. A small, red rocket was streaking upwards rapidly, and she flew over to it, curious. When it began to hiss, it occurred to Rainbow Dash that it was indeed what she thought it was: a firework, and she ought to fly away from it before her rainbow mane was charred black and her wing feathers burnt to a crisp in the ensuing detonation.

As she sped away, a large, glowing sphere erupted behind her, with streams of all colors floating down. She thought it looked like a flower of sorts, with her own rainbow trail as the stem. If she had bothered to care more for prettiness than awesomeness, that firework would be a perfect ten. But she was all about awesomeness, and coolness, and especially radicalness. And endangering her safety was none of those things.

Rainbow Dash flew down to the source of the firework, looking to knock some sense into the reckless pony that would dare endanger her. She came down on a grove of trees not far from the Everfree Forest proper, yet a fair distance from the main town, and saw the one pony standing in the center that Rainbow had assumed to be the culprit from the start.

"Pinkie Pie! Why'd ya set off fireworks when you knew I was flying around? I could have been hurt!" she scolded.

"Sorry Rainbow Dash, but I didn’t set off those fireworks!” said Pinkie. “A friend of mine makes them in secret by hoof so that he keeps the recipe a super-duper trade secret and he always shows up in a mask and sets them all off at the same time each week! Well, he isn't my friend yet, but I'd like him to be! It's like a mystery but with fireworks which are so much fun that no one wonders who he is at all! Though I’m the only pony who ever comes to see him, so I guess I don’t wonder who he is at all. Not at all...” she spookily intoned.

Pinkie Pie was a very quick, dynamic thinker, and she had ambitions. She truly did want to know the identity of this pony, even if it was only to be his friend better. But she would do anything to learn who he was under the mask, and began to ponder a plan.

“But I know it’s a he because his costume had Rarity’s tag still on it, and it was from the stallion’s section! And he does have wings so he must be a Pegasus, or maybe an Alicorn, or a Griffin, or a fully grown dragon that had wings and was very tiny and had on a pony costume! He didn’t really move his wings much, though, but they were there! Actually, he never moved them!" Pinkie was lost in her ramblings, which Rainbow Dash had learned to ignore. She was a good friend, but a little too energetic at times.

"Pinkie," interrupted Dash, "where did this firework-artist Pegasus go? I'm going to go give him a piece of my mind! Nopony should be so reckless!"

Though she hated to admit it, Rainbow Dash had other ideas. She was secretly enthralled by the display of colors, and now that Pinkie Pie had revealed that it was a stallion who created the fireworks, Dash began to think. Her parents had expressed a desire for her to get married, and she was beginning to consider the idea herself. After all, she was beginning to feel like she would never join the Wonderbolts, and if she never achieved her dream, she would at least like to have a colt or filly that would. The fact that this stallion was a Pegasus further raised her hopes. Maybe then she would have something to be proud of...

"I dunno!" said Pinkie, snapping Dash out of her thinking. "He ran off after the show, right after a big KA-BOOM! Little glowy bits went everywhere across the sky and glowed with glowy goodness! It was like my party cannon, but glowier! Maybe I should ask Twilight to make my party cannon glowy too! And then the glowiness should start glowing once the confetti explodes; and maybe I can make it explode again to make MORE glowiness, like we thought Fluttershy almost did! Although Fluttershy isn't really glowy, but maybe we could put a costume with lights on her! But I don't want her to explode, of course, just be more glowy!"

Pinkie Pie had plans, and set them in motion. She had placed a monitoring chip from Twilight’s house onto Rainbow Dash in order to follow her everywhere and creep her out, and Rainbow had never caught on. But right now, she needed Rainbow to know. “But anyway, it was like a flower, with your rainbow trail as the stem! You thought so yourself!"

"How did you know exactly what I was thinking about that firework?" inquired a puzzled Rainbow Dash.

"Easy!" replied Pinkie Pie. "I got a monitoring chip from Twilight’s basement and attached it to you! Anything you say, do, or think about gets transmitted to me! Anything...”

“Gah!” yelled Rainbow Dash, thoroughly scared at this point and worried now since she had no idea what else Pinkie could uncover! She said a shaky “Goodbye” to Pinkie Pie. Not that she'd heard Dash: she was already on another tangent about Goatglielmo Marponi and wireless telegraphy. Rainbow Dash left the clearing and went off to search for this reckless fireworks artist, to teach him a lesson...and maybe get her first coltfriend.

Oh, and she made a note to have Twilight remove that chip. As soon as possible.

Big Mac turned over in bed to keep the Sun out of his eyes. He was still sore from all of the cart pulling that he had done yesterday. Applejack had loaded nearly twenty cartfuls of apples for him, and she had called little Apple Bloom to help them too, tossing whatever Applejack dropped on the ground up into the cart. He imagined what kind of cutie mark she'd get, and whether or not she'd hate it.

Like he hated his. But he forced that story out of his mind.

Looking out onto the full South field, he could tell it would be another day of drudgery and toil with harvesting their apples. But he didn't really mind, since he got to spend it with his family. Big Mac felt that his family was the best thing he could ever have, since a family was what he really always wanted out of anything else in the world.

More memories welled up within him. He imagined several ponies from his childhood, and all the hateful words they had said about him and his family.

"Earth Ponies? Why would you ever associate with those filthy, lazy Earth Ponies?!"

“Haha! An apple? Come back when you get a real cutie mark, kid!”

"Get out! You’re a disgrace to the family, you hornless oaf! Out"

Now Big Mac was crying again. As restrained and calm as he was, there were some things that brought even him to tears, and his past was one of them. He was silent and still, though, as even in sadness he wasn't very vocal. Looking at the sun, he could see it was nearly nine o’clock, much later than his intended hour of awakening. He knew that Applejack would be looking for him.

As if on cue, Applejack entered the room and, in her usual chipper tone, shouted, "Rise an' shine, Big Mac! We got the rest of the East field to do today. You'n Apple Bloom are gonna get all the big trees, an'..." She stopped, noticing Big Mac's uncharacteristic lack of movement. "...Big Mac? You okay?"

Big Mac blinked his eyes shut twice to rid them of tears. Please don't notice, he thought silently.

"Eeeeeyup," he quietly choked out.

"Big Mac?" said Applejack, gingerly putting a hoof on him. "Yah look like yah been, uh...cryin'."

"Ah said ah'm okay." replied an irritated Big Mac. "Let's get to buckin'."

Applejack assured herself that Big Mac was alright, but she couldn't help but worry. He'd been acting oddly for weeks now, and she felt like there may be something wrong with him. She would have to go ask her friends about anything she could do to help, as therapy really wasn't her specialty. She made a mental note to bring it up today at their lunch meeting as she headed off to tend to her apples, her heart heavy with concern.

"...an' he's been slackin' on his chores! Ah just don't know what to do 'bout him, y'all," complained Applejack to her friends.

"Why are you so obsessed with his personal life anyway, dahling?" inquired Rarity, in a formal, somewhat bossy tone. "A pony's own reasons are just that - their own. It's improper to demand an explanation out of anypony for their personal behavior."

"But it ain't okay to be restin' on the job! And don't let on to him that Ah told ya this, but...Ah think he was cryin' this mornin'."

"Did you try talking to him, Applejack?" asked Twilight, easing into the situation more delicately than Rarity.

"He just up an' brushed me off! It was right rude of him, but Ah let it slide. Ah'm just worried about him..." said Applejack softly.

"I'm sure he's fine, Applejack," said Rarity, with a noticeable edge to her voice.

"Um...maybe he just doesn't, um...maybe..." whispered Fluttershy, her opinion going unheard due to her reluctance for speech.

"Maybe he just wants to save his energy to do more fun things later!" chimed in Pinkie Pie, cutting Fluttershy off. "Cranky told me that one day when I was bouncing in a circle around his cottage for about two hours. He told me that I should go away because he was saving his energy for more fun later! So I went down to swim with Rainbow Dash!"

"Yeah, and you pushed me into the lake with all your ‘energy’..." said Dash.

"But Ah'm worried about him! He was talkin' in his sleep, sayin' things about Earth Ponies and somepony gettin’ kicked out an'--"

"Applejack, just let it go!" said Rarity unusually forcefully, slamming her hoof down on the table.

Five faces turned to look at her.

"Erm...hehe, what I meant to say was, may we choose another topic of discussion, if you please? I apologize for that little...outburst there."

The word outburst caused Rainbow Dash to remember the firework she saw last night. "Oh yeah, did anyone else see that firework last night? Pinkie Pie and I were there. It almost hit me!"

"Rainbow Dash, what do you mean 'that firework'? There were lots, you just weren't able to see them since most of them didn't fly above the trees, and you couldn't hear them because the trees block all the echoing booms and bangs and KABLAMS!" said Pinkie Pie. "Some of them were even glowier than that one!"

“Well, I wish I could have seen more. That last one was pretty cool. It kind of reminded me of...” Dash stopped herself before Pinkie Pie could interject with her mind reading bit.

"Um, I saw it...it scared all the animals. I had to stay up all night comforting them!" said Fluttershy, who obviously didn't like the firework to the extent the others did.

"Shore was purty, but a bit loud for my tastes," commented Applejack.

"I saw it as well, from my balcony. The maker of that firework must have been a Pegasus! I was reading somewhere that Pegasi are the only ponies able to make fireworks of that quality, since they can use rainbows and clouds in their designs without them breaking," said Twilight, an enthralled look on her face. “Well, I guess any type of pony could make it, but it would take a Unicorn years to perfect that degree of magical control, and it would be almost impossible for an Earth Pony.

"I just wish I could meet the stallion who made them..." said Rainbow Dash dreamily.

"Look at that, Rainbow Dash has finally fallen in love," teased Applejack.

"What? No! I just thought it might be an...um, friend of mine from...flight school? Pinkie, did you see his cutie mark?" she said, changing the subject due to her unwillingness to discuss her personal infatuation.

"Nope! He covered it up with his costume! Though I guess it would be a firework, I don’t know! I just wish I knew who he was so he could be my friend! I would know his cutie mark but I've never seen him without the costume on so I always assumed it was a firework since he does that so well! And most of us would never bump into him by chance since Rainbow Dash is always practicing flying and Fluttershy takes care of her animals all the time and Twilight works at the library with Spike and Applejack is always working on her apples! But Rarity is so generous that she must be friends with everypony in town! And he was wearing a costume with Rarity's tag on it! So who is the mystery pony, Rarity?" chattered Pinkie Pie, who looked over at Rarity.

But the pink pony noticed Rarity seething in anger. "...Rarity? You okay?"

"Why must you all continue on this path of conversation?! Stop prying into other ponies' personal lives! Stop it!" screamed an extremely irate Rarity, who promptly stormed off.

The same five faces turned to look, but found themselves staring at an empty seat.

“Wow, what’s with her?” asked an incredulous Rainbow Dash.

“I’d better go talk to her,” said Fluttershy. “She might be stressed, or sick, or hiding something. You never know with a pony like Rarity.” The butter-colored Pegasus walked in the direction that her friend had ran off in. Her quiet, submissive demeanor was gone: one of her friends was hurting, and it was her personal responsibility to see to it that they were okay.

“Okay, I guess...lunch is over,” said a shocked and disappointed Twilight.

“Okey dokey lokey!” chirped an unfazed Pinkie Pie, who bounced off into Sugarcube Corner.

As soon as she exited, Rainbow Dash tapped Twilight and whispered, ”Meet me in the library.” The two ponies walked off towards the large tree in the center of town.

Applejack sat alone at the table. She took Rarity’s outburst the hardest. First her brother was acting all depressed, and now her friend is, too. She had no idea what to do anymore, seeing as the connections she had built up were now breaking down around her.

She was nothing without relationships. That was the truth. And as the Element of Honesty, she knew the truth hurt sometimes.

What would she do? She needed counsel, but her primary source of it, her friends, simply added a new layer to the problem. She really didn’t know anyone besides them too well, and those that she did would give horrible advice. Cheerilee worked with foals, she would probably tell her to give Big Mac a hug and encouragement. Granny Smith would go on a long tangent about the pioneers, or worse, try home remedies on Big Macintosh. Ditzy Doo, the mailmare, would suggest muffins. She chuckled to herself as she imagined Big Mac eating a blueberry muffin and instantly perking up to complete ecstasy. She wished there were something that could really inspire such a change in her brother. Some sort of magical mix, or--

That was it.

She slowly got up and wandered away in the opposite direction of town, towards the Everfree Forest. She knew exactly the pony to talk to. Or rather, exactly the zebra to talk to.

Apple Bloom watched from the window of the Cutie Mark Crusaders’ clubhouse as Big Macintosh sat against a tree and sighed. He had been there ever since Applejack left for lunch, crying to himself. Several times Apple Bloom wanted to approach him, but she had the feeling in the back of her mind that he would be angry with her, and that was the last thing she wanted.

Seeing Big Mac in such a sorry state was heartbreaking to Apple Bloom. He was the strong link that held the Apple family farm together, and acted as her role model. Applejack was another role model, of course, but her rigid tradition and constant treating of Apple Bloom like a child made her into more of an annoying big sister than an adult role model. Big Mac was older, gentler, and a good worker, which embodied everything she respected into one pony. Though she didn’t say it out loud, she respected him greatly, and truly thought him to be the perfect pony.

As Apple Bloom lamented the loss of her idol, she noticed another pony approaching her brother. It was Sweetie Belle’s older sister, Rarity, who she considered bossy and uptight. She wondered what Rarity would be doing here with her brother, and whether or not she would witness this with gossip to share with the other Crusaders.

“Macintosh?” said Rarity?

“Eeeeeyup?” replied Big Mac.

“Applejack is worried about you, and I believe she’s trying to find out the nature of your...depression. She brought up the topic at lunch, and I acted out and left the meal. Are you truly okay?”

“Eeeeeyup,” repeated Big Mac.

“It’s not...that, is it?” said Rarity, quieting her voice down considerably.

Big Macintosh remained silent for a few moments before finally opening his mouth.

“...Eeeeeyup.”

Rarity walked over to Big Macintosh and gave him a hug, just as he began crying harder.

“I’m sorry, Macintosh. I was too young to stop them. You know how they can be sometimes. The important thing is that you have a family that loves you...”

“One...”

“Remember, you are defined by your character, not by your outward appearance.”

The two hugged for some time. The clubhouse door opening brought the incredulous Apple Bloom back to reality. How could Big Macintosh and Rarity know each other from before? She turned to face the sudden intruder, expecting her friends, but seeing a very different pony.

“Hi, Sweetie Belle! Hi, Scoot -- oh. Hi Fluttershy. What are ya doin’ here?”

“Oh, I’m sorry Apple Bloom! I didn’t mean to disturb you. I was just here to see what Rarity was doing. Don’t tell her, but I followed her. She ran away very angry from our lunch together and I’m worried she may be hiding something. The clubhouse seemed like a good vantage point to watch her.”

“Watch ‘er? Ya mean spy on ‘er? She’s right down there.”

Apple Bloom let Fluttershy watch out the window, and the yellow Pegasus’ mouth dropped open in surprise as she watched the two ponies hugging.

“Oh my goodness! Big Mac...and Rarity...are...in love? So that’s why...oh my! I need to tell Applejack!”

Rarity loosened her grip on the large red pony and walked backwards a few feet.

“I’ll be at the boutique if you need to talk to me. See you later, Macintosh.”

“Eeeeeyup.” said a slightly happier Big Mac.

Apple Bloom and Fluttershy both dashed out of the clubhouse, each intending to report a different version of the events to their circles of friends.

“What did you want to talk to me about, Rainbow?” said Twilight.

“What’s a monitoring chip?!” demanded Rainbow Dash.

“Monitoring chip?! Oh no! This is bad! This is very very bad!” exclaimed a suddenly worried Twilight. “The monitoring chip is a sophisticated piece of machinery I made that taps into a pony’s natural neural oscillation patterns and measures the tendencies of alteration to produce an accurate mental image! It reads minds! If somepony bad has it, it could be dangerous!”

“But Pinkie said she planted it on me, and all she’s been using it for is to learn how I feel about fireworks and where I go to relax.”

“Pinkie?! Ergh, I need to have a talk with that mare about privacy. She stole that from me, and she has no right to read your mind, or anyone’s. Now turn around,” ordered Twilight.

“Okay, for wh--AH!” shouted Rainbow as she felt something being pulled from her mane.

“It’s out now,” said Twilight, placing the chip on the stump in the center of the tree. “Now let’s get the console from Pinkie Pie. She should know better than to do such an irresponsible thing.”

The two ponies walked out of the tree, failing to notice a pink, frizzy blur sneak in the top window. Pinkie Pie walked down into the main room of the library and snatched up the chip from the table.

“Perfect, Dash got the chip taken off just like I predicted. Now to go find that fireworks Pegasus,” she said, chuckling to herself at the success of her plan.