Applebuck season (Work-In-Progress)
It was apple buck season in Equestria and the apple family were hard at work harvesting apples.
Meanwhile at the library, Twilight had fallen asleep reading a book about stocks and how the credit system worked, when suddenly she jumped out of bed and exclaimed "Spike! I have the best idea for apple buck season!"
Spike yawned and said " Is this idea really that great that you had to wake me up for?"
Twilight ignored the comment and continued "If I find the radius of the trees at sweet apple acres and compare it to how many apples the tree produces, then I can write a equation telling applejack how many apples are approximately going to be produced at sweet apple acres during apple buck season!" By this time, spike had lost interest and had gone back to bed. Twilight sighed "After all, baby dragons do need lots of sleep."
Twilight proceeded to pack a saddle bag full of books, papers, quills, and lots of ink. Then she quietly slipped out the door and started trotting towards sweet apple acres.
"Hey! Twilight, what are you doing up so early?"
"Oh, hi there Pinkie Pie, I was just going to sweet apple acres to show applejack something. What are you doing up so early?" Pinkie Pie looked bored, then shook her head as if to get rid of whatever was on her mind and said "Oh, I am always up this early so I can see if any new ponies come in on the morning trains."
Twilight smiled, after all it was pinkie pie. "So what are you doing today pinkie?... Pinkie?" Twilight looked beside her, but pinkie was gone. Twilight looked up and found herself at the gates of sweet apple acres. The air was dusty from all the dirt kicked up by the hard-working earth ponies trying to harvest all the apples. Twilight walked cautiously up to the house where she found Granny Smith sitting in her rocking chair. "Hello, Granny Smith!" Granny Smith did not answer and twilight was temporarily puzzled until she remembered Granny Smith was losing her hearing so every pony had to speak up around her. "Hello, Granny Smith!" Twilight said, louder than before.
"What is it? Is it time for me to go inside already?" Said Granny Smith.
"Oh, hi Granny Smith, it's me Twilight Sparkle."
" And what brings you here today twilight?" Asked Granny Smith "You are not going to use magic to harvest all the apples are ya?"
"No, no not at all, when does AJ have a break?" Twilight said as she put her books on the table.
"She gets a break for lunch, but lunch is not until noon so you might as well make yourself comfortable."
"Thank you Granny Smith" but Granny Smith had already fallen back asleep in her rocking chair. Twilight pulled the last of the books out of her saddlebag and placed them on the table. " Ok, now all I need to do is write the equation for the apple trees. So r^2 = 2.7x where r is the radius and x is the number of branches on the tree." Twilight's talking soon turned into mumbling and then stopped altogether.
"Hey twi' what you doing here?" Twilight jumped and said "Oh, hi AJ I have something I would like you to take a look at when you get time."
"We'll I'm on lunch break right now so lay it on me." Applejack said. Twilight stared at her as if to make sure she was listening and then began. "Ok, so I'm going to explain this in layman's terms, so-" twilight caught the blank look on AJ's face and paused to say "layman's terms means In its simplest form. Anyway, so where was I? Oh at the beginning, right. So if we measure the radius- (the distance from the edge to the center of a circle) of all the apple trees in sweet apple acres, and square it, it should give us the approximate number of branches on that tree. Understand so far?"
Applejack paused for a moment, thinking then asked " Why do we need to know how many branches are on a apple tree?" Twilight looked at her dully, then said "I haven't gotten to that part yet, it's what I'm getting to right now. If we multiply the number of branches by 2.7 then we get the approximate number of apples on that tree. And if we know that, we multiply that by the number of trees in sweet apple acres and we know how many apples your family will harvest by the end of apple buck season!" Applejack looked at twilight and said "Twilight, I appreciate all this but I just don't see how this could help anypony here."
All of the sudden rainbow dash crashed down from a cloud she was sitting on and hit the ground laughing. "What is so funny rainbow dash?"
"It's just.. Give me a minute." When rainbow dash finished laughing she sat up and said "twilight, you are trying to turn applejack into an egghead!"
Twilight glared at rainbow dash and said "I am just trying to explain to applejack what use this math could be to the profits for sweet apple acres."
"I STILL don't get it!" Applejack interrupted "I don't have much more time left in my break so hurry this up."
"Ok then" twilight said, sounding somewhat annoyed "so I read this book last night (holding up a copy of The History of Equestria in her hoof.) and there was something about a 'credit system' that ponies sometimes used to buy things when times were tough. And the way it worked was that people would pay for goods before they got them, or vice versa and later they would get the goods, or the money they traded for earlier."
"Wait, so it's like pre-ordering sumthin?" Asked applejack "in a way, exactly!" Twilight exclaimed "I'm glad you are understanding, so often people will pay more for a good or service if they are guaranteed to get it first"
"so you are saying we could make a bigger profit selling apples to rich people before every pony else got a chance to go out and buy them? I don't know twilight, we have been doing the same thing here at sweet apple acres for a very long time and I'm not sure we should change it." Applejack said to twilight nervously. "Don't worry applejack, as long as you manage the apples and record what pony gets what, it will work out fine!"
"Hello? Oh twilight, pinkie said you were here and I though I'd stop by." Said rarity as she walked up to the two ponies wearing a hood, a scarf, and a long overcoat. "And what fashion is this, rarity?" Applejack said teasingly. "For your information, this is last years fashion and I only wore it because this dust is not good for my mane."
"So what really brings you here, rarity?" Twilight asked before the two ponies started arguing like that one time at her first slumber party.
"Rainbow dash said something about you turning applejack into an egghead, so I decided I should come check it out." Twilight rolled her eyes, hoping rainbow dash could see that she was irritated, wherever she was.
Then, all of the sudden, applejack yelped and said "woah there fluttershy, I didn't hear you trot up!" "Sorry, I didn't mean to scare anypony, it's just that all this dust kicked up by you and big Macintosh is driving the birds nuts, they can't fly anywhere because the dust gets in their eyes."
"Oh, darn it! I was supposed to give big Macintosh a break five minutes ago, I sure hope he's not angry! I'm sorry fluttershy, but maybe twilight can help you with that for now, I have to go buck some apples" Applejack said before rushing off to relieve her brother.
"So, how can your magic help me, Twilight?" Twilight paused to think, then said "I suppose I could cast a spell making the dust act like dark matter, then it would just go through everything and not cause any damage." Fluttershy looked scared and confused "it won't hurt any animals, I promise! It just makes the dust go through everything like it didn't exist, no harm done."
"Okay then, go ahead." Fluttershy said as she covered her eyes with a hoof. Twilight's horn started to glow a rich, dark violet and suddenly there was a blinding flash and then Everything returned to normal. Well, almost everything. Suddenly, all of the dust starting falling to the ground-wait it wasn't falling to the ground, it was falling THROUGH the ground. "Is it over?" Fluttershy said, shivering with fear.
"All done, now the birds can fly through the dust without them feeling a thing." "Oh, thank you twilight, you know how birds get when they can't fly."
"If its anything like the way rainbow dash acts, then I know." Said twilight with a chuckle
"Oh, it's a lot like rainbow dash, but worse!" Fluttershy said with wide eyes. "I have to tell the birds it's safe to fly, see you."
"Twilight, darling, what was that spell you just casted?" Asked rarity curiously.
"Well, I sort of wrote my own magic and mixed it with some dark magic so that I could actually interfere with the laws of physics." Rarity stared, wide eyed "you just used dark magic?" "The princess allows me to as long as I don't over use it. Besides, I am also a princess so I really don't need to ask." Said twilight proudly. "So if applejack decides to go through with this whole thing, would you like to design the bags to hold the apples?"
"Would I ever! Of course, the bags will need to be very strong fabric so that they don't rip, I'll also have to design a drawstring for it. I'm going to go get this started right now! I'm so excited!" Rarity dashed off to get started.
Suddenly, applejack hit the table, making twilight jump "What in all of equestria did you do with that magic of yours?!" Twilight looked very taken aback, and said " all I did was use some dark magic to change the dust into dark matter so that fluttershy's birds could fly through it without feeling a thing."
"Well, at least that's what you intended to do and it's not some weird affect of another spell." Said applejack with a sigh of relief. "But I better not find anything weird going on, or I'll make you release that spell."
"Oh really?" Said twilight playfully, unfurling her new wings.
"You still can't out fly rainbow dash, you know that, nopony can, not even celestia herself!" Applejack informed.
Twilight sighed "yeah, I guess that's true."
Applejack started walking away, but then she Turned around and said "wait, you used DARK magic?"
"Yes, I had to in order to make something defy the laws of physics." Explained Twilight "you watch it with that dark magic, got it?" Applejack scolded
"Don't worry, I'm not corrupted or anything, it's fine." Twilight said. Twilight walked back to the library feeling good that applejack learned about the credit system and was going to explain the rest tomorrow, when applejack had the day off because it was a weekend. Twilight opened the library door to find it sparkling clean, and spike quietly reading a book on where to find gems and how to steal from the diamond dogs. When he heard twilight walk in he slammed the book shut and put it on the shelf "what were you reading, spike? Gem finding for the untrained pony? Again? Spike, every time you read that book I have to wipe your drool off of the pages with the pictures of the gems on them."
Spike looked embarrassed, then said "sorry twilight, I just can't help it, those gems look so good when I'm hungry." "That's ok spike, actually rarity wanted to get that book so that she can find some gems for this years gala dresses, so would you mind bringing that over to her?" Twilight said as she walked over to her desk to unpack her things.
"Sure! No problem Twilight, I'll leave right now." "That dragon." Twilight said to herself as she curled up in her bed "sorry owlicious, no late night studying tonight"
"who?" Hooted owlicious as twilight drifted off to sleep. The dream she had was weird, her and princess celestia were in that weird void place again, but this time rainbow dash and rarity were there and insisting that their cutie marks resembled magic in some way. There was a lot of yelling, most of it at twilight from celestia about how not to flaunt one's abilities (which twilight knew she never did, but she also knew better than to argue with the princess.) then there was this sinking feeling and twilight woke up in a cold sweat,and panting hard. She soon noticed that spike was staring at her and she mumbled something like "bad dream." Spike apparently understood as he went back to bed. After she got up, she planned on visiting cloudsdale, just to hang with rainbow dash but then she remembered that she was going to finish explaining the use of the system and what it meant for the apple family's profits to applejack. Twilight packed a saddle bag with paper and quills, no need for the books as twilight had explained everything in them the previous day. Twilight decided to visit fluttershy on the way to see if the birds got to wherever they were going. On the way, she noticed that the spell she cast the day before did not effect the area outside of the apple farm, but she did not remember writing that in the magic. It should have gone as far as her power could handle, and being a alicorn, it could go very far. "Unless some pony countered my spell with regular magic, but I doubt anypony would be powerful enough by themselves to handle combatting my magic for long."
"Twilight, are you alright?" Said rainbow dash, landing next to her. "Oh yes, I'm just trying to figure out if anypony is countering my magic, but unless its celestia or Luna, I don't think they could do it for long." "Didn't you hear, discord showed up last night and removed the spell because he thought it was king sombre's work. Also said something about dark magic, was that what you used, Twilight?"
Twilight could not believe that she had to explain this again, but she might as well. "Yes, I used dark magic, is it really that big of a deal? I think I am more than capable of handling myself with it."
Rainbow dash stared at Twilight and warned her "watch it with that dark magic twilight, I don't need you destroying equestria, you would be impossible to stop!"
"Oh, twilight, guess what discord let me do for awile!" Said pinkie pie as she bounced up beside her and rainbow dash. "What, pinkie?" twilight and rainbow dash said in unison
"He let me be his guinea pig for an hour, you remember that don't you? I wanted to be a guinea pig but no, "no small animals of any kind, pinkie." That's what you said." "Well the reason I didn't want you being a small animal is because they have a very short lifespan, and if the spell got stuck, I would not want you to die before I could find a counterspell!" Explained twilight. " I did it to protect you, pinkie." Pinkie looked very happy, then hugged twilight and ran off to see the if any new ponies were coming in on the trains, even though the trains did not come on the weekends, she still sat there, waiting. "So you want to come with me to fluttershy's cottage, rainbow dash? I'll race ya there!"
"You are on!" Rainbow dash said as she flew into the air "3...2...1...GO!" Twilight was not able to keep up with rainbow dash and landed next to her panting
"I really...need to work...on my flying skills."
"You can say that again!" rainbow dash teased.
"Oh, hi girls." Said fluttershy as she noticed them land."I was just giving angel her salad." "So, did your birds get to wherever they were going fluttershy?" Asked twilight.
"Yeah,a lot of them did, then discord came and removed the spell." Fluttershy said somewhat sadly.
"Well, I'm going to go and finish explaining this to applejack, see ya later girls!" Twilight said as she flew towards the apple farm. Apple jack was outside sitting by a apple tree, so twilight decided to land right in front of her.
"what do you want rainbow dash?" Applejack said irritably. "Applejack, it's me, twilight!" Applejack looked up and said, "sorry, not used to you having wings and all. So why are YOU here then?" "Oh, I was going to finish explaining this stuff to you so we could get started by Monday." Applejack looked at twilight oddly and asked "what else is there to explain?"
"Oh, not much to explain, just some demonstrating so you can do it by yourself next time."
"So what do I have to do twilight?"
"Oh, it's simple, first, you record the pony who bought the apples here." Twilight said, pointing to a small notepad "then, you record how many apples the pony bought here, and finally you subtract that number from the total number of apples you have."
Applejack nodded and said "Okay then, lets get this started!" So rarity, applejack, and twilight set to work on putting exactly 8 apples in each bag, tying them, and putting them in the apple family's barn. "Ok, all done. What time is it twilight?"
"Well, judging from the position of the sun, I'd say its about 4 o'clock." "Ooh, ooh!" Rarity piped in. "We should make posters saying that apples will be able to be bought for 2 bits more before they hit the shelves."
"That's a great idea rarity!" Twilight said "me and applejack will bring a cart full of apples into ponyville so that we can start to sell apples, you can go and get start on the posters." Rarity galloped off quickly before twilight could say anything else.
"Hey, twilight?" Asked applejack
"yes, AJ?"
"Do you think that you could help me bring in all of these apples to ponyville with your magic? This cart is just to heavy." Applejack said as she tried pulling the cart.
"Sure thing, hold on. I'm not going to teleport it in case it lands on somepony in ponyville, so i will just do a simple levitation spell." And with ease, twilight cast a spell that made the whole cart of apples float high up into the sky.
"Woah, twilight ever since you became a alicorn, your magic has gotten way more powerful." Twilight nodded. "Celestia told me that would happen, still trying to adjust to how easy using magic is. An age spell used to be way out of my reach, but now I can do it with ease."
Both ponies started walking towards ponyville, then applejack asked "What can't you do with that magic, twilight? Isn't an age spell for the highest level unicorn already? Can you even get magic more powerful than that?"
"Well, starswirl was a highest level unicorn with similar power to mine, and he wrote his own spells that were the most powerful spells in all of equestria, but were far too dangerous if they fell into the wrong hands. So celestia had them locked away somewhere." Twilight explained.
"So is celestia going to give them to you, twilight?" Twilight shook her head "celestia used a memory spell on herself so the location could not be found out, even in the case of somepony using a memory-scan spell. Besides, I can just make my own magic." The two mares had just arrived in the market square and started setting up shop when rarity walked up
"oh, looks like I am just I'm time to hang up these posters, I don't have many because I made them quickly. I hope that's ok"