Little Redd: the Lost Concept of Peace

Chapter Eleven

Inside the Fire

Apple Bloom.

Redd leapt through the front door, treading where fire had yet to take over.  Suddenly, her past hit her head-on, and screamed for her to get out.  But she didn't listen.  The only thing she could hear was Apple Bloom's laughter from yesterday echoing through her mind.  Bloom was so young, so like Redd.  Despite the mask of completely different lifestyles, they were so alike it was almost as if she finally had a sibling.

She wasn't going to lose Apple Bloom to the same thing that took her mother away from her.

As she moved through the house, she would occasionally get licked by a thread of fire, singing her charcoal coat to a darker shade.  Redd pounded up the stairs, recklessly disregarding the structural weaknesses caused by the inferno.  She didn't know where Apple Bloom's room was, but that'd be a good place to start.

The door exploded off the hinges, red fire licking across the frame before Redd leapt through.  It was a bedroom, but it was empty.  She went through it all, under the bed, the closet, just in case the filly was frightened.  Nothing.  She skidded across the hall and blew another door off its frame, stepping through the fire like a dark entity.  Still nothing.  Scrambling back into the hallway, she heard something.  She paused and listened, waiting for it to come again.

Coughing.

The attic.

She charged to the end of the hall, looking for the entrance.  She couldn't find it through the smoke.  Suddenly, her eyes brightened, and she shimmered into Dark Equestria to see about the state of things there.  No fire.  Quiet, aside from the sounds of a fight in the yard, Apple Bloom screaming for it all to stop.

She scanned the ceiling, and located the pull-down at the opposite end of the hall.  She ran over, took the bit in her mouth, and yanked it down, stepping out of the way of the sliding stairs.  She went up, stood in the middle of a mass of boxes, and shimmered back into True Ponyville.

Fire exploded from her surroundings, and she could faintly make out the yellow shape huddled in the corner through the smoke.

"Apple Bloom!"

She burst forth, and cleared the boxes to skid to a stop beside the filly.

"Little Redd!"

Bloom hopped on her back, and the ceiling suddenly shifted.  Turning to the exit, a pile of flaming beams occupied the path to safety.  The attic shifted further, slowly warping into the house.

The shimmer passed over them with only a few seconds to spare as the ceiling fell where they had been.

Apple Bloom's first reaction was to stare.

"Am Ah dreamin'?"

She hopped off of Redd's back, testing the secure floorboards of the Apples' attic wearily.

"Sadly, no.  We need to get you back home as soon as possible."

Apple Bloom looked at Redd like she was losing it.

"Uh, Redd, this is my home."

Redd was looking out the window at the fight between Rainbow Dash and Applejack.  She couldn't believe that they'd been fighting all night.  Their faded coats were beginning to get light from the sun.  Dark Apple Bloom was on the sidelines sniffing to herself, trying to ignore it as she waited to see if her sister would survive.  Behind the scene, you could see Dark Ponyville, vines exploding out of random buildings and overturning the ground.  Overhead an orca screamed.

"No it isn't."

She turned back to Apple Bloom, who was walking to the same windowsill.

"This is the Dark Apple family house.  You can not let anypony here see you.  Dark ponies look different from True ponies.  They would be able to instantly tell you don't belong here.  Come on."

Apple Bloom was horrified at the fight going down, and Applejack was in bad shape.  Not much else could be said about Rainbow Dash either.

"I want to go home!"

Redd smiled to try to comfort her.

"We will.  We need to get out of the house or we'll come back and-- well… yeah.  Come on, let's go."

Redd stepped to the attic door as Bloom decided to follow, and pushed down on it a bit.  It wouldn't budge.

"Ballucks."

"What?"

Redd shied.

"I, uh, nothing."

"Got it.  Not around my sister."

"Well, not at all, if you can help it."

"As fer the door, it don't open from the inside."

"I can tell.  Step back."

Understanding the situation, Apple Bloom retreated a few steps while Redd blew the door into the hall.  Hopping downstairs, they failed to noticed an insomniac Granny Smith eyeing them.

"Apple Bloom?"

Redd froze, her eyes snapping to the elderly farmer.  Despite her obvious joy at seeing her granny, Apple Bloom remembered what Redd had said and became weary.

"Y-- yes, Granny?"

After a moment, Granny Smith relaxed and sat back in her rocker.

"Oh nuthin', jest thought you's outside, is all.  Evenin' Li'l Redd."

Wiping sweat from her forehead, Apple Bloom followed Redd into the West Orchard.  Which was currently occupied by eggplant trees.  That made no sense.  Above them, orcas populated the sky, raining tears down and occasionally screaming for no apparent reason.  Now that they were in the sunlight, Apple Bloom could see how many burns Redd had earned trying to get to her.  There was melted fur across her legs, and bandages barely clung on to her hooves.  When they were a good ways into the orchard, the red glow came over the two again, and they turned to the burning building.  Rainbow Dash and Twilight were trying to put out the fire with storms and magic, while Big Mac tried to comfort Granny Smith on the sidelines.

Apple Bloom's frowned.

"Wait a minute.  Where's Applejack?"

"Oh, ballucks."

Redd sped across the landscape towards the Apples, where she dropped off Apple Bloom.  Then, against the protests of Rainbow Dash and Twilight, she leapt back inside the fire.

"Applejack!"

Redd ran into the kitchen, where she found Applejack unconscious, her hind legs buried in a collapsed portion of the ceiling.  She took hold of the rubble and lifted, but turned up short.  She ran back outside.

"Macintosh!  I need your help!"

Big Mac charged up the yard, and Redd led him over to Applejack.  He slipped under the chunk of flooring and heaved his weight back on his hooves, making it ideal for Redd to slide Applejack out from the danger and get her on her back.  They left the house, and laid Applejack down next to the rest of her family.  Big Mac stepped up for resuscitation.  He pumped her chest a few times, then performed the rescue breaths.  The sun's edge cleared the horizon as Applejack coughed and spluttered, rolling over in the grass.

"Ah think mah legs're broke."