Welcome to the Jung.. er, Desert
The sun was beating down on the endless void of desert. Anyone in the area would say the most notable thing about the area was the dry, sweltering head that slapped any organic life form across the face when they stepped out of the shade. It may as well be a living oven, and maybe that's why no one had tried to build houses this far out in the sticks.
No intelligent life would be likely to see anything going on in this desolate area, and maybe that was for the best. One afternoon, there came a bright white light with a slight purple tint that spontaneously grew progressively larger and larger over the course of about a minute. Had someone actually been paying attention and seen it as anything more than a simple trick of the sun, you could imagine the fit of utter panic that could occur.
Heck, this is an area so hyper-focused on alien lifeforms that there's a beef jerky company with an alien for a logo. There's a baseball team in the nearest city whose mascot is an alien. So it's a good thing that more fuel was not added to the conspiracy theorists' fire by having someone witness two beings coming out of the light...
With the sun getting near its hottest point of the day, a white bulb of light that had been steadily growing for the last minute was now large enough to spit out two ponies. At that moment, Rainbow Dash and Applejack flew out so quickly they couldn't regain their balance in time to not fall flat on their faces. Both picked their heads off the desert floor and began spitting out the sand and rocks that were in their mouths. As they regained their composure, they turned around to see the light close up behind them, shrinking much quicker than it had grown.
"What the - dang it, Twilight!" Rainbow Dash started, speaking more loudly than needed. "Somehow I had a feeling we weren't going to end up the other end of Equestria. Why did we even agree to test out this crazy idea of hers? I don't have any idea where.. AHHHH!"
Rainbow quickly opened her wings and shot up about 10 feet in the air, suddenly becoming aware of the heat of the ground.
"Who turned up the heat?! Wherever we are, the weather pegasi must love seeing ponies in pain. Why would anyone need this much scorching sunlight? I can't imagine there are a lot of ponies living out here. This is extreme even for the hottest of Equestrian deserts."
Applejack had been listening to Rainbow's ranting and figured now was a good time to speak up. "Well, it was voluntary, sugarcube. Ya didn't have ta go if ya felt it wasn't gonna work. Ah agreed already, so why did ya say yes?"
"Because of that little remark you made about how great a friend you are because you can be depended on to try something like this and how it makes you the better adventurer. Don't pretend like you didn't egg me on to get me to come here."
"So yer blamin' me because ah figured having a partner would be good for something like this, and ya just happen to be really easy to convince?" Applejack smirked at her friend, who now had her mouth wide open like she was hoping to scoop a good response out of the air with her mouth.
"You know what? Whatever. You got me, but you owe me!" Dash said when she finally came up with a retort. "Seriously, I had no idea I'd end up in this fiery inferno. For that matter, how are your hooves not burning from this?"
"Ah buck trees everyday and run through dirt paths like this all the time, Rainbow," AJ said. "You'd be surprised how strong of callouses form on the bottom of yer hooves when ya do manual labor every day."
"Are you suggesting that I don't work hard?" Rainbow asked, clearly offended.
"O'course not! Ah'm just sayin' that as important a job as the weather is, kicking clouds of soft water in the sky is kinda... dainty... compared to us rough'n'tough farm folk." Applejack gave a wink and a smirk to her as she said this, which clearly was setting Dash off. AJ realized long ago that when Rainbow Dash was at all flustered, she became annoyingly irritable, so instead of fight against her temper, she'd decided to toy with it instead.
She actually really got a kick out of seeing how easily Dash could be led into a given reaction. Still, the first couple times she did feel bad about it. But when she would apologize, Dash took it in stride and played it cool, saying she should be able to handle such minor irritations better. At one point she actually encouraged AJ to mess with her just because she wanted to get better at playing it cool during stressful situations. After going through this routine so many times, Applejack could honestly say... if she's gotten any better about not sweating the small stuff, it darn sure isn't by any noticeable amount.
"OH! So I'm some kind of prissy flower compared to you?! Ha! You wish you were as awesome as me! Just to prove it, I'm going to use my incredible flying skills to scout out where we are," Rainbow Dash was waving her hooves around like she was in the middle of an over-the-top ritual to summon some great sky spirit.
Applejack stifled her laughter long enough to respond before Dash took off. "Okay, Daring Do II. You do what ya need to. Ah'll be waiting around here. But be quick about it. According to this here portal... key... thing Twilight gave us to return..."
"She called it a 'portkey,' Applejack. At least we know who the better listener is..."
"According to the clock on it," Applejack said, a little irritated at the display of arrogance. Maybe we're more alike than ah'd like to admit, "it says it will release the spell to return us to the library in 10 hours."
"Ten hours? I thought it was only an hour."
"Well clearly the journey affected it some."
"Brilliant work Twi. Top of the class," Rainbow said as she flew off.
Applejack stood around the desert eating some apples she had in her saddlebag. It had been a while since she'd eaten, and experience had taught her not to do anything involving teleportation on a full stomach. At least one good thing had come from her being stranded 11 hours longer than she'd have liked.
While her hooves had been calloused enough to not struggle with the heat, her flank was not. Needless to say, she planned to give most of the next day's work to Big Mac while she rested her legs after such a long time standing.
It had been almost an hour if the timer on the portkey was any indicator. Applejack had to give Twilight credit for making it out of a damaged old pocket watch she found in a Canterlot antique shop; at least she knew when it was time to get ready to go.
"AJ! We have a problem!"
Rainbow Dash interrupted Applejack's musings as she sped back to her, slamming the brakes just before she overshot the cowpony.
"Shoot, Rainbow. What's goin' on? You look like ya seen a ghost."
"I... I have no idea where we are... but we are for sure not in Equestria," Rainbow felt fatigue set in a little bit, and moved toward the ground. "There are no ponies or... dogs or... anything I've ever seen before out there. They walk on two legs and look kind of like apes if you shaved them, but they're not apes. And these buildings they're huge and --- AHHH! AGAIN WITH THE GROUND! IT'S LIKE WALKING ON HOT COALS!"
"Calm down, Rainbow. Yer not makin' a whole lotta sense here."
"You know what? It's easier if I just show you. You have everything in your bag?"
"Yeah I just put the portkey back right before ya --- HEY!" Applejack was cut off when Rainbow did a loop and then swooped back to grab her. It took only seconds before AJ's mind fully comprehended what had happened and realized she was now 40 feet off the ground.
"Dangnabit, what d'ya think yer doing?!"
"I'm not waiting all day for you to run it, though I'll admit I thought this would be easier. Sheesh, AJ, have you considered not baking so many of the apples you eat into pies?"
Applejack blushed before countering, "Ah'll have you know yer feelin' muscle mass from all the recent bucking ah've been doing."
"Muscle isn't that soft."
"So ah got an extra layer. Big deal. Ah need the weight to put more into mah kicks. Like the one ah'm gonna give you once ya put me back on the ground."
"Well before you do, how about you read that sign over there," Rainbow said as she set AJ down on the ground. They were behind some plant life about a mile from what was called "Primm." Rainbow Dash kept low enough so that the cars passing by couldn't see either of them.
"Welcome to Nevada. Rainbow, just 'cause a place doesn't look like somewhere ya been doesn't mea-- wait, what in the hay is that thing in the cowpony hat?"
"That's the kind of creature that lives here. And get this: there's another sign I could see a few miles in. It said "Welcome to Fabulous Las Vegas, Nevada."
"Ya'mean like Las Pegasus in Equestria?"
"Exactly. Apparently the creatures here are called vegas, and a whole bunch of stuff around here says 'Vegas this' or 'Vegas that.' This whole place is like Equestria but all the names have been replaced with... vega puns."
Applejack considered this for a moment. "Well, didja get a look at the locals? What're they like?"
"Well, they seem pretty cool for the most part, but I saw some areas with police and what looked like some pretty intense situations, especially in the area just outside the tallest buildings and out in what they call 'North Las Vegas,'" Rainbow replied.
"Real crack team of namers in this town, huh?"
"Tell me about it, we should complain to whoever's in charge."
"Sugarcube, ah don't think it's the wisest move to walk up to a ruler we don't know and tell'em we don't like how uncreative their names are. Anyway, given what yer sayin, ah'm not sure it's wise of us to meet the locals 'a this dimension. We'll be safe in a few hours so we can hold out here until then."
Rainbow groaned. "Oh come on Applejack! We gotta do something with our time around here. Maybe not meet anypony..."
"Don'cha mean 'anyvega?"
"Don't even start extending this insanity. Point is, though, we should check out something about this place."
Applejack looked to her right. "Well how 'bout that? This here billboard says someone named Celine Dion is performing outdoors at somewhere called 'Caesars Palace' for a few nights. Maybe we could watch from a safe location."
Rainbow Dash looked at the billboard. "Really? She looks really dressy. Like someone Rarity would enjoy seeing perform on stage."
"Well unless you have another suggestion, ah don't see any other options."
Rainbow Dash sighed and acknowledged this. "Fine. We'll go see Celine Dion. What'll we do until then?"
Applejack had a reply ready to go. "Well, ya could take a nap in those plants. They don't seem too prickly."
"That's true, I'm feeling pretty burnt too."
"Well let me help you get there!" Applejack lifted her hind legs to buck Rainbow Dash into the plants, but wound up just missing when Rainbow slipped to the left.
"Nice try, AJ. But remember, you may have the power, but you aren't matching speed with the mean, lean flying machine that is Rainbow Dash."
As Rainbow Dash got settled in for a nap, Applejack just muttered incomprehensible nonsense to herself, irritated at her friend's more arrogant side.
