The path of a hero

Razor’s mind raced in an order to understand all that had just transpired in such a short amount of time.  In less than a few hours, he had made friends with a unicorn whose name he didn’t even know, learned more of his power that seemed to continue to manifest without his knowledge, escaped from an abandoned (and very poorly kept) fort, decapitated a timberwolf and made a fool out of two more Timberwolves.  A lot of questions rose from the recent incidents, and he desired answers for all of them.  One of the questions, he supposed, could be answered right now.

“Say.”  He started, glancing down to the unicorn in his legs.  “Is it alright if I ask your name?  I’d like to know the name of the pony I’m carrying, so if you’re a bad guy, I can drop you and leave you to the Timberwolves.”  Kick paused for a moment at his companion’s words.  It was a good seventy-five foot drop from where they were and if he would have been dropped from this height, might as well call him lunch for the forest.  The somewhat concerned stallion glanced up at Razor as he said “Kick Pulse, otherwise known as Pi9o.”

Razor nodded to himself, taking in his words.  “Kick, huh?  My name is Razor Windblade Breeze, otherwise known as heir to Count Swift Windblade Action’s estate.”  Kick paused again at the Pegasus’s words.  He attempted to gather his thoughts, but at the moment simply couldn’t for the simple fact that; this Pegasus was weird.  He could do things a unicorn could do without the horn, he was oddly strong enough to lift Kick up, and he let out way too much information.  But, the unicorn thought, better have a nice weird pony than a pony that wants to use you as a sleeping bag.

After several silent, and rather awkward, moments of flying passed by, they had finally reached the edge of the town.  Razor slowly descended until he was sure his new friend could safely land before loosening his grip on him and letting him drop gently on the ground.  Wanting to get a better view of the area, the Pegasus quickly ascended and flew over the town for a moment, his eyes scanning the colorful buildings.

It had a basic, small town feel to it.  A large building sat in the center of the town, most likely acting as town hall. Several single to two-story houses covered a fourth of the circular town, possibly the majority of the residents lived in that section.  Several stories, including a very extravagant and beautiful building, took up another fourth; Razor guessed that the area was possibly used as a shopping district or some kind of hub of sorts.  A large tree that appeared to be fashioned and hollowed out to be some kind of house over took a whole half of the town, though that didn’t say much considering the place was borderline hamlet.

But what caught the young stallion’s eye, however, was the sheer beauty of the land.  The lush mixtures of green life flowed across the ground, the exact opposite of his father’s estate.  A constant happy vibe played across the small village and Razor couldn’t help but smile, he felt a tinge of envy grip his soul as he was so used to the dead and pitiful existence the ponies in the Badlands had managed to forge for themselves.  He was simply trying to be optimistic for the youngling’s sake; he did dislike a lot of things about his home.

“Hey, Razor.”  Kick called out from the edge of a field, snapping Razor out of his mesmerized daze.  “You see anything we could possibly use to eat, I’m starving.”  At the mention of food, the Pegasus’s stomach began to growl and groan with desire.  All the use of energy appeared to have left a want for food in the stallion’s stomachs, a problem that was most severe.

The Pegasus’s eyes scanned the surrounding area and with double the luck, he had spotted an orchard not too far away.  With raised enthusiasm, Razor dived down and softly landed next to Kick, pointing towards the orchard.  “I spotted some trees over there with fruit in them.  We could possibly grab a few and use those for now.  The unicorn smiled lightly at his Pegasus friend as he wrapped his front leg around his neck and hugged him.  “Man, I should of gotten a Pegasus friend sooner, you guys are awesome.”

After exchanging a friendly laugh, the two stallions made their way towards the orchard, unaware of the large red barn and ignoring the white fence that was supposed to keep them or at least warn them that the orchard belonged to somepony.  Their hunger was taking over their proper thinking procedure and the thought of eating apples, for Kick they were good but Razor loved them, and for good reason.

Apples, or any kind of fruit for that matter, were rare even for ponies with contacts out in the Badlands.  The inhospitable land made it impossible to grow food of any kind, and only select spots actually had fertile enough soil to grow, which these were already owned by dukes and counts from across the desert.  Razor was only allowed one apple every year, the day of his birth was the day he chose to have his apple.

Finally, with much anticipation and the growing noise of the stallion’s stomachs, they had reached a tree that held apples for them.  Kick’s horn glowed light green for a moment as he glanced at two ripe looking red apples, the same green light radiating from them.  Slowly, the two apples forced themselves off of their branch and moved down towards the two stallions.  Razor lightly grabbed his while the unicorn quickly began eating his own.  With a much self-control, the Pegasus slowly ate his apple, savoring the taste and the liquid that soothed his parched palate, a euphoric bliss coming over him as he indulged in the miracle fruit.

Kick couldn’t help but stare at his companion’s expression as he slowly ate the apple, raising an eyebrow in concern.  “Do you and that apple need to get a room, or are you going to blow right there?”  Razor’s eyes suddenly shot open as he realized he was verbally enjoying the apple, moaning and groaning at the taste of the red fruit.  “I heard of the forbidden fruit, but if you get like that after eating just one apple, I think you need to cut yourself right there.”  The stallion’s face blushed from his friend’s teasing; he didn’t mean to enjoy the fruit so much in all honesty.

Kick began to laugh, but it was short lived when a thick accented voice spoke up from behind him “What in tarnation do ya’ll think you’re doing eating the Apple Family’s apples?”  Razor glanced behind his companion to see a strong, yet feminine orange earth pony, giving him a very stern look.  She wore a Stetson on her head which helped protect her eyes from the sun.  Her mane and tail was a beautiful blonde tied up in a ponytail and seemed to shine in the sun light.

Razor felt his heart skip a beat, he did have a weakness for mares of the country variation, and this one was as cowgirl as you could get.  Kick craned his head back to spot the stern mare as he smiled, the remains of his apple still floating before him.  “Apple Family’s apples?”  He asked in confirmation.  The orange mare took began walking up to the two stallions, the intimidating glare in her eyes only growing as she said “That’s right, Apple Family’s apples, or did you not notice our house, barn and fence which surrounds our entire orchard?”  Kick’s backed away from the mare, a nervous smile playing on his face as he began with “No-“

“Excuse me, ma’am.”  Razor started, a part of his mind suddenly taking over in an attempt to save his friend.  “I apologize greatly for my friend and mine blatant disregard for regular etiquette and our manners were simply lacking.  However, in our defense, we did just escape from a group of ponies that had taken us forcefully from our homes and planned to do Celestia-knows-what with us.  You see, since we recently escaped, we have yet to regroup for an attempt to retake our possessions and in order for us to be fully recovered after such an ordeal, we needed to eat and your family’s orchard was the closes thing we could find.  Now, if you would be so kind as to trust me and my friend here, we can pay you for the apples we eat, plus interest, if you give us enough time to plan a way to infiltrate our assailant’s base and reclaim our possession, as well as save what other ponies may be stuck in there.”

The orange mare’s stern expression switched to a mixture of confusion, disbelief and amazement.  Even Razor himself was taken aback by the sudden diplomatic explanation of what had just occurred to him and how they arrived to the current situation.  He kept a very calm and collected expression which he had learned from his father, however.  “Well.”  She started, thinking of what Razor had said.  “So, ya’ll just got out of a heap of trouble, came here to rest, and ya’ll plan on going back to get your stuff and save some ponies?”  Razor simply nodded, seeing as how his friend was still surprised at the sudden political speech.

“I guess if ya’ll keep ya word and pay for them apples eventually, there’s no harm in it.”  Razor bowed in a respective manor, his bangs falling past his ears and covering his eyes gracefully as he said “I thank you, miss, for your kindness and patience with us.  Allow me to introduce myself, I am Razor Windblade Breeze.”  Kick stuttered for a moment, still taken aback from his friend’s change.  All he could do was shoot his front limbs out and yell “What?”  The mare simply giggled at Razor and Kick’s disposition as she said “Well, shuks, ya don’t have ta be all formal with little ol’ me.  My name’s Applejack and I help run Sweet Apple Acres here.”  Razor quickly ran the name over in his head in an effort to remember it.  “Then I thank you still, Miss. Applejack.  We will eat till we are freed of our hunger, than we will begin our return to the fort.”

“Now, hold on a minute partner.”  Applejack said with a sudden stern voice.  “If ya’ll just got out of the mess so soon, and I know I saw ya’ll come from Everfree Forest, you must be exhausted after running from not only your nappers, but dem Timberwolves too.  Now I appreciate ya’ll willing to prove your honesty and pay off your debt and all, but I doubt ya’ll even have the strength to run, let alone go back into the Everfree.”

To their distain, she was right.  Razor felt his body’s weakness the moment she mentioned it, and Kick’s magic was greatly fading away from his constant teleportation and his little spin cycle incident.  “Now if ya’ll want, I’m pretty sure we could let you stay in the barn for da night, free of charge.”  The stallions both smiled at Applejack with gratitude as Razor bowed to her once again.  “Thank you very much, Miss.  Applejack.”  The mare simply giggled as she said

“Applejack is fine.”