Return// Story: The Change// by PowerLine

"Help us Scootaloo! We NEED you!" A voice echoed from far away.

A wild CRASH hit against a closet door.

"Scootaloo! Please, we can't do this on our own!"

There was another wild CRASH against the same closet door

"SCOOTALOO!!!"

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"SCOOTALOO!!! Wake up sleepy head! We need to get going so we can get to Manehattan on time!"

I sat up in my sleeping bag, finally orienting myself as to where we were, why we were there, and who woke me up. Of course, only Rainbowdash could scream at you that loudly to wake someone up. Just as quickly as I had been woken up, I had forgotten my entire dream. I had hoped that it wouldn't be of any importance. It had turned out that I was the last one to wake up, and everything else had already been packed up and was ready to go. Rarity quickly rolled up my sleeping bag and put it into my saddle bag.

"Come on Scootaloo, we can't lose any time!"

I got my saddle bag on, still groggy from just waking up.

"Yo Scoots, now that you're awake, we can tell you what we decided." Sweetie Belle said.

"And what is that?"

"We will be taking the train that runs along the road to Manehattan instead of doing what we did yesterday."

"Will we be able to still see anything that may have been left behind from Applejack or Apple Bloom?"

Sweetie Belle shrugged,

"We should be going slow enough to notice any signs of them."

After getting the latest scoop of what was going on, we were off.

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The trip itself was quite uneventful, expect for seeing a pony trip and lose all of the stuff that she was carrying. Sometimes I wonder if some unicorns really know what they are doing or if they are in another world of their own.

We finally arrived in the outskirts of Manehattan, still able to see the skyline so closely that it felt as if you could touch it.

"Rainbowdash and Scootaloo, go and search to the East of the area while Sweetie Belle and I search to the West." Rarity commanded.

We searched for hours around the area and asked many residents if they had seen Applejack or Apple Bloom. There was ultimately no way of finding them from what we all could see, and we had searched everywhere possible for them. We decided to go home, hoping that they would turn up eventually...

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It has been a week since we first set out to look for Applejack and Apple Bloom, and everyone in town was still down with the loss of two well known colleagues. No one really seemed to be the same, although everyone still got their work done and did what they needed to do in order to survive. The 6 best friends in town had been knocked down to 5, and the 3 Crusaders were knocked down to 2.

Sweetie Belle and I went into town to get Rarity some supplies for another dress line she was making, since her swimsuits didn't sell very well. This time she ultimately tried to make more swimsuits, but with a whole different color scheme. We were about to enter into the fabric store when something caught Sweetie Belle's eye.

"Hey Scoots, why do you think so many ponies would be joined all in one place? It's not any sort of special occasion..."

"Well, why don't we just go and check out what seems to be the big deal?" I suggested.

We headed off in the direction of the crowd, Sweetie following me closely. We fought our way through the huge group of people only to find two ponies leaving the Everfree Forest. It was Applejack and Apple Bloom. I was rather shocked that they managed to be coming from that direction, and how they even got sidetracked into there. As they got closer, it was apparent that Applejack was hurt pretty bad on her front-left leg because she was limping, and was even still wincing from the pain as if it were fresh. Applejack even looked as if she had sustained multiple hits to the head and side; she was banged up pretty bad. Sweetie Belle and I both sprinted as fast as we could to meet them halfway.

"Applejack! Apple Bloom!" Sweetie Belle yelled.

"Heya sugarcube... AH!" Applejack said before she fell to the ground.

"Applejack! Are you alright?" Apple Bloom said as she rushed to her sister's side.

Applejack didn't answer.

"Sweetie Belle, go get Nurse Redheart, STAT!" I exclaimed.

After finding Redheart, they rushed back with a stretcher to retrieve Applejack, and the three of us, now reunited, followed Applejack into the hospital. Of course, we had to wait in the lobby until the nurses and doctors were done checking her out and fixing her up. It was silent as we all sat and waited and we didn't think to ask Apple Bloom as to what had happened. We figured we would wait until we could talk to Applejack instead; we had planned this out in the case that they did indeed return. It took a few hours for them to finish, and when we entered the room Applejack had just regained conciousness. She was all bound up on her front-left leg and side, and had the upper left half of her head bound up, covering her left eye.

"Applejack! What happened to you guys? Are you okay?" Sweetie and I both said in unison.

"Ah'm alright for the most part. We just took -- a wrong shortcut, ended up -- getting ourselves hurt, and -- lost our delivery. The real question -- is if Applebloom is okay." Applejack managed to say.

"Ah'm alright sis! Thanks to you..." Apple Bloom said.

"Well, we'll leave you to rest AJ, we're happy that you're finally back!" I said before I left the room.

"Yeah! We're happy you're safe and sound and back in town!" Sweetie Belle said as she rushed after me.

Apple Bloom didn't follow us, and had apparently stayed behind with her sister to keep her company.

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I laid down in bed ready to go to sleep, contemplating all that had occurred in that day. It was certainly nice to know that they were finally home and back in town, but something just didn't quite sit right with me about the whole experience. From our first setting out on the journey to the Apples returning to town, something was up, but I just couldn't pin point it.

"Ugh, it's too late to contemplate things so complex! I'm going to bed." I said restlessly.

Author's Note

For this chapter, I feel like there were a lot of things that were a bit rushed, although I also feel like I got through the bare minimum of what I needed to try to get across to the reader. I just wanted to add that the quick time changes (-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-)
were meant to show a transfer of time that I personally felt would have gotten more boring than necessary if I had fleshed out more of the story. I could release a revised version later on if a lot more people suggest that I do so, although it won't add anything to the overall plot. Anyway, enjoy!