Applejack always cared for her trees, after all, they were the lifeblood of Sweet Apple Acres. Without the trees, there would be no apples, and without apples there would be nothing to sell, and with nothing to sell the Apple family would have no money, and so on and so forth.
It appeared to be a simple day. Apple Bloom had gone off to school, Granny Smith was sitting in her rocking chair and looking through old family albums, while Big Mac and Applejack were in the orchard bucking apple trees. Normally the two siblings covered separate sections of the orchard at the same time to maximize the harvest, and today was no different. Applejack was about three fourths of the way through her section when she heard a scream come from Big Mac’s section. She didn’t hesitate for a second, she rushed over to her older brother as quickly as she could.
“Big Mac!” She yelled, “Big Mac, y’all okay?”
No response, she didn’t even see him anywhere. She saw his hoof prints in the ground near a tree, but they just ended there, as if he’d just stopped existing from one moment to the next.
“Big Mac, where are you?” Applejack asked with immense worry.
Still no response.
“C’mon Big Mac, this ain’t funny no more.” Applejack nervously said. She began to search the nearby area for any sign of her brother. She searched for a good few minutes to no avail.
“GrrrRauugGhhk!”
“Huh?” Applejack turned her head, wondering what the sound she just heard was.
“GrrRaaUggHk!” The sound was louder this time, whatever was making it was getting closer.
“Who’s there?” Applejack uttered nervously. Faint hoof steps could be heard, and they were getting closer. “Ah’m warnin’ y’all, ah’m not going ta let you off easy.” The footsteps stopped, and Applejack stood perfectly still, only moving the muscles she breathes with.
Silence, that’s all there was. Applejack didn’t dare to move, she had no idea what the heck was nearby. She heard a leaf crack behind her, and immediately turned her head to see out of reflex.
“GRRAAAUUUUGHHHKKK!!!” Screamed a large, surprisingly colorful spider. It looked like it had a pony’s head, and even that was colored like some kind of piñata, it was unnatural to see something like this.
Applejack screamed and began to run away, only to be immediately caught by the spider’s front legs and lifted up into the air over it’s giant pony mouth. No matter how much she screamed, it didn’t help, soon enough, the spider dropped her into it’s mouth, and she fell down a surprisingly long esophagus. There’s no way a spider could be this big.
“Mmmpphh.” Applejack tried to make a sound, but she was being squeezed by the seemingly endless throat of the spider.
And then it all came to a stop. Suddenly, she landed on a large bed, with no idea how exactly it got inside this spider, not that it mattered much. She sat up and looked around what appeared to be a dim, candle-lit room.
“Hello there.” Called a very deep voice to her right. Applejack looked over to see a brown earth pony with a white mane and a goatee. “I am Morgan Freepony, pleasure to meet you.” Applejack had no idea what was even going on, it seemed like this pony had kidnapped her since he was inside the giant spider.
“What do y’all want from me?” Applejack asked the pony.
“Simple, I want you to do something for me.” Mr. Freepony said with a voice that could make reading even the most boring book from Twilight’s library interesting. “I want you to-“
“Apple Bloom, what’re you doin’?” Applejack asked her younger sister who was sitting in the corner of the barn. “Y’all better not be writing none of that clop stuff ah’ve been hearing about.”
“Not at all sis,” Apple Bloom responded snootily, “Not at all.”
