At the Apple Family Reunion, everything was in its own assigned place. Parts of the farm had been marked for games, others for crafting, and so on and so forth. The pandemonium that usually ensued on a typical Ponyville day was completely absent, even if it was only ten in the morning.
Giving one of the support poles a single finishing tug—a particularly ironic action considering that it was meant to be the starting point for the seven-legged race—Applejack tugged her hat down and wiped the last beads of sweat off her brow. She’d never figured herself to be as orderly of a pony as Twilight or Rarity could be, but something about seeing a plan come together like this filled her with pride. The reunion had been nothing but a disaster in the past, and now it could finally turn into something great—
Just as she was basking in the greatness of her achievements, a streak of yellow and red rushed over to her from the nearest hill and yelled unintelligibly. Finally, after what seemed like eons of listening to gibberish, the filly got it into her mind to come closer before trying to explain whatever shenanigans had already come to pass.
“Applejack!” yelled Apple Bloom as she cantered over to her sister. “There’s no way you’re gonna believe this! Somethin’s not right here!”
That, from the orange earth pony’s experience, could mean any number of things. She looked around the landscape once more, noticing that there appeared to be no monster attacks. By all means, that should have eliminated all possibility of extreme danger. Yet, the way the filly looked at her with the most frantic, pleading gaze she’d ever seen, and the way her sister tugged incessantly at her leg, gave off an entirely different impression.
“What’s eatin’ ya, sugarcube?” Applejack asked, choosing to keep a healthy amount of skepticism. “You look like you saw a madpony in the orchard.”
Her suggestion was almost too specific, as though such a thing had already happened long enough ago to become an inside joke. Apple Bloom gave her one last frantic look, gulping as she worked up the courage to speak about whatever unspeakable event had just occurred.
“Well, you know Babs, right?”
From the sound of the question and the sheer hesitation in Apple Bloom’s voice, Applejack knew she’d practically had to pry the information out of her sister’s mouth. Ponies, after all, only asked these sorts of obvious questions when they had something to hide, and as much as she hated to think about it, there could be only one problem that her cousin could’ve caused.
“She hasn’t been messin’ with you again, has she?”
“Nah, we made up ages ago,” Apple Bloom replied, waving one of her hooves downwards. “But that ain’t what concerns me about her. Tell me, you do remember her havin’ green eyes, right?”
Applejack nodded slowly, trying and failing to hide her raised eyebrows.
“They were teal today, Applejack. And then, when the reunion started, I could’ve sworn I saw them glow.”
“Mmhmm.”
While strange occurrences of this magnitude did indeed happen in Equestria, the sheer fact that they could be traced back to half of the Cutie Mark Crusaders meant that there was fouler, yet much more mundane work at play. On any ordinary day, the farmer would’ve chosen to humor Apple Bloom, or at least give the slightest signs of belief, but this wouldn’t be yet another ordinary day.
With that, Applejack gestured for Apple Bloom to rejoin her color-changing friend/cousin. Despite her efforts, however, the filly stayed put.
“I’m not going anywhere near her. Think about it, sis! How many ponies do we know with aqua eyes?”
“Fluttershy, Rainbow Dash’s pegasus friends, the milkmare—“
“But only one of those has aqua eyes that glow,” Apple Bloom said, moaning as if Applejack were an insufferable idiot for not having figured it out already. “I dunno why Chrysalis would want to kidnap her instead of one of us Apples, since we’re technically closer to Twilight than she is, but—“
If facehooves could make a sound, the one Applejack made would’ve exploded with the cacophony of a million bombs.
“I know it sounds crazy, but what other explanation could there be? I mean, I guess one of her bullies’ parents could’ve been a witch doctor who cursed her with that. Or maybe she’s secretly a ghost-hunting superhero whose eyes go off like that when spooky stuff’s nearby. But I don’t think any of those make as much sense as the whole changeling thing.”
Applejack had already begun to trot away, at least partially hoping to see the filly in question, but mainly wanting to escape her sister’s shenanigans. However, Apple Bloom followed her even then, and nothing she could do seemed to dispel her.
“As far as I can tell, Babs has been actin’ like her usual self. That’s somethin’ a changeling couldn’t possibly copy. You’re sure she didn’t just get contacts?”
This was the point where most reasonable ponies probably would’ve given up on the conversation and admitted they were wrong, yet somehow, Applejack didn’t doubt her sister’s persistence. It’d always been one of the things she’d tried to foster in Apple Bloom, yet now it was being used against her in the most annoying of ways.
“I saw ‘em change colors, too. Like when she talked to me, they started to look like mine. Then everypony else showed up and her eyes flashed like fireworks. What kinda contacts could do that?”
From the things she’d seen on Canterlot runways, Applejack honestly wouldn’t be surprised if such things did exist. But even if they did, they were the sort of cosmetic extravagance that no filly would be subjected to, let alone a seemingly fashion-uninterested one like Babs. And, while the flashing part could have been easily attributed to changes in the light or the Apple family’s history of aura-inducing migraines, she knew that Apple Bloom would just as easily shoot both possibilities down. The only way to get her out of this obsession would have to be the one Applejack dreaded most.
The reunion would have to hold itself up for the time being. For now, Applejack had a mystery to solve.
Assuming it even existed.
****
After assuring Apple Bloom once again that Babs would neither hit her with changeling knock-out magic nor use her ghostly form to possess her very soul, the two sisters approached their cousin with the utmost of tact and clarity.
“Heya, Babs!” Apple Bloom called out, even though the other filly was a good thousand paces away. “Did your eyes change color again?”
Applejack facehooved with the intensity of a googolplex of bombs and a billion airhorns.
“This was supposed to be a stakeout!”
“You said she wouldn’t do anythin’ bad to us, so I changed the plan last minute.”
“Gee, and wouldn’t it have been nice if you’d informed your fellow party member?”
Almost as if by some sort of magic, the two sisters’ bickering increased right around the same time the filly they were supposed to be watching moved away from them. Babs had stared at the strange sight for all of five seconds, shrugged, and went off in the opposite direction, assuming that perhaps the normal ponies stayed in that area.
Granted, she herself wasn’t normal. But really, unless the secret stayed within her family, she honestly didn’t care. After a while, after all, she’d came to realize that any normal pony wouldn’t be obsessed enough to notice one of her simple color changes.
However, Applejack’s reflexes were argument-proof, something the small brown filly didn’t account for. Sure enough, her tail was now on the other end of a mouth that, Babs suspected, had gripped far too many tails in its time.
“See,” Applejack muttered through gritted teeth, “she clearly ain’t a ghost. Any spirit worth their weight in bits would just pass straight through my mouth.”
“Mmhmm,” responded Apple Bloom, having taken her mind off the argument in favor of investigating her supposed cousin once more. “But can you prove she’s not a changeling?”
If doing so wouldn’t have caused her to trip with her tail still between Applejack’s teeth, Babs would have surely facehooved at this theory as well. If anything, judging from her behavior at this reunion, Apple Bloom seemed to be the changeling among them.
“I’m not a changeling!”
“I dunno, Babs, that does sound like somethin’ a changeling would say. If that is your real name…”
Just as Apple Bloom was about to move closer, Applejack suddenly stopped her and let go of Babs’ tail, which miraculously had still not vanished from her supposedly ghostly body.
“You’re goin’ about this all the wrong way, sis. What’d I tell ya last time? Sometimes, you don’t need all this stealth to get to the facts.”
The sheer idea that there had been a “last time” and that the Crusaders had gone on similarly odd accusation quests before somehow managed to unnerve Babs without really surprising her at all. She could still see that, even though her eyes hadn’t changed colors since Applejack had been around, the older mare seemed to have a surprising lack of skepticism about the situation.
“I admit I’ve been keepin’ some stuff from you,” Babs finally whispered, “but this oughta be the last of it. And Apple Bloom, if you run off in the middle of an event again to gossip about how somethin’ about me seems funny, I’m not gonna tolerate it no more. You’d have no idea how often I get stuff like that about my accent.”
Apple Bloom was about to say something about how ponies managed to notice the accent rather than the eye color, but wisely remained silent through Babs’ confession.
“Well, anyway, I have this weird thing,” Babs continued. “If anypony says hello to me after I’ve walked twenty paces, they change. My doc says it happens to a lot of ponies around these parts, but most ponies with it just have a few set color changes.”
Realizing that they hadn’t bothered to greet the filly in advance, both of the other Apples yelled their salutations at precisely the same time. A sudden aura wiped over Babs’ body as though she’d just managed to earn another cutie mark, but instead, her eyes changed colors just as Apple Bloom said—except this time, the emphasis was on the plural. One of the eyes had switched to an exact copy of Apple Bloom’s color, while the other was Applejack’s deep green.
Babs groaned and rubbed a hoof over her face, making strangely precise circular movements over her forehead. Apple Bloom, in the meantime, stared at her cousin with sheer astonishment in her eyes.
“I gotta admit, that was pretty cool.”
“Maybe, but heterochromia’s still a pain in the flank,” Babs muttered. “Makes my head smart like nopony’s business the first few minutes into it. In fact, I’d ‘ppreciate it if ya never pulled that again.”
One of Apple Bloom’s hooves was coming dangerously close to her chin in thought, and the filly felt the need to interrupt once again.
“And yes, it happens when it’s three ponies, too. Don’t ask how it works, and you can forget about telling the other Crusaders. No offense, but they seem like the kinds of ponies who wanna do somethin’ more when you tell ‘em not to.”
While her cousin’s tone was undeniably stern, Apple Bloom could practically picture Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo roping her into testing out Babs’ strange condition. After all, it wouldn’t have been the first time they’d incited headaches in others, and with any luck, those two would come up with a cutie mark for that, too.
“Anyway,” Babs finally spoke after a few moments, “that DJ who commutes from here to Manehattan? Same deal, but with only two colors. They can go red or pink, and they can flash like a disco ball, but nothin’ else. With me, it depends on the pony. Whoever matches the conditions, I get their eye color, and since my mama’s eyes are teal, that’s actually my color most of the time. Only reason you think they’re green is ‘cause Sweetie Belle was the first pony to say hi to me when we met.”
At this point, Apple Bloom’s question-answering capabilities had completely shut down with the utter confusion of learning that you had one of your friend’s most distinguishing details wrong all along. Babs, however, was all too used to this reaction, and therefore didn’t miss a beat in the conversation.
“Needless to say, goin’ to a family reunion is the worst with my problem. That’s why this is my first one.”
Apple Bloom took an internal tally of just how many ponies had greeted the two of them at the same time and shuddered from the secondhand pain of the thought.
“Exactly. So I was kept from a ton of ponies when I was little, got eased into it, and ended up here. It’s not the best feelin’ out there, but I’m learnin’ to manage it. Heck, I don’t even care why my eyes are like that anymore. It’s just, y’know, my thing.”
The silence had swollen to a point where no reaction could be properly read. It constricted throughout the entire farm, with everything seeming to lose sound in a single instant.
“Hey, I’ve heard weirder,” Apple Bloom replied with a shrug. “Wanna do the seven-legged race?”
Babs nodded with more relief in her face than anypony had seen from her in a while. She could distinctly remember the times she’d practically begged Applejack to be the first pony to greet her in the morning, begged Diamond Tiara not to greet her in the same way. Anything to keep herself from being bullied in Ponyville the same way she had been back home.
The next pony who greeted her was also the one who returned the green eyes Apple Bloom knew to her, and she would be determined to keep them. She’d cut ponies off whenever they were about to start just so she could, for once, control what her cousin could remember her by. The inexplicable eye condition was a part of her, and yet controlling it also meant having full control over herself.
As the barn fell and ponies sang, Babs could hear her tiny moment of freedom extinguish itself to the tune of Apple Bloom singing “hey.” Her eyes flashed orange, beginning the transformation she’d known all her life. She was already beginning her twenty-pace walk.
Five seconds later, they were green once more. Apple Bloom and Applejack would be the last ponies at the reunion to uncover her secret, even if Babs knew nopony else would tease her over it.
Nopony else would ever have to know.
Author's Note
When you've been in this fandom as long as I have, you see fixfics about a lot of pointless things. I thought I'd take that as a challenge. 
I guarantee, this will be the weirdest explanation of an animation error you will ever see. 
