Applejack gave a sigh, wiping sweat from her brow as the Apple Family finally finish cleaning up after their 'family members' got tired of the fad and moved on. At least Granny Smith had managed to convince them that it isn't very family like to freeload on family and got some of them to help out to pay for it...some of them.
“There...hopefully that's the end of the trouble that book causes us...” the farmer muttered, though she knew that was hopeful thinking at best.
A sentiment that was decidedly not helped by thunder and lightning going off and making her jump at the moment. “Derpy!”
The wall-eyed pegasus blinked, bouncing on a lightning cloud. “Sorry...Rainbow Dash asked me to help clear up some of the clouds the book thing made her miss...”
Applejack gave a sigh. “Gotcha...Well at least now we'll have some peace and quiet round here...” she said...then turned to find Pinkie Pie staring at her with a grin that was wide even by Pinkie Pie standards. “AH! Pinkie! What the hay are yah doin'?!”
The farmer was even more flabbergasted when Pinkie Pie suddenly hugged her and started shaking her happily. “I knew we were related! Your Pie Sense woke up!”
“Say...what...now?!” asked Applejack, trying to reply while being shaken until Pinkie Pie finally stopped, leaving the mare's eyes rolling cartoonishly.
“I knew it!” shouted one of the fancolts from out of sight.
“Stay out of this! The book was just the inciting incident!” Pinkie Pie shouted back.
“...Again...what?” asked Applejack flatly.
“Okay, Pinkie Pie, now can yah please tell meh what the Tartarus this is all about?” asked Applejack, the two now sitting at the dining room table of the Apple's farmhouse.
“Okey dokey lokey!” Pinkie Pie said, taking in a deep breath. “So when Twilight decided to release the Friendship Journal, I realized something! We were being silly and hadn't read all each other's chapters! Which I guess makes sense, cause we all wrote them in a way that meant a lot to us, but not each other. Plus your pages smelled bad from the rotten apples!”
The farmer gave a flat look in response, trying to keep track of what the pink party pony was saying while she speaking a mile a minute. “...Fair enough...”
“So I decided to read you girls' chapters, and I just got to this one!” the pink Earth Pony continued, producing her copy from nowhere and pointing to a part in AJ's section. She quickly redid her mane to match AJ's. “'Dear Diary, Ah cannot remember a day when Ah wasn't Apple Bloom's big sister. Why, it's been mah job to protect that little filly and keep her safe since the day she was born. That's a job that never gets scratched off mah checklist because it's not a chore; it's an honor. So it's mighty hard for meh tah pony up tah the fact that this little filly will have her Cutie Mark before Ah know it and soon be lookin' meh square in the eye when we're buckin' apples. But after what Ah've seen today, Ah realize that perhaps Ah've gotten a bit overprotective and been babyin' her a bit much. In fact, Ah think it's high time for meh tah loosen the reins on Apple Bloom. Still, she will always be my baby sister. Applejack.'”
After avoiding being weirded out by the fact Pinkie Pie had managed to perfectly copy her mannerisms and accent (she was Pinkie Pie after all), Applejack gave a proud smile. “Ah remember. Mah little sis is growin' up fast, especially now that she's got her Cutie Mark...” She then gave a small frown. “Wish Ah'd figured that out sooner...”
“I know! So I came to ask Apple Bloom about it because the book was your side of it and I wanted her side! And when she told me all about it, I realized your Pie Sense must have woken up!” Pinkie Pie exclaimed, again with that extremely wide smile of hers. “Or would it be AJ Sense? Apple Sense?”
“...Pinkie Pie, if yah keep sayin' stuff without explainin', mah eyebrow is gonna get real tired...” Applejack snarked, raising said eyebrow.
“Nah! We're nowhere near your record for 'most eyebrow raisings in a single day!'”
“...Ain't gonna ask how yah know that. So what's gotcha thinkin' Ah've got some version of yer Pinkie Sense?!”
Pinkie Pie gave a smirk. “You have all the signs! Appearing out of nowhere exactly when somepony is going to turn around! Arriving at exactly the right moment for your prophetic worry to actually happen because you showed up! Seeing every single possible bad thing that might happen to somepony and preparing in some crazy way! Showing up at the exact perfect entrance cue to save her from the Chimera! And then there's when you got that 'bad feeling' about Rara's manager! I got the same bad feeling! Well, I realized I did afterward, I didn't know that combo meant 'corrupt manager forcing a pony to do something they don't want to!' Though I kinda thought her old songs were really cool though...Oh! And when you were super worried about Granny Smith with the Flim Flam Brothers!”
“Pinkie Pie, Ah think yer makin' a big deal outta nothin',” replied the farmer simply.
“Applejack, Applejack, Applejack, you don't know these things like I do!” Pinkie Pie replied, shaking her head. “This is exactly how my sister Limestone reacted when her Limestone Sense woke up!...Okay, first she yelled at me for touching Holder's Boulder from waaaaaaaaaaay across the farm, but then she acted the exact same way you did! Right down to booby trapping Holder's Boulder from literally every possible angle! Even the physically impossible ones!”
Applejack gave an eyeroll. “Pinkie Pie, Ah think Ah'd know if Ah had your Pinkie Sense!”
“Limestone didn't! And she knew it ran in the family!” replied Pinkie Pie, oddly serious from Pinkie Pie standards. “Come on, Jackie! You have to have noticed something really weird that's not a normal everyday itch, pull, or shake!”
The farmer gave it a thoughtful look. “Hmm...”
Applejack suddenly started vibrating out of nowhere. “Must be an earthquake!” she exclaimed, voice going up and down with her movement. She launched into the air and spasmed in several ways before landing. “Ugh...pretty big tremor.”
Little did she know that at Cheerilee's school at that very moment, the CMC had gotten their Cutie Marks.
“Nope,” Applejack answered simply, getting up. “Now if yah excuse meh, Ah've got work to do...” she said, trotting out the door.
“Wait! Pie Sense isn't a toy, Applejack! If you don't learn to control it there are serious consequences!” Pinkie Pie called after...then blinked. “Huh...what did Maud say those consequences were again?”
Applejack headed through her orchard, bucking trees here and there. Somehow managing to line up her baskets with exactly where the apples would fall, something she never gave much thought to...until now. She shook her head. “Uh huh, no way! Pinkie Pie's just bein' Pinkie Pie!”
The farmer continued along the path. “No way Ah have Pinkie Sense!” she exclaimed, then stopped as her tail started twitching. She stopped and started biting it like it was itching right as an apple fell and landed where she would've been had she not done so. She just turned and picked it up before putting it in a basket.
This repeated several more times, with the farmer simply continuing on as normal.
Until Pinkie Pie slowly descended upside down in front of her. “See!”
Applejack blinked, looking up to find Pinkie Pie hanging upside down with a balloon tied tah each leg. “All Ah see is yah foolin' around! Ah ain't got time fer this!” she said stubbornly, continuing on about her duties.
The pink party pony narrowed her eyes. “You've got Apple Sense, Applejack! And I'm going to prove it to you eventually!” she said, before slowly ascending upwards through the canopy of the trees.
Applejack grumbled as she walked, checking the many things scattered around Sweet Apple Acres that were in constant need of her attention. However, suddenly she felt a pinch in her knee and cringed. “What in tarnation?” she asked, kneeling down just and rubbing it.
“Ooga booga booga!” Pinkie Pie suddenly screamed as she jumped out of a bush with a big tiki mask on.
“Ah!” the farmer screamed, reflexively bucking the pink pony and sending her flying and landing with a crash. “Whoops...”
“...I'm okay!”
Applejack trotted towards the barn, pulling a cart of apples behind her...when she suddenly stopped, her ears twitching, then her eyes fluttering, and finally her knees twitching. “Huh...that was weird.”
Suddenly, Pinkie Pie swung open the door where she would've been had she not stopped. “See! You do have Apple Sense!”
The farmer rolled her eyes. “Pinkie, it's just a coincidence! Ah think Ah'd notice if Ah had Pinkie Sense! Ah must just be havin' an allergy tah somethin'!” she replied, then continued on into the barn.
Later that night, Applejack prepared to get in the tub for a nice warm bath after a hard day's work. “Crazy Pinkie Pie. Ah can't have Pinkie...Pie Sense! Don't make no sense!...Right?” The mare rolled her shoulder, finding a sudden ache in it. “Guess Ah needed a good soak more than Ah thought Ah did...”
She just stared in surprise as Pinkie Pie slowly rose out of the water with Gummy on her head.
Pinkie Pie gave a yell as she was comically thrown out the front door. “Night Pinkie...”
“Goodnight, AJ!” the pink pony called back, not getting up but waving all the same as Applejack slammed the door shut.
Gummy blinked, sitting nearby.
“I know, Gummy! She definitely has Apple Sense! But she just won't listen! She doesn't know what will happen if she can't learn to control it!” Pinkie Pie exclaimed, giving a serious look back at the farmhouse.
The baby alligator merely blinked again, otherwise not moving at all.
The pink party pony gave a gasp of realization. “Good idea, Gummy! You're such a smart baby Alligator!”
Gummy blinked again.
“You're welcome!”
Applejack finished breakfast the next morning and once more headed out to work...all the while keeping an eye out for a certain pink party pony. To her slight surprise, she got a fair bit into the morning without any sign. “Okay, if Ah know one thing about Pinkie, it's that she only gives up on something when she gets it done or when she thinks she's made somepony upset...Ah hope Ah didn't do that...poor girl's more fragile than she looks...” the mare muttered, absentmindedly rubbing a pinch in her knee.
“...Thank you for caring...”
Applejack screamed and reflexively bucked again, only for the rock solid form of Maud Pie to block both her legs with one hoof. “Oh...sorry, Maud.”
“It's alright...” the eldest Pie sister replied in her typical emotionless way.
The farmer cringed slightly, her hind hooves feeling like she'd just kicked a mountain of solid rock. “Where'd yah come from anyway?”
“My underground cave...” was the simple answer. “...Pinkie Pie asked me to talk to you.”
Applejack rolled her eyes. “About the Pie Sense thing, right? Look, Ah told her Ah don't have it!”
“No, you definitely have it,” Maud replied in a blunt deadpan with no change in expression. “And if you don't learn to control it, there could be serious consequences...”
The farmer was going to ask if Maud was joking...but she was also Maud, and the orange Earth Pony only remembered her telling one or two jokes in the entire time she'd known her. “...Consequences?”
“Come with me...” the rock loving mare replied, trotting by and leading the way. Applejack raised an eyebrow, but followed.
Maud had led Applejack to a clearing...not just any clearing, however.
The two sat there, staring up at the intertwined apple and pear tree Bright Mac and Buttercup had planted.
“...Why here of all places?” Applejack asked after they just sat there for a few moments in silence, her tone a little more somber.
“...We're cousins...” said Maud simply. “Which means they were my cousins too...”
The farmer gave a gasp of surprise.
“...Am I wrong?” Maud asked, looking to her. Despite her expression or tone not changing, Applejack could practically feel how serious she was.
“...Nah, just hadn't thought about that is all...” Applejack admitted, rubbing her head.
“...Then why can you accept that part of being family, but not the idea you might have something from our side too?” the stoic Earth Pony asked.
The farmer opened her mouth to speak...but found it hard to piece together what she wanted to say. “Because...well...if Ah had Pie Sense, then Ah think Ah would've noticed by now...”
“...When you buck apple trees, you put baskets in the exact place the apples are going to fall. How?”
“Well...we...Ah...Granny...” Applejack spoke, wracking her brain. “...Ah...don't know...Just never thought about it...”
“Back on the rock farm, we put down containers to catch jewels and important rock fragments that are sent flying when we blow up or break rocks..” Maud replied, looking towards her. “We use Pie Sense...”
It was a few moments until Applejack could respond. “Well...then why did Pinkie said Ah 'woke it up' then?!”
“Why can babies make noises but not learn to talk until they grow up?” the gray Earth Pony questioned. Applejack had no good answer for that. The fact Maud's delivery was without emotion in every way made responding difficult as it was, given the farmer genuinely had no clue what Maud was actually feeling. “...Did you notice having any Pinkie Pie's Pinkie Sense feelings going off until she told you you had it?”
“...Yeah...”
“Thought so...” Maud replied “It's because you're worrying about it...It's all because you're worrying.”
Applejack raised an eyebrow. “Pardon?”
“It woke up because you were worrying about Apple Bloom. It's acting up now because you're worrying about having it. The more worried you are, the more active it is...” the rock loving pony replied, looking the mare in the eye but not changing expression at all. “Just like Limestone's woke up when she was worried a swarm of rock mites might eat Holder's Boulder.”
“...Then why didn't it wake up when the Vampire Fruit Bats were threatenin' the farm?” Applejack questioned in a baffled tone. “Why didn't it wake up when Discord stole the Elements? Or all these other times?!”
Maud simply picked up a rock. “This rock is just a rock...I care about all rocks, but this one is just a rock. There are thousands of rocks that could replace this rock. My Maud Sense wouldn't react if you were about to smash it with a hammer. And I know I could destroy it if you asked me to...” she explained in her normal monotone. She then took out and held up Boulder. “This is Boulder...he's a special rock. He's a rock that I could never replace if something happened to him. My Maud Sense would go crazy if I lost him and didn't know where he was.”
The gray pony walked over to large rock and lifted it up with one hoof, revealing Pinkie Pie hiding behind it, who just waved to Applejack. “If something happened to Pinkie Pie, I could never replace her. When she's in danger and I know it, my Maud Sense goes crazy.”
Pinkie Pie merely hugged her sister. “And the same with me and Gummy! Or any of you girls! Remember when I went kinda crazy when I thought all of you were abandoning me? This is like that!”
“Wait wait wait...” Applejack said, trying to wrap her head around it. “So...you're sayin'...trees can be replaced, so that didn't do it...Ah thought we could beat Discord so that didn't do it...But Apple Bloom...there's only one Apple Bloom, so bein' afraid of losin' her did it?”
“Yes...” Maud said bluntly. The mare trotted over and sat down next to her. “...I know how you feel...”
“...Yah do?”
The geologist nodded. “It was the first time we left Limestone to watch the farm while we took Marble and Pinkie Pie to the doctor for a check up.”
“Oh! Flashback!” Pinkie Pie called, sliding over with a tub of popcorn. Maud didn't react.
Igneous and Cloudy Quartz sat in a carriage, little Marble Pie cuddled up close to her mother.
'I was going to stay home with her, but Pinkie Pie was scared of the doctor's back then...It was before Granny Pie had taught her to giggle at the ghosties...'
Little, straight haired Pinkie Pie whimpered, curling up next to her big sister. Maud was about a year older than Apple Bloom was in the present, with her sisters being about the Cake twins' current age and just out of diapers. The big sister hugged her close, calming the toddler down.
'Limestone had talked us into letting her stay and keep an eye on things...But from the second we decided it, I couldn't get certain...thoughts out of my head.'
While externally remaining ever blank faced and emotionless, a thought bubble appeared next to Maud's head. First it showed Limestone wandering off and getting lost in the mines, which she hadn't come close to learning how to navigate. Then she imagined her playing around with the explosives and setting them off. Then her playing in the quarry and causing a rock slide on top of her. Then her lighting the house on fire. And so on and so on.
'Except they weren't thoughts...they were possibilities...things my Maud Sense was saying could happen...'
When they finally got home, Maud rushed out the door of the carriage the moment they got home, heart racing despite the emotionless look on her face. She slid to a stop to find...
“Stupid birds! Get away from Holder's Boulder!”
...everything in complete order, the only difference being Limestone chasing pigeons away from Holder's Boulder with a broom and her characteristic rage.
“Except they weren't realistic possibilities,” Maud explained. “They were remote possibilities. So remote they were next to impossible...but I didn't know that...And neither did you. When we worry, the Pie Sense starts acting up trying to protect us or what we care about. And if we don't know how to control it, we react to all of it. Including things that are unrealistic to ever happen.”
“And even I forget sometimes! Like when I thought you guys were abandoning me!” Pinkie Pie added. “I was so busy worrying about every single way you might not like me that it was all I could think about!”
“Ah...Ah think Ah get it...” muttered the farmer, trotting over to look at the intertwined trees. “...It's just...after we...we lost 'em...Ah...Ah felt like Apple Bloom was mah responsibility...that if anything happened tah her it'd be lettin' ma and pa down...and losin' her...it'd just be awful...Fer meh, fer Granny, fer Big Mac...fer Apple Bloom...Ah...Ah know it's silly, but...”
“It's not silly, silly!” Pinkie Pie exclaimed, hugging her friend.
“My sister has saved the world more than once,” Maud replied, looking at her baby sister. “I'm still scared for her and want her to be safe.”
“Aww!” the pink party pony replied, hugging her sister tight. Maud returned it even though her expression did not change.
“But I know how to control it, so I don't worry about her all the time over things that can't happen...” the rock loving Earth Pony replied. “Those are the consequences of not knowing how to control it: it can control you.”
“...And then yah freak yer little sister out so much worryin' about her that yah make her do somethin' plum stupid tryin' tah prove yah didn't need tah worry...” Applejack admitted with a sigh. Apple Bloom had told her after why she'd done it. It was one of the reasons she wasn't more mad at her over it that she was... “...Ah saw so many ways she could get hurt, Ah made mahself one of them...”
The two sisters came up next to their cousin, each putting a hoof on one of her shoulders.
Applejack rubbed a few tears from her eyes. “...Ah'm okay...Alright, Ah get it, Ah've got Pie Sense...So...will yah teach meh how tah control it so that don't happen again?”
Maud's expression didn't change, but Applejack somehow felt a sense of warmness from her. “Of course...What is family for?”
“And you couldn't ask for a better teacher than Maud!” Pinkie Pie chimed in with a smile. “She's the one that taught me!”
The orange Earth Pony blinked. “Really?”
The eldest Pie Sister gave a nod. “We have one thing in common other than loving Pinkie Pie.” Applejack's eyes widened slightly as Maud gave one of her exceptionally rare, small smiles. “We're both big sisters whose little sisters look up to us.”
The farmer gave a chuckle. “Ah guess yer right...so let's get to it then, cousin.”
The End
