The dark legends of Equestria

Chapter 4: Apple Bloom's story.

"Maybe you should go now Apple Bloom" Said Spike calmer than before.

"What? why her? why don't you wanna say anything?" Said Scootaloo, wanting to know the reason why Spike was avoiding his turn.

"Calm down Scootaloo, I'll go after Apple Bloom because I want to see if my story can be as scary as yours, and maybe scarier than everypony else's" Said Spike giggling.

"Ugh, fine, but don't you dare chicken out!" Said Scootaloo.

"Okay guys, now, Apple Bloom, can you please begin?" Said Sweetie Belle.

"Okay, let's see what I can do" Said Apple Bloom with confidence.

This is a traditional story, all the Apple family knows it, and my sister used to tell me this story so I couldn't sleep in the nights when I was younger, now that I'm grown, I don't fear it that much, but the interesting thing about this story is that several members of the family affirm that is true, even my Granny says it.

It all started when the Apple Family was in their brighter days, granny Smith was much younger, Big Mac was just a baby and the barn was being remodeled, the day was splendid, the sellings of that day were much better than before, the apple cider was taking its flavor, and granny was ready to hit the hay in the middle of the day, everything seemed just fine.

But then, it happened, it first started as something little, like some dizziness, but then, the frames in the walls started to fall, the windows started to crash, and the walls were cracking, suddenly, all of Equestria was in the middle of a giant earthquake.

"Hold on! Are you talking about the Earthquake that happened a lot of time ago?" Said Spike, looking at Apple Bloom.

"Yes, Spike, now, as I was saying:"

In that moment, none of them knew what was happening, but the walls were cracking, the ground was shaking and things were going down fast, so, granny thought that maybe it was an earthquake, so, she quickly got out of the house with Big Mac in her hooves, the movement carried on for a while, and eventually, the house and the barn fell down, luckily nothing important was inside it, and later, the movement stopped.

After what seemed like decades, granny received a letter from members of the Apple Family, it said that an Earthquake stroke Equestria entirely, and several members of the family died on it, they needed help cleaning the rests of the buildings, at first, granny didn't want to go, but she remembered that family always supports itself, and she finally decided to go.

When she arrived, she saw the unthinkable, lots of ponies were dead on the streets, mainly because they got hit by something on the earthquake, some older ponies had a heart attack and died at the same time, and the smell of blood, death and destruction... It was everywhere!

Granny found the residence of the apple family, it was a real nightmare! All around the place there were severed body parts decorating the pile of dust and blood in the middle, some body parts belonged to some really loved family members, some of them belonged to random ponies, it was grotesque.

The newfound army helped clean up the rubble, and they ordered that the dead ponies had to be put inside coffins or boxes to prevent the whole place from getting the smell of death permanently, and so they did. Obviously Big Mac didn't help because he was still just a baby, but everypony else did, everypony was either helping picking up the corpses, or they were cooking some food for everypony.

They worked so hard that in no time the day had changed into night, but they kept working, they had orders to find more bodies in the darkness, and they had to do it, so, they separated into small groups, only guarded with a primal lantern. They didn't find anything in a long time, they were about to give up, but that's when:

"Over there! I think I see a hoof!" Yelled one of the ponies. By the way, they were in Salt Lake City, so, they were at the coasts of the city, and they found a severed hoof on the sea, One of them pulled it up before realizing it was a severed hoof, they thought that one little hoof wouldn't hurt anypony, so, they just threw it at the sea.

After a while, another pony yelled that they found another hoof, but this one was severed too, so, they just threw it back at the sea again, something really weird was happening, but then, another pony yelled a third time, they thought this was a joke, but when they turned around, they saw at least two thousand severed hooves swimming towards them!

With fear and horror in their voices, they screamed and ran back to their camping zone, when they got away, they told the army what happened, but they didn't believe them, so, they decided to separate once again in two groups, each one had a couple of members of the Apple family and a couple of soldiers, they went in opposite directions, after a while, both groups came back, one didn't saw anything and the other one was almost dead, they were frightened to death, they saw indeed a ton of severed hooves on the water.

Eventually, the buildings that were destroyed were rebuilt, and the story was forgotten by the army, but the members of the apple family could swear that they heard distant screams and callings for help, mostly at night, inside their new houses, evrn granny thinks she can hear them on the farm, and he apple family members that got old, wondered about the afterlife, they wondered if there was something on the other side, they wondered if that would be like those severed hooves, they wondered if there was somepony on the other side that would bring them to the surface, they wondered also, if they would see the ones they affected personally, economically, or the owners of those severed hooves that they failed to remove from the water that night.

Apple Bloom took a glance towards her friends to see how they did with her story, Scootaloo looked like she was about to cry, Sweetie Belle was staring at the void motionless, and Spike was wide-eyed and shaking like crazy.

"Well, I didn't know if my story was going to scare ya'll, but it sire looks like it!" Said Apple Bloom happily.

"Wha- no way! I was just watering my eyes because they were really thirsty" Said Scootaloo, trying to get a hold of herself.

"Yeah, I wasn't scared at all!" Said Spike, looking everywhere except at Apple Bloom's eyes.

"Yeah, yeah, whatever you say" Said Apple Bloom, shrugging.

"Sweetie Belle snapped out of whatever trance she was in. "Okay then, who's left?" Everypony turned to Spike.