Sincerely, Ragamuffin

by Homage

First published July 19th, 2012 17:24

Ragamuffin is a young filly who lives on a cactus farm in the country of Coltistan. She writes her experiences in the form of letters to Princess Celestia, a character from her mother's bedtime stories. Ragamuffin loses her innocence as she ages, and becomes increasingly more depressed. She has to face the fact that she will have to farm cactus for the rest of her life, never being able to leave the farm. First fic.

Chapters

Letter 2
Letter 3
Letter 4
Letter 6
Letter 7
Letter 8
Letter 1
Letter 5

Letter 2
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Sincerely, Ragamuffin

Letter 2

Dear Princess Celestia,
Today I thought about Equestria again. It has been a whole month since I heard your story, but I have been trying to get Mommy to tell it again. She won't, though, so I guess I will just have to remember. You don't have meanies in Equestria, so if we lived there we would be able to travel around and see new places. I was born on the farm, and have never left, not even with Mommy or Daddy. Only Daddy and Jackfruit ever leave, and they come back with all sorts of things, like new farming tools and shells for Daddy's gun. The gun is something I have been seeing a lot lately, because the mean ponies have been coming by me here a lot more often. Daddy now carries his gun most of the time, even inside our house. Once I tried to pick it up, but Daddy slapped it out of my mouth and said, "Don't touch, Raggy, that's not for foals." Daddy treats me like a baby, even though I am already seven whole years old. He says that the day I get my cutie mark will be the day I will be a mare and be ready to work on the farm with everypony else. Daddy's cutie mark isn't a cactus though, it is some kind of stick with a tuft of black hair with a red spot on one end. He called it a "paintbrush", but I have never seen something like that before. I asked Daddy what it means, and he said it means that a talented painter, but that he hasn't had time for art in a long time. I don't know what he was talking about. Mommy's cutie mark makes more sense than Daddy's. Her cutie mark is a little round cactus with short needles. Mommy told me that she got it while working on the farm when she was just seven. She said it means that she is good at harvesting and planting cactus. She is the only pony in my family whom enjoys farming cactus. Mommy is usually nice and understanding, but when she drinks too much “magic juice” she gets mean and yells or gives me a spank on the flank. My sister wouldn't ever do something mean. Prickly Pear is too nice to do that. Pear's cutie mark is also a cactus like Mommy's, but Pear has three cacti, and each has a flower. I don't remember when she got it, but I think I wasn't even born yet. She is seven whole years older than me, after all. She said that she doesn't like working on the farm, though, and that she really isn't that good at it. I asked her how she couldn't be good at farming because of her cactus cutie mark. She told me that her cutie mark actually has nothing to do with cacti or flowers; what it really means is that she can make something ugly look nice, by adding something pretty to it. It made sense, because she is always fixing up our home and looking for ways to make things look nice. Last month, she decorated our dining room with cactus flowers and painted the walls. Even though the paint is the same shade of cactus green, it looked nicer because the old paint was getting chipped and cracked. Prickly Pear is sweet and thoughtful, and loves to help the rest of us with anything. Jackfruit, on the other hoof, is not very fun to be around. Jackfruit is three years older than me, and his cutie mark is a steaming pot of soup. I remember when he got the mark two years ago. It happened right after he helped Daddy make the best cactus soup I have ever tasted. Cactus soup always tastes yucky, but Jackfruit's soup tasted the least yucky. He loves making food with cactus, but says how he would prefer to cook something else. Mommy said that there is nothing else he could prepare because we couldn't grow any other ingredients. Jackfruit hates harvesting cactus, but Mommy and Daddy make him do it anyway. He used to be sad and break down crying a lot, but now he just keeps working dully with a bored expression on his face. The only thing that cheers him up is cooking. I hope that working on the farm doesn't make me as drab as Jackfruit. I asked Daddy if I would have to harvest and plant cactus like Jackfruit, and he told me that I will have to work in the farm, too, no matter what my cutie mark turns out to be. I only hope that my talent is cactus farming like Mommy, so I can be happy.

From,
Ragamuffin

Letter 3
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Sincerely, Ragamuffin

Letter 3

Dear Princess Celestia,
I am now eight years old! My birthday was today. Jackfruit made me a special cactus cake with yellow cactus flowers on it. Everypony sang a song for me, and then we ate the cake. Birthdays are special because nopony works, we just have fun together. We played pin the tail on the pony, sang, and danced to the Pony Pokey. The Pony Pokey is my favorite song. It always cheers me up when I am feeling sad. It even made Jackfruit smile! I had forgotten what his smile looks like, because he doesn't let me help in the kitchen anymore. He told me that I am no good at cooking because I burn everything. I liked when I got to spend time with him in the kitchen, because it was the only time I get to see him happy. I like seeing my family smile, but I don't get to most of the time. I used to try to cheer them up by drawing pictures and singing songs for them, but it never worked. And I have started to feel unhappy, too. The bandit ponies haven't come back since my last letter, but I had some bad dreams where they did. I dreamed that the bandits came and took away Mommy, Daddy, Jackfruit, and Prickly Pear, and I was all alone. In one dream, the meanies used guns to shoot them, in another one they used knives, and in one dream there was a whole crowd of bandits and my family disappeared into it. I always woke up crying, and Mommy or Daddy came in to tell me that it was OK. But I think that Mommy and Daddy are just telling me that so that I will feel better. I'm sure they know that it is not OK because we are so scared and sad all the time. Mommy said there is more to life than being happy, and I told her that if I can't be happy, then I don't want to live anymore. That is the only time I have ever seen Mommy cry. Princess, I now see why Mommy made up your story to tell me. At this point, I have accepted that you and Equestria do not exist, and these letters are really only being written as a diary to an imaginary pen-pony. But these letters, along with your story, have given me a look into what a better life could be like, if only in my imagination. Anywhooves, I have to finish up this letter, because it is getting late and I have to wake up early to start working on the farm tomorrow. Mommy said that I have to start working now that I am eight years old, even though I don't have my cutie mark. Pear and Jackfruit both had theirs by my age, so I guess it is only fair. Maybe working on the farm will turn out to be my special talent and will lead to my cutie mark. A filly can dream, can't she?

Yours truly,
Ragamuffin

Letter 4
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Sincerely, Ragamuffin

Letter 4

Dear Princess Celestia,
A year has passed since my last letter. Since then, I have grown a lot. My parents stopped treating me like a filly since my eighth birthday, and since then, I have been helping with the farm work. I mostly just help load the wheelbarrows and plant new cacti. Harvesting the cactus takes a lot of strength, so usually Dad and Jackfruit chop the cactus with machetes while Pear and I load up the wheelbarrows. Mom pushes the wheelbarrows and empties them in the silo. After that, we all take some small pieces of cactus and plant them in empty patches of sand. It is very hard work, and there is usually no time for fun after we finish each day. The cactus fields are so big that it takes all day just to harvest and replant a tiny portion of it. I asked Mom why we needed such a huge farm just to feed ourselves, and she told me that it is because cactus grows slowly. The first day I went out with the others to work in the fields, I was excited to do something new. But I quickly got bored of loading wheelbarrows, and I got distracted and accidentally brushed against a large cactus. The needles poked my flank, and I started to cry because it hurt. Daddy heard my sobbing, and he came over and put his hooves around me and told me it would be all right. Then he pulled a small bottle of tequila from his saddlebag and poured some of the clear liquid on my bleeding flank, which stung. I yelped and jumped back. Then I asked him why he did that. He said it was to prevent infection. I looked, confused, into his dark blue eyes. Daddy sighed, took a deep breath, and told me, "Raggy, sometimes, a little pain now can prevent a big one later." That made me feel a little better, even though I didn't really know what he meant. Then he hugged me one more time and asked me to continue loading the wheelbarrows. I knew by that time that I hated working on the farm, but I didn't want my family to starve, so I kept piling cactus into the carts. Suddenly, I realized the true meaning of my father's words. A little pain now to prevent a big one later.

Your loyal subject (I wish),
Ragamuffin

P.S. - Farming did not turn out to be my special talent. I still don't have my cutie mark.

Letter 6
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Sincerely, Ragamuffin

Letter 6

Dear Princess Celestia,
I have given up. My weekly attempts for the last 10 months to find my special talent have all failed miserably. My final attempt on my "cutie mark crusade" was today. I wanted to try my hoof at marksmareship. It ended terribly, with me not only missing the target completely, but also shooting Jackfruit in the rump. He wasn't seriously hurt though. Mom was able to dig the bullet out and bandage the wound. I'm feel horrible, though, because Jackfruit wouldn't talk to me and kicked me out of the kitchen, yelling, "Stop your talent-searching mission before you kill somepony!" This was only my most recent buck-up resulting from my quest for my cutie mark. It hadn't hurt anypony else before (besides myself), but Jackfruit's tirade made me realize that it would only be a matter of time. I did the only sensible thing and halted my crusade. Maybe I'll be lucky and my cutie mark will come on its own, but with my current situation and the recent turn of events, I doubt that fortune would ever favor me. Speaking of bad luck, there is a terrible drought now in Coltistan. The bandits attack like crazy, looking for food. We have driven all of them away so far, and none of my family has been hurt. However, one of them threw a bottle of fire that burned over an acre of cactus. All that food went up in in flames, much like my dream of finding my cutie mark. My hopes reduced to ashes, I dream only about cactus now. There is one nightmare that keeps coming back. The dark green coated pony with a black mane made of cactus spines and white needles for teeth chases me through the field. I try to hide behind various giant-sized objects, only to have them turn into cacti. The cactus pony laughs, "You can't hide from me, Ragamuffin!" I keep galloping away from him, between two rows of cactus. The cacti on either side begin to close in on me, and I gallop as fast as my hooves will take me. I reach a clearing, where I see Mom, Dad, Jackfruit, and Prickly Pear standing together. I throw myself at them and cry for them to save me. However, instead of helping me, they coldly stare ahead. I frantically try to get their attention, when suddenly they all look at me. They say, in unison, "Ragamuffin, join us." I scream as they turn green and grow black spiky manes and needle teeth. They circle around me as I collapse on my haunches. I refuse to give in, but they continue to trot around me, chanting, "Ragamuffin, you must become one of us. It is your fate; you cannot escape." I look down at my forelegs, and see the dark green color spreading to my hooves. I feel a sharp pain in my head, and feel needles puncturing through my skin. I open my mouth to scream, and realize that my teeth have turned into needles. Then I wake up. The first time I had that nightmare, I was terrified and galloped away from the cactus pony. But now when I have the dream, I don't run anymore. He always catches me, anyway. Why should I bother trying to escape the inevitable?

Sincerely,
Ragamuffin

Letter 7
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Sincerely, Ragamuffin

Letter 7

Dear Princess Celestia,
I know it has been over a year since my last letter, but things have been so bad the past 16 months that I didn't have the energy to write to you. But after learning what I did today, I feel compelled to explain to you how I feel. I asked Mom today about her story of Equestria again for the first time in over a year. Mom then told me that since I am now a big pony (even though I still don't have my cutie mark), I am ready to handle the truth. It turns out that my mother didn't make up the story about your kingdom of Equestria at all. Every single word was true. Equestria really exists, and it is right next door to Coltistan. Princess, to think I thought that I was writing letters to an imaginary pony, when you really do exist. You might think that hearing the news that there really is a place where ponies are happy and live together in harmony would make me feel happy, but it only fills me with rage. How can a prosperous nation such as yours, which professes love, happiness, tolerance, and peace, continue to function without ever having lifted a single hoof to help the miserable ponies here in Coltistan? I'm sure my family aren't the only ponies in Coltistan (besides the bandits) and I'm positive that they are just as depressed as we are. Our harvest has suffered severely this year due to the ongoing drought, and we can barely feed ourselves. Because of the drought, the bandits attack our farm nearly once a week now. Five months ago, they attacked while Jackfruit, Pear, and I were outside planting in the fields. Dad and Mom were out looking for food, so Pear, who was the first to notice the group of ponies in the distant horizon, told us to gallop into the barn and grab weapons from the stash behind a pile of barrels. We only had two guns between us, a hunting rifle and a revolver. Pear had more experience using guns, so she took the hunting rifle, and Jackfruit grabbed the pistol. I took one of our machetes in my mouth and crouched down inside the barn, waiting for the bandits to come. They approached the barn, blurting out obscenities and nasty threats of what they would do to us. There were at least five bandits, and two guns between them. One of the guns was wielded by a winged mare (Dad called them Pegasus ponies), whom hovered slightly above the ground. Three Earth pony stallions carried clubs with nails through them. The remaining two bandit ponies, a gray-coated stallion and mare, each had a horn on their head. They did not carry their arms in their mouths like we did; their weapons, a crowbar and a rusty shotgun, simply floated in front of them. Mom told me that ponies with horns were called unicorns and they could do magic. I was afraid that they their magic would allow them to find us, but it would seem that magic doesn't work that way. When they got close to our barn, Prickly Pear told us to stay down, and she fired her rifle at the Pegasus from our barn window. Pear is a good shot, and the winged mare fell, spiraling downwards before hitting the ground with a loud thud. The smallest of the Earth ponies spat out his club and yelled, “Holy hay, they're armed!” and turned around and galloped away, along with the rest of the ponies, save for the unicorn mare. She grimaced at us, having noticed the direction of the shot, and her horn began to glow a bright orange. Prickly Pear tried to shoot her, but the old hunting rifle jammed. Jackfruit tried as well, but he was shaking badly and his shots all missed. Suddenly, the unicorn's horn stopped glowing, and she gave an evil smirk before turning around and galloping away. I noticed her cutie mark was a lit candle. We remained in the barn for a few more minutes to catch our breath, but Jackfruit noticed a burning smell. We turned around and realized that the barn was going up in flames! We immediately got up and tried to gallop to the open door, but a large piece of burning timber fell and blocked it. We made a dash for the closed double doors, and Jackfruit managed to reach them in time to force them open and escape. But I heard a scream from behind, and I turned to see Prickly Pear trapped under a huge piece of burning wood. I tried as hard as I could to force the wood off of her, but I just wasn't strong enough. I called out to Jackfruit, but he was still galloping away at full speed and didn't hear me. By this time, Pear told me that I should just go and save myself. Stupid me, I listened to her. I fled that barn as fast as I could, and it collapsed behind me in a pile of cinders. My parents came home soon after, and I flung myself at them, crying. I know that I couldn't really have done anything to save Prickly Pear, but the image of my sister being roasted alive under a support beam is permanently burned into my memory. I try to remember the good things: her generosity and kindness, her eagerness to help and her positive attitude, her amazing talent for decoration and renovation, and most of all how she helped make life on the farm more bearable for the rest of the family. But her absence has made the rest of us even more miserable, and I can't stop wishing that it was me who died and not Pear. I don't cry anymore. I can't shed tears of sadness when I have no other feelings.

Sincerely,
Ragamuffin

Letter 8
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Sincerely, Ragamuffin

Letter 8

Dear Princess Celestia,
It has been three months since the last letter. It has been eight months since Pear passed. My family is getting worse. Pear was the glue holding us together. The gaping wound left in her absence has not healed, in fact, I think it has started to fester. We are all being slowly torn apart; our family ties are stretching more and more taut. A large cleaver hangs overhead, waiting to chop down and cut the cords. I look up at the handle of the sharp utensil, and I see it is engraved with three small cacti, each with a burning flower. Dad has become totally absorbed in his work. He works the entire day without saying a word, chopping cactus like an automaton, just going through the motions. Even attempts to talk to him result in nothing more than a shrug or a single “eyup” or “nope.” I want my old Daddy back, the one who comforted me when I bumped into a cactus and held me when I was crying. But I don't do those things anymore. I have lost the ability to cry. Mom doesn't cry either. But she has been getting mean. She always had a fondness for tequila, but since Pear died, she has been drinking it every day. She usually grabs the bottle immediately after coming back from the fields and passes out several hours later, with the bottle still clutched between her hooves. Sometimes, she falls asleep on her back. I used to flip her on her side, but I don't really have the energy anymore. And when she wakes up, nopony wants to be around her. She starts screaming her head off and smacking anything that moves. She still manages to get up and go to work in the fields. But I think Jackfruit is doing the worst. He no longer shows interest in anything, even cooking. He only makes plain cactus soup for every single meal. On top of that, I think he might be hurting himself. I sometimes see him at breakfast with fresh-looking cuts on the inside of his forelegs. If he sees me even just glance at them, he stares daggers at me. The first time, I tried to ask him what happened, and he said nothing until after we were finished eating. Afterwards, I asked him if Mom did it, and he said “No, just drop it.” I continued to press him, and he finally said, “I haven't felt a thing since Prickly Pear died. I do this because feeling something, anything, even pain, is better than being numb.” I don't bother him about it anymore. I could have tried to convince him to stop, but I'm not the same mare I was eight months ago. I don't care anymore. My life consists of loading wheelbarrows and planting. We have to work on Sundays, too, because without Prickly Pear we have to work more to get enough food. The bandits rarely come to try to steal our cactus, and when they do, we just shoot them on sight. And the drought has stopped. It rained all of last week. It was like a rain of all the tears that were never shed for Pear. You might think that our lives have improved. But our depression overshadows our sudden luck. We are no longer a family, just coworkers. Coworkers who can't stand each other. Without my family, all I have left is the cactus fields. Congratulations, you spiky maned monster. You got me.

Sincerely,
Ragamuffin

Letter 1
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Sincerely, Ragamuffin

Letter 1

Dear Princess Celestia
By Homage

Dear Princess Celestia,
My name is Ragamuffin, and I am an earth pony filly from Coltistan. I live here with Mommy, Daddy, my big sister and brother Prickly Pear and Jackfruit. We live on a cactus farm far from any other ponies. Yesterday, Mommy told me the story of your magical kingdom of Equestria. She described your happy subjects living peacefully together. It was my favorite bedtime story ever! Though Mommy just made you up, she spoke of you as a kind, gentle ruler who reads the letters sent by her subjects and fixes their problems. That's good, because we have a lot of those here in Coltistan. We are lucky to live far from other ponies, because other ponies are meanies. Sometimes they come near our house, and Daddy starts yelling at them to leave. They never listen, so Mommy takes me inside while Daddy gets his gun. There are a bunch of loud noises, and then the mean ponies go away. Once, one of the meanies used his own gun to hurt Daddy, but Daddy got better after a few weeks. I can't imagine what we would do if the meanies hurt Daddy again and he couldn't make them leave anymore. I'm scared at night that the mean ponies will come back. I told Mommy that I want for us to live in Equestria, where there are no mean ponies, but she just hugged me and said, "So do I." I asked her if it was because Equestria wasn't real, and she told me that Coltistan is the only real place to us. Even though Mommy told me it's impossible, I still dream of living in your kingdom. We wouldn't have to be afraid anymore.

From,
Ragamuffin

Letter 5
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Sincerely, Ragamuffin

Letter 5

Dear Princess Celestia,
Things have been getting worse for me since the last letter. I have been tending to the crops for three months now. The work is brutal, not just because it is tiring, but because it is repetitive. Wake up, eat breakfast, walk out into fields, fill wheelbarrows, plant cacti, break for lunch, fill more wheelbarrows, plant more cacti, go home and eat dinner, sleep, repeat. Except on Sunday. Sunday is my favorite day, because we don't have to work. We usually try to do something fun together. Last week, Prickly Pear and I played dress-up with some of the fashions she made from woven cactus fiber. The week before that, Dad, Jackfruit, Pear and I played hoofball while Mom watched with a smile. On Sunday, I always have my weekly cutie mark quest. Since I still haven't found my special talent, Mommy and Daddy encourage me to spend at least an hour every Sunday trying to find it. These “cutie mark crusades” usually end with disaster, but at they are often fun. Jackfruit and Prickly Pear usually help me! Last week, I tried painting Pear's hooves, but they ended up all being different colors. I also accidentally got some polish on her mane. She laughed, but she hasn't let me anywhere near her hooficure set since. These little adventures are, unfortunately, just temporary distractions from the hard labor waiting for us the next day. On Sunday, I am a free mare, but for the rest of the week, I am a slave to the cactus. The spiny green plant is like a monster to me. I imagine it as a dark green pony with solid black eyes, needle sharp teeth, and a mane and tail made of cactus spikes. Its cutie mark is also cactus needles. The spiny pony mocks me in a low, creepy voice that makes my coat stand on edge. It whispers to me, "Ragamuffin, you belong to me! There is no escape, you will join me and become a cactus too!" But I don't want to be made of cactus. I don't want to be dull. I don't want to be bitter. I don't want to be prickly. I don't want to hurt anypony who gets close to me. I am sad, but as long as I have my family, I think I can manage. Prickly Pear sings songs with me while we work, Jackfruit has started to let me back into the kitchen again, Dad reads with me on Sundays, and Mommy helps me with work when I am having trouble keeping up. Still, though, I can tell that they are not happy either. Even Mom, who actually likes tending to the cacti, is unhappy, because she knows that we are. The cactus monster is at our doorstep, but the five of us, together, can protect each other from being pricked. I hope.

Sincerely,
Ragamuffin