WHAM! The screen door slammed behind the redheaded pre-teen as she rushed back into the house. She headed into the kitchen and hung the cast iron rod back on its hook on the wall just inside the farmhouse’s kitchen. Seeing the young girl enter the room, the old woman who was tending to the ancient gas-burning cook stove drew her wooden spoon from the pot of stewed apples she was preparing and pointed it at the child.

“Applebloom! Whut I done told ya bout letting that thar door slam like that! Yer brother dun fixed it a dozen times over!” The old woman had the spoon directly in front of the young girl’s eyes and her other hand firmly planted on her hip. She tapped her foot impatiently as she waited for a response.

“Ah’m so sorry, Granny Smith! I didn’t mean to!” She closed her eyes and sniffed the air, smelling the wonderful mix of aromas resulting from the old woman’s cooking, titling her head up, rising on her tip-toes and smiling as she did so. “Them cinnamon-stewed apples just smell so good! I wanted to make sure I got me some b’fore they was all gone!” Applebloom then looked to her grandmother, putting forth her most pleading ‘puppy-dog’ eyes in order to gain some leniency from the spoon wielding woman. The look on the girls face did its magic as Granny Smith slowly smiled and turned away from her, going back to the one of many pots and pan on the stove.

“Child, ya know I aint bout ta not fix enough supper fer all my youngans ta get their fair share! I’m trustin ya rang tha bell? Where ya brother and sister at?” The old woman was now bent over looking into the oven, the smell of fresh homemade biscuits mixing in the air with the scent of cinnamon, apples, green beans and fried chicken- all homemade, homegrown and prepared with love. Applebloom snuck in beside her grandmother, taking a peek at the feast at what the woman was preparing.

“Well…. I just seen Big Mac headin in tha barn with the cart of Almatas from the west orchard an’ I seen Applejack finishin up sortin the Golden Delicious out back…” At that moment, they both heard the front door open loudly, followed by the sound of heavy footsteps and the slamming of the rickety screen door once again. Granny Smith’s eyes rolled up as she sighed and Applebloom jumped up and turned towards the doorway in which she entered from the housing living room. “That must be one a’ them now! I’ll go tell em ta wash up for supper!” The girl began to skip out of the kitchen, but once she passed through the doorway, she stopped in her tracks, the large pink bow in her hair, sharply rocking forward as she stared ahead.

“Um, Granny, ya might wanna come in here fer a second…” The tone of the young girls voice peaked the grandmother’s curiosity, causing her to lay her stirring spoon to the side and, after one last glace over of all the simmering and steaming pots and pans on the stove, wiped her hands on her apron and walked up behind her granddaughter. Following Applebloom’s lead, Granny smith froze in place as well, her eyes wide and hands on her hips. “Oh, mah word….” Was all that could escape the elderly woman’s lips.

Standing just inside the entrance of their home was a man unknown to them who looked to be dead on his feet. His clothes, which consisted of thick, insulated tan coveralls opened at the top revealing a olive green button-up shirt underneath, were covered with dust, wood splinters and splotches of dark crimson. His bearded face was pale and covered with more dust and wood as well as specks of blood, both dried and fresh. His brown, bloodshot eyes looked weary and were visibly fluttering and starting to roll and wander about in their sockets, showing the man was on the verge of collapsing where he stood. Even more unsettling was what he carried draped in his arms. The dark skinned woman with the blue, purple and pink hair looked to be as dirty as he was, minus all the fresh blood. As a coughing fit took the man over, the body in his arms was shifted, revealing the woman’s face. Both Granny Smith and her granddaughter gasped in shock as they immediately recognized their good friend Twilight.

“Excuse me ladies…” the man slowly began, his eyes looking at them, but seeming to be focused a hundred miles away. “I hate to be interruptin yall’s great smellin dinner, but my friends here needs a bit of help, if I could please just-“

“Hey there, Granny! Supper bout ready? It sure is smellin mighty good…. What in tarnation?! TWILIGHT!” A tall, blonde woman in a worn out Stetson entered the kitchen from the back door. Her orange flannel shirt was damp with sweat and was tucked into her tight fitting jeans. The clacking of her boots came to a halt as she stopped behind her grandmother and little sister standing at the entrance into the next room. Quickly coming back to her senses, she pushed past the still frozen family members and rushed forward, taking her dear friend in her arms and away from the strange man. She turned and made her way to the large couch across the room, softly laying the unconscious Twilight and laying her down on the thick cushions and placing a hand on the woman’s neck, checking her pulse. Finding it, even as weak as it was, she sighed just before she noticed the small dried trail of red coming from her eye.

“BLOOM! Go ta Fluttershy’s an tell her we need here her NOW! Twi’s done over used her magic! Tell her tha bleedins’ only from one eye, but hurry none tha less! Granny! Imma need some cold cloths ta put on her head, we gotta cool her head down!” Both the woman and the child snapped to attention and darted in opposite directions; the child ran out the front door, completely ignoring the battered and bruised man and the elderly woman scurrying back into the kitchen. The blonde, still standing but bent over the couch, returned to checking on her friend, tracing her hands over her body looking for any hidden injuries before resting the back of her hand back on Twilight’s forehead.

Tim was still standing, be it just barely, where he was when the blonde relieved him of his load. He swayed on his feet as his eyes rolled up into his head again, staggering back against the frame of the door. The back of his head made contact with the wood of the frame, the new pain jostling his mind, causing him to tightly close his eyes and hiss. Opening his eyes and allowing them to a few second to focus, he looked to the couch and smirked, taking a good look and the bent over blonde.

Even though the pain he was in, Tim was still a man after all, and struggling to keep on his feet and his eyes clear, he took in the sight before him. To say the woman’s jeans were form-fitting was an understatement. From her dirty cowboy boots up, he followed her muscular calves up to her thick thighs and then to her plump, round rear end. Her hips were wide and her rump looked firm to the point that he believed he could bounce a quarter off it. The orange flannel she wore was slightly pulled out of the back of her pants, revealing her tanned skin which was still slightly glistening with a trace of sweat. As he drank the sight in, he didn’t hear the woman call to him. His eyes lost focus again as he noticed the blonde stand and turn to him, quickly closing the distance between them.

“Hey, fella, are you a’ight? Can’t ya hear me talkin to ya?” She was now face to face with him. With his head still leaned back against the door’s frame, he closed his eyes tightly again and reopened them. As the multiple images of the woman before him slowly shifted and began to group into a single person, he began to think the impact of the wall against the back of his was a lot harder than it felt. His mouth slowly opened as if to speak, but he could only stare at the seemingly familiar face.

Her golden blonde hair was coming out from under the old cowboy hat in a long, flowing ponytail secured at the end, but a few strands had come loose and was now framing her face. Her skin was a little more tanned, but was smooth and silky none the less with a few freckles dotting her cheeks. Her slender neck led down to her collarbone that was exposed due to her orange shirt having the first three or four buttons being undone. Under that, a white tank top undershirt clung to her skin, the neckline plunging down, just barely showing the beginning of the cleavage of her small-to-mid sized bust with a light coating of freckles scattered across her chest. A hand came up to his face, directing his eyes into hers. Surprised by the emerald green that shone there instead of the blue he thought he would he see, his face bore a slightly confused expression.

“Are ya ok? Ya look like hell… What happened to Twi over there?” Her voice was sweet like honey and was soothing to his ears. He couldn’t help but smile as he brought his hand up to rest it upon the woman’s hand that was still on his cheek. He closed his eyes and embraced the touch, tilting his head into her palm and rubbing his bearded face into it. Suddenly Tim was hit with another hard series of coughs. He brought both hands to his mouth and coughed violently, doubling over in pain. The tall blonde took a step back briefly before stepping up to his side and trying to hold him up as he was about to fall face-first onto the hardwood floor. As the fit subsided, be brought his hands away from his face and looked into them. He turned his face up only to see the blonde with worry in her eyes as she stared at the amount of blood coating his hands and seeping in between his fingers.

“Ann, babe…” he began, as he saw the tell-tale curtains of blacking out starting to fall over his eyes. “You back from town already? I like what ya done with your hair…” With that, he passed out; falling to the floor with the woman he mistakenly thought was his wife attempting to guide him down safely.

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“Nnnggg, Damnit, boy!” Pain was all Tim could register. Throughout his body, Tim could feel his heart beating; with each beat he felt the burn of pain tearing through every joint, muscle and bone. His eyes were still closed, that pain so bad he felt by even moving his eyelids he would hurt even more. His chest felt tight as if someone was sitting on him with half a ton of bricks on their lap. He attempted to move his arm up to try and move the crushing weight but was stopped by the force of a large hand grasping his forearm and holding it down to the bed.

“Nope, Ya don’t need ta be moving too much, just take ‘er easy a spell.” The low, deep voice came to him from his right. Tim then turned his head to the direction of the man’s voice and slowly opened his eyes. He was now in a bed; how he got there he was unsure, but he had a feeling the large, burnt-orange haired man sitting in the old wooden chair next to him would be able to fill him in on the details. Tim coughed again, violently, and the man let go of his arm so he could cover his mouth. Reaching into his chest pocket of his dark red flannel shirt, the man produced a faded white handkerchief that had a printed apple and leaf design on it. Still coughing, Tim took the offering and nodded, coughing into it a dozen or so more times. Once the spell had passed, he opened the cough and looked into it, noticing very few traces of blood dotting its surface. He let his head fall back to the pillow and cutting his eyes over to the man, he weakly help up the used cloth.

“Nah, ya keep it. How ya feelin?” The man leaned back in the chair, causing it to creak slightly. He shifted a piece of straw from one side of his mouth to the other, solemnly gazing at Tim and patiently waiting for an answer.

“I’ll tell ya… this is gotta be about the worst I have every felt, and that’s sayin something.” Tim slightly shifted under the covers of the bed, wincing at the pain from such a small movement. “I’ve had my ass handed to me quite a few times in my life, but this takes the damn cake and then some.” He looked around the room noticing the simple décor- a small chest of drawers across the room on the opposite wall from the bed, a small nightstand adorned with a simple green-shaded lamp with a glass of water and well-used Bible sitting next to it and the chair that the big man sat in which was in front of a door he assumed to be a closet as just a few feet away was another door which led out of the room and into a dim hallway. Tim turned to the left and noticed the soft light of the moon filtering into the small room from the half-opened window and its green and red plaid curtains. A soft, cool breeze came through the window and into the room across his face. Tim closed his eyes briefly, the sensation on his skin the first pleasant feeling he had felt since he came to on his wrecked boat. He then opened his eyes and turned back to the man again as he remembered Twilight and him carrying her inside someone’s farmhouse.

“How’s Twilight? I was prayin that I got her some help in time. I hope yall folks didn’t mind me barging in like I did… I didn’t feel like I had much of a choice.” Tim stated with an apologetic tone to his voice. The stoic man just closed his eyes and shook his head.

“Think nothing of it, anybody else woulda done the same thing. And Twilight’s gonna be alright. Lil’ Bloom got Fluttershy here pretty quick-like. She just overused her powers a slight bit and overheated her mind.” He shifted the straw hanging from his lip once again. “She woke up not too long ago, Applejack and Granny are out takin her and Fluttershy back to her house at the library back in town. Fluttershy is gonna be stayin with her a few days till she straightens out. Ya done good, Mister-?”

“Tim.” He slowly raised his arm and extended a weak hand toward the big man in the chair, gritting his teeth and squinting some, but never breaking eye contact with his companion in the room.

“Big Macintosh, most folk jus’ call me Big Mac.” They broke their handshake and Tim let his arm fall limp to the bed. Standing up from his chair and stretching with his fists in the small of his back, Big Macintosh groaned slightly and walked around the bed to the window, pushing the curtain open and looking out to the farm surrounding the house. “When mah sister caught ya when ya passed out down stairs, she laid ya out in the floor, run on out the house, jumped a horse and got to the hospital and got Nurse Redheart and Dr. Horse here to tend to ya. Yer mighty lucky to be alive with all the blood ya was coughin up and being dehydrated, too. One cracked rib and two broken; both of em stickin ya in yer lung. Good thing ol Doc is a soul-folk… he got ya patched up pretty good…”

Coughing again, Tim brought the handkerchief back to his mouth and Bic Mac turned back to his bed. Reaching into his pocket, the orange-haired man brought forth a small prescription bottle. Opening it, be shook out three small, white round pills and held them out to Tim.

“I ‘bout fergot. Here. Nurse said the doctor’s orders was to take one of these evry’ few hours for the pain. They had crushed one up and got in in ya before they left back for town, but seein as how yer ‘bout jus’ as big as me, I figure ya might need a few more, ‘specially if ya wantin’ to get a good night’s sleep.” Tim took the pills and popped them in his mouth and Big Mac handed him the glass of water off the nightstand. It was still cool and felt good as Tim sipped it at first, only to turn the glass up and empty its contents. Big Mac took the glass and walked towards the hallway door.

“Get ya some rest, I’mma go do the same. We’ll see ya in the mornin.” The big man nodded to Tim and switched off the bedroom light, pulling the door up behind him, leaving it slightly cracked to allow a dim shaft of light to spill into the room and across the floor. Big Mac’s footsteps slowly faded down the hall and Tim closed his eyes once more, letting the soft pillow caress his pounding head. The medication was starting to take its effects on his body, seeing as how he had taken the pills on an empty stomach. Slowly and slightly less painfully, Tim drifted off to sleep, listening to the sound of the crickets being carried into his room by the cool night breeze.

Author's Note

Well, here's another chapter for you fine folks who's been following along... I hope yall enjoy and, as always, please like/dislike and comment below. Thanks for reading.