“Yo!” Kara yelled out, vaulting over the small fence around Sweet Apple Acres.

“Howdy!” Applejack called back, bucking another tree and causing apples to fall perfectly into the provided baskets, because comic physics. She trotted over to the human, leaving the baskets to pick up later. “How’re ya doin’?”

“”I’m fine. How’dya do that?” Kara responded, waving in the general direction of the baskets.

“Oh, that. Well, ya gotta hit the tree in the right place, with enough strength to knock the apples off, but not so much ya break the tree… It’s really an art in an’ of itself.”

“Huh. Got any trees you don’t care too much about? I wanna try something.” Kara fiddled with the amber-screened device on her arm.

“Well…” Applejack guided them over to a small, isolated area. “This is what we call our testin’ grounds. We use them so new applebuckers can learn their own strength. That good enough?”

“Perfect, if she’s doing what I think she’s doing.” Michael responded, as Kara was still fiddling with the Pip-boy. She pressed a button, and the air… shimmered, before she reached into the haze, her arm vanishing. She pulled out something, pressed the button again, causing the haze to vanish, and pulled the device onto her right hand, revealing it as some manner of mechanical glove.

“What’s that?” Applejack asked, pointing at the glove.

“It’s called a Pneumatic Power Fist. I dunno how strong your trees are, so I’ll just turn it up to maximum and work from there. I mean, it would make more sense to work up from the bottom, but, ya know, where’s the fun in that?” Kara twisted a small, almost hidden dial on the side, reared her fist back, and punched the tree as hard as she could, the Power Fist letting out a loud hiss.

Not that the hiss was heard, as it was drowned out by the loud smash of the tree breaking in half and falling over.

Applejack stared.

“Well, that worked.” Kara said happily to herself.

“Are ya tryin’ ta destroy mah orchard?” Applejack shouted, turning on her.

“No, I wanted to see how tough your trees were. I’ve only ever seen withered, broken ones. I mean, Oasis exists, but I didn’t punch any of those trees. Well, one, but that one was literally asking for it.”

“Oasis?”

“Yeah, it’s this place up in the north of the Capital Wasteland. Got a tree hybrid thing in the middle called Harold and Bob. He ended up creating more trees, then some people came by and made a cult, and stuff happened. Anyway, should I meet your family, or should I keep testing the Power Fist?”

“Uh, Ah think you should come meet mah family.” Applejack quickly replied, trotting off towards the house. Kara shrugged, dropped the Power Fist back into the depths of hammerspace, and followed.

“Howdy!” Apple Bloom called out as AJ and Kara walked up to the house.

“Yo!” Kara called back. She walked onto the deck, and leaned down to pat the filly on the head. Applejack walked up behind her, and pushed through the door. Apple Bloom quickly followed, with Kara behind her.

“Howdy there!” Granny Smith called from the other side of the room. This caused Michael to ask “Is their only greeting ‘Howdy’?”

“I dunno.” Kara replied, looking around the small room. It was quite homely.

“Well, that’s Apple Bloom, Granny Smith, and… Granny, where’s Big Mac?” Applejack asked.

“Upstairs, I think.” The wizened old mare responded. Applejack turned to the stairs, just as a large red stallion entered the room from them.

“Hi!” called Kara. Big Mac acknowledged her with a nod. “Welp,” Kara said, spinning to face the whole room again. “This has been great, but I should probably get going. First, I want to do something. Do I have permission to burn one of your training trees?” At the protesting noises she received, she quickly continued. “Just the one! I’ll make sure it doesn’t spread.” AS she continued receiving protests, she finally yelled “I’m a pyromaniac! I’d probably end up doing it anyway, and it’ll look really cool as well!” At this, they stopped.

Granny Smith finally asked “Yer a pyromaniac?”

“Yup.”

“Oh, well that changes things. If yer this old, and ya been burnin’ things for that long… You probably know how t’ control it. And true, fire is very pretty when contained. All right, but be careful.”

“I will. Now, who wants to see me burn a tree?”

Apple Bloom jumped up, with a cry of “Ah ain’t seen much fire before!”

“Right. AJ, come on. You’ve got enough common sense to keep Bloom safe.” Kara walked out again, fiddling with the Pipboy.

As they got to the training trees again, she finally found what she was looking for, and pulled it out of the distortion. It looked like one of the rifles she had earlier, but it was… weird. At first, it had black and white stripes, like a zebra. But as it moved in her hands, it’s appearance changed. One moment it had the consistency of sand, the next it was made of cold, lifeless stone. Then it was rusted metal, with a strange yellow symbol on the side, and then a stark white, no detail at all. It hurt to look at. Finally, it settled on being made of wood, exactly like the trees surrounding them. Kara raised it up to her face, to look through the scope. She carefully lined up a shot, and pulled the trigger.

With a soft pfft noise, the tree burst alight.

“Woah!” Apple Bloom gasped. Applejack raised an eyebrow.

As the tree cracked and fell, Kara tossed the rifle into hammerspace, and started walking away. Applejack ran after her. “Where’re ya goin’?”

“To go meet Rainbow. I’m tryin’ to meet everyone. Seeya.”

“But-“ Applejack was cut off by Kara suddenly breaking into a sprint, the last words she heard from Michael.

“Don’t bother! She’s got her mind set on it.”

And so the pyromaniac travelled towards the prismatic speedster.

After going back to Applejack and asking for directions.

Author's Note

The rifle mentioned is the Zebra Rifle, from a mod. I have a bug where modded things with unique textures don't use those. Instead, they pull textures from the surrounding area, like the stony ground. I was just making a small nod to that.

Anyway, Rainbow is the last chapter until the ending.