Prolouge: The chase from Ponyville
“Quick brother of mine we need to go faster.” Dust billowed from a puffing chugging car known as the Super Speedy Cider Squeezy Six Thousand. Flim and Flam were racing away from Ponyville after trying to get the Apples to share the profits in a business deal. However, due to some conflict over how the profit would be split. The Apples decided to have a contest with Flim and Flam to see who could make the most cider and had managed to get the Apple's to bet their entire farm, (at stake with no risk to themselves). They were about to win by a landslide until they had allowed the apple family to take part in the contest. During the contest they in a poor sense of judgment and overconfidence. They allowed the apple family to have friends to help them. Without realizing that this had the Apples gain the lead. In a 'last moment of panic,' they had removed the quality check device. The machine suddenly started to produce more barrels of lousy quality cider with tree parts combined into it along with the apples. Thus caused them to lose the competition and out of fear of the towns reprisal they fled Ponyville as fast as they could. Flim the younger brother who was tall and lanky, with his candy cane striped mane flapping in the wind was looking behind his back with a worried look. This wasn’t the first time they were chased out of town by an angry mob. Luckily this time it seems nopony was chasing them, but he didn’t want to risk the chance of being caught and shouted, “faster my brother of mine! We need to go faster!”
Mirroring Flim’s physical appearance almost precisely sitting next to him was his older brother Flam who looked nearly identical to his twin brother in every way down to his clothing, safe for his cutie mark being a sliced apple instead of an apple slice and thin red twirly mustache. The stallion was more interested in playing with his facial hair just rolled his eyes knowing his sibling was just being overdramatic only over one setback and just scoffed,“There’s nopony there, we’re not being chased, unlike last time!”
Flam was starting to regret letting Flim take all those drama classes back in middle school. Through, he did think about those ponies in Appleloosa were going to hang them for sure when they tried to dupe the townsfolk with turning all their apples into cider, and those buffaloes didn’t seem to appreciate their generous offer of trading their land either.
Flim gave a slight nod as he brushed his mane feeling a bit stupid for losing his cool like that. Looking around in the empty country road they were speeding through he had to concur with his older brother seeing there were no ponies in sight. The stallion just slumped back into his seat with a sigh of relief. The unicorn gave a few deep breaths trying to regain control of himself and explained, “okay brother let’s go back to Las Pegasus and scam some gamblers out of their bits. Were clearly not doing so well with this apple cider business.”
The older brother; by eleven minutes, gave some deep thought distractingly twirling his mustache as their vehicle chugged along. After pondering a good long while the stallion then gave a nod of approval. “You’re the right brother, this isn't working out as great as I thought it would. We may have been a bit overzealous with our plans.”
Flim rolled his eyes at his brother’s obvious remark and scoffed, “thanks captain obvious anything else we should know?”
Flam smirked at the joke then continued to stroke his mustache as he whispered under his breath, “We need a better plan.”
Flim turned to his older brother with concern and asked, “so do you have any?”
Flam turned around in anger and growled, ”Any of what? Apples? bits?”
The younger brother kicked his hooves like a petulant foal and whined with all his whining, “you said you had a better plan!”
Flam slapped his brother. “I said we need a better plan, you idiot! Now shut it while I think.”
He sat back down into his seat grumbling and thinking not realizing their self-propelled carriage had wandered off the road. It was now going through a patchwork of apple orchards dotting the landscape. Now finally realizing that they were off course Flam looked around in confusion and asked, “what in the hay? Where are we ?”
Nowhere near as geographically challenged as his brother, left to wonder why he wasn’t the own driving in the first place, Flim’s face went blanche in horror in his own realization of where they were. “Wait we're in the same apple orchard of those crazy Apple Ponies!”
Flam smirked as he threw his hooves in the air dramatically and cried. “You don’t think they’ll come at us with pitchforks!”
Film gaped in horror and squeaked, “You think they would!”
Flam looked around with a look of worry, his eyes darting every which way for signs of that orange mare and her massive red draft horse of a sibling. “They could be watching us right now waiting for an opportunity to pounce on us!”
Flim gulped and waited nervously as what seemed like hours with his ears twitching. Then without warning, something clanged against metal, and Flim jumped into the air and fell out of the vehicle as his unsympathetic brother Flam burst into a fit of laughter at his predicament.
Flam then pressed a hoof on the brake, and the vehicle screeched to a halt, as it made loud pops! And loud hissing noises as it slowly wheezed and chugged to a complete stop.
Still laughing Flam jumped out of the vehicle with ease and held out a hoof to his brother. “Oh, Flim you always were so gullible.”
Flam growled and muttered a curse under his breath as he was pulled back onto his hooves. The stallion grumbled as he adjusted his bowtie and brushed the dirt from his blue and white striped shirt. “Well, it never hurts to be cautious.”
The machine was burning hot and breaking from the strain of the fast drive along with when it was making dozens upon dozens of barrels of apple cider. Flam went around it to the front of their contraption and opened the hood to reveal it’s mechanical workings, and they were hit with a cloud of vapor spewing out making the stallion reel back coughing. “Dear Celestia the Super Speedy Cider Squeezy Six Thousand is overheating and falling apart!”
Flam rolled his eyes as he came over and looked down at the mass of gears and strange mechanical objects. “Well, it looks like our investment from that inventor we swindled at a game of poker back in Las Pegasus is officially dead.”
Flim came over and looked down inside the contraption to inspect and saw the whole front was flooded with oil and water he chuckled, “looks like some of that tree gunk clogged up the pipes and the engine .” Then without warning a loud put sound and Flim snickered, “Flam! Did you do that!?”
Flam squeaked out loud at the sudden outburst and shouted, “what no!” Flim couldn’t help but burst into fits of laughter as he rolled around on the ground. Flam groaned a little realizing Flim was trying just to make a joke. The younger brother got up grumbling. “Alright, alright you got me.” The stallion then closed the hood of the car and scoffed, “guess you’re right, I don’t know anything about engineering, and even I can tell this thing is busted.”
Flam who was lying underneath an apple tree just shrugged and sighed, ”I doubt there’s a single pony that can fix her in this backwater town.”
Flam groaned looking at the busted machine with the steam billowing from the hood and was disappointed that they barely got any use out of it. The stallion looked around the orchard wanting to see maybe if he could make himself and his brother a cup of cider. He then spotted a dozen weird looking rainbow colored apples. They seem to radiate with some sort of power that he couldn’t quite describe in words. He picked one of the odd-looking fruits up and gave a whiff it smelt pleasing as any fruit would.
He turned around to see his brother sitting near a tree looking into a hand mirror as he trimmed his mustache. The younger brother smirked and slowly strode up to Flam and asked, “they want to see if we can still make some cider from these?”
Flim turned around and laughed, ”sure those look good! I heard of the legendary taste zap apples from my grandfather. It’s half the reason I thought we would check out this backwater town.”
Flam casually came over to the machine plopping the apples onto the conveyor belt then pressed the proper levers and buttons. The vehicle chugged as the motors and gears grinned and turned as it sucked the zap apples through a funnel tube connected to the contraption. Then with lots of stomping, mushing, processing, and filtering the machine was hard at work in creating a drink to satisfy their thirst. Suddenly with a ding, a barrel of cider was produced out the other end. He slammed right in front of the two brothers as the machine sputtered its last breath before it whined down and gasped. Flam got up and slowly came up to the Super Speedy Cider Squeezy Six Thousand and gave it a loud metallic bang as his hoof stuck the metal. “you did good old girl. Guess we could try selling you to some gullible foal for a hundred bits or so.”
Flim snickered as he pulled the tab on the barrel and poured he and his brother a mug of the full rainbow colored cider. “Well, I'm sure we can convince that gullible foal it’s a time machine or a spaceship.”
He finished pouring and came back to his brother hoofing him his mug. Flam chuckled sloshing his big cup full of the thick frothy rainbow colored cider within. He held it up and shouted “cheers, may a sucker be born every day!”
Flim gave a hearty laugh and clanked his mug against his brother’s. “Cheers.” Then both stallions took their mugs of his zap apple cider, and the flavor was beyond anything he could imagine. While both stallions gave long big gulps of the sweet Zap Apple Cider. Flim himself couldn’t resist the fantastic taste despite not really being able to describe what it was. It had the texture of an apple, but it had the sweet flavor that he couldn’t quite describe. The older stallion then felt his head being woozy as he sat down next to his brother chuckling and gasped, “Oh my, feels like when I went out drinking for the first time.”
Flam chuckled as he twirled his mustache with a hoof after finishing his mug. “Oh, you could never handle your dear liquor brother. Back at the University of Baltimare, I was the one who had to drag your rump to our dumpy apartment every night.” The stallion then slumped down near the tree and slumped his hooves down with a long sigh of exhaustion from the long, arduous day.
Flim went over to his older brother and slid among the grass into his brother’s lap. “Sorry for being such a nuisance dear brother, sometimes I wonder why you put up with me?”
Flam hugged his brother and ruffled his mane. “Well, you have the street smarts, dear brother. ”
Flim rolled his eyes at his brother’s comment and scoffed, “alright we’re not getting married.” As he pushed Flam away. The older brother laughed and laid back down onto his tree as Flim watched with an uncertain look in his eye. The younger of the two always saw his brother as the smarter of the two in building machines and planning the execution of their plans. But Flim was the one who did all the legwork trying to get ponies to buy into their plans. He knew deep in his heart Flam was jealous of his so-called “street smarts” and it for some reason put the two brothers at a small distance from each other. After some time looking into his half-empty mug, he slumped down by a giant rough looking apple tree a little ways from his brother. The stallion down the endless rows of apple trees with their leaves blowing and the sun lowering down with its rays peering straight down the column. The young stallion looked into the sun and thought to himself, for once in a long time the famous con artists from Baltimare didn’t know what to do next. Then out of nowhere his ears twitched and heard a loud hissing noise coming from the Super Speedy Cider Squeezy Six thousand. His eyes went wide filled with horror realizing what was going to happen. Before the stallion could say or do anything, the hissing machine erupted in a column of flame and exploded in a Rainbow colored mushroom cloud followed by a shadow of rainbow-colored vapor coming straight at him.
