I Swear This Isn't A Sequel To The Rhyme Story
There was an insulting quote which Macintosh had read out for her once, something which had come from one of the other nations: 'A predator has to be more intelligent than a pony. How much brains does it take to sneak up on a blade of grass?'
As insulting quotes went, it was fairly short, rather sarcastic, relatively to the point, and gave a few members of the non-herbivore sapient species an excuse for looking down because subsisting on plants was so clearly the soft option. And while bearing Honesty had allowed Applejack the opportunity to travel, she still hadn't had the chance to meet the right meat-eater: the one for whom she had set aside a few basic facts. For starters, there was the existence of root anglers: a species which kept just about all of its body mass below the surface, allowing a single tentacle tip to protrude above the soil. That tip would resemble a carrot, or a turnip: the rarest subspecies could simulate radishes. The protrusion was not only perfectly edible, but just happened to be one of the tastiest dishes in Equestria -- and rather coincidentally, the angler happened to feel exactly the same way about ponies. That was what the other eleven tentacles were for.
There was also burrow-weed: Applejack had run into (and nearly through) that one in the Everfree. Burrow-weed was mostly edible on technicality: it smelled good, but it was significantly bitter, didn't offer much in the way of nutrition, was covered in a fragile coating of something very much like sand, and most intelligent beings would be reluctant to approach it simply because it was typically found growing upon fresh corpses. You could eat burrow-weed and about a day after doing so, any of the sandlike seeds which remained on your body would split open and send tiny roots into the skin, effectively starting to return the favor. A simple extended soaking would kill the plant. Long-term failure to reach bath or river would allow a future desperate herbivore to discover the next corpse.
There were plants which made you want to lie down and warm yourself under Sun for a while: they were so good at doing that as to keep the consuming party from noticing that they were now under Moon, much less that something was nibbling on their right forehoof. Others effectively allowed a pony to make friends: those who ate them would just keep happily chatting with the figments who agreed with everything you said, as long as you didn't suggest turning away from that suspicious-looking pit in the soil: the one with all the oddly-edged rocks around the rim. Kick in Poison Joke and a host of botanical horrors which had learned that the best way to gain the nutrients which came from decomposition was to create their own supply...
Applejack suspected the majority of carnivores and omnivores acquired their food in the same manner as most ponies: through going to a market and picking out the best offerings from a harvest where someone else had done all of the actual work. They hadn't thought about hunting any more than, just for completely random example, Rainbow ever considered going to ground and actually plowing for a change (other than the furrow of soil which could be found leading into multiple crash sites). But it didn't change a simple fact: that every sapient on the planet had the chance to be in the same situation. You would be desperately hungry, to the point where you could no longer afford to wait for extra options. You would find something edible. And your best chance at survival would be to make it stop moving.
However, once brought down, meat had a tendency to just lie there. It would never move again.
"Your turn on the salad spinner, AJ," Macintosh reminded her.
Being unable to say the same thing for lettuce seemed horribly unfair.
Applejack sighed. It was a very familiar sort of sigh, one where the echoes bounced off dedicated micro-grooves in the kitchen cabinets. "Don't even see why we've gotta have salad tonight," she groused. "It's headin' for winter now, or at least that's what the Bureau's makin' it feel like. Ain't no point in startin' dinner with somethin' cold."
It was an argument for which her brother had a single well-honed response. "Your turn on the spinner, AJ."
She turned away from the counter just long enough to glare at him.
"You're jus' glad it ain't you."
"Eyup," he readily agreed. "Don't change the fact that it's your turn."
Apple Bloom backed up a little, getting her head out of the lowest cabinet and carefully depositing the mouth-held plates on the floor before she spoke. (It had taken two baths for her to reach the point where the older siblings were willing to let her into the kitchen at all: working part-time at Ratchette's fix-it shop had consequences, and one of the most reliable was the ongoing swap of tree sap for grease.) "Ah wouldn't mind some salad," she told them. "Had t' sort out the gear tray today. Hours of jus' pokin' mah head around those little fold-out shelves, tryin' t' make sure nothin' slipped into the wrong compartment. Sortin' by mouth. A nice crisp salad..." Her eyes misted. "That sounds like it might do a lot towards tastin' something which ain't metal."
"An' you're mostly sayin' that," Applejack pointed out, "'cause you're still too small t' reach it without standin' on a bench. An' y'can't get the right leverage that way, so you're exempt 'til y'get some more size. So a crisp salad's fine, 'cause it ain't your problem. Am Ah right?"
Her sister pondered that.
"Yeah," the filly shamelessly admitted. "An' it's still your turn. Ah'll go set the table." And with that, she picked up the plates and half-cantered out of the room, with the smirk radiating around the edge of the glass.
Applejack indulged in a few seconds of muttering to herself, mostly because it was a few more seconds away from the spinner.
"Let me know when Scootaloo's flyin'. No, skip that. Hoverin'."
Her dumb brother, who had just been going to fetch their semi-guest and wake Granny, paused. "Why?"
"Ah wanna see if she can do it in a tight circle. Real tight. With her head down an' her wings up --"
"-- AJ?"
A disgruntled "What?"
"Less talking. More spinning." And grinning with the glee of a pony who didn't have to take his turn just yet, he left.
There was just one thing left to glare at, and the very old wooden bowl on the main counter (a double-bowl, with a half-hollowed cradle sitting on a pivot point within the outer shell) had its own way of glaring back. It never blinked. It never shifted position unless she was using it, and then it tried to do that constantly. And it always won.
Applejack went for the romaine, furiously peeled back the outer layers of leaves with her teeth and deposited them in the trough which supplemented her tenants' diets. The core was picked apart, placed under running water, and finally deposited into the spinner's inner cradle.
One last mutter got her reared up on her hind hooves, with her left forehoof (because of course it had to be the left) held waiting over the bowl. Her mouth fetched the lid, followed by rather assuredly not slamming it onto the bowl and any echoes which suggested otherwise were clearly the fault of the wood.
She lowered her head. Then she lowered it further still, until it was just about on the same level as the waiting hoof. Paused, because the crick in her neck needed a moment for itself.
...an' y'take up the knob on the top rotary wheel in your teeth, an' y'start turnin' your head in tiny little circles while your hoof's on the lid 'cause if it ain't, the rotation sends the bowl all over the counter, or off the counter an' onto the floor, an' y'hold the position for as long as y'can stand it, then y'double that 'cause as long as y'can stand it ain't ever long enough...
There was an impact against the side of her jaw. Then there was another, right on schedule.
...plus y'keep turnin' your head while the crick gets worse an' your jaw is bumpin' your hoof on every other turn an' you do all that 'cause y'washed the vegetables an' y'can't leave the water on there --
Her hat was beginning to vibrate. The planted left hoof was shivering with passed-along vibration. She reviewed the things she felt she could say about carnivores, and most of them centered around how easy they had it.
-- so you've gotta spin all the moisture off, never goin' too fast or too slow, keepin' it all goin' at jus' the right rate of pain-in-the-everythin' in the name of havin' a nice crisp salad.
She was tired. Irritated. Sick of the little impacts and the protests her body made at merely having to hold the unnatural position. She was not a happy mare, she happened to be an earth pony and in the name of getting it over with, she turned her head just a little too fast at the same moment her teeth shifted on the knob, applying pressure at exactly the wrong angle.
It was an old spinner (although not the oldest on the Acres). It had faithfully executed its task for years and, judging by that one dark line in the wood which so resembled a smirk, had enjoyed every minute, cumulative hours and days and possibly moons, and its final spiteful act was to send splinters from the sundered lid and edge into the central bowl, ruining the lettuce at the same moment Applejack heard the crack and instinctively sent herself backwards, getting away from the sound.
Her left hoof pushed off the lid.
To start.
The siblings stared at the remains. The youngest's features were unreadable, while those of the elders hosted a mix of frustration, one shared question as to what should be swapped in for the opening course, and a certain degree of dark satisfaction. (The last had been mingled with the resolve for each to not openly celebrate the death until they were sure the other was out of earshot.)
"Can't fix that," Applejack finally said.
Three cross-hatched pieces of the inner bowl majestically tumbled over the edge to greet their new temporary destiny as miniature frames for a piece known as Still Lack Of Life With Inadvertent Coleslaw.
"Nope," Mac agreed.
Apple Bloom took a slow breath.
"Ah think," she timidly began to propose, "maybe Ah could --"
"-- naw," Applejack cut in. "Ah know you're studyin', AB, an' you're gettin' better -- but this is wood. An' there ain't enough t' save. Ain't no amount of glue that's gonna get this mess back together, an' even a wood sculpt spell won't make it watertight."
"That ain't what Ah meant," the youngest tried again. "Ah think Ah could try t' --"
"Not now, AB," muttered the elder sister, mostly while thinking about just how lucky the yellow filly had just been. The foe defeated before she ever faced it...
The youngest blinked. Stared at the remains, and a yellow jaw set.
"We've got the old one in the attic," Macintosh reminded them.
Three sets of eyes simultaneously looked up. Thousands of sparking neurons conjured an image of the old one, and a trio of bodies shuddered.
"...and I think it's gonna stay there," their brother finished. "So now what?"
"This is nice," the baker declared from three body lengths back. "Getting to go shopping with you, I mean. We don't get to do that too often! Because we're usually both at work when the stores are open. You're on the Acres and I'm in Sugarcube Corner and unless you need muffins or I need some cider, the stores are somewhere else. So you shopping on my half-day, just getting to go around together looking for something... it's kind of fun!" Thoughtfully, "Normal fun. Not Rarity-fun, because her kind of shopping fun stops when she reaches the register. And then it isn't fun for anypony."
"Didn't need any help with hagglin' today," Applejack declared, working her way past sixteen different types of shelved patina.
"Negotiating," Pinkie corrected, expertly swishing her tail through a dusty beam of light (and also away from a tray of ancient mugs).
"Ah know what she calls it. Ain't what it is. See anythin'?"
"Not yet. Applejack?"
"Yeah?"
"Why are we looking for a salad spinner in an antique shop?"
Applejack glanced back at bright, curious eyes.
"'cause it's gettin' on towards winter an' stable sales ain't available. Nopony puts their stuff out once it gets cold."
Which had left them browsing through Things Remembered, a place which Applejack preferred to think of as Memories Upcharged. There were two ways of telling when stable sale season had ended: the decreasing temperature and a sudden silence replacing the sound of Ms. Flip arguing that the item she was about to claim was actually worthless, she wanted to give the soon-to-be-former owner a single bit as a form of charity and the fact that said piece would soon be listed in the dimly-light shop at two hundred times that price was mere coincidence. It was the closest thing Ponyville had to a collectibles shop, which mostly meant items so old that confusing age for value would result in a significant profit, and any attempt to kick in scarcity might grant the shopkeeper a chance to investigate coin collecting through gathering every last one the customer had.
In Applejack's opinion, the shop was never actually cleaned: dust was just redistributed to where it would be more effective. Every narrow corridor through the carefully-arranged antiques bore a risk of having a stray tail movement knock something over, which was where a good part of the place's income came from. There was a constant creaking noise from overhead, which was either the ceiling fans trying to shift the air or the aged atmosphere complaining about having to move. Just about everypony who'd ever been inside left swearing that the price tags were enchanted, because there was no other way for the digits to be constantly shifting up. And the store hours were decidedly irregular, because fresh antiques didn't just present themselves every day and so every opportunity for gathering had to be honored.
You could always count on Ms. Flip to be at a stable sale, along with just about every estate sale. Anypony whose spring cleaning led them to shed significant bale-weight from their home's furnishings was generally well-advised to put a lock on the dumpster.
Pinkie took a breath of well-used air. (The farmer considered just how long that air had been around, and then instinctively looked for the price tag hanging from the atmosphere.) "Applejack?"
"Ah know she's got some of the older stuff," was the muttered response as green eyes strained to use the dim light. "Seen her snatch a mouth guard out from under mah snout last summer. Gotta be spinners around here somewhere." She slowly shook her head. "Y'know she won't let Twi in here, right? Says she doesn't want the place organized 'cause the rummage is half the fun. By which Ah'm pretty sure she means that wider aisles would cut into her profit margin a little too much --"
Pinkie was her oldest friend among the Bearers. They'd spent the most time together, and each arguably understood the other a little better than the other four.
"-- are you trying to find the same model of salad spinner because the last one was bought by your parents? And you want to make sure you get the exact type, so it'll be like nothing changed?"
It gave the baker a certain capacity for getting to the point.
Applejack turned as much as she could without risking bankruptcy, looked into calm blue eyes.
"Naw."
"No?"
"It's older than that. Granny had it. Somepony had it before that, and that's as far back as Ah can trace it 'cause she don't remember who gave it t' the pony that nosed it over t' her. That spinner had a life. Went all over Equestria --"
"-- I know," Pinkie gently interrupted. "We could probably track it by listening for all the echoes of ponies saying 'Ow!' Applejack, I've used that spinner, when I was visiting and helped make dinner. It wasn't a good one. I didn't like having my snout bopped over and over. You don't like it. Nopony liked it, and it was mostly just there because it had been there so long, everypony figured there was a reason for not kicking it out, and I'm pretty sure the biggest reason was to hear the next pony down the generation line say 'Ow!' It's gone. Why does anypony have to get their snout bopped by their own hoof again?"
The farmer blinked.
"Get a new one," her oldest friend placidly suggested. "Or at least something different."
"Ah know it wasn't perfect," Applejack slowly said. "Nowhere close. But it worked, Pinkie. Old ain't necessarily perfect, but new ain't always better. You've seen what happens with first-generation conveniences, when somepony decides they've got the right spell t' make life a little easier. Usually jus' gets a lot louder."
"Some of them," Pinkie agreed. "But not all. And there always has to be somepony willing to try what hasn't been done before." A little more softly, "Or there's no Acres, no Ponyville, and you probably can't be a Bearer because the last one to have your necklace might not have been an earth pony, and then we could start talking about your dating..."
She smiled. And after so many years of knowing the baker, it no longer surprised Applejack to find herself doing the same.
"Y'made your point," she declared, and squinted a little harder as she tried to focus through the shop's dusty front windows. "Is that Apple Bloom goin' by?"
Pinkie turned. "I see a small yellow blur," she reported. "Towing a small brown blur. On turning blurs."
"Close enough," Applejack decided. "Guess Ratchette sent her out for parts. So somethin' new?"
"Or at least different -- oh, look at this!" The slightly-overweight body carefully knelt down. "I found one!"
"A spinner?" The farmer cautiously began to move closer.
"Yeah! It's the same model the Cakes use!"
"Ain't sure Ah've seen it," Applejack admitted as she approached. (The Cakes believed in hospitality for their guests and for some reason, that stretched out to not letting visitors do any of the work.) "Is it a good one?" Because if the Cakes were using it...
"It's..." Pinkie hesitated. "...it does the job. But it's sort of -- you kind of have to get used to it, I guess. And I've been using it for a long time. Years. So I'm used to it. Almost. I think another two, three, five decades might do it."
Applejack stopped.
"...how does it work?"
"Well, they all have to be spun up, right? Because that's how you get the water off! The rotation whips everything through the cradle and it gets caught in the bigger bowl. So --" Pinkie's head tilted "-- you see this little mouth grip? The one shaped sort of like a fruit bat's wings? It's attached to a coil of rope, like your lasso! Only most of it is under the lid. With the other end tied to the cradle. So when you pin it under a hoof so it won't go rattling all over the place, and you get your teeth on the grip..."
She carefully bit down, making sure to match the exact tooth impressions of the previous owner. (Ms. Flip generally wore a magnifying monocle for purposes of inspection, and also to see if the customer had a stray tenth-bit in any corner of the saddlebags.) Whipped her head to the right.
There was a spinning sound as the rope extended, reached its maximum length, and Pinkie's head was pulled back towards the outer bowl. Whipped again with extra force, got yanked by the recoil, whipped over and over...
Soft pink fur rippled as the baker finally let go. Forelegs shifted, and straightened on the third attempt.
"Wooo," Pinkie dazedly said. "Wooo. Wooo..."
"Pinkie?"
"...wooo..."
"Y'okay there?"
"I whip my mane back and forth," the baker tunelessly singsonged. "I whip my mane back and forth..."
"...you're the one who usually makes the salads, right?"
"Dizzy..." Pinkie declared, and Applejack moved to block the reeling form just before it hit a very expensive shelf. "...yeah. The Cakes do so much work on all the baked goods, so I try to do as much as I can for meals..."
Applejack thought about all the things which had just been explained, and then very carefully mentioned none of them.
"Ain't sure that's the one for me," she told her friend as the internal Hearth's Warming gift list went through a sudden revision. "Or for you."
"Maybe," Pinkie considered, which was followed by "I whip my mane --"
"-- an' Ah think you jus' found the most annoying song ever. So a new type of spinner?"
"Sure, if you want to try one!" The pink body tilted to the left. "I -- whip my mane...?"
"-- an' Ah'm takin' you home."
She wound up supporting Pinkie most of the way to the bakery, although some extra help arrived when Ponyville's residents discovered that the mass of interposing bodies went a long way towards stopping the song.
New stuff. Now who's gonna be the one who has t' keep up with new?
The unicorn's skin seemed to be flushing green under the white fur, and might have appeared that way even without the distorted light which had passed through the new curved glass container resting just inside the Boutique's largest window.
"I," Rarity declared as the tank gurgled, "do not use a spinner. At all. My apologies, Applejack, but I cannot grant you a recommendation for an item which I do not possess, and I feel you would find my own method unsuitable. As such, there is no way for me to assist you in this endeavor." The designer thoughtfully paused. "Unless you are seeking assistance in negotiating your price...?"
Ponies had a variety of reactions to Rarity's negotiations, and most of them were based around making it stop. "Ain't sure Ah need the help there," Applejack carefully said, because there were still shop owners who didn't hide in their stockrooms when the designer crossed the threshold and it was probably best to keep it that way. "But --" and took a moment to not look at the water tank, along with what was floating within "-- what's your 'method'? 'cause Ah know y'eat salads, an' y'ain't going out for every meal. Y'cook for yourself most of the time, an' when we do eat out together..."
She paused, because Honesty required the truth, and maintaining friendships occasionally required keeping her mouth tightly shut.
Rarity's sniff could probably be described as a ladylike one, at least by anypony who wasn't bearing a rather exacting Element. "I am aware that I prefer my salads to be crisp, thank you."
An' so is every server an' chef you've sent one back on. Pretty sure the record was five times. Heard the crying comin' out of the kitchen after the third. "Right. So how are y'making 'em at home without a spinner? Unicorn magic? Ain't heard of a working which would do it."
The designer nodded. "Liquids tend to become tangled up in coronas. They flow along the borders, and when the effort is released... well, they have to fall somewhere. So no, Applejack: I have no spell for the drying of vegetables and produce, for such is not a unicorn domain, and to brush the water away with my field is to eventually wind up mopping the floor. And spinners..." White fur shivered. "...have you considered how those work? Liquid flying about in a confined space, rebounding back to the source! Dirty water carrying some of the essence of the plant's flavor away, to rest as filth and stain within the bowl! And should one use too much water for the rinse, one leaves their meal soaking in a soup of putrescence, because to expect that all the dirt would be removed on a single rinse is unrealistic. Also, if one places multiple types into the spinner, allowing for pre-preparation cross-contamination..."
The rupophobe shuddered again, and the left eyelash took the chance for its first slip. The tank gurgled again, and the light shifted ever-greener.
"Unacceptable," Rarity declared. "So I do not use spinners. At all. I also do not see fit to devote funds towards the purchase of a device, especially given my recent sales issues added to the basic knowledge that disposal of liquid has not become a unicorn domain since we began this discussion. And I trust that the highest-class restaurants have their own methods of avoiding such issues in order to pass what I would consider to be a rather basic health inspection -- what are you thinking about?"
It was a rather basic trick, and so it was one Applejack was ready for. "Nothin' Ah feel like sayin'," qualified for an honest answer, and was also considerably better than Ah know how tough y'are, Ah know how much y'can go through without breakin', an' you're still the most neurotic mare Ah've ever seen. An' we both know Fluttershy, so maybe y'should think 'bout that one real hard. "So what do y'do?"
Rarity took a long look around the customer-bereft Boutique, with the steady gaze easily skimming across the new tank. Shrugged, moved for the ramp towards the upper level, and swished her tail in a signal for Applejack to follow.
"There," the unicorn said as the corona around her horn winked out. "The rest is simply patience."
Applejack was still looking up.
"It takes a certain amount of practice, of course," Rarity added. "As one does not wish to do damage to the leaves. And while I am aware that your mandible dexterity is rather impressive and mean no insult -- especially as we are both aware that you can accomplish things which I never will -- this does strike me as the sort of feat which might require a field to enact."
Staring, really.
"There is also," the designer finished, "the matter of getting them down again."
Orange ears twitched, and did so in exact concert with every drip.
"Ah guess," Applejack carefully said, "it works for you."
"That it does," Rarity agreed.
"An' there ain't really many ponies in town who could manage it."
"Possibly true."
"At the absolute minimum," Applejack considered, "there's ownership requirements."
With mild confusion, "Such as...?"
"For starters? Pretty sure you're the only mare in town who's got enough clothespins. An' rigging up a dryin' line over a miniature trough, lettin' the whole arrangement jus' drip-dry..."
Which, as words went, was still an improvement over All of mah friends are insane.
An' Ah'm friends with 'em.
Not sure that says anythin' good 'bout me.
...actually, they've probably all thought the same thing at some point.
Sure that don't say anythin' good 'bout me.
"It does produce wonderful results, though," Rarity allowed. "Although it requires a great deal of advance notice and is in fact the reason I seldom have salads at home. So. If there is nothing else?"
She was Honesty, and that meant there were things she shouldn't say. Words which had to go forever unvoiced, because friendships were precious and no matter how -- 'odd' fit -- Rarity could sometimes be, she was still Applejack's friend. Besides, there was an argument to be made that a known workaholic with abandonment issues wasn't in a good position to be kicking any stones.
There were things Applejack didn't say. And there were others where she simply couldn't resist.
"That water tank on the sales floor. How long have y'had that?"
"About a week," the designer admitted. "It actually arose from a conversation I had with Zecora. Are you aware that most shopkeepers in Pundamilia Makazi set out a basket of edibles for their patrons? Including those which sell food. It is considered to be an act of basic hospitality, and I felt it was something which would reflect well on the Boutique. However, when it comes to food, I must be careful." With the softest of snorts, "Customers have been known to stain my creations with careless manipulations: providing something they can use to smear seemed to work against me. Additionally, I have enough difficulty with endless browsing without adding an eternity of grazing. So -- liquid refreshment. That seemed best."
"Serving cold drinks," Applejack summarized.
"Exactly. It has been rather well-received --"
"-- an' what was that floatin' in the water?"
"Cucumber slices and lettuce leaves," Rarity proudly declared. "An infusion of their essence, adding a feeling of extra coolness and renewal to every sip. I have been partaking with fair regularity --"
The designer stopped. Blue eyes slammed shut, and then very slowly opened again.
"You can shut up now," Rarity crossly stated.
"Didn't say a word," the farmer countered.
Through gritted teeth, "Your smile is extremely loud."
"Ah can't hear a thing."
"It is not cross-contamination. It is also not allowing them to drift within their own filth. It is infusion. That is completely different."
"Really."
"YES."
"An'... could y'explain how, exactly?"
Silence.
"Applejack?"
"Still waitin' on that explanation," the grinning mare stated. "Any time you're ready --"
"Leave."
She did. But she hid behind a tree just long enough to see the tank's contents being tipped out to soak the grass behind the Boutique and, just before the back door slammed shut, even managed to catch a hint of the retching.
In rapidly-approaching retrospect, none of it was Rainbow's fault. The pegasus had simply possessed no reason to think (along with just about the same amount of initiative) and besides, anypony who asked Rainbow for advice was arguably also Asking For It. But the weather coordinator had spotted Applejack trotting towards home, swooped down to see what was going on, the natural subject had arisen...
The pegasus' eyes seemed to be unusually wide.
"Huh," the hovering mare declared. "That's a problem? Seriously?"
Anatomically speaking, Applejack wasn't strictly sure she had hackles: she only knew she was forcing something back down. "And it ain't one for you?" Of course, given that at least eighty percent of Rainbow's meals were cooked by other ponies (most of whom now fully understood that somepony might be dropping by for a visit-and-mooch at any given moment), there was every chance that she'd never used a spinner.
The answering head shake came across as slightly stunned, and the vocal end added to that impression: a mare who'd just been told that everypony else in the world had been under the impression that Sun raised itself. "It's never been a problem for anypony! Not in Cloudsdale! I don't believe --" This head shake was considerably faster: sections of the prismatic mane briefly blurred their way through the color wheel. "It's easiest just to show you! Wait right here!"
"Rainbow, Ah've gotta head home. Spinner or no, it's 'bout time t' put dinner up --"
"Oh, yeah!" The cyan head tilted curiously to the right. "What are we having?"
Don't facehoof. The truth was that Rainbow was perfectly welcome at the Acres: the annoying part was that Applejack occasionally had to be reminded not to set a place for her in advance, because Pinkie had been issuing long-overdue cooking lessons and allowing the pegasus to eat over too often was now offering a point of retreat. "Rainbow --"
"-- let it be a surprise! Seriously, wait right here! If I knew this was a problem, I would have brought it up years ago! I've just gotta go home and get mine!"
"Get your what -- ?"
-- and the streak was already heading for the horizon, accelerating fast under greying sky as late-autumn Sun continued to dip.
Ah'm gonna regret this. Ah know it. All Ah get t' choose is where.
(She was wrong. 'When' was also an option.)
...well, all things considered, it was probably best to have it happen outside.
She waited, because morbid curiosity had its own gravity and in this case, the pull was effectively rooting her to the spot. And after a few minutes...
Aw, no...
Rainbow's grin resembled that of a proud parent, and that warm emotion was directed towards the last thing Applejack wanted to see: a basket woven from widely-spaced copper wire, with thicker pieces arcing up into what looked like a pair of mouth grips. There were multiple pieces of produce occupying the interior, and it was easy to identify all of them: the thin slice of cloud which supported everything had been left at the farmer's eye level.
The entire arrangement was sitting in a large glass bowl. Applejack wasn't sure why. There was a tiny chance that Rainbow had just felt like being artistic.
"This," the pegasus gleefully crowed, "is in every pegasus household! -- well, all the ones in Cloudsdale. And I just took it for granted, Applejack! When everypony back home has one, you just think it's normal!"
"Ah've got one," Applejack said, and marveled at the hollowness in her voice.
Rainbow blinked. "You do?"
"Yeah. We call it the old one. No idea jus' how old." She shuddered. "Too old, leave it at that. Mine ain't copper, but it works the same way, Rainbow. Y'put the stuff in, y'grip the top between your teeth, y'go outside, an' then y'whip your head back an' forth, y'whip your head --"
"Applejack?"
"-- stupid earworm... point is, Rainbow, y'shake it until all the water comes off an' it feels like your head's gonna go with it. Ah could barely stand the wood one we had, kept it too long, an' Ah still ain't goin' t' the basket. So if that's what Cloudsdale uses, then Ah figure most of the drizzles under the city is jus' y'all havin' lunch, an' Ah for one am gonna look for anything else --"
"-- it doesn't work like that!" Rainbow grinned. "You've never seen one like this, Applejack! This is a wonder!"
It had been a long day, and so it took a moment to dredge up the term: an item enchanted by pegasi, their equivalent to a unicorn device or an earth pony's talisman. Something which invoked that form of magic...
...dealing with water ain't a unicorn domain.
It's theirs.
A surge of pure Hope moved towards the surface, and found Experience too stunned to block the way.
"Let me just show you!" Rainbow offered. "Hang on! I need some water --" which meant a quick trip up, followed by pushing several clouds into each other: the merger started at grey and rapidly surged towards black. "-- and here we go!" The weather coordinator positioned the final result about three times her own height over the bowl. "I just need a good pour here..." She moved out of sight, heading for the top.
The strange sound of hooves bouncing on clouds -- and then water cascaded from the dark mass, with the localized torrent mostly landing in the glass bowl.
"I figured it would be more impressive if you could see how much was coming down!" Rainbow called out as the container rapidly moved towards overflow. "The wetter, the better! But as soon as the water stops..."
The cloud's borders stopped shifting as the jolts ended. The downpour trickled to a halt. And the copper --
-- it wasn't a flash, nor was there any kind of true light involved: nothing which might have been expected from a corona. Instead, there was a soft crackle, like hooves being dragged across an exceptionally thick carpet. And then the produce was dry. Completely dry, without even the smallest bead of water on any surface. The wire shone, the bowl was empty, and the entire perfectly dry assembly was sitting quietly upon what Applejack failed to see as a somewhat thicker slice of cloud. She was too busy looking at her dream.
"...Rainbow?"
"Isn't it great? And I never knew you didn't have one! Does everypony on the ground use something else?" A little more thoughtfully, "Because there's probably a lot of demand. Maybe if I talked to Mr. Rich and asked about getting in contact with some wholesalers --"
"-- what we're havin' for dinner," Applejack dreamily said, "is whatever y'want. Can y'do that again? Show the family?"
"Sure! I've just got to get set up! We'll put it in the kitchen, right? Just where mine usually is, and where yours is gonna be." The sleek head peeked over the edge of the somewhat-lightened cloud. "But we should get there before Apple Bloom does, so I'll have prep time." Thoughtfully, "Which still might give us a while. I went over her on the way back and she was trotting pretty slowly. I think Ratchette's got her on something tough."
"Set up inside," Applejack responded, sticking to the part she'd actually heard. "Yeah, that's fine. Ah want Granny t' see this an' it'll be too cold tonight t' do it under Moon. How long t' get one shipped?"
"Probably two weeks. It usually takes me one to get anything my parents mail, so two both ways. Unless Spike helps, and then we can cut that in half." The pegasus grinned. "And we're having dumplings. Plus we'll start with a salad. Now that you know how to make one."
"Yeah," Applejack replied, too distracted by miracle to consider countering any degree of Ego. "Let's show 'em jus' how this works!"
"Ah guess that showed 'em," Applejack calmly said.
Rainbow didn't say anything. (Technically, she couldn't.)
The rest of the family was staring at them. Staring helped. For starters, it allowed the observers to take in more of what they were looking at, and larger surfaces had presumably collected a thinner sheen of the results.
"Y'know," the farmer patiently considered from atop her current struggling perch, "Ah've learned a lot 'bout pegasus magic, the last few moons. How some of it works, an' how it don't. Y'told me, back in Trotter's Falls, remember? Y'don't create or destroy things. Clouds is puttin' the humidity in the air into a different package. Changin' the seasons is transferring a whole lot of heat. It's all movin' stuff, ain't it? From one place t' another."
The pegasus struggled a little more.
"So when you've got that wonder in a cloud house," Applejack mused, watching the newest river making its way down the wall (although she had to do so through the fall which was still streaming from the rim of her hat), "an' the moisture is what keeps the house together... it's a good thing t' have. Because it jus' moves the water. All the liquid that was in your spinner becomes part of the cloud. Reinforces it. It's food processing an' kitchen maintenance in one package. Gotta admit, Rainbow, that's a great deal."
Apple Bloom blinked a few times. A current of sludgy machine oil ran through her fur, which blended nicely with the saturated liniment which was dripping from Granny's bad hip.
"Y'never thought 'bout that," the farmer considered. "Because it was part of everyday life, every day, an' y'didn't have t' think 'bout it. Ah understand that. Ah even understand why y'didn't think of it before y'put your spinner on the counter, brought the cloud in, an' started the flow goin'. It's a natural mistake, really, an' that's why Ah'm not really mad at you. There was no way you were gonna realize that when your wonder goes off, when there ain't a cloud under it... the water's still gotta go somewhere."
Macintosh shook his tail. Drops flew, quickly becoming lost in all of the other drops.
"Which in this case," Applejack peacefully added, "is all over the kitchen."
And drippings. And rivulets. Plus the odd cascade.
A segment of snout worked its way out from under Applejack's tail.
"So if it's not my fault," Rainbow said, "then why are you sitting on me?"
"'cause y'usually make a break for it before the cleanup. An' we're gonna need some help with cleaning up."
"I was just going to get Scootaloo! I thought she could use a little extra tutoring. In stuff. With water. And --"
Applejack waited.
"-- stuff..."
Patiently.
"I'm still getting dinner, right?" the snout huffily asked.
"Yep."
"Thanks."
"Ain't nothin'."
Three dishes slipped out of the drying rack, mostly because there really wasn't any point to being there.
"Sorry."
All mah friends are insane.
"Not your fault," Applejack reminded her.
"Earth ponies are heavier than usual, right?"
"Yep."
"Oh. So you're all a bale-ton of bricks. Good to know. Now get off me!"
"And you gave her the dumplings anyway, right?" Twilight smiled as the mares trotted down the brightly-lit Cookery section of Haydocks.
"Ah promised," Applejack shrugged. "An' really, it wasn't her fault." She glanced backwards, and did so almost in time to spot three extremely nervous stallions diving behind crockery. (The shivering results, however, stood out nicely through the hoof loops.) "Ah mean, she was talkin' all the way t' the house 'bout how she'd keep it charged for us, 'cause that's a problem for most stuff that's enchanted. But she didn't have any reason t' say 'And by the way, you'll have to spend every minute in your kitchen standing in fog'."
The alicorn giggled, and three poorly-hidden stallions became that much more nervous.
To describe the situation as something like 'technically speaking, the Bearers weren't welcome in Haydocks' was a minor lie: the group had been outright banned. (Applejack kept a mental list of all the places they were no longer allowed, and too many of the stores in the Heart had found their way onto it. Shopping in Canterlot usually required careful budgeting and in the case of six mares and one dragon, some rather hasty detours around inconvenient sight lines.) There had been an Incident some time back, involving a holiday gift craze which had no right to continued existence. The group had led the charge on the Returns desk, and -- well, every establishment had the right to refuse service to anypony, and something about the ensuing mini-riot had encouraged the department store to abuse it.
They weren't welcome in the spacious store, a place which typically had salesponies waiting to help you at every turn (unlike Ms. Flip's establishment, where the owner generally materialized upon scenting bits) -- but that status had been applied prior to the manifestation of wings. And no matter how Twilight felt about the title which so many still tried to assign her, an elite shopping emporium in Canterlot had every reason to be nervous about the prospect of kicking out an alicorn.
There were security personnel following them at a distance, both waiting for something to go wrong and hoping it would happen in a way which gave all of the responsibility for their departure to somepony else.
"Did you ask Fluttershy for help?" Twilight inquired. "It sounded like you got to just about everypony else."
"Yeah," Applejack sighed. "Her answer don't work for me neither."
The little alicorn curiously inclined her head. "Why? I've seen her kitchen. I didn't really notice any spinner --" and now a light blush was highlighting the fur "-- because I'm not much of a cook, but I didn't see anything unusual either."
"Ah've seen it too. Y'know what neither of us got t' see? How it's used."
Brief silence. Terrified sales personnel cleared out in waves, lest they suggest something which a Princess of unknown tastes might not want.
"I don't get it," Twilight admitted.
"How many animals d'you think she's got at the cottage? The ones who don't fend for themselves on eatin' an' can't jus' be settled with a bag of feed."
Twilight had to think about that one. "It's a big variable. Time of year, number of temporary guests with injuries who're just staying long enough to heal, and with your conditions..." Her wings twitched in rough concert with rapid thoughts. "Maybe fifty?"
"Call it that," Applejack nodded. "Least for an estimate. Means mealtime is kind of a big production. An' since she's got herbivores, plus every other type of eater..."
The librarian blinked.
"How does she manage all of them?"
"She don't."
"But she has to," Twilight protested. "They're all fed --"
"-- there's raccoons."
Two pegasi survivors of The Refund Rebound took shelter behind the ceiling fans.
"Raccoons," Twilight tried.
"Yeah. 'cause they're on the smart side an' the ones with the closest things t' hands. And that's all Ah wanna say 'bout it." Applejack shuddered. "Ever. Y'want the details, y'drop by before mealtime an' watch."
Confused, "So how are they dealing with the --"
"Ever."
The horrified silence got them to the salad spinners.
"So Ah jus' thought Ah'd ask for your help on this one," Applejack said as they both looked at the gleaming items on the well-polished shelves. "Since we're both in the capital today an' y'know the most 'bout devices, y'could tell me what t' avoid on the enchanted ones."
Twilight slowly shook her head. "I know the principles, Applejack. Ratchette knows more about enchantments than I do, because that's her mark. I've never tried to make a device --" paused, and the blush deepened "-- since I left school. And when it comes to using salad spinners, I don't."
"Y'eat salad," Applejack pointed out. "So you've gotta --"
Twilight's horn ignited, and pinkish light twisted into the rough shape of a clawed hand. It waved.
"-- oh."
The librarian smiled. "He hates it, though. We've got one that's a lot like your old piece, and... well, he can just grab the wheel, but he says he has to pretty much lean all his weight into it to keep it from going all over the counter. And when he was younger, it used to take him with it." And sighed a little. "We could use a better one ourselves, just to make it easier on him. It's overdue."
"What about enchanted stuff?" Applejack asked. "Or jus' using your own magic?"
"It doesn't do much," Twilight replied. "I mean, I can turn the wheel and hold down the spinner: the hard part is keeping the pace constant and not letting any distractions get in. But that puts me in the kitchen, and that's really Spike's territory. I don't want to take it away from him. Rotating the inner basket and nothing else... you'd have to enchant it to move on its own, because anypony doing it from the outside is going through a closed container and if you leave one little part open to let a field in, that's where the water comes out. But that's about the most magic does here, Applejack. I know some of the ones here are set up like that, because I can feel the thaums." With a small smile, "And read the labels. But honestly, that's it. A trigger from the outside, and it turns at a set speed for a while. They don't even feel like very strong enchantments and without platinum, you'd always be running out of thaums. I could power it for you, but..."
She nodded towards one of the sleekest models: something almost crystalline in bowl and basket, leaving the empty space at the center perfectly visible. The lid silently raised, set itself off to the side, and the inner basket began to slowly turn.
"That's about the most you could expect," Twilight stated as the motion gradually accelerated. "At least if you didn't want to charge it every other day. These are weak, Applejack. For what's in stock here, hoof power means more than magic."
Applejack regretfully looked at the turning basket, which wasn't moving fast enough to fling that much moisture away.
Then she looked again.
"I think Apple Bloom's been trying to work it out too," the librarian added. "She's been in the library a few times, from when you said the last one broke. And some of the books she's been asking for are --"
"-- that's a little weird, ain't it?"
The little alicorn frowned.
"Weird how?"
"No glow," Applejack indicated. "Ain't normal, not for your kind of magic. Even Tank's rotor goes all sunlight-yellow when it gets fired up."
"Well, you know who did that one," Twilight pointed out. "That's the color it should be."
"But this," Applejack continued, nodding towards the basket (which was moving faster now), "doesn't have any hue. Is that what costs so much? Not breakin' up the lighting in the kitchen?"
"No," Twilight whispered. "That's just me."
Uh-oh.
"You," Applejack softly said.
"I want to show you what it looked like in use," the little alicorn quietly answered. "And I thought they'd be mad if I ran down the charge. So I started it spinning. And I hid my field so nopony would be mad about my using magic on the merchandise. That's all."
"Hid your field."
The spindle was beginning to hum.
"Yes," replied the confused librarian.
"Like durin' your first Wrap-Up, right?" emerged from the center of rising horror. "On the snowplow. Y'made your magic invisible so Ah wouldn't know it was more than your body pushin' things along."
"...yes," the still-embarrassed mare admitted. "I said I was sorry --"
"-- and the snowplow went out of control," the farmer added, "'cause hidin' your field changes how the magic works. Y'changed it so much that y'couldn't figure out how t' counter yourself, an' the thing jus' went faster an' faster..."
Rapidly-widening purple eyes desperately looked into green, found no solution there, and frantically switched focus to a spinning, vibrating, still-accelerating basket, something which was now visibly higher on the spindle. The librarian's horn visibly ignited, corona surging and twisting into curves as lumens flew in all directions and the security guards tried to figure out how they could move in a way which would somehow absolve them of whatever happened next --
She's a good pony. One of the best. Lookin' for lessons every day an' still writing most of 'em down, jus' in case.
Ah love you like family, Twi. An' you're one of the smartest mares Ah've ever seen. But all mah friends are insane.
The basket, moving so quickly as to turn the sides into a continual blur, began to rise out of the bowl.
An' there's still some ways where you're jus' a really slow learner.
It took quite a bit of time before Applejack could head home (although nowhere near as much as it took for the Haydocks staff to pick the last remnants of the bowl out of the ceiling. The one three floors up). The amount lost was more than enough to miss dinner, although the Canterlot holding cells served a surprisingly good spread and the officers had been nice enough to send word ahead to the Acres.
She had the last part of the trot to herself. Twilight had gone with her to the edge of the Acres, apologizing just about all the way -- but then she'd had to take care of her own sibling, and it left Applejack with some time under Moon. Time in which to have what normally might have turned into deep thoughts and in this case, wound up mostly being about salad spinners. Because the broken one had been painful to use and annoying just to think about plus she was almost certain it had its own smirk, but it had functioned and...
There was a lot of good to be found in the new. There was a lot of bad seen when looking back at the old. And there were also times when the conditions seemed to switch places.
Salad spinners.
She could see it now. Standing outside in winter, teeth on the basket grips, flinging drops of cold water into her own fur as she whipped her head back and forth, whipped her head back and forth...
...thanks a lot, Pinkie. Ah owe you one.
Ah think Ah owe you the one 'bout the hedgehog. An' we'll see how long it takes you t' get that out of your head.
Of course, the twins had some degree of vocabulary now, tended to repeat anything they heard and with Applejack's luck...
...the lights were still on in the kitchen, and anypony waiting up for her generally did so in the sitting room. Somepony had probably left the devices running.
Applejack sighed, then diverted her approach path. The kitchen had its own door: she could shut things down as soon as she got inside. Get some sleep, get back to work the next day (for the dwindling amount which offered itself as winter approached), plan out the meals...
No salad.
She opened the door, and gleaming aluminum reflected light into her eyes.
Apple Bloom blearily looked up from her place on the floor, curled up next to (and almost around) the bowl, her mane partially draped across the hinged lid. The little black topper platform, however, stuck up through the hair, and it took the filly a moment to untangle herself.
"Mornin'," was the first offering, followed by an exhausted "Is it after midnight? 'cause then it's mornin'. Technically. Lost track while Ah was waitin' --"
"-- what is that?"
"New spinner," the filly tried to proudly declare: it mostly emerged as a semi-prideful yawn.
"From where?"
"From me."
The eldest daughter stared at the bowl. Looked at her sister, and then went back to the bowl because that was somehow easier.
"Mostly me," the apprentice mechanic yawned. "Ah... did most of the design. But Miss Ratchette, she had some ideas, and Mr. Stile, he makes most of her specialized tools, so he put this t'gether. Said he wasn't using aluminum for much of anythin', an' he knew how t' make it safe for food. It's light an' it's strong. Ah think it'll hold up."
"The black thing..." Applejack tried.
"This one stays on the floor," Apple Bloom wearily explained. "Weighted so it won't shake much, plus there's a little frame y'can add if we need it. But it also shouldn't shake 'cause your hoof is gonna be on top of it. Springs goin' into gears, y'see. Y'press down, the basket spins. Lift, it comes back up, an' y'press again. Like steppin'. Tried it back at the fix-it shop. Works fine."
She slowly pushed herself up, forelegs first. It took two attempt to find her hoofing.
"So that's for you," she said. "For all of us, from me. 'cause the last one came from family, an' Ah thought -- wouldn't hurt t' have the next one be the same. Same way. Not the same spinner. 'cause that last one was horrible. Ah hope y'like it. That it hangs on long enough for somepony else t' like it. An'... Ah'm goin' t' bed. G'night."
She staggered out of the kitchen, with her older sister wordlessly staring at flanks which weren't quite ready to blaze with light. Not just yet, but... soon enough. And after a while, Applejack went to bed.
It wasn't immediate. It had been a long trot home, and she wanted a crisp salad. Which was exactly what she got.
A pony's as smart as a predator...
Even so, a lot of things could sneak up on Applejack.
