It had been a long week for everypony.
Harvest season at Sweet Apple Acres meant work. More work than any one pony could manage. More work than a team of ponies could be reasonably expected to manage. They needed all hooves on deck, especially in the last week. The apples had to come down when they were ready and they wouldn’t stop for anything. Not even a week-long Wonderbolts exhibition in Griffonstone.
The train back hadn’t gotten to Ponyville until almost two in the morning. Dash didn’t get to the farm until the sun was high in the sky and she couldn’t put it off any longer.
Dash set down between trees that had been full of apples when she left and trotted to the door, the weight of the work she didn’t do slowing her steps. She knocked, and did the one thing she hated the most - she waited. A pony as fast as Dash had to wait a lot. Even if she took nap breaks and didn’t start anything until the last minute, she always finished in first place -- and that meant waiting for second place and everything beyond.
Applejack opened the door, and her tired expression softened the moment she saw who was there.
“Sugarcube, you know you don’t need to knock,” she said. “Come on in. You just get back into town?”
“I got back last night,” Dash admitted sheepishly. “I didn’t think you’d want me stomping around in the middle of the night.”
“I might’ve slept a little better with a feather blanket,” Applejack said. She pulled Dash into a hug. “How’d the show go?”
Dash smiled. “It would have been more fun with my number one fan watching.”
“I’d offer you some breakfast, darlin, but we’re gettin’ on to lunchtime.” She let go. “Glad you’re back safe though.”
“I’m sorry about… you know.” Dash scratched her head. “Not being here.”
“Mac and Bloom picked up the slack well enough,” Applejack assured her. “They’re used to handlin’ the chores on their own. Besides, you weren’t nappin’ in a tree skippin’ work, you were bustin’ your flank out West.”
“Yeah, if I was here I probably would have just… gotten in the way,” Dash said. She tried to make it sound like a joke.
Applejack kissed her cheek.
“I must be some kind of good influence on you,” Applejack said. “I ain’t never seen you feel this guilty about missing out on work.”
“I just don’t like leaving you in the lurch.”
“You don’t make the schedules, you just fly ‘em. Better than anypony else alive, or so I’m constantly reminded.” She smirked. “Unless you think there’s some new recruit about to take your top spot.”
Dash snorted. “Are you kidding? I have to put them through the hardest boot camp the Wonderbolts have ever had just to make sure they can keep up with me.”
“That sounds like the Dash I love,” Applejack said. “I don’t wanna see no more mopin’ around, you hear? With the season over we finally got time to spend time with each other!”
“I like the sound of that,” Dash said.
“Good.” Applejack nodded firmly. “How about I make you a snack, and you can go through the stack of mail with your name on it?”
She hadn’t even filed a change of address form. It had just started showing up at the farm one day, like Derpy could sense how close they were getting before they’d even made it official. Dash flipped through the stack of letters. All the fanmail went to her Wonderbolts mailbox, which meant this was all boring junk mail and bills. Almost all of it.
“What’s this?” Dash pulled out an envelope that didn’t fit with the rest. She tore it open and started reading the hoof-written pages.
She didn’t realize how much time had passed until Applejack put the plate of sliced apples and cheese down in front of her.
“What’s that, darlin?” Applejack asked.
“This is going to sound really weird, but somepony wrote me asking for farming advice,” Dash said.
“Come again?”
“You heard me. She says her crops just aren’t growing like they should and she really needs help.”
Applejack sat next to Dash. “Did she put the wrong name on the envelope? Cause no offense, sugarcube, much as I like having you around when we need somethin’ done lickety-split, you ain’t really the type to nurse an ailin’ apple tree back to health.”
“Well that’s the thing,” Dash said. “She’s a cloud farmer.”
Applejack frowned, scrunching her nose. “I thought clouds were made in them weather factories.”
“There are wild clouds, but yeah, you’re not wrong. She doesn’t farm clouds, she farms on clouds.”
“On clouds. As in, not in the ground? How the buck does that work?”
“If you’re feeling fancy, you call it aeroponics. You sort of make an extra-dense cloud layer with the right conditions and you can plant crops in them.” Dash mimed what she thought planting seeds looked like, which she should have been able to get right since she saw it all the time.
“Still don’t explain why she’d ask a Wonderbolt for help,” Applejack pointed out.
“She says she’s a friend of my Dad’s,” Dash said. “I’m going to go out on a limb here and say he talked me up like I could do anything. She sounds pretty desperate, though. I think she realized he was all talk and decided to write to me anyway, just in case I actually could help her out.”
“You gonna write her back?” Applejack asked. “Be rude to leave a girl hanging.”
“She’s going to lose her farm if the crop fails,” Dash said. “I can’t just do nothing when a pony is asking me for help. What should I tell her to do? You know more about this kind of thing than I do. You even stopped that blight a few years back all on your own.”
Applejack blushed. “I don’t like to brag, darlin’. I ain’t been afraid to ask for help when I needed it. Sometimes.”
“So what do I say?”
“You tell her you ain’t got anything on your schedule for the next week and that when you show up, you’re bringin’ expert help,” Applejack said. “I ain’t never met a farm I couldn’t fix, especially with a pony like you by my side.”
“Thanks, AJ.” Dash kissed her cheek. “You’re the best.”
“Course I am. Now eat your apple. I saved that one special for you - best of the whole crop.”
“What’s this place called again?” Applejack asked, as she carefully stepped off the airship and onto the dock, the wood bobbing just a little under her hooves while she walked, all too aware of the drop to either side.
“Costa del Tierra,” Dash said. “It’s one of the lowest-flying cloud cities! Lots of visitors, which is why you’re not falling through the dock.”
“Startin’ to think we should have asked Twi to cast a cloudwalkin’ spell on me,” Applejack said.
“There should be somepony here who can help,” Dash said. “Twi said the spell only lasts for a day or two, so if we can’t find somepony local, we’d only have a couple of hours tops to even look at the problem. I might be fast, but you taught me if you want a job done properly you can do it quickly but you can’t do it rushed.”
“I must’ve beaten a lot more wisdom into you than I remembered,” Applejack said.
“Eh,” Dash blushed. “I know good advice when I hear it.”
“Let’s take a look around, then,” Applejack said. “Should be close to the docks, right? Wouldn’t catch the tourists otherwise.”
“Yeah!” Dash agreed. “Just like putting the merch booth right near the exit of a Wonderbolts show.”
“Knew you’d work your expertise in there somewhere,” Applejack said. “Hey, what are those?” She pointed at a stand under a bright blue tent, with balsa-wood crates overflowing with fruits and vegetables. Or at least Applejack assumed that’s what they were. She’d never seen crops like them before.
“Oh yeah! I need to teach you about the local crops!” Dash fluttered over, hovering above the stand.
The pony behind the counter, a pegasus wearing a big, broad-rimmed sunhat, smiled and waved. “Take a look around and tell me if there’s anything you like,” he said. “I’m Blue Ribbon. Pleased to meet you.”
“I’ve never seen Dragonfly Fruit or Storm Figs this big! Oh! Here’s one you’ll like! Float Apples!”
“I thought that was a balloon,” Applejack said, taking a string leading to a bright red-green mottled ball bobbing in the breeze. “You sure these things are good for eatin’?”
“Straight from the farm,” Blue Ribbon promised. “They’re the biggest, brightest, best Float Apples you’ll ever see.”
“We’ll take two,” Dash said. “I used to love eating these when I was a filly.” She tossed him a few bits. “You know where we can find a cloudwalking spell for my marefriend?”
“Go down the dock a bit that way,” Blue Ribbon pointed. “You’ll know you’ve gone too far if you see the other fruit stand. You’re lucky you came here first!”
“Thanks!” Dash said.
Applejack waited until they were out of earshot. “Think that ‘other’ stand is what we’re here about?” she asked.
“Gotta be,” Dash said. “Hey, watch this-- there’s a trick to eating these.” She grabbed it with both forehooves. “You need to have a good grip on it, then you bite a small hole and breathe in…”
She nipped at the fruit’s skin until the Float Apple made a tiny popping sound and sucked at the hole, filling her chest.
“And then you sound like Pinkie Pie!” Dash said, her voice shifted up several octaves. “It doesn’t last long but you can get two or three breaths before they’re empty!”
Applejack grinned and sat down, trying to copy Dash. When she bit into the floating fruit, the whole thing split and made a sound like a whoopie cushion, blasting her in the face with a gust of vaguely-floral wind and knocking her hat off.
Dash laughed and grabbed Applejack’s hat before it could fall too far, swooping and putting it back on her head.
“I told you there was a trick to it,” Dash said. “You have to make a tiny hole or they pop!”
“All the fruit up here ain’t gonna be like that, right?” Applejack asked, wiping bits of the exploded fruit from her face. “I was hopin’ for somethin’ I could actually eat.”
“You can have some of mine,” Dash said. “Once they’re deflated you can eat them.” She carefully tore off a section, revealing the inside of the fruit. A thin layer of white, spongy flesh was inside the skin, along with a few strings and webs of plant guts. It put Applejack in mind of a combination of a coconut and a pumpkin.
“Thanks,” Applejack said, and she and Dash took a big bite of the flesh at the same time. And both of them made a nearly identical face, and started chewing, and kept chewing, and reluctantly swallowed.
“That, uh…” Dash hesitated.
“It tastes like tree bark an’ packing peanuts,” Applejack said, not just because she was honest to a fault but because as a farmer she was personally offended by being given what was one of the worst fruits that anypony had ever attached the word ‘Apple’ to.
“Yeah,” Dash agreed. “They’re not supposed to taste like that.”
“No, they’re not,” said a voice from a shadowy corner of the boardwalk. Well, not really a corner. It was more of a fruit stand. And it wasn’t so much shadowy as just slightly set back and brightly colored with a big pink and red banner.
A rose-colored pony with a white mane stood behind the counter. It wasn’t bare, but it was a stretch to say the stall was actually stocked. The fruit she had wasn’t as nice as at Blue Ribbon’s booth, a little softer, limper, browner. Much smaller. Less appealing. And according to the signs, almost twice the price.
“Wait a minute, you must be Rainbow Dash!” the pink pony said. “I’m Fresita! I’m the pony that wrote to you about my farm!”
She flew over to shake Dash’s hoof, so excited it went on a couple shakes longer than Dash would have wanted.
“I wasn’t sure you’d come,” Fresita said. “Things just keep getting worse and I thought I’d never get a lucky break!”
“It’s no big deal,” Dash said. “I’d have come sooner but I was out of town when your letter showed up. This is my marefriend, Applejack.”
“Howdy,” Applejack said, nodding. Fresita fluttered down to shake her hoof, too, giving Dash’s a break from the impromptu exercise.
“She’s the best farmer I know and the most trustworthy pony in Equestria. If there’s anypony who can help, it’s her,” Dash said.
“That’s great!” Fresita said. “Oh, but… she’s not a pegasus.” She frowned. “We’ll need to get her a cloudwalking pendant. Don’t worry, I’ll cover it!”
“Y’all don’t have to do that,” Applejack said.
“It’s the least I can do for all the trouble.” Fresita flitted over to the next stand, giving the pony there a few bits and getting a necklace in return.
Applejack looked at the tiny green gem hanging from the tin chain.
“They last for about a week once you activate them,” she said. “Just put it on and squeeze the gem. If it works, it’ll start glowing. That’s how you know it’s working and how strong the charge is.”
“Thank you kindly,” Applejack said. She activated it and was rewarded with a subtle, swirling glow, almost like the gem was filled with sloshing liquid light. “So, how about we go look at your fields?”
“Well, it ain’t the worst field I’ve ever seen,” Applejack said. “But it ain’t good.”
She hadn’t been sure what to expect from a cloud farm. The way Dash had explained it, she’d sort of expected a garden just growing right out of fluffy white. It was much more like a proper field, with heavy, grey stormclouds in place of turned loam, forming lines and neat rows across a few acres of lighter nimbus.
The problem was what grew out of those rows. The crops themselves were scraggly and yellowed, limp and barely supporting themselves.
“Is it some kind of blight?” Fresita asked.
“I don’t think so,” Applejack said, looking closely at the leaves. “If I had to guess, I’d say they’re not eatin’ right.”
“Oh no…” Fresita sighed. “I thought those unicorns were just talking nonsense, but if my plants really do need different fertilizer…”
“Unicorns?” Applejack asked.
“They’ve been selling some kind of plant food to Blue Ribbon,” Fresita explained. “And look at how his fields are turning out…”
She sighed and looked to the west.
The other field was set up almost identically to Fresita’s, though it was hard to tell because unlike her own half-wilted mostly-empty fields, Blue Ribbon’s crops were practically exploding from the ground. The leaves were bright green, and unripened fruits of every shape and description were hanging -- or floating, in some cases -- from the branches. It was so overgrown it was almost more like a jungle than a farm.
It wasn’t just that they were healthier, either. They were twice as big. It barely looked like they were growing the same kind of plants.
“I don’t think it could just be some fancy plant food,” Applejack said. “Hard part is that I’m workin’ half-blind up here. If we were on the ground I’d be able t’ feel around a bit, tell if things were properly hydrated and such.”
“Well they’re definitely hydrated,” Fresita said. “Clouds are made of water, you know.”
“Guess so,” Applejack sighed.
Fresita sighed. “You know, I’ve been awful rude. I’m sorry. I asked you out here and I haven’t even invited you inside yet. How about I cook you some real Costa del Tierra food? I want to treat you to how these fruits are supposed to taste.”
“That sounds great!” Dash said. “You’re in, right, AJ?”
Applejack forced herself to smile and nod.
“Things started out pretty well, but after tourist season a few years back, all my luck turned bad,” Fresita said. “I tried a few things. Rotating crops, turning over the cloud-top, I even thought about buying fresh clouds in bulk from Cloudsdale, but getting them imported all the way out here seemed silly.”
Fresita drizzled oil into a steel wok while she talked, swirling it around and waiting for it to glisten. Then she dumped in slices of a pale white vegetable and kept them moving on the high heat.
“These two unicorns claimed to have a solution to all my problems, but they were asking for a ton of bits, and I’m not going to go and get another loan when I’m just barely holding altitude,” Fresita continued. “You’re a farmer, right? You know how hard a bad season can be, and then having to pay what they want for a solution that might not even work?”
The pegasus threw in a cup of dried orange-red berries, along with some greens and dried chilis, stirring them around in the sizzling-hot oil. She tossed everything in an impressive flip before putting it on a plate and adding more oil to the wok.
“I know that feeling,” Applejack said. “When I was growin’ up we ran into too many tough times to count. We’ll figure somethin’ out. You can count on us.”
“Thank you,” Fresita said. “This’ll be ready in a jiffy!”
She added cold, already-made rice, shaking it around in the oil and letting it start to fry while she added what seemed like a random assortment of sauces and spices. It turned a golden shade of brown, and then she dumped in the veggies and fruit she’d already fried and tossed it a few times before taking it off the heat and spooning it out onto their waiting plates.
“It’s just something quick and easy, but I could use comfort food right now,” the pegasus farmer said.
“I’m not gonna complain,” Dash said. “This looks great!”
“Yeah,” Applejack said. She looked at the plate with some trepidation. That fruit she’d had on the boardwalk had stuck with her in the way eating cardboard often did. The meal in front of her had a scent she couldn’t quite place, spices that weren’t quite right, colors and shapes that were just different enough from what she was familiar with that it made her think more of bad crops than new ones.
If Applejack was one thing, it was stubborn. If she was two things, it was stubborn and a good guest. It couldn’t be any worse than Apple Bloom’s first attempts at cooking, and she’d still choked that down with a smile.
She picked up the spoon and took a careful bite.
It was sweet, spicy, and savory all at once, the sugar from the fruit balancing out the salt from the sauces, spice keeping the savory dark flavors from making the dish heavy. It was a work of contrasts keeping each other in check, totally different from the way she cooked at home, and it was delicious.
“This is amazin’!” Applejack said, taking a bigger bite and liking it even more. “Gotta admit, I was a little scared. Didn’t even recognize half of them ingredients. What are these here little berries?”
“They’re goji berries,” Fresita said. “They’re full of vitamins, and when you dry them they travel well.”
“See, this is what this stuff is supposed to taste like,” Dash said. “I don’t know what was wrong with the Float Apple we bought, but they’re supposed to be sugar sweet and sort of softer.”
“The ones Blue Ribbon sells aren’t even ripe,” Fresita said. “You have to wait until the skin loosens a little bit. That’s when they’re best for eating. The only problem is, they don’t look as good then.”
“And ponies buy with their eyes,” Applejack sighed. “It’s the only reason we sell Red Delicious apples. They look big and beautiful but the best use for ‘em is animal feed.”
“If I could get my crops looking like Blue Ribbon’s, I’d be able to convince ponies mine were worth a try,” Fresita explained. “But with the bad season I have to raise prices, and I have less fruit to choose from at the stall, so I can’t even put my best hoof forward…”
“You said two unicorns sold Blue Ribbon some kind of plant food?” Dash asked. “Did you try asking him what it was?”
“They’re still selling it to him,” Fresita said. “They’ve been staying at his house. I went over to just ask Blue his secret, one neighbor to another, but they were there the whole time. If they hadn’t done this stupid catchy song and dance, Blue might have told me to be neighborly.”
“Hey, AJ,” Dash said, slowly. “You getting a familiar feeling about this?”
“Too familiar,” Applejack sighed.
“You don’t think it could be some other unicorns who do catchy songs and dances while trying to sell ponies things, do you?”
“We’ll go over there in the mornin’ and find out,” Applejack said. “And if it ain’t them, I’ll apologize to ‘em myself.”
“Hold up,” Dash whispered, holding up a hoof. The path towards the farmhouse was like a jungle trail. The fronds and stems of the plants growing -- there was nothing sturdy enough that Applejack was willing to call it a proper trunk -- closed in on all sides, making it feel claustrophobic, like wandering off the path would get them lost in the wilds.
Applejack looked around cautiously, straining her eyes and ears for a few moments, her instincts telling her there was danger, but there couldn’t be. Not here. This was a farm, not some kind of monster island.
“What is it?” she whispered back, after seeing nothing.
Dash pointed. Among the plants was a small steel cage, glinting in the way enchanted metal did.
“It’s a varmint trap,” Applejack said.
“Yeah, but why would they need one?” Dash asked. “It’s a cloud farm. It’s not like they’re going to get bunnies eating the vegetable garden.”
“Probably some other kind of critter,” Applejack shrugged. “Anywhere there’s a farm, there’s animals trying to make off with your crops.”
“Cloud rods!” declared an excited voice from too-close by.
Applejack and Rainbow Dash jumped a little, spinning around to the source of the noise.
Two slim, almost identical unicorns stepped out onto the path. They were wearing simple pull-over suits made of something that rustled like paper, and Flim was carrying a small metal tank, Flam holding the sprayer attached to the hose coming out of it.
“They’re crop pests, a bit like locusts crossed with earthworms,” Flam explained.
“Worst of both worlds,” Flim sighed. “Burrows in clouds like an earthworm, eats its whole body weight every day like a locust.”
“I should’ve known,” Applejack said. “Actually, I did know, the second I heard about what was going on. Flim and Flam. You want to tell me how you’re conning this poor pony out of his bits or should I just start makin’ assumptions now?”
“Now that’s rude,” Flim said, shaking his head. “Isn’t that rude, brother mine?”
“It is indeed,” Flam agreed. “Here we are doing honest farm work and we’re being called con artists! She hasn’t even heard our pitch yet!”
“We don’t need to hear it!” Dash snapped. “So what is it? Let me guess! You’re spraying poison all over Fresita’s crops!”
“We are spraying, but we’re spraying these crops,” Flim said.
“You must have heard of our patented Round One Universal Crop Food,” Flam said. Flim held the tank a little higher, showing it off. “A weekly spraying with this ensures that your plants are well-fed and well-protected!”
“It’s got electrolytes!” Flim said. “It’s what plants crave!”
“As you can see it’s done a wonder for the crops in this field,” Flam said. “A wonder!”
“Of course, there are some drawbacks,” Flim admitted.
“Ah-hah!” Applejack crowed.
“The main drawback being that they’re just too tempting!” Flam said. “Thus the cloud rods.”
“We didn’t even know there were cloud rods,” Flim said. “As it happens, Round One Universal Crop Food’s electrolytes are also apparently what cloud rods crave, so we’ve been trying to catch the little pest.”
“Non-lethally, of course,” Flam said.
“That’s a likely story,” Dash growled.
“It’s the truth!” Flim said. “Flam, let’s cut the sales pitch for now.”
Flam nodded.
“We just came up here to sell plant food,” Flim said. “It’s based on some old zebra potion, but scaled up so we can mass-produce it. It works, as you can see.” He gestured to the overgrown rows of crops.
“We stayed on to work out any kinks,” Flam said. “We take pride in our product and stand by the results!”
“And Blue Ribbon got us to sign a contract to do the weekly applications for him,” Flim said. “Honest work, unfortunately for us. And since it specified we would tend to any problems caused by our formula…”
“...and that formula apparently attracts cloud rods...” Flam sighed.
“It means we’re stuck fixing it,” Flim finished. “We were hoping to make a few more local sales but it hasn’t panned out. Mister Ribbon has been kind enough to let us rent a room and one of his sheds, but it’s a narrow profit margin.”
“I don’t trust either of you none,” Applejack said, pointing at them pointedly. “I know there’s somethin’ going on here you ain’t tellin’ me. You can either spit it out now or later, but if it comes out later I’m gonna be even more cross than I am now!”
“There’s not much more to tell,” Flam said. “Look, we’re not going to reveal the secret formula to you, but it’s perfectly safe.”
“The zebras used it in crops grown for warriors!” Flim said. “It was supposed to help them grow big and strong, or at least that’s the best translation we could make of it.”
“I suppose the biggest difficulty is that they grow too big,” Flam said. “And that’s not a formula problem as much as a logistical one. Blue Ribbon has been harvesting them a bit early because they’re practically falling off the branches on their own.”
“He might need to think about a few sturdy trellises for next season,” Flim said. “That’s something you’d know more about than I would, my dear Applejack.”
“Well, I, uh, I am an expert,” Applejack admitted.
“You know what we can do?” Flam said. “We can sell you a bit of our formula! Just a bit, enough that you can test it out yourself and prove it’s safe!”
“And since she’s such a concerned neighbor, we can do it at… hm. Half price?” Flim suggested.
“Don’t be silly, brother mine. We’ll do it at cost.”
“At cost?” Flim gasped.
“It’s the honest, good thing to do,” Flam said. “How about it, Applejack?”
“Uh…” Applejack hesitated until Dash flew in front of her.
“We’re not buying anything,” Dash said. “Come on, AJ, let’s get out of here before they try to sell you your own hooves.”
She pushed AJ gently back down the trail, and they trotted until the crops had swallowed up the sight and sound of the brothers.
“They’re up to something,” Dash said.
“And water’s wet,” Applejack agreed. “You got any idea what their angle is?”
“Not yet. But you saw those suits they were wearing? That’s the kind of stuff they wear at the weather factory when they’re working with dangerous chemicals. They’re made so you can just burn them after you use them once.”
“And whatever they’re sprayin’ the crops with is dangerous enough they need that kind of stuff?”
“I dunno,” Dash said. “But I think we better find out.”
“We'll come back later when they ain't expecting it,” Applejack agreed. “First thing’s first, though. I need Fresita’s permission to dig a hole.” She paused. “Actually, I need her permission to make you dig a hole.”
“What?”
“I said I’d help if I could,” Applejack reminded Dash. “You only need t’ go down until you find the roots. Be real careful.”
“Yeah, yeah,” Dash mumbled, digging through the thick layer of dense, wet cloud loam.
“What are you looking for?” Fresita asked.
“Well, they said they were tryin’ to catch somethin’ called a cloud rod,” Applejack said. “And they had little traps set up right at the base of the crops. If they got some kind of varmint problem, you might too.”
“Hey, AJ, take a look,” Dash said. She’d dug down a few inches and carefully scraped off a layer of thick vapor. What she revealed bobbed just a tiny bit in the open air and looked like something between a bunch of feathers and a palm frond.
“Strangest root I’ve ever seen, but there ain’t nothin’ strange about them bites,” Applejack said, pointing out the damage. “Something’s been nibbling.”
“I didn’t think I’d need to ask Fluttershy along,” Dash grumbled.
“Good thing is, if it’s just critters, that’s an easy enough problem to deal with,” Applejack said. “First thing to do is figure out how they’re getting in.”
“How do we do that?” Dash asked.
“Fresita, you know your fields best,” Applejack said. “Which crops got hit first?”
“Probably the Dragonfly Fruit,” Fresita said. “They’re right over here.”
She pointed, then looked confused.
“They… should be over here,” she corrected. She flew over, looked around like she could have simply misplaced them, then started to panic. “Where are they?! They should be right here!”
“The whole plant is missing?” Dash asked, flitting over.
“There are supposed to be two rows of them. I planted them myself!”
“I don’t suppose pegasus crops typically go south for the winter?” Applejack asked. She trotted over, and when she neared the bare rows, her hooves sank into the surface. “Woah!”
“Hold on, AJ!” Dash grabbed her before she could fall. “Is is the cloudwalking amulet?”
“No, that should still be workin’. Look, it’s still glowing.” She tapped it. “Set me down, but careful-like.”
Dash nodded, and let the cloud take AJ’s weight gradually.
“Seems fine,” Applejack said. “So what in the hay did I step in?”
“Oh no…” Fresita dug at the spot where Applejack’s hooves had slipped, and the top layer of cloud crumbled, revealing a huge cavity. Applejack carefully walked to the edge and looked into the shadowy pit.
“I ain’t never seen nothin’ like this,” she said. “It’s like diamond dogs decided to mine under your farm. There are tunnels big enough for a pony!”
“Big enough for a pony, huh?” Dash asked.
“I think your plants got plucked from underneath,” Applejack concluded. “Like somepony yankin’ a carrot out of the ground.”
“How big do cloud rods get?”
“Not that big!” Fresita said.
“You don’t think Flim and Flam would sabotage her farm just to try and scare her into buying their potions, do you?” Dash asked.
“Two ponies like that having to do honest work?” Applejack frowned and looked at the tunnels again. “I bet their hooves are itchin’ to make a quick profit and get outta town before it goes bad. Can we follow those tunnels, find out where they go?”
“I don’t think so,” Dash said, fluttering down into the abscess and carefully touched the wall with a hoof. The thin vapor fell away from her hoof, totally unlike the loamy cloud she’d been digging through before. “See, this hasn’t been packed down correctly. That’s why you fell through. The tunnels are already getting filled back in.”
“Dang,” Applejack sighed. “Would have been easy if we could’ve tracked it right back to those two brothers.”
“If they dug the tunnels, I bet I know where the other end is,” Dash said. “They said they were renting a shed, remember?”
Applejack nodded. “Ten bits says they’re hidin’ somethin’ worth findin’ inside it.”
“That’s a sucker bet,” Dash said, with a grin. She flew up out of the hole. “Twenty bits says they brought the cloud rods here so they could sell ponies on the cure.”
“You even got twenty bits to bet on that?” Applejack asked.
“I might have to take a loan from my marefriend,” Dash shrugged. Holding out her hoof. Applejack bumped it.
“You’re lucky I ain’t never called your tab in,” Applejack said. “We’ll head over after sunset, all sneaky like.”
“Be quiet!” Dash hissed.
“I’m tryin’ to be quiet!” Applejack snapped, but in a subtle, stealthy manner. “I keep fallin’ into gopher holes!”
“There aren’t gophers up here,” Dash reminded her.
“Cloud rod holes. Whatever! Y’all know what I’m talkin’ about!”
“Yeah, yeah,” Dash said.
“We’d get there faster if you’d carry me,” Applejack reminded her.
“And then they’d see us coming from a mile away. We’re trying to sneak up and catch them in the act, remember?”
“Thanks, Dash, I would’ve forgotten the plan I made up five minutes ago if y’all hadn’t reminded me.”
“Well, what’s a marefriend for?” Dash asked. Applejack would have smacked her or kissed her, but neither was appropriate for a sneaking mission.
“Just go on ahead a bit and make sure we ain’t walkin’ into a trap,” she said, instead.
Dash nodded and flew ahead, keeping just above the cloud layer, flying over to the next row of crops and moving aside leaves wider than her wingspan. She glanced left and right, then moved to the next row.
“Anything?” Applejack asked.
“You better get a look at this,” Dash whispered.
Applejack carefully made her way to the next row of plantings and pushed her head through the fronds.
“Is that what I think it is?” Applejack asked. There was a clearing ahead of them, with a raised circle of cloud-stuff forming a ring around a hole in the surface.
“Yeah. It’s a cloud well.”
“Why would you need a well on a cloud farm?” Applejack asked. “Everything’s made of water already, ain’t it?”
“Yeah, and there’s water in the pipes in your walls, but you don’t want to have to punch holes in the drywall every time you need a drink,” Dash said.
“And if you were to, hypothetically speaking, pour somethin’ awful down into a cloud well?”
“It’d seep into the whole cloud,” Dash growled, glaring at the scene in front of them.
Flim was muttering to himself and holding a metal cask with his magic, carefully pouring something viscous and an unearthly shade of magenta into the well. Flam was moving more of the casks around a cart, shaking them and apparently trying to find ones that weren’t empty.
“What’s he doing?” Dash asked.
“Don’t know but I aim to stop him,” Applejack said, grabbing her lasso, which she had the whole time, obviously, in the same way that both of them had their bags of bits with them. Before Flim could start dumping a second cask into the well, the lasso dropped around his neck and he was yanked back with a sharp yelp.
“Flim!” Flam shouted, dropping what he was holding to run after him.
Dash tackled him before he got there, and Applejack tossed her the other end of the lasso. She caught it with her teeth and flew around the brothers in a tightening circle, the clouds kicking up under her into a tiny tornado. When it dissipated, the unicorns were hog-tied back-to-back.
“Did you have to do that?” Flim asked, his voice rough. “You almost choked me!”
“Y’all are poisoning the well! Literally!” Applejack shouted. “You know there are some places in Equestria where that kinda’ thing gets you put away for life! And we caught you red-hooved.”
“It’s not what you think!” Flam said. “You have to trust us!”
“I ain’t gonna place my trust in ponies pouring strange things into the town well,” Applejack said.
“Anything dumped in there is going to soak into the clouds and contaminate everything in Costa del Tierra,” Dash said. “No wonder Fresita’s crops are failing!”
“No, it’s not--” Flim groaned. “We are trying to do the right thing!”
“And by the right thing you mean kill off everything growing so you can sell them the cure later?” Dash asked. “Yeah, try explaining that one to the Sheriff.”
“There ain’t no good explanation for dumpin’ poison in a shared well,” Applejack said.
“It’s not poison! It's perfectly safe, but only if we act quickly!” Flam said.
“It shouldn’t even affect the plants,” Flim added. “We're trying to solve the pest problem--"
“Let me guess, to get rid of the cloud rods,” Applejack said.
“Exactly!” Flam sighed in relief. “So now that we’re on the same page, you can untie us, and we can try and resolve this ghastly affair.”
Applejack and Rainbow Dash looked at each other.
“Are you serious?” Dash asked. “You really think we’re just going to let you go? Even if I believed you--”
“You should, every word is true!” Flim interrupted.
“Even if I believed you, and I don’t,” Dash continued. “I wouldn’t let you go, because you’re pouring feathering weird chemicals into a well without anypony’s permission! That’s gotta be illegal!”
“There’s no time for the correct forms,” Flam said. “We don’t even have time to explain all the things we don’t have time to explain!”
“You have to let us finish pouring the potion into the well,” Flim said. “Take us to the authorities if you want, but let us finish first!”
“Oh, we’re gonna take you in, that’s for sure,” Applejack said. “Sure as sugar not gonna let you dispose of the evidence first.”
“It’s not evidence!” Flam groaned. “It’s an emergency and we need to--"
Under their hooves, the clouds shook, thunder rumbling like mountains turning over in their sleep.
“What was that?” Applejack asked, looking up at Dash.
“I don’t know,” Dash said, looking around. “I don’t think it’s turning into a thunderhead.”
“We were too late!” Flim screamed. “Untie us!”
The ground shook again, and the cloud started to bulge and swell like a volcano about to erupt.
“That ain’t good,” Applejack said, totally unnecessarily.
The cloud ruptured like an unripe fruit, and the biggest worm Applejack had ever seen reared up out of it, casting a deadly shadow over the small group. The horror was like a centipede a hundred feet long, with silvery, fluttering wings instead of legs, beating at the air and keeping the massive form aloft with unnatural ease.
“What is that thing?!” Applejack shouted.
“That’s not just a cloud rod anymore,” Dash said. “It’s a Megarodimus!”
Applejack glared at her marefriend. “You’re not allowed to name things anymore.”
It glared down at them, compound eyes glowing with baleful light, and roared.
“SKREE-ONK!”
The sound alone knocked Rainbow out of the air and Applejack’s hat off her head and she had only a moment to decide between saving her headgear or her marefriend. Dash went flying into the brush.
“Dash!” Applejack shouted.
“We didn’t know the growth potion would do this to the cloud rods!” Flam shrieked. “It’s not our fault! There aren’t even supposed to be animals up here!”
“Your potion did that?!” Applejack yelled. “You were sellin’ that fruit to ponies! I ate some of that fruit!”
“It gets washed off before it goes to market!” Flim said.
“That ain’t the point!”
The huge creature lunged down, taking a huge bite out of the engorged crops, swallowing entire plants whole and tearing them out of the loamy cumulus. It swallowed in giant gulps, and with every fruit it gobbled down, Applejack swore she saw it getting bigger.
“Did anyone get the number of that carriage?” Dash asked, dazed, from where she’d landed among the crops.
“Dash, move!” Applejack yelled.
“Huh?” Dash looked up just in time to see jaws as wide as the gates of Canterlot coming down at her. She jetted and nearly made it, the last inch of her tail getting caught in those massive mandibles and leaving her dangling from the monster’s jaws.
“You two caused this problem, how do we solve it?!” Applejack yelled at the brothers, grabbing the rope and struggling with Dash’s attempt at a knot, which while secure was also entirely improvised and tangled.
“We were trying to fix it!” Flam said. “We were pouring an antidote into the well so the rod would shrink back down while it was sleeping!”
“Not much of an option now,” Flim said.
“Then get me another option,” Applejack said, the rope coming loose from around Flim and Flam.
“Now that it’s awake we need to make it swallow the antidote,” Flam said. “And that’s not going to be easy.”
“More like impossible,” Flim agreed. “I doubt the Megarodimus wants to cooperate!”
“Are we seriously callin’ it that?” AJ mumbled. “Just tell me how to fix the darn problem you caused!”
“...I have a radical idea,” Flam said.
“Come on, you stupid--!” Dash yelled, trying to pull herself free. Her tail was firmly stuck between two of the monster’s teeth. It didn’t even seem to notice her trying to get away, the monster too busy eating the last of Blue Ribbon’s overgrown crops.
She didn’t want to think about what was going to happen when it decided to try switching to a diet with more protein.
“Get away from her, you varmint!”
The creature turned towards the sound just in time to catch a gigantic right hoof smashing into it with the size and force of a freight train. The shock knocked Dash away from it, a few strands of her tail left behind as it slammed down into the cloudy surface. She nearly fell out of the air when she saw what had hit the monster.
“What the-- AJ?!” Dash gasped.
Applejack stood fifty feet tall. She grinned at Dash and snorted. Her hat was nowhere to be seen, but the cloudwalking amulet hung from her neck, the band replaced by the rope of her lasso.
“Only way to beat a giant varmint is with a giant pony!” Applejack said, her voice echoing over the fields. “Y’all look tiny from all the way up here!”
“This is awesome!” Dash shouted.
“I just wish I had about a thousand gallons of cider to wash the taste of that dang plant food out of my mouth,” Applejack said. “You get clear and I’ll wrassle this critter!”
Applejack charged, slamming shoulder-first into the monster. It fell back, knocked off-balance, and with a purposeful grimace and a terrible sound, Applejack pulled the monster out of the cloud like she was uprooting a stubborn weed from the soil.
The Megarodimus curved in on itself, pulling itself from her hooves like a slippery eel and flying in a loop around her. It was so long that despite her size, it could form three or four orbits at once. The speed and chaotic movement made it almost impossible to tell where the head or tail were as it buzzed around at high speed.
Its wings caught the moonlight, flashing right into Applejack’s eyes like a strobe light. She wished she had her hat, trying to shield her face with a hoof, but the flashes came from every angle in a disorienting blaze of light.
“Come an’ get some if you think you’re mare enough!” Applejack shouted through the glare.
She didn’t see it coming. The monster changed course and went between her legs, swooping around and doing a loop, wrapping itself around her barrel and pulling her into the air.
“Hey! Put me down!” Applejack yelled as she was carried upwards. The Megarodimus’ grip loosened, and Applejack tumbled. She hit the farm hard, everything shaking for miles around and the pendant around her neck flaring with green light as is struggled to keep her from going right through. Layers of thick, wet clouds were thrown into the air like an exploding cotton pillow.
Applejack groaned in the crater her fall had made, and the Megarodimus looked at her for a few moments before suddenly turning and diving into the surface of the cloud, weaving in and out of it as it raced off.
“Where’s it going?!” Dash yelled.
“It must still be looking for food,” Flam said.
Flim nodded. “The first thing it did when it woke up was eat every plant on the farm. I suppose it has an appetite to match its new size.”
“I’m not sure what else it would be going after,” Flam said. “It’s not going to the farm next door.”
“Cloud rods have an excellent sense of smell,” Flim reminded him. “It must have found something that smells like the produce here.”
“Something that smells like--” Dash gasped. “The fruit stand at the docks! Blue Ribbon had a ton of stuff there!”
“Rather unfortunate that most of the city is between here and there,” Flam said.
“AJ, you gotta wake up!” Dash yelled.
“What the hay was that?” Applejack rumbled, the clouds shaking as she moved. “Ain’t been hit that hard since I told Rarity what I really thought about the hat she wore t’ last month’s trip to Canterlot.”
“It’s going towards town!” Dash shouted. “You gotta stop it before it wrecks everything!”
“I got this,” Applejack said, narrowing her gaze and taking off at a gallop that rumbled the ground like an earthquake with every step.
She stepped over the farm’s fence and Applejack stumbled, her hoof catching on the cloud, sinking in just a little too far, but she caught herself and gave chase.
“What was that?” Dash asked.
“It’s her amulet,” Flim said. He tapped his own glowing token for reference. “The cloudwalking spell certainly wasn’t intended for something her size.”
“Amazing it worked this long,” Flam said. “Whatever charge it has left won't last.”
Dash swallowed. “I need to help her. Where’s the rest of that potion?”
“SKREE-ONK!”
“Goji berries!” somepony shouted, pointing in horror. The Megarodimus threw a cart full of the fruit into the watching crowd, the pegasus ponies scattering like a terrified flock of birds as it waded through the buildings towards the center of town.
It looked around, antennae wiggling, and focused on a foal running down the wide street, one of Blue Ribbon’s float apples tied to her hoof like a balloon and snack and, unfortunately, a tasty lure for the giant cloud rod. It roared again and surged towards the foal, not seeing the titanic pony rushing toward it until it was too late for it to react.
Applejack head-butted the creature without even stopping, sending it flying back into one of the tall cloud buildings, the massive creature going right through the resort hotel and breaking it apart. A whole wing came loose and started to drift away with ponies still inside.
“Dangit, this whole place is going to come apart if we keep fightin’ like this,” Applejack rumbled. “It ain’t built like a wrasslin’ ring.”
As if on cue, Applejack’s hoof fell through the cloud and she gasped in alarm, barely pulling herself back. Every moment, she felt herself getting heavier, the clouds getting a little less solid under her.
The Megarodimus reared up, ready to strike, and she couldn’t get away. She was knee-deep already, and if it didn’t get her, the fall would. It lunged, and Applejack flinched, closing her eyes.
There was a rush of speed and force. Applejack waited for the ground to meet her like a tomato thrown against concrete, and when it didn’t, she opened her eyes in confusion. Sky-blue hooves were wrapped around her barrel, wings beating hard as Rainbow Dash pulled her around a tight turn. The G-force tugged at them harder than it ever had before, even Dash having a hard time getting up to speed with the sheer mass involved.
“You weren’t kidding about this stuff tasting awful,” Dash said, her face split wide with a grin. “You know, I think you gained some weight!”
“And you’re flyin’ awful slow!” Applejack countered.
“Hey, it only looks slow because we’re like ten times bigger!”
“You got a plan for stopping it?” Applejack asked.
“Flim and Flam loaded up all the stuff they were pouring into the well in a cart.” Dash pointed to where the brothers stood, the unicorns waving to the flying titans to make themselves more visible. “If we can force-feed it that stuff, it’s all over!”
“Sounds like half a plan,” Applejack said.
“I was hoping I’d come up with the other half on the way here,” Dash admitted.
“Good thing I’m here, then. Drop me down onto it,” Applejack said, pointing. “If I’m so heavy I’m fallin’ through the city, maybe I can hang on and keep it from goin’ anywhere!”
“Just promise me you won’t fall when I’m not there to catch you,” Dash said.
“Sugarcube, no matter where I am, I know you’ll be there.” Applejack smiled up at her. Dash nodded and let go, the giant earth pony plunging through the air and landing on the monster hard enough to make it crack like a whip at both ends, its face slamming into a Hayburger Princess.
It only lay still for a dazed instant before it tried to throw her off. Its whole body rippled in waves, wings beating and thrashing from side to side in an attempt to make her move.
“Yee-haw!” Applejack shouted, hanging onto the beast. “This ain’t nothin’ compared to a real rodeo!”
“I’m gonna go get the stuff!” Dash yelled, flying over to where Flim and Flam were waiting and skidding to a halt on the cloud-top.
“Remember, it has to eat it!” Flam shouted up to her.
“And these aren’t enchanted, so you need to hold onto them,” Flim added.
“AJ, hold its mouth open!” Dash shouted, turning back to find that the monster had turned back on Applejack and was trying to remove her with deadly force.
“I’m a little busy just trying not to get bit!” Applejack yelled, holding into the thing’s mandibles, trying to hold it back. Drops of something green and poisonous-looking splattered from its maw, and as it inched closer she could see what had to be at least a half-dozen more snapping sets of teeth, one behind the other, going down its throat.
Dash struggled to pick up the metal casks but at her size she was having trouble picking up the tiny things.
“Buck it!” she swore, grabbing the whole cart. Flim and Flam jumped to the side, yelling something about how they were still making payments on it. She didn’t have time to listen.
Dash slammed the cart full of casks into the Megarodimus’ mouth, and Applejack let go, the monster’s jaws snapping shut. The steel flasks ruptured, magenta ooze pouring into the beast’s throat. It immediately shrieked in rage, a ripple down its body throwing Applejack into the air.
Dash caught her, and the weight slammed both of them into the clouds, Dash holding on tight to keep her from falling through the surface as they rolled through a T-shirt shop, a sandwich place, and what was left of Blue Ribbon’s fruit stand before coming to a halt.
“Did we do it?” Dash asked, breathlessly.
The Megarodimus cried out one last time and started curling in on itself, the countless wings slowing down. Light twinkled between the segments of its body like it had swallowed a star. It shivered and twisted, the coil of its body tightening more and more, spiraling down into itself and shrinking.
“It’s workin’!” Applejack shouted, excited.
“Squish it!” Dash yelled, reaching for it.
Applejack tugged at her hoof and shook her head.
“Nah,” Applejack said. “It didn’t do nothin’ wrong. It was just an animal followin’ its instincts.”
It uncurled, only a few inches long now, and flew away, zipping away into the tangle of clouds and debris floating gently around the town.
Ponies slowly crawled out of the wreckage, more flying down from where they’d been hiding among the loose clouds hovering over Costa del Tierra. A crowd quickly formed around Applejack and Dash, everypony asking questions at the same time.
“Oh my feathers, are you two okay?” Fresita asked, setting down right in front of Applejack’s snout. “What happened? Why are you huge?”
“That’s a long story,” Applejack said.
“Turns out you were smart not to buy the plant food,” Dash said. “And, uh, everything’s cool now. I hope.”
“Yes, we finally stopped that terrible creature!” Flam yelled, stepping out of the crowd with his brother and turning to face them, finding a nice soapbox to stand on so everypony could see them.
“All thanks to our cunning shrinking formula!” Flim said. “Fast-acting and totally safe against all sorts of giant pests!”
“We’d also like to thank these brave ponies for… giving us a little help,” Flam said, motioning grandly to Applejack and Rainbow Dash.
The crowd applauded.
“You two caused the giant monster problem in the first place!” Dash shouted.
“Absolutely true,” Fim agreed. “And we tried to take responsibility for it and solve it ourselves.”
“Don’t you dare try and take credit for fixing things,” Fresita scolded them. “You’re responsible for all this trouble!”
Dash winced and moved her wing. The rubble under her shifted and Blue Ribbon pulled himself out of the remains of his fruit stand, his coat stained with dark fruit juice.
“What did you do to my farm?!” Blue Ribbon shouted. “All my crops are gone and the whole thing is full of holes and crater! You were supposed to grow fruit, not monsters!”
The crowd’s angry crystalized around Blue Ribbon’s anger and the herd started to close in on Flim and Flam.
“Don’t worry,” Fresita assured Applejack and Rainbow Dash. “We’ll make sure they get what’s coming to them. I think a good start might be fixing everything that monster broke.”
“But it destroyed half the city!” Flam shouted.
“It could take a while to finish,” Fresita agreed. “Maybe even long enough to keep you from causing trouble for anypony else!”
“Sounds like a good idea to me,” Dash said.
“But, uh, before you take ‘em away,” Applejack said. “We could use some of that shrinking potion.”
“And a new cloudwalking pendant,” Dash mumbled, from under Applejack. “My hooves are getting tired.”
Applejack rubbed her hooves in the dirt when they stepped onto Sweet Apple Acres. She could feel the difference in the dirt between where her land ended and the road began. It was like a warm hug from family.
“Let me tell you, Dash, I ain’t never been so glad to be back on solid ground,” she said. “Costa del Tierre was nice and all but I think my next vacation is gonna be somewhere closer to sea level.”
“You sure? Fresita promised we’d get free room and board anytime we visit. Since the monster ate all of Blue Ribbon's crops, it means ponies are actually trying her fruit and seeing how good it is!”
“Yep. And I had a little talk with her while you were gettin’ my hat. I think she’ll be just fine.”
Rainbow Dash nodded and landed next to Applejack, trying to understand what she liked so much about standing on the ground, aside from the whole ‘not falling to her death’ thing.
“Gettin’ your hooves dirty?” Applejack asked, smiling.
“I was trying to figure out if you got any taller,” Dash asked, looking up at Applejack and narrowing her eyes. “Are you sure you’re the right size? I swear you’re an inch or two taller.”
Applejack laughed and pulled Dash into a hug. “Nah, I’ve just got a tiny, cute marefriend,” she said. “You’re not used to looking up from ground level.”
Dash blushed. “I love you too.”
“You know, we could use your help on the farm, especially since you don’t mind doin’ honest work.”
“Isn’t applebucking season already over?”
“Sure, but I got a little project that I need your help with.” Applejack took her hat off and pulled out a small bag. “Fresita wanted to give us a reward for helpin’ out. I didn’t feel right askin’ for bits, so I got something else.”
She opened it and let Dash look inside.
“Seeds?” Dash asked.
“Yep. From her crops.”
Dash raised an eyebrow. “You know they only grow in clouds, right? You can’t plant them.”
“That’s why I need your help,” Applejack said, bumping her flank against Dash’s. “I know it hasn’t been easy for ya. When you didn’t even feel comfortable comin’ right back after getting home from that Wonderbolts show, I got worried.”
She reached for Dash’s hoof and took it, pressing the bag of seeds into it.
“Sweet Apple Acres is your home too, and I want it to feel that way. I figure, maybe if you have a little patch of sky that’s all yours… it won’t feel like you’re just visitin’.”
“AJ…” Dash said, pulling her into a hug.
“Welcome home, sugarcube.”
Author's Note
So when I started writing this, the idea was to have Applejack and Rainbow Dash go to a strange place and do a bit of worldbuilding and put in a lot of details about crops and how they grow and so on. Obviously, plans changed. As a wise man once said, there are only three types of stories: a strange man comes to town, a man goes to a strange place, and Godzilla vs Mechagodzilla.
The cloud rods are based on, well, you can call it either an optical phenomenon with photographs or a cryptid.
In the esoteric view, they're a critter that flies so fast they can't be seen by the naked eye and only show up when captured on film. It's unknown what they feed on, and bodies have never been found.
That or they're a smear created by an insect flying across the frame.
As a bonus, here's my original cover art from before the sudden change in genre:
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