Spontaneous parties were Pinkie's forte. Of course, she had guidelines, restrictions to work around, but who didn't? When she was given just a couple of hours to get everything prepared, she knew it was going to be a whopper. Restriction breeds creativity, after all. Twilight had given her a brief explanation of who the party was for, and how things had to be set up for the event to go off without too many problems. Summoning circle, 30-foot radius, blah, blah, blah. A hue-man! She didn't even know what that was, but excitement was building in her heart, as a grin stretched across her face. What were they going to be like? Probably really colorful. Big, colorful apes!
So, with all the party favors, all the tables and all the decorations she could come up with in a small amount of time, she made her way to Ponyville's town square. The fact that the summoning circle was so large caught Pinkie's interest, but she had so little time that she didn't bother to question Twilight, who was still carving the symbols into the dirt. Hue-mans had to be huge if the circle needed to be that big. She pictured giant, rainbow-colored apes in fancy suits, and started giggling.
Everything was just getting finished up, as the Cake family rolled out their desserts, and the Apple family set up their stands, the banner that read "WELCOME" was nailed across town hall. Almost every pony in Ponyville had attended, most of them worriedly looking towards the ritual site. Pinkie had just loaded the cannons, as Twilight finished drawing the markings.
"I need everypony to stand at least thirty feet away, I don't know exactly how big the portal is going to be," Twilight said.
You could hear a pin drop in the silence that all the ponies partook in. Everyone could feel each other's hearts sink when she said that. Everyone except for Pinkie, who was bursting at the seams with anticipation, save for one lingering thought in the back of her mind. Twilight didn't know how big the hue-mans were. If she was planning to introduce a new friend to Ponyville, shouldn't she know everything about them first? But, if she were summoning them in the first place, and in such a public way no less, then she would be sure. Right? She pushed down the doubt, she had to trust her friend. It was Twilight, after all. If anypony would be the one to triple—No, quadruple check anything it would be her.
Twilight skimmed through a smaller book, then set it down, and set all of her concentration towards the spell. Her horn lit up, and soon too did the markings on the ground. From the corners of the symbols shot beams of light into the center of the circle, forming a small, star-esque concentration of energy. With time, the beams faded. The light in the center rose, and pulsated as it came to its resting position a few feet in the air. The few seconds that it sat there were agonizing. Pinkie could feel herself holding her breath, both hooves on the confetti cannon.
The spark violently stretched out in all directions. The light which was once its whole, was now only the border, and the darkness in the center grew with each moment. It looked as though it would never stop expanding. Finally, as the amorphous energy was about to escape the limits of the drawn symbols, it ceased, and the darkness was replaced with the light of another world. Foreign air, and otherworldly sounds flooded through the portal.
Then it came through.
Light overwhelmed her as the world crashed back into existence. Her head pounded and throbbed, as she laid on the ground, coughing up blood, barely able to breathe. She heard screaming from near and far; some voices she recognized as coming from her best friends, others she couldn't quite place. Smoke swirled in the air above her, as buildings caved in, and ponies flew and galloped in terror. As sirens bellowed, Twilight stared up with a wide, empty gaze. It wasn't her fault. She couldn't have known.
Twilight's mind reeled as the events kept repeating. She thought she had everything prepared just right, from the research she had conducted of humans, to the spell itself, but the moment that giant, roaring, metal monster violently crashed through her, all of the confidence, all of that curiosity, and excitement that she held within her evaporated, being replaced with a paralyzing shock.
Blood flooded out into the dirt. Her skull was cracked open, her legs were broken, and her ribs had been destroyed. Her shoulders had been decimated, she didn't think she would be able to walk again. How was she still conscious? Just as the question came to mind, her vision began fading in and out.
She became aware for only fragments of time, seconds at most, though unsure of how much time was passing between the bursts of conscious thought. The screaming had faded, but she heard weeping in the distance. She felt a stabbing pain as she was lifted onto the gurney, and cried out before losing consciousness again. When she awoke again it was in the middle of Ponyville. She saw crumbled buildings, corpses of ponies she had seen walking around that day, and smears of blood as if a brush hit a canvas. She saw her home as she passed it. A dead, green, hairless ape was crushed up on the front of the metal behemoth, which had apparently died as it collided with the tree. He was mangled, his limbs broken and bent at odd angles. Deep, dark red was spilling across the ground. She thought she could see his internal organs pooling out of him.
Now in the hospital, she was rolled through a hallway. She watched through her blurred vision, as the lights on the ceiling came and went. Doctors and nurses frantically spat orders to each other as they tried to tame the chaos. Twilight felt the pounding pain fading back into her torso. Her senses were overwhelmed, until she heard a familiar voice that shut every distraction down, silencing the world around her. Twilight strained her neck to look up and around, ahead of the gurney. Pinkie Pie was sitting in a chair, unharmed. She was subtly rocking forwards and backwards, her body trembling, her eyes wide open as she stared into the room across from her.
"Hiya, Mr. and Mrs. Cake..." she muttered repeatedly, her bottom lip trembling. She looked as though she was always on the edge of crying, but not quite there; as if she couldn't, or perhaps refused to, process what had happened.
"Why?" Twilight thought as she let her head fall, her mind fading from reality once more.
Twilight awoke in a hospital bed to the subtle beeping of a machine to her right, when she opened her eyes the light from the sunset outside pierced her. Squinting, her gaze traveled downward. Most of her body from the neck below was covered in bandages, her legs were in casts. She had no feeling in her forelegs. She didn't want to focus on that, not now, and so her focus shifted to the window. How long had she been asleep? She felt like it had been weeks, it was as though her body had been sucked dry.
In her first true moment of clarity following the accident, Twilight looked out at the sunset, trying to piece together where she had gone wrong. It had been a long journey getting to that point, months. Maybe the spell wasn't right. It was a delicate process after all, anypony could have made a mistake. No, it was the human. That human shouldn't have been trusted, he probably planned for it to happen, surely. Twilight paused, before looking down. She shouldn't have brought so many ponies there. She wanted to create a celebration; an event to be remembered for centuries, one for the history books. She had hoped for another ally, another species to befriend, and this is where it all led her. Twilight stared down at herself, and felt tears building in her eyes.
Picking up a noise from the opposite end of the room, she looked up. There was a conversation happening right outside the door, though she wasn't able to make out the words. The door gently opened, and a doctor walked in, looking down at a clipboard he was levitating with his magic. He looked up briefly, doing a double take.
"Miss Sparkle, you're up," he said, closing the door behind him.
"Hello," Twilight responded, not being able to look him in the eyes.
"You're one tough mare, you know that? How are you feeling?" he said.
Twilight didn't speak. She felt like a monster. She couldn't get the noise out of her head; all of Ponyville crying out in pain, not being able to tell where one scream ended and another began. The black smoke rising into the sky, as a town crumbled before her. All of the stone and wood of the houses breaking apart as it crashed through them.
"Well, I'll try to make this quick. We don't know if walking is going to be an option, but we'll have to play it by ear. A couple days ago we thought you'd be dead by, well, now, actually, but we worked our magic and we think you'll do just fine. We had to remove some of your ribs, but that's better than a leg, eh?" he paused. "Anyway, you'll be here for a while, so try to get some rest. I'll be around if you need me," he said.
Days? Twilight nodded. The doctor did the same with a hum, and turned to leave, but swiftly turned back around.
"Oh, you're gonna have a visitor coming in, in a few hours. Unless you want to cancel?"
She had a few ideas as to what would happen, none of them good, though all of them deserved. One scenario had Princess Celestia coming in, only to scold and cut ties with her, disowning her as a student before giving her a list of charges and imprisoning her. Or it could be one of the members of the families she helped destroy, a filly and their mother left without a father. Maybe one of her best friends would come in and declare their hatred for her. She stayed silent once more.
The doctor smiled sadly. "Try to rest, Twilight, we'll get through this," he said, leaving the room and shutting the door behind him.
The metal knob rattled. Twilight looked at the door with a groggy, half-lidded stare. She didn't recall when she had fallen asleep. The door cracked open just a tad, and the doctor peeked his head through. He wasn't as quiet as he would like to be.
"Oh, she's awake," he said, looking back.
Her stomach dropped. This was it. She thought she would be ready to handle this, but her anxiety had ramped up considerably. Maybe she should have cancelled. The door opened completely, and the doctor let her in, though he chose to stay outside. Applejack stiffly walked in, and frowned as she saw Twilight.
"I'll give you two some time alone," he said.
The door was shut. Silence hung in the air, as Applejack stared at Twilight, whose eyes were wandering elsewhere. The only sound that could be heard was the ticking of the clock on the wall, and the near silent breathing from both of the ponies. Applejack sighed, shook her head, and walked to the side of the bed. Each step pounded on Twilight's skull, and between each hoofstep was an agonizing stillness that gnawed at her heart.
Applejack took off her hat, and set it down lightly on the bedside table. She looked Twilight over. Most of her body was wrapped in bandages, and casts. Her hair, as well as her coat, had a dirty roughness to them. Even though Twilight had her head down, she could still see her expression. It was like the hope was ripped from her eyes. Applejack tried to speak up, but her voice was caught, so with a pause she tried again.
"How are you holding up?" Applejack asked.
Twilight didn't move, nor speak.
"I tried to visit you a few days ago, but you weren't awake then."
...
"Well, I'm glad you're alive, if nothing else," Applejack said, looking away, prodding her hat.
"Why?" Twilight asked.
Applejack paused. "You shouldn't be asking something like that," she said.
"But, you shouldn't be glad. You know what I did."
"Yeah, I do, but I'm still here."
"You shouldn't be, not after everything."
"Probably not, but I'm gonna stay," Applejack said.
Twilight nodded, looking up at her. She remembered something, one of the few things she saw as she was rolled into the hospital.
"What happened to Pinkie?"
Applejack paused. "She's not talking. Won't talk to anypony, from what I've seen, but I ain't seen her much."
Applejack recalled the first time she saw Pinkie after everything had settled down, after the hysteria, when the isolating dreariness enveloped the town. She was sitting on her bed, staring toward the furthest wall. Whenever Applejack would ask her a question, or say anything really, she would just hum, or nod, giving only the simplest responses. Sometimes there wouldn't be a response. She had never seen any pony like that, let alone Pinkie. If Pinkie was anything, she was a talker. Was.
"Applejack... How many?" Twilight asked.
Applejack felt a hitch in her throat, and she wavered; she looked away and considered.
"I don't know if I—"
"Please," Twilight said, looking her in the eyes.
Every part of her told her not to answer. Her limbs clenched, and her chest tightened. She thought she could handle the force of the memories that would barge their way in every time she even thought about Twilight. She could see it as clear as anything in the room. Rarity rushing to Sweetie Belle in tears, she probably could've burst that little filly open with how tight she hugged her. The working ponies who were left with no home to go back to, the way some of them collapsed as they would each approach their own piles of rubble. The ponies she had to bury on her own land. Family. She struggled to remember Rainbow's face, only able to recall the bloody, twitching mess that was splayed out on the grass before her.
"Rainbow," Applejack whispered.
Twilight winced, it was as if she was stabbed in the heart. That wasn't right. She wasn't supposed to say that. Surely, she didn't hear her properly. Out of any pony she could have killed, it had to be her.
"And Fluttershy," she continued.
Twilight became numb. She made a selfish decision, but she shouldn't have this pain. This wasn't the way life was supposed to go. She just wanted everyone to be happy again. She and all of her friends had a meal around a table together just a couple of days ago, now it was all gone. Where did it all go?
"And Granny," Applejack's voice cracked as her body stiffened, she collapsed into the bed, barely able to hold herself up. It was like her body shut down. She couldn't cry, she had to be strong. That's what she was always taught. She always tried to be strong. "I'm sorry, I can't—" she picked up her hat and walked out.
The slam of the door marinated in her mind. Twilight stared forward for an eternity. She thought those good times would last forever. For a while, it seemed like the sun would never set. After all, if you were around the ponies you loved, the wind could never stop blowing. The world used to turn. Had she taken it all for granted? She felt herself deflate. There was nothing she could do, except wait. A hint of fear settled in the back of her mind, a thought. What if she didn't die? What if she had to live through this?
Applejack stood there as everything blew past her. The wind, the roaring monster, her friends, her family; everything went by like a hurricane, yet everything was standing still. This was one of the first times in her life that she didn't leap into action. It was like being in a cocoon, but still being able to see out of it.
The squelches of organs popping, the guttural sound of air being forced out of crushed throats, bones cracking and piercing through the skin to meet fresh air; all seared into her brain as if it were branded by a hot iron. Those were ponies she called neighbors, friends, customers; ponies that she saw every day, souls she worked to feed.
Granny Smith was getting old. Hell, she had always been old to Applejack, but never once did she think she would outlive her, or at the very least, it was a fleeting thought that was never fully considered or expanded upon. Her granny was the strongest pony in the world, always living, always getting things done, always around. Immortal in her mind.
The only mother that AJ ever really had, or at least what was left of her, was wrapped up in a snug, warm cloth, a blanket from her youth. A banged-up old toy that you could see the decades of wear in, was placed on top of her. Granny Smith was lowered into the ground. Nothing was said. None of the ponies could cobble together any of their vague emotions and form their feelings into coherent words or sentences. They all stood in silence as the dirt was piled. Applejack was numb, as she stared on.
Somber days trudged along. Applejack stood at the foot of her bedroom window, staring out with static in her mind. The trees swayed emptily, and the wind was hollow. A grimy morning. The house felt empty, like an ancient tomb, or a skeleton that was left to rest for hundreds of years. She felt heavy of heart, and of body. Complicated feelings always weighed more than simple ones. It was easier to blame Twilight, and viciously cut her out of her life; many Ponyville residents had already resorted to that. Such a hastily made, simple decision, meant less weight to hold. Less to consider.
A branch snapped off one of Applejack's trees, and the force of it hitting the ground shook her enough to snap her out of the stupor. Realizing she was wasting time, she pulled herself out into the field, dragging large wooden buckets behind her. Another day to get through. Despite the tragedy, things had more or less morphed back into a relative state of normalcy. Normal for her, at least. Ponies were still hungry, maybe hungrier than ever before.
She let the buckets hit the dirt. Her head shifted down, and with her back to the tree, her muscles tightened. Her back legs flew into the trunk, striking it with titanic force. The tree groaned deeply, then the leaves above rustled, and apples fell from every branch, landing in the buckets below. A lifelong routine, done without a great amount of thought. Though, it was more than just business. Work was always there, even on the worst days, she could come out and do what she needed to do. So, she went to the next tree, and the one after that, slamming her back legs into each of them, the same as she always did.
Many trees, and many buckets of apples later, she sat on her front porch, looking out at all of the baskets strewn about the field. Sweat had been broken, but as time passed, her breathing slowed, and she found rest. She looked up with a scrunched face and squinted eyes. The sun was reaching its peak. It was better than the dreary morning that came before, though just as they did the day before, certain thoughts crept into her mind. Maybe this would be a good day to visit Twilight.
Now why would she think that? An attempt was made to wave off the stupid idea. But, who would see her, if not her?
"Definitely not Rarity," Applejack said with a scoff, "and maybe that's for the best."
Ponyville, its citizens and the physical town itself, was struggling to recover. A few homes and shops were still in ruins. She hated to see the closed, empty businesses which once thrived, especially the ones run by those she knew and worked with. If one looked closely, they would see that blood lingered on some stray blades of grass.
As Applejack walked through the town, pushing her mobile shop along, she passed many ponies with down expressions. Their eyes were firmly locked on the ground below them, as they walked. Some of the ponies she passed had gotten fatter, some much skinnier. Some wandered as though they were in a stupor, with empty eyes, and limp legs which were aimlessly reaching, automatically finding ground. Ponyville was nearly unrecognizable.
"-and don't even get me started on that 'sweetheart' of a princess. What a joke. 'Do not worry my little ponies, we shall recover from this terrible tragedy, we shall live on, like we always do,' kiss my flank. What are you gonna recover from? An overdose of the most expensive sweets?" the mare said, with a scowl.
Applejack often picked up bitter conversations. It was rare to hear positive small talk, unfortunately. On some days, she heard conversations that made her skin crawl, words that made her question whether or not it was right to continue feeding them. Some days, she would even question if she were right for not harboring hatred, as those two mares, and many others blatantly did.
"At least she got the royal guard to clean up the mess. Did you see that thing? Err, what was left of it? It looked like one of those aliens we drew as fillies. I'm honestly shocked they got all of the pieces up, what with it spilling all over the place—" the other mare responded.
"And the stink," she gagged, "I'll never get that out of my head. What do you even do with something like that?"
"I don't know. Bury it?"
"And if it wakes up and goes on another rampage? I hope Celestia sends it to the moon, or something. That would be a good start. While she's at it, she should throw her precious Twilight up there too; give us all some peace of mind, for once."
Applejack shook her head. A while after the voices faded away, she forced her cart to come to a halt. Once it settled in the dirt, she inspected its sturdiness, and once it seemed fit, she set the basket of apples atop the wood counter. She tapped the small sign at the front of the cart, and it fell to face away from her. It told the price, one bit for each apple, five for a pie, those of which she had stored in the base of the cart. As midday approached, she tried her damnedest to put a smile on her face, as she waited for the customers to come.
For a long while, AJ's station was largely ignored. Through this excruciating period of time, she watched lonely islands of ponies slowly move along. Part of her thought about giving up, but a smarter part knew better. With ponies needing to eat, and a few businesses being closed for the time being, it was only a matter of time before at least one of them came to her. Lo and behold, eventually, one did.
She saw him approaching from far off in the distance. If he were in a crowd, he would be hard not to spot. The stallion was shaky, disheveled, and a bit uncertain in his movements. His eyes were darting in all sorts of directions. AJ was almost unsettled when they landed on her stand. He walked up to the shop, and when he settled a few inches from it, he began rhythmically tapping his hoof.
"Howdy there, sir, what can I get for ya?" AJ asked.
"Err—I don't know, maybe three—no, five. Six? Five," the stallion said.
"Five what?"
"Oh, app—uhh, yeah, apples, sorry."
"That'll be five—" before Applejack could finish speaking, the stallion had thrown the coins on to the counter. She swiftly responded by laying out five shiny, red apples, in a line.
"There ya go," she said.
As soon as she said that, the stallion threw his hoof out, grabbing all of the apples in one swoop. He then proceeded to nonchalantly choke them all down. One by one, he swallowed them whole. With each apple came their individual challenges. The first one, for instance, produced an awful hiss, a loud gag from deep within his throat. Once his maw was thoroughly covered in saliva, and AJ was thoroughly shocked and disgusted, he moved to the next apple, and then the next. The third apple conjured up an involuntary gulp, the sound of which was a sudden, deep "guh".
"Could ya please take that mess away from my stand," Applejack said, with a half-lidded stare, and a simultaneously angry and unemotional expression. In response, the stallion, who was just in the middle of devouring another apple, let out some kind of indecipherable, raspy gurgle, which AJ interpreted as an apology, seeing as he left shortly after.
A few minutes later, a mare came to the shop. She walked with a dreary weight to her steps. From her face alone, she looked like she had been in a war. Her eyes seemed deep, and her stare was fixed inward, more than out. Dark bags sagged below the eyes.
"What'll ya have?" AJ asked.
"Just an apple," the mare said, with her eyes locked to the ground. She quietly set a bit on the counter, and pushed it forward an inch. AJ grabbed the apple, and put it on the counter, but she felt a pull in her heart, leaving her unable to let it go.
"Listen, I know it seems like the world just ended, but we'll be okay. We'll be alright, just give it time," AJ said, letting go of the apple.
The mare looked up at her, and locked on intensely. Her stare had a snarl to it. "Horse shit. Did you even see what happened?" She paused long enough for a response to be thought of and dealt out, but AJ didn't speak. "Don't give me that glass half full crap," she said, before snatching the apple and stomping off.
Applejack felt a tinge of guilt hit her in the chest. "I did see it," she whispered.
At the end of a long day, AJ packed up her shop. The day had been successful, in regards to payment. She had amassed more bits than she had the day before, and the pay then was better than the last, which she appreciated greatly. Applejack always did try to end the evening with a positive thought.
She dragged her shop back through the town, letting her gaze lock onto the front gates of the hospital. It was the familiar and ever-worrying sight. Another protest, with larger numbers than the last, angrier than ever. She knew what they were there for, who they were always there for. A part of her never failed to entertain the thought that this might be the day that Celestia's guards fail to keep them back, leaving Twilight at the mercy of the mob. She didn't know why that didn't sit well with her.
Applejack stepped into her lonely home and took in the smell of dust as she looked into its dull halls. She let her weight fall onto her bed. It was better to let the evening melt away, and start again tomorrow. As her eyes closed she began to think of what she would do if a riot were to break out at the hospital. Would it be right to save Twilight?
Author's Note
I've elected to separate this second chapter into multiple parts. This decision was made in part due to guilt from not updating or writing for this story in a while. The way I see it, the story will be easier to finish if uploaded in smaller chunks, piece by piece. This may affect the pacing of the story and its overall quality, but really, I have no idea what it will do.
Frankly, I'm relatively new to writing. I tend to look at everything I've done previously, things I'm not working on currently, with regret. I don't know where this story is going, either, as I haven't planned anything. It's definitely an experiment, but I'm hoping it will work out.