Author's Note
Since this is my first public MLP story and English isn't my first language, critique is welcome.
It tickles
It tickles
The wind blew gently through the fields of Sweet Apple Acres. It was a chilly breeze, typical for the autumn months despite the relatively warm weather. Applejack loved this time of year. The bulk of the farm work for this year was finished, and all that remained were smaller tasks like clearing the ground, turning the soil, planting some select seeds and making some repairs to prepare for winter. Menial work compared to the harvesting, storage and processing of the tremendous amounts of apples the orchard produced each year. Doing them was almost a relaxing procedure for her even though Applejack had to do them all by herself this year. In all corners of Equestria every branch of the Apple family always held a great celebration after harvesting season and this year the festivities would be held in Appleloosa. Since Applejack had seen her cousin Breaburn more often in the last couple of years than the other members of her direct family, she volunteered to finish the finish the remaining chores on the farm while Big Mac, Granny Smith and Apple Bloom would travel to their relatives a bit early to make up for lost time. Only a few days and Applejack would join them.
Seeing her fields free from weeds, woods and bigger rocks filled Applejack with pride and contentment as she trotted around the apple trees. Since the Pegasi announced an autumn storm in two days, Applejack spent most of her day cutting off dead tree branches to prevent them from falling down causing damage. She progressed faster than she anticipated only having some repairs and a bit of clean up left to do. Once that was done, she might even have an entire day for herself before going to the train station as planned.
Noticing that a part one of her fences was ramshackle, she made a mental note to replace it with new planks and check the other fences for potential weak spots. Still contemplating the fences, she suddenly noticed Winona slowly approaching the barn in the far of distance. This made Applejack gasp, drop her tools she was carrying and gallop towards her canine friend. Winona had been missing for the past four days. She ran off after displaying a rather strange behavior two days prior to her disappearance. At first, she would bark loudly, not a painful or fearful bark, but one that seemed to express annoyance. A few hours later, she would bark relentlessly before running up and down the orchard, until she finally ran into the Everfree forest.
Winona collapsed in front the barn door exhaling a small whimper. Without any hesitation or consideration, Applejack grabbed her, put her on her back and ran for Dr. Fauna’s doctor’s office, Ponyville’s only veterinarian.
In the evening Applejack returned to her home, having spent the last four hours in Dr. Fauna’s house to watch her trying to find the ailment that must have befallen the poor dog. Dr. Fauna could not find a satisfactory answer yet. She could however demonstrate that Winona did not suffer from the most common yet deadly diseases animals close to and in the Everfree forest often attract. Be that the Canine Parvovirus Disease or Rabies. The tests would continue tomorrow, so that Winona could get some rest in isolation overnight. Applejack did not like leaving her behind like that even though she knew Dr. Fauna did everything she could today and would certainly do her best tomorrow. Yet the feeling of guilt and helplessness hung over Applejack like dark cloud. With nothing more that could be done, she finally decided to get some rest herself hoping that the next day would be brighter for her and her friend.
The next morning was a bit more pleasant than the day that proceeded it. Applejack’s conscience felt a bit lighter and her fear decreased as well. Perhaps today would better. As planned, the orange mare started to work on her fences, replacing old planks and wire with new wood and steel. Despite the setback of yesterday, she was still ahead of her plan and she was happy knowing that all the work should be finished by noon leaving the rest of the day to spent time with Winona. Granted that Dr. Fauna would allow it.
Applejack’s thoughts were abruptly interrupted, when she lost grip on the fence as she put up new barbwire, falling forward and resulting in a long, but superficial cut on her right foreleg.
‘Ahhhhh!’
‘What the …?’
Applejack yelled, but not for sudden waive of pain that should have engulfed her, but rather as a reflex. In fact, she swiftly noticed that her leg did not hurt at all. Rather it tingled, tickled.
This made her giggle a bit as she stared at her fresh bleeding wound in both confusion and curiosity. Once the shock of the moment disappeared, she quickly went back to the farm in order to clean the cut with disinfectant and to put a bandage over it. Perhaps this painless sensation was an early sign of an infection, even though it would be weird that it occurred so quickly. Regardless Applejack cleaned her wound with an alcohol solution, washed away her blood and covered it in clean bandages. This should suffice for now. She had been through far worse and would not bother going to the hospital unless the injury would fester. The cut was not very deep and the antiseptics she used should have dealt with any aspiring microorganism setting up camp in her exposed flesh.
With that taken care of Applejack resumed her work, fixing her fences, replacing rotten wood and tightening loose wire. The work went smoothly and the young farmer once again managed to finish her chores ahead of time.
Right as she was about to put her tools back into the barn, Applejack felt the need to check her fences again, fearing she might have overlooked a spot. She looked at every post and every plank. Once, then twice. Then she checked her trees, her fields and her pastures. No matter where she went she felt like she had to keep moving, keep checking if everything was taken care of, keep working until everything was done as it should be. Once everything outside had been examined and fixed, she thought, surely she would feel better and be finally free to go …
‘Weren’t there somethin’ else Ah wanted to do?’ she asked herself.
Of course, she thought, she has not checked the barn yet. There must be still a whole load of work waiting for her from cleaning up her tools and equipment to organizing the boxes and barrels.
As she did before, Applejack cleaned, repaired and organized everything she could find, hastily walking into every corner of the building. Her breathing became heavier and heavier, her libs kept trembling and she felt fatigue slowly creeping up in her, but there was no time. She knew she had no time and needed to hurry. At least, that’s what the ever growing sentiment in her chest told her.
In her haste, the orange mare attempted to place a cider barrels, still filled with the delicious liquid on top of one another to make more room, but her exhaustion and ecstatic shaking finally caught her of guard resulting in one of the barrels toppling and falling on top of her. She managed to avoid the worst, but the barrel still buried her right foreleg. Two load cracks could be heard, as it landed on the ground, one for the barrel that partially shattered releasing its the sweet, sticky contents on the barn floor and Applejack’s mane and fur, and one for Applejacks cannon and splint bone. Both broke under the weight of the wood, metal and cider pressing onto them in a split-second.
Applejack started to laugh.
Not an amused laugh, not a blissful laugh or even a laugh speaking of utter madness, but a desperate laugh, a laugh one would expect if a pony is relentlessly tickled. The remains of the barrel still pressed onto Applejacks foreleg, and as she laid there pinned down to the ground, it felt as if she could feel every layer of flesh and skin, every tendon and bone splinter in her right forearm, but instead of feeling pain and hurt, all she felt was deep, horrible, almost indescribable tickling.
‘OH MAH GOD, OH MAH GOD.’
‘PLE-HE-HE-HA-HA-HA-SE MAKE IT STOP.’
‘WHA-HA-HA-HA-HA-T IS GOIN’ … HA HA HA HA HA HA HA … GOIN’ ON HERE.’
She screamed and begged in vain, laughter cutting to her sentences.
Instinctively she tried to pull her foreleg away but it remained stuck and the struggle only resulted in more tickles carousing through her body. In a moment of clarity, Applejack focused her energy on the remains of the barrel, still containing a sizeable amount of cider rolling it off her right foreleg by pushing against it with her head and left foreleg.
Once freed Applejack tried to run for her kitchen, where her family stored their medical supplies. Despite her delirious state, she knew this was not normal, this should not have been possible.
Did she infect herself? Did she get blood poisoning when she cut her leg? She wondered, but both her thoughts and her movements were interrupted by waves upon waves of ticklish sensations traversing through her body like electric bolts. She laughed so intensely that she had trouble breathing and kept stumbling over her own legs, hitting the ground, which in return caused more tickling to rip through her flesh.
Barely able to draw breath through her own laughter Applejack’s panic grew.
I can’t breathe. Will I die here? What is this disease doing to me? I need help. Help.
Eventually and miraculously, the young mare managed to get into her kitchen where she swiftly grabbed the pillboxes containing anything from painkiller to antibiotics, pouring it into her mouth praying that she grabbed the right one. Tears of laughter and mental anguish prevented her from identifying the correct boxes and their contents.
After swallowing what she hoped was the necessary medicine, Applejack, cowered in a corner trying her best not to move any muscle in order to not trigger another ticklish assault. Her legs still tickled, but it was bearable for the moment. Over the course of the next hour, the intensity of the tickling decreased until it was fully gone, allowing Applejack to give into her exhaustion and fall asleep.
She woke up feeling sick, tired and confused. What was she doing on her kitchen floor? She wondered. Why was she so sticky? And why did she feel as if an avalanche of rocks and timber had buried her? While she tried to put the mental fragments of the previous two days back together she felt her body tingle anew, only this time it was not limited to one limb. The tickling was now everywhere, in her hooves, her legs, her back, her stomach, her cutiemark and even her head. There were no words to properly describe how torturous the experience was for the unfortunate farm pony. Applejack struggled and wailed but nothing she did brought her any relieve. It engulfed her entire being and all she could do was laugh a painful, desperate, maddening laugh.
‘HA HA HA HA HA HA-AAA-PLEA-HA-HA-HA-SE. SOMEPONY, ANYPONY HELP ME!’ she pleaded to any random individual that might listen to her cries for help, but no one was there. Her family was far away in Appleloosa and the autumn storm that was currently raging outside prevented anypony from paying Sweet Apple Acres a visit.
Applejack did her best to regain some control over her body and rise to her hooves despite her nerves telling her she was under assault by millions of small critters, feathers and claws poking and stroking her inside and out. At this rate, she would die from either shock, exhaustion or suffocation. She needed to act as long as she could still control her limbs to some degree and maintained a slither of sanity. Suspecting that this mess likely started with her cut, Applejack, ripped off the bandage on her right foreleg. It took her a few attempts since her own laughter made it difficult for her to grab the cloth with her mouth, but she succeeded eventually. Trying her best to focus and suppress the ticklish firework her nerve system displayed, she took a close look at the wire cut and bruises left by the cider barrel. All appeared normal, given the circumstances, with the first stages of healing barely visible. As the young farmer inspected her leg repeatedly, she observed a small wiggle, which did not seem to be coming for her own twitching muscles, right under the cut. It looked more like a twitching snake or a worm.
At this point Applejack would have done anything to make the tickling stop. With most of her reasoning apparatus suppressed by wave upon wave of tingles and tickles, she stumbled over to her sink, knocking over cups, pots, plates and various food items in the process. She grabbed the knife laying right next to it, dropping it when forced to laugh, and picking it up again with her mouth to get to the bottom of this. She laid her right foreleg onto her kitchen table and launched the knife into it, opening it from hoof to knee. As she should expect by now, she did not feel any pain, which would have been a welcome sensation, but instead more scourging tickling. Not being able to suppress her laughter, she dropped the knife once more and looked at her leg. There in the gash from which a stream of blood emerged she could see it, the cause of the insanity that has befallen her: Black worms wiggling and fidgeting.
It is the worms, she thought. The worms are tickling her, they are everywhere and she must get them out.
For the last time Applejack picked up the knife, but this time with her hooves and plunged it deep into her stomach, where the tickling was particularly strong. When the blade pierced her skin and organs, it tickled so much that the orange mare collapsed to the ground, still clinging onto the knife, still launching it into every part of her body that tickled. Wherever she struck worms were leaking out, spreading all over her kitchen floor alongside her blood, but she could stop herself. It tickled, it tickled so much and she had to end it, make the worms go away. So the blade came down, again and again.
Applejack had no more rational thoughts left, only primal, damaged instincts that told her to keep going. She did not feel anything in her hind legs or torso anymore and she barely felt anything in her forelegs. The only place that still tickled, the only place that still held these horrible black worms was her head. Luckily, her forelegs still worked despite feeling numb. Once the worms was out, once the tickling stopped, everything would be fine. Nothing else mattered anymore. She raised her knife one last time and finally made the tickling stop.
--
The autumn storm hauled outside as leaves and twigs flew through the air. Dr. Fauna was concerned that Applejack did not visit her office to be with Winona, as she promised, but perhaps something more important had stopped her. Even more concerning, though, was the thought of Applejack finally visiting her. Winona’s condition did not improve regardless of what Dr. Fauna tried and she was sadly forced to pronounce the poor dog dead this morning. Dr. Fauna decided to move her cadaver away from the isolation unit she spent the last two days in, in case another emergency requires her to isolated sickly animals before treating them. When she gently put Winona’s remains on a trolley, she noticed something peculiar. Small black worms with red stripes wiggling and fidgeting on the ground where Winona just lied.
