Chapter 1: How it Came to This
How it Came to This
There's nothing that can prepare you for life in Equestria. Outside the Stables, anyway. Not many can even remember what it was like when this was a happy place. So much has happened since then...
I am the son of a pony named Applejack. I don't know who my father is, or was. My mama couldn't talk about him, since he had been left outside. My mama loved me, and that's all I'll ever need. She told me so many stories of how life was before the Stables, before she had to take me in here while I was still a little foal. I don't remember it at all. She always talked about her friends, and our family. I guess that's why I came out here in the first place.
Mama died three days ago. She died telling me one thing: I had to try to live a better life. Not better than hers or anyone else's, just better, however I could. I decided the best way was to head out. You see, my mama's stories always had sad endings. Everyone in the Stables had a few, but hers were considered the saddest. She never let me see that sadness, not for the whole of my time with her. She was strong.
I guess I got to wonder how it all came to this. My mama knew. She told us all. Down there in the grey-walled bunker, that was all we really had left to wonder about. She always began it the same way, that it was a beautiful season for "apple buckin," which is apparently when you kick trees to harvest apples, according to her. She said it was a proud Apple family tradition. But the day went bad fast, when the princesses from Canterlot and some guards came looking for my mama and her friends. They needed help bad. Someone who didn't like them very much, a pegasus named Trixie, had shown up and taken a statue away. Here it turns out, she had had a bad experience with the Ponyville crowd where my mama lived, and was out to prove herself. She had been practicing real hard to be better at magic, and came up with a plan: she would bring Discord back to help her. That's when things went wrong.
As soon as Trixie had finished her spell to bring Discord back, he took control of her with his own powers. He wanted a source of pegasus power for his own plan at revenge. As it turns out, my mama and her friends had plenty of enemies. He went off to find the final ally that would make him unbeatable. That ally happened to be Chrysalis, the changeling. Meanwhile, my mama and the others got ready for a fight, grabbing the Elements of Harmony before heading off to meet the other princesses on the borders of Equestria. They thought they knew what was coming. No pony could have. What flooded out at them was chaos, deceit and revenge too strong to describe.
They fought their hardest. Cadence, Shining Armor, Princess Celestia, Princess Luna... but none harder than Mama and the gang. There were too many changelings, too much magic, too much hate. They were gonna lose. Ms. Sparkle wouldn't have it end that way. She wanted her those she loved to survive. She took all the Elements from the other ponies, and sent the five of them plus Cadence and Shining Armor off to the caves underneath Canterlot. So many others had already been hiding there, scared and alone. Now my mama felt like them. Ms.Sparkle did her best, but she couldn't control the Elements, not all at once. The power burst. It showered everything with magic, mixing with Discord's own power, and turned everypony left outside to stone. As the world began to fall apart, Twilight mustered every last bit of herself and managed to send them all to the moon. They're still battling up there, all these years later. Discord, Trixie, Chrysalis and all her Changelings fighting Twilight and the two Princesses who have nothing but the Elements of Harmony. New craters appear every once in a while, changing the face of the moon.
When the magic burst, Shining Armor put up a barrier to protect everyone. Even with the protection of the caves and the help of Princess Cadence, it nearly didn't hold. My mama says we all owe our lives to them. Everypony knew it was only temporary though. That's why we all owe our lives to another two ponies who were lucky enough to be there. Mr. Flim and Mr. Flam set about making something to house us all in. The results were the Stables, a series of "magic bunkers" that would protect us from the background magic that still permeated the land. Without them, we'd all slowly turn to stone if exposed to dense pockets, slowing us down and making us weak until we weren't anything more than the statues so many had already become. That is where we would live out our lives, safe from the devastation around us. Some say the ones outside could be considered the lucky ones. My mama sometimes thought so, especially for one pony in particular.
We all lost loved ones outside on that day. I lost my daddy, whoever he may be, and my mama lost many more. GreatGranny Smith and Uncle Macintosh were doing chores on the farm when the burst happened. Even worse, she saw people go right in front of her. She had been near the cave entrance, watching the lights in the distance as the battle raged on without her. Her friends were in shock, and exhausted. But when the animals came running for cover, Ms. Fluttershy came out to help. No one could call to her fast enough when the burst started to come. Shining Armor had to put up the barrier. There wasn't any more time to wait. Fluttershy turned to stone right at the entrance to the caves. It hurt my mama tons whenever she told me this. She always said it may have been for the best. She'd say "Fluttershy wouldn't like the Stables much. She'd be too worried about he animals outside anyway!" I know my mama had a point, but since I can remember, I always knew when she tried to lie to me. The Element of Honesty tends to struggle with that.
Ms. Dash had it hard. She had no room to fly, and had lost many friends too. Almost no pegasi were in the caves when it happened. They all tried to hide in Cloudsdale. She told the best stories of how there used to be an endless blue sky above, and how far you could see while laying on a cloud. She doesn't say much of anything anymore. She hasn't spoke since Mama's passing. It was the last straw for her, I guess. Ms. Rarity did her best to help, giving everypony any help she could offer, any materials she could supply. She had passed several years back. Unicorns are more sensitive to the magic that can still sneak into the Stables. My mama would never talk about Ms. Pie. No pony will. The rumors are she went out soon after the burst to find friends still outside.
After so many years, the magic has faded enough for us to slowly come out, as long as we avoid the Bad Pockets. The magic pooled like water over time. Now I'm out here to find out if I can't bring my mama's favorite story back into the world: the ones she told about the Apple family farm. Acres of trees with sweet apples on them, grass under hoof, blue sky over head. I want that now more than ever. My mama's cousin lived out in Appleoosa, where he had his own farm going. I've heard rumors they escaped the burst with the buffaloes into the foothills, holding off the negative effects of the magic with the buffalo's medicine. He may still have some seeds saved after all this time. All I need is to find him, and some land to plant. I've heard some interesting stories of something that could solve that problem too...