“Applejaaaack!” Rarity’s shrill whine pierces the natural ambience. “Please tell me we aren’t lost!”

“Uh…no, not at all, Rares,” Applejack replies, smiling even though she feels her gut twisting into a knot as she tries to rationalize the situation, “we’re just, ah…takin’ a scenic route, that’s all!”

Rarity huffs, not believing this for a moment. The woodland surroundings around them are pleasant enough, but she grew tired of them an hour ago. The best view she’s getting is of Applejack’s rear, tight jeans clinging to the curvature of her shapely hips and thighs. The mare’s toned musculature flexes as she moves with deft strides along the path through the underbrush, over roots and past brushes and under branches. It distracts Rarity enough that every now and then she nearly stumbles and falls over—twisting her ankle or getting dirt all over her shirt would be the perfect way to cap off this disastrous nature hike.

“Oh, Celestia, it’s going to be dark soon!” she laments as she looks up at the scant view of the sky afforded to them by the leafy canopy, blue bleeding into yellow. “We have no idea where we are and we don’t even have anything to eat!”

Applejack whirls about to face her and sternly asks, “What happened to the granola I packed for you?”

“Um…” Rarity tilts her head so that her mane obscures her bashful expression. “I already ate all of it.”

“Cripes, Rares, I can never get you to eat anythin’ healthy at home, then we have to carefully ration it and you scarf it all down at once?!” She grimaces and claps her palm over her face. “Well we’re just gonna have to go hungry ‘til we—” But then she stops abruptly, interrupted by a desperate gurgle within her own stomach.

Rarity crosses her arms over her chest and stares with one eyebrow quirked up.

“Okay, fine, maybe we can find some fruit somewhere,” the earth pony relents with a heavy sigh. “No idea where that’s gonna happen, though, and we really shouldn’t wander any more than we already have.”

And then, while she’s looking around through the trees, Rarity looks up and asks, “What about these?”

Applejack turns and squints. The branches directly over their heads are bearing some kind of fruit—all the trees surrounding them, actually; they stumbled into a grove without realizing it. Blue light manifests around one of them and it snaps off, levitating down to Rarity’s waiting hand, resting neatly within her palm. It resembles a plum, dark mauve in color with purple rings on either side. “Ain’t ever seen somethin’ quite like that before,” she mutters.

“Well it’s not an apple, evidently,” Rarity remarks with a smirk as she gently rubs the smooth rind with her thumb, “I do quite adore the coloration.”

“Rares, you can’t just eat random fruit you find in the forest, you have no idea what it could—”

The unicorn glibly pops the whole thing in her mouth and bites down.

Applejack can only stare.

“Oh…oh, Applejack, darling!” Rarity exclaims through her muffling mouthful as she chews, ruddy juice trickling from the corners of her lips. The taste washes over her tongue and elicits a tingle along her spine. “It’s simply marvelous! It’s like a plum but so much…richer! And just a hint of…grape, I believe.” And then, as soon as she swallows, she’s already pulling down another one.

Applejack is incensed, flabbergasted, distraught, but also she is hungry, and the sight and sounds of Rarity enjoying herself make her mouth water. So she turns to the tree, and with a little effort she’s able to jump and grab one of the low-hanging fruit. She turns it around in her hand, inspecting it, as if expecting it to suddenly tremble and explode or unfurl into a hideous toothy abomination, but nothing happens. She takes a sniff of the rind, detecting nothing out of the ordinary, nothing sour or rotten, and with an anxious gulp she deposits it into her mouth.

Now, of course, having been around apples all her life, so ingrained into her existence that it’s her family name, Applejack would never dream of allowing her favorite fruit to be toppled so easily. But her familiarity with the cultivation of fruit does grant her a little distinction in her palate that Rarity lacks (no matter how much Rarity insists that she lacks the sophisticated taste to appreciate Canterlotian cuisine). She bites into the nameless purple fruit, and its juices gush in her mouth, making her cringe slightly, not so much a fan of that intense viscosity. The flesh, though, has a tender firmness to it, chewy but not mushy. Its taste fills her mouth rapidly, washing over her tongue, and despite her need for sustenance, she can’t help holding it for just a few seconds longer, savoring the thick sweet juices.

She finally swallows and then exhales heavily, her senses swimming for a moment. “Well…dang,” she admits, “that ain’t half bad.”

“It’s amazing, isn’t it?” Rarity remarks, her mouth half-full again. She hands another fruit to Applejack, one of a whole bunch she has floating in the air beside her. There are further patches of deep purple staining the white fur around her muzzle.

“Now don’t go…puttin’ words in my mouth, Rares,” Applejack replies while stuffing another fruit in her mouth and grabbing another couple from out of the air, “but, y’know, I’ll admit it, couldn’t hurt to take some home with us.”

“Oh I was just thinking the same thing, darling, just think what we could do with them!” Rarity has the plums floating to her, a gluttonous procession automated by magic, just opening her mouth again and again so she can eat them, while she slings her backpack off her shoulders. The idea of storing any of the fruit quickly becomes forgotten, though, with her consumption taking priority.

“Pies, cobblers, fritters, jam, butter…heck, we can…we can start a whole new grove with these.” Applejack goes over to the tree and with one powerful kick she pounds the trunk. It shakes vigorously, leaves rustling, and a hail of purple fruit falls upon them. She goes to pick them up as she would when gathering apples, but instead she just eats every one of them.

The ponies smack and gurgle and belch as they consume their feast. The trees intermittently shake, and their heavy hoofsteps thud through the grass. Seams strain and pop one by one and cloth tears. Juice splatters like droplets of rain. All too quickly, they deplete one tree after another, a swarm of two devouring all in their path.

It doesn’t take long either for the impact of their glut to grow apparent. Rarity’s trim and curvaceous physique is marred by her midsection bulging out in a prominent white dome, while Applejack’s defined abdomen blows up into a taut orange balloon, pushing up their shirts. More than that, however, their forms shift, thickening, widening, distending, increasingly padded with flab, tearing through the confines of their clothing. Patches of purple mat their fur, until the fur itself starts to change, shrinking and flattening into their skin, which in turn becomes smoother, hardened like organic armor, leaving the juice to trickle farther over the sleek surfaces.

Applejack grunts and burps as she ingests fruit after fruit. The swallowing motion of her throat becomes less obvious as flabby tires swaddled it, piled on top of each other like stacks of pancakes. She feels an increased sense of urgency as it seems to take longer for each mouthful to reach her stomach, not realizing that her neck is extending. There is just as much struggle for her to get her hands and their cargo up to her mouth for each bite as fat piles over her biceps, impeding her mobility. Applejack is nothing if not up for a challenge, however, so no amount of difficulty is going to keep her from sating her hunger, not her rapid fattening, not her evaporating wardrobe, not her warping anatomy, her jaws bending even as she continues to chew, equine muzzle molded into a tapering snout, front teeth contracting into sharp incisors and canines.

Rarity is no less undignified despite her long history of adhering to decorum, all too eager to devour as much as she can despite the mess that she’s making—a mess of her body and her precious clothes. Were she not so preoccupied with her hunger and her feast, she might be more concerned for her personally crafted vest and blouse (the trendiest hiking attire she could manage) falling to pieces, or the loss of her carefully manicured fur, or the bloating of her figure. Her unicorn magic allows her to not worry about the physical limitations of her body, to bring a never-ending supply of purple plums to her mouth, but instead she is faced with the complication of her focus waning, causing the spiral procession of floating fruit to dip and waver precariously. She can’t help losing herself in the delight of her meal, cupping her hands against her midsection, pressing in so that she can feel the taut pressure of her stomach beneath the layers of fat, and she makes a low bellowing moan that erupts into a belch, producing reverberations through her frame.

Applejack looks up languidly, just for a moment distracted from eating. She sees a bloated marshmallowy figure, tatters of cloth clinging to her. She hardly resembles a pony, but she understands that it must be Rarity. She looks like what the farmpony always warned she would become if she didn’t get more exercise. But what Applejack really sees is the immensity, the curvature of chest and gut and hips, and the hedonistic excess of her consumption. It is impressive, in its own way.

And Rarity in turn regards Applejack, sprawled inelegantly upon the grass. It has to be her, even if she’s a swollen caricature of the pony she knows, who else would wear that hat? Her belly keeps her propped up while also steadily growing into a detriment to her feast as her flesh extends beyond the reach of her arms. The rapid expansion in proportions is less immediately obvious on account of how Rarity herself has grown just as much. Her taller neck affords her a higher point of view, though this is canceled out in large part by the bulk of her bosom jutting in front of her.

This gives them both pause, just for a moment. Time enough to consider the ramifications of what they’re seeing. Their bloated proportions. Their inequine features. Their indecency. Their slovenliness.

But then what wins out is their fullness, hitting them all at once with the force of an oncoming train. Both mares groan deeply while clutching at their midsections with juice-stained fingers. The taut pressure of their stomachs can only be felt through compounding layers of flabby padding.

“Oh, Apple…j-jack,” Rarity mumbles, interrupted by intermittent belches. In grasping her gut, her arms push on the sides of her breasts, squeezing them together as they splay over her stomach. “I’m…f-feeling…woozy.”

“Oogh…” Applejack weakly wobbles on her hooves, trying to move, to stand, but in the end all she can do is roll over with a heavy flop that shakes the trees. Her belly juts up from her, a dome of flesh only lightly marred by creases along its surface. This doesn’t help her much, now piling all of her weight upon her, and after the churning and shaking she lets loose a thunderous burp. “Don’t ‘member…last time…I pigged out…that much.”

“I’ve never been so…so…hungry…” Even while she clutches her stuffed stomach, Rarity croons loudly. She looks around herself—past the white slopes that comprise her figure—and she sees the purple fruit littering the forest floor. There are so many within her already, but she can’t stifle the yearning to consume still more, a worm writhing through her brain. “They just…taste…so good…!” She tries to levitate some more morsels to her mouth, but her magical focus is completely shot. Or it could mean that something to do with her ability to cast magic at all is failing her, but in her current state she neglects to consider that possibility.

Applejack looks around herself, her skewed perspective flat against the ground. She sees a fruit lying right by her face, so she opens her mouth and chomps on it, grass mixed in with the juices. She relishes in its taste, in the slow pressure as it passes down her esophagus, in the persistent tightening of her stomach. After that, however, there is nothing else immediately within her reach, leaving her to groan despairingly, but her drive continues to push her on, and hunger is one of the basest motivations. With no small effort, straining the muscles buried beneath her flab, she rolls again onto her side and then laboriously stands, tremulously jiggling and wobbling and shaking. “How’d I…g-go…my whole life…without this?” she mutters while huffing and puffing for breath, sweat trickling over her brow. She is no longer mentally running the taste of the mystery plums against that of apples; the purple rind and juice are the only things on her mind.

For a couple minutes, both not-quite-ponies gaze forlornly at the forest floor, the dropped fruits that are scattered over the grass. They don’t have the slightest hope of picking any of them up—despite their oppressive appetites, they are both very economically-minded mares, mindful of the effort that goes into any task they attempt. Applejack knows that it would be too much work to bend over and reach past her gut to grab whatever is in reach, then shuffle over to another spot to repeat the process. Rarity on the other hand, still unable to focus on her magic, observed enough from the struggle Applejack faced to know that she wants to avoid it if possible, and she isn’t in a hurry to get grass stains all over her skin either. They face equal strain upon their minds and their bodies, weight piling down; any slight shift in balance poses a risk of toppling over.

Then Applejack growls hungrily as she glares up at the tree branches above her. There’s still so much tantalizing fruit up there, waiting to be devoured, yet they are out of reach, even with their elongated necks. With a low grumble, she attempts the motion of kicking the trunk again, but all she can manage is a few wiggles of her leg. Movement is hampered by her thighs grinding together and the gut which hangs heavily in front of her, spilling past her waist. She hesitates to try to kick out to the side, knowing that it would be a grossly suboptimal position—and shifting all her weight like that is a sure recipe for disaster. In the end, all she can do is stubbornly ram her belly into the trunk, and the impact on her overtaxed stomach makes her innards lurch, but it has the desired effect of bringing another hail of fruits down around them. Most of them bounce off the orange slopes, but one lands within her cleavage, and she gives a wry cheer before promptly snatching it into her mouth.

The high of victory deflates when a haughty chuckle comes floating over from Rarity. “Oh, Applejack…you’re still not thinking big enough,” she chortles, her jowls rippling, the motion transferring down along her neck to her upper chest.

“‘Scuse me?” Applejack reins in enough of her composure to put on a show of indignance, drawing her back straight despite the front-heavy bulk of her torso and planting her hands on her excessively ample hips.

“Just watch, darling.” Rarity waddles over to another tree, and instead of facing it head-on she turns to the side, allowing her to be closer to the trunk. Then she swings with her hip, popping side to side with a whack on the bark. Purple produce starts to fall around her, and she cups the sides of her bosom, heaving the swollen globes together, and with her net of flesh she catches five falling fruits. “See?” She smirks, doughy cheeks dimpling.

But Applejack isn’t listening or watching. She has already hobbled off to another tree to repeat the unicorn’s demonstration. Easier said than done since, even while properly preparing herself, she doesn’t have as much acreage of chest-meat to work with. She looks up into the branches, trying to position herself as optimally as possible, but even then she is only rewarded with two fruits coming to rest at her sternum. The orange mare grumbles some ornery country expletives to herself as she moves on to another spot, wobbling with extra care to avoid dropping any of her cargo. Rarity shakes her head, sparing only a glance at the gelatinous buttocks before she turns away.

They wander through the grove, attempting to gather as much fruit as they can. Rarity may not be Rainbow Dash but she still understands a competition when she sees one. She only hopes that Applejack doesn’t get too frustrated for her own good. Both of their efforts, though, are impeded by their hunger, unable to resist scarfing down another plum at irregular intervals. The encumbering embrace of fat grows heavier still, bringing down yet heavier loads with their hoofsteps—well, not so much hooves anymore, their stances shifting to something more plantigrade, feet narrowing down to single tapering points instead of toes. Their manes and tails start to shrink, the last of their hair receding, their identifiable pony traits vanishing one by one. They are too honed in on their impromptu contest to worry about anything of that sort. The most concern they can feel is a pang of regret any time they accidentally step on a fallen fruit, juice squelching under their unseen feet.

Because there is no agreed-upon time limit for this event, the mares simply stop when they happen to be beside each other and tired enough that they can’t be bothered to continue any longer. It takes Applejack a great deal of self-restraint just to look away from the mouthwatering pile of plums resting upon her cleavage, a dozen, maybe two. She comes to regret this when she sees that Rarity has accrued what must be twice as much or more upon the pale mounds of her bosom, and she regrets it even more when Rarity takes notice of her and makes that smug smirk again. “It would appear that…we have determined who the…the superior forager is,” she remarks, tossing her head and what remains of her purple curls.

All Applejack can muster in response is a needful whine, sagging in defeat, and as she slumps her belly brushes on the grass.

“Oh come now, darling, there’s no need to be so dour.” Then Rarity shuffles over until they stand hip to hip, joining the shelves of flesh that encircle their waists. Still Applejack doesn’t take any notice of this, not before the other mare reaches over and waves a purple fruit in front of her face, and with an intense surge of vivacity she snaps it up. “There, there, that’s more like it,” she coos while placing another few morsels on Applejack’s chest, “we’re still in this together.”

“Ouh…sometimes I dunno where I’d be without you, Rares,” Applejack murmurs bashfully, and delicately she caresses Rarity’s hand with her own.

“Well, I suppose…we wouldn’t be out here,” Rarity remarks, glancing around at the darkening forest, then shrugs, “but we have gained quite a lot as a result of this trip.”

They both look down at themselves, tunnel-visioned upon the pile of fruit they each carry, the delectable snacks that await them, and not their heaving breasts, their taut guts, or their hairless skin, the tingling warmth that fills them to bursting. The ramifications don’t matter to them, so long as they can continue eating.

So, eat they do, glutting themselves on the last of their haul. There is some paltry effort to savor the taste for as long as possible, holding on to the satisfaction of their consumption, knowing that it will be all the more difficult to gather up anywhere near this much again, but they are still commanded by their hunger above all else. They share the spoils of their efforts with each other—Applejack helps herself to Rarity’s portions, but Rarity takes a couple from her every now and then. They intermittently take turns feeding each other, a brief respite from the gluttonous intensity to tenderly eat a fruit out of the other mare’s palm. Rarity presses her tapering muzzle against Applejack’s palm, and she delicately caresses her doughy features. Applejack licks Rarity’s fingers and she yelps in surprise, then they both laugh, jiggling.

In the midst of their feast, the only thing more noisome than their eating, their chomping and grunting and smacking and belching, is the gurgling and groaning of their bodies. Their stomachs strain, stretched and swollen, not that it’s so easy to notice on account of the flab that accumulates upon them. Rarity’s gut swells and spills far past her waist, inching along her thighs, heavy and rotund, a living apron that keeps her crotch concealed (not that there’s anything to do the same for her chest). Applejack’s belly has made permanent contact with the ground, resting heavily upon grass and fallen fruits; for now, she can lean forward and relax in the feeling of support, easing the weight from her legs, but it will no doubt prove cumbersome when it comes time to move again.

They gaze longingly together on occasion, into each other’s eyes, or just watching the other eat. It is a different form of hunger, perhaps, a passionate fervor, even though they are both so drastically different from how they had been at the start of the hike. They blithely look on while their manes completely vanish, along with Rarity’s unicorn horn shrinking into her skull, and crooked, striped antennae sprout from their scalps—two on the forehead, and two more which vaguely approximate their lost manes, standing in place of bangs and locks. Amid the engorging of flesh, the skin along their backs rises, hardening into plates, an arthropod carapace, their colors matching that of their lost manes with ovoid rings on the sides of each segment, like the rings on their beloved plums—straw yellow plates and crimson rings for Applejack, amethyst and sapphire for Rarity. In place of their equine tails, stout insectoid abdomens jut from the bases of their spines, each topped with an additional pair of zigzagging feelers. Aside from their coloration, a hat precariously perched on Applejack’s head is the only trait to identify the ponies they once were.

That hardly matters to either of them, though. They know who they are, and what they are (in a figurative sense; not even Twilight knows what kind of overgrown arthropod they’ve transformed into). As they lean into each other and press their lips together, their fleshy forms mashing and squeezing, vying for dominance—it’s only thanks to their long necks that they’re even able to clear the plains of bulk between them—all that they can think of is how much pleasure they feel in their company, in all the ups and downs. Well, that and also the lingering tang of juice around their mouths.

“Mmm…now that’s a meal,” Rarity murmurs now that they are finally finished, finally granting mercy to their overstuffed stomachs.

“It ain’t…home-cooked,” Applejack comments blearily, “but it’s somethin’.” She nuzzles against Rarity, pressing into the cushy warmth of her cheek, and she does the same in turn.

“Are you ready to head home, then?” she asks, and she reaches down to caress the other not-pony’s midsection. “Perhaps we can still make it in time for supper.” It might be possible, if they rolled instead of walked.

Applejack croons with a mixture of longing and agony. She grasps at her own gut too, sinking into the swollen flab; her arms cannot hope to reach the far side of the bloated dome of flesh. For a moment, she considers lifting it, attempting to lug around her own bulk while walking, but exhaustion catches up to her before she can even try, and so she simply falls onto herself instead, a built-in mattress with pillows for a bosom. “I reckon…probably better for us to stop n’…rest a while,” she mutters, scarcely audible.

“That’s just fine, darling.” Rarity stoops next to her, standing side to side. The white not-pony takes up less space with her gut, but she makes up for that with the behemoth bulk of her breasts. Her curvaceous hourglass shape complements Applejack’s rotundity well, the two of them fitting together almost like jigsaw pieces. “There’s no one else I’d rather be lost in the woods with,” she whispers, grinning cheekily.

“We ain’t…ain’t lost, Rarity,” she mumbles drowsily, her eyelids drooping shut.

Rarity just strokes along the ridges on her neck and listens to the heaving gusts of breath within her voluminous body. She gazes over the mare’s orange-and-yellow body, carapace gleaming faintly in the moonlight. There’s so much to see, she thinks she could spend hours just staring if she wanted to.

But she can also see, faintly in the shadows along the ground, the fallen fruits that went by the wayside during their binge.

She licks her lips.

Author's Note

Initially this was supposed to be another quick project, some funny Rarity fat antics, but then I had a particular brain worm get into my head. What if I reused the concept of Don't Eat the Berries? I didn't have enough Scolipede in my life. I could have a double serving even. I could get a bonus serving of Rarijack on top of it too. I am the one in control, I hold all the power, shut up. Also tried more experimenting with a looser narrative perspective, not confining myself to a single character like I usually do.

There was going to be some hints of drunkenness induced by the fruit but I forgot.

Rarity just can't stop ogling them apples.

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Also there is now art of both Applepede and Raripede if that interests you, see DB ID 3439666 and 3475622.