The raindrops from the dismal grey clouds that hovered in the sky raced one another in a beautiful yet monochromatic display of brilliance. The fragments of sunlight that managed to penetrate the field of clouds were playfully bounced back and forth between the each of the droplets that crossed its path. Without the warmth of Celestia’s great sun, the forestry sank into the recesses of a feathery darkness. Gentle and cool winds caressed the trees and melted into the foliage itself. The rain would collect on these bits of foliage, until the weight forced the plant life to bend and release the accumulated liquid. From there, the water soaked into the soil, providing sparse nutrients to whatever rooted wildlife that was quick enough to snatch it up.
With every somber step, Applejack’s hooves sunk into the mud. The wet soil molded around them, leaving a path in her wake, which was quickly erased by the heavy rainfall. The saddlebag that stretched across her back hung limply on either side. Even though the contents were protected, the bag itself had become heavily dampened, adding extra weight to it. The mare’s blonde mane swung side to side as water that had missed her brown stetson trailed down it until it reached a fine point where it harmlessly splashed onto her cheeks. Some of it made its way to her lips. There was a faintly sweet taste to it, but otherwise no different than river water. She could feel chills running all throughout her extremities, and yet she pushed on.
With a measure of difficulty, Applejack could see a small house perched on an even smaller hill. Fine details were hidden behind a thin veil of mist, but the broad shape of the house became more and more visible as she drew nearer. Heart as heavy as her bag, she sloshed through the dirt until the mist had become irrelevant.
The light brown color of the humble home was now clearly visible and was accented by simple white shutters on either side of the two windows on the front of the house. A single candle was lit in the right window, providing an infinitesimal amount of light to the otherwise dim abode. Behind the house, larger trails of sunlight illuminated the deep green leaves on the trees, giving them a peaceful naturalistic glow.
Applejack stood on the small stone doorstep before the entrance. She dragged her hooves across the surface, removing any mud that had been caked on the bottoms. Her solemn stare reflected off of the stained glass window that was held within the door. She raised her hoof to press against the door, but felt it sink back down to the earth. Her mouth hung slightly agape, but closed as she brought her hoof her eyes to wipe them free of the clear teardrops that had formed.
Ah ain’t even through the door yet and ah’m already losin’ it…
Pushing her stetson further down on her face, Applejack once again placed her hoof on the door. With a forceful push, it finally gave way and opened with a loud creak. The mare placed her weight back on the ground and made her way inside.
The dark foyer was illuminated only just by the candle that rested in the window sill. Beautiful hardwood floors and walls made the entire room feel more at home. Ornaments and trinkets sat upon little wooden shelves, where they remained untouched by the layers of dust that had accumulated on the shelves themselves. They had been handled recently.
Applejack moved throughout the silent building, lightly guiding her hooves as little creaks emitted from the floors. Like the rest of the house, the hallways were eerily dim, yet filled with a sense of peacefulness; a peacefulness that Applejack couldn’t help but feel like she was breaking.
Not being a regular patron of the household, it took some trial and error for her to locate the room she wanted. The air in the small bedroom was gently wooed by the cool draft coming in from the window. The room itself was rather bare, containing the necessary furniture for a bedroom to have in addition to a few pictures that hung loosely on the walls. Applejack quietly walked over to one of the photos and examined it through the darkness. It was unmistakable that the ponies in the photo were her and her family. It had been one of those rare moments when everything in the world had been perfect and untainted, and they had succeeded in capturing that moment within the paper that hid behind the thin piece of glass in front of her. Everypony looked happy and healthy, a stark contrast to the reality that was the present.
Applejack glanced over at the bed that laid parallel to the window on the right. Between the bed and the wall, a small nightstand was tucked into the corner. On top, an unlit candle sat beside a thick book and a cup of tea. Applejack swallowed the lump in her throat that had formed at the sight of the figure that rested calmly under the thin sheets before her.
Leave. Don’t make this harder on her than ya already have. Haven’t ya learned yer lesson the first time ‘round, Applejack? She don’t want you here. Yer own sister h-hates…
She couldn’t finish her thought before her sniffles silenced them. She was a foolish mare to come all this way for nothing. She had been so sure of herself when she left the farm, but that confidence had gradually faded away as she drew closer to her destination. By the time she had reached the house, it had all but dripped away with the rain.
“Yer not very quiet ya know.”
The red maned mare in the bed raised the front of her body until it was level with the headrest. Her pale form was revealed as it stretched out from under the sheets. She was unhealthily thin; her once youthful eyes afflicted by the weariness of the world around her. With delicate hooves, she stretch out and took ahold of the cup of tea on her nightstand, taking a long gulp before setting it back down in its designated spot.
“Applebloom, ah need you to hear me from the bottom of my heart when ah say ah’m so-”
“Ah know sis.”
Applejack’s ears perked up from around her hat. She felt the weight that had been collecting in her head clear up and free itself. Her face and attitude brightened in one fell swoop.
“That’s- great! Ah’m so glad you’ve come to hearing me out on this.”
“Ah didn’t say I forgave you.”
That lost weight had come back tenfold.
“What d’ya mean? Why won’t you accept any of my apologies?”
“Because you don’t deserve my forgiveness.”
That tore at Applejack’s heart and mind. Her baby sister was rejecting her again. She couldn’t take care of her little sister because the big sister had failed to do her duty as a big sister. Big sisters are supposed to be there for little sisters, to be their shoulder to cry on. But what should happen when it is the big sister who is in need of a shoulder to cry on? And what should happen when the little sister isn’t willing to offer one because the big sister never taught her how?
“Sis, please ah-“
“Stop. Just, stop. Ah’m sick of yer empty apologies, they don’t mean anything to me. They never did.”
“They ain’t empty!” Applejack was now visibly failing to keep the tears in her eyes hidden. Her voice shook with every word. “Ah messed up! Ah wasn’t there fer you when you got sick. Ah ran and ah was scared. Ah’m still scared. But ah know that what ah did was horrible. It ain’t anythin’ that any little sister should have to go through.”
“Correction, it ain’t anythin’ that any big sister should put her little sister through. Where were you when everything started fallin’ apart? Where were you when ah needed somepony to look out for me when ah was sore or cold? You always promised that you’d be right there to warm me up like a fire when ah needed it, but you never were,” her voiced trailed off.
Applejack removed her stetson from her head, allowing the entirety of her pleading face come into view. “Ah was too busy bein’ a coward. Ah was scared that, when you got pneumonia and got real sick, you would pass away, just like ma and pa. That one night ah would just wake up and find my baby sister cold in her bed. Applebloom ah can’t take anymore loss in this family!” She sat down on the edge of the bed and reached into her saddlebag with her muzzle and pulled out a small blanket from within. She laid it down between her and her sister. “Look, see? Sissy brought you a blanket just like she promised! Just like ah promised!” By this point tears where running down her face in neat streams. She tried to smile, but the tears were winning over. “Ah’m sorry, ah know yer not a filly anymore, but ah don’t want you to grow up. Not if this is what it leads to.”
“Look at me, Applejack!” she released a series of violent coughs before continuing. “Ah’m basically in hospice care at this point! After you decided to run off ah decided to use some of the family funds to have Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle help me build this small cabin. Granted, ah did most of the work but they still did everything they could to help, unlike you.”
Applejack had no words with which to speak. Her sister’s truthful comments had all but torn her apology to shreds. Her younger counterpart scoffed and sunk beneath the sheets once again, twisting her body away from her sister and curling into a small ball.
“Please go Applejack. You’ve got nothin’ insightful to say, and ah’m tired. Leave.”
Applejack hung her head in defeat, the same defeat that she had been forced to taste many times before. Her mind was scrambled, her heart, broken. The Element of Honesty had been reduced to The Element of Worthlessness. The orange mare reluctantly raised herself from the edge of the bed and replaced her hat on her crown. Mentally exhausted and emotionally beaten, she began a slow paced walk to the door before stopping in her tracks.
No. Ah’m sick of this. Ah’m sick of not havin’ the one mare in my life that really matters by my side. Ah’m sick of walking away in defeat. Ah’m sick of all this sadness. Ah’m sick of all this hate. Ah’m sick of watching my sister get even sicker. And ah’m sick of all of this rain!
“Didn’t ya hear what ah said? Get out!” Applebloom’s sickly voice reverberated throughout the tiny house.”
“No.” Came Applejack’s simple reply. It had left her lips before she had realized that she had said it.
“Excuse me? This is my house Applejack and yer go-”
“Ah don’t care.”
It was Applebloom’s turn to be without an abundance of words. “What?”
“You heard me. Ah’m not going anywhere. Ah’m your sister and ah’m staying right here to look after you.”
“Oh so now you want to be the dutiful big sister?”
“That’s right, and ah don’t care how late ah am in doing this, but ah’m doing it now. Ah’m fighting for us, Applebloom. Ah’m fighting for this family. Ah have mistakes that ah need to owe up to. And that starts tonight, in this very room. You still call me yer sister. You wouldn’t do that if you didn’t believe that there was something in this relationship worth holdin’ on to. But you do, and so do ah! Ah shoulda been there and ah wasn’t, ah get that, but yer acting like all hope is lost, like it’s set in stone that yer gonna die. Well newsflash, it ain’t, and ah’ve come to realize that. Yer only dead when you stop fighting for what you believe in and you never did. You always kept fighting, and it was me who was givin’ up. But, ah know now that that’s what you’ve always wanted. Somepony that would fight for you, no matter what. Even after making some stupid mistake like leaving in the first place. Well ah’m ready to be that somepony. Ah’m ready to be that big sister that you need.”
Applebloom had been intently listening to every word that had escaped Applejack’s lips. Little silver tears meandered down her face, leaving traces of where they had been and where they were going. For a long while the young mare remained silent, allowing everything to sink in. It seemed like several eternities before she opened her mouth to speak again.
“Took ya long enough,” she said with a weak smile, the first smile that Applejack had seen in a very long time.
Wordlessly, the older mare ran over to her young sibling and wrapped her in a tight embrace, one that was not broken by either individual for a very long time. When they finally released one another, Applejack retrieved the blanket that she brought from the end of the bed. She placed it over the body of the mare in front of her, shielding her from the chill slipping in from the window. She sat quietly, nuzzling her baby sister much like their parents used to do when the girls were but little foals.
“Hey AJ?”
“Yeah sis?”
“Do you remember when ma used to call me her little princess and sing that lullaby to me, but ah didn’t really like it at first ‘cause ah though it was too frou frou?”
“Ah remember.”
“Will you do that for me?”
Applejack looked down and smiled at the sickly yet beautiful mare in front of her.
“Of course ah can.
“Sleep now little filly,
Tired you must be.
Sleep now little filly,
It’s late now don’t you see?
You can play when the sun is up,
But for now, you must rest.
When it comes to little princesses
You are the best.”
Applejack looked down to see her young sibling sleeping soundly against her body, she couldn’t help but smile at the feeling of having the most important thing in her life back on track, but it would still be a long road ahead for the both of them. Applebloom was going to need lots of medical attention, not to mention even more support, but Applejack was content with the major victory that she won for herself that night. She laid her down on the pillow over her sister, drawing her protectively near her body. She kissed the top of Applebloom’s head before allowing the soothing draft to begin to whisk her off to a gentle sleep.
“Goodnight, my little princess.”
