Dusk to Dawn

The moon high in the sky and the smell of autumn crisp in the air, the beautiful and majestic Princess Luna loved the way the fresh air felt as it glided across her face and body.  After having made so many friends only last Nightmare Night, Princess Luna no longer hated (or feared) stretching her wings and flying around her and her sister’s land.  She couldn’t help but smile at herself as she looked up at the moon and thought about how beautiful it really looked on a night like this.  It was amazing she thought, that she was the goddess of the moon, and yet its beauty never ceased to amaze her.

As she was flying though, a delectable, lingering scent found its way into Luna’s keen nostrils.  She had never smelled anything so wonderful!  “What IS that scent?” Luna whispered to herself as she neatly tilted to the left and began to dive towards the ground and the scent.  Within a second or two, all four of Luna’s hooves landed with a soft thud on the ground beneath her.  She looked left, then right, and then all around again, and instantly she noticed it as none other than the main field of Sweet Apple Acres; she was double assured at seeing the large, lit farmhouse just ahead of her.

“Think we’ll take the express route,” Princess Luna thought jokingly to herself as she opened her wings up and bounded off into the sky, impressively leaping over a sizeable clump of the neatly arranged apple trees and landing even more impressively in the front barnyard.  Princess Luna stood for a moment and looked at the house with an unsure look on her face.  She wanted to say hello to her good friend Applejack, but at the same time, she didn’t want to disturb whatever surely tedious task the family was doing inside.  Princess Luna sniffed the air once more and decided that it would probably be best to come back some time the following day, perhaps later in the afternoon.

Just before she could stretch her wings and prepare for takeoff, Princess Luna jumped as she heard a familiar voice shout, “Well a’ howdy there Princess Luna, your majesty!”  She turned her head to sure enough see Applejack coming out of the barn with a small tub full of apples in front of her.

Princess Luna smiled and trotted the short distance over to meet Applejack.  “Err… How-dee… Applejack,” Princess Luna blushed as she noticed how silly she had sounded.  Luna had been trying really hard, but she just couldn’t seem to get the hang of the new, current language, the many tones and forms it had; she struggled with the greetings especially.

Despite her awkward and unsure greeting, Applejack didn’t laugh but instead asked, “So what brings ya’ll all the way out here?”  Applejack nudged the tub forward a few more inches so that she could step out and with two swift kicks shut the large barn doors.

“Oh, We…I mean, I…”  Luna shook her head in embarrassment and tried to remind herself that it was ‘I’ now, “was taking a flight across the sky and we…” Luna almost sounded like she grunted in frustration, “just happened to smell an absolutely wonderful scent coming from this location.”

Applejack smiled and instantly knew which scent Princess Luna was referring to.  She replied, “Ya’ll must be smellin’ my latest fresh apple pie.”  Applejack lowered her head down and then before pushing the bin any further said, “You’re more than welcome to come on in and try some!”

Princess Luna smiled, and instead of wanting to embarrass herself again nodded her head and walked alongside Applejack.  Before they got more than a few steps in, Princess Luna noticed that Applejack seemed like she was struggling with the sizeable bin of large apples and the hill they were starting up.  “Here, let me…” she said.

Applejack stopped her pushing and jumped a few inches away from the tingling sensation of the blue haze that surrounded the bin.  “Oh no Princess Luna!  I can’t ask you to do that!”  Luna couldn’t help but softly giggle as she sensed that Applejack was trying to figure out how to get the bin back on the ground and prevent Princess Luna from doing a task that certainly wasn’t fit for royalty.

“Er…You lead the way,” Princess Luna said in her new, quiet voice as she refused to let Applejack take her apples back.  Applejack looked at her once more with a ‘I wish you really wouldn’t do this,’ face, but walked ahead anyway, deciding it was probably best not to argue.  Applejack led them up the path towards the farmhouse, and once they had slowed to a leisurely pace, Luna asked, “So… what is thou…are…” Princess Luna physically shook her head in frustration and continued, “Why are you preparing a meal so late on this night?  Is it not customary that ponies make their meals during the morning or daytime?”

Applejack laughed a little and answered, “Granny Smith’s asleep, and so is Big Macintosh and Apple Bloom.  I couldn’t sleep myself, so I decided to get up and get tomorrow’s sales batch ready to go.”

“Resourceful pony aren’t you?”  Princess Luna complimented Applejack’s time and business savvy sense of thinking.

They walked up the couple of steps that lead to the back porch of the house, and Applejack pushed the screened door open and held it for Princess Luna as she replied, “Aw shucks Princess Luna, ya’ll are making me blush.”

Princess Luna frowned as she looked at Applejack’s face and replied, “But your face is not changing shades.”

As Applejack led them through the dining room and over into the kitchen, Luna noticed the entrancing scent got stronger, but she listened as Applejack explained, “Of course not sugarcube.  What’s it Twilight calls em’ again… ‘figures of speech’ or somethin’ like that I think.  I say somethin’ but it ain’t really happenin’, see?”

Luna could only nod her cocked head, but in truth she had no idea what her friend had just explained to her (Applejack herself didn’t have the most lingual smarts).  “Maybe I should ask Twilight Sparkle about these, ‘Figures of Speech’ sometime in the near future?”  Princess Luna continued to follow Applejack as she made a mental note to check with the knowledgeable Twilight Sparkle about such things concerning the modern language.

As soon as they set hoof in the kitchen, Applejack continued forward and said, “You can just set those down anywhere.”  Princess Luna looked around and placed the bin on the floor next to the table closest to the oven.  Once she had set them down though, Princess Luna’s eyes could only wander over to the batch of warm, fresh apple pies sitting in a neatly arranged line on the nearby table with another set inside the warm oven.  Luna couldn’t help but feel rather at home with the warm heat in the homey little kitchen.  It was nothing like the massive kitchen at the palace, but that was a good thing.

As she was placing her muzzle down into the great bin of apples and carefully lifting apple after apple out, Applejack looked up and saw Princess Luna eyeing the pies.  She took a sniff herself, and Applejack couldn’t help but feel hungry.  She had been in here all night, and hadn’t even had a tiny pinch of one of the pies.  “Would you like ta split a pie?” Applejack stopped her apple-shoveling and looked at Princess Luna for an answer with a smile on her face.

“Oh, no my dear friend, Applejack.  I could not ask you to give a vital part of your business to me.”  Princess Luna stopped looking at the pies and smiled softly at Applejack to show that she was being truthful and minded Applejack’s family business more than she did her own hunger (she hadn’t eaten before coming out hours before).

“Vital part of my business?”  Applejack laughed a couple of times, turned from Luna and walked towards the oven where she grabbed a cloth from the handle, “Hoo wee!  Them sure is some fancy words ya’ll use there your majesty.”  Applejack grabbed the warm pie with her muzzle and cloth and then set it down on the table.  She noticed that Luna still looked hesitant though.  She knew how Luna felt, wanting be as polite as she could possibly be, having a remembrance of how she had frightened and had, to a decent degree, been rather rude to many of the ponies on Nightmare Night.

“Come on sugarcube.  You know you want to,” Applejack tempted her quietly as she grabbed a piece of the pie and held it out in her hoof.

Luna looked at the piece of pastry, then at Applejack, and then back at the pastry again, still in hesitation.  After a minute or so though, the Princess finally gave in and she thought to herself, “Perhaps a nibble wouldn’t hurt…” with a gracious smile on her face, Luna took the piece of pie from Applejack using her magic.  A hopeful look on her face, Applejack wanted to see what Princess Luna thought of the pie.  She had worked on it all night, but if it was for the wellness of Sweet Apple Acres, she’d do it all again in a hoofbeat.  Princess Luna brought the pie to her lips and took a ladylike bite of it.  As soon as it hit her tongue though, Princess Luna let her fun and playful side take over, and she took the whole pie down in just a few chomps.

“What do ya’ll think?”  Applejack asked, more positive tone in her thoughts now at having seen the way Luna had eaten her pie.

“My, Applejack, that was simply delectable!  We… were wondering if we might be able to have one more piece?”  Luna asked a bit embarrassingly, apparently having not noticed her grammar slip-up.

A wide smile crossed Applejack’s face, and she trotted over to the nearby table to pull a chair out.  “Of course you can sugarcube!  Go on and have yourself a seat!”  Princess Luna nodded her head in gracious thanks, and sat down at the table where she watched Applejack take the pie from which she had pulled the piece and place it in the middle of them.  Applejack took her seat across from Luna, and like she normally did at every breakfast, lunch, or dinner, said, “Well… dig in!”

A playful smile crossing her face, Luna used her magic and grabbed two pieces where she placed them in front of her.  Applejack did the same thing and dug her muzzle straight in as soon as it landed in front of her.  Eating like a pair of young schoolfillies, they kept up their routine for another half-hour.

Once they had finished though, Luna had sensed that the day was arriving and that she would have to return to the palace soon.  She did not want to be rude to her friend who had invited her in, and who had had some fun with her, but at the same time, Princess Luna valued and acknowledged her royal duties to her sister and to the ponies for which they ruled.  “Please forgive me, my dear friend Applejack, but I must go.  The day is nearing and I must return to my home for rest.”

Understanding what duties Luna had to fulfill (living in the life of work herself), Applejack smiled and led Luna to the front door so that she could easily take off from the hill which the home sat on.  “I must confess Applejack, I find this… this ‘country life’ rather fun.”

Applejack smiled at her and replied, “I’m glad you think that Princess.  It’s hard at times, but we here at Sweet Apple Acres see no reason you can’t work and have fun at the same time.”

The two of them walked out onto the front porch and down the steps, where Applejack followed Luna all the way down to a nicely elevated spot on the hill.  “It is also very beautiful out here…” Princess Luna complimented as she looked at the big red barn and its yard, then the rows upon rows of apple trees, and finally up at her moon.  She liked the way the calm surrounding complimented it perfectly, not like the always lit, noisy, and awake streets of Canterlot.

“Yep, it sure is,” Applejack agreed as a calm silence overcame the two and they were left standing on the hill and observing the sight before them.  After a couple of seconds though, it was Applejack who broke the silence as she bid her farewells, “Well, it sure was a mighty pleasure havin’ ya’.”

Luna walked forward a little bit and looked back towards Applejack where she smiled and said, “It was a pleasure being here, my friend.”  Her wings fully outstretched now, Luna looked back once more and finished, “Fare-thee-well Applejack.”  Luna then lifted herself off into the sky and started gaining altitude.

“Ya’ll come back now, ya’ hear?” Applejack shouted as she waved Princess Luna off.  She then turned and began to walk slowly back to the house where she would bake one more batch of pies, along with a replacement for the one that herself and the Princess had shared, and after that, return to her bed for some attempted shuteye.

Before she could get too far though, Applejack turned around as she swore to herself that she heard “I will!” ring back towards her from the dark, majestic sky up above.