The Work Horse (Working Title)

Chapter 4

Apple Bucking

Apple bucking season was almost over and Apple Cider season was coming on fast. Last year, a pair of ponies called the Flim Flam Brothers had tried to run Sweet Apple Acres into the ground by producing more apple cider then the Apple Family could. Their cider had, of course, been inferior in quality and the attempt had failed, drastically, with the brothers run out of town by a herd of angry ponies. This year, however, the Apple Family would have help making the cider from their friends, including Toola.

Still getting the hang of flying, Toola spent most of her time on the ground. But, when she could, she practiced getting up to the clouds to take naps. They were exceedingly soft, like sleeping on a giant cotton ball. Though it took a while for Toola to get used to the fact that she wasn't falling through it. Soon, she would start building her cloud palace, though she abhorred the idea of a palace. She just had to pick a place. She had been thinking about it for the better part of the week and still was when she joined the Apple Family and all their friends to make cider.

"Alright, now," Applejack was saying as Toola joined the group. Rainbowdash and Big Mac, you'll run the treadmill again, like last year."

Rainbowdash gave a salute and Big Mac simply said, "Eyup."

"Rarity, you'll go through the apples."

"Oh, of course, darling!" Rarity preened a little and Toola wrinkled her nose at the behavior. She still didn't like Rarity. The purple maned pony was too fussy, picky, and uppity.

"Me, Fluttershy, Twilight, and Pinkie Pie can pick the apples."

"Okie Dokey Lokie!"

"Oh, alright, if you say so."

"Okay!"

"Applebloom, you and your friends are going to pour the cider into the barrels so Toola stack them up in piles. Hopefully, you three won't do too much damage there." The three crusaders, still in trouble from their last adventure involving jello and helium filled balloons, grinned sheepishly.

Toola, noticing a balloon floating nearby, captured the pink orb, carefully opened it and sucked up the air, then said in a tiny little voice, "Don't be too hard on them. I thought it was amusing." Pinkie Pie burst into hysterical laughter.

"Oh my gosh! Her voice! It's tiny!"

"That happens when you inhale helium," Toola said as her voice eased back into its normal pitch. The other ponies were still giggling from the absurdity of her helium voice. Big Mac even had a small smile.

"Um, Miss Toola, while we work," Sweetie Belle piped up. "Can you tell us more about Texas?"

"Did you three finally come up with a list a questions?"

"Uh huh!" The crusaders replied in chorus.

"Sure, I don't see why not. But if you stop working, I stop talking, clear?"

"Yes, ma'am!" Then they raced off to their station near the treadmill. Toola blinked.

Looking at Rarity, she asked, "Do I look like a ma'am?"

"Oh, of course not, dear," Rarity quickly reassured her with a smile. "Fillies will be fillies! Twilight, where's Spike?"

"Oh, he's with Princess Celestia learning how to take care of Peewee," Twilight cleared up with a smile. "It's going to take a lot of work, caring for a baby phoenix. They're such strange and unique creatures..." Twilight started going on and on about the magical properties and virtues of phoenixes as they walked over to the other ponies. Toola started tuning her out and gazing around herself in boredom. Was Big Mac looking at her? No, he was watching Applebloom climb onto the platform with the help of her friends. Shaking her head, Toola said where she was going and trotted off. Twilight didn't hear a word, still engrossed in the joy of knowledge. Rarity was nodding and ignoring her to examine a hoof.

At the platform, Toola gave Applebloom and her friends a boost up. "Enough with the heights already," she grumbled with a smile. "Haven't you learned your lesson? There is a set of stairs, you know."

"Oh, yeah," Scootaloo said, rubbing her head. "Oops! Guess I forgot." She looked sort of sheepish. Toola raised an eyebrow at them and moved to roll a barrel under the spigot.

"Get ready," Toola said. "Here comes Applejack and Fluttershy with the first bushel of apples." The girls nodded and surrounded the spigot.

"Miss Toola, what kinds of animals live in Texas?"

"Oh, all kinds," Toola said without missing a beat. "There's dogs and cats and spiders and lizards and cows and all sorts of animals. Lots of birds, too."

"Are any of them dangerous?" Only Scootaloo would ask that. Toola laughed.

"Heck yeah, they're dangerous," Toola said. "There's spiders that'll bite you."

"That doesn't sound dangerous," Scootaloo scoffed.

"Well, no, not of itself. But the spiders in Texas are venomous. The snakes, too."

"What's venomous?" asked Sweetie Belle.

"It's where if they bite you, you get really sick and can die," Toola replied, thinking nothing of it. The three fillies gasped.

"But why would they bite you?"

"Scare them, hurt them, threaten them," Toola said.

"Scare them how?" asked Applejack. "None of the animals here are scared of us."

"That's because you ponies take care of the animals here. Or at least Fluttershy does. Back home, the animals take care of themselves. They find h-ponies to be a threat. Because we might accidentally step on them or mess up their burrow from not looking where we're going."

"Pull the lever, girls," Applejack called.

"The animals take care of themselves there?" asked Scootaloo as she pulled the lever.

"What animals take care of themselves?" asked Applejack from nearby, bucking an apple tree. "This isn't the Everfree Forest."

"Not in the Everfree Forest, sis," Applebloom said. "In Texas! Where is Texas, anyway?"

"Um..." Toola thought quickly. "It's beyond the Everfree Forest, past the Badlands."

"How did you get here from there?!" Scootaloo asked, thunderstruck.

"I...blew here. On a storm." If it worked for Dorothy, it can work for me. Let's go, Toto.

"And the animals take care of themselves?"

"What about the clouds and weather?" asked Rainbowdash from beside Big Mac.

"Works on its own. Makes caring for the cows rather difficult. Our cows were...very silly and not smart. That's why we had to take care of them. They'd run hither thither during a storm and get struck by lightning if we weren't there herding them."

"Whoa," the crusaders chorused.

"Lever."

"Oops!" Scootaloo said, pulling the lever just before the barrel overflowed. Sweetie Belle put the top on and Applebloom stomped it in place. Toola moved it to the side where the full barrels would go and came back with an empty one, scooting it under the spigot.

"Was it dangerous there?" asked Applebloom.

"Well, it didn't have the dangers you guys have here," Toola said, thinking about dragons and manticores and Ursa Majors. "Our dangers were more...subtle. Sort of."

"Like what?"

"Well, we had a snake that we called a rattlesnake because it had a sort of rattle on the end of its tail that it would shake to make a buzzing sound to warn people off. There were many kinds, but all were venomous. The most dangerous of these kinds of snakes, however, was the Diamondback Rattler. It's venom was so deadly, if you didn't get care, it could kill Big Mac in 30 minutes. It'd probably kill you or me in something like 5 or 10." She pushed the now full new barrel aside and replaced it. "Of course, if you got to a doctor, you'd be fine. If you didn't, then you'd probably die."

"Wow," Scootaloo said. "Were there any other dangerous animals?"

"Of course," Toola said. "Where I come from is really big. It's not just Texas. There's America, Asia, Australia, South America." In her head, Toola compressed the world so that it would fit into one country, like Equestria. "It was all very dangerous. And there were lots of animals that would kill you without a second thought if you endangered them. And some that would do it just because they could. My home was one of the more tamer areas of my world. Australia's filled with all sorts of deadly spiders that can kill you in under 3 minutes. And if you went in the water, which we liked to do, you could get stung by a jellyfish."

Rainbowdash snorted. "Jellyfish? That doesn't sound dangerous at all."

Toola looked over the blue pegasus. "A box jellyfish can kill Big Mac in under 2 minutes. You? Probably only take 30 seconds since you're a quarter his size." Rainbowdash blanched. Toola shifted the barrels around again. "It was dangerous at home. But it was beautiful. And a lot of the dangerous creatures were gorgeous. There were some pe-ponies who liked to collect animals and show them to people. And a lot of ponies liked to go see these animals. They were well taken care of with large habitats that looked like their real homes, but all were kept safely behind bars or in tanks were they wouldn't hurt anyone."

"What was in tanks?"

"Oh, things like fish, sharks, whales."

"Fish were dangerous?" Rainbowdash raised an eyebrow.

"Well, not all fish. But some were. For example, a shark is a fish. But it's a very large, carnivorous fish with a mouth full of lots and lots of very sharp teeth."

"Carnivor-what now?" asked Applebloom.

"Carnivorous. It means they eat meat. Like fish and seals and things. Sometimes they'd eat ponies, but not on purpose. In the water, we look like something they'd normally eat."

"What's in the water that looks like a pony?"

"Um...Seaponies," Toola quickly said. They'd had them in previous incarnations of My Little Pony. So why not? "Ponies that had learned to live underwater. Only they have tail-fins instead of hindquarters."

"Seaponies get eaten?!" The crusaders looked horrified.

"Well, yeah," Toola replied. "That's how the world works. There are animals like us that eat plants and there are animals like sharks that eat meat. And in the ocean, Seaponies are the easiest prey that a shark can catch and eat so he's not hungry anymore. Eating only one seapony is easier then chasing a bunch of small fish around just to get a good sized meal or chasing a seal that they more then likely won't catch. I mean, yeah, it's sad. But sharks have to eat, too." Toola moved around more barrels.

"Wow," Scootaloo said. "Your home sounds dangerous."

"Oh, it is," Toola replied. "More then you know." She thought about the lethality of the human race and inwardly grimaced.

"How dangerous?" asked Sweetie Belle.

Toola thought for a moment, then decided Why not? "Back home, alongside ponies, lived a race that stood and walked upright on their hind legs. They had no fur except for on top of their heads and they wore clothes to cover their bodies all the time." Rarity paused her work and listened. Rainbowdash didn't stop running, but listened more closely. "They were called humans. And they were nice to the ponies and the cows and rabbits and dogs and sheep. Animals that weren't threatening. But to animals that were threatening, the humans were...less then nice. To the point where ponies started to wonder why we were friends with them.

"Humans had a habit of cutting down lots of trees to make room for their cities. They encroached upon the habitats of lots of animals, forcing many out of their homes. And they had machines that took them places faster then they could move, but that made the air dirty and difficult to breathe. They left their trash everywhere, but were learning to keep it all in one place. And if there was an animal that threatened even one human, regardless of who and what they were, the humans came together in a pack and hunted the animal down and killed it. And they weren't herbivores. They were omnivores. This means that they ate both plants and meat. And most of them preferred meat. So when a cow died, they would take its body and eat it. More often then not, though, they didn't wait for the animal to die on its own. Humans are responsible for wiping entire species of animals off the face of the world just so they could eat it or because they didn't like it. Of all the animals in the world, even the ones here, humans are the most dangerous." The crusaders went quiet and Rarity sat with a hoof over her mouth. "Not all humans were like that, though. Some were good, kind people who wanted to help the animals survive. Most humans were changing, trying to save animals that were disappearing."

"Did they stop eating meat?" Applebloom asked, eyes wide and frightened.

Toola felt sad. "No, sweetie, they didn't. Most humans thought that meat was delicious. Asking them to stop eating meat would be like asking you to stop eating apples. Some did, but they were very few and were often ridiculed. Besides, meat made them strong. Why would they trade strength for an animals survival?"

"But if they didn't eat meat, wouldn't the world be peaceful?" Rarity asked.

"No," Toola said. "Because, above everything else, humans hated other humans. If a human was different, say they had different skin colors, then they didn't like each other. This is an old dispute, though. Humans no longer fought about skin color. Instead, they fought about ideas. Like say one group of humans believes in a being that created the world. But another group believes in a different being. Then they would fight. Ponies tried to stay out of the fighting, but sometimes it didn't work and accidents happened. But that never stopped the humans. They just kept fighting each other. And more and more people died."

The ponies were silent. "Did they wipe themselves out?" asked Sweetie Belle.

Toola laughed sharply. "Heavens, no!" she cried. "Humans breed better than rabbits. If anything, their population grew even larger." She smiled bitterly. "It grew so large that entire areas were being made barren from their eating. I won't be surprised if what finally kills them is them self-destructing because there's no more food or resources." She looked up at the sky. "Smells like rain. We'd better hurry up." She pushed the last of the finished barrels over to the pile, which was staggeringly tall, and watched as Applejack, Fluttershy, Pinkie Pie, and Twilight shrugged out of their harnesses. Then all the ponies headed into the house to get something to eat. Toola stopped outside, ignoring the rain that was quickly soaking her, and looked to the skies. Pegasi were busily pushing the rainclouds into place and she smiled.

Equestria was so peaceful. A change from her old home. The air was clean and everyone was prosperous. Not to mention the fact that no one was in a war. With a sigh, she shook off the rain and went inside to join the others at the dinner table where the crusaders quickly asked for more, happier, stories.

**

"Toola, weren't you a human?" The Cider Making was done for the day and Toola was sitting in a cloud by herself when Rainbowdash came up.

Flicking an ear, the young mare replied, "Yeah, Rainbowdash, I was."

"Did you do all those horrible things?" The cyan coloured pony settled down on the cloud next to her.

"No," Toola answered. "My family was trying to be good. We treated our animals well, up until the last seconds of their lives." Toola went quiet a moment, flipping her tail to the other side. "We tried. But sometimes bad things happen. Bulls go crazy. Cows just lose it for some reason. And violent animals aren't tolerated."

"What happens to violent animals?"

"They get...removed from the herd."

"Well, that doesn't sound so bad."

"Dash, I was being tactful."

"...o-oh."

Toola tugged her hat down over her eyes. "Humans are killing the only home they have. Ruining it. And the few that try to make it better aren't making much headway against the tidal wave of destruction that is humanity. Soon, every green thing will be gone. They won't have to worry about dangerous animals because they'll all be gone. And the ones that aren't will be safely locked behind bars for the viewing pleasure of every man, woman, and child who wants to go see them. Even the animals we raise will be so placid, it won't be worth keeping them." Toola felt her voice begin to shake. "I'm gonna...go." The snow white pegasus took off for the Everfree Forest. It was the only place that felt even remotely close to home.

**

It was sundown before Toola finally came back to the farm. She landed lightly on the ground before the door and entered the house quietly. "You were gone an awful long time, Toola." The mare jumped and looked to find Applejack and Big Mac sitting at the dining room table. "You missed dinner and everything."

Toola's ears drooped. "I'm not much up for food, guys."

"Ya gotta eat," Applejack scolded gently. "Is it about...the humans?"

Toola pawed at the ground, then snorted and flicked her tail. "Don't worry about it. It's not even my problem anymore. Humans do as humans will and there's nothing in all the universes that will change that."

"Well, can't you get a message to them, somehow?"

Toola looked at Applejack steadily. "Nothing will change the mind of a human. And certainly not the words of a pony." Then she turned and went up to her room. Applejack sighed and leaned against the table.

"She'd know." Big Mac looked at her. "Well, she...she lived with them. So she'd know."