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Applejack Anonymous

by Clavier

Chapter 4: 4: The Truth Will Set You Fettered

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Applejack Anonymous

a My Little Pony fanfiction by Clavier

Chapter 4

The Truth Will Set You Fettered


“With a vote of six hundred seventy three to two, the motion to… create… a youth division… is rejected.” Twilight gave a sympathetic look to the two standing audience members, but it did little to conceal her mortification.

“Now, on to the next item on our agenda,” Twilight hastily continued, shuffling papers on the podium. “Bon Bon and Lyra have offered to give a talk: ‘Coping and Moving On with Your Life’. And I think after the fair, we all could use it!” She chuckled nervously, brow furrowed, while the couple took her place on the stage. Bon Bon smiled at the crowd. Lyra mostly smiled at Bon Bon.

Applejack pulled away from the window, shaking her head. “This is just plain silly.”

“Yeah,” Pinkie agreed, nodding and speaking through a mouth full of cotton candy, “but I like silly!”

“And just how would ya react if it were your group and not mine?” she huffed.

“I’d probably sit here and watch them and eat cotton candy!”

Applejack shook her head and turned her attention back to the meeting in progress.

“What you have to realize,” Lyra was explaining, “is that the whole notion that there’s one pony meant for you is wrong. Wrong! If you pine away for that one special somepony, whether that’s Applejack or anypony else, you’re never going to be happy.”

Bon Bon nodded. “There’s a lot of joy and love to be found in the world; if you find somepony who makes you feel that, then don’t worry about what could have been, just take what you can get!”

Lyra glared daggers at her wife. “Bonnie! That’s… that’s a terrible way of putting it!”

“Aw, don’t get jealous, you know I love you!”

They nuzzled, giving each other knowing smiles, then turned back to the group.

“Y’see, Lyra and I both know this isn’t perfect.”

“Bon Bon!”

“Kidding, kidding!”


They continued teasing each other while Applejack fidgeted at the window. She was in awe of how a couple could be so comfortable, so perfect for each other, and yet still be in such an incomprehensible group, telling others how they got over her. As convoluted as the situation was, she was slightly jealous of what they had.

What she might have had.

Applejack shook her head perplexedly. “Ah just don’t get how they can talk like that.”

“Oh, I don’t know,” Pinkie mumbled, still watching the pair inside. “They seem pretty happy to me.”

“Sure they–” Applejack stopped abruptly, noticing that something was missing. “Pinkie, where’s Rainbow Dash?”

Pinkie simply pointed a hoof towards the crowd inside.

Sure enough, to Applejack’s horror, Rainbow was in the group, looking rather bored at the meandering speech. “How the heck did Ah miss her…”

Pinkie giggled. “She’s pretty easy to spot!”

“But… with her in there… and me out here…”

“I’m sure she won’t tell anypony,” Pinkie reassured, “but when are you going to tell everypony?”

“Ah… Ah don’t know.” She shook her head. “When Ah’m ready. It’s drivin’ me crazy, though.”

Pinkie pouted, but didn’t say any more, taking an enormous and oddly savage bite of cotton candy instead. Applejack turned back to the window.

Everypony was clapping, and Twilight had returned to the stage, where Bon Bon and Lyra both wore wide smiles.

“Thank you so much, Bon Bon and Lyra. Does anypony have any questions for them?”

Some members of the crowd whispered quietly amongst themselves, but none raised a hoof.

“Well, if nopony else does, I have one.” She paused. The corners of her lips drooped slightly, and her gaze drifted from the couple to the floor. “Do… do you ever really get over her?”

The crowd fell completely silent. Bon Bon and Lyra’s smiles vanished, replaced by small, furtive frowns. Lyra opened her mouth a few times, but each time closed it again without a word. Bon Bon muttered something inaudible, stopped, then started again.

“Well… I don’t want you to get the wrong idea… I’m very happy with Lyra. Happier than I’ve ever been! But…”

Lyra chimed in. “Bon Bon and I are very committed to each other, but that doesn’t mean we live in a dream world. What’s important is that regardless of how we feel about anypony else, we love each other.”

“Yeah! But hey, if Applejack wanted to join us, I sure wouldn’t kick her out of bed for eating crackers!”

The mood lifted and the crowd laughed at Bon Bon’s typically lewd comment, while Lyra just rolled her eyes and shook her head. Twilight joined in the laughter, but her smile was hollow. With nopony else volunteering questions, she led them in another small applause, and ushered the couple off the stage.

She pulled a paper out of a large pile on the podium, apparently remembering its particular position by instinct alone, and scanned it briefly. A quill rose from a nearby desk in a magical glow, dipped itself in ink, and made a sweeping checkmark over the paper. With a satisfied smile, she began to announce the next item.

“Next on today’s agenda is the introduction of a new mem–” She blinked at the paper, then looked back and forth between it and the crowd, before focusing her gaze on the telltale colorful mane. “ Rainbow Dash! I… um, to be honest, I’m shocked you weren’t already a member…”

Rainbow stood, chuckling, and flew lazily up to the stage.

“Well, I’m sure you don’t need to introduce yourself,” Twilight offered, “but why don’t you go ahead anyway.”

Rainbow’s smile turned crooked. “Well, everypony knows me! But really, I’m just here because I’ve arranged a very special guest speaker.”

“Oh, that’s– what?!” A flurry of papers flew up as Twilight tore through them in a panic. “That’s not on the schedule!”

“You worry too much,” Rainbow replied, coaxing Twilight out from behind the podium with a gentle nudge. “Come on, I promise you won’t regret it!”

Twilight looked pleadingly across the audience for a moment, but ultimately sighed and stepped aside. “Well, OK, I guess we have time if we shorten afternoon tea…” She nervously scribbled on a piece of paper, adjusting timetables and shuffling schedules.

Rainbow just rolled her eyes and turned back to the crowd. She smiled and swept her eyes over the crowd, her tail twitching, clearly enjoying her typical ability to transfix an audience without a word. She waited, happily soaking in the attention for a fleeting moment, but frowned as ponies began to impatiently tap their hooves and mumble amongst themselves.

Her expression hardened.

“Pinkie! Now!”

Cocking an eyebrow, Applejack turned her head. “Pinkie?” She fell to the ground as her hind legs were pulled out from under her and bound. “Whoa! Pinkie! What the hay do you think you’re– whoa!”

She clawed at the ground, but couldn’t halt her movement as she was dragged through the soft grass towards the stage door of the auditorium. Pinkie could be quite strong when she wanted to be.

“Ya can’t do this to me, you’re throwin’ me to the wolves! You promised!”

“I promised I wouldn’t tell anypony,” Pinkie cheerfully countered through the rope in her mouth. “I never said I wouldn’t show anypony!”

“That’s dirty pool!” Applejack retorted, her own teeth clenched around a root in the ground. It came out, leaving her with only a mouth full of dirt and a fresh sapling. “Ah promise Ah’ll tell ’em, but not like this! You’re gonna kill me like this!”

In spite of Applejack’s efforts, Pinkie didn’t so much as hesitate. She skipped merrily, rope in mouth, her entrapped quarry helpless to prevent the inevitable.

“Ah’m beggin’ ya, Pinkie!”

“You’ll thank me later!”

The lasso around Applejack’s hind legs loosened, releasing her into a haphazard roll through the stage door. The door slammed behind her, and she came to a rest at the hooves of an extremely shocked Twilight Sparkle. Applejack looked up with a nervous, terrified smile.

Twilight stared back down, agape. “… Applejack?!”

The audience was deathly silent. Fluttershy, quaking nervously in the front row, looked almost ready to burst into tears. As their silence pervaded the auditorium, Applejack managed to stand, but said nothing.

Twilight continued to stare, speaking low and apprehensively. “… Applejack… I… I didn’t mean…”

With a sudden, powerful beat of her wings, Fluttershy flew to the stage, startling Applejack into taking a hasty step back. Fluttershy very nearly hugged her, but stopped and backed off. She shrunk into her mane, yammering apologies. “Oh, Applejack, I’m so sorry we kept all of this a secret from you! I didn’t mean to, it wasn’t supposed to be like this, I’m so, so, so so so sorry!”

Terrified, Applejack looked at her, then at Twilight, then over the crowd, then back again.

“It’s just that when Bon Bon and I were younger we were friends and we both kind of had a crush on you and when you told her you didn’t like mares we were so sad that we formed a little club and it got out of hoof and we never meant to keep secrets but… I’m sorry!”

Applejack’s rigid stance softened, with Fluttershy’s long-winded, apologetic pleading winning her over. As the words finally caught up with her, Applejack affected a small frown.

“Ah don’t… Ah mean, Ah don’t think me n’ fillies…”

She scanned the crowd, and quickly found her old fillyhood friend. Bon Bon’s expression was subdued, far from her usual chipper attitude, and the pink locks of her mane covered her face, not unlike Fluttershy’s. She stared up at Applejack, with an apologetic yet almost nostalgic smile. Lyra gripped her wife tightly, leering at Applejack with feigned jealousy belied by her grin.

“Bon Bon… Bonnie…” As Fluttershy’s words caught up with Applejack, chills of shame crept up her spine. “Ah’m sorry for the way Ah treated you when we were younger. Y’all didn’t deserve that. Ah was just young and stupid.”

She shook her head and took a step towards the crowd, eyes still focused on Bon Bon. “And Ah like mares just fine, it’s just that–”

She stopped. She realized what she’d said. She realized where she was. She realized what that meant.

A sea of eyes looked up at her, growing bright one by one as they too realized the implications of her words.

“Whoa nelly…”

She took a step back.

The crowd, as one, took a step forward.

She turned to Rainbow.

Rainbow threw up her front hooves, offering no suggestions for escape.

She bolted for the door.

Ponies are instinctive animals, and sometimes one pony’s behavior will cause others to act by primal nature in ways that they would never otherwise behave. The instinct to pursue fleeing prey can be stronger than reason, stronger than propriety. Compounded with those most carnal of desires, it can be downright irresistible. And when it’s compounded further with the influence of mob mentality, only one outcome is possible.

The congregation, as a lively but disorganized mass, pursued.

The campus of The West Ponyville Institute of Geology and Mining was unfamiliar to Applejack, so she galloped as fast as she could for its gates, seeking the familiar cobble streets of Ponyville’s residential boroughs. Shortly after Applejack left the building, Pinkie Pie joined her, somehow keeping up even though the wild flailing of her legs could hardly be called a gallop. The crowd of ponies behind her began to fan out, as the faster ponies gained ground and the cleverer ones tried to flank her. The pegasi took to the air, making dives that brought them mere inches short of her tail.

“I’m sorry!” Pinkie cried over the hubbub. “I didn’t want this to happen! I’ll help you hide!”

Applejack just nodded in response, too busy pushing energy into her hooves to dare trying to speak. Pinkie turned, vanishing down a narrow corridor within the campus.

That did little to deter the pursuers. They were gaining on Applejack, and she was running out of steam. But every time she felt a pony’s hoof nearly catch her tail, or a pegasus’ hot breath against her mane, she managed to get a new burst of motivation and energy despite her burning lungs and searing legs.

She flew through the campus gates, which luckily served as an obstacle for many of the pegasi. The mass of ponies slowed to regroup, giving Applejack a small advantage, and she used the time to look desperately for a hiding spot.

The rows of houses offered little protection, and they were flying by too quickly for a useful analysis anyway. There was nopony to get in her way, but that was little recompense since everypony was behind her.

Shortly after she reached the edge of the town proper, leaving houses for shops and restaurants, a voice cried out from above, “Left!” Recognizing the voice as Pinkie’s, Applejack took a hard left turn down a side street. The buildings there were larger and more compact, offering more opportunities to hide, but she could still hear the others only feet behind her, hooves pounding against the cobblestone in a threatening roar.

“Right!” She skidded into an alley, almost losing her pursuers, but a cry from a cross-eyed pegasus overhead spoiled the ruse. The way was narrow, and the ground gravelly from disuse. It was both exhausting and painful, but Applejack pushed through, hoping only for an escape.

“Left!” She pulled into an even smaller alley, so narrow that it was dark from the shadows.

“No wait, right!”

It was a dead end.

She clawed frantically but fruitlessly at the stone wall. Naturally, the wall remained strong and resolute against her assault. After the moment of pointless desperation passed, she sighed and turned away from the wall. She sat, covering her eyes with her hooves, awaiting her fate.

“Well,” she mused, “Ah suppose there are worse ways to die.”

Hoofbeats approached. There was the sound of ponies gasping. She could almost feel their hooves reaching for her, but she was too afraid to look. Something touched her side, she felt tingly for a moment, and then… nothing. The air around her cooled and the noise faded away. The ground was less hard and cold. Everything had changed. Curiosity overcoming her panic, she cracked open an eye and pushed up the brim of her hat.

She was in the library. Twilight was frantically running from one corner to the other, locking every door and shuttering every window. She was surprisingly efficient, and in less than a minute she was trotting down a rather dangerous looking flight of stairs from her loft. She stopped near Applejack with a relieved sigh.

Applejack exhaled deeply and sat down, resting her weary muscles. “Whew! Thanks, Twilight, Ah thought Ah was–” She stopped, realizing the familiarity of the situation. “Wait, why did you bring me here?”

Twilight looked confused for a moment, then blushed furiously. “Oh, AJ, I’m not– I mean, I wouldn’t– I mean, not that I wouldn’t like to– n–no, not that, it’s just–”

Applejack’s laugh was forced and uncomfortable, but it was seemed to calm Twilight down nonetheless. “Thanks, Twi. You’re a good friend.”

“Yeah.” Twilight chuckled nervously, with a poorly concealed undertone of melancholy. “A good… friend.”

The pair hung on that word for a moment, neither looking at each other, before Twilight continued. “Well, you should be safe here until this blows over. For what it’s worth, I’m sorry about… um, everything, I guess. I think I’m gonna go take a nap.”

She started to meander away, but Applejack stopped her. “Wait. Twilight, look… Ah don’t… Ah just wish somepony had told me, y’know?”

Twilight stopped, and turned to look at her. “Yeah. I understand, I think.”

Applejack bit her lip uncomfortably as the awkward silence grew. With great trepidation, she asked, “Can you?”

Her query was met by a look of earnest confusion.

“Can you tell me?”

Twilight’s eyes widened in terror, while Applejack’s gaze remained resolute. Twilight walked very slowly back towards Applejack, each hoofstep smaller than the last, so the journey took far longer than it should have. She stopped close enough that Applejack could feel her breath, yet she was just out of reach. She spoke very softly, yet steadfastly.

“I love you, Applejack.”

Applejack had never heard it directly before, and even though she’d already known it was true, hearing it so openly gave her reason to pause. It wasn’t crude, it wasn’t lascivious, it wasn’t even particularly audacious. It was simply a fact, stated as one, with heartfelt affection. It felt so foreign to her, almost unreal in its raw honesty.

After a moment to ponder, she asked simply, “Why?”

Twilight’s eyes widened in surprise, and she took some time before answering. “I think,” she began, before stopping. She opened her mouth once more, but closed it again. Finally, she turned away and walked slowly, putting some space between them. Applejack frowned; it seemed less intimate, less personal. “Would you like to know what it’s like to be the bearer of the Element of Magic?”

Applejack tilted her head at the strange question. “Well, Ah suppose it’d be pretty excitin’. Ah mean, you’re kinda the most impo–”

“It’s terrible.”

Both paused while those words sunk in.

“The element you represent is a virtue. It’s the way you are because you choose to be that way, because you choose to be a good pony. It’s something you’ve earned by being the best pony you can be. But magic? It’s just a talent. A talent I was born into.”

“What? That’s crazy, it’s important!”

Twilight nodded, almost condescendingly, then continued in her depressed tone. “Yes, it’s like the glue that holds all the other elements together. But that’s just it, Applejack! Look at yourself!”

Although it had obviously been intended metaphorically, she did just that. “Ah don’t follow.”

“You bear the Element of Honesty. Ha! You’re the most honest, most loyal, most generous, most kind pony I know. Heck, you can even be funny when you want to be. You’re every Element of Harmony, all rolled into one, and you’re so modest and selfless that you don’t even know it.” Twilight’s tone suddenly sank, and she turned to stare into Applejack’s eyes. “And you don’t need some silly magic to hold it together. You’re just… perfect.

“You’re perfect. And that’s why I love you.”

Applejack’s throat tightened. She could barely speak. “Twilight…”

A bitter laugh escaped Twilight’s lips. “I’m sorry I brought you here, Applejack. I was being selfish.”

Applejack walked to Twilight’s side, put a hoof under her chin, and raised her head until their muzzles almost touched. Twilight’s eyes were misty with tears. “Come on, Twi, it ain’t like that at all. Ya rescued me.”

For a fleeting moment, the pair gazed into each other’s eyes, Applejack’s expression comforting and Twilight’s morose. Applejack moved her hoof to Twilight’s cheek, wiping away a tear, and leaned in.

With another bitter smile, Twilight pushed her away. “You see? Even now, you’re selfless. You’ve got half the town out chasing you, Applejack. You can do better than me. You deserve better than me. Don’t do this.”

“Twilight, n–”

Before Applejack had even finished the word, her body was encompassed by a bright magenta light. Before she could shut its brightness out from her eyes, it had vanished, and she was in her room at the farm. Alone.

“–o.”




Author's Notes:

Sorry this chapter is a bit short, but I said all that needed to be said!

… how much has season 3 changed Twilight’s character, anyway… :twilightangry2:


Editor: TheNitroPony
Cover art: Mr Snowpony
Prereading: Jackie and Mr Snowpony

Next Chapter: 5: Matchmaker Estimated time remaining: 1 Hour, 18 Minutes
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