The urge ate away at him. It was no longer just a faint whisper at the back of his mind. No, the insipid thing has grown stronger with time. It had crawled, clawed and practically beaten its way through his thought process until it could no longer be ignored. He wanted - no, he needed - to buy some apples.

The urge was irresistible. He could no longer just think about fruit. For the comparison inevitably wormed its way into his consciousness. Any thought of fruit would somehow turn to them. Strawberries would lack the crisp texture, cantaloupe the tartness to make his taste buds sing. Even pears, the mere thought of which would cause an involuntary shudder to course through him, could only be thought of in relation to apples.

The light brown stallion reached over, picking up his blue plastic glass, the outside slightly damp from condensation as he brought it to his lips, savoring the tang of his orange juice as he pushed the unpleasant thought of pears out of his head. He liked orange juice, it always had such a pleasant tartness to it, the aftertaste a pleasant whisper of the flavor.

Oranges. Why were there not more oranges in Equestira? Sure, there were plenty of apples, what with that filly Applebloom always going on about buying apples or some such. But why didn’t anypony ever ask if he wanted to buy some oranges? It was like some kind of demented montra. He couldn’t even visit the gosh darned market without some demonic manifestation of the yellow filly popping into existence on his shoulder, almost shouting that he had better buy some apples and he had better buy them right this minute or there was a reckoning to be had.

Another involuntary shudder racked his body. He remembered, if only barely, the pain being almost too much for him to recall, what had happened the last time he hadn’t bought some darned apples when he was passing the produce section of the market. He was not going there again, not for all the oranges in the world. Well, he might just give it a tinsy tiny bit of consideration if the rumors he heard about a certain white alicorn and her after sundown activities proved true.

Putting down his now empty glass, the stallion heaved a hearty sigh. He knew what was coming. It was palpable. He knew that the urge wouldn’t go away until he got off his plot and did something about it. It was just that he really did not want to go out there. On second thought, even if the rumors about the princess of the sun were true, and even if he was fortunate enough to be on the receiving end of some, it just wouldn’t be enough. Maybe, just maybe if some of the other rumors about the princess of the night were also true he could scrape some enthusiasm left from the empty room in his mind where it had once been to leave the house.

He sighed in resignation once again, an apathetic eyeroll gracing his face even though there was no audience to witness it. He was going to give in. He knew this. And his being unhappy about it and having lurid fantasies about certain alicorns wasn’t about to fix anything.

He was going to get off his plot, open the front door, and head toward the market. And he was going to buy some apples. And he was going to do it right this bucking minute.

He stared at the ground, brow furrowed in contemplation as he slowly trudged toward the font of all his woes. There had been no Daleks, no Weeping Angels, not even an army of Cybermen had been involved. No, there was no great force of evil to blame. There had been no time traveling mastermind. There wasn’t even a nefarious villain with bad fashion sense to direct his hatred toward.

It was all the work of one small, innocent, and positively adorable yellow filly, the big bow on her head practically demanding hugs from anypony who so much as caught a glimpse of the little bundle of cute. Her aura of adorableness was practically a weapon. No matter how much he wanted, and oh how he wanted, to smother the apple filly with his loathing, it was just not scientifically possible.

He didn’t know how it was even possible. He’d glared so hard at an offending pear somepony had dropped in front of his house the other day and the pure, concentrated and unending rage he had directed at it had resulted in a somewhat messy explosion.

And then it exploded again.

His hatred had grown so powerful, so immense that he had actually made fruit spontaneously combust. Twice in a row...he didn’t want to think about what that meant.

And yet, as soon as he attempted to direct his focused hatred at Applebloom, it was as if her impenetrable shield of concentrated d’aww dissolved all his menace with indiscriminate thoroughness, leaving the only other thought that occupied his consciousness of late. It left the irresistible need to buy some apples.

And so he did. Ever. Single. Celestia damned time. He’d lost count how many times he’d bought some apples when his venomous gaze swept over the oblivious filly in the market. A direct order from Celestia herself to abstain from buying any apples after the visage of Applebloom had graced his vision would have been summarily ignored, not able to sway his ironclad need to buy some apples. Nightmare Moon could have appeared in the market and begun terrorizing the townsfolk and he would have stoically marched onward. The end of Equestria couldn't hope to hold sway against something as undeniable as his insatiable thirst for the purchasing of apples.

Lost in his musings, he’d failed to notice as his body had taken him into the market on autopilot. He found himself next to a cherry vendor, well-defined stubble prominently on display. Well, the fates had decreed that he was going to buy some apples today. Now that he was finally in the position to do so, it was time to face the music.

He was finally ready to buy some apples.

He steeled his face, setting his countenance into a determined line. Those apples wouldn’t know what hit them. That’s right, he was going to march up to that apple stand, fork over his bits, and buy some apples.

There it was, a handful of stands down. Applejack’s Stetson hat was peeking over the heads of the couple of customers patiently waiting in line, waiting that is, to buy some apples. And he was going to follow them.

He trotted on past the lettuce vender, past the carrot stand, and with a hop skip and a jump came up behind the mare in front the Apple family apple stand. Unbeknownst to him, the whites of his eyes had gone increasingly bloodshot as he neared the stand. The pure intensity oozing from his gaze had almost begun to physically manifest, the air about his snout seeming to shimmer from a blistering heat.

He took no heed of the worried glances the other market goers directed his way. Nothing else mattered. There was only one mare stopping him from buying some apples. He was so close he could almost taste the satisfaction of shutting up the urge in his head - no, just shutting it up was too tame. He was going to grab it, throttle its horrible neck, rip its face off and then stomp on it violently until he could think about how much he hated pears again.

An odd whooshing noise began to grace his ears, slowly rising in volume, an erratic flapping noise soon distinguishing itself. The tan stallion looked up toward the source of the noise. His pupils made the sudden decision that the whites of his eyes weren’t important as they shot all the way open, turning his eyes into twin pools as deep black as space.

There was a tremendous crash, a truly ominous wrenching noise following as the light brown stallion gazed on in horror at the catastrophe unfolding in front of him. Right before his eyes the most vile, horrendous, heinous evil was transpiring. A certain grey pegasus mare was ending the entirety of Equestrian civilization as he knew it. Derpy was crashing through the Apple family stand right in front of him.

And she was smashing all the apples as she hurtled through it, raw, unadulterated carnage left in her wake. Not a single apple was spared as her hindquarters demolished the fresh apple crop just sitting there, all alone and waiting to be bought by him.

Somewhere behind him a mare screamed. As a single tear slid down his face he began to nod, wholeheartedly agreeing to the horror that lay before him. All of his precious apples were laid out on the ground, juices slowly oozing onto the ground as they bled out.

His ability to buy some apples utterly pulverized before his eyes, he was, at least for the moment, finally able to focus on other thoughts, even if that damnable urge had just subsided until the next day. Slowly turning around, he came face to face with a small earth pony filly, a cute ribbon tied through her mane. She had the most adorable smile, eagerness practically radiating from the dazzling pools of pure cute that had somehow taken the place of her eyes.

She looked up into his eyes and spoke just six simple words: “Hey mister! Wanna buy some pears?”

In that moment, Doctor Whooves felt every fiber of his being twist, his body racked by indescribably pain. To his utter horror his hoof reached down, brazenly ignoring every signal his mind sent its way, brought out some bits from his saddlebag, and he did something that he was never meant to do: He bought some pears.