((But I think the next time the RP stuff will be updated will be sometime later this week or into next week.  I’ve got vacation coming up in less than two weeks now, which means more time to do this…But also my eyes have been acting all funky with me as of late, so a lot of massive reading/writing might not be what the doctor ordered.

I really have been reading these RP posts and I have to say I’m really loving the sense of direction some of these are going in.  Been thinking long and hard on some responses, so I hope I’m not letting anyone down in particular and I do hope you all understand…Which I’m sure you do. c: ))

((I’ve got some back to back schedules approaching to where things have been reeeeeeeeeeeal slow lately, so I apologize for the delays in the responses to several RPs.  Hoping that things will be a whole lot better next week and I’ll be getting to those responses here HOPEFULLY by tomorrow at the latest!  Sorry for the wait!))

She tilts her head at this, blinking a few times as she gives Eris a small kiss upon her head.  ”Why would Ah be scared, sugarcube?” she smiled, staying close to the draconequus, rubbing her eyes with her hooves a bit.

Chaser was already far ahead into the wild-growth portion of the forest. It was where she didn’t need to spend all her energies staying out of sight. She could lower herself and almost appear invisible amidst the blades of grass that pressed up against each tree.

It took magic to pull the apples, as gently as she could, tugging at the apple until the tension of the stem was pinched, and then a tug. The Apple would release- sometimes dozens at once, and Chaser would climb down and collect them, one by one, and move on to the next tree.

It was in the tree she decided to break; in this tree she had been gauging the quality of the apples; bad ones she couldn’t use, so she tossed them aside willy nilly, forming a pile, an ugly pile in front of the tree. And the good pile- that was in her sack, which she  reached into now, and chomped into an apple.There was magic in it..

In this relaxed, well-hidden and yet evistence astrewn scene that Applejack would come across.

 ”What in thunderation’s goin’ on with these’ere trees…?” The orange mare seemed to speak to herself, trotting along as she inspected the trees, her basket shimmying back and forth upon her back with her sway.  She had to admit that this was quite the unusual event to occur on the farm.  They didn’t do anything different this year, they’ve followed everything by the book for a good long time now.  The weather hadn’t been too different as well, so that was also out as far as reasons for half-harvests.

The acre was so vast and covered in trees in the deeper parts that she had nearly forgotten about this place.  She glanced around at the foliage: the overgrown trees, the high grass.  If it hadn’t been for the barn near the edge of it all, she’d have no idea where she was.  ”Mah stars…!” she seemed to gasp, a grin forming on her face.  Whenever she was a filly, she used to play around in the barn, making it her own little ‘fort’, a place to get away from everything for a while.

Grinning, she took a couple of steps forward…And nearly landed face first onto the ground.  She had tripped up on something, the mare glaring behind her to see a small pile of bad apples on the ground.  Some of them were just cores that had begun to rot, but the others were just plain bad.  She raised a brow at this, but then thought nothing more of it as she continued her trek to the barn, her mind being flooded with thoughts of the past. 

Shima rubs the back of his head while taking a lingering glance at the now closed door.  ”Uh sorry about that.  I wasn’t expecting the door to slam open with so much force.”  He raises his hands up shrugging his shoulders.  ”I guess the door really wanted to be opened,” Shima says turning his attention to Twilight, “Have you been couped up in here all day? Perhaps even longer?  That’s not good.  Doors want to be opened and closed often, some more than others.  By not doing so their souls can become a bit agitated. So please keep that in mind.”

 Shima walks over to the pile of books Twilight has moments ago stacked in to a neat pile.  If anything this pony was well organized and efficient.  While he hadn’t lied when he said he didn’t mean for the door to open with such force he did want its opening to be jarring to Twilight.  He wanted to test how quickly she would be able to recover from a sudden jolting shock.  Every second wasted catching one’s breath or trying to gather one’s surroundings is a second given to the enemy.  A pony of slow mind and body would be little help to him for things to come.

He picks up the top book from the pile casually flipping through the pages.  ”Even though we can understand each other through speech our written languages are worlds apart.”  He places the book back down having not been able to understand a single word.  ”Perhaps one day I’ll get around to  learning Equestrian.  Now before we get down to business I have a question for you.  You’re the Element of Magic correct?  What does magic have to do with harmony?  Honesty, Laughter, Kindness those I can understand.  But magic doesn’t always invoke harmony and in fact can do evil things.  Magic is more of an ambiguous tool with no alignment wouldn’t you say?”

Twilight steadied herself rather quickly, though she was still slightly annoyed at the dramatic entrance to her abode without a single knock.  After his prattling on about doors though, the conversation suddenly turned towards her particular Element, the purple unicorn giving a nod to him.  ”Your questions definitely do have merit to them, I’ll agree with you there.  Not everypony uses their magic for good, or at least not unintentionally around here in Ponyville.” she started to explain, Applejack letting out the faintest of yawns as she dropped down on her flank, figuring this was going to take some time.

“From what I’ve learned over the numerous years of studying magic under Princess Celestia herself, magic can come in various forms and abilities, but it’s the user themselves who alter this and can thusly change how things can happen.” and as if on cue for a demonstration, there was a gleam of a purple aura as suddenly a flash of light erupted in a small area, Twi suddenly vanishing as she appeared next to her bookshelf, to retrieve a volume from it’s shelves.

The book was encased in the same colored aura, which also glittered around her horn, the pages suddenly flipping open as they sped on by, stopping on a certain section, propping itself up in front of her face.  ”None of the teachings of magic are meant to purposely harm anypony, but there are some from time to time who seek out this knowledge, for whatever their purpose.” she nodded, bringing the book up to Shima’s face.  ”I know you said you cannot read Equestrian, but I’m sure you can see photos and pictures.” she smiles, it fading quickly as she held it in place with her magic, the photos depicted in the footnotes are ones of destruction and distortion of the world itself.  ”There aren’t many volumes like this one outside of Canterlot’s Royal Archives…Which reminds me I need to return this soon, actually.” a faint tinge of blush flushed across her purple cheeks, a sheepish grin forming on her muzzle. 

Applejack’s eyes didn’t fault from the small nemesis before them, keeping in guard despite being in possible imminent danger.  ”Don’tcha worry none, Ah won’t let ‘em get ya…” she whispered to him, her eyes glancing back for a split second as she looked in his direction.  ”Jus’ keep calm…”

The mare watched as the gates opened, still shivering a bit from time to time, though the excitement of the situation had her excited.  She smiled as Shortstop came back aboard, returning her gaze to the window.  ”So, where’re we goin’ once we’re inside the base?” she asked, tilting her head back in his direction.

In the loft of the old disused storage barn, a unicorn began to stir, feeling the rustle of animals beginning outside. The Apple family was starting their daily routine. They never came into this barn in the morning, but even if they did Chaser was out of sight to anyone not in the second level of the barn. The unicorn slowly rolled over her hay-bed and began to stretch, yawning sleepily.

She’d more or less taken over the loft, working when the Apple  family was out in the fields so the noise of construction didn’t bother anyone. It had been hard, and slow- she’d done it all by hoof, without using magic. She didn’t want to risk anything happening. She’d built a wall up, first, doing her best to make it look like an old barn wall. The idea was hopefully no one would catch on that there was a portion of the second floor walled off.

They wouldn’t, unless they came up to inspect it, and even then she had done a bang-up job of concealing the hidden room. Well, they’d still find all the stuff she had outside it- bookshelfs, her bedding, her stored food. The barnhouse had previously held tools for construction, needless once the houses were up, so much of the storage she wanted and the tools she needed were right there.

The food was a bit harder. The Apple family didn’t keep track of every apple on their acres, of course, but it was risky to keep venturing out to different spots so they didn’t notice the decreased harvest. She wasn’t an apple-picker herself, had no discerning ability or that much of cooking, so it look a bit to get herself a good meal.

Today that venture would take her out more or less along Applejack’s path, unknown to either pony.

Applejack stared up at the bare branches of the tree she had just bucked, smiling down at her basket which was now full of apples.  She hefted the load up onto her back, carrying it along as she whistled a happy tune, a stride to her trot as she did so.  She took the haul to one of the silos on the farm, storing away the apples, closing the doors as she took up the basket once more.

She trotted back out towards the fields, her eyes gazing up at the branches of the passing trees as she did so.  The apples weren’t coming in as quickly as they usually did, the mare’s brow raising slightly as she wondered on this for a moment.  She stopped, stretching for a moment as she looked at a few more of her apple trees, noticing that quite a few of them were bare when they should of been baring fruit by now.  ”This’ere ain’t right…” she whispered to herself, trotting slowly along as she watched the branches.  

A few of the trees had apples in them, but there were a few random spots on some where no apples could be seen, this raising more concern to the mare.  She continued her path out towards a less used part of the orchards, where the trees were growing wildly and the grass was quite tall.  ”We really need t’git t’work on this one o’ these days.” the mare chuckled to herself, reaching out with a hoof to touch at some of the high grass.

“Ah pump is even better!” he said darting in the direction she had shown. “I think pumps are fun.” He said with the excitement of a towns colt. Pressing down the arm of the pump a few times he got the water flowing and put his head under it.

At first it was almost icky warm, but soon it got colder, really cold and he shuddered, refraining from the icy shower.

“Pruha, this is good!” he shook his mane violently, getting drops of water everywhere even scaring some of the chickens away which clucked annoyed at him.

“Sorry little ones.” He said sheepishly and trotted back to where AJ was laying.

“What are gonna…” he started until he noticed the hat over her eyes.

He opened his mouth to say something, but then he just shrugged finding that a short nap would be exactly the right thing and it seemed that taking mid day naps was common here for her, since she took one yesterday as well, even when it was induced by his brothers sleeping spell.

He searched a nice place next to her and laid down on his belly, head resting on his hoof. He was sure that AJ would call him, when they were about to get started.

The two remained there for a little bit, the mare shifting a little bit against the tree as she stretched a little bit, pulling the hat up from her eyes.  She hadn’t dozed off for long, her eyes squinting up towards the sky as the sun beat down onto Sweet Apple Acres.  This was the perfect kind of weather though, the kind she absolutely loved, a smile creeping up on her face.  

Her gaze then turned to her helper, who was sprawled out on the ground.  She got up onto her hooves, unsure if he was actually slumbering or not.  Being she saw the display from earlier this morning…She stood back from him, taking in a deep breath.

“RISE’N SHINE, SUGARCUBE!” she shouted, grinning from ear to ear.  ”TIME FER SOME APPLE BUCKIN’!”

ask-uncle-orange:

It wasn’t often that Sweet Apple Acres got letters of this fine quality with such expensive postage stamps. As the mailmare left the Apples’ box, crushed in between the invitation to the umpteenth party that week at Sugarcube Corner and the adverts for new and improved fertiliser was a slightly…

There wasn’t a reply to that letter for a few days, though it was no fault on the part of young Spike’s writing skills. The first Applejack would likely know about the answer to her letter was the sudden sound of clattering and creaking of a bright yellow taxi cab as a stallion drew up just outside the entrance to the main fields of Sweet Apple Acres. The young male looked flushed and hot, a little bit of foam flecking at the corners of his mouth, which told of a lot of exertion and a long canter. 

He looked back into the depths of his carriage, obviously expectant. His tired expression lit up as a roll of bits was tossed his way and he caught it in a grubby hoof. He flicked through it as suitcases were slid off the side of the cab, counting nearly twice what he would usually charge for a trip from Manehatten.

“For excellent speed, my boy,” purred a suave voice from inside the cabin, a stallion with a coat of pale yellow and an elegantly groomed lime green mane moving from the shadows to step as gingerly as he could from the cab, wincing as his left-rear hoof touched the ground. Anypony watching would notice the mixture of support bandages around it, despite the large sweatband Julius Orange was using to hide his injury.

“Now you go and get something good and proper to eat, and someplace to rest. You need it,” he said to the cabbie. The stallion seemed to take a deep breath and thanked his patron handsomely, returning to Ponyville at a more leisurely pace as soon as the stallion’s two suitcases were suitably unloaded. Unlike his wife, the male could travel light, and the two cases were easily able to be carried, one on the stallion’s back and one in his mouth the short distance to the door of the farm.

“Aaaaapple-jaaaaaaack!” squawked a voice the second he put his suitcases down and knocked on the door, making Uncle Orange recall in shock at first. “Dangit dagnabit, you go see who that is that ruined my afternoon nap, y’hear! And give them a right piece of my mind! Oooh, if I was any younger I’d go box that whippersnapper right up!” Uncle Orange wiped a little bead of sweat from his brow. 

“My mother-in-law. How could I forget?”

The bellowing from downstairs nearly made Applejack fall straight out of her bed, the mare’s Equestrian Farmers Almanac fell with a solid thud to the floor.  ”Consarnit!” was all Applejack grumbled under her breath, gritting her teeth together as she dropped her hooves down to the floor, making haste down the hallway and stairs.  She kept muttering under her breath until she threw the door open, a scowl on her face…Quite the short lived scowl, because there behind the door was her Uncle Orange, a suitcase upon his back and one in his muzzle.

“U-Uncle Orange!” she blurted out, her eyes wide in surprise as she grinned from ear to ear.  She threw her hooves around him, giving him quite the ponyhug.  ”Ah was wonderin’ if’n ya were gonna come on by!” the orange pony could barely contain her excitement, her ears pinned back onto her head.  She loosened up her hug quickly however, recalling he was here for rest and relaxation due to injuring himself in the first place.

“Oh!  Ah’m awfully sorry Uncle Orange!  Here, lemme get those fer ya, it’s the least Ah can do fer now.” she nodded, motioning her hoof towards the case in his mouth and on his back.