My Little Pony - The Legend of Friendship (MLP remake with male OC added)

73. Flutter like a Bat!

A bell was ringing through the streets of Ponyville. Normally, that is something that Star Twinkle would not bother with but in this case, he simply had to investigate. Star Twinkle remembered how Applejack once told him that whenever she would ring that bell, then it would be in some kind of emergency. Whatever the reason might be, Star Twinkle decided to check it out to see what happened. To his surprise, the rest of his friends were on their way to the orchard as well, all of them wondering what all of this was about.

"What's going on?" Rainbow Dash asked as she was diving down next to Star Twinkle who was still running towards the orchard.

"I dunno," Star Twinkle replied.

"Today is Apple Bucking Day," Twilight pointed out as she ran right beside Star Twinkle. "Since Applejack is not working out in the field, I guess something must have happened to prevent her from doing just that," she figured.

The rest of Star Twinkle's friends joined the three as well and they soon arrived in front of Applejack's barn where they could already hear the mare's voice. "Attention! This is a Sweet Apple Acres code red! I need all hooves – and claws – on deck!" She screamed over the sound of her ringing the bell.

She finally stopped ringing the barn bell as soon as Star Twinkle, Twilight, Rainbow Dash, Rarity, Fluttershy, Pinkie Pie, and Spike arrived right in front of her. Applejack seemed unusual paranoid and stressed, there was definitely something bothering her.

"What happened?" Star Twinkle asked out of worry for Applejack.

"Well, just look at it!" She replied while pointing towards the orchard.

It was really messy all over the place. Foul and dry apples were scattered all over the orchard. On top of that, there were almost no apples hanging from the trees anymore. At first sight, it looked as if Applejack's harvest was not as good as it usually was but the group then quickly noticed something else hanging in the trees.

"Are those...bats?" Star Twinkle asked as soon as he spotted a few of those creatures hiding inside of the trees, sucking the juice out of some of the remaining apples in them.

"Not normal bats!" Applejack corrected. "Vampire Fruit Bats! And they are attackin' Sweet Apple Acres!" She exclaimed frustrated and angrily.

"But I thought the fruit bats usually stayed put in the west orchard," Twilight pointed out, clearly knowing more about all of this than Star Twinkle.

"The fruit bats do, but these aren't just your everyday ordinary fruit bats. They're Vampire fruit bats! I'll be darned if they think they're gonna sink their fangs into my blue ribbon apple," she said as she walked up to something big and round standing next to her, hidden under a sheet. She revealed a gigantic apple hanging...or rather standing next to an apple tree. It was twice the size of Applejack herself and pulled the branch where it was hanging from almost down to the ground.
Needless to say, the group was heavily surprised to see something like that and watched in awe.

"That's a huge apple!" Pinkie Pie expressed, stating the obvious.

Applejack explained. "This here's our entry into the Appleloosa State Fair's produce competition," she while she proudly looked at her masterpiece. "You know how much TLC goes into getting an apple to grow like this?"

"I imagine a lot," Star Twinkle replied, not even having a single clue how Applejack even managed to get it to grow this big.

Rarity walked up to the apple as well and looked at her reflection which was mirrored on the apple due to it being really shiny. "Applejack! When you go big, you really go big!" She said impressed before she lost herself in her reflection and adjusted her mane.