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Returned From Sabbatical · FiM Minific ·
Organised by RogerDodger
Word limit 400–750
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Fear and Rust
Applejack went about her apple bucking work on muscle memory. Her legs knew what to do without her having to think about it, leaving her free to keep her attention on the sky above Sweet Apple Acres, where Rainbow Dash raced and looped and performed for an audience of one. When the sun finally wound its way down from the height of afternoon to the early edge of dusk, Rainbow Dash ended her performance with a stylish yet controlled landing a fair bit away from Applejack.

"Speed, check. Agility, check. Endurance..." Rainbow Dash stretched her legs and wings, then rolled her neck around. "Mostly check." She trotted the rest of the way to AJ then kissed her, both of them stained with dried sweat from the day's work, neither of them minding in the least. "How'd I look up there?"

AJ shuffled off her apple catching baskets. "Honest opinion?"

"As if you even could give anything else."

"Honestly, it's a bit warm still. Let's mosey on over to some shade so I can think without poppin' a gasket."

Rainbow Dash shrugged, then walked next to Applejack toward the nearest tree big enough to keep the last of the sun off of them.

"Your hips feelin' alright?" AJ asked as level as she could.

"They're fine." Rainbow Dash replied.

"Knees?"

"Also fine."

"Neck? Clavicle?"

"Still fine."

"Wing joints? Your articulation good?"

"Applejack, come on. I got a full clear from the Wonderbolts' entire medical team. Yeah, sure." Dash rolled her neck around again. "I'm pretty sore right now, but that's what happens when I spend a whole afternoon shaking the rust off."

"Mm hmm." Applejack stopped in the shade of a large tree, then laid down on her back with a grateful sigh. "That's more like it." She patted a spot of grass next to her, and Rainbow Dash happily complied with the request.

They took a minute to rest, enjoying the shade, the stillness, and the quiet; the only motion their steady breaths and occasional slow glide of one mare's fetlock against the other's.

"Something did seem a might bit off up there, Sugar. Not technically. I've seen you perform enough all these years to know what it's supposed to look like, and it all looks just about right. Reckon nopony but me or one of the other 'Bolts would even notice you weren't perfect up there."

Rainbow rolled to head toward AJ, eyebrow cocked.

"Fear's a funny thing," Applejack said, pushing her hat back further from her eyes. "Three things it can do to a pony."

"You think I'm afraid of something?" Dash replied, less indignant than she sounded. "Come on. I'm me."

"And I love that about you." AJ winked, then proceeded to ignore Rainbow's indignation. "Fear can paralyze you. Stops you from runnin', hidin' doin' anything at all. That's the obvious one. Can also make a pony faster and stronger than they ever thought they could be. Mighty powerful. Last one's trickier to spot."

Rainbow Dash rolled up onto her side waiting for Applejack to finish.

"Last thing it does," she said, looking up at Rainbow Dash lovingly, "is make folk hesitate, just a little. Steals a little hitch from their step. Might be that nopony ever even notices if those folk never need to be in a hurry. But you--" AJ poked Dash's chest from below "--are the spitting image of 'hurry.'"

Dash scrunched her nose, then exhaled. "Like I said, I'm still shaking the rust off. I've never been grounded that long before."

"Exactly. You've taken some mean spills, Sugar, nopony who knows you would ever say otherwise without being called a dirty liar." AJ's expression softened. "But this last one was the worst yet, and it took you longer to recover than any time before. I reckon you're afraid you might not make it back in the air if you go down hard again." Her ears pinned down. "Or you might not make it back home to me."
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#1 · 2
· · >>Dubs_Rewatcher >>Rao
Okay, so this one's definitely one of my favorites from this round. The prose feels really good in that it gets the heck out of the way and lets the dialogue carry the piece. I think you've also selected great characters for a dialogue-heavy piece—AJ and Dash's effortless give-and-take dynamic really helps an otherwise mundane conversation feel like it's full of meaning.

My only qualm is probably a bit of a personal one. I think you might have chosen to err on the side of being subtle with this story's theme/message, but I really think you could have been just a little more overt with it. I especially wished we could see Dash's reaction to that last line from AJ. We never really get a sense of how Dash is reacting to what AJ's saying: the last few times she does something in this fic, she's "scrunch[ing] her nose" or "waiting for Applejack to finish." The crux of the conflict of this story rests a lot on how much Dash agrees with with AJ's concerns, so it's a little funny to me that you've ended things where they did without telling us a little bit more about Dash's mindset. Normally, I'd chalk something like this up to the minific wordcount, but you've actually still got almost a hundred more words, so this must have been intentional.

Honestly though, spelling out your message with a neon sign might just kill the mood of a subtle piece like this, so I can definitely see why you went the route you did. Still, the story definitely engaged me from beginning to end and also left me wanting more, which in my book is a great metric for judging if a minific did its job.

Thanks for entering!
#2 · 1
· · >>Rao
I agree that the dialogue between Applejack and Rainbow Dash works very well. I've no problem with the way you expose the conflict here, which is pretty clear. It’s a good story, nice and cosy, even if it could’ve been made a little shorter. Certainly, dealing with age or the otherwise steady decrease of your abilities is a delicate subject, especially for people/ponies who have the lives built around their performance.

Nice entry, very different from the rest so far.
#3 · 1
· · >>Rao
Really big fan of this one, but I'll have to echo Bachi (>>Bachiavellian) and say that it ends quite abruptly. But if anything, I think that the final line is too overt -- the piece has felt very subtle up to this point, so Applejack just straight up saying that she's scared Dash won't make it home upsets that a bit.

To me, the deep emotional core of this piece is that AJ is the one who's most scared here, not just Dash. The farther you can take that without blatantly giving away AJ's worries, the better.

On a more positive note, I love AJ and Dash's chemistry. They speak honestly, but lovingly.
#4 · 2
·
I dig the look at an older, more mature AppleDash, here. Dash is still a bit cocky ("Come on. I'm me."), but not as full of herself. She lets AJ talk without exploding, which shows huge growth. AJ feels more... patient? Sensitive, maybe. Not beating around the bush, but not diving right to the point, either. Dialogue sits well; expressive without being too drawn out. Mostly avoided falling into "talking head syndrome" which is super easy to do in minific.

But maybe it could have been a little more drawn out. There's still some word count to spare here, as Bachi and Dubs noted, but that last line feels like the edge of "page 1" more than an intended ending. Let us turn to page 2!
#5 · 1
· · >>Rao
Some of the guys (gals?) have been discussing the fault of withholding information from the reader with regard to the “Happy Returns” story, but I think that is better applied here. I think you nail the tone of the characters pretty well; but all the time while I am reading, I find myself trying to piece together the context of their conversation. Only toward the end do I learn a critical piece of information—that Rainbow Dash has been recovering from a bad injury. Without this, the dialogue, which is intended to convey the emotional subtext of that event, feels soupy.

Your story is not that bad things happen to people. Your story—at least, your most interesting theme—is that hesitating fear can be more insidious and more dreadful than paralyzing fear. That’s plausible and something people can relate to, and would make a great fic with AJ and RD. You’re not too far.
#6 · 3
·
>>Bachiavellian
Normally, I'd chalk something like this up to the minific wordcount, but you've actually still got almost a hundred more words, so this must have been intentional.

Very intentional, but only to beat the timer. I spent literally the last ~90 seconds before the submissions closed cobbling together something that resembled a half palatable closing line.
it's a little funny to me that you've ended things where they did without telling us a little bit more about Dash's mindset.

That was going to be in the next ~hundred words, but procrastination is a deeply ingrained habit... Even though I had the rough idea from the day the prompt was chosen.

I'm very happy to hear that the general opinion is that I nailed down Dash and AJ's dialogue. I felt pretty good about it as I was getting it down, which either turns out very well or very poorly once it hits other eyes.

>>Monokeras
Certainly, dealing with age or the otherwise steady decrease of your abilities is a delicate subject, especially for people/ponies who have the lives built around their performance.

It sure is, I say, as my right shoulder creaks and groans more with each passing month. And that's why I thought AJ and Dash worked perfectly for this idea. They're both built for physical aptitude and were always competitive with each other, but AJ grew up with Granny Smith. She knows what old age and bodily wear and tear can do up close and I think that gives her a very different perspective than Dash on the matter—even if that specific clash of ideas didn't make it in [yet].

>>Dubs_Rewatcher
To me, the deep emotional core of this piece is that AJ is the one who's most scared here, not just Dash. The farther you can take that without blatantly giving away AJ's worries, the better.

Noted and agreed. Damn cobbled together final line. My original mental outline was to give Rainbow a chance at the mic before swinging back around to AJ's actual concern. Which, spoiler, wasn't meant to be Dash goin' and gettin' herself killed.

>>Heavy_Mole
Fair rebuke! Some more context for the injury further toward the opening would give the whole piece context from the get go, and possibly set up an expectation swerve about AJ's deeper concern which I hinted at in my reply to Dubs. Thank you for swining Vonnegut right back at me :)

Damn cobbled together final lines.