Fillies of the Apples
Chapter 1
The Cutie Mark Crusaders, as they called themselves, had gathered out a very large sheet of paper and were scrawling many different shapes on it as they sat on the floor of their clubhouse, giggling to themselves.
"Can you even get a Cutie Mark for the best Nightmare Night Costume?" Apple Bloom inquired, although her question fell on deaf ears.
"Okay, so all I know is that is has to be so amazing you'll have to make up words to describe it!" Scootaloo yelled as she drew another figure on the sheet.
"The best costumes are the ones that are completely original. Something we've never gone as before for Nightmare Night. No vamponies or werewolves or monster invented by a mad scientist. The ones that revel in the fear of the unknown!" Sweetie Belle yelled dramatically, looking at the figures they had already drawn.
"So how are we going to do that?" Scootaloo asked.
"We could go by the library." Sweetie Belle suggested. "Twilight could have tons of books about monsters that nopony knows about that well."
"Yeah!" Scootaloo yelled, the excitement evident in her.
"We're sure to have the best costume by the time Great Uncle Applewood stops by Sweet Apple Acres in a couple of days." Apple Bloom said, smiling.
And they ran out of the clubhouse excitedly.
And as they walked out of the apple orchard, they stopped by Sweet Apple Acres to verify where they were going. When they got there, they found that Apple Bloom's sister Applejack was rather obsessively cleaning the room.
"Applejack, what's wrong?" Apple Bloom said as she watched her.
"Oh, Great Uncle Applewood is going to get here early. He'll be here tomorrow." Applejack said in a worried voice.
Apple Bloom watched as Applejack continued cleaning in a maniacal fashion. "It'll be fine Applejack. By the way, we're all headed over to the library to figure what we should be for Nightmare Night." Apple Bloom said.
"Alright. You be careful now." Applejack said, it having become a routine of them going out into Ponyville on a near daily basis that had convinced her that her sister and her friends were fully capable of taking care of themselves when it came to going into town.
"Thanks Applejack!" was all Apple Bloom yelled as they ran out the door smiling and giggling.
Applejack smiled after them, her eyes going dreamy.
The whole family was dreaming of the night to come. The first time in a long while where the harvest moon came the same night as Nightmare Night.
The three Cutie Mark Crusaders trotted through what looked like an ordinary sunny and happy day in Ponyville. The odd thing was, it didn't really feel like that. It seemed off. It was probably just the fact that Nightmare Night was only three days away. Yes, that was it. The season did bring out fear in all the scary movies and books they had been reading recently to prepare for the season.
Anyway, they burst through the door of the library. "Hey, Twilight!" Apple Bloom called out, taking it upon herself to do all the talking.
"Hello girls!" Twilight said rather absentmindedly, buried in a novel.
"We're looking into a new cuie mark idea." Scootaloo said coolly, deciding to ease into this for some inane reason.
"That's nice." Twilight said, having heard what they said but knowing that a new cutie mark idea took up just about every moment of the girls behind her free time, and she wouldn't let it take up hers.
"Do you know about any monster we could be? Something that nopony in Ponyville has ever been before?" Sweetie Belle asked in excitement.
Twilight looked up from her book. She turned and smiled to them. This was an area she really was excited about. "I certainly do." And she happily trotted over to the area of her bookshelves she had reserved for horror fiction. "If that's what you're looking for, you should look for it right here."
Immediately, the three fillies ran over and grabbed every single book from the section, piling it up onto their backs, and began the strenuous task of walking with them.
Twilight stared at the scene in shock. She shook her head and then sighed. "Well, good luck with that." She muttered.
The three Cutie Mark Crusaders piled all the books they had taken onto the floor, and quickly began to look through the section for something that was new to them.
"Another vampony novel…" Sweetie Belle said, tossing it behind her head.
Twilight gasped and ran to catch the book. She plucked it off the ground, glaring at the three fillies.
"Let's face it, a depressing number of these books are vampony novels. There are no more original ideas anymore!" Scootaloo yelled, tossing several more books behind her.
Twilight rushed around like a video game character to catch all of the books before they landed.
"These all have nothing we're looking for!" Apple Bloom said, eliminating all but a small handful of books. "They're either too common or too, well…common!"
"Isn't the same thin-" Twilight began before a book hit her on the head.
"Hmmmm… This one seems awesome in this book here-" Scootaloo began, skimming through the book. "But it can be anything, including a vampony or werewolf." And she rejected it too.
Twilight quickly caught it, and looked at the title of the book: It. She sighed and put it back too.
"Ooh!" Apple Bloom said. "Here's a short story collection. There are bound to be tons of ideas in here!"
And they began to thumb through it. As Twilight recuperated all her books, they read every single story in it. It was pretty frightening to them, but their rather stupid need for a cutie mark led them to forge on.
As Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo began to talk about which one of them they wanted to be, Apple Bloom walked over to inquire about one that interested her. "Twilight, what's 'He Who Walks Behind the Rows'?"
Twilight looked up. "Oh! I have a small folder of information about that legend!" And she walked over to go get it.
Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo quickly shuffled over to listen to the tale, thinking they might really like it.
Twilight came back with a small manila envelope, and pulled out a few papers. She looked at them with worry. She had heard all about Scootaloo's reaction to the stories Rainbow Dash had told while they were camping. She sat down and began to read.
"On the other side of the Everfree Forest, there was a small town called Gatlin. Their main economy there was growing corn. But then their crops began to die off. To save the place, somepony from the town summoned a thing to the town to bring the crops back to life. He Who Walks Behind The Rows. And it did just that. It brought all the crops back to life. All it required in return was the town worshipped it. That entity became their God. They dressed like Earth ponies from the founding of Equestria. And they sacrificed all the Pegasi and unicorns to it. They tossed it into the cornfield, where it lived. They walked into the cornfield and tied their hooves to a cross with wire, ripped out their eyes, and stuffed their mouths with corn husks. And whenever the ponies failed to give it a sacrifice, it would lower the age they were allowed to be before they gave themselves up to the corn."
Twilight paused for a moment. She saw that the three fillies looked genuinely frightened at the story. Yet still, they ushered her to go on with it.
"Some ponies said that it would go to many town, developing similar yet different customs for each town that gave itself up to it. Eventually it would turn each town it went to into a ghost town. Gatlin was the last town that it was known to be in. Nopony really knows where it is now."
And she quickly stuffed the papers back into the folder.
The Cutie Mark Crusaders were actually shivering slightly. There were no jump scares in it, but it was pretty creepy to think about. "What did it look like?" Apple Bloom asked quietly.
"Well, it was described as being very big, a green color, and having red eyes the sixe of footballs. Ponies also said it smelled of corn husks. That's it really. That story and the papers in this folder are the only mention of it in any story in Equestria."
Apple Bloom looked rather afraid for a moment, but then smiled. "Girls, I think we have it!"
And at this, Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle brightened up and ran out the door to get to their clubhouse.
They ran through the streets of Ponyville as quickly as they could. They had work to do.
As they did, they passed by Carousel Boutique, where they witnessed Sweetie Belle's sister Rarity attempting to put up Nightmare Night decorations on her house while still making it look pretty.
"Hey Rarity!" Sweetie Belle said in her overly chirpy voice.
"Oh, hello Sweetie Belle. I was just making the most lovely Nightmare Night decorations for my home." Rarity said, admiring her own work.
"It looks nice!" the three said together as they bounced off.
They passed by Sweet Apple Acres and ran off into the orchard. They went out deep until they reached their clubhouse. They turned over the sheet of paper they had laid out earlier and got to work. And with a coherent idea in mind, they had enough to work with that they were in there late into the night.
They hardly noticed the nearly full moon rising in the sky nearby. And they didn't notice at all the large red eye looking at them through the window for half an hour before it disappeared.
By the time the Sun rose as visible through the window and you could see the bags developing under their eyes, they more or less had it. They had planned a He Who Walks Behind the Rows costume for Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo would dress up as its seriously mentally disturbed disciples. Nopony in all of Ponyville would have anything like that as their costume.
It was then that they decided to go to sleep. They slept for the whole of two hours before a mental alarm clock went off in Apple Bloom's mind.
"Oh! Great Uncle Applewood gets here today!" Apple Bloom yelled, the full consequences coming to hit her. She darted out of the clubhouse.
Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo burst awake and followed her.
They didn't notice as they ran through the orchard that some of the trees they past were free of blemishes or bumps, and they could not hear any animal sounds.
They arrived at Sweet Apple Acres (Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo decided to stay) and they joined Applejack, Big Macintosh and Granny Smith in greeting Applewood as he arrived.
"Where were you?" Applejack whispered angrily.
"We were up late last night." Apple Bloom said.
Applejack gave her a reprimanding look that said she would deal with her later.
It scared Apple Bloom pretty badly. Almost as much as that story she read.
And a chariot slowly pulled up in front of the house. A stallion with gray hair like Granny Smith's and a light red coat with yellow eyes stepped out of it.
"Hello y'all!" he said brightly.
"Hello Applewood." Granny Smith said happily.
"Hello Great Uncle Applewood." Apple Bloom, Applejack, and Big Macintosh said.
Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo kept silent, but smiled nonetheless.
"I'd like to introduce my grand filly. He's the same age as Apple Bloom. His name is Isaac." Applewood said in introduction.
And a small filly stepped out. He had a light green coat and red hair. And he gave them a smile and stared at them through black eyes.
Author's note: I've got the first chapter published, but this is sort of a late Halloween special. I've never read Children of the Corn, but this is based on the plot of that story.