Taking Pictures With Apples (Apple Bloom/Open)

[Deleted]

The Crystal Empire had gained more attention in the past few weeks.  Featherweight had been taking plenty of pictures. He had walked around the piazza more then a few times. There were only a few thing going in the fields for him to photograph. While the library was much bigger then the one in Ponyville, He had already taken as many pictures of that place as he could.

Featherweight finally found himself inside the palace.  It was by far the largest building in the Crystal Empire.  From the moment he steeped inside he was astonished by all the things he could see.  He started taking so many pictures that stopped paying attention to anything else that was going on. It was then that he bumped into someone.  Now broken out of his photography trance he turned and saw someone he recognized from school.

"Apple Bloom?"  he said with a bit of confusion. He new about the Cutie Mark Crusaders having taking pictures with and of them at separate times.  Usually all three of them were together.  "I didn't expect to see you here." he said a bit more shyly. He wasn't good with things like this. He always got really nervous and was spoke very shortly as to not make a fool out of himself.

[Deleted]

For the longest time, Apple Bloom had been hearing stories about her older sister saving Ponyville and a few where she helped saved all of Equestria. Throughout that time, Apple Bloom had only helped once and that time had just been getting everypony to realize that Zecora wasn’t a threat at all. But this time, she’d be able to help in one of the biggest adventures there was! On top of that, she got to see the Crystal Empire, a place she had only heard about in stories.

And boy was the Crystal Empire big. Apple Bloom could barely take in everything that was going on in this single room of the Crystal Palace. Finding out anything useful was going to be trickier than getting the drop on a fox. She moved around the room slowly to try to see it from as many angles as she possibly could. It was just so pretty. Whoever had built it must have been amazing.

She stopped straining her neck as somepony called her name. She turned to more fully face him. “Oh hi, Featherweight,” she greeted with a smile, “Of course Ah’m here, everypony has to help t’keep Sombra away,” she explained proudly. It was a lucky thing she had run in to Featherweight instead of some adult that would try to talk her out of anything.

[Deleted]

"Sombra?" Featherweight said with a bit of confusion.  "You came here all by yourself too?"  "Are you not here with Scootaloo and Sweetie Bell?" He immediately got a little worried as the talk about stopping Sombra was a very serious situation. He had gotten so wrapped up in taking pictures he had forgotten about helping with the important things.

Featherweight put the lens cap back on his camera and put it away. Unfortunately he soon realized he was having a one on one conversation and got nervous again. He didn't have problems in class because there where more ponies around and someone else was usually more interested in talking then he was. After that, there was more then a few minutes of silence from him. A few times he opened his mouth to speak but didn't say anything. When he finally managed to speak he stumbled through his sentence a few times.

"I was wondering...I mean I thought....if I could..."  After taking a breath and starting again he managed to say something less embarrassing. "Apple Bloom, I would like to help you with what you are doing.  If you don't mind me coming with you."

[Deleted]

“They’re both around here somewhere,” she explained to Featherweight, although she wasn’t sure where they were exactly. If they didn’t run in to each other, they had a meet up spot, but for now they had split up. While it was a lot to take in, things didn’t seem very scary inside of the bubbles that Princess Cadence and Prince Shining Armor had made. It was easy to forget the danger looming just outside of them.

Since she was generally quite outgoing, Apple Bloom was a bit mystified by shyness, especially when it was a classmate being shy toward her. As far as she could tell, Featherweight wasn’t a chatterbox with anypony, so she wasn’t going to make it personal. She figured the best way to help was to make sure to be nice. “Sure can,” she assured him with a smile.

“But there is one problem,” she admitted, elongating the ‘one’, “Ah’m not exactly sure what it is Ah’m doin’.” So far she had pretty aimless. Her current strategy had hinged on the idea that she would know what she was looking for as soon as she saw it. That had yet to yield any results. “Did anything turn up in your pictures?”

[Deleted]

When Apple Bloom mentioned that she wasn't sure what to do he was surprised. He managed to keep himself calm by taking a breath between sentences.  He had no idea why he got so shy in one on one conversations. "Really? You are always so smart in class.  I've seen you come up with such interesting plans to get you and your friends cutie marks that I thought you already had a plan. I'm sure whatever you think of will be a great idea."

After he was reminded about his pictures he quickly got out his photo album to show Apple Bloom. First, there were the pictures of ponies searching the library for information. Then, there were a few of Crystal ponies being interviewed for information.  Finally, there were only a few pictures of ponies searching the Palace for anything odd.  "I was a little wrapped up in taking pictures and taking notes for later.  If I hadn't bumped into you I would have just ended up getting lost in the Palace all by myself."

Featherweight was a bit more embarrassed when he said that. He had originally came here to help search the castle.  He was only going to take pictures of really important things, but he got distracted really quickly.

[Deleted]

Apple Bloom was constantly concerned with sounding like an ignorant hick in class, so to hear that someone in her class who wasn’t a Cutie Mark Crusader thought she was intelligent was music to her ears. Sure, his belief in her seemed to add some pressure for her to actually come up with an idea, but she didn’t mind that so much. Her older sister was something of a community leader and if Applejack could do it, then Apple Bloom figured she’d be able to do it, too.

”Thanks, Featherweight, Ah’ll make sure to come up with something real good, promise.” She didn’t pay much mind to his assumption that he would be lost. It was too bad that he hadn’t already come across anything in his photographs, though it was promising that he only hadn’t because he hadn’t really looked, yet.

”Maybe we should get lost, everypony else is being all systematic when they’d be just as likely to stumble upon the answer…” she mused, not sure if it made sense. With just her and Featherweight there, she didn’t feel some big need to screen herself too thoroughly.

[Deleted]

When Apple Bloom thanked him Featherweight blushed just slightly.  Although he did enjoy any kind of acknowledgment he got, he rarely spoke about it. "Um...It's no problem Apple Bloom..You don't have to thank me....I was just saying stuff..."

When Apple Bloom told him about her idea he was amazed at how fast she thought of it.  He had no idea that she could come up with such an out of the box plan so easily.  He thought that no one would have ever thought to try something simple to solve the problem. Even though this was only the second time he had ever really interacted with Apple Bloom he was definitely impressed with her skills.

"Get lost? I would have never thought of something like that!" Featherweight said with both a little excitement.  He knew Apple Bloom would come up with a plan quickly.  After taking a quick look around the palace he saw a few different directions to go in.  "I'm not sure which way we should go.  I think from now on you should lead and I'll follow and take pictures of what I see."

[Deleted]

Apple Bloom had already taken the compliment, so she had no intention of taking back her thanks. Just went to show how nice of a pony Featherweight was, couldn’t even take a thank you in a response to kind words he had said. ”Well I still appreciate it,” she said happily, but calmly to keep things from spiraling into some strange contest of politeness.

She was a little surprised when Featherweight liked her plan. Partially due to the fact that she was used to a little resistance from the other Cutie Mark Crusaders, so someone jumping on board right away seemed strange. She also had concerns that getting lost would either mean getting in trouble or truly getting lost and not knowing a way back. However, none of those issues gave her enough motivation to not want to try.

”Alright! Then let’s go…” She looked around for a moment, ”Well we both came from the outside, of course… And we’ve only seen this room so far…” she didn’t want to think about it too much, but only a fool would start backtracking and think themselves clever, ”This way!” She began slowly walking further into the palace. ”Tell me if you see anything good.”

[Deleted]

Featherweight waited for Apple Bloom and begun to think more about the Crystal Empire. Although so many ponies were around trying to help he knew very little about the history of King Sombra. He wasn't only distracted by taking pictures of everything. He was also taking notes and thing of an article to write about the experience.

Then Apple Bloom looked like she ad decided which direction they should go.  As she began to walk forward, he followed slowly behind her. "I'll be sure to tell you if I see anything strange, but I'm sure I'll see plenty of good things from where I am" Even though he was still young Featherweight had learned long ago how to talk without saying anything.  It wasn't as if he didn't trust anypony, it was more like he had a habit of saying to much if he spoke for to long.

"Magic is so interesting, I wish I could spend more time studying it." He said almost to himself. He had been fascinated with magic for a while.  He had seen a small example of it a while back and ever since it was always on his mind.  After a few moments of his mind wandering he managed to com back to reality.  Slightly embarrassed and a little red in the face he didn't say anything else about what he was just thinking.

[Deleted]

”Yeah, it’s all so pretty, no matter where you look there’s something to see,” she agreed. That was the hard part. Everything was new to her, so everything stood out. If this was one of those mind teasers Miss Cheerilee gave them every week, she’d look for what didn’t stick out because that was usually the answer. But this wasn’t based on a trip trick. It was something more deliberate and even more intentionally deceitful. ”Hard to focus on any one thing.”

Apple Bloom nodded at Featherweight’s comment about magic. She appreciated a good magic show as much as the next pony and the stuff Twilight Sparkle and Zecora could do with some know-how was pretty impressive. Leave it to Featherweight to be one of the few pegasi she knew who didn’t prefer to talk about flying or aerial tricks. ”Really? It is pretty neat, knowin’ more about it probably would be a big help right about now, too…” she admitted.

”Hmm… Hope this isn’t the opposite way…”