The cookie jar was placed at a calculated height where it was just out of reach of two foals, stacked on top of each other on the dinner table. So far several plans to reach the forbidden treasure had been executed, though not many successful. The one which involved all the chairs in the room fell at the second chair. The one based on specially trained bees almost succeeded training them to fetch sweet things worked perfectly, but, unfortunently, the jar was protected by an anti-bee measure known as a “lid”. Throwing things sort of worked, in that cookies fell to the floor -but so did a jar-sized pile of broken glass. A lot of perfect cookies were lost to the trash that day.
However, this new plan was flawless. It was a bit like their “get a long stick”-plan, but had several advantages; unlike a stick, which you either had to carry in your mouth or tie to hour forehoof, a prosthetic would magically stick to whatever was inside it’s socket. It also had a hoof which could curl and had a minor touch-telekinesis spell on it’s bottom, controlled by the wearer’s thoughts. Normally, a hoof would be to big to fit, as it was custom-made to fit a pony’s leg, but they happend to have perfectly socket-sized foal hooves. So all they had to do was put on the prothetic, get on top of each other on the table, and grab the jar.
The problem was that the prosthetic belonged to their cousin, Zap Apple, who had forbidden them from playing with it. But, whatever, they had seen her using it for much more dangerous stunts; propping up wagons, as a fetch toy for her dog and as a backscratcher. Clearly, the fact that they couldn’t use it was just a way for her to hog it all to herself. Besides, she wasn’t using it when she was sleeping, so who cared if they borrowed it for a minute or two in the middle of the night?
.
.
Zap woke up to the frantic barking of Winona IV, who, as she did every morning, had tried to fetch Zap’s leg for her. Only to find someone else was already wearing it! Blasphemy! So, waking up early, no leg, no way of brushing her mane due all her stuff being strewn around the room as Winona IV had tried her best to find where it had gone… yeah, run Mari, run! Throw of your brother, it’s every foal for themself here!
Mari and Cameo learned an important lesson that day; if you steal from Zap in an attempt to get cookies, she will enlist the rest of the Apples to eat all of them in front of you, forcing you to watch as the jar is emptied without getting as much as a crumb. Also, you’re grounded.
—
Despite being cousins, since all the apple cousins live on Sweet Apple Acres they act more like siblings. As such, they feel no remorse in fighting with each other over anything and everything -as long as it’s among themselves. If anyone outside ever threatend one of them, it pretty much summons the rest of the Apples as a stampeding force of fury.
And, yeah, Zap is actually being a bit of a hypocrite when it comes to telling the twins to not use her prosthetic out of fear that they’ll damage it, considering what she’s used it for. Her reasoning is a bit of a mix between if she damages it she only has herself to blame, trusting herself to better be able to tell if something is too much for it compared to two foals, and just the plain principle of younger “siblings” not touching her stuff.