Sunny Knight: a Pony's Tale

by TheothersideofSunny968

into Untold Dreams part 1

The zebra shaman looked from one pony to the next, making sure that every one present had seen the great concern in here eyes. "A great evil has come to Ponyville, to best this monster, you will need all your heart, wit and skill."

"Wait! Weren't you in a coma? How did you-?" Thunderlane started to ask, but was quickly silenced.

"Another time, Grey flyer" Zecorra interrupted. "We have problems far more dire. Follow me and I will show you, what evil you must undo."

Without another word, Zecorra began to lead Sunny and the others from the castle of the two pony sisters, back into town. Sunny hesitated for a moment, looking back at the ruins of the castle, something about it made him sad. Like a image of it in it's former glory flashed in his eyes, bringing with it a slight moment of happyness, before fading and turning as grey and forlorn as the castle's current state.

"You ok, Sunny?" Big Mac was at the back end of the group and noticed his yellow pal just looking off into the distance.

"Oh.... well, ugh..." Sunny's first instinct was to tell a believable lie, but he fought against it. Not only was Big Macintosh one of his best friends, and now a fellow Guardian of Harmony, but he was like family. Sunny shouldn't have to lie to him. "I just... I fell like I'm trying to remember something about the castle. Something fondly, I think. But... somethings are still fuzzy."

Pulling a hoof on Sunny's shoulder, Big Mac shot him a small smile before rubbing his other hoof into Sunny's mop of orange mane, digging into his scalp with a noogie. "Ya'll think waaaaay too much."

The obvious statement was actually able to make Sunny laugh a little as he struggled to get out of Big Mac's grip. Once he could break free, Sunny started playfully punching the big red stallion in the shoulder. "Cut it out! Ya goof!"

Smiling back, Big Mac let out a little chuckle as he knocked Sunny's weak punches away. "That's th' Sunny ah know. C'mon. Th' others are waitin' fer us."

Big Mac was right. Sunny would have time to think about all those things later, when there wasn't 'evil' to deal with. And with that, both the farm stallions left the castle, and whatever memories Sunny was trying to remember, behind for the moment...

"I don't believe it..." Thunderlane commented as he peered through a bush.

"...This is terrible...." Octavia added under her breath, almost unable to speak.

"Are they... ok?" Big Mac turned to Zecorra for the answer.

Zecorra and the 'new Guardians of Harmony' lay hidden within the bushes and behind the trees at the edge of a cleared area. All around were pony statues resembling everypony in town. They were all scattered around the clearing in various positions. Some sitting casually in a covered tented area, some outside the tent either playing or appearing to be running for their lives! At the heart of it all stood a dark and frightening unicorn stature. This statue appeared to be glowing with a dark green aura as sparks of the same color shot off of it at random jolts. He stood at the center of the circus tent like a monolith of dark decent.

To make matters worse, the statues 'were' everypony in town! The circus advertised all thought town was indeed a trap. A trap that snared everypony who came out to see the free event, including Twilight, Applejack and the rest of the elements of harmony. Their statue selves appeared to be positioned as if they were just about to take the frightening unicorn on in a fight, but were stopped just short of it as they were turned to stone!

"I certainly hope so" the wise zebra answered from her own bidding spot in a nearby bush. "But the answer, I do not know. One thing I think is true, their salvation lies with all of you."

Sunny found it hard to take his eyes off everypony, especially a certain freckled statue with a Stetson hat. "What do we need to do."

"I think our prisons had a common theme" Zecorra started to say. "To set them free, you must enter into their dream...."

"Dream?" Doctor repeated the word as he and the others pulled back from their hiding spots to rejoin Zecorra behind the scenes of the statue filled field. "How will dreams set them free?"

"The monster you see up there is the creature to beware..." Zecorra pointed to the dark unicorn statue at the center of the circus tent.

Taking a second look at the frightening creature of stone, Sunny sudeently eemembered why it seemed so familiar. "THAT'S A SERVANT OF MY FATHER! He helped my father speak to me in the dream I had last night!"

"A servant of the shadows indeed" Zecorra commented. "He enters dreams and nightmares alike, searching for power and to feed. Like your father he survives on fear, to defeat him keep your elements and loved ones and near. Your inner light will see you through. To set the other ponies free from their statue curse, I'll instruct you on what to do.

"Take a seat around me, and I'll begin a the ancient chat, a spell to set your minds free" to Zebra shaman told Sunny and his friends who began moving into position.

Now in place all around Zecorra, Sunny and the others closed their eyes and listened to the ancient words the wise zebra spoke. Taking calm deep breaths as they were told, Sunny, Big Mac, Thunderlane, Octavia, Doctor and Derpy all began to feel light as a feathers. The changing from Zecorra seemed to grow in depth and the tone stretched and warped. When curiosity got the better of him, Sunny peaked with one eye and saw that he and the others were no longer sitting around Zecorra, but appeared to be in some sort of otherworldly plane!

"W-where are we?!" Thunderlane panicked as he began flipping upside down as he floated.

"This must be the 'dream realm'" Doctor noted as he looked around, Derpy by his side spinning around in the air like a top.

"So it worked?" Octavia asked as she floated in the air, a little shaken that there was no ground beneath her hooves, only starry like black space.

"Ah guess so" Big Mac replied as he quickly gained a sense of balance. Floating as he did slightly reminded him of when he was a Pegasus. When he looked over to Derpy, he thought spinning around as she did looked kinda fun and decided to give it a try for himself.

"Will you guys quit messing around!" Thunderlane snapped, still trying to balance himself out.

Seeing him struggle, Doctor cleared his throats to catch the grey Pegasus's attention. "Why don't you try focusing with your mind rather then trying to act on 'instinct' to help you get your balance. In this world, we don't have our physical bodies to rely on."

"Right. Like Zecorra said" Sunny added. "This world will need us to focus on our force of will and minds to win against Charming Knightmare."

Taking a few deep breaths, Octavia and Thunderlane tried to calm themselves and focus their minds on standing still. And like that, they felt solid ground beneath their hooves.

"This place is..." Octavia began to say, slightly taken back in awe, but also slightly done with the whole 'mind over matter' bit.

"Making you wish we were back home?" Thunderlane finished her sentence for her.

"For lack of better words, yes" Octavia said matter-of-factly.

"We have a mission guys" Sunny stated, gathering all eyes to him. "Let's get the job done, set our friends free, and beat this guy. I know we can do it. We just took down a scary centaur guy who wanted to turn Equestria to rubble! We can handle a simple nightmare, right?"

"Yeah!" Everypony cheered, feeing a singe of bravado growing within them.

As they began to feel their inner lights glow, the magical auras from their respective elements of harmony coated their astral bodies once more. But rather then power up their receptive guardian, the element's light shot out of the bodies and began to roam around the dream realm, leaving behind them a trail of light.

Looking at the individual trails, Sunny spoke the first thin that came to his mind. "I think we're supposed to follow them."

"Guess we're splitting up?" Thunderlane stated as he noticed some to the elemental lights went in opposite directions.

"For now" Octavia added, a small smile on her muzzle as she became more confident with moving around.

"I think we need to in order to save the girls" Sunny commented. "Each of us has a element we are meant to guard. I guess the elements are leading us to the pony we share an element with."

"So let's get the girls and kick some Knightmare butt!" Thunderlane said as he beat his wings to shoot him in the direction his stream of red light was leading him. "Bet you guys I can get Rainbow Dash free before you guys get the others!"

"This isn't a race!" Octavia yelled at the grey Pegasus stallion as she began chasing her own purple light.

"Wheee!!!" Derpy cried out with child like glee as she followed the pink light stream.

"Allons-y!" Doctor yelled out as he followed a light purple light into the dream realm.

Before Sunny could follow the orange light he knew around less him to Applejack, he hesitated. Guilt began to overtake him as flashes of the last time he saw Applejack came back to him. Her body curled up, scared and shivering in his smoke like hooves. The orange light began to flicker as Sunny's mind drifted off and fear began to deep back into his heart.

Seeing his hesitation, Big Mac delayed his own decent Into the dream realm to join Sunny by his side. When he reached the troubled yellow unicorn, Big Mac put a reassuring hoof on his shoulder. Normally this would earn him a small smile, but this time Sunny really appeared to be bothered by something. "What's on yer mind, partner?"

He didn't really want to confess what he did, but in the dream realm, your emotions and thoughts fly freely, which unblocked anything Sunny would try and use to hide his secrets. "Big Mac... I hurt Applejack..."

This shocked the big red farm pony. And before he could say anything, Sunny's thoughts began to pour out.

"I lost control and became... well... an umbrum in my sleep. I think Applejack was trying to wake me up and I blasted her with dark magic..." tears began to gather at the far corners of Sunny's eyes. "I hurt her. And worse, I couldn't make things right. All I could do was drop her off with Twilight... She must have helped Applejack... I knew she could... but how can I ever face her again..."

"Ya have to" Big Mac plainly said as he looked at Sunny with his own big green eyes. "Ya have ta tell her yer sorry. She might think yer angry at her or somethin'. Or worse, that yer lookin' ta leave again."

A million different thoughts began to pop into Sunny's head, but one dominant though over all escaped his lips. "Why would she be worried about me leaving again? I mean... I hurt her-"

"Ya hurt we more when ya left during winter wrap up" Big Mac interrupted his friend. "She thought ya were angry at her and left, never ta come back again, and that it was all her fault."

"Her fault..." Sunny repeated the words, thinking it was the craziest notion ever. "Why would it be her fault..."

"She really likes ya" Big Mac added. "She probably knows that what ya did was an accident. Ah know ya would never hurt her that on purpose. Ah see th' way ya look at her. The way ya smile when ya see her. The way she smiles when she sees you. It really ain't hard ta figure out. 'Specially since she ain't never payed any stallion half as much 'tension as she does you.

"It probably ain't much, but ‘ah’ forgive ya" Big Mac's smile doubled in size as he looked deeper into Sunny's eyes. "Yer more then ah friend ta me. Yer family. And probably more ta Applejack. An' right now, she needs ya ta be her hero. Can ya do that?"

Tears fell from Sunny's eyes but for a short moment before being wipped away by his yellow hoof. With a smile and a short nod, Sunny looked back at Big Mac. "Ya bet yer yoke ah can! Ah'll bring her back an' we'll send this Knightmare feller packin' faster then us runnin' home after Granny rings th' cowbell fer supper!"

Hearing Sunny's accent return put Big Mac at ease. He knew that when Sunny was relaxed he could do great things. And this was a time that the big red stallion knew he needed to hear that accent come from the yellow stallion. As Sunny jumped into the dream realm, following the orange light stream that would inevitable lead him to Applejack, Big Mac couldn't help but smile and laugh a bit.

'Happy-go-lucky guy fits right in. His daddy may be some evil king, but he was born ta be part of our family. Ah know ya'll make Ma sister very happy' with those final thoughts, Big Mac did a cannon ball into the dream realm, then began doing a backstroke, following the light blue light stream that was leading him to Pinkie Pie.

With that final guardian on his way, the elements of harmony would be rescued in no time at all. Hopefully they could make it in time...

At the heart of the dream realm Charming Knightmare stood atop a dark tower of his own creation, appearing to be forged from bricks darker then shadows themselves. From there, he watched everypony's dreams as they continued to progress. Correcting them every now and again whenever a pony’s dream would begin to turn dark or troubling. Watching and controlling the directions of each dream was proving to be a more difficult task then Knightmare had anticipated, but he continued to hold onto his control over them.

"Those foals think they can best me?! ME?! This is ‘my’ world now! 'I' alone will rule the dream realm! 'I' will create a perfect world! A world with no war! No conflict! Where everypony, and soon, every creature in the world can live out their perfect lives without worry!" The dark grey unicorn's tone of voice was heavy with strain, making him sound more and more insane with every statement. "I'll just have to put those Guardians in their place... they will soon realize that 'harmony' only exists here if 'I' say it does! Not some rag tag team of 'friends'!"