Sunny Knight: a Pony's Tale

by TheothersideofSunny968

Guardian Disharmony

Nervous and worried, Applejack tried to keep her composure as she trotted through town, eyes open and darting around looking for her special-some-pony. She doesn't know where he went of to, but her gut told her that something was wrong. The two had plans later to work on wedding stuff, a guest list at the very least. But he just disappeared, no note or anything and if Sunny ever needed to take off suddenly and couldn't say good bye, he would alway, ALWAYS, leave a note.

As Applejack continued her walk through town, she heared a small commotion coming from the ponyville post office. Curious, and slightly hoping that's where Sunny ran off to, Applejack made her way to the front doors. But that's about as far as she could go. It was a nightmare of a sight to say the least. Ponies were cramming themselves inside, all yelling about letters they received, letters they never received, letters they wanted to send, and even a few complaining that the Post office didn't have the seasonal stamps they wanted to buy.

The mare incharge of the post office was Derpy Hooves, and although it's true that not alot of the mail gets to where it belongs, Derpy does do her best at delivering the mail. And heck, no pony else wanted the job, so it's better that somepony take it and have… issues with their efficiency, then no mail get delivered at all. Most ponies in town know eachother, so if it was something that seemed important, they would just hand it off to one another. And if it was outgoing, like, say, to Canterlot, it would be picked up by somepony else. So it had a good chance of being delivered. Most ponies in town didn't have a problem with Derpy and her… methods of delivering mail. Applejack couldn't help but wonder why ponies were acting up now, out of the blue.

Poor Derpy could only stand behind the counter and take the barrage of screams and yells. Every time she tried to speak up or apologize to one pony, it was drowned out by others yelling. Derpy was on the verge of tears when she heard something. A voice that seemed to be louder then the others, as if it was in her own head. 'How dare they be angery at you!… yell back… put them in line… or you'll never know peace…'

Something snapped in Derpy as she grinned her teeth, eyes, although still looking in opposite directions grew cold and sharp as she slammed her hooves on the counter and roared "EVERYPONY! SHUT! UP!"

But the yelling barely died down, which made Derpy's blood boil even further. An odd chill ran down her back despite her anger level raising, and the voice from earlier slipped its way into her ears past all the other ponys yelling. 'One yell won't silance them… this is a fight that you can't show mercy in… they want to yell at you?… show them you won't back down… Continue to fight back!… don't let up!…'

Derpy growled again as she rubbed the sides of her head and grinned her teeth before grabbing the nearest pony to her and pulled them closer to her. "You! What's your problem!?"

The stallion gulped a little before stating "I-I just want some Hearts and Hooves stamps-"

"We stopped selling those months ago!" Derpy shrieked before practically throwing the stallion back "Get out of my face!"

The stallion fell back on his flank, tucked his tail between his legs, then ran out of the post office as fast as he could.

Derpy grabbed the mare who stood next to the previous stallion. Derpy looked her in the eye and barked "what do you want!?"

The mare gulped and presented Derpy with a letter she needed sent by priority. Derpy took the letter and looked it over before looking back at the mare and telling her "you need to pay priority shipping, or it will take a week!"

The mare gulped and asked "H-How much is that?"

"Five bits! Take it or leave it!" Derpy snapped before pushing the mare aside before hearing weather the mare would pay for it or not.

"I'm expecting a very important letter from Canterlot" a mare stepped forward before Derpy could grab her to get to her next.

Taking note of this mares sudden burst of assertion, Derpy growled before yelling at the mare "well whoop-de-doo! Now get to the back of the line before I send YOU to Canterlot!"

Applejack couldn't believe what she was seeing! She had never seen Derpy act that way before. She pushed her way threw the crowd that was begining to quiet down, all growing afraid of Derpy and her newly found wrath.

When Applejack reached the front, she calmly asked Derpy "Sugar Cube, are you ok? Do ya want ah little help?"

But Derpy only growled and snapped at Applejack "you got a letter you want delivered?"

Shock replaced Applejack's concern as she fumbled and replied "Ugh, er, no-"

"Then GET! OUT!" Derpy roared, which practically sent Applejack's hat flying off her head.

retreating from the post office, Applejack didn't know exactly what to do, except either find Twilight or Sunny to help the poor, overstressed mare. No pony seemed to notice a tall unicorn hidden benith a cloak stood just outside the Ponyville Post office, a sinister grin on her muzzle as brown smoke flowed from the corners of her mouth and eyes. "One down, four more to go…"

"Hey Bro, didn't you make my lunch last night?" Rumble seemed concerned as he looked all around the kitchen for his tin lunch box, running late for school.

"Yeah, it should be in the fridge!" Thunderlane called down from upstairs. He himself was frantically looking for his Wondebolts jumpsuit. Today Captain Spitfire was having the Wonderbolts practice in their show suits, which were a little more flashy and reflective then the suits they normally practiced in.

Down stairs, Rumble was still looking for his lunch box when his eye caught sight of it sitting ontop of the fridge. The little pegasus couldn't fly much, but he did manage to fly up a few feet to grab his lunch box, only to grow worried when it felt so light. Popping it open, he was shocked to see it was completly empty! Rumble and his brother had their differences in the past, and were starting to really bond. Rumble didn't want to start a fight on such a big day for his brother by complaining that he didnt make a lunch for him. Rumble would just buy something on his way to school and leave it at that.

"Have a good day, Bro! Good luck today!" Rumble shouted back to his brother as he dashed out of the house, really putting a peddle to the metal to pick a lunch from somewhere before school started.

Normally Thunderlane would offer to walk his little brother to school, but if he didn't find his performing jumpsuit, Captain Spitfire was going to have his tail! He just had it cleaned the other day and swore he hung it up in his closet.

Looking under the bed one last time, Thunderlane squinted his eyes on something crumbled at the far end under his bed. As he reached for and touched it his heart sank. Pulling the item in question out, Thunderlane began to rightfully panic! The fancy, reflective jump suit that cost him almost an entire paycheck to buy, that he NEEDED to wear today, was crumbled up into a ball, wrinkled and… something else was off about it. Pulling it apart, Thunderlane felt like he was about to pass out. It was crumbled up into a ball after having peanut butter, cheese, jelly and chips smeered all across it! Then his mind jumped to his brother's lunch. He remembered that Rumble didn't sound excited about having PB and J with nacho chips for lunch, but Thunderlane told him he was on a budget this month. Rumble forced a smile and acted like he was understanding.

"He wouldn't have done that…" Thunderlane told himself outloud.

'You have been really preoccupied with the Wonderbolts…' a feminine voice seemed to slither into his ear as the air around him seemed to grow colder. '… perhapse he is getting jealous… or maybe… he's trying to get you thrown off the team… that way you'll make more time for him…'

Thunderlane looked around frantically, wondering where the voice was coming from.
When he saw he was alone in his room, Thunderlane thought he must have been imagining things. It was probably all the stress.

Thunderlane turned his attention back to his soiled suit. "Ugh, the captain is going to have my flank for this… but I guess I'll have to wear my other suit. Aw man! I know I'm gunna do some serious laps for this!"

From his window, a tall unicorn mare smiled menacingly as she watched the grey pegasus fumble around. "How easily blame cracks loyalty…"

Applejack had searched high and low for Sunny, but had no idea where he could have gone off to. She was running out of ideas when she noticed she was close to the house of a certain scientific pony friend of Sunny's. Trotting up to the house, Applejack knocked several times on Doctor Whoove's front door. Each time was followed by a few moments of Applejack pausing and politely waiting. If it had been any other day, she would have just left, but she was growing more and more concerned about Sunny. Applejack had a sinking feeling he was in some sort of trouble. Peering through a window, Applejack's eyes darted around the the house of Doctor Whooves. There was barely anything in there, say for a large blue phone booth looking thing and four chalk boards with alot of writing on them that Applejack couldn't recognize. Some symbols looked like odd numbers, but there were mostly wierd circles that must have made sence to somepony. Surrounded by the four chalk boards was a disheveled looking Doctor Whooves, eyes darting from one board to another as he frantically wrote one thing on one board, turned to another board and erased something, and proceeded to follow the same patters as he went down the line of chalk boards, only to go back to the first one and keep the pattern going.

"Yes…. ugh, no that isn't right… if I take this here… and apply it here…." Doctor was mumbling to himself and oblivious to the world around him. His mane was a mess, his tie was losely hanging from his neck, there were bags under his eyes, and his hooves shook. But the poor guy was lost in his own little world. If a monster attacked the town and ripped his house up, Doctor would still be scribbling away.

Appeljack knew it was a lost cause to try and pry him away from his 'work', having seen Twilight in such a state before when she was re-reorganizing her library some time ago. Applejack decided she would make a stop back by here in a few hours to see if he was out of his 'zone' as Twilight would.

Doctor Whooves awoke that morning with a cold chill running down his spine as a brilliant idea popped into his head. An equation that would make interdimentional travel not just possible but safe as well! He knew the other Doctors told him interdimentional travel was forbidden, but surely if he presented them with a way to accomplish the jumps safely, they may see him as more then just the newest guy who is a little wet behind the ears. They were all very nice, but never took him seriously at the meetings. 'This will change all of that! I can't wait to see the looks on their faces when I show them this!'

Not even bothering to pay attention to the scientist at work, a tall, cloaked unicorn started walking away from her recent 'patient'. Who knew such a smart stallion could be convinced that finding the square root of pi could give him the key interdimentional travel. It would keep him so busy he'll forget all about his friends in need. 'Three down… two to go…'

'I can't believe this is happening' Octavia thought to herself as she stood at her podium, facing her class of eager to learn students. All of them without instruments and seemingly annoyed or board out of their minds as they just sat there in their chairs stairing at either their empty music stands or wandering around the classroom. While trying to keep herself together, Octavia thought to herself 'Curse you Big Mac! You swore you could get the supplies here by today! 'No problem' he said 'you would get back here in no time'! He said!'

"Ms. Octavia" one young colt in the front row raised his hoof.

"Oh, ugh, yes! You have a quesgion!" Her mind hopped from being furious with her friend for ruining her first day of class to being polite and sweet to her student.

"Where are our instruments?" The colt simply asked, which started a slow raising sea of whispers.

"And where is our sheet music?" A filly called out in the back without raising her hoof.

"Aren't we going to learn anything today?" Another filly, who sounded more annoyed called out.

By now, the voices of her classroom began to erupt into a sea of talking fillies and colts, their words Octavia couldn't make out.

'What am I going to do!?' Octavia was failing at calming herself down, everything overwhelming her. The chattering of her students becoming the displeased voices of their parents, all of them questioning her ability to teach and demanding a refund. Octavia was far from being a miser, but she had to take all the money she got upfront from the students parents as well as a little bit of her own savings, to buy the instruments and other supplies for her school! If they demanded a refund, Octavia would have to sell her half of the house her friend, Vynal Scratch, and her shared just to pay back half the parents! 'Big Mac! What in Tartarus are you doing!? Where are you!?'

Peering into the music school from the corner of a window, Mourning Cloak swallowed her own dripping hunger as she watched Octavia curl up behind her podium, afraid and unable to dig herself out of her own hole. The fear Octavia was putting out smelled delicious to Moutning Cloak who was still manipulating Amore's body, but the umbrum queen knew better then to feast at the moment. She was very close to succeeding in tearing these 'New Guardians' apart, but there was one thing left to do.

'Time to check on that big oaf' the demented mare chuckled to herself, then abruptly stopped. If there was one thing she hated, HATED, above all, it was laughter. Well, ok, she had to admit, Singing was worse then laughter. But both gave the spirit hope, and robbed one of their own, delicious fear. In a flash, Mourning Cloak vanished from Ponyville, leaving behind the chaos she had sown.

Broken down on the streach of road connecting Ponyville to Canterlot, Big Mac was struggling to push a very heavy, very full waggon of instruments, music stands, sheet music and other school products, out of a deep mud whole that just somehow appeared on his way back to his home town. Big Mac had offered to fetch the instruments and supplies for Octavia's school for her, trying to be a good friend and save her a small fortune on shipping costs, knowing she had already spent so much to get her dream of opening a music school underway. The trip to Canterlot by hoof would be an all day event, there were no towns or even houses along the winding road to the great city. But he was more then willing to make the journey to help his friend. The way to Canterlot had been easy, but half way back, Big Mac had to dodge alot of muddy parts on the trail that proved a threat to his journey back home. Funny, he didn't think it didn't rain I'm that time that he had been in Canterlot, and the mud traps weren't there when he ventured down it the first time. None the less, they were there, and they proved to a real pain in the behind. He had manuvored around more then half a dozen mud traps, but eventually fell into one.

This one in particular dragged the full cart of instruments down off the side of the road and a good six or seven feet down hill, sinking the wheels and back end of the cart in atleast a good six inches of mud. What made it worse was it didn't stick in the mud, but allowed Big Mac the illusion that he could easily pull it out. But the hill before him was steep and lined with fresh, wet mud. Every time Big Mac attempted to pull the cart back onto the road, he slipped and slid back into the mud, the cart returning to its spot with a loud squish every time. After more then a dozen attempts, Big Mac was covered up to his eyes in mud.

As he paused to whipe some of the wet dirt off himself he heard the flapping of feathered wings over head and thought he might be in luck with some pegusus coming to check out the ruckus, who could possibly give him some much needed help. He was wrong.

The flapping sound wasn't made by pegusus wings, but rather the wings of large black crows that took up seats in the surounding trees. Their eyes seemed to almost glow red as they looked down at Big Mac with judging gazes. Big Mac hated crows. It was a farmer thing. Farmers grow crops. Crows see the crops. Crows peck a and half each the crops. Farmers have to put up a scare crow in their fields. Its a complicated relationship. But he couldn't let their presence deter him from what he had to do.

Trying once again, Big Mac stood up from the mud, crawled over to the cart, and tried once more to pull it out of the ditch. And once again, poor Big Mac slipped and fell face flat into the mud. Only this time, an echo of the crows cawing filled the air. The sound shouldn't have held too much meaning to anypony, but Big Mac's mind linked their cawing to laughter. Looking up at them out of the mud, he saw all their little red eyes on him as they cawed.

'They ARE laughing at me' Big Mac shook it off, got up out of the mud, and began to think of his situation from every angle.

Pulling the cart wasn't an option, but maybe pushing it would help. Pressing his back against the cart, Big Mac sunk his hooves into the muddy earth around him and began to kick with all his might. After a moment of trying to push the cart, Big Mac realized all he did was push his hooves deeper into the mud. The crows cawed at him once more from the trees. But Big Mac had other ideas.

Grabbing a rope from the cart, Big Mac made a lasso, and flung it around a stump off the side of the road. He gave the rope a good tug and was able to pull himself out from the muddy ditch. Once back on the dry road, Big Mac tied the end of the rope not tied down to the stump into a lasso as well, and flung it to the cart, grabbing hold of the back strap, then began to pull with all his might. For a second, it started to move, then the brace for the back strap snapped, flew off, and hit poor Big Mac in the head. The crows cawed in laughter again at him.

By this time, Big Mac had had enough. Of the mud. Of the crows. Of this whole stupid trip! Rage and anger filled his mind as he slid down the muddy ditch, walked over to the cart, and this time, reared his back hooves and did what he was good at. He bucked the back end of the cart with a good amount of force, and amazingly, the cart moved more with that then with any of his other tries. But the crows still cawed in laughter.

'Forget those feather brains' Big Mac thought to himself. 'Ah got this now. Hold on Octavia. Ah'll get ya yer stuff yet!'

Big Mac continued to buck the cart, over and over, moving it several inches at a time, feeling proud of himself for making such head way. Each time the cart moved, the crows would caw in laughter, but Big Mac continued to ignore them. Right when he felt he could crack a triumphant smile, the cart stopped moving. He bucked the cart again, but it wouldn't budge. Walking around to the side of the cart, Big Mac saw why the crows had been laughing at him every time he bucked the cart.

The cart was now half buried in mud! Each buck didn't move the cart up the hill, it was pushing the cart deeper and deeper into the side of the muddy slope! The crows continued to laugh at Big Mac.

The the crows laughter built up in Big Mac's ears, making the world spin around him, his heart rate kicking into over drive as he true to pull the cart out of the mud, putting all of his strength into it. But his grip slipped and the big red pony fell into the mud, again. The crows cawing only grew as the big red earth pony splashed around in a fit of fury, enraged by the situation he was in, cursing everything. He cursed his good nature and offering to help his friend. He cursed the long trip he took. He cursed the students needing so much stuff. He cursed the dirt road that he had to walk. And he really, really cursed the crows for their annoying cawing.

The red eyes of the still cawing crows looked down upon Big Mac as the suriunding forest filled with their laughter, and soon with Big Mac's enraged screams.

Not far away, tucked out of sight was Amore, watching with a wide smile on her muzzle. She personally enjoyed this misdeed of hers, in particular. Not just becouse it took two Guardians out in one try, but also becouse, above all the Elements of Harmony, she hated, HATED, laughter. Laughter was the opposite of rage. It gave courage to others and erased fear. Any sane umbrum would hate laughter. And she LOATHED it. Which is why she decided to stick around and watch the big red stallion, who represented it, break down and fall to pieces for a little while longer.

After all, with Sunny out of the picture and no way home, and the other 5 Guardians out of the way, things were going to get easier for her and her son. Now she just needed to do the same thing for those pesky mares, the ones that represented the Elements of Harmony. Hearing Big Mac scream in rage in the background, Mourning Cloak cracked a smile, confident that she could break 6 fillies even easier then the new Guardians.