Ponyville Daydream

by Kyrin_Sylver

Houseward Bound 02

Looking from side to side, Daydream started imagining where she would be coming from. It was Friday, school had just let out and Sugar Cube Corner would be receiving their weekly delivery of basic ingredients within the hour.

Daydream started walking to the right, nodding and smiling to Bon Bon as she passed with her full trash cart. Her work day would be ending soon as well, taking just a moment to appreciate how clean and well maintained Ponyville was kept. The base camps he had lived while growing up were well regulated, but it just didn't have the level of...”concern” for how everything looked the way Ponyville did. There were orders and regulations to keep things presentable, carried out by privates or out-sourced to civilians around the bases, but just seemed more...”sterile.”

Daydream slipped down an alleyway between Cinnamon Swirl and Cipher Splash's houses, ducking beneath a laundry line as he remembered he had immediately turned left last time he had gone this way and decided on going right as he reached the next sidewalk. Quickly crossing the road, he smiled to Holly Dash as she rushed by to somewhere or other, as she usually did. Her colorful mane and tail flipping behind her.

“Okay, almost there...”

Daydream's voice trailed as he zipped through another alleyway, also meticulously devoid of trash, and stood just across the street from his house.

It was an impressive affair, not only one of the physically largest houses in the town, but also one of Ponyville's first structures. Granted it was a storage silo for decades before it was renovated into the house it was today. The circular shape made it one of the more unique buildings just outside of the middle of town, while the thickly thatched roof three stories from the street gave it an interesting shadow as the sun continued across the sky.

The silo house, as he had first heard it mentioned when he moved to Ponyville almost exactly four years ago, had been owned by several ponies since the renovation before sitting abandoned for years. It was part of his original employment package, just like his job at Rich's Barnyard Bargains and a generous, bi-monthly allowance, though every day he returned to it he just felt a little more depressed.

Sweeping his eyes from one side to the other, he crossed the street with a quick trot and passed through the doorway as fast as the opening door allowed. Daydream noticed he was holding his breath and slowly released the trapped air as his nerves slowly calmed. He looked to the simple, if elegant front room and felt a heavy sigh leave his lips.

“Home sweet home...”

Straightening as he collected himself, Daydream stepped into the front room and looked from the “island” of comfortable chairs, coffee table, sofa and end tables in the middle of the room to the bookcases that lined the walls. Between the shelves of books were three suits of royal guard armor, one for each of the three pony tribes. The lightest had a hole in the helmet for a unicorns horn, while the slightly heavier set in the next space between bookcases had special slots along the sides for a pair of pegasus wings to extend. The heaviest set seemed almost fully enclosed and impenetrable by comparison, the earth pony armor.

Their style was decades older then the modern armors worn today, though they were not antique. Daydream had them hoof-crafted not long after he had arrived in town, delivered by a particularly endearing mailmare one piece at a time as they were completed in Canterlot by a blacksmith and armorer named Iron Spark. Behind them were the usual compliment of weapons each suit normally possessed. A short sword and light shield for the unicorn officers. A pole arm and short sword for the winged cavalry. A pole arm, short sword and heavy shield for the ground forces.

Daydream stepped over and looked over the heaviest of the suits as he thought what his great grandpony Rough Rock would have looked like during his patrols along Equestria's borders. Armed and armored to defend the ponies of Her kingdom from any threat.

His family on both of his parents sides had served in the Royal Guard for generations. These suits of armor would have been almost daily wear, not simply decorations for their decedent's overly fancy storage silo home.

“I understand what the Royal Guard means to you and your family, and there is no shame if you wish to serve Equestria there.”

Her words came to mind as clearly as the night She said them. Daydream's shuttering breath seemed to echo through the large, lonely room around him.

“But I will be protecting ponies, won't I, your Highness?”

Even the memory of his voice sounded so young and needy. He had been little more then an overwhelmed colt looking so hard for a place. For a purpose.

“You will, Daydream. Ponies only you will be able to reach.”

Daydream blinked back the threatening moisture and turned away from the suit. He had started collecting them on a whim a few months after arriving in town. Monuments to a life, a purpose, he had not chosen. Taking the measurements on himself and sending them to Canterlot. Puzzling together each part. The suits had been an expensive distraction at first. Something he could focus on late at night when he didn't trust himself to sleep. Though as the armor started to come together they were simply reduced to a goal he wanted, needed to complete. He couldn't allow them to simply exist unfinished. Useless.

Daydream made his way upstairs, hanging up his saddle bags and then emptying them out in as he always did. The cloak and scarf were hung next to the bags, so they could air out. The right bag holding the book he had finished during lunch, “Herdology: The Culture of Community,” and a currency pouch. A dozen bits clicked noisily on one side of the leather container while four of the five small pockets on the other side still held gleaming gems. A purple 5b, another green 10b and two dark blue 20b each cushioned from each other along the inner sides so they wouldn't chip or scratch.

Lifting out the book, he walked into the second guest-bedroom and placed it back on the bookshelf where he had picked it up three days before. The room had been untouched by anyone other then himself since he had moved in, just like the first guest-bedroom. He has visited his parents twice a year since moving to Ponyville, for a week each during fall and spring. He had made a point of persuading them away from coming down here each time it had came up, and soon they stopped asking.

He wouldn't be able to explain his nice house or fancy furniture to them. A single suit of armor would be months of his pay at Barnyard Bargains, let alone three of them just standing around waiting for him to reach the right mixture of depression and boredom to dismantle, clean and reconstruct.

He had taken a royal vow, regardless of how meaningless it may be now.

Catching his own miserable scowl in the hallway mirror he broke from his usual “shower right after work” mindset and walked back down through the living room and toward the kitchen.

He didn't really have a routine in place for Friday nights. It was the first of only two nights a week he could stay up late without affecting his work, so he tended to do whatever he could to keep his mind off of his friendly, fellow townsponies until exhaustion would drag him to bed by force. Reading, sometimes a little writing, though nothing more then overly optimistic outlines for some time now. Cleaning the house was always good, as dust seemed to magically appear if he didn't dust at least once a week, not that he had much to worry about in the way to visitors.

“Visitors.”

Daydream's voice sounded a little gravelly as he cocked his head to one side and wondered why he had bothered to say it. His only visitors were-

“Cookies.”

A smile suddenly stretched his lips as he remembered the Cutie Mark Crusaders and their yearly visit on behalf of the “Ponyville School Cookie Sale.” Each year right about this time they would knock on his door and ask him to buy boxes of cookies to get money for the schools materials and supplies. He thought back to the last time they had visited, sure it was right around the middle of autumn.

Daydream smiled at the possibilities. The cookie sale became his one shining moment to really do something worthwhile for Ponyville. By his second year in town he would buy half of their entire supply of baked sweetness, making sure to share the sugary wealth by giving Mr. Rich and all the other workers a box of their favorite treat. The rest were used to make “Customer Appreciation Tables” at the store in the mornings before his shift started.

The tables would have plates with each type of cookie on them for everyone that stopped by, which was nearly everypony in town. Mr. Rich loved the idea of treating the customers, while the shopping ponies could sample all the different flavors and then know what they wanted when the school colts and fillies came to their door.

Not the mention that Daydream kept a box of each type for his own enjoyment. It was a perfect storm of goodwill. His once a year moment to recapture a single spark of why he had originally agreed to move here.

Looking up to the ceiling Daydream mouthed a single wish to the Sun and Moon, only asking for a timid knock on the door. He promised to buy every cookie they would make and give them all away...After he ate enough to make himself happy. He was sure that was the way it worked, considering how “she” seemed to eat nothing but sugar and never seemed to miss a happy beat.

The overwhelming combination of purpose and potential sweetness induced joy made him tingle as he wished harder then he ever had before for anything, eyes tightly shut and teeth clenched firmly together.

And...Nothing.

Slowly releasing the tension from his every muscle, Daydream slowly lifted his head and looked from side to side of the edge of the living room as he wondered what exactly he was really trying to do.

“If wishes were cookies...”

Tap. Tap. Tap.

Daydream jolted completely upright, his eyes rolled down and to the right before slowly sweeping to the left as he attempted a “reality check” of the situation.

Someone actually knocked.

He blinked and wondered if he was so screwed up at the moment that he had imagined it. Could he really be that delusional?

Tap. Tap. Tap.

It was true.

He shot toward the door, saliva building in his mouth as he imagined piles of cookies. A bathtub of cookies. A mountain.

The door opened and there, down before his eyes where a trio of adventurous fillies ever-hunting for their cutie marks should have been was a single set of soft pink legs.

Daydream had to stop everything to process the disjunction between what he had wanted to see and what was actually there for almost two complete breaths and three full blinks before the jarring differences began to make a semblance of sense. With a fourth blink his gaze began to rise, noting the darker, cotton-candy pink tail behind his subject. A solid chest and surprisingly graceful neck, also framed by darker pink hair, came into view before he found himself a hoof or so away from being nose-to-nose with Ponyville's Premier Party Pony.

“Ummm. Day, is this a bad time?”

Author's Note:

Chapter two, even before chapter one got the go-ahead. It isn't as long and little rough at the top, but please push through as I get a little closer to my actual idea. Breaking things down by chapter isn't quite as bad as I thought it would be, though I still haven't got your feedback, so here is hoping.

One again, I'd love any constructive criticism. I'm trying to write for at least a little while each day so I can keep my resolve up to actually complete a full story.

Thanks for your time and attention.