What Happens on Saturday

Cinnamon woke up later than he normally did Thursday morning. By the time he took a shower, brush his teeth and went to the dining room, Coco was already back from his morning shopping and Vanilla had already left to open the bakery. He walked into the kitchen and made a peanut butter and jam sandwich.

He was just finishing up when Coco walked into the dining room, “There you are Cinnamon, I was about to go up and make sure you were still alive. Did you eat too much last night?”

Cinnamon shook his head, “Didn’t feel like I did. I’m not really sure why I slept for so long, maybe guard duty is starting to catch up with me.”

Coco hummed to himself, “Well, we could go to the spa to unwind. There’s a new one on the other side of the city that has a play room that Paprika can run around in.”

“Thanks for the offer, but no thanks. I actually wanted to work with mom today before I return to Canterlot Castle tomorrow.”

“No worries then, I had a good time yesterday anyway.”

Cinnamon looked at the clock. Realizing he only had 6 hours before the store closed, he stuffed the rest of the sandwich into his mouth and ran for the door, “Ow fee ou oonight!”

“Don’t talk with your mouth full mister!” Cinnamon heard just before he latched the door closed.

Cinnamon walked into the quiet bakery. He missed the lunch rush by half an hour so the store was currently pretty empty with the exception of one bat mare customer in the corner of the store still scribbling away in parchments and scrolls.

He walked through the door to the kitchen and was assaulted by the sweet aromas of cakes and icing. Vanilla was behind the main counter with three pastry bags held in her magic and squeezing a layer of icing on three different cakes.

He lightly tapped on the metal swinging door with his knuckles, hoping not to startle her and ruin her icing layers.

Her ear flicked behind her, acknowledging the sound he made. The pastry bags floated away from the cakes. She turned around as she set them down on the counter.

“Cinnamon! What are you doing here?” She asked as she walked up to him and wrapped her foreleg around his waist in a hug. Cinnamon wrapped an arm around her head and pulled it into his stomach.

“I came to help you work a little and ask you a few questions.”

“Oh? And what did you want to ask me?” She asked as she walked back to her cakes. Cinnamon followed her and stood on the opposite side of the counter.

“It’s about the princess… specifically dating tips.”

Vanilla picked up the pastry bags in her magic, raising a brow at Cinnamon.

He gave her a flat look, “I’ve still haven’t dated anycreature since leaving. I’m still as experienced as a foal in that department…”

“So you haven’t found anypony in the castle all this time?”

Cinnamon shrugged, “Nocreature’s asked; besides, guard duty doesn’t leave me much free time for that stuff.”

“But you still have time.”

“One day a week isn’t enough time to form a relationship with anycreature.”

“Sure it is,” she glances at him before looking back to her cakes, “You just need to stop making excuses for yourself.”

“What? I don-“

“I raised you through school Cinnamon; you can’t lie to me about this. You never wanted to go on any optional field trips, participate in any extracurricular activities, or go to any school dances. You never made an effort to get out there. What do you do on your day off? Do you go out to a bar and at least try to meet a mare? Or did you just stay at the castle, in your room, all day.”

Cinnamon couldn’t bring himself to give her an answer because she hit the nail on the head. He didn’t leave the castle. He would sleep in until around 11, go eat lunch in the dining hall, talk with Onyx in the barracks, get his next week’s guard schedule, eat dinner, and go to bed.

Even though he didn’t answer, she knew she had guessed correctly.

She finished squeezing the final touches of icing on her cakes, placing the pastry bags on the counter and used her magic to grab a carton of strawberries along with a bag of strawberry sauce. “How about we make a deal?”

Cinnamon looked at Vanilla, “Depends on what it is.”

“I will help you with date ideas if you promise me to put yourself out there after this princess thing is over.”

He paused to think it over. He could agree to that; mares didn’t avoid him anymore or give him uncertain looks. Many actually seemed comfortable with him when word spread of him being the princess’s personal guard. Maybe she was right; maybe it was time to try again.

“I can agree with that.”

Vanilla nodded as she put the finishing touches on her cakes; levitating them onto cake display stands.

“Well the most obvious is a dinner date. You can have a one on one talk with each other in a nice restaurant.”

Cinnamon nodded, “Yeah, but I don’t think it’d be a good one for the princess. It might be hard to focus on each other if everycreature in the restaurant is looking at us.”

She hummed to herself, “how about a hike? Plenty of open areas near Canterlot so there’s nopony to bother you. Or! You could make it a camping trip.”

“That… sounds like it would be really nice. Would that be a good first date though? Asking the princess to be alone with somecreature away from the castle?”

Vanilla grabbed one of the cake displays as Cinnamon grabbed the other two.

“Then what about a stroll through the castle gardens? You can still be outside together and ponies won’t bother you.”

He thought about it as he followed Vanilla out to the front room. A walk through the gardens would be a nice idea. Now that he thinks of it, they could take a stroll through the private celestial gardens.

While the widely-known Castle garden was made for the princess’ favorite animals to comfortably call their home, the lesser known Celestial garden was filled with exotic flowers the princess’ enjoyed; many of which no longer existed anywhere else. Access to the Celestial garden was also restricted to only the princesses and trusted personnel, of which he was part of due to being her personal guard for some time. A privilege he shared with two dozen other guards and would be revoked once he left.

He placed the cake stands on the front counter, “I think I can work with that, thanks mom.”

“Of course; if you need any more, I’m only a letter away.”

Cinnamon nodded, “So, do you need any help here?”

“Well, not need but you could work the front while I make todays cupcakes.”

“Could I make the cupcakes? I was kind of hoping to make my cinnamon cupcakes while I have the opportunity.”

She chewed on her lower lip while looking toward the kitchen. “Well, I didn’t put cinnamon sticks on the list of things for Coco to buy today.” She looked back to Cinnamon, “We also don’t have any bags of Stenson Mills Flour, just flour from the local mill.”

Cinnamon frowned. He could easily go out to buy a couple sticks of cinnamon from the market but the wheat needed to be ordered from Vanhoover. He could use the local flour but something about how the wheat was grown in Vanhoover made his cupcakes really fluffy. His parents didn’t like using it though since it was harder to cook with the larger pastries like cakes.

“Eh, never mind, I’ll handle the register.”

Vanilla nodded before walking back into the kitchen and leaving him in the front room.

For the rest of the day, Cinnamon handled the bits of customers that came to buy their sweets. Vanilla came out once to give the bat mare sitting in her usual spot a mango smoothie. He watched as his mother excitedly chatted with her, rolling his eyes with a smile knowing she was likely trying to find out what the play was about.

An hour after that, the bat mare actually packed up her scrolls, ink and quills then left the store. Vanilla wasn’t happy to hear that and punched Cinnamon in the leg when he said the bat mare ran before she could charge her for all the “free” mango smoothies. It improved her mood slightly, but she was still disappointed.

They closed the shop at normal hours and walked home together. After a nice dinner with the rest of the family, they turned in for the night.

Luna glided through the realm of dreams, lazily swaying from side to side as she made her way to the cluster of dream bubbles of the Manehattan residents. All the while, her mind was on Ground Cinnamon. Annoyance, excitement and a little sympathy made up most of those thoughts.

Ground Cinnamon was, beyond a doubt, the most difficult suitor she has ever had to work with. Never before had she met a creature that didn’t understand what she wanted from him on the first night and to make matters worse, he actually made her lose focus during last night’s activities.

She shivered a little as her checks grew red in a blush. It would have been an enjoyable memory to hold if it wasn’t greatly overshadowed by the embarrassment of being kicked out of the dream realm like an inexperienced filly.

She huffed angrily at herself; she participated in many battles against powerful enemies in the dream realm and defeated each and every one, yet allowed herself to break concentration from getting laid.

She shook her head to rid herself of such thoughts; it was a fluke! This Ground Cinnamon blindsided her with his attentiveness toward her; paired with the fact that she had not been intimate with an attentive lover in over a millennia had weakened her defenses.

Nopony could be expected to last as long as she did; in fact, none would have!

With the boost in her confidence, she burst forward with a powerful flap of her wings, wanting nothing more than to finish up with what she needed to do and go back to watching over the dreams of all her subjects.

The Manehattan dream bubbles came fast but Luna weaved between them with grace; flying to the center of the mass before coming to a stop. She looked around, searching for Cinnamon’s dream bubble.

It didn’t take long to find since Cinnamon had a rare and… strange dream bubble.

For a typical dreamer, she could see what the pony was dreaming about without having to enter their bubble; Cinnamon’s was black.

It was something she only saw for the castle guards she trained in dream protection. However, the odd thing about Cinnamon’s bubble was that his veil wasn’t from a conscious effort like the others were. It was an irregularity that she only noticed when she gave his dreams special protection while he held a close position to her sister. Unfortunately, while his dream had peaked her interest and concern, he never experienced a nightmare so she couldn’t enter due to one of the laws of the dream realm; not having a reason to interfere.

She reached out to touch Cinnamon’s dream bubble while she flapped her wings to hover in place. She let it rest on the pads of her hooves as if she were holding a delicate plate.

The past few nights she had to change the dreams of potential suitors to fit the situations she would put them through before entering them. In Cinnamon’s case, the second she did, she could clearly see his dream through his bubble like everypony else’s.

Tonight would be different. Tonight she only had to deliver the results; no alterations necessary. So she took a breath to slow her increasing heartbeat from the excitement and trepidation of finding something new despite doing this for thousands of years. She cast a spell on herself to prevent her from sticking out as a real pony in a dream world and touched her horn to the black bubble to enter it.

Luna walked through the wall of the dream only to find more darkness. In the middle of it all stood Cinnamon staring in one direction.

She spent the next 5 minutes observing the dream; the darkness never changed and Cinnamon didn’t move a muscle, not even to blink.

She slowly made her way to the center with Cinnamon while looking for any sign of a response, but nothing happened.

She nudged him with her hoof but received no response. She raised a hoof up to his shoulder and shook it with the same results.

Growing worried, she charged her horn, placed it on his chest, and gave him a small jolt.

Cinnamon’s head jerked back and a large two-dimensional square appeared in front of his eyes.

Luna watched with guarded curiosity as an armored pony appeared on the flat surface of the square. It didn’t take long for Luna to recognize the pony as Emerald Armor; the mare in charge of training new solar guards. Her mouth was moving but no sound reached Luna’s ears. However, she could tell Emerald was about to put Cinnamon’s platoon through exercises.

Luna’s mind was blanking as to what was happening right before her. It was as if he was having a dream within his own dream. She looked up at Cinnamon. He remained as motionless as when she first entered his dream. His eyes were still unblinking; however, his pupils would move ever so slightly in response to what was on the square.

She raised a hoof up to Cinnamon’s face to try and break his line of sight to the screen but it has no effect. Then, the screen changed from exercises to one of the castle hallways. Before Luna could recognize which hall he was in, it changed again to a schoolroom with little fillies and colts learning at their desks, then to a bakery.

Soon, the screen would change its contents every few seconds to different scenarios.

Luna looked at the screen with wide eyes filled with a mixture confusion and horror. What she was seeing before her would be considered a nightmare and require immediate intervention from her.

But as she used her magic to reach out to his mind, she didn’t feel any panic or fear from Cinnamon that would signal to her of a nightmare. Despite no signs of a nightmare, she was going to be treating it as one.

She charged her horn and sent a blast of magic to hit the wall of the bubble. The screen disappeared but the area remained dark.

She scanned the surface of the bubble wall with an aggravated growl. She’d have to return at another time to make sure this wasn’t a common thing for him.

She shook her head; now that… whatever that was had been dealt with, she could move on to the reason why she was here.

She jumped up so she was at eye level with Cinnamon, resting her fore hooves on his shoulders to remain there. She lit her horn and placed a kiss on each cheek, then one on his forehead. She pulled her head back with a smile, only for it to turn into a frown when she saw his blank stare. Since she did this part appearing as herself, she could enjoy the excitement the dreamer experienced from kissing the Princess of the Night. It would always put a smile on her face but she wouldn’t be receiving that enjoyment with him.

She gave him one last kiss on the lips but only a quick peck; she would savor this moment if it didn’t feel like she were kissing a statue.

She pushed herself off him and returned to standing on all fours. She walked to the edge of Cinnamon’s dream realm, knowing she needed to tend to the dreams of others. She looks back to the motionless Cinnamon for a moment before jumping out of Cinnamon’s dream, returning to the dream realm.

She spent the next half an hour calming the nightmares of the Manehattan ponies before beginning the travel back to look over Canterlot dreams. For the few minutes that it took her to return, her mind was focused on Cinnamon. Specifically his dream and thoughts of what it could possibly be. Thoughts that were put to the side once she began to hear nightmares come from some nearby bubbles.