Uneasy Lies the Head

Sunny's eyes slowly opened and then closed shut again quickly as her ears were filled with a rattling sound. She placed her front hooves on the ground and tried to pull herself upwards, but the floor shook underneath her and her legs shook with it. Her back hooves slipped and her body flopped to the ground again. After a few more moments of listening to the sound of whatever she was lying on, a voice called out.

"Oh, you're finally awake, huh, little filly?"

Sunny blinked slowly and tried to roll over on to her back to see where the voice was coming from. She got no further than her side before realizing she was a bit too weak to make it any further and, once again, flopping onto her stomach.

"Don't try t'uh move too much; you might hurt somethin'!"

The voice was a feminine one, and was delivered in a heavy country accent. Sunny listened quietly for another few moments, then slowly opened her eyes once more, then looked downwards. Between the two wooden slats she was positioned on, she could see a dusty path moving along underneath her. A puff of dirt carried by the breeze underneath her flew up into her face, and she coughed a couple times. The voice continued.

"I found you down by the river-bank. Y'all ought'a be more careful. When we're back to Appleloosa, we need to find your parents and get you home."

Sunny's eyes opened a bit more quickly. Appleloosa? Wha-... Oh! The gem! Oh no, the gem! It was gone!

"I don't know what a little filly like you would be doin' down there by yourself. Goin' for a swim? A little far away from anything anypony would call home, if yuh ask me."

Sunny shook her head lightly. She mustered up her strength and attempted to explain. "... fell..."

"What? Didjuh say something, back there?"

Sunny tried again. "... I... fell..."

"You what?"

"fell..."

The voice broke the mood of the conversation with a sharp cackle.

"Y'all're just gonna have to learn to speak up!" The statement punctuated the laugh. It almost felt like this pony was teasing her.

Sunny finally succeeded at rolling over on her back and watched the sky as they rolled along underneath it. It was as big and blue as she'd expected (based on how warm it was) and the clouds were incredibly big and fluffy. She simply stared at them for a few moments while deciding if she should say anything else or just stay quiet for the rest of the ride. She had to know where that gem was, but she couldn't ask her current host. That gem had seemed important, and there was too much of a chance of somepony else recognizing it.

But how was she to retrieve it? How was she even to know where it was? Sunny felt defeated before she'd even found out the answers to those questions, and so she simply closed her eyes and listened to the steady, rhythmic clip-clop of her savior's hooves on the dirt road.

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As Sunny awoke she found herself somewhat confused about her surroundings. She was on a couch in a room only lit by the windows behind her, the old looking curtains drawn up to the sides. She remembered the cart-ride shortly thereafter and then she remembered hitting her head. Then she remembered hitting her head, and that's when the despair of her situation crept in.

How was she to retrieve that gem! She might not ever. She felt as though she may as well simply give up. The gem could be anywhere in Equestria by now, and probably had already returned to its rightful owner. Sunny did believe that was how these things worked- she was the bad pony in someone else's story, and their marvelous gem would simply travel back to them on its own, given the chance to do so.

She had failed. Now she was in a town she knew nothing about, in the care of a pony she knew nothing about, with no real idea of how to get home on her own. She laid her head down, and then she began to cry. She tried to hold back the tears, but she simply couldn't. Her only chance at freedom, at making something of her life, and slipped away from her. Now all she had was a headache and nothing else.

She lay there by herself in the light of the setting sun, crying gently and whimpering to herself as she rubbed her hoof on the edge of the couch, when she heard a door open. She tried to stop crying, but she was too far into it at this point, and when she tried to stop herself she coughed with the effort.

Before long, the door to the room she was in swung open gently, and there stood a tall, lanky pony with a brown bandana tied around her neck, and a buttoned flannel shirt. She inched close to Sunny, quietly, and sat down near the couch, looking at her. Sunny's face burned as much with embarrassment as from the irritation her crying was causing her, as she still could not stop. Every time she tried, she just started crying even harder, and soon this pony leaned towards her and spoke.

"Hush, little'n'. There's no need to be upset. You're okay, now; don't you worry," the pony said, and put a hoof on Sunny's side. She wanted to pull away from the stranger, but she simply didn't have the energy left in her. She buried her face in the pillow near her instead, and soon felt the pony stroking the back of her mane.

"It's okay. You're safe, and you can stay right here with me until you feel all better. Then we'll get you home."

With the last sentence, Sunny cried even harder, and felt a few more gentle pats on the back of the head before the visitor clopped away and the door gently creaked barely shut with a small opening.

It wasn't long after that the same pony as before returned with a saucer of soup and a cup of water, and upon seeing it, Sunny realized that the only thing that felt worse than her disappointment was the hunger in her stomach. She sniffled and wiped her face, and set out devouring the food that had been brought to her with just as much energy as she'd previously been sobbing.

"My, a hungry little thing, aren't you? I'm gonna go over in the next room and let y'all have a little privacy, but don't worry. I'll be right over there if you need anything, and you just call, you hear?" With that, she took more of a leave than before, and Sunny sat and enjoyed her soup staring at the room around her.

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It had been three days since Sunny had arrived at Appleloosa, and she was finally getting back on her hooves. Her first day and most of the second had been spent on her make-shift bed, in a bit of a haze and upset enough that the slightest provocation had set her into another bout of weeping.

And yet, she felt much better now. At least, she felt more hopeful. The citizens of this town had been widely accepting of her, and her new friend had shown her nothing but kindness and patience.

Sunny's host's name was Sunny Ride, she had learned, and they had both been overjoyed at hearing they had shared a name. And yet, despite her insistence to the opposite, Sunny had taken to calling Sunny Ride "Ms. Ride."

Ms. Ride didn't have much, but she had more than Sunny had ever had in her entire life. Her house was beautiful and decorated with old timey knick-knacks that she said had been given to her by her parents. She had told Sunny all about how wonderful her parents were, and how much she missed them now that they had moved far away. "I always thought it was the young'n's that were supposed to travel far from home!" she had joked. The conversation had made Sunny a little sad, but more for Ms. Ride than herself.

Ms. Ride was still pretty young herself, just a young mare who didn't seem to have been on her own for very long. She was very responsible, and paid for her beautiful house all by herself. She lived alone, and had joked with Sunny that she'd never had much interest in having any stallion around. She had commented that she didn't think there was anything that somepony else could do for her that she couldn't do herself, and Sunny liked that.

The other thing she liked was Ms. Ride's sense of style. She always seemed so cool, wearing a different outfit every day. Sometimes she wore different hats and had lots of different clothes. One thing was certain though, she always left clean ("as a whistle," she'd say) but came back filthy. She was a real, grown-up farm-pony, and Sunny liked that too.

She hoped that one day she could grow up to be half as great as Ms. Ride.

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The fourth day of Sunny's visit with Ms. Ride, she had been lying on the couch as usual in the morning when Ms. Ride had told her she'd be out for awhile to go off to work, and as had already become customary, asked Sunny to make sure she behaved herself. It was more a little joke than a real threat, and Sunny knew that.

She was so certain, in-fact, that she decided it was time to do a little less behaving than usual. She really liked Ms. Ride, and that day, she was determined to explore her house a little more and find out more about her new friend. She wanted to really get to know her more, but she also wanted to snoop, as children are wont to do.

First she started in the room she was in, checking in every little place she could think of. She even stooped and examined the floor under the rug, as if to check for any hidden trap-doors. She walked over to the mantle and examined everything there, as well. Among the artifacts were a few pictures of a young Ms. Ride with her parents, and some candles. There was also an old necklace that fascinated Sunny, and she picked it up and tried it on. It was a little heavy on her, and it hung down near to the floor, so she removed it, looked at it for another moment, and then placed it back on the shelf.

She moved from her makeshift room into the hallway, and there, there was a door on her left that she knew led to a bathroom, and stairs to her right. Straight ahead of her was the kitchen, and the kitchen simply contained food and a front door. She knew that wouldn't be interesting, and so made for the stairs.

The first thing she noted at the top was the old carpet that had been stained in a few places, and briefly she wondered from what. She crept down the hallway in the dark, and opened a closet as quietly as she could near the end to have a peek. Inside were some towels and other random bits of cloth, she guessed sheets and maybe pillow-cases. She closed it, and continued to the room at the end of the hallway, and there she found it.

Ms. Ride's bed-room! What a fantastic bed-room it was. Everything was old like everywhere else in the house, but among the old stuff there had been scattered a random assortment of Ms. Ride's personal belongings that she'd picked up over the years. Some random tools were even scattered on the dresser, and Sunny cheerily reflected on Ms. Ride's rough-and-tumble nature. She was so mature and strong.

Sunny crept over to the dresser and opened the top drawer and looked inside, and found nothing but clothes. She opened the second drawer and in there found yet more clothes. The bottom drawer, when opened, however, revealed the clattering of some more tools and other random knick-knacks, some of which she were not particularly familiar with, and yet that was not what caught her eye.

What caught Sunny's eye as she opened that drawer was a little black bag that was tied tightly at the top, and she pulled it towards her slowly, and then began to tug at the top until its contents spilled out in the drawer.

Sunny's mouth dropped open as she regarded the diamond-shaped purple gem that had tumbled out onto the bottom of the drawer.