Disclaimer: Golden Sun is property of Nintendo and Camelot Software Planning. Charlie the unicorn and all references are property of Jason Steele of Filmcowdotcom.
Super duper special thanks go to IPO for allowing me to weird him out with my weirdness and to GSAlex for looking this over for me
Isaac lay in the grass on a hill not far outside Vale. He was dozing in the sun on his way back to Vale after picking up supplies from Vault.
"Hey, wake up! You silly sleepyhead, wake up!"
Isaac sighed and sat up, still asleep. He was sure he was still asleep because three unicorns stood before him.
"All right, you guys, give the kid some room." The grey unicorn spoke. Isaac blinked and stared at it. Animals shouldn't talk. The unicorn looked at him. "You all right?"
"You're a unicorn," Isaac said.
"Yeah," said the unicorn.
"You're talking," Isaac said.
"Shouldn't I be?" asked the unicorn. "Anyway, I'm Charlie. Now you might want to get up before one of these idiots starts jumping on you."
Isaac got to his feet, still staring. "You're unicorns."
"I think we covered this already," Charlie said. "Anyway, sorry to bother you, but these two ninnies think we're on a journey to find a 'Candy Mountain.'" The unicorn somehow managed to express air quotes despite not having any hands. "They wanted to ask for directions."
"Show us the way!" whinnied the pink unicorn. It produced, from nowhere that Isaac could see, a battered map that looked to be drawn with crayons.
Isaac took the map and studied it. The landmarks listed were "Grassy Meadow", "Scary Forest", "Magical Liopleurodon, "Dark Cave", "Lake", "Bridge", and finally "Candy Mountain". He looked up at the unicorns. "Uh..."
"Show us the way to Candy Mountain!" neighed the blue unicorn. It jumped straight into the air and did a complete flip before floating down to land on its feet.
"Calm down, Jeff," said Charlie. "Look, kid- say, do you have a name, anyway? - if you don't know where any of these places are, just say so and we'll leave you alone. I don't want to inflict these two on innocent bystanders any more than I have to."
"Candy mountain, candy mountain!" The blue and the pink unicorn were now prancing in a circle, chanting the name over and over again in a singsong fashion.
"Uh, my name's Isaac," Isaac said, "and, sorry, I don't know of any of those places."
"Ugh, okay," said Charlie. "Looks like we're back to square one. Thanks anyway." He glanced at the other two unicorns and sighed.
Isaac felt sorry for Charlie, and before he quite knew what he was saying, he'd blurted out, "If you want to come with me, we can ask the elders in my village if they know about Candy Mountain."
Charlie looked at Isaac in a way not unlike a drowning man looks at a life preserver. "You think so?"
"Sure," Isaac said, not quite as sure as he'd been a second ago. "I mean, we've got a library, and there's always my teacher, Kraden. He knows a lot of stuff."
"All right," Charlie said. He turned to the other unicorns, who were still prancing and chanting. "Hey, you two. C'mere! The kid's gonna try and help us!"
The two unicorns stopped what they were doing and walked over. Well, to be honest, Isaac couldn't quite call it walking. It looked more like they were bouncing. Their knees didn't bend at all. It was kind of creepy.
Isaac led the way to Vale, and the unicorns followed.
"La la la la la la la la la la la la la la la la la la la la!" The pink and the blue unicorns bleated tunelessly for several minutes. Isaac considered the fact that he'd never eaten horse meat; he wondered what unicorns would taste like. Probably like glitter glue or Peeps dipped in frosting. However, his murderous thoughts were cut short when Charlie, unable to take any longer, burst out saying, "Enough with the singing already!"
The pink and blue unicorns were silent for several minutes. Then, out of the blue...
"Let's play a game!" the pink unicorn whinnied. Isaac winced. Less than fifteen minutes in their company, and Isaac was ready to run away screaming.
"Oh, God, Rosco, will you just shut up?" Charlie muttered under his breath. Neither of the two other unicorns paid attention to him, however.
"Anyway, we're here," Isaac cut in. They were in front of Vale. "I think we should go straight to Kraden; he knows a lot of useless crap so he might know where to find Candy Mountain."
"He will show us the way!" The pink unicorn, Rosco, exclaimed.
"Hopefully, yes," Isaac said. He jacked up the pace, leading the unicorns briskly through Vale. As he passed them, the villagers gave him odd looks, but no one interfered. Perhaps they could tell that down this path was where madness lay.
Rosco and Jeff, meanwhile, had picked up their idea of playing a game.
"I spy, with my little eye, something that is blue," said the pink unicorn.
The blue unicorn deliberated on this for a short time. "Is it... me?" he asked.
"Yes!" exclaimed the pink unicorn. The blue unicorn did a somersault of triumph in midair, accompanied by a joyful whicker.
"Now it's your turn," the pink unicorn told him.
"Hm..." said the blue unicorn. "I spy, with my little eye, something that is... pink!"
Isaac groaned and exchanged a look with Charlie.
"I know! It's me!" said the pink unicorn happily.
"You win!" the blue unicorn told him. "Now it's your turn again!"
"Okay," said the pink unicorn. "I spy, with my little eye, something that is blue!" Isaac nearly fell over.
The blue unicorn was puzzled for a good minute before whinnying happily! "It's me, isn't it!"
"That's right!" the pink unicorn told him.
"Now I'm gonna go," the blue unicorn said. "I spy, with my little eye, something that is-"
"Pink," Isaac ground out through clenched teeth. "You mean the other unicorn." He pointed to Rosco.
"Yay!" Jeff and Rosco whinnied in unison. "You win this time! Now it's your turn."
"Oh, too late, we're almost at Kraden's!" Isaac said quickly. "It's just across this bridge." He started across the bridge, with Charlie trotting after him and the other two unicorns trailing after them.
Isaac and Charlie were almost across the bridge when they heard Jeff crooning something. "Charlie... Chaaaarliee... Chaaaarliee... Char-"
"I'm right here!" Charlie burst out. "What do you want?"
"We're on a bridge, Charlie!" Jeff told him joyously.
Charlie let out an angry snort and followed Isaac off the bridge. "I tell you kid, I don't think I can take this much longer. Screw Candy Mountain; I don't think it even exists, anyway!"
There was a collective gasp from the other two unicorns. "Shun the nonbeliever!" exclaimed Rosco. "Shun!"
"Shuuuuuuuuuuu-," said Jeff, "-uuuuuuuuuunuuuuh!"
Charlie twitched. "Let's just find this Kraden."
"Just down this path," Isaac said. He led the unicorns to Kraden's cottage and hammered on the door until the old man opened it.
Kraden blinked in surprise when he saw Isaac standing with three unicorns. "I say, Isaac, are those unicorns? Equus Unicornus, the mythical creature? How did you find them?"
"They found me," Isaac said shortly, pushing past Kraden into the cottage. "They want your help to find Candy Mountain."
"We found a map!" Rosco said. "A map to Candy Mountain!"
"Oh, did you?" Kraden pushed his glasses up his nose. Rosco produced the crayon map and handed it to Kraden. Kraden studied it. "Ah, yes. Candy Mountain. You'll want to head east from here until you reach a cave. Take that cave, then head northeast when you leave. You'll find a forest, and inside you'll find a magical liopleurodon. It will speak and show you the way."
"Yaaaaaay!" Jeff and Rosco did twin somersaults in midair. "We're going to Candy Mountain! Candy Mountain! Candy Mountain! Candy Mountain! Candy Mountain!"
Charlie and Isaac ignored the joyful chorus. "I don't know how to thank you guys," Charlie said. "I don't know how to get back to my meadow now, so I'm stuck with those morons until they find this 'Candy Mountain'." He again managed air quotes despite not having hands.
"We're happy to help," Isaac said.
"That's quite right," Kraden added. "Why don't you boys head on out now while the directions are still fresh in your minds?"
"Good idea," Charlie said. "Isaac, I remember the way out. I'll lead these two out so you don't have to deal with them anymore."
"Thanks, Charlie," Isaac said. "Good luck finding Candy Mountain."
Charlie neighed goodbye and shepherded the two chanting unicorns out of the cottage.
Isaac sighed happily. "I'm glad that's over with. Poor Charlie, though. Kraden, how did you know where to find Candy Mountain?"
Kraden chortled merrily. "Oh, Isaac, I didn't. Candy Mountain isn't a real place. It's all about what's inside you that counts."
Isaac cocked his head. "You mean like having a good heart?"
"Not exactly," Kraden chuckled. He grabbed a two-by-four and hit Isaac upside the head.
.'-"-'..'-"-'.
"Ugh..." Isaac groaned as he woke up. He sat up and saw that he was sitting on a hill not far outside Vale. "What happened?" he muttered. "Ow!" A sharp pain flared in his abdomen. Isaac gingerly reached down and lifted up his shirt, running his fingers lightly over his side. He felt a long series of stitches, still sticky with blood.
"Aw, they stole my friggin' kidney!"