//------------------------------// // That was the coldest winter ever. // Story: Sororal Instincts. // by Reptilicus //------------------------------// Leap years and time management in Equestria were a bit of an oddball, even for the usual phenomena that often occurred in the enchanted countryside. Sliding timescales, weather geometry, keyframe errors and other confusing vague terminology meant that every so often one of the particular seasons of the year would fall short. Spring wouldn't last as long as it should or Fall would end up overstaying its welcome. For the various colorful horses of Ponyville this wasn't too big of a deal. They went about their lives content that the pegasi weather teams would sort out any issues. And they would be right. Weather, and the handling and management of the weather, was a big deal in Cloudsdale, home to the winged pegasus horses. And on this particular day a rather interesting solution to a very short winter was about to commence. It was a brilliant idea, thought up by the captain of official Ponyville Weather Team herself. A brash and mischievous young mare by the name of Rainbow Dash. A girl with a lot of talent, a lot of confidence, and perhaps a small bit of a selfish streak. A champion to some, a hero to others, and a jerk to a few. But she was the best there was and she got the job done. And she did it well. Few could match Dash in terms of speed, agility and efficiency. And she knew it. The idea was simple: Winter this year was going to only last about a month so to make up for it, the pegasi would juice up the power of the clouds and ensure that winter was even more "wintery" than the previous one. Less work overall then attempting to stretch out the weather and in theory, should produce roughly the same results. This meant packing the nimbus clouds with three or four times the usual amount of snowflakes and cramming far more sleet into the stratus clouds then was naturally thought possible. Doubling up on snowflakes, frost, and sugarplum dreams. However as the team of Weather Ponies were given their orders to begin Winter, their captain was called back by Cloudsdale's lead meteorologist and current regional manager of the Ponyville Weather Department. She was not in trouble of any sort, far from it. In fact, the very opposite. And that is where this story basically begins. **************************************** "So" asked Thunderlane, a rather large darkly colored stallion. "How did it go?" "What'd the boss have to say to you that he couldn't say in front of the rest of us?" asked Flitter, a light violet mare who was craning her head forward at the team's Captain who was looking at the ground with an unreadable expression. Rainbow took off her Captain's hat and slowly looked up at the small group of pegasi who were crowded around the main door to the weather office. Her face saddened with a look of utter devastation. Small tears began to appear in her eyes. Her jaw clenched and her bottom lip pouted, trembling. "Oh no, what's happened!" shrieked Flitter, her eyes wide with horror to see their brave captain in such an emotional state. But the ruse could only last so long and Rainbow's sorrowful expression was quickly replaced by one of laughter as she laughed aloud at how easily she had spooked her teammates. "Nothings wrong guys. I guess due to me working so hard and never taking a sick day they are giving me the next few weeks off work." said Rainbow as she proudly shoved her hat and whistle into her saddlebag. "So like.....a paid vacation?" asked one of the other horses in attendance. "Yeah apparently the last time I took vacation from work was like three years ago and that doesn't look good due to employee benefits or some other businessy stuff I don't care about." quipped Rainbow as she rolled her eyes and grinned. "So in short, while you guys do all the work on this 'SuperWinter' project, miss Dash gets to sit at home and sip hot chocolate. Don't worry I'll be thinkin' of you guys while I relax!" "Oh you lucky sod!" shouted Thunderlane shaking his head in disbelief. "Well enjoy your days off I guess. Pay us a visit if you get bored down with all those earth ponies." "Aw you know I will!" Rainbow said with a wink. And with a burst of energy she rocketed into the sky causing the entire weather office, which was made of clouds, to shift unnaturally from the gale. It was no secret that Rainbow was one of the fastest, if not THE fastest, flying sentient creature in Equestria. With her short cyan hair and rainbow-colored mane and tail she looked akin to some sort of colorful fireball as she soared over the landscape. She smirked to herself as she flew. It was nice to get a vacation once in a while. Rainbow enjoyed napping a lot and one would think the pegasus was lazy from mere observation, but in truth she was one of the hardest workers in Cloudsdale. She seemed to have an endless amount of energy when it came to concentrating on her work. But rules were rules and an employee HAS to take some days off every once in a while. It looks bad if they don't. Don't want to give the impression the Weather Office are a bunch of slavedrivers, right? The air was beginning to chill by the time Rainbow arrived at her home, the beginning of the Winter she had worked so hard to organize over the last month. And now rather than have to work further to execute it, she was going to enjoy it from the cozy inside of her warm cloud mansion. It was a rather elaborate house, looking like a floating white palace more than anything. It hovered several stories in the air, small colorful waterfalls adorning its gables as greek columns made up the foundations. And for the most part far too big for one pony. But it looked impressive and it gave Rainbow yet another thing to proudly brag about when someone new came to town. Showing off was perhaps her favorite pastime. ********************************************* "This is boring!" Rainbow said aloud as she sat inside of her bedroom, staring at the bookshelf of comics and action novels she had reread countless times. Though only an hour had passed the weather had picked up violently. Snow and hail whipped by the windows of the cottages of ponyville as a fine layer of white began to cover everything. But it did nothing to alleviate the fact that Rainbow had nothing to do and was all alone in the house. That is, all alone with the exception of her loyal pet. "Maybe I should go hang out with Pinkie." Rainbow thought as she tossed her copy of Daring Do and the Chamber of Malice onto a pile of comic books in the corner of the room. Earlier that day, one of Rainbow's longtime companions had invited her to a sleepover. Which Rainbow flatly denied. It wasn't so much that she didn't like sleepovers. It was more of an issue that spending more than eight hours in the company of Pinkie Pie would probably be taxing on Rainbow's already very short patience. Pinkie was a wonderful friend and one of the few ponies Rainbow felt she could really connect with besides her other friend Applejack. The three of them were all very athletic and enjoyed the boundless energy that came with youth. But Applejack was serious all the time preferring working all day over sillyness. She never liked pranks and as of late she and Rainbow's bickering was threatening to end their friendship. So the two had unofficially taken a break from hanging out with each other to cool off. Pinkie on the other hand had an adorable childlike demeanor with a bit of an evil streak she expressed via pranks and music. Her special talent was "throwing parties" but it was a rather vague description of all the things she was capable of. She could tell a joke, do impressions, improvise a song on the spot, act, and when it came to pranks she was wildly inventive. However she also consumed vast amounts of sugar at the bakery she lived at, which left her in a constantly hyper state. She never seemed to know when to "turn off" even if it annoyed those around her. And her natural clingyness seemed to be magnified tenfold whenever she was around Dash, making the pegasus somewhat uncomfortable at all the constant affection. Which was partly why Rainbow wasn't sure she wanted to spend too long of a time in the pink pony's company, despite Pinkie's ability to make Rainbow laugh. But as Rainbow sat there thinking about her options it struck her that she'd rather be laughing and annoyed at Pinky then sitting at home being bored. If she didn't get out of the house and be social she'd end up being bored until the winter came to an end. Then she'd be put back to work helping Wrap-Up the season and get Spring started. So Rainbow grabbed her favorite scarf, knitted for her by another old friend, and wrapped it tightly around her neck. "C'mon Tank we are going over to Pinkie's place." she shouted. With a small shuffling a large wrinkly tortoise squirmed out from under one of the cushions of Rainbow's cloud couch with a piece of carrot sticking out of his mouth, chewing peacefully. Tank was a gift of sorts from Rainbow's friend Fluttershy, whose house was very nearly a zoo. Tank had saved Rainbow's life once, and she felt it was her duty to take care of the little guy as a pet. It had been beneficial for them both. Tank earned the right to be the pet of the coolest pegasus in town and Rainbow learned how to be patient and caring for a creature that depended on her. Tortoises seem like they aren't very capable of showing emotion but Tank often proved otherwise as his green beaky face twisted up into a dopey smile as he trudged slowly to his master. "Whose a good boy, huh? Whose a good boy!" squealed Rainbow as she affectionately rubbed a hoof on Tank's flat scaly forehead. He responded with a happy grunting noise and slipped his head into his harness. A small device with an enchanted propeller that allowed the slow and earthbound animal to take flight and follow his master around. He couldn't fly very fast but he could keep up with birds and Rainbow would never leave him behind. And that was enough to keep him happy. Rainbow shut the door to her cloud mansion and peered over the edge. Down below were the now snow-covered hills of the Everfree forest. On the edge of which was the small wooden cottage of Fluttershy, where Tank once lived. Beyond that was Sweet Apple Acres where Applejack and her ornery kin lived, growing fruits and veggies of all sorts for the townsfolk. Then past that was the destination Rainbow was aiming for. The small village of Ponyville. It was a nice place. Full of old friends and new; a cornucopia of ponies, donkeys, cows, griffons, dragons, goats, and other various creatures that lived in Equestria. "Alright Tank. The blizzard is pretty bad down there. Let's get to Sugarcube Corner as quick as we can. Then we can just sit back and let Pinkie find ways of entertaining us. You know how she is. After the initial sloppy hugs and kisses she'll probably do whatever we ask her to. Heck we'll probably get a bunch of free food out of it. Want some free muffins, boy?" asked Rainbow. Tank nodded his head excitedly. Or at least as excitedly as a tortoise could manage. With a flap of her wings and a buzz of his propeller the two animals leapt from the balcony of the cloud palace and dove down past the dark nimbus clouds right into the blizzard. Rainbow was immediately happy she was wearing the scarf Rarity had knitted for her. She looked over to see Tank's teeth chattering as he was buffeted around by the icy cold winds. Whirling snowflakes nearly enveloped them both as they spiraled downwards. "I guess we need Rare to make you a scarf too, huh?" said Rainbow to her reptilian companion. "Or maybe a whole sweater to go over your turtley shell thing." A blob of snow to the mouth silenced Rainbow Dash and she and tank wheeled downwards through the sheets of wind and ice. For anyone outside of Ponyville, seeing a Pegasus diving towards an earth pony town wearing a rainbow-pattern scarf with a propeller-wearing tortoise chasing after would have been a bizarre sight. But for Ponyville this was a Monday. And for Rainbow this was like any other day. That is until she noticed a small orange form far below her near the edge of the Everfree forest. Was that a pony? Whats a pony doing walking around in this awful blizzard? Especially after Rainbow had painstakingly given pamphlets to everyone in town to let them know to stay inside on this specific day. Even going so far as to plaster up signs and stickers on fences and walls in town, specifically just to let ponies know not to be outside when Winter came to call. Apparently someone did not get the memo. Well, despite wanting to rush to Pinkie's bakery house and devour all the sugary baked goods that no doubt waited inside, part of Rainbow's job was to be sure everyone was safe during weather phenomena, even when off-duty. "Hey Tank. Head down to Sugarcube Corner without me. I'll catch up with you in a little bit. If Pinkie doesn't answer the door just fly in through her window. She always leaves it open in case I visit. Try not to freak out her pet alligator. He might seem friendly but he's kinda....eh." And with that the two parted. The tortoise continued his descent over the rooftops of the many cottages of Ponyville while the cyan pegasus took off toward the edge of town and the orange pony mysteriously near the edge of the forboding Everfree forest.