//------------------------------//
// Too Slow 
// Story: Fur and Feathers 
// by Nexas 
//------------------------------//

	Rainbow Dash wiped her furrowed brow and clapped her hooves together.

"Alright, now I know that the last few tries... didn't go so well." She rubbed the back of her head, embarrassed by the repeated failures she's faced. "And I'm sorry about that. But this time..." she grinned enthusiastically, "This time, it's going to work!"

She tried to sound encouraging, which was hard when they had already failed at least four times today. it was even harder when you're trying to encourage a Tortoise.

Rainbow Dash stood on the cloud lawn that stretched out from her floating house. The fluffy clouds felt good on her hooves. In front of her stood her pet Tortoise, Tank. Tank was in fact not standing; thanks to the balloons strapped to his shell he was floating.

One of the hindrances of being a Pegasus, and having a non-flying pet, was that Rainbow Dash could never have Tank in the house, and after one too many tortoise shaped holes in the floor, Dash had decided that enough was enough.

Originally, Twilight had promised her that she would work on the walk-on-clouds spell so Tank wouldn't have this problem, but after waiting for three weeks for the results, Dash had decided to take matters into her own hooves. It had taken four hours, two helium containers, and a whole box of balloons borrowed from Pinkie Pie, but Rainbow Dash had finally figured out the perfect amount of helium and balloons necessary to keep the turtle from floating up into the ceiling or down into the floor.

"Okay Tank..." Dash grinned at her pet. "With those balloons, you'll totally be able to fly around the house." She prodded the animal's shell. C'mon, give it a try!"

Tank slowly poked his head out of the opening in his shell and looked up at his owner, then to the multicolored balloons holding him in the air. Hesitantly, he brought his legs out as well and began kicking the air, eventually succeeding in moving him forward slightly.

"Excellent!" Dash applauded herself for a job well done. "And finished a lot faster than Twilight."

Rainbow Dash turned and looked towards Ponyville. From the vantage point of her cloud home she could see the entire storm, stretching over the town like a giant, dark blanket. Dash could even hear the roar of thunder from there.

Tank floated over to Rainbow Dash and bumped into her, as if to get her attention.

"I know Tank," she sighed. "I know that the celebration was today, and that Twilight had been preparing for it all year, and that she had been up all night working on her speech for the princess but come on..." She lifted herself into the air with one flap of her blue wings and pointed towards the swirling clouds. "This is necessary, and Twilight really needs to chill out sometimes." 

Tank just stared at the Pegasus questioningly, a small gust of wind blowing him next to her.

"And besides..." She continued, speaking more to herself then Tank now. "What can Twilight do? Use her magic to affect the laws of nature and clear up the storm?" She snorted at the idea.

A sudden blast of thunder drew Rainbow Dash's eyes back to the town where something seemed to be going on. The black clouds began to swirl around the center of Ponyville and the thunder and lightning increases. A purple beam of magical light shot up out of the clouds and into the sky. Dash watched all of this with mild surprise.

"To be honest, I knew this was going to happen."

The beam of light shot back down into the clouds and for a moment disappeared from Dash's eyes. Then, the clouds began to move on their own, spreading out from Ponyville. Rainbow Dash quickly noticed the magic walls, spreading out from Ponyvile and pushing the storm clouds away.

"Darn it, Twilight." She groaned. Her eyes quickly whipped back and forth, from the hastily moving storm to her cloud home. "Oh no..." She gasped in realization. "No, no, no, no, no..."

Rainbow Dash dived off her house and down under it, she had no time to lose. She quickly reached the bottom of her house and slammed herself into the soft exterior. She risked a quick glance at the rapidly moving wall of clouds, coming right at her.

"No you don't!" She shouted at the clouds as if that would deter them. "I just redecorated the living room!"

She strained against the ironically heavy clouds, her wings flapping erratically against the winds. It took a surprising amount of effort but the house began to move up through the air, pushed out of the way of the magic by Rainbow Dash. After pushing it far enough out of the way of the advancing wall, Dash floated back up to her cloud-lawn.

"Now we're safe." She panted, landing on the clouds without a sound. "No need to thank me, Tank. It's all in a day's work for Rainbow Dash!"

She looked around expectantly for her pet. He was gone.

"Tank?" She looked around slowly, not wanting to believe it. "Tank?" She called loudly. She ran to the edge of the clouds and looked down. Tank was still down there, left behind when the house was moved. He was kicking slowly through the air, trying to paddle towards her, the wall of clouds speeding up to him.

Dash instantly jumped off her house and soared towards her pet.  She was too late though, the wall of magic passed through the tortoise; the energy popping the balloons and causing him to drop out of the sky.

"Tank!" Dash went into a steep nosedive, speeding like a rocket towards the falling tortoise. As Tank fell, he began to glow, the magical energy coursing through his body, turning him into what looked like a very bright rock. Rainbow Dash didn't need another reason to go fast. The air seemed to rip apart as Dash soared through it, her mane whipped back in the wind and the G-forces tugged at her wings.

She speed downward and when he was within reach, Dash grabbed onto her glowing pet and held tight, spreading her wings wide to slow them down.

"Come on...!" She groaned, flapping her wings with great effort to fight the G-forces pulling them down, as well as the heaviness of her pet. Soon enough, the winds began to subside and Dash and Tank were able to drift through the air to the ground below. Dash let out a sigh of relief.

"Okay Tank, now I think we're gonna be alright."

The mini star that was her pet didn't reply. She thought that she saw a head move but she couldn't tell.

She suddenly realized that Tank was really quite heavy and gave a grunt of exertion.

"Tank, what have you been eating?" She said jokingly but nervously. They were nearing the ground and tank seemed to be getting heavier.

Dash looked down at her pet questioningly. "Tank is it just me, or are you getting...bigger?"

It was true, the glowing animal was not only getting bigger, but it was morphing as well, expanding out in all directions and causing the exhausted Rainbow Dash and Tank to fall faster. Dash could only hold on and be dragged to the ground by the now much bigger Tank; they landed in a clump on the dirt. When the dust finally cleared, Dash opened her eyes and looked around.

"Okay..." She coughed. "I've had worse landings. Tank?" She called out. "Are you okay? Sorry I landed on top of you and stuff."

She looked down and was relieved to see that Tank had stopped glowing and found two eyes looking up at her.

Two, big, pony eyes.

"What the..."

***

"Oh no...Oh no..."

Twilight Sparkle ran around the circular room in a frantic manner, Her face showing the textbook example of panic. Spike and Owlowiscious watched her with mild curiosity. Peewee the tiny Alicorn was nestled in Spike's arms.

"I know I haven't been here long but does she...always do this?" Owlowiscious asked confusedly, gesturing to his panicking owner.

Spike shook his head. "Only when she's really freaking out."

Twilight stopped at their words and turned towards them. "Do you know why I'm freaking out?!" She walked up to them and pointed an accusing hoof at Peewee. "This! This is why I'm freaking out!"

Peewee babbled happily at Twilight, not registering her anger, and tried to grab the unicorn's hoof with his own.

"Peewee wasn't anywhere near the spell and yet he was also affected." Twilight noted. "Do you know what that means?"

Spike's mind drew a blank but Owlowiscious nodded. "Yes, it means that others may be affected as well."

"Exactly! I mean if it was just you then it would be different!" Twilight shouted, she looked up at the ceiling in fear, as if it could crash down on her at any moment. "And if the Princess finds out..."

"...Then she'll understand and help us." Owlowiscious cut her off. He walked off to one of the windows and peered out, ponies were starting to emerge from their houses, surprised by the sudden disappearance of the storm but shrugging it off.

"Celestia is wise and caring, I'm fairly certain that she will not punish you for something that went out of your control." He turned from the window and put a comforting wing over Twilght's shoulder. "You really must give yourself more credit. Even the greatest of ponies must make mistakes sometimes."

Twilight silently considered her pets words with a sigh. "I guess."

He nodded. "Great, now, what do you think we should do?"

She thought about it for a moment. What should they do now? "We should probably go out and assess the damage."

"Excellent, let's be off then. I want to test out this now body anyways." Owlowiscious walked to the door and opened it. Twilight quickly stepped though and he followed.

"Wait!" Spike's voice made them stop. "I'm going with you right?"

They paused and looked to one another for an answer. "Um, actually Spike, you should probably stay here and work on this mess." Twilight stated.

"What!?" Spike shouted.

She shrugged. "Sorry but it's probably for the best."

"Look on the bright side Spike."  Owlowiscious noted cheerfully with a wink. "At least you have company."

With that, the two took off out the door and away from the library. Spike looked down at the Alicorn in his arms who was looking up at him with large eyes.

Spike felt himself melting. "Do you know that you're adorable?"

Peewee giggled and to Spike's surprise, his horn began to glow a soft orange. All of a sudden an old library book on the floor near them burst into flames, it was reduced to cinders in a few seconds.

Spike's eyes widened in shock. "Oh dear..."

Peewee giggled at the smouldering ashes and waved his hooves in the air. "Marshmallows!"

***

Twilight and Owlowiscious walked through the slightly damp streets of Ponyville, eyes searching for anything that might be out of place. Other than a few ponies that they had walked past and had been given weird looks, they had found nothing yet.

"Found anything?" Twilight Asked her companion.

"Apart from a few perfectly perplexed ponies?" Owlowiscious eyed one such pony who quickly scampered off.

"I just don't get why everypony has been looking at us like this."

"Well, it could be that they rightly think that you're responsible for the magic wave earlier or..." He smiled wryly. "It could be the fact that you're walking through Ponyville, talking with an unknown colt."

"W-w-what?!" She stammered.

He couldn't hide the humor in his voice. "Someponies might start talking."

Twilight blushed profusely and looked away. "Really?" She whispered to herself. "Now my pets doing it to me?"

"Oh come on Twilight." He continued, on a roll. "I bet everypony thinks that we're a couple of lovebirds."

If it was even possible, she blushed harder. "I'd rather had Rarity doing this to me!"

"AAAAAHHH!!"

A shrill scream of fear echoed in the streets, quickly reaching the two's ears. Twilight's ears instantly perked up.

"Speak of the Draconequus." She said quietly.

Owlowiscious groaned in pain and rubbed his ear. "Huh, that was so much louder when I was a bird. Still hurt though."

"That came from Carousel boutique!" Twilight estimated. "Rarity must be in trouble!" She ran down the street and motioned for him to follow. "Come on!"

For once, Owlowiscious looked uncomfortable. Very different from his usual gentlecoltly and stoic manner.

"Yeah, uh, I think I should, uh..." He stumbled uncharacteristically over his words.

Twilight gasped silently at the owl-turned-Pegasus and put on her own wry smile. "Owl-y?" She asked playfully, jokingly. "You know what's at Rarity's house right?"

"Um..." He stammered again. "Gems, fabrics of all kinds, feathers probably from one of my family members?"

"Her cat."

He shuddered at the word. "That feline has harassed me to no end."

"And that's why you're coming with me to investigate!" She happily stated. "You're a Pegasus now, Opal can't hurt you now."

Owlowiscious could only stare at his owner. He grinned weakly. "This is for the lovebirds crack, isn't it?"

She nodded cheerfully.

He gave a defeated sigh and spread his brown wings. "You ponies, so unpredictable."

With that moment passed, Owlowiscious took off in the direction of the boutique, Twilight Sparkle quickly chasing through the streets after him.