//------------------------------// // A Not-So-Successful Help // Story: Cutie and the Beasts // by AleximusPrime //------------------------------// CHAPTER 2 - A Not-So-Successful Help Rarity was rummaging through her basket looking for some plates for the picnic that was set up before everyone. “I cannot believe I forgot the plates again!!” she cried, “How could I forget such a simple task?!?! Of all the worst things that could happen, this is THE. WORST. POSSIBLE. THING!!!” She was about to bring in her chaise lounge to faint on when Rainbow Dash spoke up. “Rarity, chill out, I brought some extra plates!!” “Oh……… I see…” Rarity started to blush. Twilight sat down on the spread she just used her magic to set on the ground as everyone else gathered around to start eating. “So, where do ya reckon Fluttershy is?” Applejack asked before taking a bite out of an apple. “I’m not sure, but I’m sure she’ll be here soon.” said Twilight doing her best to hold in the secret but Spike all of a sudden started to run his mouth as always. “Eh, I’ll bet she’s busy with all those anima-“ Twilight quickly used her magic to zip his lips and keep him from giving it away. “SPIKE! Er…I mean…well Fluttershy does have a lot of animals to take care of you know. All those birds, and those squirrels and stuff…” “Yeah, and Philomena.” Rainbow Dash said. “Philomena?” said Applejack with her ears perking up. “Wait, she’s takin care of the Princess’s pet bird AND mah dog, Winona?!” Rarity’s eyes widened and she spat her tea out of her mouth before speaking. “WHAT?!? You mean to tell me she’s taking care of those animals also?! I brought her Opal the day before yesterday!” “Oh wow, she’s also got Gummy!” Pinkie said happily while the others looked worried. “Cool, it’s like a huge pet parade in her house!” “No Pinkie, that ain’t cool at all, that’s too much!” Applejack stated. “She’s got an alligator, a dog, a cat, and a phoenix to take care of all at the same stinkin’ time! Add that to all those other little critters and that’s a mother-load of labor!” “She’s also got Owloysius!” Rainbow Dash said. Everyone looked over at Twilight who started to blush and smile bashfully. “Oh……um…yeah, that’s right…” Twilight said. “Darling, you knew about this, didn’t you!?” Rarity asked Twilight. “Alright alright fine, the secret’s out!!” Twilight put her hooves on her head and unzipped Spike’s lips. “Well this isn’t good at all, we need to march straight over to Fluttershy’s house and take back some of those animals! Oh but which ones should it be? I still can’t have Opal in my house with all those fleas!” “Well we’re just gonna have to take them to the vet or something. And I’ll take Philomena back to Canterlot for the Princess cuz she didn’t know everyone else’s pets were sick at the same time.” “What was wrong with Philomena?” Applejack asked. “That’s the thing, she was only entering her molting cycle. The Princess could probably have had some of her servants take care of her, but she let Fluttershy do it cuz she knows how much Fluttershy likes Philomena but the Princess had no idea the rest of you would have sick pets! What happened to Winona?” “She broke her leg. And Opal’s got fleas ya say Rarity?” “Yes, the poor darling is infested with those awful parasites!” “And Gummy’s got Fline Swu!” Pinkie told everyone. “It’s called Swine Flu, Pinkie.” Twilight corrected. “Yeah, what she said.” “And Owloysius hurt his neck. No sense keeping it a secret anymore…” Fluttershy’s voice could then be heard over the hill calling them. “Everypony, I’m so sorry I’m late! I wasn’t too busy or anything though……and I brought my own food for you all to enjoy…” When she came up over the hill, her face could be seen and it definitely didn’t look like the face of a pony in the mood for a picnic. Her eyes were a bit red and had wrinkles under them and her mane was a bit uncombed. She was walking a bit slow and had trouble doing it in a straight line. “I’m here…I’m here. Hope you are all doing okay…” she said sitting down and taking off her bags that had some snacks in them. “Got my own daisy sandwiches………oh……and a couple pairs…………and……and…” her eyes suddenly started to close and she started nodding off as everyone watched. She then sat upright quickly surprised at what just happened. “OH! I’m sorry, I guess I’m still a little tired. I didn’t sleep too well last night for some reason.” “Yeah, more like you didn’t sleep well because of all the hard work of taking care of our animals at once!” Rainbow Dash exclaimed. “OH, WHAT?!?” Fluttershy’s red eyes widened from the fear of everyone finding out. “You know about that?!” “I’m sorry Fluttershy, they all started telling each other that you were taking care of their animals before they got the answer out of me!” Twilight said nervously. “Oh dear……well, I guess the secret is out then…” “Darling, you can’t simply be taking care of all those animals at the same exact time can you?!” “Well, I am. It’s hard but I am…” “Well we ain’t gonna give you all that hard work t’ do. You should just give back some of the animals. After this here picnic, I’ll head on over to yer cottage and I’ll take Winona over to the vet or somethin.” “Oh no Applejack, please, it’s quite alright, I can handle it.” “Fluttershy, I really don’t think you can.” Twilight told her sternly. “I know I may look like I can’t but it was just one night of not enough sleep, I’ll get some sleep later this afternoon, I promise. Now if you’ll all excuse me, I’m going to be a little busy here so I’d better go. It was fun spending time with you at this picnic. Bye…” Fluttershy then got up and picked up her bag and put it on her back without noticing she left her untouched sandwich on the ground. “Darling, you forgot your sandwhich.” Rarity said using her magic to lift the sandwich towards her. “Oh, thank you Rarity.” Fluttershy took the sandwich in her mouth and walked on back to her cottage with poor balance. “Wow…she didn’t even realize she’d been here for practically less than a minute! And she didn’t even eat her own food!!!” “I dunno if there’s any convincing her girls. I tried to yesterday when I found out and she seems quite confident she can do it.” Twilight said. “Well ya know she most certainly cannot!” Applejack said. “That girl’s got too much on her plate and she’s gonna break down if she ain’t careful!” “How I wish there was something we could do to help.” Rarity said thinking out loud. “Perhaps we could offer to take care of them for her for an hour or two while she gets some rest? I mean she’s got that cottage to clean as well you know. All the food and the medicine that must be lying around…” “OOOH OOH! I have an idea!” Pinkie said waving her hoof in the air. Twilight sighed. “Alright Pinkie, let’s hear it…” They all gathered around Pinkie as she whispered her plan to them. Back at the cottage, Fluttershy was out at the market to get some food for the animals and had them all in a special room closed off so they wouldn’t make a mess in the main living room which was already a mess. Although she was gone, somepony was in the cottage though. Five ponies to be exact. “Pinkie, are you sure this is a good idea?” Twilight asked while levitating a bottle of clean spray. “Of course it is Twilight! If we clean her cottage, when she comes back, she’ll have plenty of time left to take care of the animals and then get her rest!” Pinkie said while using a rolling vacuum cleaner with a hose on the rug. “Yeah Twi, it’ll be fine. This will help her out a ton.” said Rainbow Dash wiping the windows with a rag. Meanwhile, Rarity was dusting off some mantles with a little dusting mop and Applejack was mopping the wooden floor. “We gotta be quick though, she might be a bit angry if she arrives ta see us doing this if we don’t finish before she gets here.” Applejack said. “Oh pish-posh, darling! A lady never rushes through anything!” Rarity said while gracefully using her dusting mop. “Pace yourself, we have plenty of time.” “Well it would be better if she walked in on a nice clean cottage guys. And we shouldn’t be here too long, we were lucky enough to all have a gap in our schedules on the same day to do this.” Twilight said while she was spraying and wiping a coffee table that was in midair with her magic while Pinkie cleaned underneath. Everyone stopped talking and went back to their chores taking their time. Twilight seemed a bit worried and kept looking out the window to check if Fluttershy was there. If Fluttershy came before they were done, Twilight would have to just try to get Fluttershy to let them finish up. Perhaps it would make Fluttershy happy that they were doing this. She really did need some help anyway. “Don’t worry about it Twi!” she said to herself. “It’ll all be fine, what’s the worst that could happen?” But just as she began thinking positively, Twilight started to slide over the floor a bit. She had accidentally walked on the part of the floor that Applejack had mopped and was starting to go out of control. She knew that she couldn’t struggle too much or she’d really lose herself and probably crash into something. But the momentum she had earlier from walking wasn’t stopping and it actually seemed to be getting worse. “Applejack, Rarity, somebody, I’m kinda in trouble here! Help!!” she said getting rather worried. “Don’t worry Twilight, I gotcha.” Rainbow Dash then flew overhead and grabbed Twilight’s hoof she was holding up and pulled her up, but Twilight lost her balance as soon as Rainbow started to pull her and slipped and fell down which caused Rainbow to fall down with her. They both landed with a thud and slid forward toward the bucket of water that Applejack was using and knocked it over which made the floor even more slippery. “LAMB SAKES!!” Applejack hollered at the sight of this. “APPLEJACK, HELP US!!!” Applejack then took a rope she brought just in case and used it to lasso Twilight to safety, but she meant to lasso Rainbow Dash also who ended up slamming into a nearby bookshelf knocking over some books. Rarity noticed the books falling and quickly used her magic to lift them all back up. She walked towards the shelf to put them back in but didn’t realize the slippery floor in front of her and started to slide around and couldn’t hold the books any longer so Rainbow got buried in them. “SOMEPONY HELP ME!!!” Rarity screamed while sliding along the ground with her legs wobbling to and fro. Applejack tried to lasso her but missed and ended up hitting a little framed picture of Fluttershy and Angel which fell to the ground. Twilight quickly used her magic to keep it from falling and luckily was able to put it back up on the shelf before it crashed. Suddenly, Rarity sped by sliding again and bumped right into Pinkie’s vacuum and accidentally turned the power switch to the highest level causing the hose to suck very hard. Pinkie who didn’t hear any of the commotion due to the sound of the vacuum suddenly noticed it was getting louder and out of curiosity pointed the tip of the hose to her face. “What the hay is-AAAGGGHHH!!!” Pinkie screamed as her bangs flew into the hose followed by her head and then her body and legs and tail. In an instant she was completely inside the hose and moving like a big circular blob through it towards the vacuum until she went in. The vacuum motor made odd sounds and then started to expand and finally exploded inside causing tons of dust to come out of the vents creating a blinding fog in the room and covering everyone with it. Everyone else started coughing and wiping away their eyes until Twilight used a spell to gather up all the dust in an envelope of magic energy and then throw it out the window. “OH MY HAIR, MY BEAUTIFUL HAIR!!” Rarity cried looking at her mane that was tainted with dust. “Least the dust made the floor less dusty now.” Applejack said looking down. “Yeah, but now it’s dirtier!” Twilight said. Rainbow Dash then walked in with a book on her head and spoke. “Um, guys? Where did Pinkie go?” The vacuum then started making coughing noises and the hose detached and Pinkie’s dust-covered head popped out with the hose stuck on her snout. She kept coughing and sputtering until she finally opened her eyes that were spinning around from dizziness. “Wow……hehe……that was fun, let’s do it again…” she said with a nasally voice. “Pinkie, you ruined our vacuum cleaner!!” Twilight said walking over to her angrily. “Vacuum cleaner? Oooooooooh, that’s what I was inside!” Pinkie looked back realizing the rest of her body was inside a machine. “Well isn’t that funny! I’m inside the vacuum but I should be out here, and the dust is……out here……but it should be in the vacuum. Hehe…sorry.” Twilight leaned back sitting on the ground with both hooves on her face making very stressed groans. “WELL GREAT, JUST GREAT! THIS IS PERFECT, NOW THE ENTIRE ROOM IS EVEN MORE OF A WRECK THAN WHEN WE STARTED!!!” Suddenly the door knob started to turn and make creaking sounds and everyone froze in the room with hearts beating fast. Fluttershy walked in. “Alright Angel, now that we have the food we can…” her eyes widened as she noticed the entire room covered in dust and her friends standing in the middle around Pinkie who was stuck in the vacuum. Angel stared and then slapped his face and fell over all stressed out over the wreck. Fluttershy herself wasn’t too amused either. “OOOH!! GIRLS?!?! What in Equestria happened in here?!? Did somepony do this while I was gone and you tried to stop them?!” “Um, no Fluttershy, we did this…” Twilight said apologetically. “You did?” “Well yeah, but it was just an accident.” Applejack added. “But…why? What were you trying to do?” “Understand us darling, we only wanted to help clean the cottage while you were gone.” Rarity said while trying to brush some dust off of her mane. “Yeah, it would have been too much for you to do with all the animals you had to take care of so we thought we’d do you a favor.” Rainbow Dash said. “It’s not going too well so far…” said Pinkie right after sneezing the hose off her snout. “Oh, I see.” Fluttershy got a bit calm but still somewhat disappointed. “Well I’m very glad you all wanted to help, but I didn’t need help, I can do it on my own. “Well not anymore!” Twilight told her. “We just made it worse for you now, how are you going to clean this up?!” “Well, I don’t know, but I’ll find a way. You can all leave now; I wouldn’t want you to get any dirtier.” “But Fluttershy, are you sure? We can help clean this up, I promise.” Twilight begged her once again. “It’s alright Twilight, I’ll just clean it up myself.” She said somewhat depressingly as if she was sad over how busier her day had just gotten. Twilight would have kept asking but she figured that would only stress Fluttershy out even more. Now was not the time to get her to give in. She sighed and continued out the door with the others. “Alright, fine. Let’s go everypony…” “Can somepony roll me out please?” Pinkie asked as she was still stuck in the vacuum. “I gotcha Pinkie.” Rainbow Dash came and pushed her along while everyone else walked miserably out the door and Fluttershy closed it after saying bye. “Well aren’t we a lot of help.” said Rainbow Dash sarcastically. “We tried giving her less work and we only gave her more!” “I’m sorry ladies, Ah shoulda been more careful with the mop.” Applejack apologized to the others taking her hat off and blowing some dust off of it. “Ah might have overdone it a bit with the water.” “It’s not your fault darling, things just didn’t go as planned.” said Rarity brushing off the last bit of dust from her mane and then moving to her tail. “It was my idea girls, I guess I’m responsible.” said Pinkie sadly still sitting inside the vacuum only able to move her head down in regret. “I only wanted to help her. Guess we shoulda asked her first…” Twilight then spoke up. “Well girls, we haven’t been able to get her to not take care of the animals, but I’m still worried about her. We know she can’t just tag-team them all at once, it’s asking for too much from her. Think maybe we might be able to do something that can help her out that doesn’t include trashing the whole place?” They all stood and thought for a moment until Pinkie’s eyes widened. “OOOH! I have an idea!” “Pinkie, last time you said you had an idea, it didn’t end too well. Are you sure about this one?” “Course I am Twilight, just hold on. Let me get out of this vacuum for a second…” Pinkie inched her left arm out as far as she could get it until her hoof was visible and put it in her mouth and blew hard until her cheeks puffed up and then the vacuum started to get round and fat. She was expanding her body with air and finally the machine exploded and parts flew everywhere with dust covering everyone once again. Pinkie was puffed up and then finally opened her mouth and flew around in the air like a balloon that had been let go. She finally fell to the ground flat like paper and bounced back up to speak. “Okay, I got a plan, but only I can do this!” Everypony stood around her covered in parts of the vacuum and dust. They were sneezing and coughing. “That’s wonderful darling, but I think the first thing we all need to do is CLEAN OFF!!” Rarity then ran off towards her boutique leaving dust in the air behind her. Applejack spat a wheel from the vacuum out of her mouth. “What do ya have in mind now Pinkie?” “Oh you’ll see! Fluttershy doesn’t have the energy to do it, right? Well I know how we can give her that energy!” Pinkie then skipped off happily covered in dust. “Oh great, I think I know what she has in mind…” Twilight said worried. “What do you think she’s gonna do Twi?” asked Rainbow Dash. “Something kinda risky…” TO BE CONTINUED...