You finish turning the knob for the hot water counter-clockwise, content that the bath is now ready. You have made the bath slightly hotter than normal, worried that it will be the right temperature by the time that you get the foal that you are looking out for today. After all, Soarin is a pegasus and future Wonderbolt and experience has taught you that not only do most pegasi foals hate bathing, but that it’s much easier to force somepony into the bath if they can’t fly. You hope that your pursuit of the young flying ace doesn’t leave the ground like it did with Rainbow Dash.
The last time you saw Soarin he was playing outside, getting some flying practice, so that’s where you begin your search. Once outside here in Cloudsdale, you get some polite waves and unintentional stares from some of the local Pegasus here in Cloudsdale. They have seen you before after all, but you’re still a bit strange to most of them.
Finally you find the colt of the hour, or rather, the sheer air current produced by him racing past lets you know you’ve found him. The force of the air current knocks you over, but thankfully the ‘ground’ here is made of clouds, so it doesn’t hurt. Once you stop seeing stars, a tiny white pegasus stands over you with a genuinely sorry look, “Don’t worry Soarin, I’m alright, but it’s time for your bath now.” Soarin smiles, glad that you’re okay. You can’t help but wonder if that’s really all. It’s never this easy to coax pegasus into the bath.
Once you are both back upstairs and the bathroom door is closed behind you, Soarin flies up and sits on the rim of the tub, waiting for you to be ready. “Well this is a first,” you can’t help but say. Soarin isn’t exactly eager, but doesn’t show any signs of dreading the event either.
You make your way over, ready to begin, and sit down next to the tub. Soarin slides into the tub gently and you worry that it will be too hot still since you didn’t expect to get him here so fast. He doesn’t seem to mind the temperature though, so you decide to begin.
You start by squirting some shampoo into your palm; apple-cinnamon flavored this time, and begin lathering it into Soarin’s hair. Soarin’s hair is relatively short but is very thick, so it takes about a minute to lather it completely. Once it is fully lathered you cup your hands and scoop up some of the warm bath water, embarrassed that it’s still this hot, but you brush it off since Soarin doesn’t seem to mind. Since his hair is so thick it takes over a dozen rinses and you have to scrub a little, but you manage to get all the suds out.
Soarin meanwhile hadn’t demonstrated any emotions at all. Even now he was just sitting there, totally passive, neither enjoying nor resenting the procedure. You then ask him to turn around so that you can wash his wings. Immediately Soarin lets out a happy little sound like any filly or colt opening their Hearth’s Warming presents to see that they got exactly what they always wanted. Soarin quickly turns his back to you and spreads his little wings. You get the feather shampoo and begin massaging it into the wings, careful to preen then properly.
Soarin lets out a contented sigh and you realize that this is what he had been waiting for the whole time. The poor little colt had been practicing so much and his little wings must have been completely exhausted. The cool massage caressing his wings must have been wonderful. You mentally facepalm for not realizing why he was being so agreeable earlier and decide that you will preen his wings perfectly. There’s really no need for such precision and you could have settled for cleaning them in less than a third the time, but it felt wrong to deny him this one simple relaxation. He had been so good after all.
Finally you have to move on to the tail. You tell Soarin to stand, and as if in thanks for earlier, he complies, again feeling neither excited nor depressed. Like his mane, Soarin’s tail is also thick, so it takes a while to lather it properly. After about a half minute of scrubbing, the tail is finally sudsy and merely needs to be rinsed. You start to cup your hands, but Soarin sits down, and wiggles about, effectively rinsing his own tail.
Satisfied, you reach over and get out some bath toys and hand them to Soarin to play with. He again gasps happily at the prospect and takes the toys to play with.
Unlike many of the ponies you’ve bathed, Soarin has no trouble just being himself and having fun. After a while of letting the toy boat and rubber ducky become friends, he decides that they should race. He places them side by side as fairly as he can, and begins making them race all around the tub.
And the race is underway! The boat is off to a good head start, but the ducky is making sure not to fall behind! They’re coming up on the first turn, the ducky cuts the corner and is in the lead! The boat’s not letting him get ahead that easy. The other corner of the bathtub is just ahead. The boat tries to cut the corner, but ducky won’t let him. Ducky is still in the lead, but what's this? The boat goes into turbo drive! (which sounds like Soarin’s best “zoom” sound by the way. DAWW!). They’re coming up on the finish line! Boat’s in the lead! Come on Ducky you can do it! It’s neck and neck! And the winner is…
Ducky!
“Ab, haha, ah-haba!”
KABOOM!
Soarin was so happy to see the way the race ended that he unintentionally flapped his wings as hard as he could, which it turns out, even at that age was a small shock wave. The water from the tub had been jettisoned into the bathroom floor, and more importantly, all the suds were now on your face. It made you look like you had a Santa Claus beard and unibrow, all white and sudsy.
Soarin was so sorry for what he’d done. He put both his little hooves to his mouth in shock and stared at you wide-eyed, wondering what you were going to do. You laughed as sincerely as possible, you didn’t care. Even if it was at your expense, that was the funniest, cutest, most awesome moment of your career.
Your laughing made Soarin start laughing, which was honestly more of a coo at this point. You helped the young colt out of the bath, and after finding a towel that was still dry, dried him off. Soarin nodded, silently thanking you and made his way to the door. He then turned and waved at you with his wings, which now that they were dried, looked like a duckling’s down feathers. It was all just too cute. After waving goodbye to him and having one more laugh to yourself, you turn back to the room.
“I’m going to need a lot of towels.”