Somewhere in Equestria, a place surrounded by lush green trees, a wealthy four-story manor stood beside a crystalline lake. Ponies in shorts and polo shirts trimmed the lawn and hedges. A maid or two trotted to and from a nearby storehouse with trays full of refreshments.
In the front driveway, a stallion wearing a finely-pressed tuxedo finished directing orders to a pair of landscape workers. As he turned to trot towards the property's storehouse, a thin shadow streaked across the bricklaid path.
"Huh?" He looked up, then jumped, startled. "Bloody hell!"
With a yellow blur, a pegasus landed, planting a pale cinderblock-shaped item in front of the storehouse.
"Young lady, what is the meaning of this?!" The butler galloped up, then did a double-take at the deposited item. "A... salt lick?" Jaw dropped, he gazed up and spoke in a thick but eloquent accent. "Could you actually be a representative of Banner Company?"
"Yup!" Rainbow Dash sweatily smiled, pulling and snapping back the yellow apron across her fuzzy chest. "I don't just wear this thing because I like directing traffic!"
"But... but..." The butler trotted in an anxious circles while blinking maidservants looked on. "Pray tell, where is your chariot?!"
"We've got something better than a chariot!" Rainbow's voice cracked.
"And that is...?"
"Me!" Rainbow winked and flapped her wings.
"But... but..." The butler was red in the face by this time. "This will not do! There're supposed to be twenty-nine more salt licks!"
"Count to sixty!" Rainbow hollered before rocketing towards the sky with enough force to knock the nearby landscapes onto their flanks. "I dare ya!"
"Now see here! Oomf!" The butler struggled back onto his hooves with assistance of the maids. He snarled at the yellow streak burning its way southwest. "My master's a paying customer and he deserves an explanation for this!"
"It's simple, really!" Rainbow Dash leaned back in the cottage's front room couch, dangling the loose yellow apron from her bouncing lower leg. "I need bits, and Banner Company can provide them! I used to work for them all the time—you remember that."
"Well, yes, I do," Fluttershy said with a nod from where she poured feed for a family of happy, hungry, hopping hares. "But... I thought the job was always... uhm..."
"What, simple?" Rainbow rested her head back on a pair of criss-crossing forelimbs. "Boring? Stiff? Dull?"
Fluttershy blushed slightly. "Well, all of the above, actually. If I remember correctly, you'd come home everyday complaining about how Banner Company was 'holding you back,' and that eventually you would break free and join the Wonderbolts."
"Hey! A mare dreams, Fluttershy! But a mare also needs bits!"
"What for? Aren't you doing well for yourself?"
"Pffft. Yeah, well, I could do better, y'know?"
"That can be said of anypony."
"True, but I gotta do better-better." Rainbow sat up. "And don't worry about the 'Simple, Boring, Stiff, and Dull stuff." She winked. "I got that covered."
Swooosh!
Rainbow darted back down onto the front lawn of the Trottingham manor, depositing another salt-lick onto a little pyramid that had formed in front of the storehouse. Several landscapers stopped what they were doing to gawk at the scene.
"Aaaaaaaand there ya go!" Rainbow Dash brushed the sweat from her brow. "That's eight so far! Thought I had given up on ya guys, huh?"
"That's all well and good," the butler muttered, his brow furrowed. "But you still have twenty-two more to deliver by—"
"Sorry! Can't hear you at the speed of awesome!" Rainbow shouted as she was already rocketing her way back south.
"Didn't even need a chariot on my first day back!" Rainbow Dash said with a smirk. She glanced out Fluttershy's front window. "Yup. Stamps should be thanking his lucky stars. I frankly don't know how he's been holding the warehouse up all these months without me around to lend him a hoof."
"I thought you two didn't get along that much," Fluttershy remarked.
"Eh, he's an okay stallion, but a little too by-the-books if you ask me."
"Sound like anypony we know?" Fluttershy said with a sly grin.
"Heh. Good point. If he put a violet streak in his mane and cut his bangs straight, then maybe we'd get along better."
"Maybe he was never a fan of your wreckless attitude."
"Huh?!" Rainbow Dash sat up straight, blinking. "Heeheehee!" she wiped her eyes dry as she giggled. "Fluttershy, I can appreciate you being frank with me!"
"Uhm... s-sorry?"
"But come onnnn!" Rainbow rolled her eyes and giggled some more. "Me? Wreckless?"
"Aaaaaaaand..." Rainbow hovered down to the lawn, balancing a salt lick on her nose while grasping another in two hooves. "Two more, fillies and gentlecolts!" She tossed the brick off her nose, flipped it, and landed it atop the second as she stacked both neatly across the growing pyramid. "Ha! I bet Clotopatra couldn't have done it better!"
Several landscapers and maidservants who had gathered by the scene clapped and cheered.
"Enough!" the butler growled, scribbling off his clipboard. "You've done well so far, but you're running out of time!"
"And you're running out of mane!" Rainbow stuck her tongue out and ascended on flapping wings. "Chillax, Jeeves, I've got this!" She turned and leaned down to wink in one maid's face. "Celestia alive, girl, could your skirt be any shorter?"
The maid blushed while the mare beside her giggled.
The butler cleared his throat.
"Zoop!" In a thunderous burst of air, Rainbow throttled herself south.
"I swear!" Rainbow Dash stifled a yawn and leaned back in Fluttershy's couch. "This first day was an absolute breeze! I must have knocked out those twenty-seven salt licks in less than two hours!"
"Huh?" Fluttershy suddenly perked up, her ears twitching nervously.
"Yup! I've got this deal in the bag! If Stamps doesn't take my offer, he's a total featherbrain! I don't care if he doesn't have any wings!"
"Uhm... Rainbow Dash?"
"Maybe I can even talk him out of enforcing the stupid, fru-fru apron—"
"I thought you said there were thirty salt-licks in today's delivery."
Rainbow Dash's eyes crossed. Shaking her muzzle, she stood straight up, gazing at the clock on the wall. "Snap crackle poop." With one hoof, she tossed the apron up, then forward-flipped through it. She landed on the floor with the apron on, tied it tight, and burst out the front door of the cottage. "ThanksforthetalkFlutters! Gottagobyebyeeee!"
Rainbow Dash roared over the neatly trimmed hedges of the manor's front lawn. Landscapers had to grab onto their hats to prevent them from being blown off.
Panting, sweating, Rainbow Dash nevertheless afforded a grin as she levitated down and hoisted three heavy salt licks onto the very top of the pyramid.
"Here... you... g-go..." She touched down and wiped her brow. "Nothing like delivering half the salt of Equestria in the noonday sun with an entire continent melting beneath me." She gulped and flashed a damp look at the butler. "How am I doing? Did I melt the records or what?"
"You finished with..." The stallion's eyes narrowed on his pocket-watch. "Hmmm..." His muzzle tightened and untightened. "Forty minutes to spare."
Several servants cheered and whistled all around the front lawn.
The butler rolled his eyes. "Yes yes, quite the accomplishment for one mare without a chariot, I agree. But let us not be uncouth." He turned to face her. "A good delivery is simply that, a good delivery. No need for showing off—" His eyes bulged.
Rainbow Dash was juggling three weed whackers in the air using only her wings. "Come on! Come on! I'm begging for it!"
Grinning, a landscaper tossed another lawn tool.
"Aaaaaaaaaand four, ladies and gentlecolts!" Rainbow Dash shouted to resounding applause. All four weed whackers blurred through the air. "Hah! Somepony! Quick! Toss bushes over my head and I'll trim your garden for you while I'm at it!"
The butler whistled shrilly, summoning silence from the group. "Can you please cease this riotous display of jocularity?"
"S-sorry!" Rainbow Dash held her breath, squatted low, and caught all four instruments neatly in outstreched limbs. The landscapers picked it up as she stood tall with a guilty smile. "I got straight-A's in Jocularity 101." She gulped. "Before I dropped out of flight school, that is..."
"Why am I not surprised?" The butler shuffled over. "Right. Let us sign your order, and I'll be swift about delivering your proprietor's check through the mail."
"Awesome sauce!" Rainbow reached into her apron and grabbed a clipboard. "Let's just scribble right on the dotted line! Uhm..." She fiddled around, hooves running all over her yellow pockets. "I know I put a pen here somewhere..."
The butler stared with lethargic eyes.
With a sigh, Rainbow Dash slumped, then turned aside with a wing outstretched. "Okay. Make it quick."
"Hrmmm..." The stallion smiled. "I see you're as generous as you are swift." He reached forward and clasped his teeth over a feather.
"Yeah, well, don't spread it around. Totally the wrong element—" Plink! Her face grimaced as her eyes watered. "Augh! Dammit, Jeeves!"
The air filled with the maids' giggles yet again.