//------------------------------// // Chapter Two: The Idea // Story: Cars in Equestria // by Dudofall //------------------------------// Twilight groaned and tried once more to keep the image of the flaming cart out of her head. It was distracting her from what was supposed to be the fun task of sorting the books she had received from Princess Celestia. The cart had moved so quickly, almost as fast as a train! But it had been so much smaller. She focused on the stack of books she was supposed to be sorting, which was twice as tall her. Levitating the top book, "Theory of Automatic Movement", she was reminded once again of the cart. "This is hopeless," Twilight sighed. She trotted to her desk and picked up a quill. After sketching a rough image of the cart, she set about improving its design. The whole structure would need to be reinforced, the explosions that propelled it would require refinement, and a set of straps to keep a pony on would be necessary. "Spike!" she yelled. The dragon appeared from behind a bookshelf. "Yeah?" "Can you please bring me a stick of dynamite, some rope, and a cart?" "We don't just have dynamite lying around, Twilight." "Fine, just get the rope and the cart for now." There was a thought, where would she get the explosives for her experiments? They were pretty rare, at least in Ponyville. Maybe Rainbow Dash would know. And logically, the best way to find Rainbow would be to fly around looking for her. Twilight grinned and made her way to the castle's golden balcony. Although she was no master flier, her skills had improved; she had come to like the wind in her mane and the ability to look at everything from above. Twilight flapped her wings experimentally, then took off slowly. It was mid-morning in Ponyville. A few ponies were walking around, looking like dolls from up in the sky. In the distance the weather team was preparing a microburst with some heavy rain clouds. Twilight flew closer to the team and the menacing gray clouds. She spotted Rainbow Dash talking to some weather ponies Twilight didn't recognize. "We got this," she was saying as Twilight flew within earshot. The weather ponies nodded. While they both wore hard hats and white lab coats, the stallion hovering to Dash's left was a dark shade of green with a maroon mane and the mare on her right had a purple mane and was yellow. Rainbow greeted her friend, "Hey Twilight, what's up?" Twilight gave Pinkie a questioning look. Twilight excitedly asked her question, "Do you know where I can get a ton of dynamite?" Dash looked nervously to the weather ponies next to her. "No! I hate explosions and would never blow anything up!" she anxiously replied. Well, if Rainbow Dash didn't know about explosions, who would? Twilight sighed. "Thanks anyway." She sank towards the ground and tried to come up with other ideas. Pinkie Pie! Yes that was it! "Tail twitch, eye flutter, ear flap, shaky legs. Someone's thinking about me!" Pinkie said exuberantly. Twilight gave a small yelp of surprise. "Hiya Twilight! Whatcha doin'?" Twilight answered her, "I'm just looking for somepony who has a large stock of dynamite." "I have some fireworks!" Pinkie chirped. Fireworks were pretty close to TNT. They were more controlled, which was necessary. Twilight wouldn't have to devise any sort of system to reinforce the cart if all the force was directed away from it. She smiled, "Could I please have a few?" Pinkie grinned wider than should have been physically possible, "Sure. That's what friends are for!" Then she bounced away. Twilight walked back towards her home, relieved that the most volatile part of the prototype was taken care of. The rest of the materials would be easy!