“You know what I love most about the spa?”
“Hm?” Aloe couldn’t really speak with the brush in her mouth, but she did her part to appear interested.
“I love the silence. The peaceful serenity. It’s so quiet you could hear a pin drop. As if nothing in this world could interrupt-”
CRASH!
“OH YEAH!” The west wall had been completely annihilated, bits of rubble strewn about the new hole in the building. In the swirling cloud of dust stood a mound of muscles and sinew in the vague shape of a white pegasus with a closely cropped yellow mane.
“My wall!” cried Aloe.
“What is the meaning of this?!” demanded her customer.
“Snowflake don’t got no time for jawin’!” The burly pegasus yelled as he charged straight through the wall next to the spa door. “She’s right behind me!”
“Mrow!” agreed the tiny white kitten nestled between Snowflake’s ‘compact’ wings.
“OUTTA MY WAY! OUTTA MY WAY!” Ponies ducked left and leapt right as Snowflake barreled through the marketplace like a four legged bulldozer. He glanced the edge of somepony’s apple stall and ran straight at the stall of some yellow cherry seller.
“When somepony tries to block...” Snowflake rammed through the stand, sending cherries spilling in every direction as he tried to remember the last part of his phrase. “Uh... YEAH!”
Frightened faces and occasional detritus flew past him in a blur. All the while, the tiny white kitten with a blue bow purred happily on his back. Snowflake ran through ponies, park benches, the occasional building, and more than a few terrified shouts.
“Watch where you’re going!”
“Slow down, you lunatic!”
“Watch out for that building!”
With a hearty, “OH YEAH!” Snowflake rammed through the wall of a building that seemed to be made of gingerbread. Inside was a blur of blue, yellow and pink followed by a snowy haze of white frosting as Snowflake rammed through a display of tasty baked goods. Blindly slamming through the other side of the shop, he slurped the goop from his face with one long lash of his tongue.
“SWEET, FLAKY GOODNESS! YEAH! You like it, Buttons? ...Buttons?” Snowflake looked over his shoulder at his empty back. “BUTTONS!”
His economical wings flapped desperately, tugging the rest of Snowflake along like a burlap sack as he rose into the sky. Scanning the ground like a hawk, he was so intent on his search that he flew right into a skywagon. Finally looking up, he saw a pair of pegasi hauling a heavy piano.
“Now be careful!” said the brown one with what looked like a rough beard on his chin. “I didn’t give you a second chance so you could mess it up like-”
“Buttons!” yelled Snowflake, hovering in the brown moving-buck’s personal space. “Little white cat! Heart of a lion!”
“...What?”
“You’re looking for your kitten?” piped the second pegasus, a grey one with golden eyes going in different directions. One of them was pointing down. “Does he have a little blue bow? Because I think that’s- oops!” As the pegasus lowered a hoof to point to the ground, the piano slipped from her grasp. The first pegasus yelled, losing his grip and dropping the piano. Snowflake looked down and saw a tiny white blob with a blue bow on the ground below them.
“BUTTONS!” Snowflake dove, his wings pumping with all the mighty force of a burly hummingbird to drag him just under the piano. Planting his hooves on the underside and grunting with the exertion, he slowed the instrument to a stop mere feet before reaching the ground. Tossing it safely aside, he flexed his forelimbs and stretched his bulging neck. “YEAH!”
“Look out below!” cried a familiar voice.
Snowflake looked up in time to catch a large metal anvil before it smashed him flat. He tossed it onto and through the piano. “YEAH!”
“Look out again!”
Snowflake turned his red eyes skyward just in time to receive a faceful of metal safe. After a moment the door swung open to reveal a dazed-looking Snowflake standing over a hole his thick skull had made in the floor of the safe.
“Sorry!”
Snowflake staggered out of the metal box and collapsed onto the ground with a soft, “Yeah...”
“Mrow?”
Snowflake looked up and into a ridiculously huge set of bright blue eyes. He rose to his haunches and picked Buttons up between his hooves, bringing the kitten right to his muzzle.
“What did Snowflake say? What did I say about running away? No more of that! Cut the- You aren’t gonna- I ain’t standin’ for no-” Snowflake set his jaw and tried to keep angry as Buttons pawed at his snout, but his anger sloughed off like melting snow. He quickly nuzzled Buttons and gently placed the cat on his back. “Just no more of that, Buttons.”
“You named him Buttons.”
Snowflake froze, sweat dripping down his face. “Yeah. Buttons. Like the things you PRESS to make BUILDINGS EXPLODE! YEAH!”
“I think it’s a nice name.”
“Nice? Nice?! IT’S AWESOME!” Snowflake turned to face this faint newcomer. “It’s EXTREME and STALLIONLY and it’s- FLUTTERSHY!”
“Hello, Snowflake.” The yellow pegasus winced slightly as her hair was blown back by Snowflake’s intense exclamations.
“Mrow.”
Snowflake whipped Buttons out from behind his back and held the kitten protectively, speaking over the soft purr as he backed up. “Listen, Fluttershy. Snowflake is STALLION enough to admit when he MAKES a MISTAKE! I promise I’ll never sneak into your pens again! You have my WORD as a pegasus and a bodybuilder! Just let me keep Buttons!”
“Of course you can keep him.”
“I will feed him only the HEALTHIEST and most NUTRITIONAL food available! I will personally see to his PHYSICAL and MENTAL wellbeing! There will be no HAPPIER CAT in all of EQUESTRIA!”
“You can keep him, Snowflake.”
“I will protect him from bigger cats! I will protect him from a MANTICORE if I have to! There is no safer home than a home with 100% SNOWFLAKE APPROVED PROTECTION! YEAH!”
“You can keep Buttons.”
“With my DYING BREATH I will keep this cat as safe and as happy as my own-”
Snowflake paused at the touch of Fluttershy’s hoof, gently pressed against his lips. “I know. That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you. I know you’ll take good care of Buttons. You don’t have to be scared or run away.”
“Ain’t nothin’ scares the Snowflake! YEAH!” He looked down to the little white bundle in his forehooves. The kitten yawned and blinked his eyes sleepily. Snowflake looked again to Fluttershy. “...I can really keep him? Forever and ever?”
She nodded. “...Yeah.”
