Canine Complications

Conditions and Formal Introductions

"So I was thinking Twi, why don't you go see Zecora? She's helped with things like this before, maybe she knows something that can help." Applejack said between bites of her flapjacks.

Twilight gave a weary glance to the door.

"Oh yeah, uh... Why don't I go with you? That'll help keep ponies from freaking out right?"

Twilight looked up from her plate and gave Applejack an ' are you serious? Do you really believe that will work?' stare.

"You got any better ideas?"

The wolf returned a shrug as she licked her plate clean.

"Then we'll leave right after breakfast."

"Now where'd she get too?" Applejack cursed as she ran through the streets checking every alley and listening closely for any shrieks of terror from across the town.

-20 minutes earlier-

Applejack and her carnivorous friend left the farm expecting to head straight for Zecora's. The ponies of Ponyville had a different idea.

"Now Twilight, I need ya ta' stay close or else we'll cause a panic." Applejack said as they approached the town proper.

Twilight nodded absently as she looked to the storefronts just starting to welcome their first customers of the day.

Things were going great, ponies were jumping at the sight of the large predator walking through town, but to Twilight's amazement, they were behaving as Applejack expected, waving to her and calming down as soon as they saw the orange mare walking alongside the fearful beast.

Everything was fine until one pony decided to jump off the roof of Sofas and Quills with a Pinkie-class comically oversized net.

"Don't worry citizens! The Ponyville dog catcher has saved you from your almost certain fate! Never more will you have to fear this foul creature! Why, I would even go so far as to say-" he stopped as he saw the looks he was getting from the few ponies out on the street. "What? Do you not realize what I have done?"

"Yeah! Ya just spooked a big-bucking predator away from the mare that was helping it out of town!" the Sofa clerk shouted, "Not to mention tore off part of my gutters!"

The previously ecstatic dog-catcher-extraordinaire looked back at his net.

True to the shop owner's words, the net was empty of his great prize, and the mare that had been near it was running full gallop down the street. Part of the shop's gutters also lay on the ground behind him, the rear end of the net's handle pierced through the twisted metal. The handle must have gotten in the way of his decent, throwing off his aim and allowing his prey to escape.

"Buck..." the net-flanked pony thought as he bemoaned how much more work he'd need to do now. He couldn't even pass it off as outside his jurisdiction now, no doubt the city would blame him for spooking it if it happened to run anypony down.

"Great. Just great." he had a job to do.

Applejack turned down another street just in time to see a pink tipped tail turn the corner a block ahead.

"Twilight!" she yelled after it, receiving no break from fortune.

By the time she turned the same corner she had lost sight of her target.

"Come on Twi. There's nothing to be afraid of." she said to herself as she began her search again, this time in the direction of the disappearing pink tail.

"Yeah! You better be afraid ya' mutt!"

The valiant dog catcher was in pursuit.

Well... He sure was screaming as if he was.