"We're the Odd Squad, ma'am. We heard you had an odd problem...?" Olive said as she and Otto stepped over to the tall, blond-haired teenage girl.
"Yeah, I do. Thanks so much for coming." The teenager gestured for them to follow her. "Come on, she's down here."
"She?" Olive and Otto glanced at each other.
"It's a person?" Otto asked.
"No... she's a horse." She started walking down the aisle. Olive and Otto shrugged and followed her.
"Neat place you've got here," Olive commented, glancing around at the many horse heads that appeared over the doors. She stopped and patted an all-black horse on the nose. The beautiful horse nuzzled her hand and made a snorting noise.
"Neat...?" the girl laughed. "By 'neat', you definitely don't mean nice, do you?" She stopped and looked around. "It's not exactly the nicest place around, but we keep it as clean as we can." She smiled at Otto, who was watching Olive pet the horse. "That's Spartan, by the way. Don't worry, you can pet him, too. He's a sweetie."
"No, thanks," Otto responded, eyeing Spartan warily from a distance.
"Oh, Otto, he won't hurt you." Olive reached out and grabbed Otto's hand, pulling him over. She held his hand out under Spartan's nose. The big horse whickered softly, sniffing it.
"See?" Olive said, but Otto pulled his hand away.
"What, are you scared of the little horse?" Olive snickered, crossing her arms.
"I'm not touching him." Otto shrugged. "He's not a little horse, and he's got teeth."
"So do you," Olive pointed out. "And you don't bite people."
"Because I am a person!"
"Yes, well-"
The teenager cleared her throat. "Um, could we get back to the problem, please?"
Olive gave Otto one last glance, then turned back to the girl. "Yes, ma'am-"
"Please don't call me that. I'm not 'Ma'am', I'm Amy."
"Okay, then, Amy, let's go." Olive started back down the aisle.
Amy stopped in front of a stall door on the end. A palomino pony had her head hanging low over the door, kicking her stall impatiently.
"Why's she kicking?" Otto asked, hanging back.
"That's part of the problem." Amy picked up a hay net from a corner. "She's hungry, but every time I try to give her her breakfast, this happens." She opened the stall door and stepped in, pushing the pony gently out of the way as she closed the door behind her and walked over to the ring on the wall. She tied it on and took a step back. Just as the pony started toward the net, suddenly the hay disappeared and in its place was a load of snowshoes. The palomino turned away, sighing sadly.
"Whoa!" Olive and Otto gasped at the same time.
"Can you fix it?" Amy pleaded. "Ty's not here yet, and I really need to get all the horses fed before he shows up. We're going to pick up another horse, so I need to finish."
"Not to worry, Amy. We have a Hay-put-backinator." Olive nodded at Otto.
Otto whipped out a gadget with a hay bale on top and shot it at the net. Instantly, the snowshoes changed to hay. The pony gave a delighted whinny and plunged her nose deep into her breakfast.
"Thanks so much, Odd Squad." Amy put her arm around the palomino's neck. "Sheila thanks you, too!"
"All in a day's work." Olive gave a short nod, starting for the exit.
"Have a good day," Otto said over his shoulder, and with that, he and Olive ducked behind a bush into the tube entrance and disappeared.