Chapter 5
Baby Come Back
Usually for parenting, the mother is better at taking care of the child. You can call it a mother's instincts, intuition, or love, but you can't argue with the fact that mothers just have a better ways with babies. This was no different for Flareon and Twilight. She was clearly better at taking care of Solana than him, however, Flareon would soon be tasked with babysitting Solana by himself. It all began one, Friday morning in Ponyville. Twilight had just received a message from Princess Celestia. It said that she needed her and Spike to travel to Fillydelphia to complete an errand. Unfortunately for Flareon, that meant he had to babysit Solana while they were away.
As Twilight and Spike were getting ready to leave, she kissed Solana on her forehead, and put her back inside the crib. Twilight then turned to Flareon. "We'll be back Sunday afternoon. Are you sure you'll be ok alone? You don't need me to get a babysitter?"
Flareon smiled and replied, "Of course I'll be ok. You can count on me! I mean...I've been doing a great job taking care of Solana."
She looked at him seriously. "You changed her diaper...once." Unfortunately, Twilight didn't have time to worry as she and Spike were running late. They said their goodbyes to Flareon and Solana as they quickly left the house. Soon after, Flareon turned around to Solana, who was sleeping soundly. He then went to her crib and moved the blanket over her.
"Don't worry Solana, I may be new at being a dad, but I'm going to try my best to raise you to be the best princess Equestria has ever had," Flareon said to Solana. He then went downstairs and returned with a book. As Flareon sat on his bed and began reading, he hoped that the weekend would go smoothly. Luckily for him, Friday and Saturday went by without any problems. He Solana for a walk a couple of times to visit Fluttershy, Applejack and Rarity, fed her, gave her a bath, changed her diapers, and played with her. The fact that it was going this smoothly was too good to be true. The next Saturday night however, Solana had trouble sleeping which forced Flareon to stay up all night, but Sunday morning, she had finally gone to sleep. After placing Solana in her crib, Flareon moved the blanket over her and said, "This week has been pretty fun hasn't it? I told Twilight she had nothing to worry about. Now all we have to do is to wait for her to come back." Unfortunately, Flareon didn't get any sleep last night. He then slowly laid his head on the crib and feel sleep. A couple of hours later, he awoke to an empty crib. "Solana...Solana?" Flareon said as he looked around the room, "Where are you?" He then ran downstairs and searched the main room, side room, bathroom, and garage. She was nowhere to be found. As if things weren't already bad, a letter suddenly appeared before him. Flareon opened the letter and began to read it. "Dear Flareon, me and Spike have finished our mission in Fillydelphia and will be retuning home today at 3pm. See you soon!" At that moment, Flareon's heart skipped at beat as he slowly turned his head to the clock and saw that it was 12pm. "Twilight is going to be home in three hours!" Flareon yelled as he began to panic, "I've got to find Solana or...I don't want to think about what Twilight is going to do to me." He then looked at the front door and it suddenly hit him. "Wait...Solana didn't go outside...did she? I'd better check around town just in case." Soon after, Flareon left the house and began his search for Solana. A couple of minutes later, he spotted Rainbow Dash by her catapult. She apparently was placing a white object into it, activated the catapult, and sent it flying through the air. The worst part, it looked like Solana. Flareon then rushed over to Rainbow Dash and began to yell, "Rainbow Dash...what are you doing?! Solana is just a baby! She's not old enough to be flying!" Unfortunately, she wasn't able to respond as Flareon quickly flew after Solana. He followed her to a metalwork factory and saw Solana fall into an open window. Flareon then flew through the window after her. What he was now witnessing froze him in pure terror. Flareon was seeing Solana lying on a conveyor belt and being molded with scraps into a metal scrap box. As it finally made it off the conveyor belt, Flareon flew to it and began to cry. "Solana...I'm so sorry. This is all my fault!" He then started to get angry with rage. "I swear...Rainbow Dash is going to get it!" At that moment, a pony worker can over to him.
"Hey kid...are you ok?" he asked.
Flareon quickly wiped the tears from his eyes and replied, "Oh yeah...I'm just fine. My daughter was just turned into a metal box which Twilight is going to use to bash me on the head!"
The pony looked at him confused. "What are you talking about? Wait...do you mean that pillow that came out of nowhere and landed on the conveyor belt? Seriously kid...are you sure you're ok?" When Flareon looked closer at the metal box, he noticed part of a pillow sticking out of it. Apparently, Rainbow Dash had used a pillow as a test flight subject and he mistook it as Solana.
"Oh thank God!" Flareon sighed as he threw the metal box aside, "I was just hallucinating." Soon after, Flareon flew out of the factory and continued his search for Solana. He searched every inch of Ponyville from the schoolhouse, Carousel Boutique, Fluttershy's cottage, Sugarcube Corner, town square, the bowling alley, the park, Ben's Breakfast, even Everfree Forest, but still, Flareon didn't find her. He then asked his friends to spread the word and soon after, everyone in Ponyville was searching for the missing Solana. While searching town square again, Flareon noticed from the clock that it was now 2:55pm. Twilight would be returning home any minute to find their daughter was gone. Flareon knew he had to face the music and submit himself to whatever Twilight was going to do to him. A minute later, Flareon arrived at their house. "I failed as a father...Twilight is never going to forgive me," Flareon said as he began to open the door. When he went inside, Flareon was completely surprised at what he was seeing. Solana was sitting on the floor right in front of him. "Solana!" Flareon yelled as he ran to pick her up, "I was looking everywhere for you!" He then noticed she had food around her mouth. "Wait...food, where you in the kitchen?" When he went to investigate, Flareon saw the fridge was open and there was food lying on the ground. At that moment, it suddenly hit him. He never checked the kitchen. "I'm such an idiot, I forgot to heck the kitchen!" However, Flareon knew he didn't have time to fret over it as he quickly put the food back in the fridge, and cleaned Solana's face. Soon after, the door opened and Twilight and Spike came inside.
"Flareon! We're back!" Twilight said as she put her bag on the floor. At that moment, Flareon brought Solana into the room.
Solana then looked at Twilight and said, "Mommy!" Everyone quickly gasped in amazement as Twilight ran over to Solana and began to hug her.
"Solana said her second word...she called me mommy!" Twilight exclaimed. She looked at Flareon and said, "Did you have any problems while we were away. Did everything go ok?"
Flareon smiled and replied, "Oh...yeah, everything went by perfectly. No problems at all! I told you there was no reason to worry." For some reason though, Flareon felt like he was forgetting something important. Suddenly, there was a knock on the door and Rainbow Dash came inside.
"Flareon...we didn't find Solana yet," she said. Rainbow Dash then spotted Solana near them. "Oh...I guess you finally found her. Everyone was so worried. I'll tell them to call of the search. Hey Twilight and Spike, you're back! Well, I'll see you guys soon ok? Bye!" As she left, Twilight turned her head slowly to Flareon. She didn't look happy.
"Flareon," Twilight said in an angry tone, "What was Rainbow Dash talking about?"
He began to sweat nervously and replied, "Oh...nothing. Just me, Solana, and everyone pony in Ponyville playing hide-and-seek. It was so much fun, you guys should join us next time! Well...would you look at the time! I think I'll just go play a couple of games at the bowling alley. Bye!" As quickly as he could, Flareon flew in the air and left the house. Later on, when he returned home, Flareon explained to Twilight what had actually happened. Luckily for him, she was relieved to find out it was just a minor mistake and agreed that he did a great job babysitting Solana.