An answer!

If we strapped a bunch a photons to the outside of an atom, then could the whole thing go as fast as light or would the atom slow the photons down?

As you know,  photons are the "particles" of light.  But they are very strange particles - they are not like marbles or baseballs which are the particles we see every day.  They are both waves and particles.   As waves they are everywhere, as particles they are in one place.  This is part of a branch of physics that is hard for us to understand  but is real and true - it is called "quantum mechanics".

When a photon attaches to an atom it doesn't attach like a baseball.  It is absorbed by the atom and it increases the energy of the atom.  A photon has energy but no mass.  The atom has mass so it can never move at the speed of light.  The energy of the photon will make the atom move faster - but never at the speed of light.

The high energy atoms will send out light (photons).  That's what makes a light bulb work.  So photons come and go constantly but they aren't the kind of  particles that we know every day.