Scootaloo and her friends made their way South the next morning.
The train was empty other than them. The smarter crystal ponies had already left, and though the mandatory evacuation was to be announced within the hour, nopony had left yet. It wouldn’t be long before the train station was filling up with ponies, which is why Scootaloo had been eager to catch the earliest possible train.
The early morning air had been bitterly cold, and even within the city the skies were overcast. The train wasn’t much warmer, and Scootaloo sat hunkered down in the heavy coat she’d been given back at the palace.
She turned her attention to the ponies sitting nearby. Shining Armor, Starlight Glimmer, and Sunburst. Fewer ponies than she’d been hoping for, but she couldn’t have picked any better. Hopefully quality would serve better than quantity in this case.
The train pulled out of the station. It didn’t take long for them to leave the city buildings behind for the snow covered countryside. She wiped a hoof across the frost covered window, hoping for a better view of the sun. She could make out the lighter patch of clouds where it would be.
The ponies of Canterlot had gotten better over the past few days. The sun no longer shook along its path. It still lacked the special glow of Celestia’s day, but they’d only been raising it for two weeks.
She pulled away from the window, hugging her legs to her chest. It was a shame the sun was hidden today. Even on the train, she could see her breath on the air. Minutes passed. An hour. Spike was snoozing in the seat across from her, apparently unfazed by the weather. That or he was just that tired. Scootaloo would have loved to sleep, but it was just too cold. It wouldn’t be long, she told herself. They’d be in the South soon.
Starlight Glimmer and Sunburst. She didn’t know much about them, besides the fact that they were supposed to be some kind of magical geniuses. If anypony could get the princesses free, it would be them, right?
But what if they couldn’t? Scootaloo had racked her brain all night and come up empty. She wasn’t a planner.
Finally she gave up on the line of thought. Between the cold and the growing wind as they picked up speed, she couldn’t focus. Maybe when they got to warmer climates, she’d be able to come up with something.
The windows on their side of the train shattered.
They didn’t break all at once. The window furthest up the car shattered, and then the next one, and the next, one after another in rapid succession. Spike jerked away at the sound, looking back. They only had a moment to react, but it was long enough for Scootaloo to lift her wing over her head.
The window beside them shattered, spraying them with shards of glass. Her coat and wing caught the brunt of it, stinging the appendage in places, but not seriously harming her. Spike simply turned away from the window to protect his eyes, letting the glass bounce harmlessly against his scales.
“Whuh? What’s happening?”
“I’m not sure,” Scootaloo said, but her answer was drowned out by the sudden howling of wind. Snow flurries flew in through the broken windows, and the icy wind cut through her. The air outside had dropped well below freezing.
There was something else. Something in the wind. Furious snarling. Howling.
Windigos.
The train shuddered as something heavy slammed into the side. The wheels screeched against the rails. Flurries of snow and wisps of dark mist obscured vision beyond the broken train windows. Something flashed by just outside. It passed again, going the other way.
Spike took a deep breath and released a spray of dragon fire at the windows just as the figure passed by once more. It cried out in pain and whipped away.
Two of the windows on the opposite side shattered as dark figures crashed into the train. Scootaloo turned away from the broken windows to face them just as another figure crashed into her from the other side, rolling her into the aisle. She bounced against the far seat with a grunt as the air was forced from her lungs. She landed on her side and forced herself back up, wings instinctively held aloft protectively as she tried to get her bearings.
Five windigos were on the train with them. They were pony shaped, more or less, though their back half trailed off into wisps of cloud stuff rather than legs or tails. Their manes were nebulous, and their bodies didn’t look much more solid.
Shining Armor had already started moving, his horn glowing as he threw a torrent of magic at the closest windigo, forcing it back against the wall of the train. Starlight Glimmer had caught the attention of another and was teleporting rapidly across the train to keep out of its reach.
Spike was breathing more fire at a third. He caught it across the shoulder and it spun away from him, becoming formless for a moment. It resolidified, screaming at him in pain and rage.
Scootaloo gave a shout just before she hit it. She jumped, pumped her wings once so that she was even with its head and bucked with both hind legs. The windigo turned toward the sound of her shout and her hooves hit it in the side of the head.
The feeling was similar to busting clouds: a faint surface tension that gave away as she struck it. Unlike normal clouds however, the windigo didn’t explode into quickly dispersing wisps of vapor. It didn’t even look pained as her hooves passed through its head. It snorted in annoyance and became formless again.
“Oh, come on. That’s not f—” The windigo hit her in a torrent of freezing wind, sending her sprawling once again. She felt ice crystals form in her feathers and along her coat. She slammed into the floor and rolled.
She expected another blow, but there was a flash of reddish light and another scream of pain from the windigo. She looked up to see Shining Armor standing over her. The windigo backed away, and she could see a portion of its body that was fainter than the rest, like a cloud that had nearly evaporated. It roared at them and flew sideways, out the window and into the snowstorm.
One of the other windigos launched itself toward them forcing Shining Armor to throw up a shield. It struck the magic bubble, its hooves becoming indistinct claws that scrapped across the impenetrable surface. Ice froze across where it scratched.
The windigo didn’t see Starlight Glimmer and Sunburst move into position behind it. Sunburst whispered something, gesturing with a circular motion, and Starlight’s horn glowed. Magic flowed into the air and coalesced into a bubble around the windigo. It screamed and threw itself against the bubble, but couldn’t escape.
“Spike!”
Spike climbed onto one of the train seats, took a deep breath, and unleashed a torrent of fire toward the bubble. The fire burned through the bubble and the windigo screamed across the aisle and out the window.
“Watch out!” Shining Armor called.
Starlight teleported herself, Sunburst, and Spike immediately at the sound of the warning, appearing inside Shining Armor’s shield just as another windigo struck where they had been standing.
The last two windigos were circling Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle near the front of the train car. Apple Bloom threw a powerful buck towards the side of one, but met with as little luck as Scootaloo had.
The windigo that had tried to attack Starlight and Spike howled, and as it did the wind outside the train windows intensified. The ice left on Shining Armor’s shield began to expand. Outside they could hear the cries of the two injured windigos.
Scootaloo swallowed, steeling her nerves. She ducked her head and wiggled out of the heavy coat before kicking it aside. “Can you drop the shield for a second? I have an idea.”
Shining Armor looked at her, doubt clear on his face, but he nodded.
“Okay, just give me a second.” Scootaloo closed her eyes and did something she hadn’t had to do in years. She focused on her magic.
It was the magic that let her fly. Her ability to walk on clouds when unicorns or earth ponies would just fall through them. And it was the magic that let the pegasi of Equestria control the weather.
She focused on her earliest memories of flying. Her lessons with Rainbow Dash, and how elated she’d been when she first managed to get airborne. She focused on that feeling. The freedom and exhilaration that came from flying, and as she did she felt a warmth at the pit of her stomach. She remembered her first lessons on weather control. How she’d had to focus before she could move or bust clouds, long before such things became second nature.
She didn’t know how it felt for other ponies, or even other pegasi, but for her, magic felt like the pure joy and freedom she felt when she was flying.
She shook her wings, dislodging the ice crystals that had formed on them. “Okay, now!”
Shining Armor’s shield flickered, and the freezing wind blowing from the windigo hit them. Scootaloo launched herself forward, shattering the ice that had formed, and she felt the shield pop back into place as she passed.
She ran straight for the windigo. Its glowing eyes widened in surprise, and its howling doubled. Scootaloo leapt sideways as the ground where she’d been was instantly coated with ice.
She landed on the back of one of the train seats and kept moving with far more agility that Apple Bloom or Sweetie Belle ever could have managed. She drew even with the windigo, stood on her back legs, wings flared for balance, and drove her full weight into its side. As she did, she focused every bit of weather controlling magic she could on her hooves.
Her blow landed solidly on the windigo, driving it sideways through one of the unbroken windows.
Scootaloo was already moving again, toward the last two windigos attacking her friends. In the peripheral of her vision, she could see the windigo she’d hit circling back outside of the train.
She hit one of the windigos full force, throwing it into the other. They both gave feral screams of rage as they rounded on her. She checked her left. The other windigo had finished circling around and was flying straight toward them.
“Come catch me!” She shouted in challenge, jumping back and then toward the broken windows on her right.
“Scootaloo!” Apple Bloom called.
“Wait, no!” Sweetie Belle shouted at the same time.
The wind hit her full force when she left the train, nearling dashing her into the ground at lethal speeds. She fought against it, lungs screaming as she breathed in the freezing air.
She managed to pull herself up above the train just before the three windigos charged out after her. She climbed, opening as much space between her and them as she could.
A fourth windigo hit her from the side, sending her into a tumble. She fought to control herself, and the fifth hit her from the other direction. She fell, the world rolling around her in a confused mess of snow and wind. She desperately flapped her wings, trying to straighten herself, but she had no idea which way was up any more.
Something hard hit her right legs. A split second later it hit her side. She bounced and started sliding, grabbing at the smooth something in a desperate attempt to stop herself.
The train roof! She rolled, wings flapping again now that she knew which direction was down, and she kicked off from the train. She snapped her wings closed, landing on all four hooves and ducked. A blur of movement passed overhead.
She leapt into the air, fighting to gain altitude. The windigos were circling her. Another charged her, but now that she’d gotten her bearings, she was able to pull out of the way in time. She shot forward, and focused everything she had on the wind around her.
Just like funneling water to Cloudsdale, she thought, tilting into a large arc.
The windigos followed. She rolled out of the way as two of them came after her, but a third hit her from the bottom. She bucked it off her and kept flying.
Ice had formed on her hooves where she’d hit it, and she could feel patches of it across her body, weighing her down. She pushed herself harder, trying to get enough speed.
She completed her first lap and started on the second. The windigos were struggling to keep up now, all five following her in a large circle over the train. The winds began to change, following their pattern.
Just a little more.
She could see the vortex forming in the middle of their circle. It was starting to pull on her. Her timing was going to have to be perfect.
The windigos fought against the pull of the forming tornado, closing in for one last strike. She rolled away, out of the circle as two of them collided where she’d been. She gave a powerful flap of her wings, adding one last gust of wind.
The windigos screamed toward her, but their flight was slowed, and they came to a stop before they could reach. They looked back, at the newly formed tornado, and then to Scootaloo. Eyes wide.
Scootaloo snapped them a quick salute and folded her wings close to her body, dropping away before she could be sucked in too.
She flared them open again as she neared the train, coming out of her dive and angling toward one of the windows. Her aim was off. She threw her forelegs out to catch her on the side of the train and tried to catch one of the windows.
She jerked her hoof back as she caught it on a shard of glass and nearly fell, but then two pairs of hooves grabbed onto her and pulled her back onto the train.
“Scootaloo! You’re alright!” Sweetie Belle called as her two friends pulled her into a hug.
“Ow. Yeah, I’m alright. Ow. Not so tight.”
“You’re covered in ice!” Sweetie Belle said, pulling back. Scootaloo looked down to see she was right. Most of her coat had been frosted over like grass on a winter morning, though luckily it hadn’t gone any deeper than that. Sweetie Belle pulled her scarf off and wrapped it around Scootaloo’s neck, then used magic to start clearing one of the seats of glass.
Scootaloo looked back out the window. The tornado would keep the windigos busy for a few minutes, and as the trained left them behind the snow storm had begun to clear up.
“Scootaloo,” Apple Bloom said.
“Yes?” Scootaloo asked as Sweetie Belle ushered her into the newly cleared seat.
“That was really stupid.”
“Yeah. It really was, wasn’t it?” Scootaloo grinned and wrapped the scarf a bit tighter. “But it’s gonna make a great story.”
Apple Bloom sighed.