Backfire

by Zoom zoom

Beware the Bumbles

The high winds and cold were till hitting the two purple unicorns despite their magic. “Sheesh,” remarked Spike as he tried to push through the heavy snow, “your boyfriend really has a thing against us going through here.” Despite them both at the point they needed to focus fully on the task at hand Spike felt a crash of his magic force field against his sisters that nearly floored him.

“I told you it isn’t like that,” called Twilight. “Just cause he’s a guy that isn’t related to me that I care about doesn’t automatically make him my boyfriend. Otherwise I’d be dating Big Macintosh for years.” She emphasized this with another bump.

Spike stayed true and bumped back with a smirk. “Who said I was talking about Wishful? I was speaking of your old filly crush on Jack Frost you moron.” Which was in fact true, Spike’s first memories where of Twilight trying to show him how Pegasus ponies may have gotten their powers over winter because of a head elf creature that was in charge of whistling it up for centuries before weather manipulation become the norm in Equestria.

Twilight blushed at the memory. She had been such an optimistic fool back then, well more so than now anyway. There was even the one time she had ignored her studies to make sure she could catch the first snowflake of the season, thinking that because elves needed to be believe in to live and no pony she knew believed in Jack meant that he would be grateful and give her a present for her belief. It didn’t help that Shining Armor seemed to enforce that along with her dad as they tricked her into thinking the first fallen snow was for her somehow. Still even now that was why winter was her favorite time of the year, and why she only had Winter Gear on when it came time to clean it up or look normal to other ponies. Magic was simple enough to keep her warm and the less between her and the winter winds the better.

Spike wasn’t sure how his sister pictured Jack Frost, and he personally thought of a short little guy who likely would just get annoying after a while, but that wasn’t the point. He had tried getting Twilight’s mind off Wishful and Rarity for the first time in the three days they had been chasing after them and failed. Seeing the trail they were taking, Twilight had determined if they went over this mountain they’d be able to meet them at the first destination obviously on Wishful’s list. Leave it too his sister to know what Wishful was going after even if she wouldn’t tell him. Not like he had a stake in this that could be, you know, important.

“Hurry up Spike,” called his sister. “If we take too long we’ll lose the advantage of cutting the mountains in the first place.”

Spike responded after spitting out a lump of snow that was freezing his tongue. “I know you can’t teleport us the entire way but why can’t you make a field to at least keep this wind from blowing in our faces? It’s kinda hard to see.” Actually it was because he was sick of using his own magic to keep him warm but he didn’t want to come off as winy. Besides if he did say the truth, Twilight would be a good sister and never let it go in front of Rarity. So yeah a lying we go.

“Because then I’d be too tired to walk and you’d have to carry me,” lied Twilight. She was still embarrassed about the emotional erection she was basically having with high cold winds blowing in her face. But it wasn’t all a lie, if she did protect them till they got down then by the time they did catch up to Wishful and Rarity she’d need a huge rest. And she doubted Spike would carry her at all once he was reunited with Rarity. Which left Wishful to be her carrier if that happened and well she could have that now could she?

The two ponies became so caught up in the member of the first party that they wanted to see most that they didn’t noticed the thunderous steps for some time that were following them. Had they been good to notice this, Twilight likely could have subdued the thing easily or at least been able to get them out of there fast. But they didn’t, and their stalker was able to follow them and take note of how the female unicorn had the stronger magic.

When the creature finally decided to bound after the two it was loud enough that both ponies noticed instantly but it was too powerful and was already in mid air and about to crush Twilight when they turned their heads. Both instinctively blasted the thing with magic but its hide took them like it was nothing. Sharp blue claws sprang for the female unicorn, Spike changing his blast to his magical fire which only seemed to combine with the icy wind instead. For an instant he was flashing his horror of his sister’s dead body before him, but the green winded blast struck the claw and took both it and the creature ten feet away from Twilight. Only grazing her cheek and giving her hair that same look from when he had accidently breath in her face a few times in the past.

The creature rose slowly. Its blue skin mostly covered by snow white fur that nearly made it impossible to see in the winds. But as it turned said wind dyed down just enough for this not to be a problem and the two ponies could get a look at the thing that stoop well ever ten feet tall. Spike thought to himself that if there was a Jack Frost, the guy just did everything he could to help the two out so he had better take advantage of it. Twilight however stood unmoving, her encounter had freaked her out so much that she stayed there shaking in place, her brush with death making her unable to do anything short of keeping herself from releasing her bowls.

Spike didn’t have time to snap her out of it. So instead he did what he knew she and Wishful would do in this situation. He focused and summoned up the biggest blast he could to shoot at the creature, he hoped if it didn’t stop it at least he could drag Twilight out the line of fire and escape with her. This charge took time he didn’t have though, and he had to watch as the creature made its horrible cry and showed its line of razor sharp teeth. At that moment as he also noticed Twilight’s cheek start to drip red blood, he remembered what this creature was.

---

Wishful had talked with him about it once back when the two were hanging out in Canterlot and he was looking through Wishful’s old reports in magical creature’s class. Wishful laughed at the weirdness of this particular creature. “The Bumble,” he nearly laughed. “He’s gotta be my favorite ‘dangerous creature’.” Wishful had used air quotes at this and talked in a mocking tone. “Thing’s a freaking pussycat if you knock out the teeth. But it’s immune to the effects of magic so only force can touch it, they are usually super hungry since they live in the mountains with so much cold nothing big enough to ever satisfy it ever lives there. It looks intimidating but like I said, it’s a kind creature at heart. I mean how can a creature who can bounce off from any part of its body be anything but something fun? Thing has more stories about it helping ponies and being non-destructive than domesticated dragons like yourself SD.”

“Hey,” called Spike somewhat offended. “I’m not domesticated. I can be just as tough as a wild dragon if I wanted to.” He blew out a patch of green fire to show this.

Wishful just rolled his eyes, “sure you can. Still one of these days if I got a pet I’d want a defanged Bumble. Since I’m not a unicorn like most of the ponies around here it would give me some status and I could have a friend who’d be a sort of bodyguard too. Long as I kept him well fed anyway.” He chuckled and put the paper away.

---

“He wasn’t a unicorn,” was Spikes mental note to this memory as he finished his charge. The Bumble had opened its claws again to take Twilight. Spike did his best to aim at the teeth of the creature and sent a blast of green force from his horn. He missed and only got it in the face but it was enough that the Bumble flew back again, but this time off the side of the cliff face they were on and a good thirty feet down so it would take time to climb back up.

Spike scrambled to grab his sister’s mane and pull hard. Twilight finally yelped at this and regained herself somewhat. “Wh-what in the hoof was that!”

“Tell you later,” he yelled still trying to pull her mane in his teeth. “We better get out of here before it-“ But the creature wasn’t gone for very long at all. The thing sailed from the ground as if it were made of cloud and landed in front of the two unicorns. It roared at them and blood trickled from its nose and mouth, it had lost the majority of its top front teeth. It was furious at the male unicorn.

“I mean how can a creature who can bounce off from any part of its body be anything but something fun?”

“If I live through this,” Spike told the memory of Wishful. “I’m going to tell you how.” With Twilight still out of it and he counted into a charge at the beast putting all he could into it. At this point the cold winds blew yet again. Spike thought he could hear a laugh as he pressed into the Bumble who wrapped its arms around Spike, trying to crush him as the two fell off the mountain’s deeper side. One that even if the Bumble bounced off of, he could never climb back up again. He saw hundreds of feet fly by him as they fell. And the last thing he heard was Twilight’s cry for him as he passed out from the sight and his bones starting to give into the Bumble’s grip.

Author's Note:

I wanted to go further in this chapter, but that would require going back to Wishful and I wanted a chapter with just Spike and Twilight for once. Hope you enjoy, and see you guys at this story next year as I try to get new stuff or my other stories out by the end of the year.

Another fun fact was the Jack Frost thing, it was going to be its own story but I had to change it since I didn't have the time to make yet another one shot that would likely turn into an ongoing thing in the time I had left.

Comments

[Path_of_cloud]

Spike and Twilight's sibling behavior felt very genuine, and Spike's sarcasm was spot on and amusing. Nicely done.

[RainbowsAreMagic]

Not the Bumble! Nooooooooooo!