11. Lost
Sometimes, having your wish granted wasn’t very pleasant. Fluttershy awoke from a dreamless sleep, and it felt like no time had passed at all. Barely had she closed her eyes when Applejack roused her, her rime-coated hoof oddly enough seeming almost warmer than her own skin. Still, the sky didn’t lie. While it was hardly sunny, it was night no longer, and the day begun as did they all—with more snow.
“I’m cold,” Fluttershy murmured. It was an insipid, stupid thing to say, of course, and she didn’t even know why she said it. Perhaps to convince herself her throat hadn’t frozen solid. Applejack managed to muster a smile, though, somewhere below the frost that clung to her muzzle.
“So am I. For a few days running now. Up and at’em, sugar,” she said, extending a hoof to help Fluttershy up. They had taken shelter in a rocky outcropping that kept the worst of the snow and wind at bay, but with ‘the worst’ taken off the top, there was still plenty to go around. Fluttershy accepted the offered hoof and rose to stand.
“I guess you have it even worse,” Fluttershy admitted, trying to keep her teeth from chattering. “If it’s cold for a pegasus, I can’t imagine how you are feeling.”
“I try not to think about it,” Applejack replied with a shrug, her gaze forward. Side by side, they forced themselves to keep marching down that very same raised road. The earth mare did not protest when Fluttershy snuck her wing from under her cloak to cover Applejack’s side, but rather, leaned against her as they walked.
“Fluttershy?” Applejack asked, her voice raspy.
“Sorry?” Fluttershy replied, shaking her head. She’d nearly dozed off as she walked. Again. It wouldn’t be the first time Applejack’d tried to get her attention and had to repeat herself.
“If push comes to shove, you might have to fly us out of here. Do you think you can do that?”
Fluttershy felt a lump of ice form in her stomach as she glanced off the road to the side. There were mountains all around, now. There had been no green in sight for days.
“Glide down from here?” she asked. “I—I mean, my wings are stiff, and I haven’t really—” she began, but she stopped herself. It took effort, but she took a deep breath and cast the doubt from her mind. Pushed it to the side, at least.
“Maybe. I think so. But together, we’d lose height fast, and I can’t feel any updrafts,” she said, chewing on her lip as she tried to get a clear picture of the area. The heavy snowfall wasn’t making it easy at all. “And we don’t really know where to go or where the shortest way down is, but, um, yes. I think so.”
“Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that, but I think we’re walking about due south right now, so my nose is telling me we should probably head east through the peaks, that way.” Applejack sighed and cast a mournful glance at where her saddlebags hung empty and slack against her sides. “‘I’m thinking we’re approaching the point where we have to do something. I don’t know about you, but I can’t take much more of this.”
Fluttershy nodded and shivered. “I don’t think I can, either.”
“Wait. D’you see that?” Applejack asked.
Fluttershy squinted. When the wind shifted she could see a faint glimmer of color through the otherwise monotonous white. If she was hesitant, Applejack showed no such restraint. A bit of frost cracked and fell off her face as the orange mare grinned and upped her pace.
“I think I might have spoke too soon,” Applejack whooped, and Fluttershy was helpless to do anything but follow in her wake as she ploughed through the snow. Suddenly, they were getting somewhere, no longer merely moving for the sake of moving. Stiff joints and biting chills were forgotten while she raced after Applejack, snow flying everywhere as they ran. The road climbed and turned before darting through a tunnel barely twenty strides long.
When they exited on the other side, their goal became apparent. Applejack was still leading the charge at a pace that made Fluttershy worry she’d trip and fall, but her own steps slowed of their own accord as the wind abated. It was very possible that the wind was simply less furious on this side of the tunnel, but it felt like the world itself quieted down so that she might watch. She stood on one bridge among many that led from different points along the edges of a cauldron of mountains; a circle of mountaintops so regular, they couldn’t be natural. Each of the bridges spanned the cauldron, disappearing into the middle.
Instantly, Fluttershy’s thoughts jumped to the shield that Twilight’s brother, Shining Armor, had erected around Canterlot weeks or months before—it was getting hard to tell how long ago that had been, but the resemblance was clear. A shimmering bubble dominated the centre of the cauldron, glittering in transparent blues and whites. The field shielded their bridge’s destination; a spire, a massive castle that blended the definitions of building and geography, the towering mass hard to make out in detail past the shield.
And amidst it all, Fluttershy had completely lost track of Applejack. It was a small task to continue following the furrow that the powerful earth pony had made in her haste; a straight line ran down the middle of the bridge, but her heart beat faster and faster as she ran all the same. She was barely aware that the bridge was becoming increasingly elaborate as she galloped in Applejack’s wake. Soon, her hooves impacted on metal, not stone, and columns decorated the sides. It might have been a marvellous sight, once, but any loving detail put into the bridge’s design had been worn away long ago, leaving only blank faces and smooth rock—and, to Fluttershy’s mixed relief, a very irate earth pony leaning on a shimmering wall of energy.
“It won’t let us through,” Applejack growled, holding on to her hat with one hoof and pushing against the bubble with the other.
“Oh. Um, I guess, if it’s anything like the shield Shining Armor made, you’d need—”
“Magic, yes,” Applejack said, the word not so much spoken as it was exhaled. She took a step back and looked through the bubble before them with eyes so full of obvious longing and despair, it was hard to watch. In a compromise, Fluttershy stepped over to stand side by side with Applejack, extending her wing under the frozen and tattered cloak to touch her.
It was so very near, yet so desperately far with the energy field in place. The bubble that encased the spire flowed with two colors, a deep blue and a milky white, but it was easy enough to peer through it up close. On the other side, no snow fell, and the bridge was very different. It was as if though time had failed to pass, elegant arches in delicate filigree and ornate stone carvings flanking the patterned bridge that shone like it had been made entirely of silver.
Even this was just an afterthought to what waited beyond. Past the short span that remained, a massive plateau awaited, a tiled courtyard without walls, defined by dried-up fountains and patches of garden that had grown out of control, leaving it a mess of ancient stone and greenery. It was hard to focus on anything else once Fluttershy realized she could see blotches of color amidst the trees. Fruit.
The courtyard garden was barely a speck of the full grandeur of the place. The spire was massive, a mountain turned into a building. It seemed a city unto itself, a massive tower of rock and colored bricks, countless grand porches, glimmering crystal lights and windows both empty and in glass colored and plain adorning its imperfectly cylindrical shape. The top of the shield and the true height of the spire were both obscured by the thick white clouds above, and it was frightening to think that the place was even larger. Fluttershy stole a quick glance over the side of the bridge, and sure enough, there were a few lights dotting the base of the spire where it disappeared in the snow-blasted bottom of the caldera below.
All in all, it was magnificent except for the small detail of the insubstantial yet absolute barrier in front of them. Fluttershy’s heart sank as she reached out to confirm what Applejack had said and shown. Her hoof impacted on the magic wall with a glassy clack. If the implications worried her, it was twice as disconcerting that Applejack hadn’t made a single sound yet. Twice as frightening as the idea of having to turn around, the farmpony stood completely still, snow piling up against her as she stared past the barrier.
“Are you okay?” Fluttershy asked, tentatively leaning a little closer until their snouts almost touched. Applejack didn’t even look at her, but after a moment, she drew back and pursed her lips.
“I know we both agreed to come here,” Applejack said, her voice low and quiet. It was the type of calm that Fluttershy thought wasn’t very calm at all. It was the rumble of thunder before the storm.
“I don’t blame you in the least. I don’t blame you, nor do I blame myself. It ain’t our fault. We couldn’t have known,” she continued, her teeth chattering as she paused for breath. “That don’t change that we’ve spent—oh sweet merciful Celestia, I don’t even remember how long,” she spat, raising her voice. “Weeks, maybe? We’ve spent a darn long time crawling up these here mountains, freezin’ our tails off and starving ‘cause we’re trying to make our food last, which won’t be a problem any more since we’re all out.”
“My legs are sore and I swear my thoughts are freezing solid!” Applejack yelled, finally turning to face her. The farmpony was livid, her eyes green fire now. “We’ve travelled longer’n I ever have before in my life, we’ve done all we could chasing some crazy unicorn, only to catch our deaths up here? No!” she snapped, glaring. “No, I am not okay!”
Fluttershy swallowed and nodded along with her words wishing very much Applejack could be a little more quiet, but despite her assurances to the contrary, Fluttershy couldn’t help but feel a little guilty. Perhaps the anger wasn’t meant for her, but there wasn’t anypony else around to receive the blame.
“I know,” Fluttershy said, folding her ears. “It’s all very, very terrible, and I know we’re in danger, but we’ll find a way out of it. It—it’s not so bad,” she forced herself to lie. She wanted to agree, but Applejack was scaring her, and this time there was no explanation for it, no mysterious shadows or incomprehensible whispers. No, Applejack scared her, and she suspected it was because Applejack herself was scared.
“We won’t!” Applejack groaned, throwing back her head. “Look at this; we can’t get in, how can you even say that? I ain’t no glass half empty kind of pony, sugar, but even if we start back now, if the wind is as you say, getting back down ain’t a sure thing!”
Again, Fluttershy nodded as Applejack spoke, her own face set in a fake and frozen smile. “We’ll just have to—” was all she managed before Applejack cut her off.
“We’ll just have to what?” she asked, but the venom was quickly spent. Applejack sat down on her rump on the middle of the bridge, deflating until it seemed she would meld with the snow itself. When she spoke again, she sounded tired, her voice reduced to a croak.
“Do you even want to get home? Do you even miss our friends? Sometimes it seems you’re almost happy to be here. Well, that might be a stretch, but compared to how I feel, it sounds about right.”
“Of—of course I’m not!” Fluttershy stammered.
“‘Cause I don’t know about you, but I got a huge hole in my heart right now, knowing I might never see my family again. How do you do it? What kind of crazy source of strength are you hiding, Fluttershy?” Applejack asked, a sickly smile on her face as she shook her head and lay down. “I just don’t know if I can do this any more.”
Fluttershy sat very still. The words had stung. The suggestion that she didn’t miss her friends, it had been a terrible thing to say, but being hurt wouldn’t help. Applejack looked peaceful where she lay with her eyes closed. Her mane and tail were riddled with frost and both her cloak and the empty saddlebags were shifted to one side, but she didn’t look angry any more. Her mane half-covered her face, but there was a serenity to the resting pony. A dangerous calm. It was just another thing that scared Fluttershy, atop the cold, the futility, the loneliness, the idea of never getting home, the idea of actually getting home—there were plenty of reasons to panic.
Fluttershy didn’t panic. Instead, she crossed the short distance to Applejack and sat down in front of her, cradling the other mare’s head as she cleared her throat. A strange calm had settled over her, and she knew it wouldn’t last. It was a frail and brittle thing that existed only because it must and eroding quickly. Fluttershy very much wanted to get around to panicking soon. Softly, she raised her voice in song.
Rest well and rest swiftly, brave little pony,
Make of these hours what you can,
Dawn will be breaking, clouds will not last,
All wings are needed to find our new land.
Her voice quavered. It was a far cry from the way she recalled it being sung to her, but somehow, she remembered every single word through all these years. Fluttershy licked her lips and closed her eyes.
Tomorrow the tribe will all fly together,
All of us precious, just like the rest,
Be you weak or strong, as long as you try,
Your day is well spent if you did your best,
The commander, she shelters—
Fluttershy tried to keep singing. The words were harder and harder to find, but the song was the only thing keeping her sane. Finally she was interrupted by a wracking cough, then another, and when she was done, her teeth were chattering and she had lost it. She clung to Applejack but didn’t dare open her eyes. She hovered there in between hope and desperation, knowing that she would have to face the world again sooner or later. A world where they were hopelessly lost, and where Applejack may already be—
“Never heard that one before.”
Fluttershy drew a stinging breath and let it out again, shaking her head slightly as she looked down upon a smiling Applejack who was very much alive. She sounded as weary as before, but there was a trace of the playfulness that usually lurked beneath her hard demeanor.
“I don’t sing very often,” Fluttershy said with a little giggle. “I mean, not more than most ponies. I just remembered a song that mother and father used to sing to me if I was afraid of something when it was time for me to go to bed.”
Applejack slowly turned around in her lap and struggled to stand, shaking the worst of the snow off of herself before nodding, prompting Fluttershy to go on, but there was precious little more to say.
“I guess that was most nights, really,” Fluttershy admitted, her blush lending false heat for a second. “Well, until I got older. At least until...” she muttered.
“You miss them a lot,” Applejack gently intoned. “Your parents, I mean. You’ve missed them for years, I guess.”
“It’s my fault. I haven’t lost them, it’s just—just different,” Fluttershy tried, and suddenly the words were as ungainly and awkward as her wings during her first flight. These were private thoughts, things she didn’t speak of; they were thoughts, and certainly not a conversation topic for a frozen mountain top. Still, she spoke.
“I even went to visit them last year,” Fluttershy said, tugging on her cloak. “And, um, well, I left the same day because I was afraid they would ask about things, and I didn’t want to lie. Dinner was really quiet.”
Applejack nodded slowly and shuffled a little closer at that.
“I do miss them. I always have,” Fluttershy continued, her neck tingling oddly as she forced herself to speak. “I miss Rainbow Dash, too. I don’t know how, or why. I mean, of course I miss her, I miss everypony!” she blurted, her heart racing. “I miss them all so much, but Rainbow Dash—”
Rainbow Dash what? She had absolutely no idea. Her own words echoed in her mind. Not strong enough. A million variants of the same sentiment, of the hundreds of ways in which she couldn’t compare to Dash, and most of them words she rationally knew were silly.
“But you could have it back,” Applejack said. Her gaze was levelled at Fluttershy, and her voice was not unkind, but it lacked that intensity she had expected. No command. Perhaps no hope, either. “You could fix it all with the truth, either to R.D. or your parents,” she added, but Fluttershy saw that Applejack didn’t expect her words to do anything. And she was right.
“Maybe,” was all she could muster, and silence settled between the pair. Here, sheltered from the wind, there was a certain peace to the way the great white flakes of snow drifted down from the sky to settle. It was a quiet, beautiful danger, and Fluttershy had been staving off the desire to lay down and sleep for a long while. Applejack, on the other hoof, seemed far less inclined to do just that.
“It’s different for me,” Applejack grumbled. “My family means a lot to me, and I ain’t used to being apart from them. May be I lost track of things just then. Picked some bad words to say.”
Fluttershy nodded at that and dipped her head. Sometimes, more stubborn ponies struggled with the word itself, but she could tell the apology for what it was.
“Different but the same,” Applejack added, rolling her neck. “Far as I can tell, we both want to get home, and I don’t know about you, but I want me some of those fruits in there.”
On one hoof, Fluttershy was very glad to see Applejack regaining some of her usual strength and posture. On the other, she didn’t particularly like the way the powerfully built farmpony was grinning at the barrier in front of them.
“Um, Applejack?” she asked as Applejack took a few steps away from the dome.
“Sugar,” Applejack said, her eyes never leaving the shimmering colors of the magical wall. “I’m getting mighty tired of havin’ it rubbed in my face how I ain’t got any magic. Sure, there are the Elements, and I’ll pay you ten bits when we get back if you can name a better farm in Equestria than Sweet Apple Acres. Ain’t like it’s a problem back home, but so far in this apple-forsaken journey, it’s been getting on my nerves, I’ll say that.”
“That’s—I’m sorry?” Fluttershy tried, but that unsettling grin on Applejack’s face was hardening as she scratched the ground with a forehoof.
“Let me show you some real magic,” Applejack growled. “Earth pony magic that I have spent years makin’.”
“I’m not sure you should!” Fluttershy squeaked, but the earth pony mare was already moving. Applejack galloped forwards, picking up an awful lot of speed in a short distance before she spun on her forehooves. When she kicked out with her hindlegs, it was in a blur of orange that rang the magic force field like a bell, a deep reverberating thrum echoing off the mountains that circled them like rolling thunder. Fluttershy tried to speak, to protest, but her words were drowned out by a still-building crescendo. The roar shook the very bridge they stood upon and took long seconds to die.
Fluttershy gaped. Where Applejack had braced herself, she could see the metal of the bridge had a faint depression, testament to the strength of the blow. Applejack herself didn't rest for a second. The farmpony was already backing away for another run, no doubt eager to channel her weeks of frustrations into another buck.
“Let. Us. In,” she roared as she charged again. Fluttershy had watched Applejack at work before, but this was no gentle, practiced maneuver. On her second impact, the shield shook. While she ofcourse didn’t know how proper magic was supposed to work, preferring to leave all that scary business to Twilight, there was a profound absurdity to the way the colors shied away from the impacts. It looked like when Fluttershy would gently poke her hoof at a thin cover of ice over a puddle when fall was becoming winter.
“Applejack, please, stop!” she called. Applejack was breathing heavily and steadying herself for another charge, but halted at Fluttershy’s words.
“It’s working,” Applejack breathed.
“It could be dangerous!” Fluttershy cried. “You don’t know what the magic does!”
“Better’n nothing,” Applejack shrugged, lowering her head. Fluttershy hurried over to stand in her way.
“It really isn’t, it’s just making a lot of noise, but it won’t help,” Fluttershy tried again, holding out a leg to try to ward her off, but Applejack perked up, peering over Fluttershy’s shoulders with a triumphant smirk.
“Bet you three bits and an apple you’re wrong, sug’,” Applejack laughed.
Glancing over her own flank, Fluttershy could see amidst the swirls of color that somepony was approaching. Rather, something was approaching. Close by on the other side, something that bore the shape of a pony was walking towards them with no real hurry. The thing was translucent, a ghostly white unicorn. Fluttershy shrank back, not quite convinced this was a victory.
“Well, alright, make it two bits and half an apple,” Applejack murmured as she walked over to stand side by side with Fluttershy.
“Two Elements of Harmony approach.”
Fluttershy squeaked and whipped her head around trying to locate the speaker, nearly colliding with Applejack who was doing the exact same thing. The two ponies exchanged confused glances, and as one, finally looked back through the barrier to the spectral pony stood completely still on the opposite side.
“Did you hear that too?” Fluttershy asked. She suddenly realized why she couldn’t find whomever had spoken; the voice had come from inside her own head.
“Sure as sugar did,” Applejack murmured. “Reckon it’s this here feller who spoke?”
“The speaker was I, Castellan of Dreamspire.”
Applejack squinted and furrowed her brow, leaning forward until her snout touched the translucent dome. “Is that a yes?” she asked, but the creature made neither movement nor sound.
“But we don’t have the Elements with us,” Fluttershy protested, though she glanced at her neck just to make sure.
“I was not made to contradict, and so I will not,” the voice asserted. It was melodious but intangible, echoing strangely and sounding neither masculine nor feminine. It was all too easy to confuse the voice with her own thoughts—thoughts that were, at the moment, quietly chanting oh my goodness oh my goodness.
“Gotta be this one,” Applejack shrugged. “Fine, I’ll play. Who are you?”
“I am Castellan of Dreamspire,” the voice echoed, its words completely devoid of emotion.
“And you speak Equestrian,” Applejack suggested, scratching her head through her hat. “Didn’t ponies speak awful different way back when?”
“I speak in meanings. You understand them as you will.”
“Right, okay,” Applejack snorted. “Changed my mind. Fluttershy, you deal with this for a second, will you? I’m already building a right powerful headache. Ain’t got no patience for riddles.”
“Oh. Okay,” Fluttershy said, clearing her throat. “Um, may we please come in?”
“No.”
Fluttershy awkwardly scratched her cheek. At her side, Applejack rolled her eyes, and she wasn’t quite sure what to make of that. What she did know was that she was very, very cold, and that her legs had stopped being comfortingly numb and had started stinging sharply. Applejack was rubbing her forelegs together, and though she said not a single word of complaint, her face was a rather worrying shade of blue.
“It’s just, um, a pony called Brighthoof came here, we think,” she said trying her best to piece it all together. For a moment, she’d forgotten the real reason they were here, but that thought sparked the next question. “Was he here? Is he here now?”
“Must’ve been a lot of years ago,” Applejack said.
“I can give you that information freely. One did come.”
“Right,” Applejack snapped. “And I reckon you let him pass just fine.”
“He was kin.”
“But we’re all ponies!” Fluttershy squeaked. “And we’re very cold, tired and hungry. I—I mean, we don’t want to be a bother, but...”
“Sugar, I reckon that ain’t much of a real pony,” Applejack sighed, nosing Fluttershy’s neck. “Doubt we can reason with him. Her. It. Whatever.”
The ghostly pony did not object to those words, and Fluttershy’s heart sank further. “What do you do here if you don’t let travellers in? Are you protecting this place?”
“I protect nothing. I am Castellan of the Dreamspire. I am the Dreamspire.”
“So you just going to stand there and watch? Wait,” Fluttershy added, frowning.
“What’s the matter, sugar?” Applejack asked.
“If—um. Oh my. I’m really sorry,” Fluttershy muttered.
“Uh, beg pardon, but mind bringin’ me up to speed here?” Applejack asked, and Fluttershy lay her ears flat as she nodded.
“Sorry, it’s just that, well, if, uh, Castellan—is it okay if I call you that?” Fluttershy asked, but she got no reply, of course. “I just had a thought.”
“Well, then spit it out,” Applejack said.
“If it’s the Dreamspire, if it—or he—is the castle, but he’s not here to let us in, that probably means he can’t do anything to us, or he doesn’t want to, but we’re... a threat.”
“I’m not sure I follow,” Applejack admitted.
“Why would he be here if he doesn’t care, unless you were breaking through?” Fluttershy said, leaning close to the energy barrier. Sure enough, when she looked closely, she could see the tiniest crack where Applejack’s hooves had impacted. “It wants to stop us, but it can’t. I think he’s just trying to scare us away.”
She tried to wipe the rather unwholesome smile from her face, but she found that she couldn’t. It had to be the height or hypothermia, or perhaps she was simply losing it. “Um, Castellan? Let us in, please,” she repeated.
“With a side order of, ‘or we’ll bring this barrier of yours down, courtesy of Bucky McGillycuddy and Kicks McGee’,” Applejack added, catching on.
The barrier parted. After the slowest three seconds of Fluttershy’s life, during which she had plenty of time to envision a million ways in which her certainty was a gamble and her gamble could fail, an oval portal opened in the shimmering wall. Applejack leaped through with a loud whoop, and Fluttershy wasted no time in darting after her.
Once inside, she let out a shuddering breath she did not even know she had been holding; the wind was gone, and it was a little warmer, though by how much, she was too numb to tell. When she let into her mind the idea that she wouldn’t freeze to death, she realized exactly how cold she truly was, every joint stiff and brittle.
Fluttershy had barely completed the thought when she felt a set of strong forelegs wrap around her neck and hold her tight. She returned the hug in earnest, holding on to Applejack with aching limbs for all her worth. Flakes of snow and ice fell out of Applejack’s mane as Fluttershy peered out through the blonde, winter-speckled tresses to look upon the strange ghost-pony where it stared back at them. Castellan faced the pair with its eyeless sockets.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t want to force you,” Fluttershy said, slowly rubbing a hoof up and down the back of Applejack’s neck as her friend did the same. At least she still had feeling. That was a start.
“Apologies have no place. You forced my hoof. The situation has changed.”
“But you didn’t want to let us in,” Fluttershy protested, reluctantly letting go of Applejack who cast the nearby gardens a longing glance that Fluttershy didn’t miss.
“I do not have wants, I have directives and priorities,” the voice replied, and finally, the creature moved. At a sedate walk that left the air distorted in its wake for just a second, the apparition set course for the spire proper. After an exchanged glance, Applejack and Fluttershy followed.
“Cheery sort of fellow,” Applejack murmured, tossing her mane. “Ain’t as cold here as outside. Thought the unicorns fled ‘cause of the weather like the rest.”
“Well, the props at the play didn’t really look a lot like this place, and we know the play isn’t completely true,” Fluttershy hummed as she craned her neck to trace the spire that towered above them. This was no simple stone castle, reminding Fluttershy more than anything of an outsize Canterlot tower that had been added to for decades after its construction, a thousand magic-wielding masons and architects let loose upon the rock with no unified plan.
“A lot of things’re different, Applejack agreed, slowing as they left the bridge and stepped onto the large plateau; the skirt of the spire. While the ponies hesitated, Castellan continued onwards without a sound.
“Um, do you mind if we eat some of the fruit?” Fluttershy asked. No reply. She sought Applejack’s eyes, but her friend merely shrugged.
“Guess that’s a yes?” she asked, but the creature had said all it would say. Without a backwards glance, the ghostly unicorn passed straight through a set of large and ornate wooden doors set in the spire itself. Fluttershy’s coat stood on end, and she couldn’t quite decide which unsettled her the most—the uncanny resemblance to everything she had been told a ghost would be, or its mannerisms. Rather, its lack of mannerisms.
“It’s not a 'no',” Applejack concluded, scanning the garden with narrowed eyes as if though she wasn’t completely pleased with what she saw.
“I guess it would be a little silly to starve just because we didn’t get a yes, and I suppose nopony is going to get hurt,” Fluttershy muttered, agreeing even though it felt a little wrong. Wrong, and very delicious. Even the bark on the trees looked positively edible to her, her stomach clenching; now that the cold was less of an issue, the hunger made itself known. Gingerly she picked her way between some weeds that had grown out of control, helping herself to a few dandelions. Applejack still wasn’t moving.
“Aren’t you going to eat?” Fluttershy asked.
“I swear I saw something red,” Applejack muttered. “Pears. Oranges. Don’t even know what the hay those blue things are—there we are!” she exclaimed, darting off with an unmistakable look of triumph. Fluttershy blinked and followed, climbing out of the overgrown little garden patch and onto the path. On the other side of a plaza adorned with benches and a central fountain, she saw Applejack sidle up to a tree. Fluttershy had to stifle a giggle; it looked like Applejack was ready to give the tree a hug. Instead, she turned and let out a gleeful whoop as she tapped its trunk with her hind-hooves, triggering a rain of red fruit.
“Finally,” Applejack called, knocking her hat back on her head as Fluttershy approached. Bending down, she grabbed a bite of one of the fallen fruits. “Apples.”
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Double update!
The fic is progressing in a way that keeps suprising me.
This has all my attention, until I get distracted.
I can't wait for the next chapter.
You used the word "Lost" way too many time, pal.
1211486 Try stuffing it in the disk tray!
1219613 Very glad to hear it, thank you!
1226031 Well, I hope to continue to please; the surprise is a nice bonus, hah. 2-3 chapters every Wednesday and Saturday.
1226327 I scanned the master doc for the word, and I'm still not sure what you refer to; there's one area where the word occurs a little often, but that one word can have many uses. I'm not sure what to say; I'm sorry?
1226376 You have no idea how much I love ending an update on that note.
Started and caught up with in about four hours; Already looking forward to the next bit! You have written these two perfectly. Still, can't help but feel that t's been a while since you've gone back to show how the others are holding up, but I'm sure the pacing wll end up consistent with the rest of the story; It has been consistent so far! Loving it, and terribly interested in this Garden-of-Eden reminiscent "Dreamspire" place.
Damn, I was hoping these chapters would be Ponyville based. Still like where the story is going though.
So they were denied entrance... by a building. Did I miss something there?
All right, this is different. So Castellan is some sort of magical A.I., left behind to guard the unicorns' (awesome) castle from weak-willed intruders. That is a cool idea, and not what I expected to see at all. Can't wait to see what they can learn from this thing, assuming it doesn't have some kind of backup defense to use on them.
This chapter was an emotional roller coaster. Dreary desperation at the beginning, hope and awe once they found Dreamspire, crushing defeat once they got to the shield, hope again once AJ started attacking, and now... suspense, I guess. The ponies have food and shelter for the moment, but Castellan may not be trustworthy, and there's still the matter of getting out of the mountains and closer to home.
Fluttershy's song was a highlight. It's not a true adventure novel without some music along the way, and this song fit the moment and Fluttershy very nicely. No matter how dire the situation gets, she has her own brand of strength to pull herself and her friends through. And once again, it probably saved their lives. Go Fluttershy.
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I think what 1226327 meant was you use Lost for the title of almost every chapter.
That said, this is a wonderfully written adventure, and I'm looking forward to the next chapter.
This just gets more and more interesting.
Definitely loving the journey so far!
Great so far, I love adventure stories like these.
But is this Flutterdash or Flutterjack?
Minor correction: “A lot of things’re different, Applejack agreed,
Just needs a quotation mark.
Very interesting story so far!
A white and dark blue barrier? Might it have maybe been set by Celestia and Luna together? I know, Celestia's magic is normally portrayed as yellow, which is pretty much the only reason I'm not wholly convinced. If that is the case, then it's almost too bad Applejack didn't break it. I can't imagine a barrier of that strength coming down would go unnoticed by the ones who raised it. Especially if they're still powering it, perhaps subconsciously. And having anyone shatter one of their barriers has got to be cause for at least one of them to check it out at the absolute earliest possibility.
Of course, if the pair got found now, then the story would take a very different turn, if it didn't head straight for the end.