//------------------------------// // The Ride of Her Life // Story: Surviving Sand Island // by The 24th Pegasus //------------------------------// Meanwhile… Rarity paced beneath the wreckage of the hull. Every so often, the thing would creak, groan, and shift as Gyro moved about inside of it. A few times, Rarity attempted to stabilize the hull with her magic, but it was much too heavy for her to influence in any way, especially with a horn as exhausted as hers. She just hoped Gyro knew what she was doing. Pacing wasn’t getting her anywhere, so she sighed and turned toward the interior of the island archipelago. Nothing but green trees and white sand greeted her, the palms rising and falling with the contour of the land. She counted eight or nine separate islands, barely divided by little channels of water, with maybe more tiny ones hidden from sight by the thick canopy of the jungle. But there was no sign of a blue pegasus. Nothing larger than parrots flew between the trees, shrilly shrieking the entire time. The entire shattered island chain was alive with the noise and music of the wildlife, but a raspy, cracking pegasus’ voice wasn’t carried in their song. Just where was she? By now, Rarity figured it abundantly clear that Rainbow had gone off to explore more of the island after stopping at the wreckage. What she couldn’t understand was why the pegasus hadn’t returned yet. Or, perhaps, a better way of putting it was that she didn’t understand what was keeping Rainbow from returning. She just hoped she was wrong… The wreckage groaned again, and Rarity sent a nervous look over her shoulder. “Gyro, darling?” she shouted, hoping Gyro could hear her from within the splintered wood and steel. “How’s it going in there?” “Good!” came Gyro’s muffled response. Rarity had to point both her ears in that direction and trot a few steps closer just to hear what the mechanic had to say. “I’ve found some parts and stuff. Gonna go through the rest, see what I can find.” “Okay…” Rarity chewed on her lip for a few seconds and ultimately went back to pacing. At this rate, she was going to wear her horseshoes down to nubs. They were already rusty and weakening from so much time spent around salty water. Sooner or later, she’d have to discard them entirely. The minutes dragged on. The clanking and clattering of metal parts from within the hull gave her the only clue she had as to what exactly Gyro was doing, yet even that wasn’t much. She was half tempted to lift herself into the wreckage to supervise the mechanic or something… but she was too exhausted to do it and even if she could, she didn’t want to risk upsetting the wreckage any more. The only thing she could do now was patiently wait for Gyro to return. That was when she heard the shriek of metal followed by the booming of something heavy hitting the interior wall of the wreckage. Rarity flinched and jumped in place, and with widening eyes beheld the entire splintered and sodden wreckage sway violently, pitching downwards and showering pebbles and stones from the single finger of rock it was perched on. Moments later, a terrified and pained scream wormed its way through the cracks in the hull, shooting ice through Rarity’s veins. “Gyro?!” Rarity screamed. “Gyro, are you okay?! What happened?!” A stone the size of a golf ball bounced off the ground and pelted Rarity in the chest, and that was enough to turn her eyes from the sliding wreckage to the finger of stone holding it up. Cracks and fissures opened up in the rough face, and as the wreckage tilted further and further down, shards started to rain across the top of the rocky mesa. Rarity gulped. “I knew this was a bad idea…” With a thunderous boom, the stony spire split across the middle, sending fragments of rock flying in every direction. The piece of the Concordia’s hull careened downwards, the rocky spire on its left shearing a sizable chunk of splintered planks off the hull. The piece of the hull cracked under its own weight, nearly splitting in two as it tumbled off the spire. In that moment, Rarity’s worries over Gyro’s safety evaporated as her own panicked instincts took over. While her mind tried to come up with a plan of action, her legs skipped that entire part and simply acted, sending her galloping away from the cascading tumult of debris advancing on her. But then she realized there wasn’t anywhere to run to. The moment she saw the sheer cliff in front of her, she skidded to a halt, all four hooves jammed into the ground in front of her. She came to a stop just in front of the edge of the mesa, inches from taking a plunge of a hundred feet or more to the ground below. Then the first wave of debris fell upon her. Splintered wood, bands of steel, sharp nuts and bolts washed over Rarity’s body like a tidal wave, sweeping her off her hooves and flinging her off the side of the spire. Screaming, howling, and writhing in adrenaline-deadened pain, Rarity felt her heart fly into her throat as she spun wildly during her descent. The horizon flipped several times, the trees and sky switching places as she spun and flailed. And then the ground came flying up to meet her, so astonishingly fast— Her horn illuminated, mana forcing its way along the grooves without any guidance from her. She faintly felt the buzz of mana in her skull, and before she knew what she was doing, it loosed itself in one final, desperate act of magic. She didn’t know what it was—darkness took her before she hit the ground.