//------------------------------// // The Glacial Sermon // Story: The Call of the Wretched Sea // by Starlix //------------------------------// Among the shattered remains of icy glaciers and collapsing pillars of snow and white laid it’s majesty. Highlighted in the shadows laid by the sun, streaks of black covered crevices and cracks within the icy surface. If not for the sun’s winding grasp, the sheet of white would have appeared to be flat, blankless, when in reality caves and snags, hooks and bends burrowing under the surface scarred the landscape along the endless sheet. Twilight’s hooves trembled in the fluffy snow, her thin form trudging through the heavy grasp of icy particles. Gasping lowly, head burrowed under her hooded cloak, the breaths she breathed shallow and painful under her ribs. Numbing air bit at her face, eyes watering in pain and anger, each passing moment fueling a larger fire within her stomach. The mare’s horn glimmered weakly, a spell as bright as the snow below encasing her for the barest of seconds. A wave of heat pushed into her bones, pressed and shoved deep within by the razor-sharp winds. Above, the sky pulsed strangely, contorting and whipping in spectacularly bizarre motions, angrily pummeling the ground below with a righteous fervor. Clumps of snow crept along the edges of her thick coat, dragging her weight and further offsetting the starved mare, effectively trapping her inside her own clothing. A sudden chill racked her spine, eliciting a muffled groan from the Alicorn, as well as violent shake, racing up her body and through her wings. Lifting her eyes weakly from the monotone white ground, the mare scanned the terrain as far as her half-lidded eyes could reach. Not the barest hint of change was present even out to the horizon, nothing but these pale, ghostly plains of ice and snow. A low, hideous rumbling emerged from the writhing storm above, snowfall, vibrating in the air. The immense call of thunder did nothing but rattle the frazzled mare, even more, her sharp, chipped horn alit with furious energy. Lighting split the skies, drawing her vision in pale, eerie blue light. It was within that grueling, furious din of thunder and pale lightning, that her weary vision made out the slightest of humps in the plains. Twilight’s ever-sharp mind immediately kicked into action, gears cranking inside the beaten mare’s skull. Even the slightest on breaks in the snow indicated something different, something to go off of, anything to break the monotony. Pushing forward against the howling winds, Twilight sloshed through the slush, horn glowing brighter. Straining her hooves in the air, the mare conjured a bubble of pure violet light, it’s strong humming surface, reflecting the blizzard and stemming the wind. With a sharp cry of happiness, the mare flared her unkempt wings, pushing off the ground several feet. The effort on her damaged and unmaintained wings and feathers created a nearly herculean effort just to lift a few feet. Panting as a sudden sweat broke across her coat, the mangled Alicorn pushed through the pain and suffering with nothing but willpower and a unexpected, furious rage. From the slight avenue of sight she was afforded, the hill easily gave way to a dipping cliffside, with only the pale blue light shining down from above every few seconds letting her make out the slightest curves in the snow. As the Antarctic wasteland played her game of bloody dice, Twilight pushed forward, teeth gritted and brows furrowed tightly. A roiling, heated feeling of nausea swept over her stomach, the strain of flight causing her insides to react poorly. Bringing a tattered and matted hoof to her muzzle, she kept the heaving at bay, mind solely focused on the possibility of shelter from this storm. It would only be temporary. It rained for centuries on the ocean. The snow would not be stopping. With a weak gasp, Twilight’s wings suddenly locked, sending her reeling forward. A startled whimper barely managed to escape her before she plowed right back into the snow, the momentum from her flight sending her careening off the rapidly approaching cliffside. The fall wasn’t too far, yet it felt like minutes had passed in the meantime. Twilight’s bubble disbanded with a sound akin to shattering glass, the spell matrix rapidly deteriorating under the strain. Fifteen feet closed quickly, Twilight slamming into the hard-packed snow with force. A strangled scream, wretched and wet, wrenched forward, the sound of a sickly snapping filling the air before being quickly swept away into the winds of mayhem. The mare laid there for several moments, chest heaving up and down. Sharp raw, burning hot pain pulsed from her right wing. The pain burned straight through her, the full force of her weight lying on the appendage, yet she couldn’t move. Not while the thunder ravaged the heavens above. In that nightmarish haven above, she could hear it. A mournful, echoing call spewing forth from the clouds like a spring rain, the sound reverberating within her head over and over. Breathing weakly, the storm fell away from her sense. Everything fell around her. Only the whale remained. Only the whale. At the end, it would be there. At the beginning, it would be there. Life flooded through her and Twilight shot to her hooves with a strangled gasp, shaking the building snow from her body. Her manic eyes, met the wing at her side, dragging limply, the pain shooting up her shoulder almost immediately. The mare pushed a hoof into her mouth, horn lighting up dimly. Her teeth punctured flesh, a blood-curdling scream of agony ripping out of the mare’s throat as the wing in question pulled up against her coat, Twilight could only moan in pain as she began to frantically rush towards the mouth of the cliffside. A shallow dip in the whitewashed rock wall showed a tiny opening about the size of two of her. Gnashing her teeth and pushing the bleeding hoof forwards, the mare dragged her body against the snowfall, pushing with the last reserves of dwindling strength and willpower. Her body nearly gave out the second she was given reprieve of the blizzard, her body slumping against the opening as she carefully squeezed her way inside. An unnatural darkness seemed to reside inside, her vision limited to a foot or two in front of her. Ducking her head, the mare was forced nearly onto her belly, crawling along the ice cold ground. The chipped and jagged pebbles along the floor scraped against her hide, however, Twilight hardly felt it against the agonizing burning of her wing. Pumping a small number of her reserves, the mare shakily attempted to illuminate the tiny crawl space ahead. Fear of many things pushed at the barriers of her mind, many of which she did her best to not entertain. Despite the fear of the chamber collapsing on top of her, not to mention a few other unnatural and terrifying possibilities, Twilight felt a compulsion take over her, giving her no choice but to proceed. The dip into the cave was steep, and Twilight quickly lost her balance, tripping over her own hooves and falling down the steep incline. She tumbled without sound, lacerations being torn into her by jagged icicles stuck to the floor like a stubborn child. Laying at the bottom of the fall, the mare groaned weakly, a sweat breaking across her brow and the cold shivers spiking with fervor from pain and stress. As it was trained to do, her mind quickly displaced itself once the pain started to grow more intense, her horn lighting up automatically as she shakily pushed herself to her hooves. With a dull plaster shining in her eyes, Twilight warily scanned the inside of the dark cave. Hardly a shade of light shone within, merely the dim glimmer from outside illuminating a slight shade of the hill she found herself at the base of. Something about seeing this darkness set off alarms inside her own head, the absence of night being a near constant in this purgatory for Celestia knows how long had left the mare with a striking unfamiliarity with the lack of light. Limbs shaking slightly from fear, Twilight took a few steps forward, a dim light blinking into her own and illuminating the area directly around her for three or four feet, just enough to see. With distress, something odd happened. Any further light she attempted to force into the chamber just vanished into the foggy darkness around her as if the light itself was being sucked out of the air. Her mouth hung open, dry and gasping. Groaning, Twilight channeled the energy harder, opening more pathways for the spell matrix to flow through, yet no matter the complexity, no matter the source, no matter the strength of energy, the light fizzled away, sucked into the unknown depths of the cave. Swallowing hard, Twilight stood dead still in the center of the chamber, eyes frantically whirling around. Shadows danced around on the edge of sight, surrounding her and pulsing in waves, held back only by the dim, flickering light of her horn, shining in the dark, a beacon like a star against the dark. Or a lighthouse for those within it. Flicking her long bangs from her eyes, Twilight slowly moved to the edge of the chamber, laying a hoof against it and tracing the fetlock along the drying cracks. An idea came to mind, one that she immediately set into motion. Spurred on by the action, the thrill of a mystery to solve, one to see through, the mare quickly followed the wall, hugging close as she followed it’s pathing. Starting from the point where the entrance, it’s hazy light that of a point of reference, she followed the wall all the way around, careful to note every dip within it’s surface. Fighting to ignore the biting cold digging into her body within this dark, damp chamber, Twilight kept her still hazy mind focused on the task at hand. She did her best to ignore the slick streaks of cold blood dripping down her back, not giving mind to the gentle sounds it made as it feel to the icy floor below. With careful, practiced motions, the mare outlined the walls, the glow from her horn giving her just the barest notice of the land around her before it vanished into the trembling void suffocating the majority of the chamber. As she began to loop almost back around to the entrance to the cave, a dip in the wall ahead showed itself. Heart pumping faster at the sight, a chilly smile began to cover over her muzzle, the motions feeling almost alien by this point. Rushing over, she slid to a stop just before it, peeking into the shallow dip with caution. Her analytical gaze quickly noted the similarities it showed with the cave entrance she had stumbled upon before. The fiery ache in her back was enough to remind her that this time a stricter level of caution would be wise. They would not be so lucky again. Pushing her head into the dip, it appeared that the drop was just as steep if not steeper than the first. A gulp forced itself down her throat, Twilight eyes becoming slightly glossy as fear welled up to replace her brief spike of happiness. Casting her eyes back to the first dip she had fallen into, she felt an odd sensation overwhelm her. Looking back at that tight, narrow entrance into the unknown cave, this dredging darkness, it made her composure falter. The hazy, saturated light that dwelled from outside had been hellish, but that was all she had known. She hated it, but at the same time, she could hardly bear to part from it. Like a dying, old friend, it tortured her by both being alive and not quite dead yet. Better the hell she knew than the one she didn’t. It took an actual effort to rip her eyes from the light at the top of the tunnel, but as she gazed further down the burrowing pathway downwards into the earth, Twilight felt an odd compulsion willing her downwards, further into this odd cave, this unbearable darkness. A tear welled up in her eye and slid down her face silently. With a grunt, she forced herself into the hole, sliding down the black pit as the light in her horn vanished, the matrix collapsing as she lost focus. The slide down into the deeper section of the cave was not as uncontrolled as the first. Just barely. Twilight noticed almost immediately that she was sliding, far, far longer than before. Panic flooded into her veins as the possibility of the incline suddenly breaking off and sending her plummeting into an endless abyss. With careful focus, the alicorn pushed those thoughts back, immediately putting together the spell matrix and relighting her surroundings. As soon as the matrix was functioning and the meager light was restored, the incline flattened out, sending the mare sliding on the hard ground with a constrained grunt. Moaning weakly, and muttering a few weak curses, Twilight quickly and rather ungracefully got back to her hooves. The darkness remained, this time, seemingly more intense. Eyes hiding low under her brow, Twilight fought to keep the matrix alive, finding it much more difficult this time. While the darkness from before was impenetrable, this, this was something else. It was colder down here, much colder. The very fringes of her fur grew stiff, hardly able to handle the pervasive cold. Twilight was starting to sorely wish her coat hadn’t been lost in that storm from the surface. The matrix struggled under the weight of something. Twilight could feel it, a pressure, it’s energy focused on her head, attempting to snuff out the life whirling through her veins and blood and up into her brain. This darkness was malicious, alive in it’s very own manner, unpleased and uncomfortable with the bastion of light standing alive and bright in the middle of it’s territory. Despite the terror threatening to sweep her off her hooves, Twilight remained steadfast. Her brain had been comatose for so long, drowned underneath the weight of water, an entire ocean full of it, the life on that ship being one of forced obedience, nothing to stimulate her naturally active mind. But now, now…. Now she had something to focus on. A coil of magical energies began to pool around her, something stirring within, not entirely awake, but no longer held under. Gritting her teeth, Twilight felt the pounding pressure bubbling in her skull, vile and primordial, it threatened to take her over any second now. Opening her eyes just a tad, Twilight view had been reduced to a meager two feet. With a gasping, uneven breath, Twilight funneled as much of her magical reserves as she could into holding her spell together, while quickly building up the strength to begin walking. She needed to map this room, find her bearings. Underneath all that pressure, all that fear, something dragging her along still remained. She hadn’t even begun to think about it yet, however, it began to become more apparent to her that something wasn’t quite right. Twilight decided to focus her efforts on the same strategy as before, follow the wall, find the next step of the pathway. With efforts born of pure will, the alicorn paced the edge, hugging the wall. Her teeth chattered and her limbs began to shake with a peak fervor. She walked. Hugging her wings close to her side, she walked, moving like a robot, mind on that of two things. Walk and hold the matrix. Walk and hold the matrix. The further along the fall she began to follow, Twilight found that the solid, rock-like consistency that made up the majority of the hollowed out cavern rounded off very suddenly to one of ice, pure and easy to identify. Curiosity burning in her veins, Twilight raced along the edge, carefully making note of where the ice was. A few steps later it ended, merging back with the rock once more. Intrigued, Twilight moved, compelled with that strange energy once more, back to the ice. Tracing her eyes carefully along it’s surface, it looked roughly the same along the four-foot stretch of it’s entirety, though, with the pervasive darkness, it was hard to truly tell how honest that was. The longer she focused on that wall, the stronger the pressure building in skull became, and just as much, the more forceful that mysterious compulsion became. Her headache became more incised, the pain began. Angered, Twilight forced a hoof against her forehead, massaging the area just underneath her horn, yet no relief came, in fact, it grew stronger by the second. As she opened her eyes, Twilight noted with no short amount of panic, that the hazy darkness around her was moving attempting even more furiously to snuff out the light she was creating. More importantly, it was moving heavily on the wall. Compulsion flared inside her head, overshadowing the pressure for just a moment. Twilight became much, much more interested in the ice wall ahead, noting for the first time, an odd shape just barely noticeable within. Gritting her teeth, finally, understanding, understanding the unusual crushing, suffocating darkness around didn’t want her to reach this point. Whatever was in here, it didn’t want her to see whatever was inside that wall. That odd compulsion, like that of an aching hunger, pushing her forward against her will, against her better common sense, it all was for this. Whatever was in that blasted ice wall. Twilight had to know. She had to. Planting her hooves squarely against the ground, Twilight closed her eyes, straining with all her might to call upon whatever magical energies rested inside this dead land, all that still remained pooled inside her, in the very core of her soul. She needed all of it. Winding the spell tighter, Twilight fed all of her strength into her head, funneling that spell into her horn with whatever energy, whatever life was still inside her body, withered away by time as it was. Shadows began to grow, tumultuous fighting against the lighthouse before it, trying to drown her. It held valiantly for several minutes, pushing the weakened alicorn back with a might she herself couldn’t muster. Angered and distressed, Twilight shrieked out, a blinding pain splitting her skull open as she rammed every inch of her remaining power into her horn, a brilliant, red-tinged light pulsing through the room suddenly. Twilight was faintly aware of the shadows themselves shrieking lowly as they dissolved. Silence reigned for several moments. Twilight hovered in place, wings immobile, head slumped over as if unconscious. The mare fell to the ground, her head resting on her forearms, breathing heavily, greedily sucking in gulps of the tainted air around her. A dribble of blood slipped down her horn, sliding into the fur on her muzzle. Opening her eyes blearily, Twilight looked up at the wall, weakly and with evident confusion. Her mouth fell open. Disbelief and denial ebbed into her eyes, she began shaking her head feebly. Tears fell from her eyes, and a choked sob threatened to spill out of her throat. She wanted to look away, yet she couldn’t. She had to look. She was forced to look…. …..At the figure, easily distinguishable now, it’s white coat and stylized purple mane shining brightly in the light from Twilight’s horn. It’s eyes were closed as if sleeping. She looked healthy, alive and well, yet completely imprisoned in the wall. Twilight screaming loudly, her voice breaking and shuddering, before dying out with a wet cough. Rarity slept on, completely unaware.