//------------------------------// // IX - Under The Ice // Story: Rise and Shine // by Skijarama //------------------------------// But the storm would not let them go that easily. The family soon realized how completely unprepared they were for the journey ahead, and for this, the frozen world demanded a high price... “DAD!” Celestia shrieked at the top of her lungs. A rush of adrenaline flooded her veins as terror gripped her heart. She took a frantic step forward, her wings flaring instinctively. Her heart twisted tighter in her chest when she briefly saw Sprout’s face appearing through the hectic splashes he was making in the water. She could just make out his exclamations from here. He was shaking. The cold was stealing his breath so much he could barely even gasp. “Sprout!” Honey exclaimed, stepping in front of Celestia with her eyes wide and fearful. “H-h-help!” Sprout called out before his words were swallowed by the freezing rapids under the ice that now threatened to pull him under. His voice was laced with a fear and panic that Celestia had never heard before, and it put a horrible feeling in her gut. She took a step back, a quiet, mortified whimper slipping out of her. “Mom, do something!” Luna shouted, reaching out and shaking Honey by the foreleg. “Help him!” Celestia wasn’t sure what Honey could do in this situation. She didn’t know what any of them could do, and that was the worst part. She felt so powerless, standing there on the frozen bank, watching her father struggle against the water. Suddenly, Honey stepped forward. She quickly lowered herself onto her belly, her eyes aglow with fiery resolve and her jaw set. She spread her legs as wide as she could, then looked back to Celestia. “Slide me to him!” she ordered, the intensity in her voice leaving no room for debate. Celestia hesitated briefly. “What about us?!” she asked. “What do Luna and I-” “You stay put!” Honey snapped, cutting her off. “Now stop talking and push me!” Another splash from Sprout chased away any further questions. All they could do was act, and they had to act now! With a frightened whimper, she ran up to Honey, her horn lighting up with golden light. She gave her adoptive mother a hearty shove, sending her sliding across the ice toward Sprout’s location. The ice crackled under her as she went, but not nearly as much as when she had been walking. With that, it was out of Celestia’s hooves. She and Luna watched with bated breath as the brown earth pony mare slid swiftly across the frozen river. The bumps and ridges that had once been ripples and white caps made the journey bumpy, and the occasional gasp of pain could be heard coming from the mare, but she did not make any effort to stop herself until she reached her target. Honey reached out and caught herself on a stray branch jutting up from the water near where Sprout was struggling. The branch sagged from the sudden weight, and an audible snap could be heard from the ice. Honey glanced down but did not waste any time. She turned to where Sprout was struggling. He was getting weaker, his helpless splashing barely enough to keep his head afloat. Honey stretched herself as far as she could, reaching a hoof out to Sprout. “Grab on!” she shouted to him, her voice tense from the strain of stretching herself so far. Celestia winced, imagining the pain that must have been flaring in her shoulders and forelegs from such a position. Thankfully, Sprout had enough strength left to start reaching out. One hoof managed to prop himself up on the edge of the ice while the other reached shakily for Honey’s hoof. Celestia’s breathing was slowly starting to calm down. It was all going to be okay, she kept telling herself. Just a few more inches and Honey would haul him out of the water. Then they could find somewhere sheltered, get a fire going, and get him warmed up.  “Come on…” she whispered, walking anxiously in place. “Come on… come ooonnn…!” Sprout’s shivering hoof coiled around Honey’s. Celestia heard Luna let off a quiet sigh of relief off to her side. The wind howled in the distance.  Crack. Suddenly, the ice under Honey caved, eliciting a startled shriek from her. Celestia cried out when she saw the chunk of ice her mother was on slant dangerously towards the water, and her heart flash-froze when she realized that Honey was about to fall into the water, too. “NO!” the sisters shouted at the same time.  Luna turned to Celestia, her eyes wide and frantic with panic. “What do we do?! Tia, do something!” she begged, grabbing onto her sister. “Help them!” Celestia didn’t need to be told twice. Casting aside both caution and her mother’s previous orders, she quickly tore off her coat with her magic to free her wings. The cold wind bit at her skin under her fur, but the adrenaline flooding her veins burned like a furnace hot enough to melt a glacier. A little snow wouldn’t be able to stop her now. “Hang on!” she shouted as she kicked off from the shore, flying for her parents. “I’m coming!” Once again, however, the wind saw fit to intervene. Celestia cried out in shock as a biting gust of freezing wind slammed against her like a barrier, sending a thick veil of snow in front of her face to obscure her vision. She swore under her breath and tried as hard as she could to push through it. “Dangit!” she strained through grit teeth. She lit her horn, calling on all of the power she had to try and force the wind back. Not with control of the weather, but with simple brute strength. “Stupid wind! GET OUT OF MY WAY!” The wind held firm against her for several seconds before, at last, it began to retreat from Celestia’s magic. She let out a triumphant gasp as she tore through the invisible barrier. She looked down and saw Sprout and Honey struggling to pull themselves free from the water. Honey was only partially submerged, her belly and parts of her legs under the surface. Her face was contorted in agony, though, and her eyes were screwed shut as she struggled to keep not only Sprout but herself from sliding completely into the water. “Just hold on!” Celestia shouted, circling down. She dare not touch her hooves down on the water, though. She came to a stop behind them to try and assess the situation. She could hear the sound of the water flowing rapidly under the ice, an ominous roar that reverberated and crackled like a trillion shards of glass under a dragon’s claw. “C-C-Celestia!” Sprout stuttered, his eyes locking onto her. “W-w-what are you-” “Dad, I say this with love, but shut up!” Celestia cut him off, her horn lighting up even brighter. She reached out, wrapping both her mother and her father in her grasp and attempting to lift them up and out of the rapids. She gasped in strain when the flow of the water seemed to be actively pulling them down with its momentum, offering fierce resistance to her efforts to lift them up. Another audible crack filled the air, and the sloped slab of ice that Honey had been precariously perched on broke away underneath her entirely. Celestia’s heart almost stopped in her chest when her mother, too, plunged into the depths. “MOM!” she cried out, trying to pull them back up and out of the water. The river was too strong. Celestia began to hyperventilate as Honey’s weight plowed into Sprout, sending them both under the water. The current snatched them both out of Celestia’s grasp, carrying them downstream beneath the ice. “No, no, no! Dangit!” Celestia babbled frantically as she took off after them. Her horn glowed brighter as she tried to reach for her parents. To her rapidly mounting panic and frustration, however, she couldn’t get a solid grip on them through the ice. It acted as a solid barrier, disrupting the flow of her magic before it could reach her parents. Her blood was beginning to freeze to match the world around her. Tears were breaching her eyes as her mind raced frantically for a solution. But what could she do? With the ice blocking her path… She gasped. That was it! The ice! With a grimace, she turned and flew farther downstream, as fast as her wings could carry her. She glanced off to the side, spying Luna sprinting along the shore to keep up. Her eyes were alight with a frantic terror of their own. When she looked ahead, her heart all but stopped in her chest. A series of thick rocks stretched up through the ice up ahead. They were sharp and jagged. She didn’t want to imagine what would happen if Sprout and Honey crashed into them. Gasping for breath, Celestia touched down on the ice before the rocks. The ice crackled under her hooves, and she slipped for a moment, her hooves scrambling for purchase before she stabilized herself. Satisfied, she spun to her parents. She could still make out their faint silhouettes under the ice, coming straight for her. Celestia looked down at the ice. “Give them back!” she snapped before pumping her wings and lifting into the air. Then, with a guttural cry, she dove down, hind legs first, and kicked the ice as hard as she could. White-hot pain danced up her leg from the force of the impact, drawing a scream of pain from her. Her effort was rewarded, however, as a spiderweb-shaped crack formed on the surface of the ice. It did not, however, break all the way through. “Tia!” Luna called from the shore. Celestia looked to see her standing right at the river’s edge, one hoof lifted, her coat shed, allowing her to spread her wings, revealing the ugly bruise on her barrel. “Just stay there!” Celestia shouted, thrusting a hoof at her sister. She winced in pain as more weight went to her now-throbbing hind legs. She glared back down at the ice. She only had a few more seconds before her parents would pass by her! With another scream, she reared up on her hind legs, flapped her wings, and stomped down with her forehooves with all the might she could muster. This time, she broke through. The ice buckled and shattered under the force of her hooves like breaking glass. Sharpened shards of ice dug into her skin, burning like fire before the beyond freezing water stole the feeling from her nerves. She gasped involuntarily from the shock, almost losing focus. Then she felt an incredible weight slam into her hooves as her parents finally reached her. She grabbed on and lifted with everything she had. Her wings, her hooves. Even her horn flared to life as she ensnared Sprout and Honey in her magic grasp. But even with all of that, the sudden weight dragged her down. Her hooves dipped deeper into the water, and she could feel the biting current slashing at her chest. She grit her teeth and screamed through them, barely able to hold her parents in place. She felt them drifting past and under her. She briefly saw Honey’s wide, frantic eyes looking back up at her, her brown hoof curled around Celestia’s, before she vanished back under the water again. Celestia screamed with strain. Even with her magic, she was struggling to just keep her parents where they were. Lifting living beings in her magic had always been harder than lifting inanimate objects, or the fallen trees around their house. She didn’t know why, but right now it was a very inconvenient truth. “Gah! Come on!” Celestia bellowed at the top of her lungs, pumping her wings for all they were worth. “Get up! You have to get up!” The water was biting at her shoulders and the bottom of her chin. She was losing ground, slowly but surely, to the strength of the current. She was beginning to lose feeling in her forelegs altogether, aside from the burning pain in the rest of her body from holding up the weight of her family against the river. But she couldn’t lift them any further. She realized with dread and horror gripping her heart that she was at her limit. Between the wind sapping her magic at every turn, the ice blocking her spells even further, and the river carrying an impossible amount of force in its current, she had nothing left she could bring to the table. “DARNIT!” she screamed. She looked up and around for anything that could be of help, but there was nothing. It was just them. Just them, the frozen river, the supernatural wind, the biting snow, and the dark, ominous clouds that smothered the sky. Celestia’s eyes lingered on the clouds above. For a brief moment, time seemed to stand still. Her ears perked up. She thought she could hear something. Something was calling to her. Not a voice. But… something. It was distant, though. Muffled. Whatever it was, she couldn’t make it out or even discern a direction. Just that it was reaching for her, but it could not reach her. The clouds almost seemed to glow in response to the call before Celestia was snapped back to reality by the first taste of water in her mouth. She had dropped another few inches, and now it was starting to touch her wings with every flap. She screwed her eyes shut and took a deep breath. She wasn’t going to give up. She couldn’t! She had to save her family! ...But what about Luna? Celestia’s mind drifted to the smaller, frightened filly, and she looked over at the shore. Her heart spiked with fear and panic when she saw no sign of her little sister. Just her coat discarded by the river’s edge. “MOM! DAD!” A shadow passed over her. Celestia looked up to see Luna diving down for them, her horn aglow and her hooves outstretched. “Luna!?” Celestia exclaimed in confusion. Water slipped into her mouth and into her throat, eliciting a series of painful coughs from her as it attempted to invade her lungs. She hacked and coughed to get it out, feeling the chill in her core. She also felt something wrapping around her barrel from behind, and the weight pulling her into the water lessening significantly. Finally opening her eyes, she realized what was happening. Luna had grabbed onto her from above, using her own wings to pull Celestia up. They gained several inches, and when Honey’s shivering hoof came back above the water, Celestia realized with a start that Luna’s magic was blending with hers. “...Thank you,” she whispered quietly before focusing on pulling her parents out. With every inch the sisters gained, the weight became easier to lift. The effects of the water faded steadily, and the ice became less of a barrier as the now shivering, pale earth ponies were lifted out of the rapids. Finally, with one last pull, Sprout and Honey were liberated from the ice. Celestia felt a surge of relief on seeing them again and had to resist the urge to hug them tight. First, though, they had to get to the shore. Together, she and Luna carried their parents in their magic the rest of the way. They set Sprout and Honey down on the bank a ways away from the river. With that, Celestia was finally spent. She crumpled into the snow, gasping for breath. “Mom! Dad!” Luna’s voice echoed in her ears, loud and quivering with tears of both relief and fear. “You’re okay! Oh my gosh, I was so scared!”  Celestia could hear Honey giving a low, muttered response, but she couldn’t make out the words through the ringing in her ears. She simply took a moment to close her eyes and rest. The burning in her muscles remained, and she imagined it would for a while yet, but at least she had succeeded. Her mother and father were safe, now. “Everything is going to be fine…” Her moment of tranquility was broken by Luna giving a horrified gasp. “Dad! Y-y-you’re leg…!”  A spike of adrenaline shot into Celestia’s veins, even as her mind and body both begged for a respite. She forced herself to power through it, though, and rose to a sitting position to see what was wrong. Her eyes fell on Sprout’s prone form to see the stallion laying prone. His eyes were closed, his body was shivering uncontrollably, and he was still noticeably pale. What drew the eyes of everypony present, however, was his right hind leg. It was horribly swollen just below the knee joint. Celestia felt her stomach churn in disgust. “H-h-he must’ve hit something while we were under,” Honey gasped, her stuttering voice filled with fear. She went to rise, but gasped and fell back to the ground with a cry of pain. “MOM!” Luna exclaimed, quickly placing her hooves on Honey’s side. “Are you hurt?! What do we do?!” Honey shook her head. “I’m f-fine, Luna. Just… Just t-t-tired. And c-cold,” she managed before looking at Celestia. “We need to get dry.” Celestia nodded. They weren’t out of the woods yet, literally and figuratively. “Right. Fire?” she asked as she forced herself to stand back up. She wobbled slightly on her hooves but found her balance soon enough. “And shelter, if there’s any around,” Honey nodded in acknowledgment. “I’ll have a look.” “What about me?” Luna asked anxiously, nudging Honey with a hoof. “I wanna help, too!” Honey smiled weakly down at her. “G-g-go get your b-bags. If you have any b-blankets, we need them s-so we can d-d-dry off and warm up.” Luna hesitated for a second, before nodding. “O-okay,” she mumbled. She then turned and ran off down the shore to where their saddlebags and coats had been discarded. Celestia watched her go before turning back to Honey. “What about his leg?” she asked, her eyes lingering on the ugly swell on Sprout’s leg. “Soon,” Honey replied shakily, pulling Sprout’s unconscious form closer with her foreleg. “Go. I just need a little rest.” Celestia hesitated for only a moment before she spun on her hooves and galloped into the trees, her eyes searching frantically for firewood. “If this is what it takes just to cross a river,” Celestia thought. “Then I really don’t want to imagine what the rest of this journey’s going to be like.”