//------------------------------//
// The Day the Earth Froze 
// Story: Legends of Equestria: The Long Road Back 
// by JimmyHook19 
//------------------------------//

It was a fairly normal morning, by all accounts. The city of Los Angeles woke up as normal, and people went to work and lived their lives. But overhead, none of them realised that there was a grave threat hanging over their heads. How could they? After all, nobody knew of Project 722's existence. Although Edmonton in Canada had been destroyed, most people assumed that had been the handiwork of a terrorist group rather than a government agency. As they set about their day, it was then that all went into motion.

Sable Spirit looked at the tracker screen and looked on with a grin as the satellite floated into position. "How long until firing can commence?" she asked.

"We'll be in position in T Minus four minutes," one of the operators replied. "All units, ready the charges, prepare for payload release. Target coming onto monitors now."

Sable Spirit rubbed her hooves in glee as the satellite closed in on Los Angeles. Not only did she have a chance to test project 722's newest and most powerful weapon, she had a chance to get rid of her hated rivals who had plagued her existence for years.

"Satellite is now over the target. Core one is cycling for payload release. All equipment is functioning. We await your order."

Sable Spirit wasted no time in issuing that order. "FIRE!"

"Roger that. Payload released."

Up in outer space, the satellite glowed briefly, before a lock released and what looked like a missile began to fall toward Earth. It flew through the atmosphere, easily surviving re- entry, and roared toward the ground at frightening speed. When it was a mile above its target, the warhead detonated.

But it was not an explosion that followed. Instead, the entire area was covered in ice and cold liquid that soon hardened into ice. It was as if the entire area had been caught inside a snow globe. But Project 722 had just demonstrated the true function of Skyhammer. The satellite used cryoshot warheads, developed from Starswirl's magical energies and Crystal pony magic, to quite literally freeze anything that Project 722 wanted.

And today, that meant the hotel and block where Starswirl and Mistmane were.





Mistmane and Starswirl were suddenly awakened by a loud bang and what sounded like ice shattering. They got out of bed and went over to the window, opening the curtains as they did so, and gasped at once.

Everything before them was covered in thick sheets of ice that didn't look natural. For one, it was incredibly thick. For another, it was a bright sunny day, and the thermometer was well above freezing. "Giant greats!" said Starswirl. "Where did all this ice come from?"

"You can ask that again," Mistmane replied.

"Where did all this ic-"

"Not literally. The ice appears to run all the way to the door, and over it, and even onto the roof of this building. We need to find a way to cut ourselves out without compromising the structural integrity of the building, or else it may be crushed under the weight of all this ice."

"Why not try melting some of it?" Starswirl suggested. "If we and a few other unicorns cast a heat spell, we can melt the ice in stages, ensuring that the load never gets too heavy on one side of the building and that the weight of the ice is distributed evenly."

"Excellent idea!" Mistmane said. "Let's give it a shot!"

And so, they rounded up every unicorn staying there and, after using heat magic to cut a tunnel to the outside world, they started the process of melting the ice surrounding the hotel.

It took them several minutes to finish melting all the ice, but by the time they were done the giant pools of icy cold water were the only evidence of such an incident having occurred. But the question that was on everypony's mind was what had caused this to happen? Such a mystery could be solved at a later date, but for now Starswirl and Mistmane had places to be and things to go and do. So, having collected their supplies, and got themselves ready for another long journey, they set off on their way. It was time, after all, for them to head to the coordinates that Flash Magnus had supplied. And it was set to be a long journey too.

The duo passed underneath another of the interesting ice sculptures that had appeared on the route they had taken, and went south, before taking a right turn on the road they were on and following that right turn up with another right turn, which led them onto another critical road for their journey, a large, multiple lane road that stretched infinitely into the horizon and beyond. To infinity and beyond, you could say.

Sensibly, they held to the left on this road (although Starswirl grumbled about the humans driving on the wrong side of the road), as they had a turning to take off this road, and eventually arrived on a road so huge and marvellous it put the previous road to shame. They passed another place full of those strange iron monsters humans used to move things about, and before long, with the winter sun of California coming down upon the land before them and slowly warming the day up. Onwards they went, climbing a great hill, and going over it, and down the other side. At long last, they found themselves wandering through a desert. Mistmane indicated they should stay on the right, and so the duo did, passing through a handful of abandoned ghost towns as they did so before taking a slight left off the road, following it with a proper left turn. They proceeded onto another street, apparently named after a car, before taking an abrupt right turn. Here, a body of water that was blue opened up before them and stretched for miles out into nothingness, before the road following it took the duo to a right turn, followed quite suddenly by a left.

Moments later, they found themselves standing outside a blue building. The doors were padlocked and the place completely deserted. "Are you sure this is the right place?" Starswirl asked.

"You had the map!" Mistmane replied, stepping towards the door. Her horn illuminated and the lock slowly undid itself. "That was suspiciously easy." The lock off the door, she opened the door and stepped inside, looking for any sign of life.

They had stepped through a lobby, and pushed open another door, into a room that was full of seats and an odd stage. On that stage were two figures. One was lying, still quite badly hurt, and the other, who was pink, was pacing about in concern.

"Somnambula?" Starswirl called.

The pink pony looked up, and said something to him. But he couldn't understand. Somnambula then began waving a piece of Glowpaz at him and beckoning for him to come over. The duo did, and then she handed them both pieces of Glowpaz, which they put onto their persons.

With that act, they could all understand each other. "You have to help!" Somnambula said. "Flash is badly injured. I've done my best to treat his injuries, but there's only so much I can do! Do you have any spells that can help?"

"Just leave me and go on without me!" Flash said. "I'll only slow you down!"

"We would never give up on a friend," Mistmane replied. "Starswirl, can you cast the spell of healing?"

"Given all the magic interference, we'll both need to cast it together," Starswirl replied. Both unicorns lit their horns, and the energy began to flow through the room and into Flash Magnus. In fairness, he looked a lot better before the spell was cast than he had in the message, but the spell of healing clearly worked succesfully, as his wounds were cleaned up and vanished as if they'd never been there.

Once they were done, Flash shakily got to his hooves. "Well, that was something," he said, moving one of his wings. "Yeesh. Wings still feel a little ropey, so I'll need to be careful with those."

"How did you get here?" Starswirl asked.

"The Sphynx imprisoned us in this place," Somnambula replied, "and we have been trapped for some time. Flash was wounded trying to stop her killing his fellow soldiers."

"Not much use that was," Flash replied, bitterly. "They're all dead."

"Who was the he you referred to in the message?" Mistmane asked.

"I have reason to believe that it's the Pony of Shadows," Flash replied.

Suddenly, a new message flashed up on the Magical Communications device, which Mistmane and Starswirl both opened. On the message was the face of Mage Meadowbrook.

"Ta all receivin' this transmission'," she began, "We are all in serious danger. Project 722 is makin' its move on the world. As Ah speak, Lafayette burns in flames. Please hurry. The Pony of Shadows has returned and is stoppin' at nothin' to take control. He will kill anybody who gets in his way. He tried ta take control o' Stygian and killed Colonel Peterson. Ah have no idea when he'll come fer either me or Rockhoof."

"We shouldn't waste any time," Flash said grimly. "Let's go."