The snowfall had increased quite a bit in the short time since she had renewed her walk after making it out of the crevice. It was heavy coming down from the clouds and the winds swirling around her made Rainbow Dash think that she might now be caught in a blizzard. No longer were the harsh winds confined to the higher altitudes, now even just walking across the snow she was forced to endure them at their worst. As if traveling through here hadn’t been enough of a bother, it was like the weather was reacting to her finding these clothes and making sure things were still difficult for her. Now even with the boots and the jacket she could feel the cold piercing into her. It didn’t matter that the hood was pulled up, the wind still came at her face and soon Rainbow Dash ended up covered in frost and icicles again.
She had to hold her hoof up and try to block out the wind coming directly at her face in an attempt to see anything in front of her. Not like there was much to see in the first place. Just snow and mountains around her. She may have passed a glacier and some other solitary rock formations that were covered in ice but no more tents or anything particularly interesting.
Rainbow Dash wondered how far she had traveled through this snowscape so far. Probably not very since she had only been flying for a little while before she had to land. She’d make up for it somehow.
The antler tips she had used to climb her way out of the crevice were now rattling together with the flint stones in her bag. Her only tools left and hopefully all she would ever need out here. Though she still didn’t have anything extra to burn if she needed to start a fire, she supposed if it came down to it she could use the bag for that now. Burning some of her new clothes for warmth seemed really self-defeating.
Still, the clothes weren’t exactly doing their job right now. Made for keeping someone warm in freezing cold weather like this they might have been, but the unnatural deathly cold of this place was completely overwhelming. Rainbow Dash was feeling chilled to the bone and shivering with each pained step. She doubted anything but a constant fire or some kind of magic spell could keep her or anything else warm in this endless white country of snowy valleys and mountains.
And the skies above were now starting to become darker. Well, the clouds above were starting to become darker. It must be getting late in the day. Rainbow Dash didn’t want to stop though, she couldn’t without first finding a place that would at least protect her from the wind and keep the snow from burying her the more it fell. If only that Reindeer skeleton had a backup tent she could’ve carried it out too. Since she didn’t have one she was going to have to look for a cave somewhere that didn’t have its entrance facing the wind.
That was tough when she could barely see anything at all.
“I hate the snow. I officially, totally, one billion percent, hate the snow,” Rainbow growled as she fought to keep her hoof up and stop the icy wind from blinding her.
She ended up walking for another hour like that, fighting both the wind and the cold, going through other valleys of snow and around mountains, while her hooves grew number by the minute. As much as she hated to admit it, she could tell that her body was failing her. There was no way Rainbow Dash could survive a night in the snow. If she fell asleep she would never wake up.
While her thoughts were occupied by that, she almost didn’t notice the wall in front of her until she almost walked right into it.
“What the?” Rainbow Dash looked up at the tall cliff of ice that had appeared out of the snowy winds before her. She hadn’t seen it coming at all. Thanks to where she was standing now though, the wind wasn’t whipping into her face quite as badly so she could actually look at it.
She wasn’t sure if she was looking at a glacier or perhaps a plateau covered in ice but either way it rose high above her head and stretched as far as she could see to both her right and left.
“Great. Just great. I can’t walk around something like this before night...” Rainbow Dash glared up at the icy wall. Her ears then perked up inside her hood. “But I don’t need to.”
Rainbow Dash grinned and reached into her bag to pull out the two antler tips. “You’ve been my best friend out here, dude.”
It was just like before, she stabbed the first antler in and then the other and slowly worked her way up the wall. A few chunks of ice would come away each time she thrust the antlers into the ice but there were only a couple of times where Rainbow Dash felt like she might accidentally come loose. Her mood was way better than when she was climbing up the crevice too, something about being able to tackle all the obstacles thrown at her was filling her up with a new round of determination. Even though this wall was a lot taller than the crevice was deep, she didn’t feel tired at all as she scaled it.
While there was still the last fading remnants of light in the world, Rainbow Dash made it to the top of the wall and pulled herself over. “Whoo!” She whistled to herself and cracked her neck, putting the antler tips away. “Now tell me I’m not awesome.”
The wind was still blowing full force in her face but she didn’t care right now. She was too invigorated from her recent victory. Rainbow Dash peered through the white blizzard to see if there was anything on top of this glacier or anything ahead. Her eyes widened out of reflex when she saw that there indeed was. Something very interesting and fortuitous to her.
A medium-sized domed dwelling stood close by, it was many times larger than any Reindeer tent she had seen and was partially made out of wood and what looked like large furs stretched over it. Rainbow Dash was a little put off by that part but she was still going to check this thing out. Her hopes that it was inhabited were dashed quickly though as she noticed how dilapidated it looked with several holes torn or busted open along its surface. Still, that was way better than just staying out in a blizzard unprotected and with the day turning to night out here she might just use this place to sleep.
Hopefully there was some more useful stuff inside too and she could get a fire going. Rainbow Dash walked towards the dome and skirted the perimeter in search of a door. She finally found one on the south side of the building, directly opposite from where she had first climbed up and seen the dome. Only problem was it was half-buried in snow. Not a surprise, but still annoying.
Rainbow Dash grumbled and started to dig the snow out of the way, something that took her longer than she wished it would what with the sky continuously growing darker over her head. She could somehow feel the temperature beginning to drop even more. It was instinctual, she knew that if she didn’t get inside and at least have a weak flame around her, she’d be frozen solid as soon as night came around, regardless of anything she wore to protect herself.
“Finally,” she said as she finished removing the snow from in front of the door. It wasn’t some simple flap but an actual wooden door with a carved handle on the front. Rainbow Dash calmly reached out to grasp it. “Here goes I guess.”
Upon opening the door the wind tried to rush in behind her but Rainbow Dash quickly slid in and closed the door back shut. She was thankful that it wasn’t stuck or anything. Thanks to some of the holes in the dome though there was still plenty of wind coming in but it wasn’t nearly as bad as it could be. Snow also covered most of the floor of the domicile, probably a good foot of it in most places. She saw boxes peaking out of the snow, along with some other planks of wood that looked like they might have belonged to beds or sleds at some point. In the very middle of the single-room dome there was a pillar of cedar wood that held up the entire thing. Rainbow Dash could tell just by checking things out that this definitely wasn’t left behind by the Reindeer. It was all too different.
As she walked over the snowy interior she kept her eyes open for anything else, including any unfortunate former inhabitants.
She almost missed them because of how well they blended in.
Rainbow Dash paused as she walked around the cedar pole, the door to the dome directly behind her. At the far wall from it was what at first looked to be an exceptionally large pile of snow, but as Rainbow Dash looked closer she realized that’s not what it was at all. Fur. Snow white fur, perfect for camouflage in an environment like this.
But the creatures piled up still weren’t moving and Rainbow Dash could tell just by looking at them that they had been dead for ages. That white fur that was so suited for the snow still hadn’t helped them with the cold.
“You’re… foxes, right? Arctic foxes?” Rainbow Dash tilted her head at the piled up creatures as she stepped over to them. “Being friends with Fluttershy has its perks in a few ways.”
She couldn’t tell how many there were but she would guess at least a dozen of them all in one pile, they seemed to be about half her size individually. She wondered why they were like this. Maybe they had been trying to huddle together for warmth in the end? Rainbow Dash swallowed and reached out to touch them even though it seemed a little rude to do so. Their fur was brittle and the bodies beneath felt more like rocks or blocks of ice than anything that had once been alive. Frozen completely solid and perfectly preserved by the cold here.
“So the Reindeer weren’t the only ones who had tried to go through here, huh? You guys must’ve wanted to explore this place too. Wonder how long ago… or if maybe you guys came from the south and not from the north like the Reindeer,” Rainbow Dash puzzled.
It was depressing to meet another group of creatures like this. Victims of this horrible, unnatural cold. The Reindeer’s journal was becoming more and more accurate about this place being death. Just simple death.
Suddenly the wind picked up from outside so fiercely that it blew in new waves of snow through the holes and made the entire dome shudder.
“Oh that’s just great!” Rainbow Dash yelled as she winced and bowed her head to try and avoid the biting cold winds.
It didn’t let up at all either. Night was practically upon her and a blizzard raged outside and she had no idea how long it would last. The cold was still overwhelming inside here as it obviously had been for these foxes ages and ages ago. At least there was discarded wood and other stuff in here that she could start a fire with, she just needed to clear out an area on the ground first. Maybe the floor of the tent was wood as well or a thick fur, but she needed to make a circle with rocks or something else to contain the fire so the whole place didn’t go up like the tent she had been in.
Rainbow Dash hated how much work she still had to do before she could rest, after everything else she had been through today she was tired. But a fire needed to be started before she could sleep.
“When am I going to get to the awesome stuff again?” Rainbow Dash grumbled as she shoveled snow out of the way with her hooves.