The cold was harsh, but Fire Bolt’s wings were strong enough to shield both herself and Sonar Moonshadow for a few seconds at a time. In front of the four of them stood the countless menacing mountain peaks of the Frozen North, revealing themselves each time the snowy winds broke for a moment.
“Sonar, anything yet?” Sapphire shouted over the freezing atmosphere racing through their manes, and with the time it took to reply, they thought that he hadn’t heard them. “Do you see anything-”
“Up ahead. Boltie, keep going straight.” The light emanating from Sonar’s magic gave only the slightest bit of relief in the white tundra that seemed to halt everypony’s vision past a few inches.
When they had initially approached the snowy terrain, Sapphire asked if Sonar could clear a path for them, to which Jelly Splash laughed in their face. “Nopony has ever cleared a path,” She had said.
Sonar still tried a few times, but the violent and thrashing winds were simply not compatible with his magic; Sonar was not a weather pony, but Fire Bolt was – she had incorrectly assumed that she might be able to wrangle some of the wind to a different direction. On the fourth time that she flew in, she was thrown back out of the winds with such force that she cracked her chin open against the cold, hardened dirt, refusing to allow Sonar to check for a deeper injury and calling it a scrape. In reality, each time the frozen winds crashed against her face, the blood from the injury trickled more and more into her red fur, and the wetness quickly got frigid.
Their ultimate decision was to use a combination of too-weak shield spells from Sonar and Jelly Splash and the protective strength of Bolt’s and Sapphire’s wings to push through the winds, stopping frequently to regain strength.
Beginning to clear in front of Fire Bolt was a darkened portion of a mountain, and as they inched closer, she realized it was a cave. She wondered briefly if Sonar Moonshadow knew that he was looking for a cave, but dismissed the thought as he led them inside. The winds still blew into the opening, but it was considerably less now that they were under a covering.
Fire Bolt and Sapphire Swirl looked at each other with soaked and disheveled manes, grimacing as they both spread their wings to shake the worst of the moisture off.
Everypony but Sonar Moonshadow stood weakly, heaving in cold breaths as the wind screamed outside. Sonar’s magic grew brighter, illuminating the cave completely around them. Fire Bolt started to ask, “Is this where we’re supposed to-”
“Show yourself!” Sonar suddenly bellowed out, cutting through the sound of the whistling winds and echoing through the cavern. As his magic grew even more still, deep laughter answered Sonar’s echo, sending synchronous shivers down the remaining three’s spines. Fire Bolt closed her open jaw.
A wisp of air suddenly raced past Jelly Splash’s face, making the hardened shape of her manestyle swish back and forth. She took a step forward with her chin raised, seeming to hear something that the others could not.
“It’s not real, I don’t think,” Jelly spoke up. “I learned a sound spell like this one.” Fire Bolt, eyes wide open, looked to Sonar Moonshadow for confirmation. His attention had been lowered, and he was sightlessly gazing in Jelly’s direction.
“You’re right. The sound doesn’t echo quite correctly.” He said, nodding calmly. “It could’ve been triggered by walking in here. Maybe an alarm meant to scare ponies off.”
“Well, it kind of works!” Sapphire Swirl piped in, and they were pacing around the cave. “Why would somepony put the sound of scary laughter in a cave that nopony’s ever been to?”
“We’re certainly not the first here. Far from the first.” Jelly Splash replied, illuminating her horn to observe the scratches engraved into the stone around them. “I think it’s fine to stay here, though.”
“So now what?” Bolt asked.
“We wait,” Sonar replied.
Fire Bolt dug her teeth into the hardened bread loaf from her saddle bag, cringing as the texture accidentally touched her injured chin. “Wait, so you were glittery and stuff?” Sapphire asked after swallowing down their own stale bread. Bolt wished that she had asked Swift Breeze for some variety in the food she picked up in her last few trips.
“Glittery, shiny, the whole bit,” Jelly Splash replied, rolling to lie on her side rather than sitting up. “I don’t really remember if it felt any different, though. It’s why my mane doesn’t move or brush, I think.”
“It’s like… between Crystal and normal mane,” Sapphire pondered aloud, and the three of them now looked with more scrutinizing eyes at the shiny but hardened mane and tail.
“Can’t really remember what got me either,” Splash twitched her torn ear as if to emphasize her long-healed injuries, and the scar tearing down her back. “I think it was around the explosion.”
“Do you remember… um, sorry,” Sonar started before awkwardly backpedaling at the realization that this might be too personal. Jelly Splash lazily nodded her head, prompting him to continue. “Do you… remember the explosion?” A long pause followed.
“It’s just about the only thing I do remember…”
The artificial sun gleamed upon the Crystal Empire, being interrupted every few moments by a seeping darkness that threatened everypony who saw it. Terror had been building in the Empire for two days now; murmurs and rumors told of the rest of Equestria being held in the grasp of some dark force. All they were told was that Cadance and the magical spirit of Shining Armor were protecting them, but the confidence amongst the townsponies was fading dangerously quickly.
Jelly Splash walked into the center of town with her young brother named Taffy Twists, hoping to distract his nervous mind with traditional games and activities of the Crystal Empire. He seemed entirely distracted, though, and no matter what she did, Jelly could not lift his spirits.
“Jella Spash?” He suddenly spoke up, and Jelly Splash looked down at him expectantly – he still couldn’t say her name quite right yet. In the brief moment they shared eye contact, everything changed in slow motion.
The first thing she saw was his tiny body hit the ground, hard. Next came the fiery heat that nipped at her back hooves, pushing her forward as well and slamming her into the crystal walkway.
It felt like she had blinked, but by the time she was opening her eyes again, it had clearly been hours. The first thought in her mind was Taffy Twists, and her eyes quickly found him - mangled, burnt, and practically dismembered with the force that he was thrown into the ground. She stared for a moment, then two, then for several minutes in disbelief. A morbid part of her brain thought to soak it all in.
A choked scream tore from her chest, anguish flooding her body and filling her mouth with bile. Nopony heard – every single pony in sight was disgustingly deceased, so far beyond saving that she couldn’t fathom that she could even stand.
There was not a single standing pony in sight. Jelly Splash took several steps back before she was unable to hold in her vomit. Blood tracked under her hooves, and it almost seemed like Taffy Twists looked worse the more she backed up. When she was looking right at him, her brain could shut it down; deny it. But from afar… he was a lump of limbs and crimson red, spread further across the floor in length than he was tall, a white bone of what seemed to be ribs poking out of the lump like a trophy. That was her brother now.
Sonar was silent the entire time. Sapphire couldn’t help but gasp once or twice, their empathetic nature wanting desperately to nurture the traumatized pony in front of them.
“I… I kept this,” Jelly Splash said, and after a deep breath, she opened her saddle bag and revealed something unexpected.
“Is… that the last piece of the Crystal Heart?”