//------------------------------// // Part 4: Rolling in the Flood // Story: My Guardian Cozy // by Idyll //------------------------------// I smacked the wall only because it appeared a coat’s length away from my turned-back head! Even less than that... Also a force pulled me downwards. And I had fallen, not underneath the pier, where darkened beams of wood served a settlement of barnacles, but into the center of the sea, where I hover now. The only side I could see (that isn’t blue and white) is where the wind is pointing towards: to the far-off shore. Above and below and everywhere else is all just water or sky. Both are sort of the same to me, though my world is kept to their middles. Can’t go too high up or too far down for too long, especially that latter one. I’m not a hippogriff. The waves under my dangling legs march in droves towards the shore. I may be without my helmet or my shoes, but at least I still got my—Flurry’s, ice cream. Now I just need to figure out— “Gasp!” (Flurry says the word: “gasp”) “Softie!” she continues, and tilts her head, pouting, eyes melting, “You came to check up on me? How thoughtful.” If I squinted and flew a few hooves higher, I would just barely make out the glow of the pier over the Sun’s. “Your magic sure has a long reach…” Flurry smirks. “Is it scary? How far it is.” Then she spots the ice cream. “Oh, did I interrupt you on your break?” “I didn’t have a break,” I say. “You’re supposed to give us one.” Flurry cringes. “Right, right… My bad. Maybe you should sort that stuff out for yourselves next time? Do it for me at least? I keep forgetting this is technically a job for you guys.” “Technically,” I hoof-quote with sass. “Fine, fine. You can have a break right now!” Flurry declares so charitably. “...This is meant to be for a certain somepony, actually.” I pass her the treat. “Cadance said to get you one, kind of, so...” “For me? You shouldn’t have!” She takes the cone from my grip, and I say, “You wouldn’t believe the hoops I had to go through to get that one flavor. Those were the very last scoops. It’s super popular. You’d better like it!” Flurry licks and processes the flavor for a moment, and I flutter sideways with crossed wingtips. She smacks her lips and says, “There are bits of white chocolate inside, and added strawberry syrup, and flakes?!” She sounds happy. But then her face shifts to a sort of “really” look: sucked lips, sloped forehead, upwards facing eyes piercing me, ominous concern. “Mom wouldn’t have told you to get me this. My dad is going to murder you. You are going to die.” I chuckle. “Oh, come on, you had an early lunch and besides, you’re a grown mare. He should get out of your business.” A splash of water hits my flank. Oh gosh. Please don’t be him. Please don’t be him. Please don’t be… Nothing. Just a fading yellow hue. “You’re so lucky,” Flurry says, lips to her dessert. “Well, I obviously would’ve noticed if he was here,” I retort. “The idea of a sea monster was what popped into my mind.” She rolls her eyes. “But anyways, just because I’m a mare doesn’t mean he doesn’t, like, comment on what I eat and stuff.” “What’s his deal policing you like that?” I ask. “You’re going to outliiiiav—shine him at becoming the picture of health! Ha, ha… Catch the pun?” The Alicorn squints at me with mad eyebrows. “Maybe you don’t want this flake,” she says, tapping my muzzle with a crumbling chocolate log laced with a cold dipping of pink. I look left, right, and spin. “Where is your father anyways.” He isn’t in the waters nearby, and I can’t see any bubbles popping up on the surface. And we’re so far out. These aren’t shallow depths. Even if I swallow a stomachful of clouds, making it to the bottom of here—and actually getting back up—would be a feat. The pressure would push down or crush or flood my body. To add to that are the waves reaching Shining’s upright height, roughening the terrain, and the winds that never sleep. And he isn’t easy to spot either. The Sun is still screaming and the water reflects that. Flurry’s torso bobs up and down. Her wings uncurl making her back look like an island, and her hooves sway through the currents, bait to any real sea monsters not fond of living. From her perspective, Shining would be camouflaged with the clouds over the horizon. “Want a bite, Softie?” She turns around to me—and is holding a flake between her lips. “Uhm, Flurry, I—” “I’m kidding!” she reveals and swallows the whole thing, not to share. “That’s unprofessional, right? Well, Dad was a guard... More of a commander than what you are, but… Anyways, you don’t have the right to say anything because I’ve seen what you and your friends do outside of guarding.” “Don’t group me in like that!” I defend. “I’m not one of those mares.” “What about ‘the party?’ You were invited to ‘the party.’ And you went without telling me.” Oh golly. She’s bringing that up. I say, “Look, there were weird forces at play that night (on whichever party you’re referring to). I’m pretty sure it was cursed, most probably by Chaos!” “The cup.” “Oh, no. Please don’t,” I beg. “You were in a circle.” “Listen, Princess, I—” “Playing Jenga.” ...Seems I can’t stop her. Flurry continues, “And whenever somepony passes a round, they’d add drinks and things into the cup. And you lost.” I cross my upper legs. “I only lost because you were stalking me with an invisible spell.” “Your lips actually touched the edge of it! Why would you do that?” asks the Princess. “…” I stay silent. Flurry continues, “It was completely tar-black with bubbles, but I saw layers and stuff on top of that darkness, like oil or something. I saw bubbles. I saw chips, and I saw a lollipop sticking out—” “Yeah, and coffee, and vinegar—” For every item I list, I fly closer, just to better watch her squirm. Might as well be self-aware. “—and spit, and teatmilk.” It’s scary, but one of the pegasi in our group actually does have a small family of her own: a crystal stallion (I couldn’t believe it!), and one newborn foal. They own a tiny but admittedly lovely home in the Empire and she stores bottles of her own produce in the fridge. Her house was the venue for a lot of our get-togethers, which I attended only to gain their trust. The only reason! Her crystal colt (wingless) gets taken care of by his grandmother, who on that weekend won a getaway to Las Pegasus from a scratch card. So, things got wild, especially after a muffling spell was cast. Anyways, too much happened to go over now. Flurry gags. “Relax. It was my own spit anyways,” I comfort. “Why would you do that?!” Flurry asks. Princesses sure are judgy. “Trust me when I say it’s much better than truth-or-dare.” Then I smirk. “Maybe we should invite you over more often?” “...That’s it,” Flurry says. A force grabs my left leg. “Get into the water. You need to be cleansed.” She pulls me down. “Right now. That’s an order, Silver Surfer.” My buzzing wings tug the air for freedom. The peak of a wave scrapes the tip of my hoof. Using a free hind leg, I kick a splash of water to the Princess’ face. She lets go—even though she casted a shield before a droplet could reach her dry mane. “How. Dare. You. Pegasus. Guard.” she says smiling under a dark voice. “The water’s cold,” I lie. “And I know you’ve got earth pony strength and all that, but these armor pieces are a burden.” Once I end my sentence, my armor vanishes, poof!, brought to whatever magical vault Flurry stores her things. The air feels light as I do a loop with a new spring, now unfettered by those sweaty, sticky slabs of hot steel, but… “Still cold.” “No, it’s not!” Flurry pontificates. “Look at the Sun! ...Maybe don’t do that. But why would we wear sunscreen if it wasn’t warm?” I say, “Because sunburns are caused by ultraviolet radiation, not heat.” “Fine, Smartass. I can make the water warm.” “…” “With a spell!” Flurry facehoofs. She fences a cube of water in her yellow magic under me. As her horn brightens, plumes of steam start to rise. My wings displace enough air to keep me at a fine temperature. Until bigger and bigger bubbles form and pop!, and a few scolding drops sizzle a side of my pastern. “P-Princess, that’s a bit too hot,” I voice. Her telekinesis grabs another leg. “F-Flurry? Flurry?!” “...Oh my Celestia. You complain so much!” She lets go both of me and her segregated pot. “I’m gonna make your showers cold forever.” “Like how it is already?” Flurry is still. Her body is practically a buoy, undulating across the waves, not moving, not tilting. And underneath the water, I see her royal shoes shimmer, rowing currents as slow as needed to stay afloat. Her diadem slips a degree as she faces the sea. She’s calm. Too calm. “The calm before the storm” calm, and I’m smack-dab staring at the living epicenter, whose turquoise irises rise up to watch her favorite guard. She’s focused. I hate when she’s focused. If you pressed an ear to her head, as I have before, you could hear the cogs churn spells to put aside a spot in her memory palace. She smirks and squints (and a dot of tongue sticks out to the side). An orb of water emerges from the ocean and kamikazes towards me—wrapped in who-else’s hue. My shoulder’s tilt and I manage to dodge. They always say I ask for it, that I reward her with my reactions, that I tease her. And I don’t know why that’s true. But I turn to her and blow a raspberry. My chest is branded with a yellow target sign. I’m flying to reach the clouds. Alicorns aren’t just ascended unicorns. Flurry is one half pegasus. Onlookers made me painfully aware of whenever she and her mother would zip around Canterlot Castle. Can’t blame her; it’s a wonderful space to fly. No other place had as strict of a weather schedule, so every drop on my frozen head was deliberate but ignoring that; those rules don’t apply to Princesses. She could learn how to control weather in most any sacred airspace, and most creatures would sadly be no happier than to serve her attention. She usually brushes away those opportunities. So, her cloud-squeezing skills color me shocked. She chokes a bunch of those together until they turn dark to make a teary ceiling to trap me under. I’m sandwiched between dangers. What else is new? The clouds affected by her influence squeeze to produce a clap of thunder. I rotate my shoulders backwards and reach a halt. The world turns foggy; the wind picks up. Glad I lost those clunky pieces of metal. From a dark cloud above, a wall of water falls and moves towards me. It’s an easy dodge when there’s only one. But another one pops out, magnetized to the other. I dash out of their trajectories as they clash into a big bang of opaque mist. My path gets blocked by a third of these walls. But this one is only starting. Another dash gets me to the other side before the edge can fall to my head. Flurry, who is floating on the water below the previous collision, has her horn form the focal point of a spell that spawns a waterspout. The waterspout beyond me swirls a lot of the fog away to fatten itself. I’m thinking if I keep a healthy distance, I should be able to do a flyby and slingshot out of the storm. Currently this has been a breeze—Oops! Mind the pun. Mostly I’ve been gliding or controlled falling; and flailing a bit, since the air is splashing against itself, forming vortexes that act as speed bumps. It’s calm again—despite the weather. There’s nothing unpredictable happening. I’m not carrying anything important. I don’t have anywhere else I need to be. It’s impossible for a pony who’s me to get injured from this. Flurry’s up to something. And as I’m riding a defined current of air, a cloud uncurls to reveal her in flight. She’s on my level and still has that murderous, cheeky look. The winds are exponentially more deadlier closer to her. Flurry’s figure is shrouded, partially gray. And to believe that tiny bright tip on her horn is causing all of this! There’s a hum. A forceful jet of water slithers up from the sea and around Flurry’s cyclone and misses me just barely. Then it takes a U-turn. I’m fighting against the wind with my wings. Flurry’s water animation transforms into the body of a Roc—a plane-sized, predatory bird—and threatens to swallow me whole. I dash as it nears my tail. It speeds up too. The walls of water from before block my path, wider now than I could see on either of their fading sides. I took my only option: flew up the sky-block. There’s now a hole and a trail of clouds from where I shot out. But Flurry’s magic seems to have a lock on me. How does she—oh yeah. The target spell on my chest. The water Roc follows me through the sheet of clouds, wings tracing the surfacing like a shark. Then there’s a calm. I don’t slow down but wonder if I have left Flurry’s sight and range. I look back and can’t see any beast, only blue skies. A pop! in the distance and a light. The Roc bites the air in front of me. I hoist my wings; the tip of my hoof dips into its liquid body. We both pause. I catch my breath. Though I’m slowly shifting my wings to bounce away. My back is hit. The orb Flurry initially threw boomeranged around to strike my naked mane. Everything goes dizzy. I clutch my heart, and I fall facing up at my Princess who struck me and teleported nearer. My face asks why? Why did you do this to me? She only celebrates her blow with a pitiless “Hah!” The journey to the ground takes several seconds, but Splish! I fall to my depth. “Gotcha!” adds Flurry with high spirits. “See, it’s not cold, is it?” No sounds surface for the Princess. “We should train more often,” she continues. “You and I should go to Mount Everhoof. We can prove who’ll be the first to scale the top. You’ll have to drag my Dad along, though.” … “You can bring your friends.” A minute passes. Flurry swims around. “...Oh, ha, ha. Real funny. Pretending to be dead. If I get injured or traumatized one day from one of your tricks, I wouldn’t even be able to stop what my parents, Canterlot, and also the crystal ponies will do to you.” Her wing gently waves the waters. “You know that, right Softie?” Three minutes. “Softz? Hello?” Flurry looks around. “Hey, stop doing that!” she commands. “Seraph?” She looks down only to see her own reflection. Five minutes. Her horn enables a spotlight. The spell makes the ocean clear, as if peering through glass, free of refractions and murkiness. “Seraph, are you okay?” The light sizes up with her dread. She’s playing, Flurry probably thought. There’s no way a guard wouldn’t know how to swim. But is she the type to admit it? Stillness. Six minutes. The Princess takes her deepest breath and ducks into the ocean. She has an okay form. Her wings, layered by pockets of air between her feathers, stroke the waters in congruence with her legs. At least, at first. That’s better than a lot of pegasi already. The surface gets blurrier, and half a minute passes by. She brightens and widens her lure and finds herself drifting between pieces of fallen seaweed and schools of fish. Even Flurry’s spell fails to show the bottom of the navy abyss. But she dives deeper anyways, searching for her guard using her bare eyes. How could she? And where could she be, I bet she thought. What was she even trying to prove?! Could she be sinking? Her body couldn’t have sunk that quickly, she’s so—she’s a… a… Would she shoot me if I tapped her on the back now and said I was swimming right under her? Too late. At first, she looks past me, but she then turns around and stares. I avoid her strong look by focusing on how puffy her cheeks are. Bubbles float out of her ears. She really was scared. We’re both sinking, but I don’t feel endangered. Flurry’s here, and I hold the official record for longest breath held by a filly. The Princess reaches for my temples, but her hooves stop and hang about halfway. She’s in a bit of a shock. This is the worst place to be in shock! I tap her once, twice, grab her and shake her around. Her eyelids fall. I keep shaking; my wings keep stroking upwards. I know I have enough breath left for me, but enough to rescue a Flurry? The scare is bad enough for my heart! And her bones might as well be lead. And in terms of bulk, Cadance is a slimmer build. But at least my wings managed to stop us from falling under the weight of the water. If only we could ascend a bit higher. The light of her spells turns her eyes and blood transparent. I could see the ghostly outlines of her bones under a jello silhouette of skin. We’re only a third of the way up when my lungs tighten and now I feel sick. Pulling a Princess really ravages a mare’s oxygen supply. Maybe Flurry had a point about training. Oh, Flurry. I drag her iron-wood mane across the viscous depths with my teeth. Usually I’m a better swimmer, though I never got many hours of practice. Her eyes hang only half-open. Bubbles leave her nostrils and mouth. We’re halfway there now, I move her head to show her, pointing at the waves and glimmer of sunlight above. But her body returns only despondency. She’d easily be able to teleport us out, or turn us into Mermares, or something spectacular if she could just wake up. Please. And her horn is still aglow, albeit dimming, so there has to be some Princess left in there. If I could just—I could… When I was a filly, I used to wonder if Love could or ever would free me from my curse; whether it should come from a family member I’ve forgotten about; or a creature whom I’ve worked against, coming back to say they’ve forgiven me, and wish we could try again. Creatures out of my sight would cry at our statue’s base. It happened at least thrice a weekend, worse around long weekends. Most of those tears weren’t for us; rather, for other creatures or things: broken-up partners, lost family members, pets, or self-pity from freshly redundant drunkards. Nearly all of the rest were for Chrysalis. A column of drones gave us flowers and would scrub us approaching Changeling holidays. Even Tirek and I got attention. I could tell they got bad looks. “Why are you helping these three?” asked some confused creatures. The drones never seemed able to answer properly. They would work in silence scrubbing off moss from our bodies. They’d start with Chrysalis, but recoil upon open touching and sensing her malice. Chrysalis, unlike us, was in sort of a magical hibernation, yet I had a hunch her venomous dreams softened after sensing the pity of her drones, though she despised pity. Tirek and I were less opposed. That they could sense my feelings to any degree unsettled me a lot. But one said, “You seem excited,” once when they scrubbed my crown of branches and dookie—and I clutched onto being heard. I forgot that feeling, really. So concluded the first year, and not as many drones showed up for the next, but those who returned were loyal and soon were tagged by curious larvae. But they were reformed drones, and were and still are pacifists. And Love never cracked my shell, so my hope washed away over the many months and seasons. Maybe pity love wasn’t strong enough… There’ll be Tartarus for me if Flurry drowns. I’m not sure if that’s even figurative. The way I know she sees me tells me she wouldn’t mind if I—only out of desperation—were to—only because she’s shown some shape of kindness to Seraph—share a few of my air bubbles. Only because of the emergency we’re under… of course… Only because… I feel her warmth as I reach to grab her head. Wonder if she feels my warmth too… My face approaches hers, my lips half-sideways, and I look at the Princess in the eyes for this… But her eyes are wide open now. And water boils around her horn. She’s blushing. I’m teleported to the surface. Correction: a few meters above. We both splash. The sudden change in pressure hits my ear. Pony ears canals are pretty much a wall and water loves to exploit that. But I had stuffed my ears with clouds before falling—an Ancient Pegasus Military lifehack—so most of the effect is dampened. I shook my earplugs off. Flurry coughs and pinches her muzzle to geyser water out of hers—and I hope that taint of yellow is from her hue. Her horn keeps a hold of her clarity spell, so still she looks freaky. This would be a cool effect on Nightmare Night. Maybe I’m too focused on staring at her eyes. Her spell drops. When we fell, she was flustered, but now she looks to be a single raindrop away from murder, and with Royals, that’s really not a taboo. “N-now Princess, Flurry, you were the one who—” “You have so much training ahead of you,” Flurry says. “We’re not just gonna go to the gym anymore or go hiking. You’re gonna do hoof drills, endurance gallops, camps, special training exercises. And I’ll be there with a juice-box to watch. Just like two months ago.” I gulp. “You mean when I did a harmless prank and you tortured me without mercy?” “You put a whoopee cushion under my seat when I was having breakfast with my parents. Breakfast! With my parents! When I just woke up on a Monday! A Monday! And it wasn’t as if I made you scrub the castle’s bathrooms with your own toothbrush. It was just a copy and I kept that fact a secret. You could’ve guessed when I passed you a different one for the shoes.” “You’re just Heartless Flurry. You should change your name.” “What? You use my bathtub and steal my soaps when I’m sleeping anyways, I mean—” She remembers. “—and we shared a pizza on the weekend that happened so you have a very good thing going on here.” “Your pizza reward was for after you made me move your whole mansion of a bedroom for ‘redecorating,’ a hundred-thousand times. And you gobbled all the best slices before it cooled down enough for me to bite.” “I wasn’t… Okay, maybe using an adrenaline spell to keep you going was a bit too much,” Flurry admits, “but at least you were able to lift twenty extra pounds by the end of it... right? That’s what being a soldier’s all about. Pushing past your limits. Yeah.” “We really should swap places for Opposite Day.” “Pff! I have a spell for anything you’d throw at me,” Flurry dismisses. “Oh, so you do have a spell for keeping your place tidy?” “No, I was speaking in hypothetical. I probably have a spell that could replace a grumpy guard though.” “I’m grumpy?! You know what you sound like every morning? ‘Uughhhhhghhhh what are you doing, ughhhh, don’t open the windows so quickly my eyes need to adjust to sunlight! Bleh bleh bleh!’ Then you start physically abusing me.” I humph. “What, you mean with a pillow?” Flurry rolls a sliver of cloud and hovers it above my head. “Like this?” Smack! Smack! The baleful Princess delivers blow after blow on my poor head and back and sides. I refuse Fate, grab the roll, and toss the weapon spinning towards the Alicorn. Clouds sure do move slowly… Flurry paddles a hoof to the side. She sucks a mouthful of water and sprays my face across the three-meter distance. I’m too late to cover myself. “Ew!” “The cup. Remember the cup,” Flurry says, “You can’t judge,” and she does the move again. I nearly stooped down to her level. Instead, I get underwater and then stoop down to her level. “Treason!” Flurry shouts. She uses magic to grab a square of water around me, lifts and flips it over, and on top of that grabs the cloud baton. As she’s about to strike my head, I grab the other side and twist my end. Water from the clouds shoots out at Flurry. “Insolent blasphemer! Thou shall not be getting away with this transgression.” We splash water at each other. Then she freezes me yellow, does a few cheap splashes as my limbs are suspended, and says, “I’m done with the swimming,” before letting go. “Seriously though, I thought you were drowning at the bottom of the ocean. And I never knew it was so deep.” “I’m a pretty good breath holder,” I say. “Were you actually in shock, or were you hoping I’d ‘share’ a few of my bubbles but chickened out?” She blushes. “You were the one who started it! And you nearly were about to, you know, peck mouths… I never told you to do that…” “Too nervous?” I ask. She rids me of my smugness by magicking me back into my armor—every piece from my helmet to shoes—and she lifts me out of the water. “Let’s call it even,” she says. “Sure,” I reply with a hint of sarcasm. The Princess is such a pretty grudge-holder. No way she’d forget about today. She’ll be using this against me in a week at most: You really thought I was in shock, huh? Sure… “I guess it makes sense why you didn’t drown,” she says, using a drying spell on herself. “Clearly your short body doesn’t need much oxygen.” “What’s that supposed to mean?” I tap my head. “This thing takes up more oxygen than you!” “Yeah, well not everypony can be as ‘biologically efficient’ as an Alicorn,” Flurry teases. “Come on, let’s go!” “Sure, let’s—wait, where’s your dad?” “Oh, he’s somewhere around here.” Flurry shows no concern. “He’s a good swimmer. I mean, he swam all the way here and he taught me swimming when I was a foal, so I wouldn’t worry. He’s probably back at the beach.” “...Right, well, I better look around just to be sure,” I say. “Don’t want your mom to vaporize me when I get back. And I don’t trust anypony would respect my ashes.” “Yum!” Flurry says. I say nothing. I want the moment to linger on and I want to watch her hear herself. “...Go on,” Flurry commands. “Find my dad!” Fine, fine. Guess it’s my job to foalsit her father now too. How hard could it be for a silvery pegasus to find a white and blue stallion in the center of the reflective ocean? That’s me hoping there’s a pony left on the surface to find. It’s been an hour since they left. An hour of drifting between these currents, through this heat? Yeah... And he doesn’t have my lungs or my buoyancy. He can’t use his horn as a paddle. He can’t even sit still in a rocking ship. Now I’m getting a bit scared. Cadance isn’t actually the type to order my head into a casket if I do bring her husband back rotting, eyes red from salt, water sloshing between his lungs; and neither is Flurry. Grief might actually make her nice to me for once; “There, there. It’s not your fault. Don’t beat yourself up.” But the funeral would bring a halt to my plans… A pink flare rips through the sky. That’s a relief. I glide down performing useless galloping motions because that’s the formal thing to do. Shining isn’t green. Maybe he ran out of puke. But I could hear his panting over the wind. He did slow kicks to stay afloat, without rhythm, because the waves still roughened the water—worsened from the remnants of Flurry’s spells—by rows of his own height. His face lit up as he saw chubby-cheeked me hovering over the Sun. “G-guard!” he says. “Glad you’re here.” I salute. “Yes, sir. Do you need help getting back to shore?” “...Do I need help? I wouldn’t mind it…” He smiles blushing. Flurry teleports to the side of us, not alone. My pastel-orange partner from before is beside her, and she has an ice cream in her hooves. Flurry must’ve placed it to the side before our fight. My partner takes a long, labored lick, inching closer to me as I’m excavating our boss. She even eats the second flake. She whispers into my ear, “Does Shining know you got Flurry a dessert?” My glare is enough of an answer. “Well, you two can catch up,” Flurry says. “We’ll just be heading to Mom.” “Yes, Princess,” says my partner. They teleport away, leaving me to carry Shining to the shore. She’s definitely holding a grudge.