//------------------------------// // Shining's Log: The Path // Story: Shining's Log // by Zulaq //------------------------------// “So let me get this straight,” Rock questioned Shining Armor, “The Lieutenant has ordered you to take us and find the ward-stone. Which we don’t know the location of. And recharge it. Which we don’t know how to do.” “Yep,” Shining said cheerfully, leading the way along the narrow mountain path. “Although, we do have a general location.” “Yes,” Fiery Hammer said dryly, “Down this path, wherever that may take us. In a land infested with windigos.” “Don’t worry,” Shining reassured them, “Between the three of us, we’ll be fine, I can protect us with my shields. Fiery can blast them with his heat. And Rock can throw rocks at them until they give up.” “Heh,” Rock said sarcastically, “And what good does throwing rocks have against wind spirits?” “Probably more than you’d think,” Fiery stated, “Although what annoys me more is the fact we don’t know what to do once we get there.” “It’ll come to us,” Shining stated with certainty, a faraway look in his eyes. “If we don’t fix this now, it’ll mean chaos across Equestria, and all our families will be in danger,” he smiled gently, “Have faith, I’ve at least read the basics about wards in my family library. We’ll figure it out.” “I guess you’re right,” Fiery stated, “Well, things could be wor-“ He cuts himself off as the three ponies came to an abrupt halt at the edge of a cliff. The path led right up to the edge, but from there, there were no further indications of where to go. “That’s one large gorge,” breathed Private Boulder, “How are we going to get across that?” “Look,” said Fiery, pointing across the gorge, “There’s a path on the other side.” He then looked around the edge of the cliff they were on. “Ah ha! There used to be a rope bridge across this,” he said gesturing to two points in the ground, which contained rotten wood, “But it looks like old age got to it.” Shining Armor didn’t say anything, he just stood there with a thoughtful expression on his face. “That doesn’t exactly help us, Fire,” Rock pointed out, “So what if there used to be a bridge. That doesn’t help us now. We’ll need to go around.” He looked around the cliff, before adding, “Somehow.” “Wait,” Shining ordered, with strength in his voice, “I have an idea.” He closed his eyes, and a determined look crossed his face. Shining’s horn began to glow it’s rose color, and a line of light shot out from it. The light resolved into a glowing partially transparent, path three feet wide across the gorge, connecting the two sides. “Hurry,” Shining ordered, “I’m fairly certain it’ll hold us, but it’s a big drain on my magic.” “I’m fairly certain this is nuts,” stated Fiery. “Yes,” Rock said, “Yes, it is. But Shining hasn’t led us astray yet.” He took a step towards the bridge. “Here goes nothing!” He jumped with all fours onto the light bridge. Shining winced, but it held. “Woah,” Rock breathed, “You do good work Shiny!” he then ran across the rest of the bridge. “You’re both crazy,” Fiery sighed, “Ah well, here goes nothing!” With that he crossed the bridge. Shining Armor crossed last, he quickly trotted across the bridge. Once he was across, the glow faded from his horn, and the rose-tinted bridge faded out of existence. Shining turned to Fiery with a grin. “We might be crazy,” he said, “but crazy works.” He then pointed with his right hoof. “Onwards!” he ordered smiling. The three ponies trudged on. --- An hour later the three ponies were still carefully navigating the old mountain path. The three of them had long since stopped talking, and were instead on full lookout for potential trouble. After rounding yet another sharp corner, the group came to a halt again. Before the three of them, was a large, flat expanse of snow and ice, which had completely obscured the path they needed to follow. “Great,” muttered Fiery, disheartened, “how are we supposed to follow the path, if we can’t see it!” “Isn’t it supposed to be Summer?” questioned Rock, “I didn’t think we’re up high enough for snow to be here.’ “Must be the windigos,” mused Shining, “We’ll just have to uncover it by hoof.” “That’ll take forever,” complained Rock, “Maybe we should just follow the side of the mountain. I’m sure the path does.” “This is a plateau, so if there’s anywhere that the path might branch off of the mountain from, it’d be here,” replied Shining. “I have an idea,” Fiery interrupted, “I’ll just use my heating spells to melt the snow from where the path first gets covered.” “Don’t we run the risk of being burned if we’re so close to it when you use it?” questioned Rock. “Nah,” Fiery Hammer shook his head, “Dad uses it all the time when he’s forging something. This’ll just be a wider version of that spell.” “Then do it,” Shining Armor ordered, “you take the lead, and Rock and I will follow you. If any of your magic gets out of control, I’ll use a shield to contain it.” “Yes sir,” Fiery said. Fiery Hammer’s horn started to glow red, a moment later a red beam of light shot from it, forming a line across where the path disappeared under the snow, before tracking further into the snow. Instantly after the red lined passed it, the snow started steaming, and cleared up, revealing dirt and rock in seconds. Once again the path was clear, and the three of them started trotting along it, Fiery first clearing the path with his magic, and then Rock and Shining, watching carefully for trouble. The path led them away from the mountainside, out onto the plateau, before abruptly disappearing. Fiery used his magic in order to clear away the snow for nearly six feet from the end of the path, but nothing other than bare rock, with a series of cracks running through it, was revealed. “Great,” Shining said, running a hoof along a crack in the rock, “the path ends in the middle of nowhere. Did we miss anything?” “I don’t think so,” Fiery muttered, “I-“ he stumbled, dazed, “I think maybe I used a bit too much magic. Didn’t think it’d take that much out of me,” He ungracefully plopped his read on the ground, “Ugg, I don’t think I’ll be much help.” “Take a break,” Shining ordered, “Rock and I will check around here. You rest, it’s dangerous enough around here without the windigos, I think a tired soldier would only make it worse.” “Yes sir,” muttered Fiery tiredly. “So what are we looking for, Shiny?” Rock questioned, “’Cause I don’t really see anything around here except for a bunch of rocks.” “Just look for anything out of place, maybe a cave or something where the ward-stone might be kept. Or maybe a continuation of the path.” “If you say so,” Rock said doubtfully. The pair wandered across the mostly snow-covered plateau, occasionally using their hoofs to uncover the stone in order to check the rock. Both were careful to keep in sight of each other, and the third member of their party. After ten minutes of unfruitful searching, the two ponies returned to their starting point. “I don’t get it,” complained Shining Armor, while messing with the cracks in the rock again, “Why would the path lead us to the middle of nowhere, and then end at a completely unremarkable spot.” “I don’t get it either,” Rock said, “I mean, the only thing I can see that makes this spot stand out is the rock type, and I-“ “-What’s different around the rocks?” Shining interrupted, as he abruptly stopped messing with the cracks. “Well the rocks we saw on the mountain were all various metamorphic rocks, you know slate, schist, marble and some gneiss. While on the plateau, the rocks are all siltstone. Or at least all the surface I’ve seen uncovered is siltstone. Which is rather weird, I don’t know how sediment would have gotten deposited all the way up here.” Fiery looked at Rock uncertainly, “You actually remember the different types of rock we passed? “Well yeah” Rock shrugged , “I did grow up on a rock farm you know.” “Siltstone doesn’t weather in any weird ways, does it?” questioned Shining, ignoring the others conversation. “Not really,” Rock responded, “It might erode due to weathering more easily than most rocks, but it’s actually notable for not splitting like shale.” “So forming perfectly straight lines, and ninety degree corners isn’t normal for this type of rock,” Shining said, pointing at the perfectly straight crack that he’d been messing with, which continued on, with a second crack meeting it at a 90 degree angle. Rock examined the cracks. “Yep, that’s not natural. And actually I came across a couple of similar cracks when I dug up the snow.” “So did I,” Shining stated, “In fact, I’ll bet those cracks run the entire length of this plateau. Which means that this plateau is probably pony-made. And given that the path lead us straight here.” “Wait a minute,” Fiery said, “You’re not implying…” “I’m implying,” Shining continued, “That this plateau is the ward-stone!” “That’s great!” Rock cheered, before drooping slightly “But how do we charge it?” “I-, uh, I don’t know.” “You don’t know,” said Fiery flatly, “We came all this way, and you don’t know how to fix it?!” “Hey,” Shining defended himself, “I said from the beginning that I didn’t know what to do. But I’m sure we’ll figure it out. I know a bit about wards, just not enough to know how to charge this one.” “Great,” Rock said, “I was hoping that you were exaggerating. Well, what do you know that might help?” “Well,” Shining mused aloud, “most permanent wards are attached to objects, and use that object as a power sink that they gradually drain. Depending on the type, strength and size of the ward and ward-stone, the power sink retains and drains energy at different rates. Given the sheer size of this ward-stone, I’d say this power sink is probably needs more energy to charge than I could channel for a decade. It probably took dozens of unicorns to set these up in the first place.” “So your saying that it’s hopeless,” breathed Rock with dawning horror, “That we came all this way, and wasted all this time, for nothing.” “Not nothing!” Shining defended, shivering slightly “Now that we know where the ward-stone is, we can go back and safely lead a group of unicorns up here and recharge it.” “Go back?” questioned Fiery angrily, “You should have thought of this before we left!” “I didn’t know the ward-stone would be this big, or that it’d take this long to get to!” “It’s a ward that protects all of north-western Equestria,” retorted Fiery, “Of course it’d take a lot of power to recharge!” “Well-,” Shining began, before shivering hard enough to shake his entire body, “Is it me, or has it gotten colder?” “It’s not just you,” said Rock, before pointing with his hoof, “It’s them.” All around the three ponies were wind spirits, flickering in and out of visibility. “Get close to me,” Shining ordered as soon as the shock wore off. With a look on concentration on his face, a rose color glow sprang up around his horn. The other two ponies moved closer to Shining Armor, and a transparent dome of magic formed around them, but unlike at the fort, the windigos didn’t flee. “Great,” Rock snorted, “now we’re trapped here, on an open plateau, with only a flimsy shield to protect us. What next, an avalanche?” “Given the way things seem to be heading,” Fiery responded dejectedly, “Probably.” “We can’t give up,” Shining implored, although his voice lacked authority, “We’ve come this far.” “And what exactly are we supposed to do?” questioned Rock, “We’re stuck in the middle of nowhere, with only a flimsy shield to protect us from the evil spirits just outside it, with no hope of rescue. Let’s face it, we’re doomed.” “I didn’t know you were such a pessimist, Rock,” Fiery stated, “There must be a way of defeating the windigos, or at least repelling them long enough for us to escape.” “Well,” Shining mused, “what about the old stories about windigos?” “Everypony knows the story of Hearth’s Warming Eve,” Fiery stated, “They were defeated by the fire of friendship. But that’s not much more than an old myth.” “Every myth has some sort of historical backing,” Shining replied, “It’s all there if you look deep enough into history.” “And I supposed you’re suddenly an expert on the history behind the Hearth’s Warming Eve story,” Rock said cuttingly. “Not really,” Shining shook his head, but he wore a slight smile, and a distant look in his eyes, “But I do know that the fire of friendship is a real thing. I’ve seen it.” “You’ve what?” questioned Fiery, “That’s impossible!” “Not really, just very, very improbable.” “Well if the fire of friendship is a real thing,” Rock replied cautiously, but with hope in his eyes, “Then how do we use it?” “Well first,” Shining began ordering, with authority back in his voice, “we stop arguing. That will only make the windigos even stronger.” The other two ponies nodded firmly at him. “Next, try to think about everypony you love and care for. Think of all your friends.” He looked the other two straight in the eyes. “And always remember that you’re both my best friends. And nothing will change that.” “Yeah,” replied Fiery Hammer with a broad smile, “You’re my best friend too Shiny.” “Well of course you’re my best friend,” Rock said with a cocky grin, “Remember that time I got Major Mirage with that paint prank, and you convinced everypony that a griffin did it?” “Or maybe that time when you and I tricked Rough into wearing a tutu to his date with Windy Twirl?” Fiery reminisced. “Wait a minute,” Rock said laughing, “That was you two? Rough was red as a tomato for almost a week, but he didn’t tell me or Roll why he thought wearing a tutu was a good idea.” “We told him that she really liked sensitive stallions,” Shining shared with a grin, “and that as a result, she only will date stallions who like ballet. It was his initiative to actually wear a tutu.” While the three talked and reminisced about old times, the shield around them started glowing brighter. The three friends ignored the shield, caught up in their happy stories, but they couldn’t ignore it when the entire plateau lit up. The three stood there dumbfounded, as the snow melted, and the water ran off, revealing a massive, intricate inlaid pattern in the rock. The windigos around them screamed, and fled from the glowing rock, out to the north. After a minute, the rocks stopped glowing, but the pattern still glinted in the newly revealed sunlight. “Wow,” breathed Rock, “that was amazing. But what was it?” “I think,” Shining stated, somewhat dazed, “that was the fire of friendship, charging the ward-stone.” “So we did it?” questioned Fiery with a grin. “We did it,” Rock stated, also wearing a grin. “We did it,” affirmed Shining with a matching grin. All three friends shared a hoof-clap.