Solar Sails: Marooned In Equestria

by Bluecho


04 - Maelstrom

Ch. 4 - Maelstrom


“Hey Fluttershy, where's Rainbow Dash?” asked Twilight Sparkle, looking out the library window.

“Oh, Dash said the Weather Patrol called her in,” said the yellow and pink pegasus meekly. “Turns out they needed another big downpour this week.” Fluttershy considered this for a moment, then gasped, clutching hooves to her face. “Oh my gosh, I need to head home and get all the animals out of the rain! Sorry, see you later Twilight!” Nervously apologizing, Fluttershy flew on towards her house.

Twilight looked past her departing friend, towards the sky. Indeed, storm clouds were building. Or being built, as it were, by the diligent hooves of the Weather Patrol. Scattered drops of rain started falling in irregular patterns, and the wind began to blow, whipping Twilight's hair around.

Shutting her window, the alicorn groaned. “So much for getting back to that spot in the forest before the rains came. Now all the evidence will be washed away.” She took a seat at her desk and pulled out the broken slab of wood. The brown stain of blood was still there. “Well, at least I still have you,” Twilight cooed to the wood block. “Let's see what your blood tells me.”

With that, Twilight began picking flakes off and examining them under a microscope.

Business, it seemed, was canceled for the day due to scattered showers.

Sarin Miles sat in the tiny cave she called base one, looking out the mouth at the torrent of rain. She'd spent roughly a half-hour collecting tools that might be useful for her trek south. As much as she'd wanted to set off right there, in the middle of the crash site, she knew she had to be methodical. Had to prepare with every resource currently at her disposal.

A part of Sarin hated herself for bothering to wait. For wasting time before the rains came. But her more rational side realized she had no idea the distance she needed to travel to get to the place called Ponyville. She could only deduce the direction, not the distance. Given her targets – the two winged ponies Rainbow Dash and Twilight – had the power of flight, they could very easily have ventured a hundred kilometers from their home to get here. Sarin had no means of knowing.

What she did know what that within thirty minutes, it started raining in earnest. She most likely would have been caught in the rain had she left immediately. Walking through the rain, especially this heavy a downpour, held little appeal for a trained soldier.

If Ponyville is a town, it's not going anywhere, Sarin thought dejectedly. She released a tortured sigh. So there's that.

She reclined back on the floor, or at least as far as she could in the cramped space available. The cave was more a crack in the mountain side. Even when Sarin found it, the space was limited. In the days since, she'd accumulated all the bits and pieces from the crash site. The busted ether engine, the busted radio, the busted boxes containing what remained of her busted provisions, and the busted remains of the solar sail. Between those, the parachute re-purposed as a bed roll, and the chunks of wood that comprised the hull, Sarin had somehow managed to pack the entire solar dory into the cave. Necessary and an admirable accomplishment if Sarin said so herself, but aggravating.

Not to mention she also had to leave room for the fire.

Sarin wanted to avoid sticking the fire at the entrance – thereby giving just a little bit more room to work with inside – because of the threat of being spotted. This fear was confirmed to Sarin as she saw the rain starting to pour, chancing outside to see a group of pegasus flying in the cloud layer and manually rearranging them.

That's another tidbit going in the report, thought Modified Soldier G7-H3. The inhabitants of this planet can manipulate its weather at will. Good to know. Upon further reflection, Sarin realized she needed to watch the skies as she traveled. Now for more reasons than just signs of rescue.

Thankfully, the cave seemed to have a pit already suited for building a fire within. Sarin worried the smoke would be trapped inside, but found there was already a crack in the ceiling that acted as a chimney. Further inspection from the inside and outside revealed that the chimney bent halfway through its course, so that it wasn't a straight shot. Presumably it also had a means of diverting water, since the present rain didn't leak in.

So very convenient, thought Sarin. If I didn't know better I'd say this cave was designed to be lived in.

No where to go and no preparations to complete, Sarin sat on the floor and thought about what to do. She didn't have any substantial hobbies; her training, exercise, and duties kept her busy enough. Her free time was almost always spent thus; her social life was, to say the least, deficient. But there wasn't enough space to do push-ups or sit-ups or to jog.

In fact, the only exercise she could perform were stretching. Contortion stretching. Small mercies.

Every sub-series within the MS G7 line had its own physical specialty. G7-Bs were known for their tough hides, G7-Es for their ability to absorb and discharge currents of energy. Both had other “tricks”, but Sarin could never remember their more mundane endowments. For her sub-series, the G7-Hs, they were rated for three things: celerity, dexterity, and contortion. They were spry, agile, and capable of squeezing, hiding, and bending where normal Fatae could not.

Part of the process of making G7-Hs so flexible was in the biological changes. Whereas average Fatae could exhibit a capacity for double-jointedness or flexibility, her sub-series had as much of such traits stacked upon them as was possible. Or at least as much as reasonable. To her unease, Sarin Miles was not the first with the third H position in her series; the previous one was euthanized because of complications resulting from their super flexibility. Technically speaking, Sarin's full designation was MS G7-H3b, though most in the military omit that to avoid embarrassment.

Sarin considered all this as she practiced bending her left foot behind her own head. Such was the second part of making the G7-Hs the contortion masters that they are: physically making them contort in every way on a regular basis. There's no amount of genetic manipulation that could substitute for raw training.

And so Sarin's exercises continued. To Sarin, most of them were simply habit. She'd been collapsing herself into tiny bundles of limbs for years, so they bothered her little. To an outside observer, the activities would seem grotesque and painful. And people wonder why I don't have friends, thought Sarin. Although my appearance doesn't help.

Thinking this caused Sarin to curl into a tight ball and sulk for thirty minutes. She had nothing better to do, she could afford the indulgence.

It grew darker outside, rain pelting the ground as heavy as ever. Sarin took to bending individual fingers back as far as was comfortable. When she was young it had been difficult, leading to more than a few tears shed from the pain. She learned very quickly how little the military thought of tears. She soon stopped crying; it's just that she had to stop the tears well before it stopped hurting.

What would the ponies think of this? Since they don't have fingers, Sarin assumed they would be curious at the idea of even having them, and less put off by such a grotesque display. Then again she had no plans to reveal herself, so the point was largely moot.

As Sarin began practicing to collapse her hand – both the most uncomfortable and most useful of all contortion tricks since it allowed her to slip out of handcuffs – she was startled by a crack of thunder outside. The storm was getting worse. She turned back to her hands and worked for a few minutes before an even louder sound came from outside. The sound of stone scraping against stone. Looking over to the entrance, Sarin saw what little light that came through was slowly being blocked by a shadow.

She was being sealed in.

Grabbing a spear, Sarin thrust out through the gap. Sarin struck out three times, on the third feeling the end of the spear impact against something. A soft something.

“Aaaahh!” bellowed a pained screech from outside. It sounded off, somehow, but Sarin couldn't fathom why. The spear pulled along further, sunk into flesh that was drawing back. Sarin tried to resist the pull, but before she could a flash of lightning lit up the area. Just at the instant of light, a cloven foreleg swept down and smashed the spear shaft.

Plunged into new darkness, Sarin scrambled backwards against her wall of useless dory parts, clutching the equally useless remains of her spear. She sank to the floor panting, hearing the boulder scrape at the mouth of her shelter until it stopped. Venturing over, Sarin could feel the hole blocked completely. Sealed.

At least that entrance is, thought Sarin Miles, before turning her head to look up. There's still one way out.

For a normal person – be it Fatae or Pony – the chimney would be impossible to move through. Assuming they could squeeze through the gap, they would be hard pressed (literally by the walls) to circumvent the almost ninety degree turns that prevented the hole from being a straight shot. But Sarin was not normal even by her species' standards. She knew she could get through.

After all, she'd done it before. More or less. Practically. Sort of.

She had to figure out the shape of the tunnel, so squeezing up into it had been the best way to do so. Of course she hadn't actually gone in one end and popped out the other. Just ducked her head up until she saw the zig-zag. It was a simple matter of placing a torch there and checking the top to prove her suspicions.

Climbing up properly with intent to travel through it was another matter entirely. Sarin used an impromptu stack of debris, moving the engine block et al to form a step stool up. From there, she reached her arms up ahead of her and began to shimmy up. The walls scraped against her side, with many points threatening to cut deep if she wasn't careful. Once she had her feet against the wall of the chimney, she began the climb of inches.

At least this section of the climb was dry. Not so much when she finally reached the bend.

True to her theory, the rain failing into the hole deviated down another smaller hole. No doubt collecting in some underground spring. Sarin groped around the bend, roughly half a meter in length connecting two parallel tunnels. This next part would be the deciding factor. Either she could bend around the angles, where she could keep climbing, or she couldn't, in which case she'd have to descend again and continue being trapped in a cave. All that assumed she didn't get partially around the obstacle only to get stuck somehow, and die horribly where she was.

At least my body would remain hidden, Sarin thought, chuckling uneasily and cracking a half-smile. The situation had induced dark comedy. Comedy that wasn't funny. Only now did she realize she might have at least tried pushing the boulder out of the way first. Shameful blunder.

No, I'm already here, she thought, let's just stay the course.

Sarin slowly rotated herself around so her back was to the bend. She could conceivably contort her knees or other parts if necessary, but going up so as to be in a sitting position was the most intuitive method. With agonizing slowness, she inched her head around the bend. She felt the rain pour down on her face, sapping precious heat and nearly blinding her. Sarin debated whether it would be better to wait until the storm subsided, but dismissed the plan. She would need as much lubrication as she could to shuffle the rest of the way. If she had oil it would be even better.

Her side stung where an edge slid over it. No chance to check the damage, just keep pushing through. Sarin's shoulders caught on a thin ring. She briefly wondered if she would need to dislocate one of her shoulders to make it through, but a modest turn provided the space necessary. As well as putting her face into a particularly thick stream of water cascading down the wall. It would be her luck to find the rain gutter of the mountain. Her upper back was through, and she pushed further, spitting water from her mouth.

By the time her bottom plopped onto the “shelf” of the bend, she was sure she couldn't get more soaked around the head and shoulders. She was mistaken, as a greater flood of water splashed down the hole in that second. Excellent.

Finally, after finagling her legs back and forth, she managed to stand on solid ground. Looking up, Sarin saw only a half meter between her and freedom. She was scratched, scraped, bruised, soggy, and for the first time in many years a little claustrophobic.

The last time was her test of compressibility back in training. Had to fit into a large suitcase and stay there for an hour. At least then, she knew the testers would pull her out if they detected that she'd stopped breathing. Nobody but her would-be murderer potentially waited outside.

With one final heave – contorting her shoulders so as to push her elbows up early and save time – Sarin heaved herself out of the chimney and flopped on the hard ground. Her skin felt raw in multiple places, she was cold, her muscles and joints protested such long-term abuse, and her heart raced with utter joy. She made it. Sarin smiled.

Somewhere below a beast grunted. She dropped her smile. Sarin remembered what trapped her in the first place. And now she'd have to face it too. She suppressed a whimpering cough.

Inching quietly, counting on the roaring rain and the claps of thunder, Sarin crawled along the stone cliff she was on to witness the one below her. Peering over the side, she could see little in the dark, but she could hear it just fine. A heavily breathing creature climbed up the path to the cave. As it paced in front of the stone blocking then entrance, lightning fired overhead, giving Sarin her first good look at her opponent.

Oh what fresh hell is this?