//------------------------------// // Chapter 09: Up in Smoke // Story: Wild Sky Yonder // by Mysecsha //------------------------------// Chapter 09: Up in Smoke “Captain?”         Aurora looked up to see Dr. Firelight enter her office. “Yes, Doctor?”         “Come with me, please, Captain. B Flight’s had another incident.”         She sagged. “What is it this time?”         “They were attacked by six civilians... and one cadet.”         “What?”         “I’ve instructed Coriolis to take them to an old enlisted barracks at the west end of camp where I’d set aside equipment for your mission. She is debriefing them. I suggest we head there now. I’ll tell you what I know on the way, Coriolis will fill in the blanks. One of the civilians is being prepped for emergency surgery and I’ll be needed back at the infirmary posthaste.”         Stepping out into the rain, Firelight recited the litany of injuries sustained by B-Flight’s assailants. “Thus far I’ve observed two shattered radii, a dislocated shoulder, at least four concussions, a broken jaw with several dislodged teeth, a deep flesh wound that appears to have been inflicted by a slingspade, a broken scapula and severe internal bleeding accompanying a shattered pelvis -- and a collapsed trachea. Captain, that last pony is dead.”         Aurora stopped dead in her tracks. “Not the cadet, I hope?”         “No. Southwing Two is unconscious, but I expect her to make a full recovery. I’m certain we’ll both have a number of unpleasant questions to ask her in good time, but right now, she’s in no condition to answer them.”         Hesitating, Firelight continued. “Captain, the injuries I’ve just listed; Northwing Seven is responsible for inflicting almost all of them. Cori reports that she’s... unresponsive, right now. I recommend she be grounded pending psych eval.”         Aurora scowled. “I’ll consider it. After I’ve spoken with her.” The two officers resumed their trek to the far corners of the base.  “The deceased appears to be a transient troublemaker from town. A ‘Wild Sky’ fanatic, or some such? He has scars that are consistent with old winter wolf bites and frostburns.” He turned his head and narrowed his eyes. “Unusual, isn’t it? What use has a rabble-rouser for a place with no rabble to rouse?” Aurora cursed. “There go any thoughts of scrubbing the mission. If I’m gone by the time Blue Two wakes up, just don’t do anything I wouldn’t. While I’m gone, I’d like you to take the lead on this Wild Sky menace and let T-Bone handle the routine training business. After all, our six best leads are your patients.” Firelight smiled. “Very well. Captain, I recommend we put the base on lockdown. No more leave in town, no more trips in or out.” “Agreed.” Firelight stopped as they arrived at the squat, long building where he’d ordered B Flight. “Furthermore, I recommend we keep this matter strictly internal.” Aurora’s eyes flared. “Absolutely not, contact the sheriff immediately! If those ponies are residents of Glimmervale, she can help you. More importantly, they have rights!” His smile thinned at the reprimand. “Very well, ma’am. With your permission, I’ve a patient to attend to.” Aurora dismissed him with a salute and entered the building. To her left, Wedge sat and squirmed while Red appeared to kiss him rhythmically on the cheek. Only when she moved further into the room could she see the cut on her son’s face that his wingmate was stitching closed. To her right, Soarin’ argued with Coriolis, the two exchanging heated words over whether or not Spitfire needed to give her statement on the evening’s excitement. The yellow mare in question sat in the far corner, staring at the wall.         Coriolis disengaged from Soarin’ and saluted the captain. Aurora nodded to the younger mare. “Sergeant. Report?”         “If the doctor filled you in on the injuries to the other side, then the only thing to add is that it seems to have been racially motivated.” The last two words sounded like they felt foreign in Cori’s mouth. “B Flight seems to be okay, though I can’t get Seven to say a word. Would you like a summary of my debriefing?”         Aurora shook her head. “I’ll do my own, thank you. That’ll be all.”         Cori nodded. “One and Two saw some of the excitement as well, I’ll get you my report on their debriefing ASAP.”         The captain nodded, and the younger mare left the building. Aurora sagged with relief and wrapped her wings around Soarin’, kissing him on the forehead. “What happened out there, son?”         Red and Soarin’ talked over one another, recounting the tale from start to finish. Stargazer tried to contribute, but every time he did, Red shut his mouth so he wouldn’t reopen his cut. Honest Soarin’ even disclosed that he’d intended to sneak dinner for four onto the mission expenses.         As the story ended, Aurora blinked back tears and offered her son a tremulous smile. “See? That’s what happens when you disobey your mother. Are you ok?”         Soarin’ squirmed. “Aw, Mom. Nothing we couldn’t handle. Just some guys like last spring, only with knives this time.”         She shook her head. “No, no, no! Nothing like this happened last year! Stand back, let me look at you. Are you alright?”         He tilted his head to the side and rolled his eyes at her. “I’m fine, Mom! The Ponyville Prowlers worked me over better’n this!”         Wedge laughed. “Now that was a hell of a game; that big red colt was out for blood! What a nut!”         Red bopped him on the chin. Through clenched teeth, she said,  “No talking!”         Aurora offered Soarin’ a hesitant smile and turned to her other son and his wingmate. “Looks like a fine cut you’ve got there, Stargazer. I don’t recall the Prowlers doing that.” She trotted over and laid a hoof on Red’s withers. “Well, Cadet: you look no worse for wear, so what’s the prognosis on this one?”         Red smiled around the needle in her mouth as she tied off the final suture. “He,” she said, “is going to have an absolutely gorgeous scar.”         Aurora laughed. “Is that so?”         Red kissed Wedge on the cheek. “Mmhmm. I suspect I’ll have to chase away all the other mares with a shovel. Maybe a few stallions, too.”         The captain shook her head and smiled. “Atagirl.” She patted the young mare on the back and sauntered over to her final challenge of the evening.         She sat down next to Spitfire and said nothing for a long moment. “You know, Sunshine, that wall over there? The one you’ve been staring at since I came in and probably a lot longer? It’s really not that interesting.”         Spitfire glanced at her with haunted eyes, then looked down. “Evening, captain.”         Aurora leaned forward, trying to make eye contact. “You know, my wingmates in the ‘Bolts used to call me ‘Lightshow.’”         Spitfire’s voice came back more brittle than she’d ever heard it. “Maybe someday I’ll deserve to call you that.”         The old mare sighed and seized the cadet with both hooves, forcing eye contact. “Maybe you deserve it right now. Maybe I owe you a great big ‘thank you.’ Maybe it’s because of you that my sons are still alive, Sunshine!”         Spitfire shrugged and looked away. “Maybe. ‘N’ maybe I’m a murderess. Maybe that crazy stallion didn’t hafta die. Maybe the others didn’t have to be all maimed ‘n’ screaming...”         Aurora gave a frustrated huff. “Cadet? Look at me.”         Spitfire looked up. She stared right through the captain and into whatever private hell she was keeping herself in.         “I’m not going to lie, and pretend I know what you’re going through. I’ve never had to do what you had to do tonight, and I thank Harmony for that. But I’ve had to kill my fair share of creatures, some big, some small, some terribly intelligent. And I’ve had to watch ponies die, knowing the whole time that I was responsible.         “That comes with the job, Spitfire. Sometimes, rescues go bad. I lost my first wingmate and the stranded hiker she was carrying. It was my fault, too: I was the one leading us out of the storm.         “You’ve heard about the forest fire, years back? I lost five ponies under my command, and a dozen civilians. Damn near lost Dee, too. Worst loss of life on a Corps op in eighty years. Not a day goes by I don’t wonder if my orders got them killed. Just days ago I was sure my orders had killed Thunderhead. “It’s hard, what we do. And sometimes, the only comfort is that somewhere, someday, somepony we’ll never meet won’t have to suffer because we suffered for her.         “I can only imagine what it must be like to kill another pony. It’s not a pleasant thought. But what you did tonight, Spitfire, was this: you saved two lives, and those two lives are very dear to me. Is it possible that you might have saved those lives without taking one? Yes. But let me tell you something, kid: the way I see it, there’s exactly one person in this valley who had even a snowball’s chance in hell of doing a better job out there tonight than you did, and that’s me. And I’ve got thirty years of training and career on ya, kid. Dial it back to when I was a half-trained cadet, I doubt I could’ve done nearly as good.”         She wrapped Spitfire in a bear-hug. “Look at ‘em, Cadet: look at my boys. If it happened all over again, would you do it again?”         Spitfire’s voice came out in a whisper. “In a heartbeat.”         “I know you would, Sunshine. I know you would. I’m proud of you, kid. Hang in there.” Aurora released the cadet and stood, blinking away a tear. “Right. To business, then. Doc found some evidence your friends came from up north, so the mission’s still a go. We’ll be circling out and around to the northwest to the deepest search area first, then working our way back to the upper icefields and down the Glimmerfang Glacier into town, and it’ll take us as long as it takes us. We’ll pack up first thing, and head out. I think it’s best if we all stay here tonight: mission gear’s here, and you four have already been attacked by a fellow cadet. Blue Two might not have acted alone. I’m not sure I want you sleeping in the dorms until we have this ‘Wild Sky’ nonsense straightened out.” She gave one of the matresses an optimistic pat. A cloud of dust flew free.         The boys groaned.         “It’s disgusting and freezing in here!” said Soarin’.         “Then huddle up!”         Red brightened considerably at that suggestion. “Really?”         Aurora nodded. “Sure, it’ll be good practice for the mission, anyway. Cold up on the ice!”         Red latched onto Wedge. “I am liking this mission more and more and more.”         The captain hit the lights and four ponies settled down with their newly-purchased sleeping bags and ancient, musty mattresses for what sleep they could find. The fifth pony, Spitfire, just sat with her head hung low and her eyes closed. Shuffling hooves approached. After so many days together, she could tell it was Soarin’ just from the sound.         Softly, so the others couldn’t hear, he whispered, “Hey, Spit. Brought you a bag.”         She knew she should turn around, acknowledge him. She didn’t. “Thanks.”         “Wanted- wanted to say thank you. For before. That one guy, he had me doubled over. He... he had me, Spit. He only needed another second or two. You saved me.”         “You save me lots of times, Soarin’. From trees, from bullies, from myself...”         She heard him grasp for words a few times, taking in a breath, then letting it out in a frustrated sigh as he couldn’t decide what to say. Finally he asked, “Does that mean I can’t say thank you?”         She half-turned and looked at his hooves. “It made me so mad when he hit you. I lost it, just like I did with Bigs. Only worse.”         He reached toward her, but pulled his hoof back. “I think Mom’s right, Spit. I don’t think anypony coulda done better. What say we get you settled down, huh? Get some sleep before tomorrow?”         Spitfire turned back to the wall. “Can’t”         Soarin’ gave a frustrated snort. She heard him tromp off a bit, then heard a metallic squeal, horribly loud in the silence of the hut. She turned her head to an even louder crash: Soarin’ had picked up the neighboring cot and deposited it adjacent to the one she was sitting on.         All of his pretense at stealth was gone. “Okay, Sunshine. Time for bed.” He snatched her up with one hoof, lay the sleeping bag he’d brought across the mattress with another, and set her back down.         “What do you think you’re doing?”         He flashed her an innocent grin, barely visible in the soft moonlight. “I’m making sure my wingmate gets enough sleep. C’mon, Sunshine. It’s night time. Sun’s all done. Bedtime for sun.”         She scowled at him. “No!”         “Fine. Does it matter to you if I get any sleep?”         She snorted in frustration. “Yes.”         “Good. I’m not laying down ‘til you do.”         “Fine!” She glared at him and moved to lay down on the sleeping bag. On the adjacent bed, Soarin’ did the same. To her chagrin, he watched her very closely. If she tried to move back up, he did, too.         She sighed and settled onto the mattress. “Okay, you win.”         He chuckled and in a tired voice said, “The important thing is that I win.”         Spitfire listened to his breathing for a few moments, until she was confident he’d fallen asleep. Then she tried to sit back up.         Strong blue hooves wrapped her up, keeping her from her pensive reverie.         “I’ll hold you all night, if I have to.”         As she melted back down into his embrace, she decided that was the sweetest, most reassuring thing she’d ever heard.         Light. Voices. Warmth. Spitfire began to stir.         “Oh, they’re like angels! Let’s not wake them!”         “Red, if you and I woke up like that, we’d be on the next train outta here.”         “Yes. You would.”         Spitfire began to recognize the voices, and where she was. She was in one of the old barracks buildings. Wrapped up in Soarin’s hooves. And that was Soarin’s mother’s voice. Her eyes snapped open.         “Captain!”         “Mom!”         Aurora shot Spitfire a wide, predatory smile. “Good morning, Sunshine! Seems like just recently we had a little talk about this kind of thing, don’t you remember? I recall telling you that this” -she waved a hoof to indicate the way Spitfire was tangled up with her wingmate- “was a perfectly valid way to deal with your aggression issues, but I put a condition or two on that. Didn’t I?”         Spitfire shook her head. “But I-”         The captain held out a hoof to forestall further protest. “Ah, ah!”         “But we-”         “Ah, ah!”         Spitfire slumped in defeat. “You said not to tell you about it.”         Aurora shook her head, disappointed. “When I said ‘don’t tell the captain,’ showing me instead isn’t what I had in mind. Do we need to go over it again?”         Spitfire and Soarin’ flushed beet red and began stammering their protests, but Aurora waved them off.         “Oh, never mind. Up and at ‘em, you two. Roll up those bedrolls, pick a blade, and we’ll be packed and ready.”         Soarin’ stood up and groaned. “Ready? What about all the other mission prep?”         “Done. It’s nearly nine.”         “Nine?”         Red gave him a mock-scowl. “We all decided Spitfire deserved a few extra hours. You only got off the hook because we couldn’t figure out how to untangle you without waking her up.         Spitfire gave her sleeping bag a perplexed tug. Packing these things up had always been Mom’s job. Soarin’ laughed at her. “Tell you what, Spit: you pick out the rest of the gear, I’ll handle these. Okay?”         She nodded and abandoned the bedding for the other gear. She perked up when she saw the pile of slender metal boxes. Gravity blades, like the ones she’d worked on before.         She strapped one to each foreleg and flicked her hooves to let them slide free. Standing on her hind legs, she brought them up and struck an experimental fighting pose. Satisfied, she set those two aside for Soarin’ and grabbed two more for herself.         Aurora chuckled. “Familiar, are we?”         Spitfire shrugged as she continued inspecting the weapons. “I oughta be. Spent my first Friday cleaning twelve of these damn things while the doctor droned on and on and on about history in his museum. Still, beat the tar outta sitting in my room another day.”         “Excellent, you just volunteered to familiarize these three. I’m off to grab Firelight for one last check-in. You four: there’s a flagpole about a hundred yards southeast of here, be under it in half an hour. We’re leaving. Four ponies and five packs awaited the captain beneath the old flagpole. Wedge busied himself fussing over the packs, Soarin’ by fussing over the line on the flagpole, trying unsuccessfully to get it to stop slapping against the pole in the wind. Red, meanwhile, fussed over Spitfire, doggedly trying to engage her forlorn friend in conversation -- mainly on the subject of whether she’d really gotten Aurora’s permission to bend the rules. Presently, Red held up a hoof to silence the other three. Softly but distinctly they heard the captains’ voices in the distance.         “... and under normal circumstances I’d agree with you, but grounding her now means taking her away from her support network, leaving her alone for weeks. So unless you’ve got hours each day to play counsellor, I have to conclude it’s better for her mental state to be with her friends and keeping busy, instead of alone. End of discussion.”         “Very well, on your head be it.”         As Aurora and Firelight rounded the corner Spitfire saw to her surprise that all three of her sergeants were with them. Thunderhead rolled alongside Dee and Dinky under his own power, in a wheelchair.         A broad grin crept onto his face. “My little worker bees, all grown up! You take care up there. Watch yourselves and one another. Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do.”         Soarin’ abandoned the flagpole and bumped hooves with his brother. “Don’t do anything T-Bone wouldn’t do. So, no listening to Mom, no being responsible, and no staying out of trouble?”         Wedge laughed. “Yep, that sounds about right!”         As Aurora turned to give her final instructions to Thunderhead and Firelight, Spitfire felt a tap on her knee. Little Dinky looked up at her with pleading eyes.         “Miss Spitfire? You’re my favoritest cadet. You’ll take care of Unca Soarin’, won’t you?”         Spitfire smiled and tousled the little filly’s hair. “Of course I will, Sarge! You can count on me!”         Dinky gave her a quick hug and scampered over to Red. Spitfire heard her say, “Miss Red? You’re my favoritest cadet. You’ll take care of Unca Stargazer, won’t you?”         With a twinkle in her eyes, Red shared an isn’t-she-precious look with Spitfire before answering, “Don’t you worry, hon. I’ll take good care of him.”         Dinky smiled and scrambled back to her mother’s side. “Did I do good, Mom?” Dee chuckled. “Of course you did, Muffin. Of course you did.”         Goodbyes were said. Gear was checked and rechecked. Red, Wedge, and Soarin’ demonstrated to Firelight’s satisfaction that they’d be able to handle the heirloom blades without much risk to themselves or the artifacts. Before long, it was time to go. Aurora took wing, and B Flight followed.         Spitfire settled into formation with Soarin’. Even with the goggles covering his face, she could see he was excited about the mission.         “Hey, this is your first time heading west over the mountains, right?”         “Sure is.”         He smiled at her. “There’s so much great stuff out that way, I can’t wait to show you! There’s this marbled canyon by the edge of the burn zone, paint vents where hot springs turn the mud a bunch of colors you won’t believe, a stone bridge where a waterfall ate away under the hard rock, a moose settlement where they have really good coffee...”         As they glided over mile after mile of hills and pines, Soarin’ regaled her with all of the places he wanted to take her. As they neared the ridge separating Glimmervale from the next valley,        Aurora flared her wings and dropped back in the formation, coming up right between the two ponies and ending Soarin’s litany. “Son, we’re on a recon mission. I doubt we’ll have time for sightseeing.”         Soarin’s face fell. “Yes ma’am.”         “Speaking of, we could use some eyes up high. Why not show off your talents for a while, son?”         Soarin’ sighed and shot Spitfire a wry grin. He beat his wings and ascended to a height none of the others could match.          The captain laughed. “Sorry to spoil the moment, there, Sunshine, but we’ve got work to do.”         Spitfire furrowed her brow. “We do? Ma’am?”         “As I recall, you’re scheduled for some one-on-one combat training this week. You didn’t think you were off the hook just because we’re on a mission, did you?”         “No, ma’am!”         “Drop the ‘yes, ma’am, no, ma’am’ crap, kid. You sound like a kiss-ass. Now. Think back to your little scuffle with the thunderbird. You made one critical mistake, and got yourself killed for it. What was that mistake?”         She scowled at the question. “I, uh... starting the fight in the first place?”         The look on Aurora’s face told her that wasn’t the right answer.         “But I did start the fight, and I probably didn’t need to!”         “Fine. When to fight and when not to fight’s an important lesson, and we’ll cover it before long. Now assume I meant what did you do wrong during the fight?”         As they soared high over the unbroken carpet of pines, Spitfire relived those tense moments in her head. She’d not known what the thunderbird was capable of. She’d been stunned by its first bolt of lightning. Once she’d won, she’d plummeted towards the ground...         That must be it. “I didn’t protect my wings?”         Aurora smiled. “I knew you had good instincts. Your wings are your most powerful asset. If you’re in the air, a few lost feathers can mean death -- messy, awful, painful death with a nice long fall to think about it. Now: what’s the most important bit of what I just said?”         Spitfire chewed her lip for a moment. “Um, ‘if you’re in the air’?”         “Good! Why?”         “Well, if you’re on the ground, you should probably be a bit more worried about your head and neck, right?” That got her a nod. “And your belly. Think about it like this, Sunshine: you can still be a fine SAR pony with three legs, or no tail, or a cropped ear. Not so with a crippled wing or a damaged brain. Back to the bird: when you administered the coup de grace, you destroyed the bird’s flight surfaces. What does that say to you?” “Go for the feathers?” Aurora shook her head. “No. Okay, maybe I can’t expect you to stumble into every single fundamental on your own. You grabbed it by the tail, right?” Spitfire nodded. “If it’d had a shorter tail, you’d have missed, right?” Another nod. “The bird had no choice in the matter: it needs that long tail to fly. But there’s a lesson there, isn’t there?” Spitfire cringed. “I’m gonna need a haircut, aren’t I?” “Ha! Excellent! Why?” “Because long hair is something an opponent can get ahold of and use against me.”   “It’s not so bad, Sunshine: a nice, tight braid solves most of the problem... still, you could stand to shorten that mess just a bit, don’tcha think?” As morning gave way to early afternoon, they dissected every hop, twist, and kick of each of the first three fights she’d had since joining the Corps. By the end of it, her cheeks were red with embarrassment and she felt the only fight she’d really handled well was that first one with Bigs, when she hadn’t attacked at all. Then she said as much, and Aurora disabused her of even that notion. “Not so fast, kid: the very first thing you did there was try to let him hit you in the wings. I know you were trying to exploit the rules, but that was a truly boneheaded move. Speaking of ‘boneheaded,’ I want to talk about headbutting, and why it’s almost always a bad-”         A blue streak from the heavens forestalled any further commentary on her performance. Soarin’ dove down at a speed Spitfire hadn’t known he was capable of.         “Mom! Willowbrook! It’s... it’s bad!”         “Slow down, son. What’s up?”         “There’s a patch and it’s round and black and I don’t think we’ll be getting that coffee. Ever again.” If not for the panic in his voice, the jumble of words might have been comical.         Aurora patted him on the withers. “Ok, Soarin’, let’s go have a look.”         As they approached, Soarin’s shock and panic proved contagious. Spitfire had gathered that Willowbrook was the moose community with Soarin’s favorite coffee shop. When they reached it, it became clear that Soarin’ should have said, ‘Willowbrook is gone.” The town and the brush around it had been burned to the ground. Perhaps even more disturbingly, the forest around the burn site was still intact, a nearly perfect ring around the former townsite.         Aurora put a hoof to her forehead, trembling slightly. “Take a look, kids. What do you see?”         Soarin’ spoke first. “This wasn’t an accident; somepony did this.”         “Think carefully about what you just said. ‘Somepony’?”         Wedge backed up his brother, saying, “Some pegasus did this, Mom. And they used weathercraft to cover it up. Look at that ring. Think about this: we’re close enough to home that someone in Glimmervale would have seen the smoke - unless it was intentionally dispersed.”         His mother gave a grim nod. “You’re right. Sunshine? Blades out. Boys? Look for survivors. Red, I want you trailing the boys with your aid kit ready, though I’m afraid you’ll only be needing it if one of us takes a fall.”         Stargazer led his teammates through a thorough search of the destroyed town that lasted deep into evening. The ash and coals were cool to the touch, though telltale signs of flowing water suggested that had been accomplished by a surreptitious rain. The burning might have happened weeks ago, or it might have happened hours ago. When they found no sign of moose remains on the surface, the five ponies struggled to find and enter the town’s cellars, in search of survivors. They found none. The lack of any sign the town’s inhabitants had been present for the fire comforted them even as it deepened the mystery.         Aurora chose to search the town’s perimeter alone, leaving B Flight to investigate the town square. Spitfire and Soarin’ lapsed into an argument about the source of the fire.         “Salamanders. Gotta be. Look how completely burned it is, it must have been a magic fire.”         Spitfire rolled her eyes. “Soarin’, does this look like a volcano to you? There’s no salamanders anywhere near the Whitecrowns! How in the hell do you propose they got a fire elemental up here?”         The ice-blue stallion shot her a hurt expression. “Fine then, phoenixes. Or even phoenix eggs; those’ll go up like a torch if you break ‘em hard enough.”         “Right, and it’d only take a few dozen to torch the town like this. And a few dozen phoenix eggs costs more than this entire valley is worth.”         Soarin’ leaned in close and scowled at her. “Okay Sunshine, if you’re so smart, how’d they do it?”         Stargazer leaned back and watched the fireworks. He nudged Red and said, “Trouble in paradise? They’re really going at it.”         His wingmate grinned and shook her head. “Look at the corner of her mouth. Look at his eyes. There’s a smile behind both of those glares. No, this is a play-fight. The kind where one thing leads to another and the combatants wind up ‘going at it’ in an entirely different way.”         An outburst from Soarin’ preempted Stargazer’s response. “Oh, so a fire elemental’s completely ridiculous, but gallons and gallons and gallons of fuel? That’s easy to bring in. They wouldn’t have to buy that in town or anything. And nopony’d be suspicious about some newcomer buying a barrel of lantern oil. And you said my idea was stupid?”         Stargazer flinched as he saw Spitfire’s eyes ignite. He leaned over and murmured in Red’s ear, “This is getting out of hand. Soarin’ never gets sarcastic, and Sunshine’s about to pop. Maybe we oughta...”         Red winked at him. “I’m on it, honey bunny.”         She trotted in between the two arguing ponies. “Hang on, there, team. I think you might be getting just a touch ahead of yourselves. Don’t you think there might be a simpler explanation?”         Spitfire and Soarin’ wheeled around, scowling at her. She took an involuntary step back. “All I mean is, if you wanted to start a fire, how would you do it?”         Something clicked in Stargazer’s head. He zipped over to Red and planted a kiss on her surprised lips. “Red, you’re brilliant.”         Her eyes fluttered and a slow grin spread across her face. “Whatever that was about, it’s about time!” She leaned in to kiss him again but he’d already dashed off.         Stargazer darted about, looking frantically around the townsite. There? No. There? Maybe... he spotted the charred remains of a tree stump that looked to have been split down to the ground. Aha.          He dove down and began digging at the base of the stump. Before long, Red arrived at his side. She flopped down beside him and kneaded his withers with her hooves. “Watcha doin’, hon?”         Gotcha. Wedge saw what he was looking for a few inches down and set about unearthing it. “Testing a thought. An idea you gave me. Thanks, Red.”         He pulled a sandy, glassy tube out of the ground and presented it to her. Red gasped. “For me? I’ll treasure it forever! What is it?”         “It’s proof that I’m right. Lightning glass. Like you said, they’re overthinking things: we already suspect pegasi because they probably used weather to disperse the smoke. So, if you’ve already got a weather team in place, what’s the easiest way to start a fire?”         Red fixed him with a seductive smile. “Your eyes.” She giggled at his confused response. “They always set me ablaze, honey bunny.”         She laughed as he rolled his eyes, and he kissed her on the cheek. “Fine, then. Assuming I didn’t seduce the town into flames, they used lightning. That’s the proof.”         “Wonderful. Now let’s talk about what you just did twice in the last minute or two. What I’ve been waiting for you to do all my life. Let’s talk about how I can make sure you get around to it a lot more often, mister.”         “What’d I do?”         “This,” she said, and she kissed him.         “Oh! That.” Stargazer fumbled his hooves, looking anywhere but into her eyes. “I just... I thought- that is, I wanted...”         Red’s eyes welled with tears, and she smiled at him. “I love you too, Wedge. We’ll talk more later. In the meantime, just keep it up, okay?” She snatched up the glass tube and beckoned him back to present his discovery to the quarrelsome half of the team. If anything, discovering that they’d both been wrong improved Spitfire’s and Soarin’s mood tremendously. before long, Aurora summoned them to the north side of the town’s perimeter. The transition from burned to unburned was startling. Black ash led right up to healthy green pines. No more than a few yards into the treeline, another sight startled Spitfire so badly she leapt into the air and flicked out her blades. An alpha frostwolf lay forlorn on a tiny patch of snow. It had been chained to a tree. The elemental’s delicate icy coat was melting, and she could see the tree through its midsection. Its paws, ears, tail, and lower jaw - everywhere a slender body part protruded from it - were withered and stunted. It whimpered piteously at them. “Hold off, Sunshine,” said Aurora. “That one’s not hurting anypony. There are chains like this every twenty feet or so around the whole town. This is the only one with anything in the chains.” Wedge whistled. “We know how they kept the fire from spreading.”         “Exactly. What else?”         Spitfire frowned and sheathed her blades. “Do we know how long it takes one of these things to thaw? We might be able to timestamp the blaze this way.” She approached the beast, which shrank back and cowered.         Aurora leaned against a tree trunk. “Can’t say I know off the top of my head. Thought you were the bestiary expert, kid.”         Red ran her wingtips through Wedge’s mane, lost in thought. “Doc said it would’ve taken two, maybe three days for T-Bone to melt if he’d been treated improperly. Figure there’s more of the same kind of ice here... he started melting four or five days ago? Maybe?”         The captain smiled at the red mare. “Good. Not quite enough to hang our hat on, but very good nonetheless. Sunshine, put it out of its misery, please?” Spitfire turned a shocked expression to Aurora. “Don’t worry, kid. It’s an elemental. Take it out and we’ll see a puff of blue smoke make its way back to the mountaintops. You’ll be doing it a favor, not killing it. Reluctantly, Spitfire shrugged and approached the ice wolf. It raised what was left of its coat and growled, hopping back and forth to avoid her blade. “Captain, if it’s really a mercy shouldn’t he want me to send him home?” The wolf stared at her with empty eyes and chewed at its chains, breaking off several weakened teeth in the process. “I think... I think it wants me to cut it free. What should I do?” Aurora stalked over to her side. “Stand back a step and cover me if it tries anything.” She jammed a blade into one of the links of the chain, and the cold-brittle link shattered. The wolf wriggled free of its confinement and bounded off to the east. It turned and looked back at them, flicking its head in a gesture that could only mean follow. The perplexed ponies followed it to the stream that ran through the town. It bounded down onto the surface of the stream, where the water froze beneath its paws. It loped upstream to keep itself from travelling down with the current. It looked at them, growling softly, and pointed its nose upstream. Aurora sounded shaken. “He’s showing us how they moved him here. They used the stream so the trail would melt more quickly. Follow the stream back to its glacier and straight up to the icefields. That’s where we’ll find them?”         The alpha wolf turned to her and stopped running. The current carried it several yards downstream. It gave a howl and a puff of blue light left it and raced up the water toward the mountains. Its lifeless body sank into the water and drifted down through the town.         B Flight camped for the night at the edge of the destroyed town. Wedge and Red volunteered to scrounge up some dinner from the forest, saving their precious supplies for the icefields -- and giving them time to talk. Spitfire had questions she wanted to ask, but the captain seemed distracted by the intelligence the wolf had shown. The corps was supposed to make every attempt to reason with creatures before terminating them, but they’d never suspected that the ice elementals were intelligent.         Over dinner, the captain announced her decisions: they would try to send a message to camp, calling a team to look for survivors, and then they would heed the winter wolf’s message, following the stream up to its source rather than spending days going around the mountains to enter the far side of the icefield.         As Spitfire prepared to bed down for the night, her thoughts turned again to the pony she’d killed. This time she also thought about the pony she’d saved; the one who even now was set on protecting her from herself. She watched Soarin’ construct their tent and unroll their sleeping bags. She closed her eyes, and instead of a panicked, dying thug she saw smiling green eyes. I saved him. Maybe she could live with who she was, after all.