Chapter 4
Tania grasped with her hands, and dragged her feet against the ground, but she could do nothing to stop her rapid slide down the side of the hill. She had no idea how high up the thing was, and what would happen when she reached the bottom. On either side of her, the other girls disappeared as they grabbed onto roots and rocks. Tania tumbled forward and ended up on her stomach, in time to see Applejack grab a root and grow smaller. Tania’s feet stopped touching ground and flailed into empty air. She only just managed keep herself from falling over the edge with her elbows. No longer falling, her legs swung back to her and banged her knees painfully against the cliff face.
“Hold on! I'm a-comin'!” Applejack let go of her root and started sliding carefully towards Tania.
Now at the edge, Applejack grabbed her arms and tried pulling Tania up. Tania tried to help by kicking at the face with her feet. She stopped when she felt the ground crumbling under her belly. Applejack saw what was happening and stopped pulling harder than necessary.
“Applejack! What do I do?” cried Tania in distress.
Her rescuer looked at the space behind Tania thoughtfully. She then looked Tania in the eye.
“Let go.”
Tania felt she was going to be hysterical in all of two seconds.
“Are you crazy?!”
“No I ain't. I promise you'll be safe.”
“That's not true!”
“Now listen here. What I'm sayin' to you is the honest truth. Let go, and you'll be safe.”
Without knowing how or why, Tania saw something in the farmer girl’s face that meant absolute trustworthiness. Tania closed her eyes and let go.
There was a ridiculously long moment of freefall. Tania let her fear bubble up her throat and screamed the entire horrible moment. And then it ended. She bounced for a moment, and when she tried to grab at something to stop the movement, her fingers felt netting. She opened her eyes. On her right, Rainbow Dash’s relieved face greeted her. She was still attached to the rope, and had secured it up at the edge. In either hand was a corner of a net. The other side of the net was held by a wide-eyed Fluttershy, who was perched on a ledge. She too, had a rope attached to her waist. Both she and Rainbow Dash had let themselves down a short ways down the cliff with the rope, where the wall slanted away from the edge. Had Tania have panicked, she might have missed the net or upset it, and Tania would have panicked for sure if she had known the plan. As she was helped off the net and down the ledges, she was glad to see Applejack making her way down too, safe and sound.