//------------------------------// // Frozen Apples // Story: What must be done // by Foxgear //------------------------------// What must be done chapter 4 By foxgear Applejack slumped in the recliner in the living room of the farm house, the chair had been her dad’s and he had spent many a nights reading story books to her before putting her to bed when she was little. Though she was still little cross with her dad for forcing Big Mac to become a monster hunter and leaving her out, she found comfort in the chair as she sank into the leather. With just today’s recent events she needed something to help her relax, at least a little bit. Still there were those of their group that were a little too relaxed, namely Aria and Sonata, who just finished taking two long showers, each of them taking roughly half an hour. “I know you said we needed to wait, but aren’t you two at least a little concerned about some crazy lady hunting us?” They had told her about Maddie Hoof and how they suspected her of being behind the attacks on both Big Mac and her friends. “Shouldn’t you be arming up or something?” Plopping on the sofa across from her, Aria kicked up her feet onto the coffee table with a big sigh. “Says the girl resting in the lazy boy and it’s you she’s hunting, not us, though I bet she’ll be coming for us soon enough. Either way if you get worked up about this stuff every time something comes up you’ll burn yourself out. You have no idea how long it took us to get Mac to cool down when he first started monster hunting. Guy nearly ground himself down to the bone. Remember when he had to sleep for two days Sonata?” The blue siren flopped down next to Aria and laid a tray of cookies and coffee on the table, pouring a big cup with a lot of sugar, a lot of sugar! It almost more sugar then coffee! “Yeah I remember that!” She said nearly bouncing in her seat. “He missed two days of school and we had to do all the chores! What was really funny is that Adagio tied him to the bed so he couldn’t get up! It was hilarious!” “And that helped him how?” Applejack asked crossing her arms. She knew what they were talking about; she had to bring Mac his homework for that week. He had said he was fighting cold and was staying at the farm so it wouldn’t spread to everyone else. Aria answered while pouring her own mug, she likes hers with a lot crème. “Well one he finally got some sleep and two he learned the world wasn’t going to come burning down if he took a day off. Applejack hummed as she poured a cup of her own. Thinking back Mac did seem to mellow out, well mellow out more than usual before their argument, it was probably her fault for getting angry with him the night she waited up for him. As worried as she had been that was poor time to confront him. Maybe if she had waited for morning he wouldn’t have gotten attacked or maybe they all might have burned? “Don’t think about.” Sonata said suddenly. “What?” “I said don’t think about what could have happened if you did this or that, it’s not going to fix what happened already, so there no use thinking about it you know? Past is the past and all that.” “Very philosophical of you,” Applejack drawled, Sonata smiled at her and giggled, leaving Aria to roll her eyes. “Don’t mind this one; she probably got that off a fortune cookie.” “That doesn’t make it any less true!” Sonata argued. Applejack couldn’t help but laugh at their antics. Hard to imagine that only a few months ago they were locked in a battle for the fate of the world and now? They were sitting in her living room drinking coffee together. The world was certainly strange. As she took good hearty sip of her drink Applejack noticed the fourth member of their posse missing. In fact she hasn’t seen Sunset Shimmer for quite some time now. Remembering the bacon haired girl’s last location to be the kitchen Applejack quietly dismissed herself to go take a look. In the kitchen she found the cooling coffee pot on the counter and some homemade treats with a note next to them. The note was from Sunset and it read, “Went home to get my journal will be back soon.” Applejack frowned and looked outside the front window, outside she saw her truck, the siren’s truck and Sunset’s bike all parked where they had been left. Once more she hadn’t heard any engines start up, so what did Sunset take home? Actually where did Sunset live? Well never really caring before, now it was really starting to bother Applejack, really what are the chances Sunset was living in her orchard too? “Nah that’s crazy, it’s not like we have shacks in every part of the orchard…” Applejack paused thinking back to the time her dad had made a big order of building materials to build a new barn. She also remembered he had over ordered and had enough extra to make a few small shacks… “Hey you two,” She called into the other room, “Do you know…” Aj stopped mid sentence as a pair of head lights filtered into the windows. Peering outside she saw a white van park in the middle of the yard, about thirty yards away from the house. She didn’t recognize the van, nor would anyone she know park so far away from the house. In the other room she heard the sound of guns cocking as the sirens took up positions beside the windows. “Better arm yourself cowgirl,” Aria shouted while looking out the window, the sound of the van door opening and closing drawing their attention, “Things are about to go down.” Huddling close to the wall Applejack peeked out for another look, the yard light illumined the new arrival making out the form of a tall woman wearing deer skin clothes. Looking further to the left she managed to see inside the van’s front window and inside was an unconscious Sunset! “Sunset!” “Don’t go out there!” Sonata tackled her before she could even reach for the door, the window shattered above them as two loud “THUNKS” came from the opposite wall. Aj lifted the brim of her hat to see two antler spikes stuck in the wall. Pushing Sonata off her she rose up catching a glimpse of the woman now sporting a pair of antler on her head. “Are deer’s inhabitants of Equestria too?” “Yeah, some are smarter than others, others are normal deer, and I think they had their own country once.” Sonata answered dusting the glass off her clothes, “Oh and you’ll want this.” She handed Applejack a pistol. Applejack looked between the gun and the siren. “You expect me to kill her?” Sonata shrugged, “Basically, I mean first we have to interrogate her to find out where she took your friends and then maybe we’ll see if she’s willing to switch sides, but until we have her chained to a chair, shoot to kill. Magical beings tend to be tough.” “Will you two shut up and shoot already!” Aria screamed unloading her gun at the deer woman. The woman leap sideways avoiding the shots with ease, running as fast as any deer making her a blur of brown and white as she rushed for the house. Sonata fired, making her detour again. Applejack’s hand shook as the sound of empty clips hitting the floor rung in her hears. She pointed the gun, which was her dad’s 1911 colt 45 at the deer woman. Time seemed slow as she looked at the woman’s face, seeing every detail as she got closer and closer. She placed her finger on the trigger and froze, she couldn’t do it. “Celestia’s teats shoot her!” Aria screamed pushing Applejack aside, three shots followed after; there was a grunt and the sound of footsteps on the porch. Rolling across the floor Applejack jumped to her feet as the deer woman and Aria were wrestling on the floor in front of her. The woman swung her head wildly about trying to spear Aria with her antlers; Aria deflected them with her gun and a knife. Sonata come screaming in firing four shots into the woman’s back. The woman grunted as blood poured down her sides, she whipped her arm out smacking Sonata away. Applejack’s grip tightened on the gun and she ran up jamming the barrel right into the deer woman’s face and pulled the trigger! “Fuck!” The woman screamed grabbing the side of her face. The round had bounced off her skull, blowing apart her right ear and antler. She whipped her arms wildly about keeping Applejack at bay as she pinned Aria by the throat with the other. “Too powerful…get bigger… gun!” Aria choked out as she tried to keep from being strangled. Applejack stood petrified for several seconds and then made a break for the stairs, running with all her might she skidded around the guard rail and made a beeline for the old storage room busting down the door without hesitation. She stopped in the middle of the room eyes searching for her great grandpa’s old chest, finding it under a pile of blankets. Pushing the clutter aside she popped open the locks and lifted the lid revealing the boxes contents; her grandpa’s 84 caliber rifle, also known as an elephant gun. It was one of the most powerful guns in the world and Applejack had four rounds. Hopefully they wouldn’t explode in her face, she was pretty sure these rounds were from world war one. From the first floor Aria screamed, “Hurry up!” Determined Applejack broke open the gun and loaded two shells into the double barrel and hurried down the stairs. She came to a stop at the base of the stair way and shouldered the rifle, the old sight bead swayed with the weight of the gun as Applejack braced herself and fired! The force of the recoil knocked Applejack to the ground! As she fell she could see the scene unfolding in front of her. The bullet hit the deer woman on the right side of her torso, the round tearing through her like a hot knife through butter, she flew off of Aria and slammed into the wall with a hole in her chest that you could stick an arm through. Aria sat up as she rubbed her throat, her eyes wide with shock as she looked between Applejack and the dying deer woman. “Holy Celestia is that an elephant gun? Where the hell did you get that?” At the same time Sonata regained consciousness, blinking a few times as she processed what was going on. “Yay, we won!” She turned and looked at the gun in Applejack’s arms and then outside, where one of the smaller trees had been chopped down by the round, just barely missing the van with Sunset inside. “Good shot.” On shaky legs Applejack rose up, her shoulder throbbing in pain and her guts were turning inside out as the sight of the deer woman bleeding out in her living room. Slowly she made her way over to the woman falling to her knees in front of her. The deer woman coughed, blood spilling down her mouth as she looked into Applejack’s eyes, “What do you want? You want to mount my head on the wall?” Applejack shook her head, hot tears flowing down her face like a river as she placed her hand over the wound. Even with her fingers stretched open she could still fit her hand through the bullet hole. “I’m sorry!” She choked blowing her head to the deer woman. “I’m so sorry…” White Tail laughed, “I kidnap your friends and you apologize for defending yourself? Stupid girl.” She laughed harder, the pain was overwhelming, but it didn’t matter, she didn’t have much time anyway, “Do not apologize for such things, it is only a matter of two wills pushing against each other and yours won.” Her vision began to fade to black and her breathing was getting more ragged, this was it. “Too bad… you won’t be so lucky against Tundra…” Aria pulled Applejack up and shoved her behind the wall; Sonata took up position across from them, both sirens keeping a keen eye out for anything strange. “Sonata you go and get bacon hair, I’ll cover you.” Aria said taking charge. Sonata nodded and ran out to the van. For a full minute there was nothing, only the sound of Sonata pulling Sunset from the van and her footsteps back to the house. There was nothing and that’s what worried Aria the most, there was no sound of insects or night critters in the orchard, only the eerily stillness. Once Sonata was back in the house Aria sighed with relief, only to stiffen at the sight of her own breath. It was late spring and a comfortable sixty five degrees out tonight, she should not be seeing her breath! She looked around at the others, whose breath was also visible as well as the air chilled. “The trees…” Applejack pointed towards the orchard, “There’s frost on the trees!” Not just the trees, but the ground as well, it grew gradually freezing everything in its path. In the distance the sound of a single pair of footsteps could be heard coming up the drive way and with each foot step the frost grew closer. “You two run now,” Aria ordered pushing both Applejack and Sonata towards the backdoor. “I’ll deal with this.” Sonata protested grabbing hold of Aria’s arm, “But Aria!” “No buts just go!” She yelled slamming the door in their face and locking it. The purple siren panted hard her adrenaline sparking as her body shivered. She could barely move with how badly her limbs were shaking. On unsteady legs she returned to the living room, where Sunset was still unconscious on one of the couches. Walking over to the girl she adjusted her head so it was up right. “Don’t over think this, I just need some magic,” She said to the unconscious Sunset, kissing the girl fully on the lips. Instantly she felt the spark of magic enter to body as she gained her wings and ears. Singing a soft song she pulled the water from every faucet in the house and gathered it around her, making sure the water was nice and hot as she waited for her opponent. She didn’t have to wait long as the door swung open revealing a light blue toned girl with ice crystals for hair. Aria remembered the girl from the files, another one of Madhoof’s experiments, the girl’s real name was Icy breeze, but it was later changed to Tundra. She was basically a walking ice storm. “Well come on then!” Aria challenged gathering the water for an attack. Arm stretched she sent a whip of scolding hot water at the girl only to gasp as it instantly turned to ice before even getting close, the water whip froze to the ground trapping her arm. In a rage she attacked with the other, getting the same result. Tundra took three steps towards her and froze all of her water, trapping her. Aria cringed as the ice girl touched her face and everything went dark after that. Applejack and Sonata ran down the old dirt path though the east orchard, neither one daring to look back as they skidded around trees and rocks. Sonata’s face was a mess of tears and snot as she whispered Aria’s name under her breath, knowing her siren sister didn’t stand a chance. Ice was a siren’s primary weakness. “Come on, we just need to get across the river and then we can get over to Jubilee’s acreage.” Applejack said as they made their way through the shallow stream the water only reaching up to their ankles. They stopped on the other side to catch their breaths, having just made a mile and half run in only ten minutes. Both girls part took in a good hearty gulp of river water to hydrate. “We gotta keep moving, it’s five more miles to Jubilee’s.” Sonata shook her head as she walked into the center of the river, her back turned to Applejack, “I’m not going,” she said, her voice cracking. “I’ll… I’ll buy you some more time.” “Don’t be stupid Sonata! Now come on!” Applejack yelled reaching out for the girl with her hand. At first it seemed like the siren was going to listen to her but as soon as their hands met Sonata pulled Applejack close and kissed her and then pushed her away, a wall of water rising between them. “You should get going, she’s almost here.” Sonata said solemnly as the trees began to frost over. “And if we don’t see each other again, I just want you to know you’re a pretty nice girl and sorry for accidentally stealing your first kiss.” Applejack blushed despite herself, “There no way you could know that!” Sonata chuckled as she floated into the air gathering as much water as she could from the river. “As if anyone would be stupid enough to hit on Mac’s little sister, don’t worry I just needed a little energy and that’s the quickest way to get it. Now you should really get going.” Applejack stared at her for several seconds, probably taking in her wings and ears, before finally nodding and said “Thank you.” Sonata smiled as she watched Applejack disappear into the trees. “Good luck.” She turned and came face to face with Tundra, who stood on the river banks waiting, “How nice of you to wait.” Tundra said nothing as she walked towards the siren, the water freezing beneath her feet. “In the words of Aria, I say bring it on! I’ll show you what we did to sea ponies that dared attack us back home!” With a thunderous scream Sonata sent all the water at Tundra, the wave spilling over the banks and rising half way up the trunks of the trees creating a small lake. She dived beneath the surface avoiding the ice spears Tundra threw at her. The ice girl was having a hard time moving under water, her movements were slow and predictable to the siren, Sonata also kept the water moving preventing Tundra from freezing it right away. Ducking under another ice spear Sonata was finally close enough to seize the ice girl by the throat and drag her down to the bottom of the water. There she began to choke the girl, air bubbles floated past her as the ice girl struggled beneath her. “I got you!” Sonata boasted her voice sounding clear as crystal even underwater. She continued to squeeze with all her might avoiding the Tundra’s grabs. She lifted the ice girl’s head and slammed it against the ground to try and quicken her death, but that proved to be a mistake as a sharp rock cut into her finger. The injury was nothing, but it didn’t stop Sonata from reacting to the pain and release her grip on Tundra. The ice girl smirked at her as she grabbed Sonata’s face. Sonata shivered as she felt her entire body go cold and her magic drain from her body. Her water made its way back to the river leaving her lying on the ground at Tundra’s feet. Tundra barely even glanced as her latest victory and pressed on. She was the last one; it was just like those stupid horror movies Rainbow Dash liked to watch when they had sleep overs. Some manic picks them off one by one, the friends of the first victims realize what’s going on too late and are picked off as easily as the others until only one remained to fight the monster and that was her. This was no movie though. She wasn’t going to stumble onto a magic object that would banish the demon, some random hunk wasn’t going to jump in and save her so she could deliver the final blow from behind and the ghost of her dead parents weren’t going to come in and save her at the last second. That last one was Harry Potter, but it was the same principle, she was screwed! “God’ dammit! Why didn’t I bring the elephant gun?” Of course there was no proof that it would work on the ice girl, but it did kill the deer girl, so it wouldn’t have hurt to at least try it. Applejack pulled her pistol from her pocket and slide the clip out, she had four bullets in the gun. Bullets that the deer girl shrugged off and it was safe to assume the ice girl was much more powerful. The bullets weren’t going to do much, but maybe they could still be of some help. A plan was forming in her brain, a plan that relied on a hell of a lot of wishful thinking and dumb luck, but it was a plan none the less. Following the old trail that lead to the north orchard she hoped against hope that her theory was right and her dad had made shacks in each part of the orchard and knowing him he would want them to be in roughly the same sport as the others. Applejack couldn’t keep the grin off her face when she found the shack just where she expected to, it was in rough shape, having had no attention to keeping it up for some time, and the door was locked. She tried to break it down by ramming it with her shoulder, but the old wood held firm. Deciding to take the risk she shot the lock off and went inside, hoping something was in here that could help her. There was no power so she had to fumble around in the dark and feel around for whatever she could get her hands on. Checking the items she grabbed in the moon light. After some time of searching she found what she was looking for. “This will do.” In her hand was a tin can with the symbol for flammable on it. She twisted the lid and poured the contents onto the floor. Quickly and loudly she moved for the back window of the shack and grabbed onto the frame ready to jump through at moment’s notice. She heard footsteps and saw the windows frost up as the ice girl entered through the open door. She looked around, clearly not seeing any better in the dark then any normal person as she began to feel around, knocking over cans and other items. Applejack called out to her, “Hey!” She yelled the ice girl turning towards her, the moon light out lining her body. “Burn in hell!” Without hesitation Applejack pulled the trigger twice, the first round hitting Tundra, dropping her to the ground, the second round hitting the can next to the ice girl, the can exploded into a small fire ball igniting the flammable liquid she poured on the floor earlier. She jumped through the window landing in broken glass and wood as the shack combusted into a giant fireball! “Damn, what did dad put in there?” She coughed rising to her feet. Stumbling over to a nearby tree Applejack slumped against the trunk to watch the shack burn; also she had a piece of wood in her leg meaning she wasn’t running anywhere anytime soon. With a hiss she pulled the chunk out of her leg and tossed it aside, tearing a piece of her skirt off to use as a bandage. “This is like a fricken die hard movie.” She joked tying the cloth tight. With that done she leaned against the tree and finally caught her breath before laughing hysterically. She couldn’t believe her planned worked! It really worked! She was laughing so hard that she didn’t even realize she was crying, the weight of the situation finally catching up with her. Her friends were still captured. Aria and Sonata could be dead for all she knew and she was stuck out here till someone come to investigate the smoke, which raised further questions, why wasn’t anyone coming? Sure they were out in the boonies, but they had neighbors, guns shots, even pistols could be heard from miles away and now she had a good bonfire going. Someone anyone should have called this in by now. Grabbing a stick off the ground Applejack used it to hoist herself to her feet. She needed to get back to the yard and check on the others. She didn’t know how, but she had a gut feeling the proper authorities weren’t going to be coming anytime soon, meaning she would have to do something. Hoppling along Applejack made it to the edge of the clearing when the shack finally collapsed. She didn’t bother to turn around, not wanting to see the ice girl’s burnt carcass, but a sudden chill and frosty grass made her stop and turn. “You gotta be shitting me!” Rising from the ashes was Tundra looking a little worse for wear, but still alive. Her face where Applejack shot her was cracked and only a few parts of her were burned. Beneath her was a large puddle of water, meaning she probably saved by freezing herself in ice and the fire melting ice creating water which gradually putting out the fire. Slowly Tundra walked out of the smoldering ruins of the shack. Applejack raised her gun ready to use her last two bullet. “You aren’t taking me without a fight!” She bravely yelled firing at the ice girl’s head, the round swizz by harmlessly as Tundra continued her approach. Applejack grit her teeth and adjusted her aim, her eyes were dry from staring at the fire, her night vision was completely ruined, so she took aim at the girl’s mid-section and fired her last round! She smiled as the round hit true, the ice girl stumbled back as pieces of ice fell from her body like glass, but she didn’t stay down for very long. Tundra righted herself and showed Applejack the damage, which looked pretty minimal, the girl was coated in a literal suit of ice armor. Applejack fell to the ground the fight leaving her body. Her eyes stung with tears at her failure. This was it; she was going to be taken. What would granny think happened to her? What would Applebloom do without her? And Mac, oh Mac, he would probably blame himself. Tundra’s shadow fell over her, she huddled into a ball to try and keep warm against the cold as the ice girl reached for her. “Daddy,” Applejack whispered with trembling lips, her mind going back to the time she was attacked by the chimera “Please help me!” Applejack braced herself for whatever was to come next, but nothing came, in fact it was getting warmer. A strong breeze rustled through the trees making the trees sway, sticks fell to the ground glowing with an unnatural energy, both Applejack and Tundra were transfixed by the display as more and more sticks gathered between the two girls. The sticks began to take shape as they blackened, two glowing sets of blue eyes opened as the shape fully formed into that of a black timber wolf! “What in the Sam hell…” The timber wolf growled, snapping its jaws at the ice girl; the wolf crept forward as the ice girl backed away. Applejack doubted she was actually afraid of her would be savior from the smirk the girl had, in her hand was a rapidly forming ice dagger. Applejack yelled for the wolf to move as the ice girl swung at it and to her surprise the wolf danced around the attack and bit the girl on the shoulder! The wolf pulled her down to the ground and began to savagely tug at the girl’s arm, trying to rip it off! The girl jabbed with her knives, breaking chunks of bark and stone loose from the wolf’s body, but he seemed to pay her no mind as it sunk its teeth deeper into her icy skin. Applejack cringed and cheered as droplets of red blood appeared on Tundra’s blue skin. “Yeah get her boy!” Applejack cheered, the wolf seemed to appreciate it as he got more aggressive and clawed into Tundra’s stomach sending shards of ice everywhere as he dug through her ice armor to her skin. Tundra began to panic as the timber wolf’s stone clawed drew closer and closer to her skin. She tried to turn out of his hold, but the wolf’s teeth held her firm, she only had her single arm to use and her attacks didn’t seem to hurt it, but she kept stabbing anyway. Her persistence paid off as a bright blue light began to peek out between the mass of twigs and bark and with a savage grin she plunged the ice dagger into the light! Applejack gasped as the wolf yelped and released Tundra, the hole in its side exposing a bright floating blue orb that must be the creature’s life source. Before the wolf could fully recover Tundra speared it with an ice spear pinning it down as the wolf tried to recover its exposed core. Tundra was having none of that though as she kicked the wolf, it yelped and growled as sticks and bark fell from its body, one of its hind legs fell apart as it tried to get up. The ice girl kicked again this time in the face, wanting to prolong the wolf’s suffering. The wolf growled with defiance as it tried to get up again, even as its body fell apart, the ice girl kicked him again, breaking his stone teeth loose. He snapped angrily not wanting to give up, prepared to fight to the death. Tundra formed another ice spear and raised it high and aimed for the wolf’s core. With a wicked grin she plunged the spear downwards the wolf too injured to move, however Tundra stopped her attack short as her true target threw herself protectively over the timber wolf. “Don’t hurt him anymore!” Applejack yelled covering up the wolf’s exposed core. She didn’t know why she was doing this, but she felt she had too as she held black timber wolf in her arms. Something about it seemed familiar, like she knew it from somewhere. “I’ll go with you peacefully, if you just leave him alone.” Tundra debated, looking between the girl and wolf, it would be easy to push the girl aside and simply kill the annoying creature that had almost gutted her, but on the other hand she could feel her strength waning and she wasn’t in the mood for anymore funny business. “Fine,” She replied speaking for the first time, “You come with me, no more running and resisting.” Applejack nodded as she let the ice girl grab her by the arm and take her away. All the while she kept looking back at the black timber wolf, its blue eyes staring back at her. “Thank you,” She whispered as they exited the clearing. A long anguishing howl echoed through the trees as the wolf tried but failed to rise up. His blue eyes filled with sadness as he stared at Applejack’s retreating back. He had failed.