The Fire and The Flutter

by A. Tuesday

VII

VII

When I got to the Marine Center, I had feared it would be too late, but luckily, I still had time.

The carriage horses and darted away as fast as they could as soon as I got off. Whatever, I didn’t care. I had a friend to save.

Feeling every spasm of pain in my right hoof, I walked straight through the research building, much to the surprise of staff, who backed away from me. I couldn’t say I was surprised – after all, I had burned down a section of the park. But, at this point, I didn’t care.

I approached one of the stallions there, wearing a lab coat. He looked at me in pure shock, and began retreating. I glared at him, and he stopped dead in his tracks.

“Where’s the whale?” I demanded.

The staff member shook violently, as if he just had freezing water dumped all over him. He recoiled into the corner, “Just keep going s-s-straight. Last door o-on the r-right.”

I continued on my way, as he breathed a sigh of relief. I kept hobbling all the way, barreling through the instantly cleared hallways. Today was not a day to mess with Firestarter, and it seemed that the staff and pretty much everybody understood that.

I finally got to the last door on the right, and headbutted the door open. The glass on the door cracked a bit, but the door swung open.

The room was this massive, massive pool, that I noticed had a gate at the far end, which I guess was letting bay water in and out. The room itself wasn’t a room, but a warehouse about the size of a sports stadium.

The whale was just lying there in the water, and I saw the ice patches all over the whale, along with seeing them slightly increase about 1/10 of a hoof a minute.

Fluttershy had been leaning over the whale, but now turned around to the sound of the door slamming open. “Firestarter?” she questioned, “Wh-what are you d-doing here?”

“Fluttershy!” I yelled, “Stop what you’re doing! Get away from the whale!”

Fluttershy backed away almost instantly. “Okay, okay, I’m getting away…but, why?”

“You got a letter!” I exclaimed, “Your – your, um – friend! Your friend, um….Twilight!”

Now, THAT was weird. I usually had the memory of an elephant, so the ability not to recall Twilight’s name was kind of unnerving. Especially when Fluttershy had told me that very day about her.

She cocked her head to the side. “Twilight? Twilight Sparkle? What did she want?”

“She – she was – she was reading –“ I couldn’t think of the words to say at all. I racked my brain for the right phrases, but none would come out.

Fluttershy shook her head disapprovingly. “Well, what did she say?”

The letter, the letter! What did she say, what did she say! I didn’t have a clue. Thinking hard, I tried to pull together everything I remembered about the letter.

Then I remembered, “The train station! She said she can meet you at the train station!”

She brightened up. “Oh, good! I don’t know why she would do such a thing, though, but that’s very nice of her. So, I guess you want to take me to the station, now?”

What? That wasn’t it at all. What had just sprouted out of my mouth?

She then looked down to my splint. “Oh, Firestarter! Did you come all the way here in a splint?”

“Um,” I got out, “Well, possibly, I don’t know…” The splint wasn’t important. There was a specific reason Fluttershy should not be near the whale. And I couldn’t think of it.

“Firestarter, I’m disappointed in you. Didn’t the doctor tell you to stay off that hoof for at least a day or two?”

She shook her head disapprovingly. “You need to get back in bed. Come on, once I’m done here, I’ll just take you back to the hospital myself. Just wait patiently, and maybe you’ll remember what your thinking about.”

I honestly couldn’t formulate a reply on this, and stared at the ground. For some reason, I felt that wasn’t a good idea for her to be near the whale, but I couldn’t think of the reason why at all. I looked around the shed, as if the answer would be right there.

I saw Fluttershy, apparently comforting the whale, but also deep in thought about something. She walked over to a little bin, reached in, and pulled out a bag labeled bath beads.
“Maybe this will cheer you up, Mr. Whale,” she said.
I didn’t uinderstand how bubbles and scents were going to help this whale – it was beyond help. With this in mind, I looked towards the whale, lying groggily with ice patches constantly growing on it. Towards the back, I also saw a swirling fog on the other side of the pool.

Wait, swirling fog? I didn’t think it was that cold in the pool. Or at least, it shouldn’t’ve been.

As Fluttershy continued pouring in the bath beads, the swirling fog in the corner of the shed as growing. It began to grow upwards, and a hissing sound emanated from it. Suddenly, I knew what was going to happen. I remembered now.

“Fluttershy!” I screamed, “Get away from the pool! There’s an Ice – “

The last shake of the bag was heard and my pegasus friend tossed the empty container to the side. “Got it!” exclaimed Fluttershy, “They’re all in.”

The aroma was magnificent. The bubbles were all over the place and the constantly-churning inground pool gave off a light green shade.

“What were you, um, saying?” asked an almost inaudible Fluttershy.

“I SAID,” I yelled, “THERE’S AN ICE FLAMER IN HERE!! GET AWAY!”

“A what?”

But by this time, the fog had begun to solidify.

“FLUTTERSHY! GET OVER HERE! WE NEED TO LEAVE!!”

“What?”

The fog took a shape, something that was leaning over due to it being taller than the shed. The water around it began to freeze, in spite of the warmness of the pool. The ice climbed up the fog, creating a new figure out of ice.

Fluttershy has walked over to where I was, and now stood staring in awe at the ice figure on the other side of the shed.

The figure was taller than the shed, and was this massive uncelestial thing, like nothing I’ve ever seen before. It sort of looked like a dragon, one with spines but no wings at all, and had razor-sharp talons. Its body was slender, like a snake – and with each breath, it puffed out that same, below-freezing fog that it was made from. Its tail was spiked, massive icicles that were sharper than the needle of a syringe.

The massive ice flamer stood up straight, demolishing the overhanging ceiling. Debris splashed into the water from great heights, actually getting Fluttershy and I wet with each one. It roared something fierce – the sound that came out was enough to make the water ripple 10 feet high, and the whale was tossed along with it.

The massive mammal flew 20 feet in the air, and then landed with an even bigger splash back in the water. It slowly returned to the surface, and bellowed out its normal call, something I associated with either annoyance, or pain. Or both.

Once it was done, the flamer glared at us, breathing angrily.

Fluttershy was paralyzed with fear.

And to be honest, so was I.