Powdered Snow Falls Softly

by libertydude

Bared Teeth

The warmth of Pinkie’s loft dissipated into a bone-chilling cold. All around Celestia and Pinkie whirled a heavy blizzard. Dots of white filled their vision against the dark grey sky, while the snow underhoof crunched with their sudden appearance. Gales blew their manes back and left their tails wiggling with each gust.

“The weather team must have the day off!” Pinkie hollered over the wind.

“No weather teams in this part of the Macintoshes,” Celestia called back. Her eyes scanned the area around them, a determined expression upon her face. Just past the long lines of dots filling her vision, she saw a black object standing against the oncoming whiteness. She pointed towards the enveloping darkness.

“There!” she proclaimed. “The cave!”

Pinkie squinted, soon finding the black opening in her vision. “Why’d you teleport us so far away?”

“The cave plays with magic, remember?” Celestia said, taking her first steps toward the cave. The wind blew the opposite direction and she grit her teeth. “Didn’t want to risk the place blowing up or something like that.”

“Okie-dokie-lokie,” Pinkie said. The gusts seemed to be blowing her cheeks open and flashing all of her teeth. A short giggle escaped Pinkie as her cheeks flapped. “Just like when I use the hairdryer!”

Celestia gave no heed to her joke if she heard it. She pushed on against the wind and sleet, Pinkie likewise grasping her way forward. Her initial attempts to bounce her way to the cave resulted in the wind merely pushing her the other way, so she kept closer to the ground like Celestia.

Five minutes later, they came to the cave opening. Less a circle and more an askew oval, the opening seemed like the weight of the mountain above had warped it into something not native to the land. The roof at its highest point reached thirty feet, and the oblong sides seemed twice that wide. A sign, obviously placed there by a local, read:

KEEP OUT, WILD ANIMAL RESTING SPOT.

I hope not, Celestia thought. The last thing we need is a mountain lion infected by the curse and-

“Let’s go!” Pinkie gleefully chimed. The mountain blocking the wind, she immediately resumed her traditional bounce inward. Each bound pushed her five feet deeper into the cave.

“Pinkie, wait!” Celestia called, trotting in after her. “We need to make torches so we can-“

Suddenly, a loud rumble filled the cave. Both Pinkie and Celestia ceased their forward progress and stared up at the black ceiling. Tiny rocks tumbled from the edges of where the ceiling met the walls, but nothing else seemed to move.

Celestia gave a relieved sigh. “Whatever power is in that recipe knows we’re here now. Let’s just hope-“

Her face froze in horror. Where light had once come in unimpeded from the opening was now filled with shafts of dim sunshine bursting past cracks. The rocks that jutted from the floor and ceiling had the unmistakable similarity to closed teeth. Had anypony seen the cave from the outside, they would have thought it was giving a mocking, smug sneer after catching its prey.

“We’re trapped!” Pinkie screamed, grasping her tail like a comfort pillow.

“Don’t worry,” Celestia said evenly. “I expected something like this would happen. Let’s just stay calm and light those torches.” She reached over to the walls where numerous roots and dried leaves hung. Taking out her two torches, Celestia placed the roots and leaves within the top of the sticks. She gave the smallest burst of magic she possibly could. The cave rumbled as if it felt the magic too, before the cavern was flooded with light.

“As long as I don’t cast powerful magic, we should be fine.” She handed a torch to Pinkie. “Now we should-“

An earth-shattering roar shook the cavern. Celestia turned and caught sight of a large, black mass thundering its way from deeper in the cave. She lit her own torch and held it aloft. Each stride brought the thing closer to the light, and Pinkie let out a scream as the figure reared and stood on its back feet.

What stood before them was a bear, or at least what used to be a bear. Eight and a half feet tall and with gnarled claws. Where fur would normally be was covered in dark, green moss. Long fangs, caked in black mold and rotting, bared with the creature’s bellows. The roars emanated nothing but hatred and fury towards the two little ponies below.

“Aaiiiieee!” Pinkie screamed, bee-lining for the cave entrance. Furiously she began pounding against the rocks, trying to knock them down.

Celestia, on the other hand, stood firm. No point in panicking, she thought. Only action will save us from these enchantments. She looked the bear-thing in the eyes, her own gaze like steel and unblinking.

The creature roared. All animals knew such a stare to be a challenge, and even corrupted by black magic the creature would not stand such an insult. He threw his front legs down and resumed his charge toward Celestia.

Celestia stood unmoving. There’s a chance this is a feint charge, she thought. And if it’s not-

She didn’t get a chance to finish the thought, for she thrust herself to the side. The bear’s charge had been faster than she expected, and she just managed to roll out of the behemoth’s path. So close had he been that Celestia felt his putrid breath upon her nose just before she tumbled out of the way.

Quickly, she righted herself and got to her feet. To her shock, however, the creature did not slow down and turn around for another lunge. Instead, the beast kept throwing itself forward. Celestia’s eyes widened as she saw Pinkie still futilely trying to break the entrapping rocks of the entrance. She was actually making decent chips against the rock, but not fast enough to save herself.

“Pinkie, move!” Celestia yelled. Her horn began to glow, but she forced it back down. Even a paralyzing spell is too risky, she thought. It could rebound on us and make us easy meals!

Pinkie looked up from her work and screamed. The creature was only thirty feet away and would be on her in seconds.

Instead of running along the sides of the jagged rocks or trying to climb the walls, Pinkie instead sat on her rear. Celestia’s horrified gasp was matched by the creature’s gleeful screech, thrusting itself faster toward a meal that showed all signs of surrender. Five feet away from the sitting party pony, the creature leaped forward with claws out and jaws open.

Sproing!

The creature felt Pinkie zip over his head. Her tail tickled his nose as she whirled past. This was followed by the pressure of solid rock smashing into his face.

Crunch!

Pinkie continued her journey forward. Just before she reached the ground, her tail began to whirl furiously. A soft wind fluttered across Celestia’s face, and Pinkie hovered above the ground. Her tail kept spinning like the blades of a whirlybird.

Celestia chuckled. “I’d forgotten how powerful your tail was. Enough strength to coil into a spring.”

“Yep!” Pinkie said, still hovering. “I figured that if I was always going to have a spring in my step, why not have one in my tail too?” She giggled, and even Celestia couldn’t help but crack a smile.

The jolliness ended when Celestia saw past Pinkie. The creature, though dazed from his headlong crash, was beginning to right himself.

Celestia scrunched her face in thought. No low level spells will disable him, she thought. And I can’t risk a high-level spell so early into the cave. She looked around them. They were practically in the middle of the cave’s opening passage, with twenty to twenty-five feet of clearance on either side of them.

“Pinkie, you go to the right and I’ll go to the left,” Celestia said, pointing to the opposite walls. “If he goes after you, I’ll kick him in the back of the head. There’s a little spot on the back of a bear’s head that, when struck, will render them unconscious for hours.”

“What if he goes after you?”

Celestia gazed up at the wall on the left side. Several notches and dark holes sunk into the rock. “I’ll climb up those hoofholds in the wall. Then I’ll need you to distract him for a moment so I can leap off and strike him in the head.”

“Got it!” Pinkie dug her hooves into the hard floor below her. Celestia’s confidence seemed to be rubbing off on her, and she glared at the creature now with eager cockiness rather than fear.

Celestia steeled herself as well. We’ve only one shot at this, Celestia thought. Bears aren’t smart, but they aren’t stupid either. He won’t fall for this a second time if we can’t pull this off.

The creature, fully recovered now, roared and charged again. The duo’s closeness meant his eyes were on both of them the whole time. Reading which one he was more interested in was impossible to tell.

Each step forward rumbled through the cave, almost as loud as when the rocks had raised to block the entrance. Faster and harder they came with each second. Strings of saliva flew off the creature’s mouth.

Celestia and Pinkie stood, ready. They gripped their torches ever more tightly.

Thirty feet away.

Twenty feet.

Ten.

All at once, Celestia and Pinkie sprung to opposite sides.

The creature turned to follow Celestia.

Curses! Celestia thought. She threw her legs forward with all her might, desperate to keep her lead. The creature pounded after her, regaining the speed which the sharp turn has cost him. Celestia kept her eyes on the hoofholds down the cave, her whole focus on timing the jump just right.

This focus, however, left her unprepared for the rock jutting out of the floor. Her front right hoof caught the rock and tripped her forward.

The creature roared in triumph and quickened his pace. His prey laid stunned and prostrate upon the floor. Nothing would keep him from a feast tonight!

BONG!

Celestia looked up to see the bear falling forward. Unlike Celestia’s forward tumble, the creature merely fell flat where he was. Standing just to his side stood Pinkie, beaming and grasping a large carnival mallet.

A sharp laugh escaped Celestia. “I wondered if you’d pull anything else out of your tail.”

“Oh, this was in my mane,” Pinkie said, shoving the impossibly large hammer back into her mane. “I figured that hitting a bear on the whole head would work too.”

Celestia gazed down at the furry lump now dozing on the floor. “I’d say you figured correctly.”

Pinkie walked over and helped Celestia up. “Shall we continue? All this fighting has left me kind of famished and…” She wiggled her eyebrows. “…I think some cookies would be nice, no?”

Celestia smiled. “Yes, they would.”

They made sure their torches were still lit, then made their way forward.