The River Rising (Iota Force Issue #7)

by The Iguana Man

Chapter Four: Crossing the Streams

It took a good ten minutes for Icy to calm down after her shock. Admittedly, that was only partially because of the inherent terror in the sight and slightly because of how much it had caught her by surprise – as lacking in situational awareness as Icy knew she could be at times, even she wasn't going to claim that seeing a river running through a ravine was some stunning revelation.

No, what truly shook her was how the sight of it brought the whole situation crashing through her eyes and into her brain, wrecking her thoughts like the tsunami she couldn’t stop imagining. Before that moment, she'd been so distracted by the activity and not being eaten by timberwolves that she hadn't consciously noticed the water streaming down around her and flowing beneath her hooves. However, that didn't mean the deluge wasn't weighing on her. Even had she closed her eyes, covered her ears and hid under shelter, she'd have still felt the falling of the water all around – another reason it took so long for her to recover.

However, what had mainly happened was that the moment she caught sight of the river rushing far below her, all that tension and ever-present weight around her had snapped into sharp focus, like a stretched rubber band with a wrecking ball inside. The instant it all registered, the band snapped back and the wrecking ball... wrecked.

Whatever the case, Icy spent far longer than she felt comfortable with lying on a tree branch, feeling more sorry for herself than she thought was reasonable for anyone.

To their immense credit, Archer and Lance both seemed perfectly understanding of the situation – they neither objected to Icy taking whatever time they needed to get her bearings nor did they spend an inordinate amount of time trying to hurry or forcibly console her with “it's okay”s or “there, there”s. Instead, they seemed to understand that she simply needed some time to herself to find her hooves again and flush her fear out of her system, so limited their interactions to sympathetic looks and an unspoken implication that, if Icy needed anything from them, they'd be happy to help.

Other than that, they simply busied themselves with keeping a lookout, both among and below the tree branches, to watch for any threats, and towards the sky, to keep track of the progress of the storm. Oddly enough, Icy felt thankful for that most of all, as it made it feel less like anypony was watching and judging her little exercise in helpless self-pity.

Eventually, however, she managed to get herself under control enough that she was able to rise to her hooves. Admittedly, she was a little shaky, but that was partly because of the simple fact that they were perched on a branch – a thick, sturdy one, of course, but a branch nonetheless.

Still, after a moment to regain her balance, physically and mentally, she spoke up. “Okay, sorry about that, I'm... I think I'm okay now.”

Archer turned an eye towards her languidly. “You sure?” She asked, though she nodded as soon as she saw Icy's expression, continuing before she could give a verbal response. “Okay, cool. Let’s go.”

She swung down from the branch, a movement Icy saw mirrored in her peripheral vision by Lance. Lacking their grace, to put it mildly, Icy elected to simply glide down at a steep angle and felt more satisfaction than she thought appropriate when she suppressed a shudder from the splash of water she made as she landed.

Still, she managed to keep her voice under control as she asked, “So, where are we going now?”

Archer started walking along the path of the ravine, close enough to keep the edge in view but far enough that the group wouldn't be able to see down to the bottom of it, something Icy wasn't sure was intentional or for her benefit, but that she appreciated nonetheless.

As she walked, Archer jerked her head towards the ravine. “Well, we're gonna have to cross over the ravine to get to the path to Mount Foalja.”

Icy gulped – the only reason she hadn't been afraid that that was what Archer was going to say was that she hadn't thought of it. “Oh. Right, um... so, do we need to cut down a tree to cross? Because I'm not sure...”

“Nah, don't worry, no trees'll be harmed in the making of this mission,” Archer smirked. “Take a long time to find one tall enough and it’d be a pain getting it stable enough to cross.”

After a moment, she shrugged and waved a hoof in the direction they were walking. “There's a bridge about half a klick that way, we can cross over there.”

Icy blinked in confusion. “A click? Like... of fingers, like the time it takes to click them? Cause that'd be right next to us, plus we don't have fingers. Though I could maybe snap my feathers, but I've never really tried...”

She trailed off as she heard Archer's chuckle – not a mocking laugh, but still amused at Icy's tangent. Which, in fairness, Icy couldn't blame her for – she'd long since gotten used to that reaction to her thought process and could usually understand it... a few minutes later when she realized how strange her line of reasoning had become.

“Nah, klick with a k,” Archer informed her before looking briefly contemplative. “Well, a k at the beginning instead of a c, obviously it has a k at the end. Anyway,” she shook her head as she ended her tangent with far more efficiency than Icy ever managed, “it's Guard slang for a kilometre.”

Icy nodded, even as she replied, “Huh, seems a little weird. I mean, I can kind of see the K-L thing, but why not just say ‘kilometre’?”

Archer laughed. “Well, from what I heard, it started as a joke in the Wonderbolts that, at the speed they went, by the time you've said “in a kilometre”, you've already passed it. Then it got turned into 'Bolt slang, then got taken up by the guard. Plus, it just rolls off the tongue better. 'Klick.'”

Icy giggled. “I guess so. Although, if the K-L comes from “kilo”, does that mean a metre would just be an “ick”?

“Depends how many of them I have to run,” Archer replied as she turned a little towards the edge of the ravine.

There was a long pause before Archer spoke up again. “Though, right now, I'm feeling like giving a few.”

Tilting her head, Icy waited for a few moments for her to elaborate, but nothing came – Archer simply kept looking down into the valley, clearly in deep thought.

A moment later, Lance trotted up next to her to see and, though his body language made it clear there was a problem, it wasn't especially helpful in determining exactly what it was.

Swallowing hard, she steeled herself before walking up alongside them and following their eyelines.

She was inordinately proud that she kept herself from flinching when she saw the rushing river below. As it turned out, it wasn't nearly as terrifying a sight when it wasn't catching her unawares. Partially, this was because of the fact they were far above it and standing on relatively solid ground, but mostly it seemed like the water she could feel all around her was both keeping her at a relatively stable level of anxiety and providing a slight barrier between her and the more solid body of water below.

This momentarily struck her as odd – she had never really given much thought to how water felt to her and had always assumed that it was all in her head – a feeling she got when she saw or heard water, made far worse by her near-drowning a few months prior but present long before then. However, while she was unquestionably more scared of bodies of water than before, it didn't seem, now she had her attention drawn to it, as if that feeling that she could sense the water was any more intense. Nor, indeed, had the sense that it was eager for her to come into it increased, it was just that the prospect of doing so was more frightening.

However, all thoughts of that fled her as she spotted what the others were looking at and her fear was briefly subsumed by a feeling of disappointment, worry and a tiny touch of relief that she didn't wish to acknowledge.

A couple of hundred metres in front of them was, as Archer had predicted, a rope bridge. And, contrary to her expectations, it was mostly intact. The problem was that it seemed ‘mostly’ wasn’t quite enough.

About a third of the way across the bridge from their side, it seemed one of the lower ropes on one side had snapped, causing all the planks between there and the cliffside to come away, along with a fair number of them on the other side of the breakage, up until the length of remaining rope was long enough that the plank merely hung worryingly loose. Fortunately, it seemed that the rope on the other side was both strong and firmly woven enough that the planks hadn’t fallen into the river below, instead hanging down vertically, but that still didn’t make it remotely practical to walk on them.

Archer shook her head. “You know, just once,” she said, sounding more amused at their misfortune than annoyed, “I'd like to find a bridge in a creepy forest or the like that was made of, like, metal or solid wood or, you know, something that doesn't sway in the breeze and break when a leaf falls on it.”

Lance looked at her with a “Really?” expression before waving a hoof to indicate the forest around him.

Archer rolled her eyes. “Yeah, I know where we are, Lance. I said I'd like to find one, not that I expected to.”

“So what do we do?” Icy asked, clamping down on the small part of her hoping that this meant they couldn't continue. Even if they couldn't do anything about the bridge, she knew there'd be other ways to cover the gap and she was going to have to cross over the valley sooner or later. “Do we use a tree after all?”

Archer shook her head. “We'll keep it in reserve, but don’t think we’ll need to. Most of the bridge’s fine, just a question of getting there.”

Icy nodded for a moment before blinking rapidly. “I mean, I guess, but… well it’d still ‘just be a question of getting there’ if there wasn’t a bridge at all, wouldn’t it?”

Archer chuckled. “Huh, guess you got a point, but at least there’s more to work with in getting there. Come on, let’s take a closer look.”

After another moment's thought, she began walking again, keeping closer to the edge this time. Lance almost immediately joined her while Icy took a moment to register what was happening before trotting to catch up, making sure to go off to the side a little to obscure the ravine's bottom.

Feeling the need to say something, largely to distract herself from her worries, Icy asked, “So, do you think you could… put the planks back up, one at a time as you cross?” She paused for a moment before her choice of words caught up with her thoughts. “Or, we could?” she finished in a mumble

“Maybe I could,” Archer replied, her level tone not making it clear whether she just hadn’t noticed Icy’s correction or was actively ignoring it for her sake, “if there was something stable to attach it to. Trouble is, without a rope on the other side, not much of a way to do that.”

Icy nodded, feeling a little silly for the suggestion. She hummed as the group reached the broken bridge, taking a few more steps away from the edge now that she could see the whole thing without looking at the river below it.

“Well, we do have a lot of rope,” she said, not thinking about how she was going to continue or end her sentence, “so that’s a start, but we can’t really use it to hold up the planks just from our side, can we?

“Nope,” Archer replied, trotting over to Icy and standing next to her, their sides touching enough that Icy could get a slight sense of stability from the contact. “Need something to anchor it on the other side.”

Icy nodded for a moment, before pausing, Archer’s wording catching on a thought at the edge of her mind. As she watched Lance move up to the bridge and experimentally pull at one of the planks, she concentrated, leaning slightly into Archer as if keeping herself grounded. Need something to anchor it… anchor…

She clapped a hoof against the ground suddenly, sending a spray of mud and water up against her belly and a subsequent shiver through her body, but it wasn’t enough to distract from her idea. “Hey, could we use one of your… post… impact…? Your Stick-and-Stays?”

Archer let out a hum, not seeming to notice the shudder. “Hey, now there’s a thought.” She looked up at the bridge, her eyes darting around it rapidly. Icy wasn’t sure exactly what she was thinking, but she could tell Archer was doing some sort of rough calculation – while the easy-going bowmare would be the first to admit she wasn’t the most cerebral of ponies, she had a good head for the practicality and mechanics of this sort of thing – a consequence of her Special Talent, Icy supposed, needing an inherent knowledge of physical and ballistic factors.

Unfortunately, that meant that when Archer shook her head and said, “Doesn’t quite work, though,” Icy felt no need to doubt her.

Still, she did want to clarify. “Oh, would the arrow not work? Or not be stable enough or…?” she trailed off, not wanting to pre-empt Archer’s answer.

Fortunately, it seemed that wouldn’t have been a problem, as Archer’s slight chuckle would have brought her question to a halt anyway. “No, actually, the opposite – it’d be too stable.”

“Huh?!” Icy flinched slightly in confusion and even Lance looked askance at Archer over his shoulder.

Archer laughed a little more before shaking her head. “See, the problem is that a Stick-n-Stay doesn’t just attach to whatever it hits. Fact, it doesn’t attach to anything at all, ‘less you count the air. Once it hits, it stays exactly where it is, even if the thing it hit in the first place moves.”

Icy nodded, though her confused expression didn’t let up. “Okay, but… isn’t that kinda what we’d want?”

“Oh, yeah, totally would be… if the bridge was anywhere near as stable. But, well, in this weather,” she pointed a hoof at the bridge, moving it slightly to emphasise the structure swaying in the wind, “well, the wind’s pulling the bridge this way and that, but the stuck arrow’d stay right where it is, ‘long with any planks attached to it. All it’d take is one big gust and the other rope’d snap, and with both gone… well, down goes the bridge.”

It took a few moments of thought as Icy pictured what Archer had described, but she soon saw what she was describing, making her shrink a little into herself. “Oh, I guess you’re right.”

“Still,” Archer said as soon as Icy finished, letting the word hang in the air for a moment and cutting off Icy’s self-reproach, “that kinda arrow might not work, but I reckon you’re onto something with the idea. Getting an arrow over there might let us set up a rope.” She flashed an encouraging smile at Icy before wincing, drawing in a hissing breath. “Trouble is, I don’t trust wood that wet to be able to hold an arrow too long, ‘specially if it needs to take the weight of all those planks. And my glue-goop arrows wouldn’t be able to set…” She let out a hard exhale as she thought. “What we need is some kinda way to attach our rope to that one from over here.”

There was a lengthy pause after that as the two thought over the problem. However, before too long, a clearing of the throat reminded Icy that it wasn’t just the two of them there. Looking up, she saw Lance giving her a meaningful look, although precisely what meaning it had she couldn’t tell.

After a few seconds of looking at each other, it seemed to occur to Lance that he needed to be more specific, so he lifted a hoof and pointed over Icy’s shoulder. Squinting in confusion, Icy looked behind her, seeing nothing but the forest fading into rain and darkness.

She looked back at Lance, only to find him shaking his head and moving to the side. After a moment, he pointed again, but this time at Icy’s side.

“Oh, I get it!” Archer said from her other side. “Your wings – you could freeze it in place. Nice idea, but…” Icy looked over to the other filly, thankful for a reason not to think about how she’d twice forgotten the only ability she had. Archer, meanwhile, was looking out over the ravine, apparently evaluating it, “Well, sending out a blast through this rain… could probably get it there, but not as tight as we’d need it. And that’s if you could even hit it and I’m really not sure your aim’s that good. Er, no offense,” she added suddenly, apparently only now realizing the potential for it.

Fortunately, Icy understood that feeling very well. “Oh, none taken… though I think I maybe might have if there wasn’t so much other stuff going on. Still, if I can’t freeze it from over… here…”

She trailed off as the obvious solution occurred to her and she desperately wished it hadn’t.

From the looks on their faces, it seemed the others realized this too, and didn’t look any happier about it. Still, Archer swung her quiver over her shoulder and began spooling out rope.

Looking up, she gave Icy a smile. “Up to you, Icy. We can probably figure something else out if we need to, you don’t gotta do anything you’re not willing to. But I remember what your mom said and we’re not gonna stand in your way either.”

Icy swallowed hard and nodded, returning the smile without any of the certainty. It didn’t help that, while she could tell Archer was sincere in not wanting to pressure her, her words did feel a little like they were guilting her into going over, though she had no idea whether that was on Archer’s accidental implication or Icy’s own interpretation.

Either way, she shook her head, trying to will herself to be as confident as she needed to be. “No, this is the best way. I mean, even if there is a better one, we’d just be using up time trying to think of it.” She took in a shaky breath and stood up straight, forcing her eyes and ears forward and towards her nightmare.

She raised a hoof to step forward before a firm hoof on her shoulder stopped her. She blinked in surprise, looking over at Lance. “I thought you said you weren’t…” She was cut off when she felt hooves lightly encircling her barrel. For a moment, she was confused before she felt the movement of rope over her fur. “Oh, right. Yeah, that makes sense – easier if I take it over there, right?”

“For me? No,” Archer replied as she tied the rope securely around her. “For you? I’m thinking a bit of extra safety can’t hurt.” She stepped back. “Now, remember, don’t land on the first few planks you reach – too much slack in the ropes on the broken side. You can secure ‘em once you’re on stable ground.”

Icy nodded, trying to focus on the advice instead of her task, but the roar she heard and the force she felt below her quickly subsumed her thoughts once Archer finished speaking. She closed her eyes and tensed her body, trying to give herself a sense of firmness and stability to contrast and stand firm against the roiling chaos of the river. As she stood there, she tried her best to open her senses and take in as much as she could, preparing herself to truly face the raging torrent. She felt her legs weaken and her stomach twist as she felt the power, the turmoil and the hunger of the water beneath, but she stayed upright, the feeling of the rope around her and the friends beside her giving her just enough strength to keep facing forward.

She took a deep, quivering breath before wrenching her eyes open and surging forward, putting every ounce of force she could muster into her movements to try and overwhelm any hesitation or weakness. She flared her wings out and slammed them down through the air, sending a powerful burst of air against the ground and rocketing her into the air. With a rush of energy, she spread her wings out and held them firm, going to a glide just as she came over the edge and face-to-face with her fear.

To her immense surprise, the sight of the pounding river didn’t worsen things nearly as she expected, only sending her stomach leaping up into her chest rather than up through her throat and out of her mouth. She did feel her wings tremble, but it felt as if the sight wasn’t increasing her fear, but just sharpening it slightly, bringing it into more vivid focus. It still felt awful, but wasn’t as much of a shock as she expected. If anything, the lack of shock was itself a great surprise, but one she had an easier time working with, managing to channel it enough to focus on keeping herself level. She looked down at the bridge below her and the water below both, feeling it grasping for her even as it continually failed to reach her.

Fortunately, it didn’t take long for her to reach the intact part of the bridge, even if it still felt like minutes on end. Smiling shakily, more to encourage herself than anything, she slowly and arduously angled her wings down, sharpening her angle of descent and bringing her in for a landing. It seemed as if she’d overdone her initial leap, as she still overshot her target by at least a dozen planks, but, as it turned out, that was a very good thing as the planks didn’t make for an especially solid landing point, catching her legs between them and bring her to a sudden, jarring halt.

The instant change, impact and feeling of empty, unmoving air beneath her hooves drew a sharp, terrified yelp from Icy and sent her into a brief flurry of panicked flailing. Luckily, it seemed the planks were close enough together that she was in absolutely no danger of falling between them, and her landing point was far enough away from the broken end of the rope that they were as stable as any rope bridge. Which still wasn’t stable enough for Icy to get her thoughts together for a good while, but enough that she eventually managed to calm down enough to stop thrashing around and take a breath.

She stood up slowly, shifting her hooves and weight around as much as she dared to test out the planks beneath her. There was a slight groan that did little to help her anxiety, but no real movement as far as she could tell. Squeezing her eyes shut for a moment, she nodded to herself before turning around. She reached a hoof out in front of her, placing it on the next plank along and giving it a tiny prod. When that produced no movement, she pushed harder, then harder once again, increasing her force until she felt confident stepping onto the plank. Forcing herself to breathe as regularly as she could, she took another step and started the process over again.

Her progress was painfully slow and she tried her best to ignore the part of her that was berating herself for her cowardice, but eventually, that part was silenced when one of the planks gave a little under one of her harder prods, confirming that she shouldn’t have stepped on it. She stopped and looked up towards the cliffside, equal parts hating the rain she saw and thanking it for obscuring the faces of her friends, which she couldn’t imagine as anything other than bored and impatient.

With a shaky hoof, Icy reached up to her chest and pressed her badge. “Okay, I think this is where we need to start.” She reached a hoof up to the knot in the rope around her, only to spend a few seconds fumbling with it, unsure how to even begin undoing it. “Er, Archer? How do I untie this?”

“You don’t,” the reply came, feeling a little surreal since she could see Archer’s mouth start to move a fraction of a second before the sound came out of her badge. “I got another one ready. Hold on two seconds.”

It seemed that, intentionally or not, Archer was being entirely literal, since within two seconds she had grabbed, nocked and fired an arrow into the plank in front of Icy, landing it exactly in the inside of the hole where the original rope passed through.

Icy looked down, seeing what Archer meant about the wet wood – the arrow wasn’t going to fall out immediately, but it was vibrating far more than it should have from the impact of the rain. Looking up for a moment, she pressed her badge once again. “Okay, freezing it in place now.”

She leaned down and placed a wingtip against the wood. Taking a breath to steady herself, she sent a wave of freezing energy down to set it in place.

KRRRHGK

Icy stumbled back in shock as a huge chunk of ice burst into being around the arrow, her movement being the only thing that stopped half her entire wing from getting caught and encased in the massive block. After a moment, she stumbled, her haunch colliding with the wood below her as she stared in astonishment at what she’d done. The hunk of ice reached halfway up to the top rope of the bridge and had gone even further horizontally, encasing almost the entire plank in a curved layer of ice, rising gradually along its length before rapidly surging upwards when it reached the end.

After a moment, a crackle came from her badge. “Whoa, little too much juice there, ace!”

Icy shook her head, not caring if no one could see it, before tapping her badge. “No, it… I didn’t…”

“Hey, no worries,” Archer interrupted her calmly, “I get it, you’re on edge, put a bit too much oomph in, it happens.”

“No, that’s…” Icy paused, trying to gather her scattered thoughts. “That’s the thing, I… yeah, I am on edge, but that’s not why… I didn’t put anywhere near that much energy in, I know I didn’t. It shouldn’t have made nearly that much.”

“Wait, really?” Archer replied, more curious than skeptical. “Huh, that’s weird. Well, in either case, not sure you’re gonna be able to get to the next plank too easy with that lot under you, so you should probably come back. Better if we can all help anyway now the rope’s… real secure.”

Icy nodded absently and flapped up into a leap, her eyes fixed on the anomalous ice. Her head turned to keep it in sight even as she went into a glide, utterly baffled as to what happened. In fact, she was so focused on it that she didn’t even notice that she was again gliding over open water until she was almost at the cliffside.

And, as it happened, she didn’t have much time to register that before she landed without looking where she was going, making her tumble head-over-hooves along the ground, skidding a good few metres through the mud and slowing down until she almost-gently bumped into a tree. She lay there, upside down against the trunk with her legs hanging down over her face, not moving as Archer approached her.

“Y’okay there, filly?” She asked as she began untying the rope around her. “I mean, any less than normal right now?”

Icy just gave her a brief, empty glance, the many emotions of the past minute all mixing and fuzzing into each other to create a general, cloying sense of misery.

Fortunately, she was soon pulled out of it – quite literally, as Archer took Icy’s hoof in one of hers and grabbed her unmoving body with the other, using just enough force to offer to help her up without imposing it. With a sigh, Icy allowed it, coming awkwardly to her hooves before scraping a few of the larger bits of mud off her suit.

Archer gave her a sympathetic grimace. “Well, you think you’ll be okay to help with the bridge?”

Icy tensed her right hoof for a second, trying to will herself back into the moment. She wasn’t entirely sure it worked completely, but she at least felt aware enough to nod and set off toward the bridge.

As they approached, Lance looked up and nodded, pulling out his sword and reaching it gently down over the edge of the cliff. It took a moment to realize what he was doing, but when Icy got close enough, she saw he was using it to hook the hanging plank in front of them and raise it to the point where hooves could grab it. As soon as it was somewhat horizontal, he held it there, letting it rest on the outstretched rapier.

Once they came level with him, Archer crouched down and took the plank in her hooves, manoeuvring it so it lay on top of the rope she’d fired over.

“Okay, Icy, freeze it. With, er, maybe less than you used last time?” She gave Icy a gentle smirk, no doubt hoping to lighten the mood a little.

Icy didn't feel like it worked, but did feel confident enough to reach a wing down and send a tiny jolt of energy down onto the wood.

It seemed that the initial burst wasn’t an isolated incident, as even that small amount created a substantial block of ice around the plank and rope. Icy frowned, confused at what was happening, before Archer’s voice brought her out of it.

“Okay, so we go one plank at a time, repeat this process. Bridge’s wide enough shouldn’t be a problem. Ready?”

Icy nodded absently, catching Lance’s more firm affirmation in her peripheral vision. The three stepped onto the now-stable plank one at a time, not even drawing a groan from the ice, giving Icy enough of a sense of security to keep going without issue.

As the three worked, Icy paid close attention to the feeling when she froze the wood in place. It was… odd. It didn’t feel as if the energy was any more powerful, but more that it came out a lot easier and quicker. It was like the difference between pushing an object along the ground and putting it on wheels and pushing it then – the act of pushing was the same, but not only did it have much more effect, but the sensory feedback the push gave was massively lesser.

As she froze the final plank they needed to fix, Archer spoke up, “Okay, I think I see what’s happening?”

“Hm?” Icy turned to her, only now remembering the ponies alongside her.

“It’s the water in the wood,” Archer said as she stepped back, allowing Lance to begin chipping away at the oversized block of ice she’d initially made. “The way it freezes – it goes right through the wood way quicker than normal, but once that’s frozen, the rest goes like it usually does with you.”

Icy blinked, tilting her head as she thought. “O… kay?”

Archer chuckled. “Yeah, I know, ‘water freezes better than air’, not exactly Fig Newton and the apple tree, but I figured I say.”

“No, it’s not that,” Icy took a moment, trying to think of exactly what it was she was thinking. “It’s… like, that makes sense, but it doesn’t… it didn’t just feel like that. It was… different. Something was… I dunno, it just felt like there was something… something helping more than normal.”

Archer nodded even as she tapped her head in thought. “Huh. Well, if you say so. In the meantime, fancy a little shaved ice?” she said with a shrug and a smile, gesturing to the now-far smaller block of ice Lance was whittling down.

The stoic colt looked over her shoulder, an unamused eyebrow raise coming through his wire mask, before he turned back, taking out a few more chips before finally sheathing his sword, having made it far easier to cross that plank. Icy smiled slightly, stepping carefully over the slippery plank, finally feeling as if things might start getting back to a normal level of unpleasantness.

The sudden, sharp burst of wind that shot through the ravine almost literally blew that notion away. The bridge was shoved hard to the side, sending Icy plummeting to the surface beneath her to hold on for dear life. Even as she did, she heard a sound she was desperately hoping not to hear – the groaning of the many blocks of ice she’d made – as well as a sound it hadn’t even occurred to her to be terrified of – the strained stretching of a rope under just slightly more weight and force than it was designed for.

Icy let out a long squeal through her clenched teeth, not caring how pathetic it sounded, and squeezed her eyes shut as the full reality of her situation caught up with her – the precarious bridge, the wild weather, the rushing river…

After a moment, she felt a hoof on her cheek, gently encouraging it to look up. For a couple of seconds, she resisted, her neck muscles refusing to move, before the gentle but unyielding pressure finally overcame her nerves. She looked up, her eyelids raising along with her head, to look up along Lance’s body. Once her gaze reached his chin, she saw he’d removed his fencing mask, confusing her for a moment. However, when she finally got a look at his face, she let out a small gasp as she saw the look he was giving her.

It wasn't a look that could be identified as any one emotion and, indeed, didn't seem to betray any emotion at all. What it got across was stability and immovability, both in his face and in her gaze. His bright red eyes held her sight in a vice grip such that it honestly felt as if she couldn't look away if she tried and his mouth was utterly without expression or tension, presenting an image of someone who held no opinion or judgment on what was happening, simply a determination to help with it.

It wasn't a perfect distraction, of course, as she could still feel the water falling all around them and speeding past below them, but it held her attention enough that, when Lance tilted his head ever so slightly, indicating they should continue crossing, Icy found herself nodding in agreement and, when he began walking slowly backwards across the bridge, she found her hooves cooperative enough that she could slowly follow him and was able to ignore the little voice in the back of her mind screaming at her what a terrible idea this was.

Of course, it wasn't a perfect solution, as she did find herself tensing up considerably as she stepped out across the next plank, not helped by how carefully she had to move, feeling out every step before making it to make sure she was on a solid surface. However, Lance's gaze held her steady and, every time she had to stop to either stabilize herself or simply gather her strength, he would patiently pause and wait until she was ready to continue.

From behind her, she heard Archer's hoofsteps make their way across as well and tried to convince her jittery hooves that the creaking came from stepping onto the individual planks and not from the bridge as a whole.

It took a short while, of course, but they managed to make it to what felt like the middle of the bridge, where the planks reached their lowest point, and past it to where they started rising. However, they hadn't made it much farther before another huge gust blew along the ravine, sending the bridge swaying dangerously.

With a yelp, Icy slammed her eyes shut again and wrapped her hooves tightly around the rope on the side of the bridge. She felt her hooves turning white as she squeezed, the effect of Lance's gaze now gone as she held her eyes closed, as if she could somehow will the world around her away. It didn't help – the water around her was still ramming its presence into her mind – yet she couldn't bring herself to open them.

After a few moments, she felt a pressure on her hooves, grasping them gently. Unable to stop herself, she opened her eyes. She had intended to do so only briefly, but when she saw Lance's face before her and his hoof over hers, she found herself able to keep them open.

This time, Lance wasn't expressionless, but sympathetic, the smile on his lips thin but definite, letting her know that it was okay; that he didn't blame her. However, his eyes held that same firmness as before that allowed him to take Icy's hoof and lead her along the bridge once more.

Icy exhaled as the two moved, a little slower even than before since each was using one hoof to hold the other. And yet, to Icy's astonishment, in seemingly a fraction of the time it had taken before, she found her hooves landing on solid ground once more as they moved past the bridge.

That done, Lance gave a firm nod and looked away, satisfied with their progress.

Icy looked back at the bridge, a little confused about what had just happened, and found that it was no less terrifying to look at, even knowing she didn't have to cross it again. Frowning a little in puzzlement, she turned back to Lance. “How did you do that?”

Lance just shrugged with a distinct look of apathy on his face – he didn't know or care how he had helped her stay calm, only that he did.

“I got no idea either – force of personality, I guess,” Archer said as she stepped onto the cliffside behind them. “But it's a real good thing it did. I wouldn't want us to be on that bridge any longer than we had to be. And not just to stop you going crazy, either, Icy.”

Icy nodded. “Yeah, it... probably wasn't safe, even if my... issues made it seem even less.” She breathed a sigh of relief at the mild validation.

Archer nodded. “Definitely not, but not for the reason you're thinking of.”

Icy's face fell a little. “What do you mean?”

Archer indicated up and along the ridge, into the treeline. “Normally, the trees block the line of sight from the bridge to Mount Foalja, but when that second gust hit, it swung us... or at least me, into a position where I could see the top of it. And if I could see it, that means it could see me.”

Icy's eyes widened. “You mean the pony up there knows we're coming?”

Archer thought for a moment. “Hmm, I don't think so. They could have spotted us, definitely, but if they did, they'd have probably sent a few gusts or lightning bolts our way by now. That means either they're not that observant, which really doesn't square with what we know they can do or...”

There was a pause as Archer held the tension and Icy tried to think of alternatives. After a moment, though, she prompted, “Or?”

Archer looked out along the sightline from Mount Foalja. “Or there's something else that's got their attention right now. Which, I mean, could be good, for us at least, but...”

There was another pause, but this time it wasn't because no one had anything to say, but because they heard a strange sound from deeper in the forest – a combination of several rushing rockets and a strange sort of wind.

---

Domino let out a growl as she looked through the spyglass, her whirling thoughts and the information pounding into her brain through her senses all focused on what she was seeing.

Far in the distance, past the wind wall she'd so painstakingly set up and that she'd been making sure to top up every so often, the ponies were in motion, just in front of where the forest began. Her growl was as much in pain as in anger, as seeing so many unpredictable ponies was tortuous, and yet she needed to see them to see what they were doing, which, in turn, was the source of her anger.

They appeared to be setting up some sort of giant crossbow, with several carrying a thick bolt with small restraints tied around it, clearly meant for the pegasus donning goggles just next to the device. It only took one look for Domino to see and understand every force involved in the contraption's operation and know that it could get any passengers past the wall unless the ponies operating it did something bizarre and insanely stupid.

Admittedly, the very nature of ponies' free will meant she couldn't rule out that possibility, a fact that, despite being to her benefit, only amplified the pain she felt not knowing what the ponies would do at any given moment and what effects that would have on the otherwise-consistent world around them.

Still, the thought managed to rise to the top of the maelstrom in her mind that it would be terrible for her if somepony managed to get out into the forest and, spurred on by that realization, a rare coherent sentence drifted through her mind: Soon see about that!

With a snort, she lowered the telescope and stowed it in her pack before turning back to the crate containing her weather rockets. She'd had to tie it down at first to stop it being swept up by the wind – the pegasus magic packed into the rockets made each one significantly lighter than air, meaning the crate as a whole was ridiculously light for its size. So far, though, she'd used around half the rockets, meaning it was far more stable and in far less danger of leaving the ground. She still kept it tied down, though, as it would take fifteen seconds to release it and she had far better uses for that time.

Plus, the crate's weight wasn't necessarily on a solid downward trend, as she reached in through the crack she'd opened and pulled out three large rockets, each one having a fair weight to them. This was not because they had less pegasus magic in them, but rather the opposite – the magic and weather energy were so densely packed within them that they were much heavier than air, in the same way that a canister of pressurized helium didn't become more likely to float away.

It was this level of energy that had caused Domino to set them aside, along with a few others, for if she needed them. It was also what had inspired her to tie the three rockets together with strong twine, forming a rough triangle that she took to the side of the mountaintop and placed on the ground.

She looked up, her eyes briefly glancing over the strange winds around the forest ravine – huh, temperatures weird, lot of cold, probably some creature – before she fixed her gaze on the town far in the distance, the path between it and her, and the forest surrounding it, and she opened her senses fully. It was a painful process, but necessary if she was going to get this right. After three seconds of looking, she nodded and reached down to the rockets in front of her. The one closest to her, she moved ten centimetres and turned thirty-seven degrees, the second seven-point-four and forty-one and the third only naught-point-nine and three.

Nodding to herself, she took the fuses for the latter two and placed them together, such that she would be able to light both simultaneously, and pulled out her lighter, placing the nozzle over the first rocket's fuse. Waiting for exactly the right moment, both such that the wind would be perfect once the rocket fired and the rain wouldn't interfere with the electric arc from the waterproof lighter, she clicked the lighter on, setting the fuse alight.

She then waited exactly four-point-one-nine-five seconds – this manoeuvre needed timing literally down to the millisecond – before she lit the other two fuses and stood back to watch the show.

---

“Okay, Thunderlane, do you understand what you need to do?” Raindrops asked the stallion as he suited up to ride the most bizarre ride Sunny had ever seen – and there'd been some competition.

Thunderlane nodded with a smirk. “First priority's to interfere with the wind rockets this pony's been using to keep up the wind wall, that should let it dissipate and let more through. Other than that, do what I can to reduce the rain and get rid of the wind wall faster.”

Raindrops nodded, though she didn't look entirely satisfied. “Any idea how?”

Thunderlane shook his head. “Not a clue – can't get one till I'm there, can I? But don't worry, I'll figure something out.”

His smile dipped somewhat when Raindrops gave him a light smack on the forehead with a wing. “Little less of that ego. That stuff may fly at the Academy, but unlike Rainbow Dash, you're not in charge around here, so keep it under control, got that?”

As the two began talking over the specifics of dealing with the extreme weather Thunderlane would encounter, Sunny strolled over towards Princess Twilight, who was standing with the unicorns projecting a force umbrella over the area and looking out into the forest. Sunny took a deep breath, a little annoyed at her impulse to quibble, but still asking, “Are you sure he'll be able to do anything once he's through?”

To her credit, Twilight responded with only an encouraging smile. “Oh, definitely. Remember, to create this wall, the rockets have to be aimed and fired with a frankly ridiculous level of precision.” She shook her head. “I still have no idea how this pony's able to do that, but anyway, even a small change in the surrounding air that Thunderlane can provide should completely ruin that precision. Most likely, the rockets should just create a small area of wild winds while the rest of the wall fizzles out.”

Sunny raised an eyebrow. “Most likely?” She echoed, having been somewhat comforted before Twilight said those words.

Twilight shrugged. “I mean, there's always the possibility something weird will happen, but..."

"But it shouldn't be a problem," Pinkie piped up, looking up from the work she and a few other Earth Ponies were doing securing the balista to the ground, having to drive the pegs very deep into the muddy ground to make sure it would be stable enough to fire properly. "This pony's had to fire off a new rocket every ten minutes or so to keep the wall up, so Thunderlane can just wait until the next one.”

Sunny sighed, actively trying to suppress the urge to search for a flaw in this plan. Not that that was generally a bad idea, but she didn't trust herself in her current state of mind to not drown Twilight in false positives. “How long ago was the last one?”

“About four minutes,” Twilight replied, looking out towards the forest again. “Once he's all set up and been fired through, he should have a minute or so before the next rocket fires, whe-”

A whooshing noise, louder even than the previous rockets, came from the forest, causing Sunny to turn her head towards where Twilight's eyeline was pointing. “You were sayi-'' she cut her remark off when she saw that this rocket was not going along the same path as previous ones. “That's... Is that heading towards us?!”

“Yes,” Twilight said quickly, “but the wind wall should sto-”

Once again, the conversation was cut off as two more rockets burst into life next to the first, both attached to it and travelling along with it.

“What in Equestria...?” Sunny began as the three rockets started moving around each other. It took a moment, but soon, they were spinning in a clean, perfect circle, exactly parallel to the ground far below them.

“That's impossible,” Twilight said, her eyes wide in astonishment. “Getting them spinning like that would take such calculation that... and why would they even want t- Oh no!”

Sunny swallowed, not having to ask what Twilight was talking about, as she was seeing the same thing – the wind magic packed into the rockets was moving and sucking in the air around them and, since the rockets were spinning in a long spiral towards them, the wind began moving in that same spiral, drawing in more and more and becoming more and more visible, such that it was obvious what was being created.

Twilight lit her horn, encasing her mouth and throat in purple light before calling out, in a magically-amplified voice. “TORNADO! ALL AVAILABLE PEGASI TO SWEET APPLE ACRES, EAST BORDER!”

She then turned back to Sunny and the other unicorns with an apologetic smile that they were only able to see once they'd let their winces fade, having been right next to her announcement. “Sorry. Luna keeps offering to teach me the Royal Canterlot Voice, but we never seem to get around to it. That was the best I could do. Anyway,” she lit her horn, her face falling into a determined neutrality, “we're going to need you all to help in stopping the tornado.”

“But what about the umbrella?” Amythest Star replied, waving up to the huge sheltering construct she and the others were making. “Won't everything get wet if we...”

“It won't matter if we don't stop this whirlwind,” Twilight replied, turning towards the incoming rockets as they became obscured by the wind. “That comes first.”

“Besides, it's heading for the ballista!” Sunny shouted, lighting her own horn. “We need to stop it before it can hit it.”

She heard Twilight gulp loudly even as the umbrella vanished and the rain cascaded down around them again. “I, er... I don't think we'll be able to – the wind wall will block our magic until it's too late.”

“What?!” Sunny blurted out, whirling around on Twilight. “But...”

“I'm sorry,” Twilight said, giving her a stern look out of the corner of her eye, “but we can stop it from destroying any more of the town.”

“But...” Sunny paused, trying to think of an alternative. “But one of us could put a protective bubble over it, we can...”

“Then we may not have enough force to stop it destroying even more and I doubt it'd be strong enough anyway. Please, Sunny...”

Sunny squeezed her eyes shut before jerking her head back towards the tornado and lighting her horn. “Dammit!”

As the Tornado burst through the barrier the wind had made, blending with it for a while before coming out without disrupting it at all, the various unicorns shot out a coruscating beam, the colours of all their magic blending and shifting into one another, though the purple of Twilight's magic tinted the whole thing towards her aura.

The beam hit the tornado, creating a barrier in the middle of the wind's circuit in the hopes of diminishing it. The instant the wind hit it, every unicorn in the group winced as they felt the impact, followed by the continual pushing on their magic as it moved forward, their construct keeping pace with it through colossal effort from everypony there.

At the same time, the four pegasi who had been close enough to get to it at that point began flying around it as hard as they could in the opposite direction, pouring every ounce of magic they could into the counter-spiral in the hopes of dispelling it. Sunny could feel just how much of an effect they were having – far more than even the combined magical might of the unicorns. Anypony who thought Sunny and her tribe had a monopoly on magical power didn't know the first thing about Ponykind.

Unfortunately, as much of an immediate effect as they had on the tornado, they weren't fast enough to stop the ballista from being picked up and flung into the maelstrom, the pegs that had stopped them from moving it away ripped easily from the wet soil by the sheer power of the whirlwind. They had positioned the contraption as close to the wind wall as they could, after all, to make sure it had the best chance of penetrating it. That had seemed like the best solution, but it meant there was no chance to stop it from being caught in the wind.

On the upside, it did soon impact one of the rockets, making it burst into a literal cloud of magic and making the other two fly out of the tornado. Sadly, most of the pegasus magic in them had already been used up, so it didn't do much to stop or hinder the tornado, but it at least meant they wouldn't be bolstering it any further.

Twilight groaned as the aura around her horn increased from a double corona to a triple before a blast of magic shot out, striking the ballista just before it would have had a chance to hit one of the pegasi and knocking it up and out of the tornado.

Sunny growled, knowing full well that, while that had protected one or two of the pegasi, it wasn't going to do anything to save the ballista, and the sickening, splintered crunch from behind her only drove that point home. However, she resisted the urge to turn around, instead pouring even more magic into trying to interfere with the whirlwind.

Soon, a few more pegasi flew in and joined in with the counter-rotation, further weakening the tornado. However, it was still getting worryingly close to the barn where they had been building the ballista. If they didn't find some way to speed up dispelling the whirlwind, the barn's walls would be smashed to pieces. Sunny groaned as she tried to think of something, but what...

A sudden stream of water suddenly burst past her head, pounding forward and into the hurricane. It was such a bizarre and unexpected thing to happen that it almost got Sunny to lose focus on her magic, but she was experienced enough with the unexpected to just about keep pouring magic into it.

She did manage to get a look behind her to see that Pinkie and a couple of others had gotten a hosepipe and were blasting water at the hurricane. It took Sunny a moment to realize what the point of this was – by cooling down the air within the whirlwind, it would make the whole thing a little less strong and, hopefully, easier to dispel.

It felt touch-and-go for a moment, but, just as the tornado looked as if it was about to get in range to start damaging the barn, it visibly began to fade. A few moments later, one more pegasus joined the effort and within a few, strenuous seconds, the tornado eventually petered out into nothing, the water, dirt and wood chips that had been caught up in it flung off by the cessation of movement.

There was a long, tense pause as everyone caught their breaths and thanked whichever cosmic forces were listening that they were able to stop it from doing any more damage.

However, the moment was eventually broken by Sunny's astonished words.

“They threw a tornado at us.” She paused and took a deep breath before restating, “They threw a bucking tornado at us!”

“Sunny, language!” Twilight replied, though the chastisement in her tone was mollified by her shock.

Sunny let out a small growl as she glared at the Princess. “I don't care!” she snapped. “I'll use whatever bucking language I like and you know why? Because my daughter isn't around to hear it! She's out there!” She waved in the direction of the Everfree and the heart of the rainstorm. “Probably terrified out of her mind,” she glanced over to where she'd heard the ballista land, her eyes lingering there for only a fraction of a second to confirm the pile of shards and splinters it had become before returning to Twilight, “and I. Can't. Get to her!”

Twilight sighed, looking unsure about her words. “We... we can build another. And maybe I can figure out some way to hide it so it won't get...”

“And how long will that take, huh?” Sunny interrupted, throwing up her hooves in exasperation. “By the time we're done with that, the town'll have been flooded and Icy'll probably be...” She cut herself off sharply, not wanting to say or think about any more of that sentence.

After a moment, she shook her head. “There's gotta be some other way through. You're sure no one can make it through the wind wall on hoof?”

“Positive,” Twilight replied, a sympathetic look on her face. “Listen, Sunny, I think you're just going to have to trust Icy to stay safe.”

Sunny snorted. “Why does everypony assume I don't trust her? I mean, I'm scared for her, sure, but I know she'll probably be okay. I just don't want her to have to keep herself safe. I don't want her to go through this alone.”

Twilight looked out towards the forest. “She's not alone.”

Sunny sighed. “I know, but I also don't want her to go through this period. But if I can't walk through and I can't fly through, I guess...” She trailed off as she wilted.

“I know,” Twilight said, shaking her lowered head. “But with the magic running through the wind wall, a pegasus wouldn't be able to keep themselves in the air, let alone a passenger.”

Sunny nodded. “I know, I just thou-”

Her head snapped up suddenly, her eyes wide. “Say that again.”

Twilight frowned in confusion. “Er... with the magic running through the wind wall...”

“That's the problem?” Sunny interjected. “Pegasi can't fly through because their magic gets messed up?”

Twilight paused before nodding slowly, having no clue where Sunny was going with this. “Well, I mean, the wind would still make it incredibly difficult, but it's the wild pegasus magic that's making it impossible, yes.”

“All this time...” Sunny paused in astonishment, though Twilight had no idea at what. “All this time, it was just pegasus magic that got screwed up.”

Twilight looked to the side awkwardly. “Er, the magic that lets them fly in the first place, yes.”

There was a long, tense pause as Sunny stared breathlessly at the forest and Twilight stared uncomfortably at Sunny, the rainfall around them providing a thick, low background noise as the tableau went on.

Then, without warning, Sunny turned sharply on her hooves and started marching back towards town, her walk making it clear that she wouldn't be stopping for anything short of the end of the world.

“Sunny?” Twilight called, running after her a little. “Where are you going?”

“Where do you think?” Sunny replied without looking behind her, steel in her voice. Her eyes were locked firmly at a point in town.

“I'm going to get my baby!”

Comments

[Herald of Opera]

“I'd like to find a bridge in a creepy forest or the like that was made of, like, metal or solid wood or, you know, something that doesn't sway in the breeze and break when a leaf falls on it.”

That'd be stone, usually. And the monster living under it will make up the difference.

feeling it grasping for her

This was actually established well before the phobia proper, and it's not normal. Reminds me of how hydrophobia doesn't mean what you'd necessarily think. (Wikipedia link)

Icy stumbled back in shock as a huge chunk of ice burst into being around the arrow, her movement being the only thing that stopped half her entire wing from getting caught and encased in the massive block.

Because ice is made out of water. That's the deal, water "wants" to be solid around her. It also establishes the power boost our villain has inadvertently given the protagonist so that we aren't surprised when it's used to solve a problem instead of cause one.