Friendship is Survival

by rlogic1994

Ch 3: The Search

Survival is Magic
By Mmadhu94
(NOTE: The OC in this story is from ask-frigiddrift.tumblr.com, and because i am partially advertising his OC, the owner of the tumblr will be doing pics from this fic. Check it out and follow his tumblr!)

Chapter 3: Training

After their show of skill, all 3 groups of the team were led by the same blue pegasus out of the cave and back into the main encampment. Until now she had not seen how the Earth Ponies were moving around; the pegasus could fly with wings and the unicors with magic, but what about the earth ponies. She watched as they trotted right off the cloud, very confused that gravity wasn’t dropping them down. Then she saw that under each of their hoofs was a small cloud that held their weight. She noticed a glow coming from small amulets they were all wearing. She had seen so many things today she didn’t question it and looked ahead. Flying past a few of the clouds, Frigid noticed the blue pegasus’s cutie mark was just a shield with a bright four pointed star centered on it. She wondered quietly to herself what talent it could possibly represent. As she let her eyes drift around, she noticed some of the other ponies looking at her with confused looks on their faces. She looked away quickly, realizing that they were probably surprised that she had flown into the torrent outside.

The blue pegasus led them to a small set of tents that were next to the stormy blue one. He left and told them that they can pick a tent for each of them. There was also a bigger tent that served as a place for them to be when not in the tents, because there could only be one pony in a tent at a time. The group dispersed and each pony picked a tent, exploring the interior to see what they had been provided. The inside of the tent was a simple setting; it consisted of a lumpy mattress, a lantern, and a small makeshift table that looked more like a piece of cardboard taped to a few twigs. She went over to the bed and let herself totter and fall onto it. She didn’t want to face the convicting stares of the other team members who were probably gossiping about her now. She could hear talking from the bigger tent and tried to shut it out by covering her ears, trying her best not to be aware of where she was and trying to imagine she was in her old bed in her room in Cloudsdale. She awoke suddenly to the sound of breaking glass followed by hushed voices coming from the bigger tent.

Frigid got to her feet. She wasn’t planning on getting into trouble for what the others did, so she had better help them cover it up. She walked up to the tent, still hearing the hissing whispers floating out from the larger tent. She took a deep breath, ready to endure a barrage of judging stares. But when she pushed aside the flap and entered, she was met not with accusatory stares, but excited ones. She was even more surprised when smiles crept onto some of their faces as she took a step back. Then as fast as lightning, the small crowd of ponies rushed over to her, overwhelming her with a vast amount of questions and praise on her performance.

“Finally out of the tent huh, high flyer?”

“Oh my Celestia that was awesome when you went into the blizzard!”

“How did you survive the cold?! I couldn’t take more than a few jabs of wind when I flew next to the edge!”

“Are you single?”

At that last question, everyone got quiet and looked at the soft blue unicorn blushing at the back of the group who had asked the question. For a second they didn’t say anything, and then they all burst out laughing at the stallion’s unbelievable question. Frigid smiled and looked around at her fellow teammates and saw that they didn't suspect her of anything after her stunt at the try outs. She looked back to the exit, contemplating whether to leave and get some rest, but decided to stay and talk; she still had to come out of her shell! But she didn’t stay quiet. Answering the continued interrogation by the others of how she had survived the stunt she had pulled. Even Scootaloo joined the crowd that was amazed by Frigid’s survival, in a way accepting the fact that they had both equally impressed Rainbow Dash. This q&a session lasted for a few more minutes before the ponies went back to talking in small groups.

Frigid met up with Aurora Skies and the soft blue unicorn from before, whose name was Azurus. They talked about their lives before joining the army, thinking nostalgically back to the times when they hadn’t a worry in the world. Frigid found out that Aurora was from a family that mostly worked during the summer, clearing the sky of any clouds and also making the weather as pleasant as possible. Although it sounds easy, Aurora assured us that it was almost as hard as the winter team’s job, because they had to make sure the temperature wasn’t too hot or too cold and make sure that the sun wasn’t too bright or too dim. Their job was to make each day as perfect as it could be, which was not as much of the case with the winter team. The job of the winter team was to keep the cold out and that was pretty much it. Azurus’s parents worked as spell researchers and worked with regenerative spells, which was probably why his cutie mark was a circle with a 7 pointed star inside it which signified synthesis and creation magic. He told us that it was confusing to explain, but basically it was the rearranging of the parts of some object, whether it is a stone or a sword, and changing it into a different object that is made of the same material.

He started telling us about a theory called alchemy, but from that point on the words that were coming out of the young stallion’s mouth flew completely over Frigid’s head. She left him saying something about transmutations and meandered over to a trio consisting of a unicorn and 2 earth ponies who were waving at her to come over. As she was walking over, the unicorn stallion, who had a silvery grey coat and a blonde mane, closed his eyes and let his horn glow a little. Frigid was a little confused at what he was doing, but quickly realized as he suddenly appeared next to her, having teleported from the group. He grinned at her and then with a glow of the horn teleported back, again gesturing for her to come over.
Frigid resumed her course and joined the new group. All of the ponies soon became acquainted with one another and knew a little about each other. It was around eleven o’clock when the blue pegasus came in and informed them that they had to return to their tents at 11 sharp every night, as curfew would be put into effect after 11pm. And any pony venturing outside in the camp would face consequences. He said it with a hint of contempt in his voice, pushing aside the flap and exiting the tent. The ponies scattered and filed out of the tent, hurrying to each of their small tents.

When Frigid reached her tent, her level of exhaust hit her like a train, her body letting itself tip over onto the lumpy mattress. “Well I guess for a 1st day, things weren’t so bad…”she thought to herself. She shifted into a more comfortable position, grabbing the blanket that was nothing more than a pale thin sheet. As she let her eyelids drop, she could see the mist forming around the ground near her tent, creating a wall of light grey vapor outside visible through the gap in her tent’s entrance. Outside of her tent a cyan pegasus lay low in the billowing mist, watching the mare fall into a deep sleep. She thought to herself for a moment before flying off to her own quarters. She met up with 2 other ponies who emerged from the mist on her own cloud. Both Twilight and Applejack had answered to her message.

“She seems like any other mare…” remarked Rainbow Dash to the other 2 ponies.

“Yes, but there is something about her that seems familiar. I can’t place it, but there is something. I just don’t know,” replied Twilight.

“Well we can’t just judge her cuz she has some unusual talents. Ya know that, don’t you?” said Applejack, with tones of drowsiness edging into her words.

“Yeah yeah, I know Applejack. *yawn* Well we should all try and get some sleep, tomorrow we’re gonna be out all day with the new recruits. We’ll discuss this some other time,” offered Rainbow Dash, with tiredness slipping into her own expression as well.

The trio parted to each of their tents, leaving uncertain of Frigid’s fate.

Frigid’s room was slowly filling with light, as the sun had pierced through parts of the mist and painted some of the clouds shady yellow. The light edged through her tent and soon onto her face. Her eyes opened slowly and focused themselves, getting used to the brightness. Frigid sat up and winced at the stiffness present in her limbs, her energy sapping performance from the previous day taking its toll on her. She stretched her wings and legs, also trying to get all the knots in her back out.

Frigid trotted out of her tent and into the larger tent, which was already occupied by a few ponies. They greeted her with mixed tones, some sleepy and some wide awake and energetic. Before her was the breakfast that the guards had set up for them; there was some overcooked toast and water on a table in the corner. Although blackened pieces of bread didn’t sound appetizing, Frigid didn’t care about taste because she realized how hungry she really was.

She grabbed a few slices and wolfed them down, grimacing at their unpleasant taste. But nonetheless she ate, knowing that they would probably have more demanding exercises today. More ponies arrived and everyone followed Frigid’s example and also started to chomp on the charred squares, looks of disgust and displeasure coming across their faces with the horrible taste. Soon the bowl of toast was empty and all the water had been drunk. Now they waited for someone to come through the flap of the tent and tell them what to do. They waited a few seconds, then the seconds turned to minutes, and soon an hour passed. Everyone was confused; why hadn’t anyone come yet. Their questions were answered in the form of an inter-cloud memo in messy mouth writing.

Come to the east barrack cloud immediately. We are having a special visit later and we had to prepare, so we were not able to tend to you. – Brig Gen Dash

At that, every pony in the tent hurried on hoof, wing, or magic to reach the east barrack cloud, wherever it was. They went towards the left wall, which was to the east. But as they passed clouds, some of the ponies started noticing that none of them were barracks and that they were storage tents. But nonetheless they kept their course until they hit a dead end; they were now next to the wall and there was no barrack cloud remotely near them. They all looked at each other confusingly, trying to find someone who knew what was going on. Frigid started thinking of why the hell there was no cloud when they were ordered to immediately be present there. Then she had an idea, which she voiced to the confused crowd.

“What if this is a test? What if they want to see what we do when we’re in unfamiliar environments and confused?” said the white mare.

“That’s true, they tested our skills yesterday, so maybe they want to see if we can apply them to any situation on the spot…” suggested Scootaloo.

The other ponies nodded in agreement; this was a test. So what was the goal? They debated on what they were supposed to do and reached the conclusion that they had to find the rainbow mare. So then they started thinking where she could be and came up with a few ideas like the weapon’s tents, the magic tents with Twilight Sparkle, or maybe in the high altitude clouds for the higher ups. They split up into 3 teams by race, team 1 being Earth ponies, team 2 being Pegasi, and Team 3 being Unicorns. Azurus with his creation magic made little trinkets for one pony in each group that had a little button that, when pressed, would tell the others where the group was in case they found Rainbow Dash. They all looked at each other for a moment and then started off. The Earth ponies would check the weapons tents, the unicorns the magic tents, and the pegasi the high clouds.

All 3 of the Pegasi flew beneath the clouds to hide themselves from unwanted spectators, looking around every now and then to make sure they were alone and not being followed. They quickly reached the center of the camp and started shifting their angle upwards, sailing through the clouds and towards the higher ones. They noticed that their stealth was not needed all that much; many ponies were taking lifts or flying up and down from the clouds. The trio just looked like any other group, except that they were not garbed in their military uniforms, which they were to receive later. They kept flying upwards, periodically flapping their wings to mask the fact that when they had started their ascent, they tried to maintain a high speed, expecting some sort of obstacle to slow them down.

As they started slowing to prepare for a landing on a cloud near the edge, Scootaloo pointed out some royal guards who were patrolling and only interrogating ponies without the proper rank emblazoned on their uniforms. Frigid bit her lip, pondering what they could do to avoid them when Aurora suggested something. The plan could work but it was risky; getting caught without authorization could mean getting court martialed. They stopped short of the cloud and started to execute their plan carefully.

The guards on the cloud were having a tough day keeping people out, for with the arrival of 3 important war mares, who not only were legends, but also elements of harmony who saved the world twice, came a rush of people wanting to get even a glimpse of the violet unicorn or a peak at the cyan pegasus or a glance of the yellow pink-maned pegasus. They were extra watchful, stopping every pony who didn’t have the proper authorization. A guard pony stationed at the edge of the tents was kicking at the cloud a little waiting for something to happen, when 3 little puffs floated slowly into his field of vision. He cocked his head sideways and squinted in confusion, because the clouds weren’t supposed to move because of the anti-wind spell. He could have seen what the clouds were doing floating around but having not done anything much that entire day had made him somewhat lazy, so he started kicking the cloud again.

Behind each puff, a soft sigh could be heard from the pegasi hiding behind the clouds. Aurora said that in the summer sometimes they had excess cloud and she used to play with it as a kid, using it for hide and seek and other games. With Scootaloo’s cloud kicker legs, they were able to get 3 chunks of white fluff big enough for each of them to hide inconspicuously behind. But Scootaloo kept chuckling under her breath at something or another, until finally Frigid looked over at her stonily.

“What is so damn funny?” she mouthed.

“Well…I can’t help myself. Beep Beep, I’m a cloud!” replied the orange mare with a whisper, breaking up into another fit of quiet chortling, her comment also bringing silent laughter from the other 2 pegasi; it was a joke from flight school about how Rainbow Dash had avoided the gym teacher by hiding in a cloud all day when she was their age.They went rigid when the guard pony looked at the clouds with a scrutinizing stare, but were relieved when he went about his work again. They floated for some more until the perimeter guards were beginning to go down in number and touched down on a small cloud with only a few guards in sight. Now it was Frigid’s turn to put her skills into action.

All those years of stalking Rainbow Dash finally paid off; Frigid was able to recognize every creek or bump as a guard approaching or a pony leaving a tent. The other 2 pegasi were amazed at Frigid’s ability to differentiate between 2 sounds that sounded almost exactly the same. Soon they reached a sort of plaza with some benches. It was deserted, but they still stayed to the shadow, trying to edge closer to the next path without ruffling the tents too much. When they reached the next path, Frigid put her arm up for them to stop, her acute senses having detected something. She looked back and drew a big RD in the air. They had found the pegasus they were looking for. Scootaloo reached for her trinket and pressed the little button, startled as it started shining bright blue and making a clicking noise. Frigid tried to help Scootaloo muffle the noise, but it was to no avail; the thumps of footsteps on cloud could be heard approaching fast. They didn’t have any time left, so Frigid did what she could and dragged the other 2 pegasi with her under the nearest tent and right into the sleeping quarters of a snoring Twilight Sparkle.

Even Frigid couldn’t slink around the tent with her superior stealth; when they took one step forward, they accidently triggered a spell which rang out in a short burst of sirens. Twilight bolted upright, flew off her bed, horn glowing, and tried to face her enemies blinded by the sheet on her head. She was quick with her reaction, but in the time it took her to take the sheet off, the perpetrators were gone, leaving nothing but a glowing red mark from the security spell where they had stood. The violet Unicorn went outside her tent to greet Rainbow Dash who was waiting for her.

“What was that?” she asked, puzzled by the burst of trumpeting coming from Twilight’s tent.

“Someone trespassed into my tent while I was sleeping! I mean I know the guards are a little thin, but what if the perpetrators had try to kill me?” said the flustered unicorn.

“Well I doubt they would have gotten through that wall of spells you put up. I mean it takes you longer to undo all the protective spells than Fluttershy to unlock all the latches on her door. I mean, come on!” replied the cyan pegasus, rolling her eyes at Twilight’s frustration.

“Well we still have to find them. Come on, they’ll be around here somewhere,” uttered Twilight grudgingly.

The 2 trotted off, rainbow hovering a few feet off the ground, and started looking around for the pony perpetrator. The said group of now hidden ponies was huddled up behind a desk in an empty test that was next to Twilight’s. Frigid had been surprised that the 2 warponies hadn’t checked in the tent that was empty, but then looked around and realized that it belonged to a very important pony; there was a coat sittin on the bed with 3 golden suns on it, symbolizing a Liutentant General. She froze at the sight of the coat, the amount of trouble she would be in if discovered finally hitting her like a train.

“We have to get out of here! Maybe if we get to Rainbow Dash and explain, maybe we can get out of this situation. If we get found out by a guard or someone, we’ll be in hell,” whispered Scootaloo, also realizing the amount of trouble they were in.

Three heads popped out of the front of the tent, looking around to make sure the coast was clear. After a few moments, the heads dissappeared and out came 3 pegasi, running as fast as their hoofs could carry them. They weren’t even looking where they were going, just hopeful they would run into Rainbow Dash. They were so caught up in moving fast, they collided into a group of unicorns, who were blown back by the crash. Frigid looked up and recognized the unicorns by their lack of armor and their alikeness to the other unicorns in the team. Azurus informed them that the Earth ponies were on the other side and that he and the others were on their way to meet up with them. Just then, a few guards could be heard galloping down the aisle of tents the group was in. They all ducked behind any shelter they could find, as 2 guard ponies flew past them in a blur. Nothing much was heard of their conversation except “young earth ponies” and “caught”. Aurora and Frigid froze and looked at eachother and then at Scootaloo.

“Oh horseapples,” cursed Scootaloo.

The small squad, following Frigid’s stealthy example, lurked through the tents successfully undetected. At one point the unicorns split up with the pegasi to cover more area, allowing them a more efficient way to find the Earth ponies. They kept stalking until they started hearing a commotion up ahead, in front of a clearing in the tents that had an ominous looking bronze cast gallows erected in the center of the small square of open cloud. As the pegasi sneaked in between 2 tents to get a view of what was happening, they saw the unicorns on the other side in a similar setup between 2 tents. What was happening in the square made both pegasi and unicorns go rigid.

In the center of the square, 3 younger Earth ponies with recognizable cloud-walker trinkets dangling from their necks were backed up against the bronze monolith, with worried looks painted across each of their faces. Before Frigid could stop her, Scootaloo charged out from hiding towards the guards. But midway she collided with another pony who had just arrived on the scene. Looking up towards the pony she had collided with, Scootaloo could only make out one distinct feature through her dizzy daze: a rainbow mane.

Comments

[Blaiset]

good story i am liking it

you need to spell check this though i noticed a few mistakes that made it hard to enjoy the story at times

other than that good story