I stood in a small sub slowly puttering to the west. Orchid circled around us as Mici and I drove on through the bright morning air. Mici laid her hooves up atop the sub. "Wind...." She sighed heavily and slapped my leg with her tail. "Right, I'll be around." She lifted herself up and tumbled down the side of the sub. She landed in the water with a loud splash and soaked herself.

I kept looking ahead as the seaponies swam around me. "...I feel like Aquaman.... The good one," I corrected. I put my hands on my hips and put my hip against the lip of the sub hatch. "Jack, don't let go!" I put my arms out. "Just hang on--"

Orchid groaned and breached the water. "Titanic."

I crossed my arms and ducked down slightly. "Yep." I watched as the land came into view. "Orchid...don't tell anypony."

Orchid nodded and started to hit the land. She transferred from swimming to walking rather well. The land of the west was a soft white sand beach, the sky overhead was clear and the sun beat down a rather nice heat into the air. "Wait.... Wasn't this supposed to be frozen?"

Orchid stepped up onto land and looked around. "Yeah." She scratched the ground, kicking sand up the beach towards a set of dark green hills that made up the top of the beach. "Remember when I wanted to show you something?"

I lifted myself out of the sub and closed the hatch. "Yes.... Orchid, what did you find?"

A bright orange shot flew into the sky from over the hills. It popped in the air and lit up the scene. Sparks fell from above and fizzled out in the water and sand. A normal looking white unicorn with a bright fiery red mane stepped up over the hill and looked down at me. "What the buck is that?" Her voice was like iron going through a cheese grater, but with such a heat to it that I couldn't help but get slightly aroused.

"Oh...." I dropped down into the shallow water, my highriders keeping me dry. "Hi there?"

The white mare walked down and trotted slowly on the sand. "Oi, you the daddy of this monster right here?" She pointed her horn and shot a few embers out towards Orchid. "Some human, bipedal lanky thing, right? That's you?" She walked past Orchid and stood off with me at the edge of the beach. "Oi, you listening?"

I nodded. "Oh completely. But who are you exactly?"

The mare snorted. "I'm the reason this place isn't covered in three feet-a-buckin snow." She stomped her hoof. "Eureka, age old mare! Fighter of the Frost! I keep the windigos back, and I keep Equestria safe from the cold bitter end!" She trotted in place. "Been her a few hundred years... was getting a little bored until this filly showed up, started dragging squid onto the damn shore."

I stepped out of the water and held my arms out to Orchid. "Really? I told you to stop that!"

Orchid stepped back over the hills at the far end of the beach and his herself. "...They're like squirty ink babies." She snapped her teeth in the air. "They explode and its all slimy and sweet and chewy."

My mind immediatly equated squid to Gushers. "That's not a damn excuse!" I walked after her and past the white mare. "I tell you to stop something and you stop, okay!"

Orchid growled at me. "I wanna eat the squishy!"

"No!" I pointed at her. "They're bad for your teeth! You get ugly black teeth stains and your breath smells!"

Orchid growled again. "I like them!"

"You like having ugly teeth?" I crossed my arms. Orchid stayed quiet and laid in the grass. "Orchid!"

Orchid jumped up and roared at me. I stood there, arms crossed as she screamed. "Fine!" She reached down and tore up a chunk of earth from the hill. She carried it in her mouth and walked straight into the water. She smacked me with the tip of her tail and knocked me back.

"Don't you get pissy with me!" I walked after her, she scurried into the deep before I could follow.

Eureka huffed. "Giants...can't control em, ever." She shook her head and walked beside me. "I thought she was a bloody seamonster at first, then she came out, just like a big ol' filly prancing around on the beach, rollin' in the snow and laughing."

I turned to face the mare. "She's a filly alright.... Gonna have to grow up sometime though."

Eureka sighed. "Aye...." She looked past me towards the sub. "How's Equestria? Been a while since I saw it last. I can't imagine its changed too much in a few hundred years."

"Uh, I mean there's humans around. Got carts and electricity and that thing." I pointed to the submarine. "...How long have you been gone?"

Eureka shrugged. "Few hundred years. You stop counting after a while." She lit the tip of her horn on fire like a torch. "So, things got better? No more blizzards?"

I shrugged. "Occasionally, but you get some pretty advanced warnings before they hit."

Eureka shook her head. "I meant constantly. They used to be constant back when I lived in Hoover."

I shook my head. "No then. North is still frozen, but it's getting better from what I heard."

Eureka nodded. "Right, glad to hear it. So when is somepony coming to help me deal with the things out here?"

I rubbed my chin. "Never? I don't think anyone knows someone is alive out here. I sure as hell didn't." I scratched my ear. "How exactly are you alive?"

The mare looked up at her horn. "Fire...."

"Ah."

She nodded. "How are you alive?"

"Giant...."

"Ah." She laughed and nodded. "That'll do it." An otherworldly cry came from the west. "Oh, well looks like I'm back on the clock." She turned away and shot another fireball high into the air like a flare. "Enjoy the beach! And tell somepony to get their asses out here to help me! Really wanna go home already. Few hundred years and no break really tends to leave a pony a bit tired."

I watched as the red head popped over the hill and off towards the unknown. I hurried after her and clambered over the hill. The entire area aside from the sixty foot beach was covered in ice and snow, and the temperature change from stepping away from the sand was immediate, from a pleasant eighty to below freezing within two meters. I could see ancient stone buildings buried up to pony height and ice crystals jutting from the ground as the red mare walked a swath of heat through the icy wastes.

"... Fuckin' bugga." I stepped back down onto the beach and sat down in the sand. I rubbed my forehead vigorously. "Well... I'm just surrounded by bloody wonders, aren't I?"

Author's Note

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