Excitement was in the air, and things were looking fairly positive for Ice Storm. The icy blue unicorn was wearing a black sequin dress that covered both her cutie mark and the patch of darker blue that draped over her hindquarters stopping midway down her flank. Today was a fairly important day for her after all. Not everypony got invited to the Gala that was being hosted on the top floor of the Crystal Spire. It was definitely pointing that Ice Storm was starting to make some headway into the higher societies of ponies. Of course, starting a whole new franchise change of ice cream stores from a single store in Ponyville went a long way to help with that. With her blue and white striped mane done up into a bun for the event, she stepped into the room.

The decor was about what a pony would expect it to be for a ballroom in the Crystal Empire. The floor itself was wide open with an assortment of tables both for sitting and conversing, and for the service of others. The crystal that made up the floor was a pale blue in color, and the walls were a color that Ice Storm would expect to see from an arrangement of ice. She rather liked the decor herself being a pony attuned to the element of ice.

"Hey Icy! Glad to see that you could make it out here! With you having four stores in four different cities, and your apprenticeship with Princess Luna now, I wasn't sure if you'd remember to take time to enjoy yourself a bit," the blue mare heard from beside her. She would turn to find a yellowish tan mare with a silvery white mane and tail. Said mare was dressed in a a sea-green dress with a white saddle and a three-layered trail. Each layer had some swirling embroidery flowing around the bottom of each tier.

"Hey Pressy! Of course I'd be here! A pony just doesn't turn down an invitation such as this," Ice Storm responded. Her and Presteza had gone way back. Was one of the first friends that she'd made when she set up shop in Ponyville. She was also a member of the Canterlot Spellbound guild. Ice herself had recently just been named an archmage in the guild over ice and snow.

"I know right? This is the first Gala the Crystal Empire has hosted since it's return. To think they added this as part of the Faire! Everything here is absolutely stunning! The way the light reflects off of the crystals and somewhat through the crystals is just… unreplicateable," Pressy commented.

"Yeah… I tried to recreate that effect in my shop with benches made from crystalline glass. It made a nice rainbow effect, but that was about it," Ice Storm said, giggling a bit with Presteza in response.

"Speaking of, how is the snow cone business going? It must be going pretty well. I heard that you just opened a new store in Hoofington. I also heard that you rekindled things with your mom and she helped you find a building there for it," Presteza asked. She knew that Ice Storm and her parents hadn't gotten along well. From what she understood, a noblepony had come in and ended up splitting the family apart in ways she didn't want to think about.

"Mother and I did. Father still blames me for his own shortcomings but it's his loss. I made it this far without them, so there's no limit to how far I can go," Ice Storm replied. She didn't harbor any ill will against the ponies that brought her into this world, but she did hope to someday prevent something like that from happening to another.

Ice could still remember the day that Golden Hoof arrived at her family's door. He loved her mother's aquarium and her father's jewelry store and began showering their family with gifts. The one issue was, he absolutely hated her. Golden has filled her parent's heads with all kinds of lies and the fact that she was a late developer with magic didn't help. She didn't even show any signs of magic until she had gotten into her filly years. This led to her parents getting more and more distant instead of closer. After all, Golden Hoof kept telling them that a unicorn with no magic was going to be a blight on the family name and after a while, they started pretending that she didn't even exist. She still remembered the day that she granted their wish, and that neither of them batted an eye when she left.

That was then though, and this was now. She still had a distrust for nobility, and it led to a few issues in Canterlot her first time in the city. Now, however, she had to curb that distrust a bit because with running a franchise establishment now she found herself getting closer and closer to that noble circle. One thing she vowed though, was that she would never become like Golden Hoof, Jetset, or Upper Crust. She couldn't stand ponies like them and she refused to act like that.

A few more ponies had started making their way over to them. Among them were a couple friends that she had made along the way; A light brown stallion named Coffee Bean, and a light blue unicorn mare named Winter Frost, a fellow ice massage from the city of Stalliongrad. The other was a pony that she had heard of but had been actively trying to avoid after hearing that his noble arrogance was even worse than Upper Crust's… Prince Blueblood. She was certain that there weren't many ways that she'd be able to get along with him and tried to avoid him when she could so that she wouldn't accidentally say something that wasn't warranted. Now, he was standing right next to her. Just stay cool and give him a chance… she said to herself. He might have a reputation, but that doesn't mean I have to be a jerk myself, she thought, giving him a small smile and a respectful nod off her head when he approached.

"Why hello there. I couldn't help but feel that I had met you somewhere before, but for the life of me I can't seem to remember where… Was it at the Gala maybe?" Prince Blueblood asked.

"Oh, well it is possible that you might have seen me around Canterlot, or in the castle through the recent months. I've never had the opportunity of going to the Grand Galloping Gala before, though being an apprentice of Princess Luna in the study of stars I've been in the castle observatory quite a bit. Luna even gave me a personal key," Ice Storm replied. "My name is Ice Storm, and it's a pleasure," she added. She didn't exactly think it was a pleasure, but so far Blueblood hadn't done anything wrong. She would be no different than any other noble that she despised if she didn't give him a proper chance to be friendly.

"The pleasure is all mine, Miss Storm," Blueblood replied. "Though I will admit that I had not known that Auntie Luna had taken an apprentice. Such news fills me with a bit of sorrow."

"Excuse me?"

"Oh! Nonono… nothing against you and more my own sorrow. I personally haven't been as close to auntie as I probably should have been since her return. I actually know very little of what she even does anymore. That is at least one problem that I should be able to remedy pretty easily though," Blueblood interjected immediately, sensing how his statement might have been interpreted. He knew his reputation wasn't there best and he was hoping to recover a bit from that fiasco at the Gala. It was part of the reason he was at this one.

"I see. Unfortunately there are many that still see her in a negative light, even though no pony alive today was around when the bulk of the evil was done. They have no right to judge her, just as no pony has a right to judge another without first giving them a chance. I’ve been a victim of that myself on more than one occasion,” Ice Storm mentioned to Blueblood.

“That is quite unfortunate. You seem like the kind of Mare that Canterlot and Equestria as a whole could do with more of,” Blueblood said. “That said, outside of apprenticing with my auntie, what is it that you do?” he asked the blue unicorn.

“Oh, I’m the owner of Frozen Delights. What started off as a simple store in Ponyville has turned into quite a hit. I just opened my fourth store out in Hoofington just about a month ago. We sell everything from snow cones to ice cream in just about every flavor available freshly made in front of the pony ordering it,” she answered.

“More like the absolute best store to get ice cream from! Seriously, I've never tasted Ice Cream so fresh, delicious, and creamy before!” Presteza interjected.

“I must agree with the pretty mare here. I’ve had the luxury of trying a few of her treats at her Ponyville shop, and I was blown away by it. She even did an amazing job with frozen coffee with just the right amount of pop to really give you a good kick in the morning,” Coffee Bean added.

“Ah, yes...” the prince started. He had gotten a lot better about himself than to refer to such food as ‘simple carnival fair’. That would be in even more distaste given the fact that this Gala was put on as a part of a larger carnivalesk event that was taking place in the city around them. “That would probably be why I haven’t heard too much about it myself. I don’t doubt your frozen treats are amazing, but I really do have to watch what I eat. All of that sugar goes straight to the thighs and then I would be a bubbling mess,” Blueblood finished.

Ice Storm couldn’t help but snicker a little bit at the comment. “If I’m being completely honest, as often as I’m sneaking snacks… I’m surprised I’m not heavier than I am… Although I don’t know if it really counts as sneaking snacks if you own the…” Ice Storm said, feeling the ground start shaking under her. It seemed that she wasn’t the only one that had as several ponies started looking around. Even more surprisingly… None of the guards seemed to be on alert. The ground started shaking again, first with a low tremble and then a few violent shakes with what sounded like explosions outside.

Ice Storm and several of the other patrons attending made their way over to the stained windows and looked outside. While most stained glass could be difficult to see through, the glass here in the Crystal Empire was made to be semi-transparent. “What is that?” Ice Storm asked, pointing to the smoky clouds that were looming in the distance. Nopony got a chance to answer her though as another, much stronger rumble shook the very foundation of the spire. When she looked down, she saw ponies starting to flee as dark figures began rising from the ground, and she spotted several figures in the sky heading towards them. They looked to be airships, but they weren’t of any make that she’d seen before in Equestria.

“What the hay?” Ice Storm asked as she looked before seeing a few flashes from the largest vessel heading for them… “Everypony get away from the.” she started before a massive explosion sent broken glass and herself kareening across the room. She had enough reflex to create a small wall of ice to catch most of the glass, but there were more than a few ponies that weren’t so lucky. She looked over towards the doors, and what she saw there made matters even worse. The guards that were supposed to be protecting ponies in a situation like there were blocking the doors. This added to her confusion as to what was going on until she saw their eyes. Both of the guards had green pupiless eyes.

In fact, as she started scanning around the room, she noticed that almost all of the guards had the same green eyes. Those who didn’t seemed to be forming some sort of line. “Something is controlling them…” she said to herself. About that time a rush of creatures came off of the deck of the longship that had targeted them and made little work of breaking through the line. She wasn’t sure what these things were, but one thing that she was sure of… they weren’t friendly.

“Icy, Coffee, everypony okay?” Presteza asked, rubbing her head a bit after getting knocked around from the explosions herself.

“Yeah… I don’t know who the buck they think they are though…” Ice Storm replied. Her attention was soon drawn back to the deer-like creatures as they began screaming about one of them called ‘The Red Jarl’. “This can’t be good,” she spoke.

Moving from the ship, was a large caribou. He had a dark brown coat with a grey stripe down the center. One of the antlers was vastly shorter than the other, looking like it had been a victim of a recent sword fight along with other scars. Behind him with enough weight to crack the balcony, a large vault-like chamber dropped from the ship. It was heavy enough that it easily gouged the crystal that the floor was made from. Only moments after the vault was inside the balcony that it had landed on had cracked again before falling and cascading down the side of the spire before crashing to the ground below. At this point the guards at the door had turned their spears on to the guests themselves. “Looks like we found who’s controlling the guards…” she said under her breath.

“Ponies! I am here for my payment and to show this so-called Empire what it means to be HUMBLED! If you wish to survive, do as I say. First, I know there are two members of the Equestrian royalty here. I need both. One is Princess, one is Prince. You will open this sealed vault, or my caribou shall exact the blood price for Sombra's betrayal on all of his new citizens!” He finished as the vault was no longer being moved. He tapped two hoof inlays. “This only opens to the Royalty of Equestria, so you better be quick before I find Celestia and Luna and cut their hooves off.”

"Excuse me… if I may," Coffee Bean interjected. "I myself am not a fighter by any means and if there is any way that we could talk this out without violence… I would be for it… unfortunately… I am afraid that whatever pony or group led you to believe Sombra has any power here is mistaken, and if you're looking for his power specifically, his horn was destroyed a long time ago. Whomever promised you that it was in that vault was unfortunately lying to you," Coffee finished.

The caribou looked at him incredulously. "Wa…. Wah….BWAAAAHAHAHAH...AAHHAHA...AAAHAHAHA… What would I want with that fool's horn!? Sombra does not need resurrection. He lives- he is at the Heart as we speak, dealing with your Princess and securing his so-called throne! This vault is a gift. I want it opened. Now, are you a royal pony or are you not? If not, then remove everything you have of worth and drop it in a pile near the ruins of the antechamber where your beloved Twilight Princess met her demise. If you are, then touch your hoof to the vault. I'd prefer it if you tried to fight, however!”

"I would think not!" Ice Storm said, stepping forward. With every step she took forward a plate of ice would wrap around different areas of her body, creating a full set of ice armor. The spell was similar to the ice creation spell that she used on super hot days to cool herself down. She would surround herself with a layer of ice that would cover her body, but would still allow her to move. She just made it thicker, denser, and more capable of taking a hit.

"Ice! What are you doing!? You're going to get yourself killed!!" Presteza interrupted.

"The guards have been compromised. That means that they are no longer capable of protecting the princesses, and as he had said, he's already slain Twilight because of this. With that being the case it falls upon those that are capable to defend the throne," she said as a few others stood up next to her. One, a grey unicorn that was built more like a brick house than a pony, and a light brown pegasus that was already drawing a sword. At first she wondered how in Equestria he had gotten that in here, but at the moment she honestly didn't care. She looked back to the buck. "I don't care what you want, I don't care who you follow, but you will not threaten our princesses like that, and I'm sure as Tartartus am not going to stand here after you've already claimed to have killed another. Whatever is in that vault is something that had to be sealed away for a reason that took more than one pony of immense power to be able to stop. What makes you think you can control what's inside of it any better than they can?"

“Hmmph,” the Red Jarl smiled as the ponies moved closer, each one in their own way oddly enough. The Jarl whistled, and back on the ship some shuffling was heard. The longship started to move, imperceptibly at first and then faster for a second before stopping. What was happening, blocked by caribou bodies and the vault. He whistled twice and the caribou started to part, the vault as well. “Your ice is impressive. Reminds me of my home, the land of ice and snow and wind and fury. You think you know ice? I was born in it. Lived in it. Saw my reflection in it. By the time I saw green grass it was nauseating! While you and your kind prance in fields and waste your lives, we hone ourselves on the razor's edge of survival. And survival is the greatest teacher of all...” he smiled as the line finished parting. A moment later, all could see why- they had cleared a path for one of the barrel launchers on the longship, which soon let loose a blackwebbed diamond tip and not the full barrel. It launched itself at terrible speed but was caught by the Jarl, who then tossed it up in the air playfully.

“And it taught us we needed ways to break through ice. Blackwebbed diamonds have such a fine and dense point that at the right speed they can penetrate anything. So our spear points, thrusting swords, tipped weapons, explosive barrels, pickaxes, crossbow bolts...we can do so much with it,” To illustrate, he threw the tip at the ice that was advancing. True to his word, it penetrated...and penetrated hard, shattering the ice and embedding so far into the crystal that it was sticking out of the ceiling of the floor below. “So please, do not threaten me with ice. Your armor will help you, but no more than my armor would against...” he unsheathed his sword and pointed it at the fire-using mare, “against your fire. Oh, it's true. Fire would hurt me. Iron and wood are not the best combination, but if you think you're the first unicorn to try that...well, you're welcome to your delusions, pony. So do it. Attack me. But what do you think will happen first... we kill everyone, or a little bit of fire does anything more than tickle?” he laughed, beckoning to one of the dead guards. One of the other caribou picked the body up and tossed it to the Jarl, who himself caught it and then tossed it at Bulk Bicep's hooves.

“As for you...yes. I want a fight. I've been more than polite in trying to get you simple-minded ponies a chance, but if you cross that body, then we attack all of you. I don't need the royal hooves to be alive, after all, and I know there are royals here. Whether the rest of you live or die doesn't matter to me in the slightest,” The Jarl shrugged as the rest of the caribou started to unsheathe their weapons and raise their shields. One of Sombra's agents looked around in confusion.

“King Sombra said you were not to harm his new citizens,” he protested.

“King Sombra will have his own head on a pike if I'm not satisifed with this vault. And I am very much not satisfied with this vault. And I am starting to think that the only way I will be satisfied is if I order my longships to destroy the Spire and dig through the rubble to open it. So maybe King Sombra should pick citizens that listen to simple directions well because I very much prefer the idea of treating all of the assembled like we treated those guards-” he kicked a body for emphasis, “-when we came in. Now, somepony, something, somedog... open up this vault! Why and how it has been sealed matters not to me. It is our payment and will be used for the greater good of the Clan! Open! Now!”

"HEY!" Blueblood said, pushing himself up from some of the debris. Now that he was finally regaining his bearings, he started making his way to the balcony. "There's only four Royals in all of Equestria. What do you want to bet on this one's hooves surviving impact at terminal velocity?" It was like a hostage situation, only he was holding himself hostage. This probably really dumb, most of his ideas were, but he had no others just now, so it would have to do.

"You think I care if you live or die? I don't need your brains you stupid prince. All I need is your hoof that I can easily cut from you when you're dead. So jump, I don't really care. In fact, I would be more than happy to give you some assistance in the matter," he said motioning for another bou.

At that point, after seeing his rather stupid attempt at holding himself ransom falter, Blueblood stepped back from the balcony.

"That's a smart lad," the Jarl started. "Now… my patience is growing thin… bring my a princess now or," her started, interrupted as he had just enough time to react to the shard of crystal that was heading towards him. He looked over to the grey mare that had thrown it at him. She had no visible emotion on her face and she had almost no fluctuation in her voice when she began to speak.

"You've damaged the infrastructure of the many priceless formations of gemstones which make up this palace..." she started. "You attacked a dear friend of mine, and worst of all… you attacked my sister who was with her," she added, looking at the collapsed structure where Twilight had been. She chose the word attacked, because she could not convince herself the princess had actually been killed. There was no body, no charred remains, no trace elements. She was just gone. "I can never forgive you..." she finished strongly, traces of intensity perhaps momentarily visible even to an untrained eye before her expression returned to blankness. With nothing else said, she hurled two shards of diamond towards his face, the first embedding itself into another buck that took the hit for the jarl.

"Hahah, good shot!” The Jarl bellowed as two caribou tended to the wounded. One listened to his heartbeat and shook his head. The other stood back and with her spear impaled the wounded in the head. “The strong survive. The weak perish. Such is the way of the caribou,” she bellowed, affirmations from the rest as well as a nod from the Jarl.

“A good heart stopping throw there! Why, if we didn't find the Prince we would be all over you now. I wonder how a collar would fit around your neck? Maybe I should discuss with Sombra a further set of payment. The best and brightest of the resistance. We can always use a," he said before he was interrupted.

"So, you grew up around ice then? It's great that you have so much knowledge about it. However, I will change what you know," her heard the ice blue unicorn problem. He then watched as she created a veil of ice over the spear he had thrown before rapidly increasing the density around it to cause the spear to shatter. He could tell that she was powerful, but she was out of her element here.

"You may have survived in a harsh climate, but not all of us have had it easy. Of course, I did notice that you have extraordinary weapons for penetrating Ice, and the like," she said, taking point once more. Standing in front of everypony, she was more than ready to intercept the first attack that was handed out. "But then again, who said anything about Ice only being a defensive element? If you grew up around it, then you of all should know," she looked towards him, creating many objects in the air around her, all of which taking the form of shards. Each of them were as sharp as finely tuned obsidian. "Ice can kill as easily as it can defend. I may not leave here alive, but I guarantee if you attack, Neither. Will. You."

"ENOUGH!! Will everyone please just stand down!?" Coffee Bean shouted. He turned to the group of ponies. "If you open the vault… you leave… and no one else gets hurt?"

"Coffee!? What the buck are you doing!?" Ice Storm shouted.

"I'm saving lives, that's what I'm doing. Look around. There are hundreds of ponies in this room, myself included, that aren't like you and the others. We can't fight and we're all sitting ducks for the cannons that are in that ship! Even if we kill him," Coffee said, pointing to the Jarl. "That longship will open fire and this entire place is coming down and everypony else here dies… So I ask again," he said "if we open this… you leave?"

"Well well, it looks like some of you do actually have something inside that skull of yours. Yes… once the vault is open, we claim our payment, and then we leave. How many of you die along the way is completely determined by how many of you get in our way."

"And you're just going to trust the word of a viking? He's a viking. They don't leave survivors. He's going to kill us regardless!!"

"DO NOT INSULT MY HONOR FOAL!" The Jarl boomed. "We are not MINDLESS savages that kill for the sake of killing! And while I may be a lot of things, a liar is not one of them! Though for you I might make an exception!"

"My Lord!" One of the brainwashed guards shouted. "We've found Princess Twilight in the rubble. She's unconscious but still alive! She's being transported here as we speak," one of the brainwashed guards said.

Hearing this made Ice's brow furrow even more until she noticed something… this guards eyes… they weren't green. This guard was actively betraying those whom he swore to protect! This added another layer to everything now because now they had no idea who they could trust. She watched and waited. With Twilight now here with them, this changed things drastically, and there was one thing that Coffee was right about. Almost everypony else here were either unwilling, or incapable of fighting. These ponies would get slaughtered if fighting broke out. Ice wasn't certain fighting wasn't going to break out anyway.

Just then though, something happened that she was sure no pony was expecting except for maybe the traitorous guard. There was a blinding flash and a cacophonous explosion that rang from the vault. Where it was now was a large hole in the floor, but more importantly, a giant hole in the longship that was now lisping heavily and beginning to fall from the sky. She watched the guard tap something and the brainwashed guards had their eyes turn from green to yellow.

"Attack! No one leaves that's not with W.R.A.I.T.H.!"

Ice Storm was getting ready to help with the fight before she was cut off by the two grey ponies in the room.

"No. You and Winter get everyone that can't fight out of here. We'll handle things here," they told her. She really wanted to stay and help defend, but they were right. Between Icy's magic and Winter's magic… they were the only ones that really stood a chance of getting them out. Ice nodded.

"Alright! Everypony that can't fight over here!" Ice Storm said before launching the shards that she made at some of the bou and a few of the guards. This gave the non-combatants a path to get to her and Winter. Naturally this had gotten the attention of other guards that were heading towards her. Thankfully there were more than enough caribou in the room to intercept them.

Once Ice Storm had a majority of the ponies on the floor gathered, her and Winter started leading them towards the guarded doors. As they were moving, Ice Storm spotted where Twilight had been thrown from the explosion of the vault. “Wait a second! We can’t leave her!” she said breaking formation and running to Twilight’s aid.

“Ice Storm! We need to get these ponies out of here. She took an explosion point blank… she’s probably already dead!” Winter said.

“I’m not leaving her behind. IF there’s any chance she’s still alive we have to take it,” Ice said, ignoring any further warnings. Besides, most of the guards and the caribou were too focused on each other at the moment to worry about a single unicorn bolting through the room. That changed, however, as soon as they realized who she was going for. With a skidding stop, Ice Storm levitated Twilight onto her back and started bolting back to the rest of the ponies that were preparing to blast the door open.

“Ice! Watch out!” Winter said, firing a blast of ice and impaling a bou that was heading straight for Twilight and herself. Ice had to jump to the side, but the spear that the bou was wielding still got her along her side, cutting through her ice armor like a knife through warm butter and putting a decent sized cut on her side. “Ice!!”

“I’ll be fine,” she said, wincing a small bit before activating her magic and sealing the ice around the wound. At the very least it should help her from losing too much blood. “We need to move! Now! Get that door open!” She said before she felt the entire building tremble once again, sending her to the ground. She looked back to where the explosion had occurred and she saw cracks on the floor starting to spread as well as cracks starting to drift up the walls. At the very least, the doors had broken off their hinges and the guards in front of it had fallen backwards down the stairs. “This whole place is about to come down! We need to get out now!”

“There’s no time! We’re at the very top of the spire! There’s no way we’ll get to the bottom in time!” Winter said in a panic.

“We don’t need to!” Coffee Bean interjected. “I came to the gala on an airship of my own. It’s not the largest thing in the sky, but it will fit everypony here well enough. It’s about fifteen stories down! We’ll be cutting it close, and there’s no guarantee that it survived the initial attack on the spire… but I don’t think we have any other options!”

“Then what are we waiting for…” Blueblood interjected. “Let’s go!”

“There’s still the matter of the stairs… we can’t safely get down them in this number that fast!” Presteza proclaimed.

“Leave that to me!” Ice Storm said, taking a deep breath and in the region that she could see, turning the crystal stairs into an ice slide. “Everyone hold on to each other. IF need be, tie your clothing together so that we form a singular unit. We’re going to have to take this hard and fast if we’re going to make it!” she added. She took another breath and started channeling more magic into the ice, creating an embankment to help them get around the curves of the staircase that wrapped around the just inside the spire's outer wall, at least to where she could see.

“I’m going to have to channel this spell for the entire duration… I hope we can make it down before I run out of magic… Let’s Go!” she said making sure Twilight was secured on her back before jumping onto the slope. “If you don’t trust yourself to stand on the ice, then sit or lay. If you fall, do not try to get back up,” she said, jumping onto the sloped platform. This would be a lot easier if she had packed skates, but she couldn’t really say that she was planning on skating down an embankment of ice to escape a collapsing building today.

The rest of the group was quick to follow, staying close to Ice Storm with Winter Frost pulling up the rear. She would be able to help defend them from the back line while they moved forwards. Unfortunately, that path forward was already littered with those who were slain unexpectedly by what they could only presume were the guards that were meant to protect them. By the time the group had made it a couple floors down, there was more blood on the steps than there was exposed crystals. The very sight made most of the ponies in the group queasy, but for Ice Storm and Winter Frost… it filled them with rage. That burst of energy proved to be enough to power Ice’s spell for a little bit before she was starting to feel a bit winded.

Winter noticed this and was about to speak up until she noticed that piece of the building were starting to fall around them. “Presteza! You have wind magic right? You have to push us faster. Ice! Conserve your resources and pump everything you have into making this slope. Don’t create the water for your ice! It will double the longevity of your magic!”

“It’s… not like there’s any… other water for me to use…” Ice Storm said keeping her spell up. She could already feel it started to tax her body a bit, and the wound that she had suffered earlier was really starting to hurt at this point.

“Ice Storm! Drop your moral compass for a second and think! You have water all around you. As much as it is cold to say, these steps are coated in blood, and blood is mostly water! This is about survival at this point, and that option has already left these ponies! We still have a chance to survive!”

“But that makes us no better than the caribou!” Ice countered.

“Yes it does! These ponies are already dead! We’re not killing them for our benefit. We’re using what they left behind in other to ensure that we make it out alive! That’s not being cold or evil! That’s using all resources available! Now you can either risk running out of magic, or do what needs to be done!” Winter shouted as she herself started adding to the shoot of ice, giving them a cover to protect them from falling debris.

Ice Storm swallowed hard. She didn’t like the idea of using the blood of the fallen as a resource for her spell… It seemed beyond evil for her to desecrate them like that… however… the blood was going to end up on the steps anyway by the time the ponies had bled out… and they would have to be exsanguinated anyway when they were prepared for burial… With tears starting to well up into her eyes, the ice that she was casting was starting to take more of a red hue as she ultimately gave in and started taking her advice… They had only made it halfway to where they needed to rendezvous with the airship, and the cracking that the rumbling of the building was getting harder and faster. She could also feel the gust of wind behind them starting to push them even faster, signalling that Pressy had started using her magic to propel them.

“Only a couple more floors to go!” Coffee Shouted… “We’re almost there! We’re going to have to make a sharp left though to get to the landing port!”

Ice Storm nodded, losing her concentration a bit as she started coughing a bit… It didn’t last long enough for her to lose her connection to the spell, but there were a few noticeable patches of darker red on the ice that she was making afterwards, and the aura around her horn had shifted from her usually pale blue to a dark red.

“Ice! Hang in there!!! We’re almost there! You can do it! You have to do it!” Pressy yelled.

“You’ve got this Ice! A lesser mage would have worn out already!” Winter said as they prepared for the final turn.

Ice was going to have to get this angle right, or the entire group would get sent down the stairwell and then all of this would have been for nothing. She raised the embankment on the left of them to send them to the right and then turned the ice into a helix turn going through the door. The speed of which they were going made the force on the ice hard and she could hear it cracking a bit without the stairs under it and she heard it break not long after they passed.

“There it is! Coffee yelled. “It looks like the guards couldn’t get on board to destroy it!”

Spotting the guards, Winter followed Icy’s methods from earlier and fired some shards of ice at them, causing them to dodge out of the way. Then instead of harming them, she put a wall between them and the guards. “Drop the ramp! Drop it now!” Winter shouted out.

“No time we’ll make our own!” Ice Storm said, pushing the ice up until her magic. When the Ice reached the deck, she quickly turned to Pressy. “Pressy, reverse your wind magic to slow us down! We’ll fly off the other side of the ship otherwise!” Ice said.

With a bit of quick thinking, Winter forms a swoop on the other side of the ship to catch the group and loop them back onto the deck in case the magic couldn’t slow them down. Soon they found themselves on the deck of the ship and Ice turned around to address them.

Ice was panting at this point, and to say that she was running on fumes at this point was an understatement. She coughed a bit more, spraying more crimson fluid on the deck as she did. “Pressy… Take the princess… and get down below deck… I have to…” she said, starting to sway a bit. “I have to…” she added, feeling herself slump a bit before getting caught herself from one of the other mares on the ship.

“Miss… you are in no condition to continue fighting! You’re wounded, and you’ve exhausted your magic! You need rest, and you’ve already got the princess on your back,” A white pony that looked to be a medical pony said, already started to tend to her and nudge her towards the door leading below decks.

Ice Storm then felt the weight of a hoof on her shoulder. “Icy… you’ve done more than enough today. More than anypony could have expected from a bunch of civilian ponies. You need rest. Let the world's future best painter take over from here,” Presteza told her before turning to the medical pony. “Take her below deck,” she told them before turning to Winter. “And make sure she stays there. She’s no longer in any condition to continue.

“Right, with that settled, cast off and get away from the spire! It’s about to come down!” Coffee said as the engines fired up and started to propel them away from where they were. No sooner did they get out of the way the top of the spire came crashing down, rolling down the side of what remained. The resulting devastation left only a jagged tip where they once were, and a cloud of dust and debris on the ground from where the tip landed.

“Go… you need to hurry… there’s nothing we can do for them now… we need to save you while we still can,” Winter said practically forcing Ice Storm to follow the medical pony.

They had just made it down stairs before what little strength Ice had, faded and she collapsed onto the ground. The pony leading them down then noticed the aether lines at the base of her horn, along with the tint of red moving into the horn. “Blyad,” she said under her breath, though not going unnoticed by the fellow Mare of the Motherland.

“Ty govorish' po-russki?” Winter asked in her native language.

“Da, no seychas eto ne vazhno,” she replied back before continuing in ponish. “She’s gone into Aether Fatigue… she’s been casting magic from her blood, and judging by how bad this cracking and discoloration is from the base of her horn… She’s been casting like that for a while… I’m surprised she had the strength to walk down here…”

“Blyad… I told you Blue… Don’t go overboard…” Winter said, stomping her hoof.

“The princess isn’t much better, she’s breathing but only barely. She’s got a lot of damage from being caught in multiple explosions…” the medical pony continued before letting out a sigh. “They need more medical attention than what I can provide here,” she finished.

“After something like this… I imagine they aren’t the only ones…” Winter said, moving back above deck. “Coffee! We have to land immediately! As close to the Crystal Empire Medical Center as possible. Both Twilight and Icy are untreatable on the ship, they have to get to a proper hospital now!”

“Does anypony know where that’s at?” Coffee asked aloud.

“Over there!” a pony shouted. “It’s on the northern point that comes to the spire in the center of the city. It doesn’t look like it’s been hit too hard!”

“Set a course and bring us down. We can’t let the princess fall. We’re going to need her now more than ever. We also need to send any survivors that we can back to Canterlot immediately. Celestia and Luna must know of what happened here… We lost a lot of friends today,” Coffee said in a somber tone.

Author's Note

This story is a bit more serious than my other ones. They will be getting continuations, but this one will be my focus for the moment. The events that take place in this story are based on ten years of roleplay in an alternate universe.

Also translation for the different language in dialogue above.

“Ty govorish' po-russki?” = "You speak Russian?"

“Da, no seychas eto ne vazhno,” = "Yes, but that's not important now,"