You're the prima donna. A strange buzzing resounds and makes Frozy slap a hand over her ear. It physically shakes her heart. It sounds like that smothering Glaciari's vapid sweet nothings
Perhaps this is why that obsessed snorunt moves closer to the source on her own in such a daze. Frozy lets her wander off as she drags Arctina in the opposite direction.
A headache sets in as the buzzing grows more intense and sand stirs in the air. It must be some pokémon, but Frozy is not interested in dealing with them if they emit such a reprehensible noise.
For the first time since they settled into the arrangement of Frozy lugging them around, Arctina resists. The glalie's intact horn slips out of her hand and she follows after Shivian. Frozy sighs as she trails them, rubbing an eye as sediment blows into it.
The occasional sand blowing with the wind evolves into a severe sandstorm. Low visibility abound, Frozy treks ahead with utmost prudence. The buzzing amplifies and she finally realizes the source. Having faced off with a few in the past, Frozy sighs again at the pests fast approaching.
A hoard of green dragons descend with blinding speed. She unleashes an overwhelming blizzard with everything she has. Several crash to the ground encased in ice, and the sandstorm thins enough for Frozy to count the vague silhouettes flitting about.
Thirty flygon is her guess. They fly much too fast for her to call it an accurate count, but all the same, they will die soon enough. Frost creeps on a good amount of their wings. Frozy takes a deep breath and prepares to launch another blizzard.
Speed and numbers are the only things they have going for them. Shaky as she is floating, Frozy dodges each and every one that charges at her. The closer they get, the louder the buzzing from their fluttering wings is. Frozy smiles as she expels her blizzard and mutes some of them for good.
Three flygon shoot at her with extended claws. Frozy boldly meets them since there is no place on this battlefield she can flee to faster than them. She sets off short bursts of ice beam as she weaves between their swipes. She catches one's hand and throws them to the side, primed for a full-force ice beam.
As she launches her attack, she hears something out of place: the clanging of hard items against one another. No pokémon present is capable of producing such a harsh sound, so Frozy scans the area for the source. The sandstorm rages on, though, leaving her to click her tongue.
Frozy flings ice shards at the trio trapping her to keep them at bay, carefully drifting backwards with peeled eyes. A shattering noise and cold specks landing on her head that melt can only mean that Arctina is fighting above her. Fighting and losing. All Frozy can hear over the blowing sand and cracking ice armor is muffled grunts.
Turning back to her match, Frozy squints as the flygon circle around her at a dizzying pace. She shoots a prolonged ice beam straight ahead, which only one fails to dodge. Its body falls unnaturally quick, and Frozy catches a green glint a different shade than the dragon swarm in the corner of her eye. She follows it to one of the other flygon circling her, who dips down in their flight before correcting themselves. At the other flygon's hiss, this flygon drops again before they jolt just the same. It is as if something is pushing each of them on the back.
Frozy floats up upon realizing what is happening, but the two flygon suddenly dart at her. Left with no choice, she grits her teeth as she stands her ground against the immediate threats while she tries to suss out not what, but who else is among their scrap.
With a clumsy spin, Frozy freezes all of her assailants with a frantic blizzard. Another flygon emerges from the sandstorm and slashes at her with dragon claw, but Frozy parries it with ice shards she conjures in each hand. They clash in a stalemate again and again, but Frozy does not jump to overpower the struggle as she watches its tail twitch.
The flygon lunges and grabs both of Frozy's hands in theirs. Unable to properly breath, all she can cough out is a frigid breeze that agitates them further. As Frozy locks their arms in an awkward angle that forces a standstill, it screeches in her face and swings its hard tail at her head.
Having predicted this, Frozy pushes up and launches herself above its head. It is far too smooth an execution. The flygon below her holds its arms in the air, as if it helped propel her up. Frozy automatically skewers an ice shard through its head and grits her teeth. She senses something fast approaching, leaping through the air: a new interloper she just knew was there.
Her ice shard clashes against his arm, meeting in mid-air. Although she puts full force into her stab, abandoning dual wielding to hold one icicle with both hands, he overpowers her without much effort. He smoothly extends the other arm and shepards her with the crook of his elbow at the back of her neck before they fall.
When they land, she finally drinks in the image of the flygons' accomplice as the sandstorm subsides. She has never seen this kind of pokémon, but he bears strong resemblance to one she has killed before: a gardevoir. But instead of an elegant charm, he bears a body built for combat, large blades extending from his elbows.
Frozy breaks free of the chokehold and backs away. He sharpens his blades against each other, eyes locked on her. Frozy beckons him forth with a finger. He dashes ahead, arms raised, eyes narrowed and glowing with an intense energy. Foresight. Frozy freezes the ground between them.
Without any indication, he bursts forth with an absurd speed, cracking the slippery, melting ice with every heavy stomp. He appears in front of her before she can even blink. Just as quick, he swings his fists at her with such force that she can feel a wave of heat accompanying it.
Frozy's body reacts faster than her head. She flinches out of the way and just avoids the close combat strike to the face. His arm grazes the top of her head, but Frozy only responds with sending a shadow ball into his chest. It does not stop his fisticuff onslaught as he continues to swing at her.
As something crystalline falls from above in her peripherals and her head tingles, Frozy grabs onto his elbow while she dodges another punch. She uses it to fling herself behind him, but he catches on far too quickly for her to let go safely. He spins in a circle at a dizzying rate. If Frozy were to let go now, he would stab his other extended elbow blade into her head.
Before she can formulate any plan, he stops spinning. She is flung off at mach speed and crashes into a boulder. Head a mess, Frozy looks up to see the scene before her fading in and out of focus: the pokémon crumpled on the ground with his head caved in. A black spire stabs through his chest, and wielding it is Arctina.
The glalie heaves, one eye red and squinted terribly. Her ice armor now contains sand granules with green antennae and wings sticking out. Blood leaks out her stuffed, puckered mouth. She pulls her horn out of the pokémon looking around like a true hunter. Delight blooms in Frozy's chest at how gallant Arctina saved her… unnecessary as it was.
Despite his mangled body, the pokémon moves ever so slightly. His arms twitch, then his legs. Observing it with a perked brow, Frozy watches as he defies all logic and sits up. He lives, despite his crushed brain and pierced heart. With now-convulsing limbs, he manages to rise to his feet. And all he does is hold his arms up in surrender.
Frozy rolls her eyes. The coward invites death so warmly now. If he wants to give up with such a pathetic will to live, then he deserves a most humiliating end. Mommy taught Frozy that from the start. So she cannot help herself from lunging at the vulnerable pokémon and latching on to his neck.
His jaw, completely unhinged, somehow quivers. Tongue lolled out, he strains to breathe, "Please don't kill…"
Such helplessness equates death. Frozy doles it out with a satisfying crack as she twists his neck at an impressively unnatural angle. He falls down for the last time.
Frozy signals with her hand that all is right. Arctina's eyes relax but lose some life. Her left one continues to squint and twitch as it leaks tears. She finally parts her large mouth and something slides out as she sighs. Arctina pushes it with her tongue, and a snorunt emerges.
Shivian stands drenched in saliva, blood, and disappointment. She scans the land littered with flygon body parts and a mutilated pokémon armed with blades. "They called me the prima donna…"
"Me too…" Arctina weakly says
If she cared any bit about the title, Frozy would nod. But she does not, so her eye twitches like Arctina's. The buzzing of the flygon wings was truly meaningless chatter.
After failing to speak many times, Shivian gently pats Arctina's side and settles on saying, "Good job."
The two of them look down and fidget. Frozy sighs. She approaches the most intact flygon corpse and dines until she is sated. Since Arctina does not move to eat and recover, she approaches the remaining bodies and harvests the choice cuts to toss in her wobbuffet sack of rations and frozen stones. It tasted much better when they ate alongside one another, though.
Rolling her eyes, she extrudes several souls and tosses them at Shivian's head. No reaction. She throws a beautifully marbled fillet at Arctina and the glalie avoids it. The flesh lands with a bloody splat. Arctina suddenly snivels and her large mouth twists down. Blood continues to leak out of it. She really does need to learn to battle better. But looking at the bodies around them, Frozy does like how she can easily tell which ones she killed and which ones Arctina did.
Frozy rips out a flygon's eye cover, so radiant and crystalline. She keeps a neutral face as she floats up to Shivian and properly presents it to the snob.
"Stop presenting me with dreck!" Shivian moves to swat the red dome out of Frozy's hand, but makes a visible effort to restrain herself. Showing too much joy makes one weak, Mommy tells her. Still, the snorunt's retorts have yet to fail to garner a chuckle.
Things fall to a lull as Frozy finishes looting the corpses. Arctina takes the lead, never looking back at them, and the three take off northward.
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A pure whiteout. They exit the Gorged Gorge, but have yet to reach the mountain to the north, and yet the world beyond the clan's mountain is cloaked in snow. Dark clouds concentrate at the top. No doubt the Frozen Gigant is at the peak.
"What is that?" Arctina speaks for the first time since their battle with the flygon.
They hide behind a pile of snow on the flat plain between the two mountains. Frozy presses the two of them to the ground with her own body as she ponders this as well.
The snow crunches ahead, the reason why Frozy dragged them into hiding. A strange something trudges toward the mountain to the north. They stand on two legs and carry a tall, bulky mass on their back. Their torso is a bright orange that extends to their head. Orange fur covers their face in a circle. In its hands is a long object emitting steam that it brings to its face and tilts.
"It is a human… right?" Shivian says. "It must be."
This is Frozy's first time seeing something like this, too. But given how unnatural it looks, she is inclined to agree.
"What now?" Arctina squints her one good eye as the figure starts to disappear into the snowstorm.
"Kill it?"
Frozy barely hears Shivian's half-hearted suggestion as she charges ahead and closes in on the supposed human. She comes up from behind and throws an ice shard. Just as easy, they fall to their knees before kissing the ground, completely limp.
Arctina and Shivian catch up to her and simply look at the corpse. Without any care, Frozy flips them on their back and slaps their face. Confirming their death, Frozy is almost taken aback at how weak they were.
No matter. She pokes around their corpse and the outer layers of their skin peel off so easily. She rips them all off, thrusting her hand into every crevice. When she feels around a pocket near the groin, she fishes out six hard spheres. One hemisphere on them is red, the other white, separated with a thick black line.
Frozy rolls them around in her cupped hands. From the little light filtering through the clouds, she sees the images of different pokémon reflected in each of the balls. She gasps, almost dropping them at the sight. Arctina and Shivian do the same.
"Are they trapped in there?" Arctina gulps.
Shaking them wildly, Frozy loses interest when the captured pokémon do not seem to react. She tosses them over her shoulder and resumes rifling through the human's person. The spheres land face-up nestled in the snow.
Arctina hovers above the capsules. "Shouldn't we help them?"
Frozy waves her hand no. There is a chance that the pokémon were captured consensually. If they free them and the weirdos were to see their human dead, they would start a fight.
"We have our hands full worrying about ourselves," Shivian says, kicking the spheres away.
For once, Frozy agrees with her. She rips off the final layer coating them and studies the body now stripped down to its true, bare skin. She guesses it is male; he would look wonderful as a frozen statue. Nonetheless, sating hunger takes precedence, so she beckons Arctina closer and claws out a chunk of flesh to offer.
The human is no more appetizing than a pokémon to her, so Frozy leaves it for Arctina, who has not eaten for some time. Though her left eye still appears off, having gone from squinting terribly and red to shut tight and leaking.
Shivian slinks over wearing the same tired face as the glalie and muses, "When I save our, er, the mountain, more of these cretins will invade, then?"
Frozy turns to the thing she ripped off the human's back. She shoves a hand in and roots around. It contains a variety of objects that she takes out and tosses aside, none of which look particularly interesting despite them all so foreign.
She gets to the bottom and pulls out the last object in the container's chamber: a colorful stone. The sheen makes her heart skip a beat, and touching it sends a rush through her body. She has felt this sensation before: when she discovered that stash of transcendent jewels buried just outside the Gorged Gorge. There is no doubt about it.
Hiding it with her back turned, Frozy peers over her shoulder and sees Arctina has devoured the corpse and Shivian now holds the soul in her hands with her full attention on it. Frozy turns back to marvel at the transcendent jewel one more time before tossing it into her wobbuffet sack. It is of no relevance to Frozy if Shivian evolves now or later, or even at all, but she would like to tease the snorunt about it for just a bit longer.
She will confer the transcendent jewel upon Shivian eventually. Most likely by tossing it atop her lifeless corpse. Frozy watches as Shivian swallows the soul without savoring it. Her face looks stupid, jaw unhinged with her eyes lazily crossed. They make brief eye contact and Shivian, face red, snaps, "What are you looking at?"
Genuinely caught off guard for the first time in a while, Frozy grabs the first thing she can and floats back to them. She presents it while looking off to the side, hiding a snicker as the image of Shivian reappears in her head. As long as Shivian does not get the gemstone just yet.
"What is this?" Shivian snatches the object from her hands and quickly wipes a dribble of drool from the corner of her mouth.
Frozy shrugs and tries to define the thing herself. It is the object the human tipped to his mouth when they first observed him. Frozy takes it back in her hands and fumbles with it until she manages to alter it. By grabbing the smaller bit at the top and turning it, the piece falls off and a hole is revealed, steam wafting out of it. She shakes the thing and something splashes out.
The liquid lands on Arctina's face and drips down to her mouth. "Hot water?"
So it is nothing special, just some sort of vessel like her wobbuffet sack. Frozy moves to toss it, but Shivian jumps to take it back. "Just give me it," she quietly says, hugging the large container.
Rolling her eyes, Frozy allows her to have it as long as it shuts her up.
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Night is upon them, rendered absolute darkness with the snowstorm. They need to rest now. They only just step foot on the mountain to the north when Frozy spies a small cave. She pushes Shivian and Arctina in and freezes a wall of ice against the mouth for a safety measure.
When the two press against the ice with confused faces, Frozy puts her hands together and tilts her head against it to pantomime sleeping. The last thing she wants is Shivian whining about being tired.
Arctina mouths something, but her voice does not penetrate the ice. Oh. Perhaps it was cruel to force Arctina to be with Shivian like this. Eventually, they retreat into the cave and she sighs.
Maybe she should grab Arctina when Shivian falls asleep and return to the clan. Maybe she can kill Shivian right now. It is quite easy. She can stage an invasion and tell Arctina that someone else killed Shivian.
Breaking her out of her musing is a scratching and subdued grunts. She whips around to see Shivian squeezing out of a small hole in the corner of the ice wall. And of all things she does, she simply approaches Frozy and sits beside her.
Eying her with disdain, Frozy pretends Shivian is not there. But the snorunt makes it so hard. She coughs, and something hits the top of Frozy's head.
"You looked terrible," is all she says, wiping fresh ice from the corner of her lips.
Frozy brings a hand to where she was struck. A chunk of ice is where one of the crystals atop her head used to be. Then she remembers that that was where that pokémon struck her. How strange.
Shivian ruins the moment by singing. She begins with a scale. Not that Frozy is one to speak, but Shivian sounds bad. Her notes are similar, and her face scrunches as if in pain. As she reaches the end, she repeats the same pitch over and over, a withered little ah, until she takes a sharp gasp and forces out an utterly divine high note.
The author's tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.
That Elder Glaciari so eagerly demonstrated the aria the prima donna is to sing to Frozy. An old hag clutching onto former glory, if you asked her. The conclusion of it sounded almost exactly like Shivian just did.
With a mockingly slow clap, Frozy watches as Shivian struggles to catch her breath. It is unlikely that Shivian can sustain such quality for her silly little opera.
"Why? Why cant I sound like her?" Shivian's voice is rough. Clicking her tongue, she shoots a glare at Frozy. "I don't need your pity."
Turning around, she begins to babble nonsense. Oh, not nonsense. The lyrics to the Frozen Opera.
Nonplussed, Frozy returns to surveilling the area. The droning in her ear is unbearably vapid and childish. Are these truly the words that will stir the heart of their almighty Frozen Gigant?
Shivian loops her song again and again whining with every conclusion. It cannot possibly be good to use her voice for so long at full force, but who is Frozy to judge? Utterly bored at the display, Frozy watches as she wonders why this is so important to Shivian. If she heard correctly much earlier, Shivian does not even enjoy singing this.
"Why did they believe in you so easily?" She finally stops singing. Her voice is still ragged. Come to think of it, it has sounded like this since they departed their mountain. "You're mute, but they have full faith in your Frozen Opera. They forgot about mine without even trying. Is it because my voice is that bad? I've done everything I can to sound like Elder Glaciari… Or is it because I'm unlikable?"
A mind-reader! Frozy nods eagerly.
"Shut up!" Puffing her cheeks, Shivian turns away. "I don't even care about them anymore. They never cared about me…"
Frozy stops herself from clapping again. It is strange. Not just Shivian, but Arctina as well. The both of them talk to her expecting an answer. But how is she to supply one when she cannot utter a sound? Even Mommy does not enjoy talking to her.
"How…" Now she is unable to do more than repeat and stutter that word over and over, so Frozy ignores it. And when she manages to spit it out, she says, "How do I get Arctina to like me?"
Frozy wheezes a silent coughing fit. This is the last thing she expected to hear.
"Shut up. I don't care about you one bit." The feeling is mutual. "Arctina likes you, though, somehow, so tell me how you beguiled her so."
Frozy glares at her. She only now notices that the item she took from the human is nestled in the snow, no longer spewing steam. Frozy thinks to raise her hand, but decides against it. She only did it before to give Shivian a taste of her own medicine, but her pathetic cowering reaction is not particularly funny to her.
"She was so nice to me before." Shivian hugs herself tightly. "Even when I called her the worst."
Frozy floats in front of Shivian and forces eye contact to make a point. She yawns a big one. She then makes a frame with her fingers and centers the snorunt in it before drawing a finger across her throat. She is not Shivian's friend.
"I said to kill me after the opera!" Shivian snaps. As Frozy holds a lazy stare, Shivian's stiff face breaks on its own. "I don't want to die at all…"
Yawning again, Frozy wonders how she will end the snorunt's life. Make her suffer like she has her, or show some mercy?
"I don't want to die without meaning. I want someone to miss me when I'm gone!" Face a strange mix of depressed and determined, Shivian yanks on Frozy's sash and draws their faces closer. "I know there's no chance you will mourn me. Never would I wish you to. So it has to be Arctina."
Why is this necessary? How selfish can one be?
"She's saved me in so many ways…" Her tongue drags across her chapped lips and she gulps. "But all I did was insult and hit her…"
Why is the onus on Arctina? Shivian is so cruel. Arctina is far too good for her.
"Dont fall asleep yet!" Another tug on her sash cuts off her yawn. Shivian pulls harshly and manages to drag her along with one hand. The other carries the human's item.
"Let's go." Shivian pulls her into the cave with a cool demeanor. Frozy holds her breath and decides to entertain Shivian out of curiosity. "I need you to hold Arctina still. Then I'll leave you alone, alright?"
Frozy blinks slowly. Shivian repeats herself and looks at her expectantly. Frozy glances at the glalie, planted on the ground upright with her eyes closed only a few paces deeper into the cave.
"I will pour this water into her eye. You keep her in place and hold it open."
Taken aback, Frozy covers her mouth with her hand. Indeed, Arctina's left eye is clearly irritated, likely from the sandstorm they weathered. The residue must be flushed out if she treasures her vision. Frozy realized this earlier, but she had no gentle method of doing so. Credit where credit is due, Frozy acknowledges that Shivian does have a brain in that big head of hers.
Doing this will curry favor with Arctina. How clever. Only because it will benefit the glalie, Frozy obliges.
Approaching Arctina, Frozy knocks her down on her back and freezes her in place. A hand on either side of her left eye, she forces it wide open. Red with a slimy discharge coating it, Arctina's eye darts around as she screams and attempts to flail.
"What are you doing?"
"Dont move!" Shivian climbs over her rotund body and kneels on her chest. "And stop crying!"
"No! Stop, it hurts!"
Frozy cannot stop her from squeezing her left eye shut again. Tears flow from it. Moving to get a better angle, she forces the glalie's eye open once more and glares at Shivian to hurry up.
Holding the object with both hands, Shivian tilts it until a small drip of water falls out onto Arctina's eye. At the contact, Arctina screams louder and the ice holding her in place begins to crack.
"Why are you doing this? No! Owww…"
"Sorry, okay?" With that, Shivian completely flips the container upside-down and dumps all the water onto the afflicted eye.
With one final scream, Arctina twists and breaks the ice restraining her. Frozy lets her go and watches as Shivian tumbles off the glalie's body wearing a relieved face.
Arctina floats facing the cave wall, blinking rapidly and crying. Thinking it best to leave her alone to collect herself, Frozy drags Shivian with her back outside the cave.
They awkwardly stand opposite each other. If she could talk, Frozy admits, she would commend Shivian for helping Arctina like she did.
"I… You know, I feel a little better after shouting at you earlier." Of all things, this is what she says. Well, if she does not wish to acknowledge what just happened, so be it.
How does Shivian get Arctina to like her? Was what just transpired not enough? Arctina is simple. She is kind. No doubt she would forgive her with even a half-hearted apology.
To some degree, on the inside, Shivian is the same as Arctina. At the very least, Frozy acknowledges that the snorunt is all bark, no bite. It is not charming, but it is not completely annoying, she supposes.
"Th-thanks… for listening to me." She bows, suddenly so humble.
Deciding to answer the question posited earlier, Frozy holds her fist to her mouth, then pulls it away and unfurls it in front of her face to say, Just talk to her.
"Shut up." A flaccid snap. "I just… need some more time. Give me another method."
Wondering how it will go, Frozy presents another object not a transcendent jewel to Shivian with a sly smile. It is very familiar.
The snorunt almost reflexively sticks her nose up at what is offered, but stares deeply at it. "Is that her horn?"
Indeed, it is Arctina's shortened horn, which broke off during their mock match. It glints like obsidian. Frozy watches as Shivian snatches it and holds it close.
"She… she is so weak despite being the guardian." Shivian weakly chuckles to herself. Frozy agrees.
"Hey…"
They both jolt at the approaching Glalie. The ice wall has a hole carved out from where she emerged. Frozy curses at how she let that slip past her senses.
Arctina bashfully floats before them. Her left eye is now normal, completely flushed of impurities, only slightly pink. "You guys can go rest. I'll stand guard…"
Protesting does nothing as Arctina gently nudges Frozy inside. Then comes Shivian dragging her feet. They pass by each other, and Frozy rolls her eyes as Shivian keeps her head down. But to her surprise, the snorunt says, "Thanks for always saving me, Arctina."
With a toss and deep breath, Shivian manages to freeze the broken horn back in place. As Frozy expected, Arctina only smiles warmly at her. "Thanks for saving my eye!"
As Shivian lies down in the cave with a brighter air about her, Frozy slips back out. She stares at the cloudy ice armor Arctina dons. How many suits must she have frozen in her lifetime? How many were avoidable?
"I'm alright." A wistful smile marks her face. "I'm always okay. I'm the guardian."
Yes, Arctina and Shivian are quite similar. All they like to do is define themselves as prima donna and guardian.
"You know, I didn't always want to be the guardian. I… I wanted to be the prima donna. But, now that I think about it, I was never cut out for it."
Frozy would like to judge for herself.
"Before they forced me to evolve, all I did was proclaim myself the future prima donna. It was my dream. I wanted to be just as radiant as Elder Glaciari." She laughs, a faint glimmer in her eyes. "But I think it was clear from the start that it would never be reality. We had Shivian, who was always so resolute and talented. And then we had you. I'm just tone-deaf."
Frozy shakes her head. Why is it that both Arctina and Shivian cannot be what they want? Because of skill? Fate? Frozy herself and the prophecy? No, it is the clan.
"It's a little embarrassing, but that's how I lost my horn. I tried so hard to look like the prima donna, but… A glalie can't be one, right?"
More like a cult, with that Elder Glaciari leading them. Frozy would know. One group she and Mommy mingled amongst before was led by a lively ludicolo who preached dancing to his beat would bring eternal happiness. They all ended up starving to death before the fat leader fled elsewhere. Their clan is similar.
Arctina and Shivian should run away. No, that is what they are doing now, and still, they adhere to their traditions.
"I'm happy being the guardian, though. But, could I ask you one thing, Frozy?"
Frozy hesitantly nods at the gentle look the glalie has.
"When she finishes the Frozen Opera, can you not kill Shivian?" she humbly asks. "I really like her. She was the only one who ever talked to me back home. So I don't want her to die. If anything, please kill me and offer my soul to the Frozen Gigant. Just like how it's supposed to go." Tears fall from her eyes. "She said she wouldn't sacrifice me. But I'm the guardian, so I should die."
One should strive only to live. Death should never be welcomed. Frozy cannot comprehend how both Arctina and Shivian so easily ask her to kill them for reasons so absurd. Mommy used to say that if someone asked her to kill them, Frozy should do so. But she has nothing to gain from killing these two fools.
"It's tradition, after all. Elder Glaciari told me I should be proud about it."
Frozy wildly shakes her head no. Arctina smiles and says, "You know, that makes me really happy."
Suddenly stricken with a headache, Frozy fakes a yawn and retreats into the cave.
How strange. She dreams that Arctina asks her, "Can you be the guardian? I still wanna be a frost maiden."
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They set out at the crack of dawn. The headache from the night before has migrated to her chest, and Frozy knows it is her body telling her it is already sick of this little excursion.
They will scale this mountain, Shivian will sing her little ditty, Frozy will kill her, and she will bring Arctina back to Mommy and the clan. Simple and easy, she reassures herself.
Shivian sits atop Arctina's head, as if their little scuffle yesterday never happened. Ignorance is bliss, as they say. Pathetically enough, the snorunt sniffles and shivers as the wind and snow assault her.
Having sensed a faint presence behind them, Frozy assumes the rearguard. It is beyond difficult to make anything out in this snowstorm, but she knows something is there.
"You're just paranoid," Shivian remarks with an edge. "Stop creeping me out."
With a sigh and roll of the eyes, Frozy sweeps her eyes about before turning around and scanning the area once more.
"There is no one bold or daft enough to endure this weather. The previous inhabitants of this mountain must have fled with the storm. We should count ourselves lucky." On and on, she chatters.
But she is wrong. Frozy finally pinpoints it. A heavy presence looms above her, spawning from the ether. Lacking any and all malice and intent, even presence of life, it is no wonder she did not notice it until it moved. Still, she curses her ineptitude.
Descending from high above, a large figure hovers before her. It has an immaculate metallic luster. Utterly smooth and unnatural, it looks like that container they stole from the human. Is it man-made? A large silver cross marks its face, red eyes staring at her. It cannot be alive. And yet, it is sentient
Completely silent, its appearance alerts neither Arctina nor Shivian. They continue ahead, away as Frozy remains trapped in eye contact. It raises a hulking… leg and swings it at her.
Frozy throws herself away. The calculating gaze it holds and the heft of its now-whirling parts spell doom. All four of its potential legs rotate about its body, claws capping each of them blurring into a perfect circle. She needs to run.
Arctina's back is so far away, blending perfectly with the snow. She stays in place, wildly looking to and fro. Frozy clambers after her.
Frozy travels forth a decent distance before reality ceases to make sense. She now moves backwards. Her body is otherwise immobile. She drops her wobbuffet sack. With every ounce of effort, she forcibly cranes her neck and sees the metal monster getting closer. No, she is getting closer. It must be using psychic. Is this truly a pokémon? Its face is utterly blank. In the past, Frozy has been able to break free from, or at least struggle against a psychic hold. This time, she can only concede to the force.
It turns her around to face it. Frozy fights against the psychic to clench her jaw once she sees it bring one leg up and draws it back. Before the punch makes contact, Frozy can see stars.
The pain does not register. The world does not register. For several long moments, Frozy blacks out. When she comes to her senses, she realizes she flies backwards, free of the psychic clutches. Her ears fill with an oppressive ringing, far worse than flygon buzzing. She pats her face and feels that it is now completely flat, aside from her jaw jutting to the right, refusing to close. Three holes pierce in a circle, only just missing her eyes and open mouth. Her hands draw away dyed purple. A trail the same color follows her. She is impressed her vision is only slightly blurry.
Every orifice on her head leaks miasma in place of the blood a froslass lacks. But Frozy does not care. She is alive. She is gaining distance from it.
How unfair. Trapping her like that for a sucker punch of a meteor mash? If any variable was just a twinge different, she would have died.
No matter. She need only escape. Her flight slows down, and she realizes Arctina and Shivian are right there. She also realizes that the pokémon is following her.
"Frozy!" Arctina foolishly floats toward her, so ignorant.
Indifferent to all else, Frozy claws her way to the glalie, climbs her lumpy body, and bats her hand about until she grabs a snorunt's foot
"Hey, stop! What do you-" The noise swirls in her head, barely decipherable.
Frozy does not hesitate throwing Shivian at the thing. The screams she makes only worsens her aching head. Frozy watches as the snorunt hits the ground and tumbles, snow sticking to her body. And yet, the pokémon completely disregards her.
It shoots by, ignoring the easy prey. Left with no choice, Frozy shoves Arctina at it and floats the fastest she can away. She cannot die.
The pokémon avoids Arctina, charging ahead only for Frozy. When she glances back, Frozy can see Arctina and Shivian frozen stock-still, gawking at her. But this pokémon is the true pain in her side. It seems it is interested only in a challenge.
It gains speed. Or perhaps Frozy unwittingly slows down. Either way, she can tell, her only option now is to fight.
Waving her arm, she summons an ominous wind that visibly slows it. It is not enough as it lunges at her with metal claw. She weaves between the forceful swipes and throws a sequence of shadow balls at its exposed underside. It seems the most effective of her repertoire.
A constricting sensation encompasses her being and it swings its leg like earlier. Frozy desperately struggles to move, and by some miracle, she budges. With a sharp breath, she becomes one with the snow and manages to avoid the hit.
She takes gasping heaves, but it does not show signs of slowing down, much less stopping. It throws its entire body at her, head consumed with psychic energy. Frozy cannot dodge, and her left arm takes the brunt of the strike. She crashes down with her head spinning.
It pins her between the claws of a leg. It makes a face, almost as if disappointed. Her own face twisting, Frozy unleashes another ominous wind, followed by a barrage of shadow balls going with the gale at its underbelly. A water pulse douses him and freezes on contact, and a thunderbolt finally breaks her free.
Frozy can barely float steadily, but she spews a blizzard that manages to freeze it in place. Just as fast, it breaks free and punches her thrice in the torso. Its claws pierce through her and leave gaping holes, but it is hollow as a froslass is. Miasma spurts out and she blanks for a moment.
Falling into the snow, Frozy beholds as it lifts a leg. She refuses to die, but her body refuses to move. Her eyes cannot focus, so she counts the seconds until it crushes her. One…
Its leg is suddenly pulled away. A pokémon latches onto it with its teeth. A glalie.
They struggle, but the strange pokémon quickly overpowers Arctina and drives its claws into Frozy's body, pinning her in place. She goes limp. Turning, it finally acknowledges Arctina.
Frozy wills her hand to move. She just needs to find a way to get away, then Arctina will entertain it. With every ounce of energy remaining, she unleashes more shadow balls.
It staggers. It lifts its leg, claws pulling out of her cleanly. It will stomp on her, so she pathetically rolls away and shoots an ice beam at its legs. They freeze solid, then its body. Frozy laughs at the sight of an oversized ice chunk.
But of course, it manages to break free. Its target switches back to Frozy. As it levitates toward her, it is slower, clumsier.
This is it. With all she has left in her reserves, Frozy looses a marathon of attacks with no strategy. Arctina joins in and crunches it mercilessly. It slows. She licks her lips as she attacks while dragging herself away.
Arctina bites down on one leg and it twists terribly. The pokémon crashes down, a plume of snow sent in the air. Frozy targets the joint attaching the leg to its body and throws a shadow ball. With that, it rips off in Arctina's mouth with a delightful creak.
Frozy cannot die. She claws herself across the snow. Mirrored ominous winds push her away and it back. Arctina can handle this. Sadly, this is where they part. Frozy cannot face her after this.
More dangerous creaks resound. That thing must be nearing its end. Frozy cannot stop smiling as escape is imminent. But she collapses with a massive blow to the back of her head.
The force tosses her like dust in the wind. She flops on her back and sees the "pokémon" trudging at her with only two legs and body covered with bite marks. Its "skin" strips away and stands rigid. A sheet atop its head peels back, flapping in the wind.
Does it hold a grudge with her? In her sorry state, this bloodthirsty thing would rather come at her than Arctina, who wounded it more savagely? No, Frozy remembers, Arctina fights to survive. Frozy aims to kill. It likely sees the glalie as a simple distraction.
It ambles closer, on the verge of death. When she thinks it will shut down, it pounces at her with the last of its strength and stabs the claws of a leg through her chest. A regular ticking resounds from somewhere, and Frozy just knows that this is the end.
Its eyes flare with a dark fervor. It wears a crooked smile Frozy is sure she mirrors. Its face glows red, and an intense heat radiates from its core.
Frozy curses the world. She glances at her mangled body and pounds on the thing's leg with the last of her strength.
Something flies overhead and clings to the leg pinning her. Arctina? She desperately gnaws on the joint until she crunches through it. She tackles the leg out of Frozy's chest, and with her teeth, she grabs Frozy and floats away.
Awestruck beyond comprehension, Frozy stares at her hero. A deafening explosion steals her dwindling focus. Behind, the frightening pokémon is but a blustering inferno, extinguished by the snowstorm in mere moments. Shrapnel soars through the air, and all that remains is a spot of melted snow quickly covered with fresh precipitation.
"Please be okay, Frozy," Arctina mumbles, froslass still in her mouth.
"Is she dying?" The shrill voice pierces the soup that is Frozy's mind. "Good!"
She feels herself laid upon the snow. When she opens her eyes, the world spins, but she can make out Arctina and Shivian talking over her absolutely numb body. She feels nothing, but she knows that something is wrong with her.
They will kill her. Kill her, right? Surely they are sick of her. Even Mommy says that Frozy is annoying when they stay together for too long.
Something cold caresses Frozy's cheek, but nothing is there. Mommy?
If you will not get up and follow me, then you are free to stay and die.
Frozy remembers the first time Mommy told her that. It was the same as all the other times she did. Frozy, still a snorunt, lay broken and bleeding on the ground after protecting Mommy. Frozy could not move. It hurt too much, and her body refused to obey. So, Mommy turned her back and floated away.
Forcing miracles, she peeled herself off the ground every time because she wanted to stay with Mommy. She got stronger, too. But this time, she just knows she will not be getting back up.
Arctina and Shivian will abandon her. She is dead weight now. She invites death. She does not blame them. Frozy draws a line across her neck with what little strength she has, a laugh dancing on her lips all the while. What delicious irony. And yet…
Arctina openly weeps over her. Keeping her mouth agape, she takes in Frozy's head as a frigid breeze bellows from the depths of her throat, alleviating the pressure pounding in Frozy's head.
Shivian screams at her, ice following her every breath. She desperately twists her head, plugging every gaping hole in Frozy's body with ice.
Why are they attempting to save her? It makes no sense.
"You… you must live so that you can grovel for forgiveness!" Shivian's pitchy voice bounces in her head. "A phantom of frost does not die so easily!"
They will… ignore her transgressions? How utterly foolish.
They manage to stop the leaking miasma. But something is still wrong, broken inside of her. Frozy will die soon.
It seems she will die before she can kill Shivian. No, it was Arctina she meant to kill. No, that is wrong… Did she mean to end herself later? Frozy does not know anymore. Her head is utterly scrambled. All she knows is that she is meant to die now. But if she will die first amongst them, then she has nothing to lose or gain from anything. So she weakly reaches out for her wobbuffet sack lying on the ground nearby, which Shivian seems to have held onto after she unceremoniously launched her away.
Still ugly-crying, Arctina hesitates before fetching it, never taking her eyes off Frozy. Accepting it graciously, Frozy shoves a spasming arm into it. This is an act of utmost pity, she tells herself. When her hand grabs onto it, she yanks it out and throws the object at Shivian's feet.
The transcendent jewel she stole from the human lands below the snorunt, fresh snow piling atop it. Shivian gawks at it. But with a red face, she kicks it away and resumes desperately freezing Frozy's injuries. Still, she is soon engulfed in a brilliant light.
Arctina openly weeps as if the world ended before her eyes. Why is she so sad? She deserves to be happy. Comforting her the only way she knows how, Frozy rifles through her sack again and retrieves the most brilliant stone in her frozen collection, leagues grander than some transcendent jewel. Unlike with Shivian, Frozy offers it to the glalie with a smile. But Arctina only knocks it away and nudges her shaking arm to rest.
How strange. Pretty stones make Mommy so happy. That is why she wears such a beautiful cape adorned with them. Mommy smiles widely and praises Frozy when she finds them for her. So pretty stones must enchant everyone. Then why does it not soothe Arctina?
These two are impossible.
A hole bored through her heart shines impossibly bright. Is that her soul? It seems to be escaping. It punches her repeatedly as payback for such a pathetic end. Its vessel is ruined and irreparable. Accepting her fate, Frozy closes her eyes and breathes her last.