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-Part 7: Pregnant Rarity, Prehensile Tail, Anal Sex, Denial, Fisting, Minor foodplay, High Drama, Outdoors, Large Weight

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Ahead of you your wife's indigo tail bobs slowly up and down. You can hear her on the trail above you, puffing gently as she struggles to maneuver it. Behind her, you follow at a short distance, ready to catch her should she lose her footing on the gentle incline. Of course, the gentleman's gesture is more dangerous than you'd care to admit as you drink in her thick jiggling haunches and enormous body. You're fairly certain her weight would take both of you a long way before you'd have any hope of stopping, but the precious foal in her womb inspires you to work doubly hard and press that risk far to the back of your mind. She turns her head every now and then to make sure you're behind her, craning her neck with much difficulty to see around her rotund posterior.

The “walk” had been Twilight's idea, of course. You'd headed over to get Rarity's routine checkup out of the way and ended up spending much of the morning pandering to the purple unicorn's insecurities. Rainbow Dash and Pinkie Pie had gone off on one of their prank-filled “play-dates”, a term Twilight had used with more bitterness than you'd thought possible of the normally level headed pony. With as much jealousy as it was inspiring in the lavender magician, it had only been a matter of time until your overly generous spouse had been hard at work baking with her. It had been over the cookies and brownies that Twilight had remarked on Rarity's need for exercise, a suggestion she had somehow raised with miraculous tact as your prim and proper partner had polished off the last of the pecan pie they had baked.

Of course, no matter how kindly the suggestion had been put, Rarity had still blushed furiously at the implications. With more than a little trouble, she had finished swallowing the cookie she had been in the process of eating, the wafer seeming to get stuck in her throat. Still, once pressed, you'd had to very subtly agree with Twilight. While the sight of your wife's ever thickening body was boner inspiring, delivering a foal at her weight might prove difficult unless she was in the proper shape. So it had been that walking was suggested, and in no time at all, you'd walked to the base of the mountains around Ponyville.

You're not sure how she'd managed to take the comments so personally, but she'd trudged onward and up the mountain despite your assumption that it would prove too difficult for her. Even now you hear her grumbling ahead of you with a small air of frustration and bitterness. A small trickle of rocks escapes her hooves, and you brace yourself ready to catch her as she regains her footing. She steals a glance over her shoulder and glares slightly.

“Look at you. I'm not so bad off that I need rescuing from such a... minor incline as this. Why, in my prime, I saw to the protection of Equestria. I climbed this mountain to drive away a dragon, I'll have you know.”
She pants slightly as she stubbornly pushes forward, pride getting the better of her common sense as she carefully deviates from the trail. Her muttering continues to assault your ears in the quiet of the overcast afternoon.

“Honestly, the nerve of you both. Both of you encouraging me to do... THIS. And now you're complaining, positively WHINING. About the effects. I didn't see you whining as you stuffed me senseless the other night, though. You were singing QUITE the different tune then. Oh yes. How did that tune go? It was so baritone, so throaty. A regular chorus of manly grunts with every THRUST as I recall.”

Her voice is level and even as she reaches a stop off point. Next to her, an old tree stands defiantly against the cliffside, path winding on past it. The entire area is reminiscent of a bowl that empties out in the path you just came from. Somewhere above and ahead of you, you can hear running water. The sound is overpowered momentarily by the loud flop of her body as she heaves onto her side panting, accumulated body heat finally having nowhere to go as she rests. The immensity of her stomach pools out next to her, a firm balloon in a river of excess pudge. Her glare softens as her eyes lid and she tries to catch her breath. Worried she's overdone it, you hurry over to her side, offering her the bottle of water you brought to share. As she drinks from it, she tries to manage a glare out the corner of her eye at you, but gives up.

Next to her you slump against the tree, looking warily at it as you do so. Even discounting the autumn chill, it looks nearly dead. It's possible it hasn't seen water in a little while, at least since last spring. It's certainly nothing like the trees you might climb during your trips to the forests around Ponyville, gnarled and barely hanging onto the mountainside it grows out of. Thankful you've no cause to climb it, you content yourself with leaning against it until her harrumphs call your attention to her.

She points up the mountainside to where you hear the water running from.

“Up there. When we get there, you're going to tend to me. A lady needs her... exercise. If you win, we'll turn around and go back. If not, we simply -must- exercise more.”

She's panting, obviously still out of breath, but she hurries past you all the same. Scooping up the water bottle, barely a moment to catch your breath, you follow her galloping body past the tree and up the hill before you. It's quite some distance to the top, a few moment's work to navigate the trough like path. On both sides of you the mountain sweeps upward, pushing you up through the small valley and through the large collection of loose stones. Ahead of you, you watch in shock as she picks up the pace. Heavy frame aside, she's still a pony, built for running and endurance. Your longer legs and easier stride give you a small leg up, but you still find yourself being outdistanced halfway up. You put on speed, bursting into a sprint that carries you close to her back before slowing down. You've no intention of overtaking her even if you weren't interested in her offer; someone needs to be behind her to catch her if she falls.

She crests the lip of it before you do, cheering and giggling.

“I win! I win I win I win!”

She rears up on her back legs with much effort and kicks her front ones happily. You catch up, thanking the heavens for the gray cloudcover and cool breeze at this elevation. Here the grass is more thick, growing in abundance by the pooled water collecting on the cliffside. You look down and see your own path, searching for the trail you were meant to be following. After a few moments of careful examination, you spot it. Down the mountain past your detour it meets a cave before winding far up around your current location and out of sight. You feel a nudge against the back of your hand and look behind you. Her azure eyes narrow as you drink her bulky body in. She knows what you're looking at and takes a step back, turning a full circle and a half. She looks at you with a pout over her shoulder, hips poised, meaty haunches jiggling with the aftershock of the momentum.

“Oh just be honest. Do you like all of this, or don't you? It's not a hard question. Just tell me.”

You try to choose your words carefully. Of course you love her like this, but the concern for her safety and the safety of your little foal... The answer pains you as you try to think of a way to phrase it, knowing she enjoys being pampered and fed just as much as you enjoy doing it. She gives up on waiting for an answer as you try to piece one together.

“I understand it, Darling. I do. You want what's best for both of us. For all of us. But I'm thinking ahead of that. After the baby... will we continue on like we have been?”
You tilt your head, honestly never having considered that future. The past few weeks have been an oddity, exploring your relationship with her in daring leaps and bounds. Even discounting your recent experimental excursions, you've done more together in the past week than you have in years, deciding it was getting close enough to her delivery date that it was time to take off from work to be with her constantly. Although you've still got over a month to go by anyone's math, renovations on the boutique have finished, and you've squirreled away enough on savings to press on together until then.

It had been a mistake of course, in its own way, to spend so much time with her. At a loss for anything else to do in your home together, you'd quickly fallen to the tasks she'd normally done. During the day you'd cleaned and moved your things back into the Boutique and out of the apartment you'd shared. During the evening you'd come home to her long day of lounging about and cooked her large meals until she shouldn't manage to eat anymore. After a week's time, the routine was well established. Bringing her meals to her sunken spot on your sofa, her hind legs dangling over the edge, body spilling out and flowing in all directions; waiting patiently for her to break down mid-meal and ask for your other attentions. On the eve before your trip to visit Twilight, she'd laid on her back and found that her stomach forced her legs apart on its own. She'd giggled as you'd rubbed it and lifted it out of the way to get to her.

Now she practices the same, looking up at you invitingly as she performs her new trick. She slowly eases onto her side before rolling onto her back in the grass. On her back, her stomach spills between her spread legs, hips widened from carrying her weight for so long. She locks her eyes onto yours with an optimistic smile. You lift aside the softness that is her rolls of fat surrounding the expanse of her pregnant firmness, finding her incredibly moist already. Her proposal sounds enticing, but will you really have time to carry on with a child to look after? You ponder the possibilities as you examine her.

“If you're not going to do anything, don't do it. Help me up then. You can come back to it when I've shed a dozen or so pounds.”

You risk a glance at her and find a deep crimson blush has crept into her coat as she looks away from you, teeth grinding defiantly. You decide to shock her by suddenly slipping a finger in. She stiffens, always surprised at the power of your probing digits. Beside you, she moans gratefully.

“Nnn... THAT's more like it. More.”
You slide the second one in, flexing and curling them inside her as she grips and lifts at her stomach.

“More. Give me MORE.”
Your third finger wiggles into her and she desperately pulls her expansive gut aside.

“Both. You need both of those... your... hands.”
Her voice drops to a husky purr at the last word, unable to resist placing the emphasis on one of her favorite parts of you. You cock an eyebrow at her nonetheless. She's never managed more than four fingers. Her body, while heavy, is still smaller than yours. The frame is roughly three and a half feet tall by four feet long. Four fingers is an accomplishment, eight would be an impossibility. You open your mouth to protest, but her voice comes out a harsh growl.

“Give. Me. Them. Now!”
She swats at your face with her tail until you carefully force the fourth finger into her, looking at her womanhood with renewed skepticism. Past four fingers, the largest thing you've managed is the rod that is even now stiff and fighting to escape your jeans... You don't want to hurt her. Carefully, you lower your face to her clit, licking and playing at it, hoping to coax out more lubricant if you're to play her game. Your head is forced down suddenly into her moist lower body, stomach enveloping you and blocking out the light from above as she loses her grip in surprise. Around you, you feel her shaking and writhing. You can hear her hooves clawing at the grass. From your awkward and muffled place under her, you attack her clitoris with renewed enthusiasm, hoping she's forgotten about her absurd request and settled on your generous compromise. Inside her, you flex your hand back and forth, feeling the walls of her slickening and tightening. She cums around your hand, her insides flooding with glistening juices. From your position, the sudden assault on your senses is impossible to manage. Air is having difficulty escaping, the scent of her fills your nose and lungs, and your sense of taste is nearly overpowered. Hooves grab your shoulders and help you out from under her.

“I... You... you cheated.”
You look at her helplessly, trying to catch your breath in the fresh air. She pouts at you.

“I want them all. I want them all RIGHT NOW.”
You shake your head pleadingly, and she rolls over, struggling to her hooves and pushing her butt into the air.

“I don't care what it takes. Do it. Do more than you've done before.”
You look at your hands, each one easily capable of covering her small chubby face. You grip her flank with one, hand disappearing into its pillowy depths until your bright wedding band is concealed entirely in marshmallowy softness, reluctantly sliding the other one into her finger by finger. She moans with the entry of each one. Still, upon the entry of the fourth, you can see her stretched to the width of anything imaginably comfortable. She wiggles around you, adjusting enough to speak.

“Come now, do something... please do something?”

You fold your thumb and bite your lip, hoping it's not too much as you slide your hand into her up to the wrist. As it goes in, she folds and buckles around you. When you clench your fist inside her, she pulls you to the ground as she flops onto her side, unable to hold herself up. She manages nothing, not even a moan or whimper, but around your hand she flexes and kicks. You push forward gently until you feel the boundaries of her comfortable zones before slowly withdrawing up to the knuckles. Now the moan comes out, loud and shrill. Around you, she tries desperately to get onto her back again. She grips the grass around her with her hooves, and you help ease her into a reclined position.
“Need... need more. So full. Put more in.”
You look at her as if she's gone insane. Her eyes, half lidded, play about the sky, only managing to settle on your face for a few seconds at a time before rolling back again.
“Need MORE. The other spot... your... it's... put it in.”
One of her back legs nudges your crotch hopefully, pushing and rubbing against the erection struggling inside its denim prison. She growls at you from behind her fleshy barrier.
“More. MORE. Put.... it... in me.”
You look down, knowing you're in entirely the wrong position for such a request. The lack of lubricant would make it appallingly painful, and you're forced to conclude that her judgment is too far gone at this point. You gently withdraw your hand, prompting a squeal of pleasure and lust from her mouth. You fall back into a sitting position to try to come up with a plan, but she's fast. She crawls across the grass with as much care as she can manage to her stomach, finding your lips with hers almost instantly.

Her breath fills your mouth, the taste of the bottled water and her drying mouth begging forward your gentler and moistened tongue. You oblige, slipping it into her mouth and licking about the inside of it for her. She breaks the kiss after a few minutes and looks up at you, sanity seeming to return to those sapphire pools. You wait for her apology. “Ah... I know it's...” She looks at the ground and back at you awkwardly.

“You're going to manage to get it in, right?”

You sigh and roll your eyes.

“Oh please, dear. It's... you're thinking it too. When the baby gets here, we won't get the time to... experiment. I want that feeling before it's too late. The feeling of the fullness only you can provide.”

Something rubbing against your pants draws your attention to the raging hardon you've been keeping in check. She's got a hoof halfway down your jeans now, thick legs fumbling against the tightness of the waistband. You unbuckle your belt to make her descent easier, and she manages to brush up against it.

“I'll get it good and slick, so you'll do it, right? Only you can do it, you know? I've waited my whole life to find you, you know... my whole life. Several others come and gone before I found you, my perfect man. I don't want to miss out on anything. We've so much to try. Only you can do it.”

You smile at her straightforwardness, and it prompts her eyes to light up. She slides down your chest, laying kisses on you over your shirt until she reaches your pants. She unbuttons them, freeing your manhood to the chilled air. She wastes no time in wrapping her lips around it, throat hard at work to slicken it. Before long it's coated in her saliva, but she's not done yet. She takes to her hooves and unceremoniously drops herself onto you, sliding your thickness into her love tunnel unexpectedly.

“You can't lose it here, understand? It's just insurance to...”
You buck your hips to interrupt her, and she moans and bites her lip.
“Nnn... no. Musn't lose sight of...”
You thrust again, and tease her stomach with your hands.
“Ah... so much... so...”
She clenches down and furiously begins to push herself up and down, working her heavy frame masterfully on your shaft. In a matter of seconds she's shaking and shuddering, orgasm rocking her. You know her body all too well – difficult to get the first time out, but a simple matter to make her cum again after. She's at that threshold now, the slightest teasing sending her back into ecstasy. She slides off with a great deal of effort, huffing and breathing heavily into the grass her head is resting on. With the last of her strength, she pushes her backside into the air, flicking her tail aside invitingly. You approach cautiously.

It's not easy to loosen her ass at this point. You end up using your fingers, still slick with her juices, to loosen her gently. After a couple minutes' work and her own efforts at regrouping and relaxing, you're confident you can manage her there. The difficult task of filling her womanhood goes easier than you'd expected however, and before long you're daring to squirm yourself up to the wrist again. She's begging at this point, promising you absurdities if you'll only give her the rest.

“Anything... put it in... I'll do... anything. All day, anywhere. You can tie me to the bed. Use me for days... Stuff me until I can't move. Fill me with babies and your... I'll give you anything. Just... this... give me this.”
As you slide into her, you need none of her encouragement. The feeling is intense and absurd. You swear you can actually feel the bulge of your fist against your erection with each thrust. It's difficult and awkward to manage, but soon she's working her hips and clenching herself around you. You work your hand and your penis as a pistoning pair, and she alternates which area she clenches and relaxes. Soon the difficulty is too much for her to manage however, and both grow slacker and more comfortable to navigate. You choose this moment to increase your pace, and she melts into the ground, face thrashing about in the grass and moans escaping the divots her horn and nose are digging into the soft earth. Inside her, you wiggle your fingers, twisting your hand in varying directions as you pump it in and out of her.

Mud coats the front of her face and you hear her scream that she's cumming. The warning is an unusual signal for her, she loathes the term. You feel her tighten around your hand and liquid assaults your wrist, squirting out in an arc from inside her onto the grass behind you. The stream is powerful, coating your shirt and spurting with varying degrees of pressure before settling to a drip. She ceases moving and you pump into her ass experimentally. A small groan comes out with the thrust and you try again. The groan repeats. She's still conscious. She can still feel the pleasure you're giving her.

Abandoning all pretense of control, you pound into her. The thick rolls of her haunches ripple and clap with each thrust of flesh on flesh. Below her, her stomach touches the ground, jiggling furiously with each clash of your bodies. Her groans become one long, low, unbroken note. You reach out with your free hand, grabbing her hair and pulling her head back so that her face is out of her hooves with a series of gentle tugs. She obliges, managing to get her neck up. The moan is louder now that it's not muffled, and you can hear its pitch sliding up and down depending on your position inside her. You feel her tail wrap around your torso, pulling you down until your chest rests on her back. Tremendous heat is coming off of her, and you use the position of her broad back to give more force to your thrusts.

The thunderous noises of your bodies colliding almost drowns out the noises she's making as you grit your teeth, groaning into her back, stamina finally spent. You find yourself about to cum as she wriggles free and manages to swing around, mouth open. Your hand drops instinctively and finishes pumping as you burst across her face in long sticky shots. Her tongue hangs out greedily, lips smacking with each sample of her favorite treat. The orgasm clouds out everything – the chafing of the denim of your jeans on your knees, the drops of rain falling on your forehead, the smell of freshly wet grass – how long has it been raining? You slump down next to her, and she falls onto her side, panting and snuggling up to you as the rain drizzles gently over both of you. Somewhere, distantly, thunder rolls, and cuddled against her warm coat you drop slowly into a blissful nap.

The thunder clap that wakes you is far from distant. You sit up, immediately alert, and she's stiff next to you. Around you, the wind has picked up. The rain is picking up now too, finally being carried on the wind around the bit of mountain that was sheltering the two of you. You're sure a storm wasn't scheduled for today, but it's come nonetheless. The previously overcast sky is dark and ominous now, and in the distance you can see lightning breaking over where Ponyville would be. You lick your finger to check the direction of the wind, finding your mouth still surprisingly dry from the play of earlier. The remainder of her taste assaults your tongue, and you hold the finger up. Wind's coming toward you, which means the dark clouds are also. Next to you, Rarity has taken to her hooves.

“Oh this is simply dreadful! Just where has it come from? Twilight didn't mention a storm!”

The wind picks up again, colder than you remembered it, pushing her messed hair across her still dirty face. She wipes the hair from her eyes as the rain's pace increases. She looks around nervously, another roll of thunder sounding closer than the last.

“We've not much time before it's here... we should... we should go.”

You scoop up the water bottle nearby and together the two of you navigate the path down. In minutes you're assaulted by heavy sheets of rain from around the side of the mountain. The wind is carrying it easily now, and the trail is becoming muddy and difficult to manage. You search for secure places to move between, constantly positioning yourself between your wife and the treacherous trail below. Beside you, water and mud begin to run down around your feet, sticking into your shoes and soaking your socks and feet. Each step squishes inside your shoe, and each placement of your foot splashes mud up your pants leg. Behind you, she's positively beside herself with worry.

“My coat! My poor hooves! Oh no, nonono! My hair! It's so nasty, why did we come up here? Why?!”

The last why is punctuated with a sharp shriek and you whip around expecting the worst. She's on her side, mud running around her, having lost her footing but still fairly secure. You slog up through the mud to check on her, and discover that she's started crying.

“Oh I didn't want any of this... please make it go away... please... It's all a dream, we're still up there napping!”

You help her to her feet as the mud and water around you picks up. Her beautifully groomed ivory coat is now splotched with mud, and her back is soaking wet and covered in dust and twigs. Your pants aren't faring much better, and you're certain your shoes are ruined at this point. Above you, you hear an ominous rumble, and loose rocks and debris begin to float down amid the water and mud. You look about hopefully for a more level area, and lead her off your makeshift path up against the valley wall. Below you, you can see the water pooling up in the bowl shaped area the two of you had rested in earlier. The path beyond it has become blocked and clogged with loose debris, flooding the bowl until the waterline is halfway up the frail tree's trunk. You kneel down to get a better grip on Rarity as the fast flowing muck runs around the two of you.

You hear the oncoming tide before you see it. It makes a strange noise, an odd gurgling and rumbling. On the plateau you had both occupied you can see water has collected and begun to overflow the pond. Your position makes sense now, you're in the once dried bed of a mountain river. It's coming to life once more now, collected debris cleaning out. The mud is almost entirely diluted in the oncoming movement, and you can see more places up the mountain past your makeshift rest area where the river continues, filling with water that will soon be down on top of the pair of you. The mocha colored onslaught of your hours ago safe haven reaches you with tremendous force.

Your center of gravity is higher, and so despite your bipedal physiology, the tide doesn't sweep you very far. Up to your knees at first before slapping your belt line and pushing you a few steps back, you gain your bearings quickly and look around for Rarity. You feel a tug at your leg, and see her clinging to your back, water over her shoulders, barely keeping her head up. You risk turning at the waist to pull her around in front of you, using your body to brace her and keep her in place. She looks around wildly, joining in the search for an escape route. The rocky walls around you catch your eye, and you're certain you can see where the water level usually reaches. It's over your head, and that's far from a good thing.

You stand there braced for as long as you can manage, legs aching with the effort of keeping the two of you in place against the fast moving river of liquid. The other various bodies of water up the mountain are beginning to connect with yours, and the pace of the water is increasing as the pressure behind it grows. Before long you're regularly being challenged with waves that flow over your shoulders, and it's a particularly large one that dislodges you from your precarious position. Your battle here is lost, and you scoop her up into your arms against your chest, floating and walking awkwardly down to the bowl from before.

The water is up to your neck here,with waves commonly pushing over your face and head as the place continues to flood. Struggling, you try to lift her over your head to safety, but find your limbs too exhausted to manage the task. Your joints scream at you from their constant abuse, your muscles ache and your eyes sting from the mud that keeps splashing into them. You try to shout to her over the torrent of rain and wind, but your mouth fills with muddy water and you're left sputtering. A particularly large wave of water crests over you, and the two of you are forced under into the dark depths.

Your hands grope blindly, finding a handful of what you pray is her hair. Kicking with all your might to the surface, you pull yourself up and suck in lungfuls of air. Your spare hand grabs one of the tree's branches above you, but the combined weight of yourself and Rarity is too much and it snaps off in your hand, sending both of you momentarily back under. This time she's kicking back to the surface with you, and doubt begins to enter your mind. This could be it. As you break the surface you look up the mountain, seeing the connecting rivers flowing with more force now, knowing it's only a matter of time until your bowl is out of standing reach. You look at her, and she grips your hand tighter with her hoof, other legs paddling furiously to stay afloat. She's not in the right shape for this, she'll be under before long, and she's not as tall as you. You're not sure if she can hear the three precious words you try to shout to her, your voice is drowned out from your own ears by the wind whipping through your ears as the violent gale picks up its pace around you. She tilts her head, frowns, and tries to shout something back, but you take a deep breath and close your eyes, letting go of her hoof and slipping under the murky surface.

Your vision is gone, and your hearing is barely effective. Under the soupy waters, you can faintly hear the rain drumming above you on the surface. You calculate as best you can, taking a step forward as you stoop down, feet planting on the ground, hands groping above you until you find her body. It feels like her haunches, and you push up with your legs, meeting the fullness of her weight with your shoulders and arms. Your legs do most of the pushing, and your ploy succeeds, she's out of the water. You take a staggering step back towards what you hope is the tree. You can feel her fumbling around above you, and slowly her weight recedes from your shoulders. Your lungs ache and you start to lose your sense of direction as your feet kick off the ground. Are you going at an angle? Straight up? Where is the tree? You open your eyes as a last resort, but darkness consumes your vision. A couple more kicks of your legs and you surface near the tree. Your hands wipe insistently at your eyes, and slowly your vision returns.

She's up in the tree as you'd hoped, awkwardly perched in the midst of its branches close to its trunk. On any other day, a pony in a tree would possibly be the oddest sight you'd ever see, but at this moment you offer thanks to the heavens that she can manage her bulk among such unfamiliar circumstances. She leans forward, trying to extend her hoof without compromising her awkward position. You shake your head. The tree can't possibly fit the both of you, it's a miracle it's holding her. Hefty pony though she is, your sheer size and musculature would at least double its burden. She shouts at you as you cling to the side of the trunk, treading water as long as you can manage.

“Take my hoof! Please!”

You shake your head, mouth opening to shout back, waves choking you with water and mud and leaving you spitting. Numbness is setting into your arms now, and your legs feel weak and old. You find the adrenaline that inspired your feat of strength receding, and leaving behind it exhaustion and cramping. Slowly your fingertips cramp, and your joints cry to be released. You try to alternate which hand does the holding, flexing the other. She's safe, and with her your unborn foal. You smile up at her encouragingly as she keeps her hoof outstretched to you.

“Stop it! Stop that! It's stupid, you're stupid! You're the greatest idiot in the world! What will I do without you? What will WE do without you! Get up here, now!”

You feel hotness stinging your eyes, thinking about how dearly you want to see your little unicorn grow up. The thought inspires you to look around once more for some means of escape, some distant manner of effectively aiding your survival. How has this tree survived here if the water runs so deeply when the river flows? The short answer is that it can't possibly do so, and your eyes catch the clogged outlet of the bowl. It's a long shot, but those odds are all you've got left. You hook your foot around the trunk of the tree for a moment and start to flex and relax your hands, trying to inspire any remaining circulation in your fingers and arms that you can. From above you, she changes the course of her shouting.

“What are you DOING?! You can't!”

You risk a deep gulp of breath before plunging under, traversing the expected eight to nine meters quickly before surfacing against the debris. Tree branches, rocks, some damp clumps of grass and leaves all block your path. There's nothing to grip onto to dislodge them, so you start at the top, tossing branches and rocks up and over the barrier. The work lasts for several minutes, and you find the water running a little more easily, but the large clumps that make up the majority of the blocking are beneath the water's surface and far from any place you can manage. You wince as your thigh cramps up and you're left clinging to the very barrier you were trying to destroy to keep yourself above water. The looser rocks slip away in your hands, and you tumble back into the water. Your hand gropes above the surface desperately as you sink lower and lower.

The bitter coldness assaults your throat, too shocked to keep your mouth closed. With a reflexive gasp, you've unintentionally breathed in an entire lungful of water, and the result it has on your system is catastrophic. Your lungs spasm, trying to force it out, only to let more in. Your eyes water and force themselves open only to be stung by the bitterly cold filth around you, and your still surfaced hand clenches desperately about. The fact that it should have sunken into the water long ago escapes your primal state of consciousness, everything fades to white around you as that surfacing feeling spreads up your arm and around your body.

Your eyes are blinded by brilliant lavender and white light, and the water around your body explodes away from you, dropping you unceremoniously onto your back on the slick exposed ground. You cough up lungfuls of water, throat retching, stomach heaving. You vomit twice before your eyes allow themselves to open, and you're greeted by walls of floating water on all sides. Through your blurry vision you see incredible light pushing the water back, giving you more dry land to work with. You choke and almost vomit again, spitting out more water and mud. It's just too much to take in, you're sure you're dead, but the barricade of rocks and branches you were trying to move defiantly greets your back as you take a stumbling step backward, laid bare by powerful magic that's forcing the water away from you as you move.

Furious with the barrier, with yourself, with your circumstances, you kick at it. It gives slightly, and your mind snaps back into place. You're not sure how it's happening, but you're being given a chance to save yourself. A chance to save your life, and your future with your wife and child. You grit your teeth and slam your whole body against the wall, pushing loose dozens of smaller rocks and branches. You flop onto your back after the impact, but kick your legs up and push hard against the wall with them. Slowly, painstakingly, the rocks tumble about from their stacked positions. The resulting collapse happens in all directions, including your own. Debris tumbles over your face and water follows it, engulfing you and smashing aside the barrier before you. Loosely conscious, your body floats along the surface of the running water and you hear a heavy splash behind you. Rarity kicks madly toward you, horn still glowing like a lantern with residual magic. She clamps her teeth onto your collar as soon as she reaches, fighting to keep both of you afloat as you're carried down the mountainside.

You regain your senses in slow waves of consciousness, and as the clouds in your mind recede you do what your body instinctively tells you to do, attempting to stand. To your surprise the water is shallow by your standards, it's not difficult to stand, and you reach out with another wave of recognition just in time to snatch her up by the mane as she's almost carried past you. You wade over to the edge of your river and heave her onto the bank, senses slowly recognizing the proper path you both should have taken. You're not trusted to pull yourself onto the shore; her tail is around your chest in seconds and she's dragging you up and out of the current with wild screams.

On the shore you crawl further inland together for what seems like an eternity before flopping down, out of breath and heaving desperately in relative safety. Above you the rain mercilessly drives into your bodies, and the cold wind bites into your soaked skin. You shiver and your teeth chatter, beside you she's gone limp and her breathing has become shallow. She's expended almost all of her energy doing more than a unicorn of her caliber could ever conceivably do, but she's saved both of your lives. You grit your teeth determinedly, remembering the cave on the path you'd spotted earlier and stooping down to lift her into an awkward and unceremonious shoulder carry. It’s a difficult position, but it’s the only one your drained body can manage that spares her stomach any of her own weight. Your back protests and your shoulders ache as you take each incredibly heavy footstep up the path, hoping you're going in the right direction.

By some incredible stroke of luck, you stumble across the entrance to the cavern after only a few minutes and slide her down off your back into it, sheltered from the elements. Knowing you're not out of danger yet, you shake her as hard as you can, trying to wake her incase she needs to run. It pains you to wake her so soon, but it's entirely possible that something lives in the place you're hoping to hold out in, and the mountains aren't the most safe place to camp without warning or preparation. Her eyes slowly lid open, and she groans at you, head bobbing up to meet your gaze doggedly.

“Where... where are we? Did we make it?”

You nod encouragingly and she squirms toward you, settling for embracing your leg. She yawns against her own volition and she tries to get her bearings.

“That’s... s’good. We home now? Looks like a cave.”

She takes to her hooves uncertainly, and you reach out and grab her, helping her steady herself.

“I see... Need to check the back... come on then...”

You're about to warn her, to tell her to wait there, but her horn glows once more from the most basic of unicorn magic and the cave is bathed in light. It's shallow, but the remains of something's bed coat the corner of it. You approach it as her light slowly flickers to dimmer and weaker shades, checking it for signs of recent activity. It looks old, and you scoop up the brittle pieces of sticks and twigs, along with some larger branches, bringing them to the mouth of the cave. The shivering is rocking both of your bodies now, and you pull her close to you, wringing out your wet shirt and using it to towel her off. She grits her teeth and a small spark emanates from her horn, more basic magics. The effort drains the last of her reserves, and you're left blowing gently on the bundle of twigs until smoke and a flicker of fire rise from them.

You feed the fire one of your bigger branches, and the dry wood crackles and roars. Resting your shirt over her shoulders and back, you exit the mouth of the cave, looking for something nearby to build the fire up with. A stump catches your eye, likely dead, certainly damp from the rainfall trickling off of nearby rocks. You uproot it with a bit of effort and heft it back in. She's on her side now, blowing gently on the fire to keep it going, feeding it more of your small branches. She looks up at you with a beaten smile, exhaustion creeping into her features and putting bags under her eyes that catch the light of the fire in sunken shadows that play across her still damp face. You can hear her trying to mask the sound of her teeth chattering, and despite your desire to ease her suffering you don't feel much better.

You strip the damp bark off the tree trunk you rescued and very carefully place it over your fire, hoping it will catch as you join her in blowing on it from the other end. Soot kicks up on both of your faces, and you wipe it from your nose and cheeks before resuming your diligent work. Finally the trunk begins to smoke and smolder, and you feed the fire the last of your small nest remains encouragingly. Before long the trunk is blazing happily at the entrance to your cave, and you huddle with her behind it, drinking up its warmth. In the span of a quarter of an hour your shirt is dried, and you work her into your lap and lay it over her stomach. She looks up at you weakly at the gesture and you manage to keep your chattering teeth still long enough to grin down at her. Over the course of the next hour you're forced nearer to the sole log as it turns to embers. These coals give plenty of heat, but only when you've both moved very close to them. At this point her coat is dry and her fur is keeping her warm.

Rarity returns your shirt then, unable to meet your eyes. “I'm... I'm sorry darling. I really am. If I'd not been so stubborn, if I'd taken the proper path, if only... Oh... I almost lost you!”

She nuzzles her face into your stomach and you brush her matted hair away from her face, rubbing her head gently as she starts to cry.

“I can't believe... can't believe what we were able to do. Oh I feel foolish. Are you terribly mad? You must be so upset...” She looks away from you into the burning coals. The heat finds an unscorched place as it grows and a tongue of fire creeps around the side of the log hungrily.

You lean into her and whisper soft assurances. You couldn't be mad after the things she's done to protect you today. Apologies spill out between you both, and her sniffles and tears soon turn into full on sobs.

“I told you didn't I?”

She finally manages to look up and get this out between hiccuping gasps and hyperventilating gulps of breath. Her eyes are puffy and red in the dying light of your fire, whether largely from the filthy water or the crying you can't tell.

“I told you, I spent my whole life looking for you. I can't lose that. I need you too much.”

She fumbles with her hair, trying to straighten it with her hooves as she struggles to meet your eyes. You rub her ears encouragingly, only further messing her hair. She frowns at you and blows it out of her eyes defiantly, but it's too late. She accidentally makes eye contact and blushes furiously, looking for all the world like a young filly again. You recognize the awkward behavior from the first time she'd admitted her feelings for you, and though you've both grown up it's remarkable how similar some of her habits have remained. You decide to break the difficulty for her now, as you did then, with a question. Tonight's question is quite different in nature however. How could she do what she did with the water?

“You're... you're really the best I could have ever asked for. Perfect in every way. Heavens help me if I ever, EVER forget that. When I saw you sink under the water I didn't know what you were doing. But the moment you lifted me- us... out... I knew it. There is really no man mule or stallion in the world better suited to be the father of this child than you. I couldn't lose you. When you swam off, I thought it was going to be the last time I'd see you. I wasn't sure what to do, I couldn't... couldn't lose you. I had to hold onto the only part I could, no matter what it took.”

You follow her gaze to your hand, where your wedding band rests snugly about your finger. Silently you realize that she's not been trying to avoid your eyecontact all this time, but rather struggling to break her gaze on it. You remember the day she made it for you, covered in her customary gems. It had been awkward for you, seeming terribly girly; but you'd known the customs weren't the same between you. It hasn't ever left your hand, and now its abundance of diamonds, emeralds, and rubies sparkle and play small reflections of light across the cave as you hold it against the glow of the fire's golden and pink embers.

“That ring... was the most difficult thing I think I've ever made. I know I've never told you, but gems in Equestria aren't often cut. Add to that that I'm a fashionista by trade and only a jeweler by hobby... You know that much from working together... with me. When I reached out, it was thinking of the time I'd put into that ring for you. The next thing I knew, I had my magic around your whole hand... then your body... and from there it was just a hop skip and a jump to rescuing you...”

You look at her in wonder and admiration, knowing fully from your time around the unicorns of Ponyville how much magic of that level must have cost her. Extending her connection from the gems in your ring to your whole body is an adaptation of magic beyond what anypony might have ever expected from her. It's a miracle she's breathing and awake, and as if she could read your thoughts, she yawns heavily again and her eyelids flutter slightly.

“I can't lose you, you know that now.”

She lays her head on your lap and her breathing slows as she nears exhaustion.

“I love you too much. I love you... so very very much. So... so much.”

The breathing grows heavier.

“So... much. So... much. So... love... you.”

You lean back against the wall of the cave, eyes slowly closing, fatigue creeping into you as well. Your questions are satisfied, and you see no point to keeping her up longer. Tomorrow won't be easy, but together you'll manage your way back to Ponyville. There you'll cuddle for days in your warm bed together. You whisper these encouraging thoughts as much to yourself as to her as you drift off to sleep, the thought of your warm bed pulling you into sleep amid her still mumbling the same words. Delicately, you brush aside her messy locks of hair and lay a soft kiss on her cheek. She turns her head ever so gently, still mumbling in your arms.

“Love you...”