Every inch of her was soaked to the skin, and every muscle in her wings screamed with pain. Sweat and rainwater stole away her body's dwindling warmth as she fought a losing battle against the unseasonable storm that raged over the coastline, blown inland by ocean winds. There was nothing but churning darkness below her, a hungry sea that would swallow her up without a second thought if she gave up now. Legs thrashing helplessly below her, the stocky pegasus strove desperately to stay aloft, though her wings felt like lead weights with each stroke. There was nothing left in her, not even adrenaline, just a primal will to survive, to deny the ocean it's claim on her life.
Worse than the physical agony, though, was the mental pain of loss. Java's terrified cries as he was dislodged from her back and sent spinning into the darkness still rang in her ears. He had been the closest thing she had ever had to a friend, the gentle calm to her firey storm, and she had let him down. He was gone, and it was all her fault. She screamed her helpless rage to the heavens as she battled the winds that tossed her about like a leaf. The ocean couldn't go on forever, there had to be land somewhere. She just had to stay above the water til then.
There--beyond the darkness below her, a scrap of pale grey. Sand? A coastline?
Safety.
With a few precious embers of hope now stirring within her, she angled herself towards the rapidly-approaching shore. As it drew closer, she squinted through the driving rain and found herself looking upon a sea of sand, rather than water. Belatedly, she realized she was coming in too fast. The winds were driving her towards land, and her wings had no strength left in them. She flared them out, shouting at the new surge of pain, but it barely helped slow her uncontrollable descent. There was only enough time for one thought to cross her mind before she made contact with the ground.
This is really gonna hurt.
And it did. Mercifully, Aryel's exhausted body won out over her mind, and she lost consciousness right before the crash.
The disheveled girl hit the ground on her right side, outstretched wing barely avoiding being crushed beneath her weight. She tumbled forward, pulled for several feet more by her own velocity, until she finally came to rest on the rain-soaked beach, a mass of feathers and fur. The storm would rage on through the night, finally abating in the wee hours of morning. When a grey dawn arrived, the sunlight would find her still lying there in a twisted heap, one wing spread out across the sand while the other was tucked loosely at her side, hindquarters half-submerged in the lapping surf. The only sign that the scruffy creature was still alive was the shuddering rise and fall of her sides.
