Hans looked down at Anton's sword, sticking up in the snow at his feet. He knew what was expected of him. He knew he was supposed to defend his brother. And, yet, Hans hesitated. He was conflicted about what he should do.
Hans looked up at the battle that raged around them. It wasn't what he wanted. While he was capable in combat, Hans had never sought it out. He didn't even want to be there. His previous failure to usurp the throne of Arendelle had ended in his humiliation, and he'd had no intention of ever coming back. Anton didn't give him a choice. Hans had been forced into this battle, but he didn't really care about the outcome. He knew the result wouldn't improve his own situation. Even if Anton succeeded, Hans knew he would just be sent back home to continue his sentence of hard labor, and if Arendelle was victorious, Hans shuddered at the thought of what punishment he would suffer at Queen Elsa's hands.
"Brother!" Anton called out, reaching toward him. "My sword!"
Hans looked back at Anton and realized that, after all the years of disdain and cruelty his brother had inflicted upon him, Anton's fate was now in his hands. For the first time, Anton needed Hans, and for the first time, Hans was actually in a position to choose whether or not to help him. Hans had never had that kind of power over Anton before.
Hans grasped the hilt of the sword and pulled it out of the snow. He knew that no matter what he did, Anton would never treat him any better. Now that he had the chance, Hans desperately wanted to repay Anton for all his callousness, but he feared the repercussions of turning against his vindictive brother.
Hans looked up and saw a look of desperate hope in Anna's eyes. He had caught a brief glimpse of the same look before when she begged him to stand up to Anton from behind the bars of the Valkyrie's brig. It reminded him of the way she had looked at him when they first met, before he had revealed his true intentions to her, as if she still believed he had the potential to be the good person she once thought he was. As he considered whether she might be right, he looked around at the battle again. It all seemed so pointless. There was nothing in it for him, and he was, after all, an opportunist who recognized the potential for, if not forgiveness, at least leniency. He had no love of Arendelle, but he didn't want remain a mere pawn in his brother's scheme anymore.
"No..." Hans muttered.
"What?" Anton hissed angrily.
"I said 'No!' Anton," Hans repeated defiantly, staring down into his brother's eyes. "This has gone too far."
"How dare you..." Anton growled.
With Anton distracted by his brother's treachery, Anna took the opportunity to quickly snatch the helmet from his head.
"Ha!" Anna shouted, leaping with excitement. "I got it!"
Kristoff pushed Anton off of him and scrambled for his stolen sword as he got to his feet. Anton attempted to lunge at the jubilant Anna but was blocked by the point of his own sword in his brother's hand.
"Stop, Anton," Hans said. "It's over."
"We did it!" Anna exclaimed. "We've got the helmet!"
All of a sudden, Anton inexplicably broke out into laughter. The others looked at him in confusion.
"What are you laughing about?" Hans asked.
"You think you've won, but you haven't!" Anton replied. "Don't you see? The helmet doesn't matter anymore."
"But you said the dragon has to obey whoever has the helmet," Anna said.
"Yes," Anton said, "but you can't command the dragon if it's too far away to hear your orders."
"I think he's right," Hans admitted after a moment. "Anton always had to speak directly to the dragon."
Anna and Kristoff turned to look toward the harbor and saw Elsa and Lars battling the dragon in the distance, far across the ice.
"You'll never get there in time to save her," Anton said, "and your soldiers are no match for mine."
Anna and Kristoff looked at each other, facing the possibility that Anton was right and that his victory was inevitable. Suddenly, the ground started to tremble. As the rumbling sound steadily increased, the group began to look around in search of the source, and it soon became apparent to each of them to look up to the ridge above the village. A cascade of round moss-covered boulders thundered over the ridge and down the snow-covered slope onto the battlefield.
Soldiers on both sides tried to scatter as the large rolling rocks careened toward them, but astonishingly, the boulders seemed to follow only the soldiers from the Southern Isles. As the stones closed in on their targets, they unfurled to reveal their true nature as trolls and pounced on the invaders. As they realized what was happening, the Southern Isles soldiers tried to fight back. Though the trolls were unarmed, they were still made of rock and were impervious to swords and arrows, making the soldiers' efforts futile.
From the top of the rise, Grand Pabbie looked down on the battle. When the two young trolls who had stowed away in the sled had reported what had happened to Kristoff and Anna, he hadn't hesitated to organize a rescue mission. Though normally reclusive and peaceful, the trolls could prove formidable when one of their own was threatened.
"Troll out!" Grand Pabbie ordered, sending another wave of trolls pouring down into battle.
Invigorated by the arrival of the new allies, Arendelle's forces quickly rallied back to the offensive. With the assistance of the trolls, the enemy soldiers were easily disarmed and captured. Anton looked on in disbelief as the tide of the battle quickly turned against him.
Heartened by the turn the battle had taken, Anna and Kristoff turned their attention back to the action on the frozen fjord. They could barely make out just what was happening as Elsa and Lars evaded the dragon's attacks. Between them lay a vast expanse of perilous ice, left shattered by the weight of the dragon. Even to an experienced ice harvester like Kristoff, the mere thought of attempting to make the dangerous crossing was intimidating.
"What about Elsa?" Anna asked. She glanced down at the enchanted helmet she held in her hands, then up at Kristoff. "Isn't there anything we can do?"
"We'll never make it," Kristoff replied. "It's all up to her now."
Elsa narrowly dodged one of the dragon's fireballs, and responded by sending a barrage of icicles flying at the dragon's face. Though uninjured, the dragon flinched as the sharp projectiles hit their target and disintegrated. The dragon was about to spit another ball of fire at Elsa, when it was struck by a crossbow bolt from the other direction. The dragon turned to see Lars and Sven and sent its flames their way. With a quick change of direction, Sven evaded the assault as the fireball left a crater in the ice behind them.
Elsa and Lars had settled into a strategy of alternating their attacks and covering each other to keep the dragon from focusing its attention on either of them for very long. As they varied their timing to avoid creating a pattern the dragon could anticipate, they were also leading the dragon farther and farther from the shore. They hadn't actually been able to injure the dragon, though, and they still had no clue how to stop it.
Even though his crossbow bolts hadn't been able to injure the dragon, Lars hadn't given up on the possibility that it might still have a weak spot. As Elsa distracted the dragon with another icy attack, Lars turned Sven around and charged straight toward it. Lars loaded another bolt into his crossbow. He knew the dragon's head wasn't susceptible to his weapons, but he hoped that, as with most animals, the dragon's underbelly would be vulnerable. He just had to get a clear shot.
The dragon saw Lars and Sven approaching and spit a fireball in their direction. Sven sprinted forward with a surge of speed. Lars ducked, feeling the heat from the fiery projectile as it narrowly sailed over his head and crashed into the ice behind them. Elsa distracted the dragon with a volley of snowballs, giving Lars and Sven an opening to race between its giant legs. Now beneath the dragon, Lars fired his crossbow straight up at its underbelly, but the bolt bounced off harmlessly, its only effect being to alert the dragon to his and Sven's presence. The dragon began trying to stomp on them with its massive feet, the ice cracking under its weight as Sven deftly maneuvered around the dragon's legs to relative safety.
As Elsa drew the dragon's attention with more frozen projectiles, Lars and Sven circled around for another attempt. Forsaking the ineffective crossbow, Lars drew his sword. As Sven charged up alongside the dragon, Lars swung his sword at one of its huge legs. Lars was nearly knocked from Sven's back as the sword recoiled against the dragon's scales as if Lars had attacked solid rock. As Sven veered away, the dragon spit a fireball at them. As Sven dodged the projectile, Elsa launched a ball of ice at the dragon, momentarily dazing it.
As Elsa skated alongside Sven, Lars came to a realization.
"Weapons can't hurt it," Lars shouted to Elsa. "You'll have to use your powers to stop it."
"I can't!" Elsa replied.
Lars could tell Elsa had been holding back, and while he was sure she had her reasons, they were running out of options.
"You might be the only one who can," Lars said. He looked ahead to see that the sheet of ice was getting thinner and that the open water beyond wasn't that far away. "And we're about to run out of ice!"
Elsa realized that they were getting close to the edge of the ice she had created when she froze the harbor, and while she could always make more ice, she recognized that wouldn't really be a solution. She did have an idea about how to stop the dragon, but it wasn't an idea she liked. Elsa was still haunted by the memory of the night she accidently struck Anna with her powers. She couldn't stand the thought of intentionally doing that to another living thing. And, yet, Elsa knew the damage the dragon could do if she didn't stop it. She couldn't let it hurt anyone else. She knew she had to stop it. Anna had recovered, so the dragon could too, Elsa rationalized, and no one else would have to get hurt.
The dragon shook off the effects of Elsa's last strike and resumed its pursuit. Lars and Elsa went off in different directions, and the dragon followed Elsa as she was the last to attack it. As Elsa raced to stay ahead of the dragon, Lars and Sven came back around and Lars fired his crossbow at it to get its attention. As Lars expected, the dragon came after him, but Lars realized he had a new problem. He knew he was close to the edge of Elsa's ice, but he only now noticed that the thinner ice was breaking and cracking more under the dragon's weight, and now he and Sven had only one clear path, and it would lead them to the end of the rapidly thinning ice and the frigid open water beyond.
Watching Lars and Sven flee the dragon, Elsa came to the same realization Lars had. With an icy wind at her back, she skated after the dragon, hoping to stop it in time. As she caught up to the dragon, she had to jump over ever-increasing chasms left in the thin crackling ice in the creature's wake.
Lars looked back over his shoulder and saw the dragon closing in. Hoping to temporarily stun the dragon to put some distance between them, Lars loaded another bolt into his crossbow and fired. The bolt struck the dragon square in the nose, and while it didn't harm the dragon, it did startle it enough for it to break its stride.
The dragon's moment of hesitation allowed Elsa to pass alongside it. With every step the dragon took, the ice shuddered and split, and Elsa had to act quickly to avoid being tripped up by one of the many uneven cracks that suddenly appeared in her path. She looked ahead and saw how close they were to open water. She knew she had to act quickly before the dragon noticed her.
The ice was getting thin enough to begin to crack under Sven's weight, and the reindeer was beginning to have trouble keeping its footing. Lars looked over his shoulder again. The dragon was taking a deep breath, as it if was preparing to spit another fireball. Even if they managed to dodge the fiery projectile, Lars doubted he and Sven could successfully avoid the huge crater it would leave in the thin ice. Desperate to delay the dragon's attack, Lars scrambled to load another bolt into his crossbow as he watched the dragon and realized he wouldn't be fast enough.
Elsa recognized the predicament Lars and Sven were in and knew had to do something. Bracing herself, she launched herself ahead of the dragon with a gust of brisk winter wind. She could tell the dragon was about to unleash another fiery onslaught as Lars still struggled with his crossbow. Elsa took one last deep breath and jumped up, spinning around in midair to face the dragon. As the blades of her skates touched back down on the ice, Elsa stretched out her hand and released a pure blast of icy magic directly at the dragon's head. The full force of Elsa's undiluted power struck the dragon in the face.
Elsa's powers struck the dragon as it was in midstride. The dragon lost consciousness instantly and abruptly crashed down onto the thin ice, which gave way beneath it. The resulting shock wave shattered the surrounding ice and violently heaved the broken sheets skyward at sharp angles. Elsa found herself flying up in the air and barely had enough time to create a pile of fresh powder to land in before falling to the bobbing ice beneath her.
Lars was thrown from Sven's back and was sent hurtling forward toward the open water. Elsa looked up from her rough landing in the snow just in time to watch helplessly as Lars fell and smashed through the thin ice into the frigid water.
"No!" Elsa screamed in horror. "No, no, no, no, no..." she continued as she scrambled out of the pile of snow and made a beeline for the spot where Lars fall through the ice, leaping across the ice floes without taking her eyes off the crater in the ice for even a second.
Though Elsa managed to cross the fractured ice faster than anyone would have dreamed possible, it still seemed to her like an eternity. As she reached the spot, she fell to her knees praying that she had gotten there in time to reach Lars and pull him out of the water, but instead she peered down through the hole in the ice only to see his face disappear as he sank into the dark water.
"No..." Elsa whispered as tears welled up in her eyes and began to roll down her cheeks.
Elsa sat there, frozen, crouched over the gaping hole in the ice. She so desperately wanted to save Lars that she had to fight the instinct to dive into the water after him. Despite the way she felt, she knew that would be a futile gesture.
Elsa didn't know how to swim.