The wind howled. The ship shook. And soon, the rain began to pour.
As the hours passed, the Concordia continued her southerly flight, right into the heart of the storm. The skies darkened so much that the pirates had to turn the ship’s deck lights on just to see around them. Nopony dared venture onto the deck itself for fear that the winds would simply blow them away.
Rarity watched all this with growing concern from the back of the bridge. Keel had returned just before the storm got worse, and he’d been keeping a close eye on his prisoners ever since. They couldn’t so much as move or shift the ropes an inch without him snapping at them, and Rarity wasn’t going to risk her pretty face to the stallion’s hooves if she could help it. He’d already whacked Rainbow once, and that blow had left her dazed and helpless for several minutes.
The longer the flight went on, the more Rarity’s thoughts shifted inward. Her luxury flight had turned into a nightmare in minutes, and now that nightmare might even be the end of her. How would her friends in Ponyville, or even ponies who knew her all across Equestria, take the news? How long would it even take that news to reach them? She could already imagine a desperate search over the seas dragging on for months, weeks, before eventually being called off as hopeless. There wouldn’t even be a body to return to Equestria for a funeral; her beautiful corpse would be little more than fish food!
“Cut it out, Rares,” Rainbow grumbled.
Rarity blinked. “Cut what out?”
“You’re being dramatic.”
“But I didn’t say anything!”
“You’re thinking it.”
Rarity huffed. If she could’ve, she would’ve crossed her forelegs. “And how would you know?”
“Because that’s exactly the kind of thing you’d be doing right now.”
Keel shot them another glare. That was all it took to silence them again.
The wind continued to pick up, and thunder rumbled around the ship, somehow audible over the howling. The helmsmare tensed at the wheel, and her wing rested idly on the throttle controls for the ships engines. Swallowing hard, she turned to Keel. “We’re all gonna die if we keep this up.”
Keel turned around and walked over to the helm. “Follow Squall. Those are the orders.”
“Squall’s in a fucking flat barge with a low balloon. The winds aren’t gonna toss her ship around anywhere near as much as this mammoth.” She tightened her grip on the wheel as the ship shook again. “This thing’s got a ton of decks and a tall balloon. Any crosswinds we run into are gonna rock this boat. Might even rip the balloon from the deck.”
“We have to trust the captain’s judgement,” Keel insisted. “She’s gotten us through worse before.”
“Not a storm as bad as this!” the helmsmare shouted back. “We should put this ship down, beach her if we have to, and ride out the storm. There’s islands around here, it’ll be the safest bet!”
“Are you questioning the captain?”
“The captain’s always been good at daring shit. This here is just idiotic!”
Rarity felt the ropes around her barrel shift while Keel was distracted with the helmsmare. Behind her, Rainbow Dash grunted, grunted, grunted… and then let out a breath. The ropes binding the two of them together noticeably slacked, and Rarity heard the softest clop of a hoof touching the floor. “Rainbow Dash, what are you doing...?”
“We need to leave now,” Rainbow hissed back. She cast a worried glance out the windows of the bridge, looking nearly straight into the heart of darkness. “That’s a Cat Three, and a strong one.” She swallowed. “The ship isn’t gonna survive that.”
Keel turned around and scowled at Rainbow. “What are you—?!”
The door to the bridge suddenly blew off its hinges. The slab of wood flew into the opposite wall, nearly taking off the helmsmare’s head, and the inset window shattered on impact. Blisteringly shrill winds pierced the bridge, sending a deluge of rain through the open doorway. In an instant, everypony inside was soaked to the bone, and a slick layer of water coated the controls at the helm.
Keel cursed and stepped toward the door, wings in front of his face to shield his eyes from the wind and rain. “Get a tarp or something! Cover that up!”
Pirates ran around the bridge as they looked for something to patch the gap with, but as they did that, a thunderous snap-twang! echoed through the howling storm. “The cables!” the helmsmare screamed, right as the noise repeated itself again. “The wind’s tearing them—!”
One of the cables holding the balloon down snapped with a deafening crack, and a second later, a length of steel cable ripped through the bridge from left to right. Wood and steel exploded into the air, along with the bloody bodies of a couple of pirates, torn to pieces by the snapping cable. The helm lay in scattered pieces across what remained of the floor, and the piping Rainbow and Rarity were tied to was torn away. But miraculously, the two friends weren’t taken with it, though Rarity could feel an agonizing assortment of cuts and slashes in her back. Had the ropes binding them to the pipe still been taut, she realized that they might have gone with the pipe.
But they were free, and Rainbow wasted no time taking advantage of it. She tossed the ropes off of her petite frame in one motion, and then pried the bindings on her wings off with her teeth. She triumphantly unfurled blue feathers, but almost immediately regretted the decision; the howling gale tearing through the bridge only flung her backwards into the wall.
Rarity managed to stand, but between her shod hooves and the water coating the polished wooden floor, she found it difficult to keep her balance. She rushed over to Rainbow’s side and helped the pegasus to stand again, and her eyes widened at the rivulets of red running off of her friend’s back. “Rainbow, you’re bleeding!”
“Mrff… You are too,” Rainbow said through gnashed teeth. Even though Rarity could feel the cuts on her back, she was still surprised to see red running into her white coat. “We need to go, get out of here!”
They started toward the only remaining safe exit from the bridge, but Keel was standing in front of it. “Hey!” he shouted. “Sit back down! You aren’t going anywhere!”
Rainbow stepped away from Rarity’s side and slowly staggered over to Keel, resisting the urge to spread her wings for balance as the wind blew her mane into her face. “You gonna stop us?” she shouted at him, “Or are you gonna try to save the ship?”
Keel grabbed a cutlass sheathed under his left wing. “You two are worth more than the ship!” he shouted around the handle. “Sit down!”
“Screw you!” Rainbow shouted, and her hoof moved like lightning. She struck keel in the nose, forcing him back, but he quickly found his balance. He raised his hooves to charge forward again, but a light blue glow enveloped his left wing and pulled it open. The wind sent the pirate flying backwards and out the door, out of sight of Rarity’s strained magic.
Rarity wasted no time carefully maneuvering her way to Rainbow’s side. “What are we going to do?” she shouted almost directly into her friend’s ear just to be heard.
“We gotta get below decks!” Rainbow shouted back. “Get everypony out of their rooms! Then we get to the lifeboats!”
“But there’s hundreds of ponies there! We can’t possibly get them all out in time! Plus the pirates!”
Rainbow forced herself through the wind and rain and emerged from the bridge, a hoof held up to her eyes. “We’re not leaving them! We’re the only ponies who can—!”
Snap-twang!
Both Rarity and Rainbow turned their heads toward the bow of the ship, where one of the steel cables in a triple-cable coupling snapped free. It bounced and flailed in the wind as it released its tension, and the end flew upwards and tore a gash through the skin of the balloon. The ship lurched, and Rainbow’s head snapped to the left, where the midship cable—or what was left of it—was flailing loosely in the winds. Gulping, she turned back to Rarity, torn.
Rarity sucked down a deep breath and pushed her forward. “If we don’t leave now, Rainbow, we’re going to die too!” Swallowing, she added, “Maybe others can find their own way off the ship, but we have to go!”
Snap-twang!
“But—!”
“Rainbow!” Rarity stopped Rainbow with a hoof on her shoulder. “There isn’t any time! You know that!”
Precarious seconds passed by as the winds tore across the deck. Rain battered them, flying almost parallel to the splintering decks. But finally, Rainbow seemed to deflate as she made her choice. “Okay. This way!” She began to clamber down the steps, trying desperately to keep her balance in the face of the howling winds. Rarity bit down on Rainbow’s tail to steady herself, and together, the two went in tandem to the deck.
The shadowy figures of a few pirates rushed around the deck as the storm whipped the disabled ship from side to side. None of them paid attention to Rainbow and Rarity as they maneuvered to one of the lifeboats, which shook as it dangled from its elevator. Rainbow hopped in first, then turned around to help Rarity in after her. Only when they were inside the cramped little boat did Rarity realize just how insane the whole thing was.
“How are we going to survive a storm in this?!” she shrieked, her voice climbing into hysteria. “We’ll be a little leaf in this storm!”
“It’s all metal, for one thing!” Rainbow shouted, and she quickly sat down and strapped herself to her chair with the provided buckles. “And it’s rated to plunge from altitude! Just think of it like a really big roller coaster!”
“I hate roller coasters!” Rarity squealed.
“This is the roller coaster that’ll save your life!”
Rarity swallowed hard and sat down next to Rainbow, fumbling with her buckles and straps. It took her a minute, but she finally secured herself to the seat, and she almost immediately clung to Rainbow in terror. “Now what?!” she shouted.
“Hold on!” Rainbow shouted, and she pulled a lever. Almost immediately, a pair of thunks shook the hull of the lifeboat, and Rarity’s stomach flew into her teeth.
She didn’t remember much of the fall. Somepony screamed in a voice much like her own. But she kept her eyes closed during the plunge—at least until something struck the bow of the lifeboat and smashed it open.
The world was a spinning malaise of gray and blue. Wind and rain pelted Rarity in the face. She didn’t know if she was alive or dead.
And then, just like that, the lifeboat slammed into the water, and the superstructure shattered into pieces.