//------------------------------// // Chairmare of Survival // Story: Surviving Sand Island // by The 24th Pegasus //------------------------------// By the time Rainbow Dash touched down on the sandy shore of her home island, her mood was beginning to edge on annoyed, and it was only half Champagne’s fault. She couldn’t fault the Prench mare for voicing her opinions, but dwelling on the divisions between the survivors and the pirates during the final few minutes of glide down to the island had really put Rainbow in a fouling mood. To be fair, while the two groups had only reluctantly joined together barely three days ago, she was already sick of the hostilities. Blinking and rubbing at her bleary eyes with the back of her fetlocks, Rainbow quickly spotted a pair of ponies lying side by side on the sands not too far down the beach. Gyro’s gray coat she recognized quickly enough, but it took her a little longer to remember the stallion with the even darker one. But after a moment, she finally recognized Hot Coals, and a grin broke out across her muzzle. Finally, after so long, the stallion was awake, and it looked like he and Gyro were already reacquainting themselves by the water’s edge. She was able to almost sneak up on the two ponies before Gyro finally noticed Rainbow. Gasping, Gyro lifted herself up on her forelegs, surprising Coals with her sudden movement. “Rainbow!” Gyro exclaimed, a widening grin breaking out across her muzzle. “You’re back!” That grin swiftly died after a split second, however, and the engineer furrowed her brow. “What happened to Rarity? Where is she?” “She’s coming,” Rainbow assured her. “She’s fine. We, uh, made a friend at the south island. A big, scaly, green friend.” Gyro blinked. “You mean the siren?” she asked. Rainbow nodded. “Yeah. Her name’s Melody. She’s really nice. She’s helping us get out of here. She took care of Rarity when she found her almost dead on the beach.” “A siren?” Coals asked in disbelief. “You befriended a siren?” Rainbow laughed and lightly slapped the stallion on the shoulder. “I’m great at making friends, even if they’re giant fish dragons with teeth as long as my legs. She’s really nice, though, I promise. Mostly, she’s just lonely, and so when me and Rares met her, she just wanted to talk and stuff.” Smirking at Coals, she sat down on the sand next to the couple, dropping her supplies from her back as she did so. “Glad to see you’re awake, dude. When Squall shot you for trying to stick up for me, I thought you were done for sure.” “Coals is tough,” Gyro said, nuzzling the stallion’s neck. “It’d take a lot more than that to bring him down.” The she raised an eyebrow.  “So if Rarity’s not with you, she’s with this Melody then?” Rainbow nodded. “Yeah. Melody needed her help to get the last figurine. So that’s what they’re doing.” “Why would an enormous and powerful siren need a little pony’s help?” Coals asked. “Does she need a pony to get into someplace she can’t reach?” “Not quite. It’s a lot more complicated than that.” At the sound of fluttering wings, Rainbow looked aside to see Champagne touching down nearby. “Hey, Champagne, go get everypony else, will you? I wanna get this debriefing and stuff done with quickly so I can go and take a nap.” Champagne nodded and set off for the camp, carrying her share of the supplies with her. As she left, Rainbow sighed and pulled some fruit out of her supplies. “I’m so friggin’ tired,” she muttered. “I can sleep for a week.” “Maybe you can,” Gyro said. “Now that this stuff sounds like it’s almost over with. I can’t wait to go back home.” “Yeah, me too.” Rainbow shook her head, though she momentarily froze when she saw a bundle of red feathers watching her from a tree. Grinning, she waved her wing. “Hey, Chirp! There you are! Come here, boy!” “Rainbow!” Chirp squawked, flapping his wings and dropping out of the tree to perch on a wing Rainbow outstretched for him. “’Ello! ‘Ello!” the macaw proudly said a few times, fluffing his wings and looking Rainbow over from side to side. Rainbow giggled and nuzzled the bird’s feathery neck. “I missed you, buddy,” she said. “I didn’t really get a chance to see you after I got back with the crew, didn’t I?” “I’m surprised he’s made himself pretty scarce,” Gyro said. “I think all the new ponies scared him.” “Yeah, I’d be a little put off too if a bunch of strangers just suddenly showed up in my living room.” She brought her wing closer to her shoulder, and Chirp happily traded places for something a little more secure to stand on. “But now me and Rares won’t have to go anywhere for a while, so we can hopefully get him a little more comfortable with the crew.” Shrugging, she turned to Gyro. “Anything happen while I was gone? Apart from the obvious, of course,” she said with a gesture to Coals. “Nothing really good,” Gyro said. “Nothing much of anything, really, but Linens died to her wounds. That sucked. Everypony else is mostly okay, though.” “Alive and kicking,” Coals agreed. “Give me another day and I’ll be back on my hooves, able to help.” “Give me another three or four and I’ll be the same,” Gyro said. Rainbow chuckled and held her hoof out. “Don’t rush it, you two,” she said. “We won’t need you for a little while yet. You’re good for now, just focus on resting and recovering.” She turned her attention back to the interior of the island just as a throng of ponies began to emerge from the treeline. She saw all the survivors walking in a tight knot, and behind them, the two pirates staggered through the trees. Rainbow figured they must have gotten into the crate of rum and been drinking for a while. At least they were drinking instead of taking out their aggressions on the rest of the crew, but they were pirates. She didn’t know if them getting drunk would be a good or bad thing for their temper, but she decided it would probably be a bad thing. She’d have to be extra careful with them. Ratchet was the first to approach Rainbow, and he smiled as he did so. “Glad to see you’re back home, Rainbow Dash,” he said, stopping a few paces away from Rainbow. “And Champagne tells me things went well on the island, even if Rarity isn’t here with us. She also said you could tell us all what happened?” Rainbow nodded. “I’ll try to sum it up quick,” she said. “Me and Champagne flew to the south island and met a siren there by the name of Melody. She took me to Rarity and showed me she was alright. Then she told me that there was an underwater temple at the island that she needed some help to get into, so she turned Rarity into a siren too and the two of them went to go open that. In the meanwhile, they gave me the unicorn figurine that Rarity managed to recover from the tomb when we got separated, and if all goes well, the should be coming back here in a short bit to deliver the last figurine.” Rainbow rifled through her supplies quickly and pulled out the obsidian statuette, holding it aloft so everypony could see it. “We’re going to go home soon, guys and girls. I hope you’re excited.” Confused silence was the immediate response, though Rainbow had expected as much. She had, after all, condensed quite a tale down into a few quick sentences. And, as she expected, it was the pirate brothers that broke the silence first. “Sirens?” Flag asked, swaying slightly and using his brother for support as much as his brother needed him to stand up. “We’re working with fucking sirens now? You gonna feed them our bones to try and get the shit out of here?” “She’s not like what you think,” Rainbow said. “I promise. She’s been trapped here for decades, and all she wants to do is go home. She was super excited to have some company. She’s harmless.” “Bullshit,” Roger muttered. “Sirens’ is always hungry for… f’pony blood.” “They eat sailors,” Flag said. “We’re… we’re snacks on a platter for her.” Ratchet waved his hoof. “I don’t really care about what they think,” he said. “They’re obviously very inebriated. But did you say that this siren turned Rarity into one, too?” “She needed another person to help her with something underwater,” Rainbow said. “Rarity insisted on doing it. But hey, now we’ve got two giant scaly fish dragons to help us with crap, so that’s not bad, right?” “I’m… just amazed, is all,” Ruse said from Ratchet’s side. “Though I do have to admit, I am excited. I’ve always wanted to see sirens, though only from afar, on account of their reputation. But this one is friendly? And one of them is our friend, Rarity? Now I’ll be able to see one up close with no risk to myself.” “Are you sure that siren is safe?” Stargazer asked. “It could have just been a trick.” “I… had to ride in her mouth twice to get to Rarity and back,” Rainbow said. “She could have swallowed me whole, but she didn’t. In fact, she really didn’t like the taste of my feathers, so I’d say we’re safe.” “Well, then,” Gyro said. “I guess that’s a pretty strong argument.” “Anyways, they’ll be back here in a bit with the final figurine,” Rainbow said, cradling the unicorn statuette in her hooves. “When they do get back… well, please don’t freak out and stuff. Especially to Rarity. You know she was always weight-conscious before, but now… hoo boy.” “This is a fucking terrible idea,” Flag said, turning about and staggering away from Rainbow. “Me and Roger’s gonna hide in the trees. Sirens can eat you all they want. Not us.” Rainbow narrowed her eyes as the two drunk pirates started to leave and sighed. Maybe she’d be able to deal with them later. At the moment, however, she’d at least gotten things sorted out with the rest of the survivors. “Now, I don’t know how long it’ll take them to get here, but I’m going to take a nap.” She passed the figurine to Ratchet as she walked past him. “Don’t lose that thing. It’s super important. And wake me up when Rarity gets back, but not for anything else, ya feel me?” Ratchet chuckled and stepped aside to let Rainbow through. “I feel you,” he said. “Have a good rest. You’ve earned it.” “That I friggin’ have…”