"Wait. Slow down," Shinespark commanded. "What did you just say?"
"Us? Or her?" Sirena blinked innocently at Melia and then Valey.
Shinespark shrugged intensely, suddenly standing. "Either. What are you saying about recognizing the Sosan harmony extractor?"
Sirena tilted her head upward. "Well, mostly the coily thing. It's all technology to me."
"Hold on, though." Valey waved a hoof, pointing at Shinespark. "We were there, remember? Chauncey was inviting you to check out his spooky laboratory and stuff because you said something about harmony magic, and he was all, 'Oh, I do that too!' Remember? Bananas." Her eyes unfocused. "You did a whole bunch of original research on this stuff, right? So it was your work in the first place. Means if it's here, someone stole it, and the way out it could have gone is through stinking Dorable! Because Puddles was here and both of them have connections to... Bananas..."
"How it happened isn't important!" Shinespark barked, gaze snapping between Valey and the Firefly Sisters. "Valey, whatever you just said before. About one of these being used as an amplifier, and then them singing reminding you of a dusk statue! Forget where Chauncey got the technology, is this true? Has your singing been compared to a dusk statue before? This is important!"
"It has, actually." Melia cleared her throat and stepped forward. "There are a lot of sarosians in Izvaldi, and it's a frequent compliment we've gotten. They often think we've visited the Night Mother in person and been blessed by her power, even. They say we remind them of her."
"We haven't, of course," Sirena giggled. "That you can do that is just a myth."
Valey slowed down, eyes widening again. "So hold on, that's actually a thing they think can happen? Are random blessed agents and stuff like that a regular occurrence around here? Wow. That actually explains a lot about how they treated me, even if I have no idea how I got that into their heads. Bananas, where's Grapejuice when you need her?" She stared for a second. "Do all batponies do this? Or just the nice ones? Because... if you guys could just talk to all of them at once and convince them you were divine or whatever, you could command every last pirate there to stop fighting and lay down their arms and go become farmers, or something. You see?"
Shinespark glanced to the harmony extractor.
Starlight did too, and took a few steps, frowning upward. "What's this thing's deal? Can it just do anything it wants to?" She kicked one of the tower cases that held its other components. "That makes no sense. It's like you just have to come in here and give up and it solves all your problems. Hey! You want to help me and Maple stay safe and happy, too!?"
"Huh." Valey blinked. "Yeah, it does actually seem kinda weird that we were right there, basically begging no one for some way out, and this kinda just falls into our hooves right out of the blue. Isn't that weird? I mean, not that anyone could actually set up or orchestrate something like this, but..."
Melia tilted her head. "Well, Puddles kept telling me to just use my brand when we were on the ship, and..." She trailed off.
Valey looked at Shinespark, utterly confused and trying to fit together pieces that seemed utterly the wrong size for the puzzle they were given. "Puddles?"
Shinespark ignored them, ducking to an access panel and prying it open with her teeth. "Hmmm..." she mumbled, staring around inside, horn temporarily exhausted after so much fighting and flying. "The engine really works with three core components," she thought aloud. "First are the helmets themselves, which don't drain you so much as extend you so the machine is a part of yourself. It's the underlying idea behind how Braen works, too. I don't know how easily they would replace microphones or whatever else you used as a receiver, but they might and probably would as long as your magic at its core comes from your brands. That's the focal point we've identified in every case but unbranded ponies before. The next part is the mesh, which is what you said you recognized. It... is sort of a cross between an amplifier and a battery. It causes harmonic energies to move in a circle and resonate with themselves, building up and preserving their energies. Sort of like a buffer or regulator. The last part is just used to-"
"Hey, Sparky." Valey nudged her with a shoulder. "Don't want to interrupt when you're doing a nerd monologue, but how bad could stuff go if you just hooked them up and turned it on and saw what happened?"
Starlight cleared her throat with a deadpan expression.
Shinespark folded her ears. "Five minutes. I need to rewire some things involving the intercom, because these are definitely not microphones, and I don't want this ship trying to fly on the off chance they're that many orders of magnitude more powerful than any pony I've ever seen before. And..." She glanced up at Melia and Sirena. "Since we ran through this fast and jumped to a lot of conclusions, are you on board with what we're trying?"
"I think so?" Sirena grinned and flopped her head sideways.
"You want me to take that mare's advice," Melia sighed, looking at her broken cutie mark, "and try to use an unmodified airship engine as an amplifier to hold a concert for an army of sarosians we're supposed to be running for our lives from. Is that right?"
Valey and Shinespark looked at each other. "Uhhh... yes?"
For a moment, Valey's ears folded... until Sirena shifted to show off her own cutie mark, still cracked but glossed over and healing, not as bad as Melia's. "I mean, it worked for me."
Melia sighed, squared her shoulders, and lifted a helmet off its pole in her aura, turning and inspecting it. "Very well. Given what I've just been through, I think it will be entirely understandable if I can't keep it up for long, but I'll try this. If you want to thank me, something to eat would be very nice."
Valey blinked. "Oh bananas, I'll go get that. And hey, the helmets go on your butts!"
She was gone from the room in a flash, leaving Shinespark looking around. "I've got some changes to make," she announced. "Shouldn't be too long, and I think I've got all the stuff I need. Less time than it'll take for us to get in range, anyway. Gonna try increasing the flow between our normal mana core and the ship's horn and loudspeaker, and wire you through to that. I also need to see if we have any better mics than the intercom one in here. But that'll all take less time than us getting in range, anyway. Starlight, can you let the bridge and everyone else know what we're doing? Including if anyone objects, because getting closer again will always be a risk."
"...Okay," Starlight decided, taking her mission and trotting out the door.
Starlight stepped out onto the Immortal Dream's deck, night sea winds tossing her mane and blowing around her. The frigate was still there in the distance, colored explosions sounding from its deck like a festival spell. Howe and Neon Nova were in the process of helping move the recovered supplies back belowdecks, hauling them under a wrinkly black griffon's watchful eye. What were they doing here? She wasn't glad to see them, though at least familiar faces were better than everyone else new who was showing up. Hopefully this would be a temporary thing and they would all go away once they got back to land.
She glowered at the frigate. She didn't want to save Puddles, or Meltdown, or a bunch of soldiers or pirates. They had done nothing for her, and some had hurt her. But it somehow mattered to her friends, and she wasn't sure how or even whether to piece that together right then. She had a clear job to do, so she did it.
"Gerardo! Hey, Gerardo!" Starlight rapped noisily on the bridge door to announce her presence, then slid it open and stepped inside.
"Hmmmmmmm?" Gerardo raised a feathery eyebrow, spinning around in the cockpit, and Nyala moved a little next to the wall. Right, the armor was a pony now, too. Yet another Starlight would have to get used to. "Ah, hello, Starlight. You look purposeful."
"Valey and Shinespark say to turn the ship around," Starlight announced, delivering her message. "They think they can use the ship's harmony engine to help use the sisters' song to convince all the pirates to stop fighting, but they need to move back towards everyone first."
Gerardo blinked. "Well, that's quite the request. I must say... err... Hrrm."
Starlight shrugged. "It destroyed windigoes before. Maybe it can do this, too. I just think it's weird. I just want to go home." She looked guiltily away. "They told me to come tell you, but I just wish we could run away from danger instead of toward it for once."
"That's quite understandable," Gerardo assured, tapping a few buttons. "I'll just... Engine room, come in?"
No response. Starlight spoke up instead: "Shinespark is re-wiring something about the ship's sound to make it work better."
"I see." Gerardo nodded, giving the wheel a spin and starting to adjust their course. "Rather unfortunate if I can't get the opinions of everyone involved, but an order is an order. Good luck ending that duel, though. Perhaps you ought to take cover with Maple, if this is really our course of action?"
"I'll..." Starlight swallowed. "I will. And I'll tell them to come up and tell you what they're planning, too. I don't know. I think it sounds weird, but maybe it will work. I'm... going to go back to Maple now..."
"Here." Gerardo reached to his side and unbuckled his newly-restored sword, then offered it to Starlight. "I'd probably just get this stolen from me in a fight. I haven't quite proved my competence in that arena..." His headcrest flopped. "If we're going back into danger, take care of yourselves?"
Starlight took the sword and frowned, but didn't say anything. Maple had just lost the sound stone, earlier. Maybe guarding the sword could be like a second chance.