I glared at the young pegasus from across the galley table. “Start over. This story isn’t making any sense.”
Penny rolled her eyes. “What part is so hard to get over? Several years ago, my father developed a way to store and transport a large amount of magic. The prototype and I were taken by a cult that wanted to use the power to resurrect the Nightmare. After being rescued, Princess Celestia ordered that the device be kept under government control. Now it’s missing again, along with my father.”
“So let me get this straight: We’re looking for a magical weapon, someone in the Equestrian government dropped the ball on security, and your family is really kidnap-prone.”
This time, Penny glared at me. It was harder to take her seriously since she’d revealed her age as only nineteen. Not that I was too much older, but there was still enough of a gap to make a difference.
“So why didn’t Princess Celestia mention to me that your father is also missing?” I asked.
She shrugged helplessly. “I don’t have any idea. Did she tell you where to start looking? Do you know where he is?”
I got up from the table. “That’s need-to-know information. Stay put.”
Leaving the galley, I met up with Nika who had been listening. We went to find the rest of the crew.
“What do you all think?” I asked.
“If she’s telling the truth, she could be a valuable asset,” said Jones.
“Other than the fact her story is kind of farfetched, a lot of the details she knows match up,” added Andy.
Jeff nodded. “It even casts some doubt on Princess Celestia’s story.”
Agreeing with him, Shep said, “Someone is clearly not telling the whole story here.”
“So who do we trust?” asked Nika. “This random filly, or our employer the Princess?”
I frowned. “It’s depressing that that question isn’t easy to answer. I suppose we’ll keep her, but make sure she’s on a tight leash. We don’t tell her where we’re going or relevant details, and she doesn’t need to know I’m a pony.”
Having settled that, we went on. After agreeing to let Penny stay, she impressed us all with her work. She really knew how to sail. While the rest of us kept the file of information that had been delivered to us away from her, she knew the area better and deduced that we were heading for the Griffon Kingdom.
After getting a moment to myself, I checked the time and made a phone call. There were only a few Iridium-system satellites currently in orbit, although I had heard that more would be launched soon to provide more coverage. Sat phones only worked when one was overhead. The dimensions had been connected for more than two decades and it frustrated me how slow ponies could sometimes be to take up new technology.
Speaking of technology, Celestia had only told me that this device Penny’s father had developed was a weapon. Technically, I supposed a portable source of magic could be for peaceful purposes, but she was probably right. Who would steal it for that?
After a couple of transfers that ate into the valuable time while the satellite was still overhead, I finally got Celestia on the phone. It was not a secure line, so I was careful.
“It’s Sean Carter,” I said. “We had an uninvited guest.”
“Oh really?” I couldn’t tell if Celestia was truly unconcerned, or feigning it for the sake of the unsecure phone.
“Our stowaway claims to know a pony involved with your project. Said he disappeared at about the same time.”
Celestia paused. “I know who you’re talking about.”
“Any details you can give me?” I meant, Why didn’t you tell me about this?
“The missing pony is dead, not disappeared.”
“Then why does my guest think he was kidnapped?”
“You’ll have to ask.”
I grumbled something unpleasant about young mares. Celestia spoke over me. “Please be nice. Your passenger has had a rather rough life.”
There was at least a grain of truth in everything Celestia said, but it was often masked in subterfuge. Her last statement to me seemed to be in completely plain language. I just wished she spoke that way all the time. Maybe I would listen to her more often.
I got off the phone. Going to find Penny to deliver the news that her father was dead was actually not the first thing on my mind. I hadn’t been much older than her when both of my parents died, and had a bit of a hangup about that.
On the other hand, was it my place to keep the information from her? I wrestled with the choice for a while and decided that Celestia’s mission came first. Telling Penny the truth might jeopardize that. It was possible that she was only looking for her father, and couldn’t care less about his device.
I went to re-read the file that Apple Bloom, Sweetie Belle, and Scootaloo had delivered. Some of the details were surprisingly specific, but at some point they trailed off into guessing. It was almost like whoever had put the report together had followed the leads to their conclusion and then announced to the enemy, “Hey, we found the thing you stole. You might want to move it now.”
I frowned. What if that was what happened? What if the three mares had gone after the device, and it was inside that bag I failed to retrieve? If that was true, it certainly explained their hostile attitude towards me, especially after Celestia decided to pull them off the mission and let me try.
I skimmed through the section about the weapon itself. It was a glass sphere a little smaller than a bowling ball that had been made and enchanted in such a way to contain vast amounts of magic that was charged by unicorns. It worked better when there were more ponies feeding energy into it at once. If that much power was let loose, I could see how it could warp the dimensions a little. I wondered if that was just a test of the weapons capability, and if it would be used again on an actual target.
I didn’t know a whole lot about magic. Maybe if I was born and raised in Equestria I might have observed more. I would have thought that such a huge discharge would have been observed by the griffons. Perhaps that was why the fighter jets had been in the area.
I went to check the sails. I was slowly learning how to tie knots with fingers, and wanted to make sure they stayed tight.
“Already got it, skipper,” said Penny, drifting down from the top of the mast. Her attitude had already become more cheerful.
I gave her a curious look. “Where did you pick up that term?” It was typically slang for naval commanding officers in English-speaking countries. I hadn’t heard ponies use it, mostly because it’s hard to skip with four legs.
While trying to come up with a better joke, I watched Penny’s face. She started to reply, but appeared to think better of it. She shrugged. “Just something I heard.”
I couldn’t imagine why she wouldn’t be completely truthful about something like that, but let it go. I understood all too well that each of us needs our secrets.