Chapter Two: Assembly
Upon landing on the first desolate moon they could find, The Captain and his Lieutenant pulled everything aboard to survey their take. As they moved the crates in their netted bundle into the airlock adjoining the cargo hold, they didn’t speak a word to one another. Dex knew better to confront the Captain when he was in one of his moods, and she would gain nothing by prying on his reasoning. Wordlessly, she assumed her duties as First Mate the second the airlock pressurized and the crates, which had previously floated weightless in space, came crashing down atop a cart. As she rolled the cart into the cargo hold, her Captain calmly plodded up the stairs lining the walls of the vast storage space and trotted silently to his room towards the helm as the engine fired to life beneath his hooves, making the floor vibrate as their taxed and slightly worn out engine swirled to life, pushing them further along to their destination.
Only when he arrived at his room and checked that the door was securely locked did he remove his space barding, grabbing the fabric in his teeth as he placed it as carefully as he could on a hanger, leaving the helmet on his desk. He pulled out a hidden sink from the wall with his teeth and washed his face, making sure to thoroughly clean the neckline where his sweat had collected the dirt, a common and annoyingly pervasive hitchhiker, and plastered it to his coat. When he was sufficiently clean, he wiped his face off with a towel, glancing at the mirror to survey the damage.
The face which looked back at him was perfectly clean, and the only remaining dirt left on his face was forever encapsulated by the new skin growing from the several small scars on his face and neck. His chocolate-brown coat, pockmarked by a few dark freckles here and there around his nose, was undamaged: a fact which was becoming more and more unheard of as work grew more scarce. His hair hadn’t been impacted either: it was still as straw-colored, coiffed, and short as it had always been. He smiled and allowed himself to finally relax, satisfied at the condition of his coat, face, and their soon-to-be well off circumstances should his contact have been true to their agreement. Without a word, he clambered up the tight spiral staircase leading to the deck, sealing and locking the door behind him.
He arrived in his hold to find his crew awaiting his arrival like children on Hearth’s Warming Day, eagerly pawing the ground to split the take and enjoy the benefits of their new-found wealth. The three of them closest to the crates looked up at him expectantly, their faces portraying patience while their eyes--the Captain’s preferred method of ascertaining the truth of things--betrayed their excitement and their insatiable need to rip into the crates like the mad children they sometimes became upon the presentation of their ever-more infrequent rewards.
With a nod from their Captain, the crew grinned widely at one another and tore into the crates with shrieks and yells of mirth, steel and wooden lids rattling on the floor of the hold, packaging pellets and hay alike strewn everywhere as joyous pandemonium broke out below. He smiled broadly, watching them fight over the trinkets and riches inside as he propped his fore-hooves over the railing, surveying the damage.
“You know, if you don’t let your babies fly they will never leave the nest, and we both know you wouldn’t want that,” came a voice from his right as Dextra the zebra’s stark black and white Mohawk came into view. The mare which followed was as limber and toned as any member of her species, further hardened by war and her years spent shouldering the burdens and assignments of her Captain.
Her skin--like the Captain’s--was slightly scarred, the burn marks, knife slashes, and gun holes highlighted on her skin just beneath her coat in lines of pink. The glyphs and markings in a foreign alphabet that had previously graced her flanks had been sullied slightly as the passing years and the acquisition of gunshot wounds ruined their prior perfection. Her tail, knotted tightly as always in a long braid, was as stark and as clean as he had seen it in a while. She hadn’t had the chance to dirty it by using it as a very effective knotted club, as she enjoyed doing on occasion. The handle of her modified carbine gleamed at him from its harness at her side, the polished brass catching the interior lights of the hold as it flickered brightly.
“I know that, Dex,” he smiled curtly. “They haven’t been off the ship in a long time, and I hate to do that to them...but sometimes it’s worth it to see them like this even if it means me being a little hungrier or a little more battered trying to make sure my world doesn't spill into theirs. It makes me learn just how much I can push myself to make them better."
Casting his eyes downward to the grated floor beneath his hooves, he watched his reinvigorated crew play and enjoy themselves before turning to his Lieutenant.
“It makes me love them even more, even if I never tell them, and especially if I hate their guts at a certain moment. Besides, they continually surprise me: hell, I didn’t know he was that limber!”
He pointed a hoof at the oversize and heavily muscled stallion below who lay on his stomach, curling backwards as he tried to wrest control of a sparkling piece of machinery clasped firmly in his female coworker’s teeth, her face beaming around the shiny new metal component as she avoided his swiping hooves.
"Keeping them out of harm's way entirely is the only way I know to keep them safe. If it means I take some additional punishment...then so be it."
He stamped his hoof resolutely while his Lieutenant turned her gaze from her childish partner below to face him in surprise.
"Them?! They've been in tight spots before, Captain. You were right to exclude them from this job though: they would be better off not knowing whose cargo they're ransacking." Watching her husband and the rest of the crew as they sorted their rewards from the objects they were told to acquire, she leaned her head towards her Captain's as she surveyed their work.
“You know, they might just raise a mutiny if they heard you talking like this,” Dextra whispered coyly. “Shadow Bastion, the stone that broke the Alliance’s hoof, a softy?!”
She smiled wide, probing his face for a sign, even a flicker of laughter, but there was none to be found.
The two warriors sat in silence, having perfected the art of using body language to convey orders and aspirations. It was a skill picked up in nights of total silence, of nights spent behind bunkers and in dark corners behind enemy lines.
“I’m glad you gave him a chance, Sir,” his Lieutenant muttered quietly, making sure not to raise her voice enough to echo around the hold as she broke their silence. “I’m glad you listened to my advice.”
“It was sound advice, even if I didn’t need it at the time,” Bastion replied, grinning again as two of the crew, the large stallion and his previous opponent -- a smaller yellow earth pony mare -- bounced a sack of grain between them as they played keep-away from the pilot.
“He has always been reliable," Bastion began, watching the pilot in question jump in vain to snatch the bouncing package. "It's just he has never seen combat, and he doesn’t know how to handle himself in tricky situations. I doubt he even knows where the point the barrel of a pistol, let alone knowing how to squeeze the trigger properly.”
Let alone knowing how to survive afterwards with what you’ve done.
“I know he doesn’t, but he has his niche and he excels in it. It would be nice to see him out about, he only talks about it constantly..."Dextra paused for a moment, watching her loving partner play below before nodding at the Captain.
"But you're right: sometimes it’s worth taking an extra bullet just to see days like these...when everyone is safe.”
She concluded her observations, placing a hoof on her friends shoulder as she grinned mischievously.
“I know you feel the same way, I’ve seen your fuzzy-wuzzy side!”
She gave a rather uncharacteristic giggle to her Captain, nudging his shoulder in a playful punch. He gave a little smirk, moving his gaze from the zebra mare to his crew and beyond to the walls of the hold, gazing at what he imagined to be an infinitely small mote of dust on a faraway crate.
“Besides, it’s been a long time since any of us have had a break. A little R&R will be good for us, Sir, you’ll see. C’mon, let’s get into character!” Dextra exclaimed as she proceeded down the steps into the hold. When she turned around to follow the stairs, her face was set just as he’d grown accustomed to seeing it before he became her Captain: emotionless and steely. Only their shared wink broke her illusion as he followed her, donning his war face as well.
~~~~~
“At last! We can retire and give up this life of crime,” the larger earth stallion remarked, snark and sarcasm, along with a few other things, oozing from the corners of his heavyset jaw.
Of all of the members of the crew, and in particular the three more militant ponies, he was by far the most formidable. His dark charcoal-grey coat hid layer upon layer of muscle, crafted and toned to the point that it appeared to be bulging with every move, casting small shadows on his frame as the light wrapped around the bends and curves which pushed out from beneath his skin. His face, complete with a thin jagged scar from cheek to left ear, said more of his years of hardship and combat than any of his words, when he happened to spare them, could ever address.
His barding, every visible surface of which covered in patches and glints of hidden armor plating, sported a large hunting knife along with several firearms, complete with one or two grenades on each shoulder which rested like epaulettes near his face for easy access. Across his chest, in two swaths of red cloth, rested homemade bandoliers lined with various ammunition of myriad calibers, dirtied and stained in the places where sponge and soap had been unable to fully absorb or remove the blood of his enemies.
The only thing not completely sinister about this earth stallion was his hair: a close cut mane of pure cinnabar red, the same color as his carefully groomed goatee, shone like a splash of fire. Yet despite the bright red blaze erupting from his scalp, his mane was topped by a single line of bright pink running like a stripe off center down the middle, the one trait he inherited from his mother before she passed.
His chest-borne insignia designated his last name as 'Wildfire'. Not one of the crew knew his full name, and the one pony they met who did know hadn’t been heard of since.
“I mean, we get a bunch of junk, some grains and oats, that random book of numbers and business things, that damn calibrator that Cam keeps hiding from me, and then this?! What the hell is it? We risked our asses for this of hunk of crap?” Wildfire snarled, gesturing wildly to the object on the table which had been the final point on his long list of annoyances.
When they had cleared the packaging and sorted out the food they had somehow managed to find, they were left with a little lockbox securely fastened with a padlock bearing the Alliance crest. The box held only this object: an oblong metal ingot, completely seamless and unmarred except for a small four-starred diamond-shaped puncture placed squarely in the center of the box’s otherwise perfect top surface. It rested on its wide base, slightly longer than its topmost facet, in the middle of their kitchen table, contrasting slightly with the table’s mahogany finish.
“Correction:WE risked our asses for this hunk of crap!” came a sharp reply from the kitchen where a range, an oven, a sink, and a series of tightly sealed compartments for storing food and various spices lay unopened and locked. The sound of a few crashing pots and closing cupboards betrayed the presence of their pilot and sometimes chef, Wind Dancer: an cream-colored pegasus stallion who trotted to the table with bowls of food perched precariously on his outstretched wings. “I don’t remember sitting around and reading those awful magazines of yours as being the definition of ‘earning your keep’ around here.”
Wind Dancer slid the bowls off his wings as he orbited the table, placing spoons tangled in his feathers alongside them as he went.
“Well, what the hell else was I supposed to do, Windy? Pilot the ship? Tinker with the engine? Try and cram myself into those stupid space suits?” Wildfire spread his hooves wide, challenging Wind Dancer as he lay back in his chair which teetered on two legs and groaned under his colossal weight. Leaning back even further, he snarled at the pegasus as he continued with his tirade.
“I wasn’t left with a whole lot of options. Besides, it’s not like doing what you do is hard: You get to sit in a nice comfy padded chair and spin a little wheel around while your little wife feeds you grapes…or apples…or whatever. Hell, you’re two togas short of a full-on orgy while I’m getting shot at and stabbed!” he exclaimed wildly, pointing a hoof at the bandage wrapped around his shoulder. His wild gestures ended up in him bumping his injury, causing a sharp wince of pain from the earth stallion and a little smile to appear on the pegasus.
“That little wife of mine can kill us both with her hoof…we both know this...” Windy stated evenly, jabbing a free wing towards Wildfire. “...And I would love to see you try to do my job, or anything involving your brains for that matter.”
The pegasus trotted over, placing the final bowl on the table before ringing a small triangle by the kitchen counter to signal the arrival of dinner. “Have you done anything recently which didn’t involve being shot at?” the pegasus challenged as he sat down to consume his meal.
“In fact, I have, Windy: while you went around pressing buttons and being more-or-less useless, I was reading.”
Wildfire smiled wide, displaying his pride for his supposed accomplishment as he stuck his spoon in the sludge the pegasus had prepared, making no small grimace when, as he lifted the spoon, the bowl and its contents followed it.
“Reading? You can read?” Windy questioned, cocking his head to side in a look of pure surprise.
“Well, the kind of material I read doesn’t necessarily require me to be…” Wildfire paused, looking for the appropriate word to use before continuing.
“…Literable?”
He tested Windy’s gaze for a sign of comprehension before giving up entirely, summing his thoughts with a simple grunted conclusion.
“I've got my things, and you've got yours. Let’s just leave it at that, okay?” Wildfire sneered, trying to extract his spoon from the oaten goop as Wind Dancer chowed down happily, speaking when he got the chance.
“It’s just I’ve never seen you so, you know, engaged with reading as you are with that pulp you gawk at,” the pilot said with a twinge of disgust, cocking his eyebrow and looking over his bowl as he addressed his seething and well-armed compatriot. “You’re usually complementing your reading with…other things...”
“Whatever, Windy: you’re just jealous I can distract myself more than you can.”
“Whatever, Wildfire,” the pegasus countered, “I don’t need to distract myself with panting heavily while I ‘read’...I have a wife for that.”
The look of surprise and anger erupting from behind Wildfire’s eyes was nothing compared to the zebra mare’s from the hallway entrance, though her years of training and combat alongside the Captain had made her anger much more subtle than Wildfire's. Grinning devilishly, she watched as the mercenary attempted to chase down the pegasus stallion, losing his balance and knocking over his chair to send him rolling onto the floor as Wind Dancer laughed uproariously, snorting his porridge out of his nose.
“Straighten up, Wildfire. The Captain’s on his way,” Dextra ordered from the doorway, her assertion and her strict forceful tone causing Wildfire, with a little glare, to stand his chair back up and sit down heavily. That same dangerous and sultry zebra sauntered over to her husband, wrapped a towel around her hoof, and proceeded to clean him up, eying him dangerously as she did so. The look of terror and confusion arising from the suddenly intimate behavior of his pampering wife--and the understanding of the complete and utterly terrifying power his angry zebra bride was capable of--made Wind Dancer sit up straighter than ever, a paragon of proper dining decorum, as Wildfire slopped down his food noisily, grinning widely as he did so.
The sound of hooves down the corridor signaled the arrival of Captain Bastion, adorned as he usually was in his long, clean, and patched up duster, as he followed in the footsteps of a dainty yellow earth pony mare named Chamomile Calm. She was of a slender build, and in the places where she was not covered in brown and black oil and grease stains or her heavily patched overalls, her banana-yellow coat peeked out. She wore her pure white hair down, draping down her neck and in front of her face, her bangs held back away from her bright green eyes with a small butterfly hair-clip--one of her more prized heirlooms. She had her tail cropped short, both out of fear for possible entanglements with rapidly spinning machinery and just because it looked, as she often stated to the floor whenever asked, “nice”. Atop her head, to keep her hair more or less clean and out of the way, she wore a stained red and grey paisley bandana, frayed at the edges and with more than a few holes. It was obviously used for tightening the many screws and bolts which her profession entailed, and while her slender and dainty build might have suggested her lack of a sturdy backbone, there was no better ship mechanic still flying.
“With all our loot, Cammy, you should really go into town and buy something nice,” the Captain offered, smiling as his favorite mechanic matched his pace, bouncing slightly ahead of him. “Give those jumpsuits of yours a break, and perhaps wash them…”
He grimaced as the odors of years of coagulated engine grease and rust wafted silently into his nostrils.
“…And yourself…” he added, followed by a gag. “...Please?”
“Awww! Thanks, Cap’n!” his companion beamed, unaffected by her utility jumpsuit’s odor as she challenged him a little, puffing up her chest as she hit him on his chest with her little hoof. “...And that’s what you get for telling me to get her all worked up pulling that stunt of yours. Do you have any idea the kind of strain the Hyper Boom entails? I’m surprised she’s still running, to be completely honest...”
“Well, next time," he smiled, chuckling a little at her diminutive anger, "I will make sure I pick a job where we don’t have to use it.”
Chamomile smiled her consent as she turned back around to make her way to the kitchen, Bastion following close behind, still slightly reeling from the engine reak.
“Cammy, I know it’s mostly my fault you are the way you are, but next time: wash up before you come to dinner. We can’t be spoiling your otherwise pretty face with those damn grease stains, now can we?” He nudged her shoulder playfully with his own hoof as they stood in the doorway together.
“D’AWWW! I love my Captain!” Chamomile chirped, nuzzling her head under her Captain's neck. “Why can’t I find a guy that’s as nice as my Captainy-Captain?” she added playfully as her ‘Captainy-Captain’ visibly reeled from the heavy rust scent forever encrusted inside of her bandana.
“Probably because you use those stupid little kindergarten words."
Wildfire’s gruff reply was clearly audible even as he used his long tongue to lick the interior of his bowl with a high degree of dexterity and obvious practice. It was a move which made Wind Dancer shut right up as he watched in shock and embarrassment.
“Whatever, little Mr. Pony Prancy-Pants,” Chamomile sneered, sticking her tongue out at the mercenary. “At least I can control myself when I’m mastur-”
“Enough, all of you!” Bastion barked, cutting off his mechanic as she and Dextra took an empty chair, not noticing when his favorite yellow mechanic made a funny face at her tempestuous, but ultimately harmless, mercenary crew-mate.
“We need to have a talk.”
Bastion waited until all were seated and paying attention before continuing, watching the four of them as he stood at the head of the table.
“So, Cammy informed me about the strain we put the engine under…”
“Strain you put the engine under…” both Windy and Wildfire said surreptitiously though Bastion heard them, continuing after momentarily staring them down.
“…Strain I put her under, and I don’t think we have any other choice but to get her all patched up when we pull into the Hoovesdown Docks tomorrow. We have our contact who will want his cut of the take, and with our portion we can afford to replace some of the engine’s parts.” This remark earned him a glowing smile from his mechanic, who ground up some sugar with her hoof to add to her porridge as he continued.
“Dextra, Wildfire, and I will deliver what goods we need and fence the rest before looking around for some more work, but I think we might need to take on a few passengers in order to get by. Cammy, if you wouldn’t mind playing hostess, I would much appreciate any extra fare you can manage.” He looked over to his mechanic as she nodded, sampling her meal. He smiled back before nodding to his pilot.
“Wind Dancer, I would much appreciate it if you would go grab some food for us. I don’t know how many bits you will have to work with, but I trust you can make it work. You always seem to do a good job.” The vote of confidence made Wind Dancer look up with a little surprise, and both he and his wife smiled back at Bastion, grateful for his comment.
“We have a lot to do tonight and a full day tomorrow, so eat up and hit the hay,” Bastion concluded before grabbing his bowl and spoon with his teeth and leaving the kitchen without another word, long brown coat trailing behind him.
The rest of the crew did as they were told, finishing their meals with only small amounts of conversation before setting off to do their pre-bedtime chores. Chamomile hesitated as she looked at the chair at the head of the table in which the Captain usually sat, puzzled by his reticence. When they were finished, she and Wildfire walked silently to their rooms, turning off the kitchen and hallway lights behind them. Dextra and her husband made their way towards the helm, where they shared the ship’s larger passenger dormitory near the bow.
When all the indicator lights on his screen showed that his crew were safe in their rooms, Bastion remotely locked the doors around the ship and doused the lights. The lantern's glow flickering in sequence as one-by-one the lights died out, the electrical current traveling down the hallway to die silently at the end. The hallway to the helm was cast in the ethereal glow of the stars and passing planets, though no one was there to watch them as they passed.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The following morning found the crew caught up in the hustle and bustle of the morning marketplace of the Hoovesdown Docks, a teeming and active spaceport adjacent to the fairly large, only slightly Alliance-overrun city of New Bridlesburg, the capitol of the planet on which they stood. Such a prominent Alliance presence both in the docks and their surrounding market saddled Captain Bastion with more than a little unease as he and his crew walked down the ship’s airlock wall, which also served as their chief loading ramp. Their ship had looked worse, with the siding and metal plating only modestly burned by the combination of warship lightning-bolt gunfire and the decay of their own engine’s plasma Hyper Boom gunk.
Chamomile began her work patching up the low-lying holes and tears, welding torch and wrenches peeking out of her heavily pocketed, but now refreshingly clean, utility barding. At her feet, a lawn chair and parasol, two of her favorite possessions, laid sprawled out on the walkway leading to the cargo hold with a sign leaning against it. The words "We’re Taking on Passengers, Inquire Within" were splashed on the sheet in bright colors and floral patterns. He chuckled to himself as he watched his mechanic move about their ship, the pops and hums of her welding torch punching through the audible din of the marketplace as she made her preliminary repairs. She was taking her role seriously, and they shared a little wink and a smile before Bastion and his compatriots moved out to go about their tasks.
For the most part the ship was intact and more stable than half of the ships which the crew found themselves weaving between as they made their way towards the central market, a fact which made Bastion’s face beam with a little Captain’s pride for his vessel. His crew was likewise outfitted, all of them happier and healthier than most of the urchins who had made the Hoovesdown Docks their permanent home: ponies with mangled limbs begging for change, griffon mercenaries standing silently as their well-to-do employers bartered with the wealthier merchants, indentured mules struggling under the heavy loads of whichever pony or zebra held their contracts.
It was places like these that made Bastion glad he had the means to leave that life behind, and while a soldier’s stipend was small he had made the best of what he had earned.
But then again, Shadow Bastion had been no ordinary soldier.
With a nod back to the Captain and a kiss to his wife Wind Dancer departed with his wagon, his saddlebags clinking with the money he’d been given as the wagon creaked behind him. He made his way about the marketplace, his shrewd eye picking out only the freshest of foods and the most thrifty of deals. Dextra watched him as he left before sweeping back her duster, identical to the Captain’s in size and weight--though lacking in sheer number of bullet hole patches--to expose her carbine, a small rifle only as long as her forearm though as deadly and precise as a surgeon’s scalpel from short to medium range.
Wildfire didn’t exactly need to sweep back any of his clothing: having grenades on his shoulders made wearing anything more than his bandoliers and various weapons sheaths superfluous.
They had an easy enough time finding their fence, and as they traded those things they had found for the money they so desperately needed, they counted out what money they’d earned into a large satchel, keeping special care to protect their contact’s requested documents which they’d found stored inside one of the crates. Counting out the bits they’d earned from a rather odd looking merchant pony with an equally odd accent, Bastion clinched another bag with their own take shut, weighing it in his hooves before smiling to himself and his Lieutenant.
It was quite a haul, even if the other half of it would go to their contact. He regretted having to pay that roach when he did little to nothing to contribute, but that money which they did receive would be more than useful around the ship. Bastion couldn’t complain: it was a well-earned reward for their efforts.
Making their way into a main square of the bustling market with their bits and their contact's documents secured in Bastion’s saddlebags, they surveyed the throngs of ponies and other races milling about them before Bastion turned to his crew-mates as they huddled together to divide duties.
“Let’s spread out and find our contact, he has to be around here somewhere,” Bastion ordered, gazing over the heads of the various races inhabiting or milling about the market square. Dextra and Wildfire obliged and began to pace forward, but were stopped in their tracks by a most unnatural sound.
“Too late, Bassssstion.”
Those three words, accompanied by an airy whistle and a prolonged hiss, signaled the arrival of their contact. The three of them turned to face what foreign and unnatural sound they had heard, and as they gazed Wildfire recoiled in shock at just what horror he was witnessing for the very first time.
A large, foreboding male griffon stood before them, proudly sporting faded business attire which did nothing to hide the obviously bedraggled condition of his hide and feathers or the smell of stale blood emanating from his long, serrated talons. His signature hiss was the byproduct of his beak: a yellow mass of scarred bone filed sharp into a dangerous point, topped with two gaping, rough holes where his nostrils should be. The numerous scars on his face and body were no doubt the souvenirs of long campaigns which he, accounting for his gruff demeanor, unblinking eyes, and heavy-set and muscular body, was undeniably the victor.
The final main feature of the soldier-turned-business griffon rested in his eyes, or what was left of them: his left eye gazed heavily at the crew, flicking back in forth between his two acquaintances and the other foreign crew member, working overtime to compensate for the other. An old bright-red scar coursing through his eyebrow and down to the center of his cheek had sliced his eye in half, infection and deterioration causing the entire eye to become a milky white. The scar had rendered him lidless, and Wildfire recoiled as the ripped orb flickered around, unable to see and unable to close--an effect which made business dealing a little more difficult, but rendered his opponents shaking in their boots if his infamous reputation wasn’t enough to do so.
“I thought that whistle might be you, Battlebeak: you’re the only griffon I know of stubborn enough not to get those holes plugged.”
The Captain turned to face the massive beast as his crew-mates, unknown to the aging griffon or his bodyguards, readied themselves for combat. Dextra quietly cocked the hammer on her carbine as she turned to face them, Wildfire doing the same, their movements masking their preparations. As they flanked their Captain, Bastion turned to directly address the business-griffon.
“If I knew any better, I might be willing to shake your hand. But then again, I know where those things have been,” the Captain said, eying the griffon’s lidless eye with trepidation.
“Mossst good to sssee you too, Sssergeant” was Battlebeak’s reply, his left eye sizing up his old rival. “I was beginning to wonder when you’d decide to uphold my requessst.”
After a moment of staring down the chocolate-colored pony in front of him, the aging griffon turned to the side and swept his claws out towards a solitary iron door on the furthest wall of the market, his bodyguards flanking the crew as he did so.
“Would you care to join me? I believe we have sssome things to discusss, you and I.”
Much to Wildfire’s surprise, his Captain sidled up to the griffon like an old friend, though the slight click of his own pistol’s hammer gave them some slight relief:
Their Captain wasn’t completely crazy.
“Keep your eye on the left bodyguard, I will do the same on the right. Be careful: Battlebeak has a pretty long and sordid reputation. You don’t want to be on his bad side.”
Dextra’s quiet order to her heavily armed compatriot snapped Wildfire back to attention, even if he had no clue what ‘sordid’ meant. His gaze rested on a particularly curved and beautifully serrated hunting knife adorning the forearm of the griffon bodyguard nearest him, and it took him a few moments to shake his attention from the blade and fall into step alongside his zebra Lieutenant.
“This is our contact? Who the hell is this guy? If I had known we’d be dealing with him, I don’t think I would have come along with you and our psycho Captain on this deal,” Wildfire jabbed, trying to keep from staring at the griffon’s many scars which laced his legs and sides.
“Watch your tongue, Wildfire. What, are you scared?” she snapped, her anger at his disrespect quiet enough so only he could hear.
A look of surprise and pride surged through his eyes as he struggled to keep his anger in check, shaking his head wildly. “NO!” he barked, catching the attention of one bodyguard. With a little more control and a glare from his winged opponent, he looked over at Dex, finishing his thought.
“No, Dex. I’m just surprised the Captain and this guy aren’t outright killing each other right now. I mean, did you see how that griffon was staring him down? I was about ready to jump him and his little gang of chickens before our dumbass Captain decided to get all buddy-bud...”
He was cut off by the zebra who, quick as a flash, had rounded in front of the mountainous earth stallion, a single hoof placed squarely between his bandoliers, a look of pure and unbridled rage dancing around her sneering mouth and wide, livid eyes.
“Listen, dumb-shit!" Dextra snarled, punching his chest with her insult. "The Captain is your employer and you will address him as such! He gave you your life back when we rescued you, so you had better buck up and show a little more respect. The Captain and that griffon have a history, and a stupid and completely brainless move from you is going to ruin this or any other chance we have to get paid!”
Reeling slightly from her caustic temper, Wildfire returned her gaze, staring her down as he loomed over her only-slightly smaller body.
“If Bastion is going to keep associating with obviously untrustworthy types like him, than he deserves to be mocked! He must be insane! I’m not going to follow some meat-head who doesn’t think about where he gets his money from. He's just begging to be taken advantage of, and I don't want to be shafted!”
“That doesn't matter!” Dextra growled, keeping her voice low as she whispered venomously at the mercenary as he looked over the zebra's shoulder to see his Captain and their contact gaining distance on them. “You are a member of this crew, and therefore you will listen to your Captain. You will do as you are told, or you will leave. Do you understand?”
“You can’t make me do anything,” Wildfire sneered, his eyes tightening as he shot her a broad grin of defiance. “I can respect the Captain for what he’s done, and I will follow his orders as long as I like them, but I don’t owe my allegiance to him or anyone. Got it?”
The silence lingered, the two warriors staring each other down as their accompanying bodyguards looked at one another in confusion. Without dropping her gaze Dextra gave one last little challenge, Wildfire mirroring her squinting eyes as she snarled under her breath for his ears alone.
“The next time you step out of line, I will kill you myself.”
Her words betrayed her lingering fears, and Wildfire, though taken aback by her sudden display of fury, countered without hesitation.
“You can try. Believe me, I will too.”
Their griffon escorts balked, puzzled by the sudden dissolution of their camaraderie as the two backed off one another slightly. Their gazes still locked, Dextra turned to follow the griffon and her Captain, her pace accelerating to close the distance between herself and the pair of soldiers. Wildfire followed her, waiting several minutes to allow her some time to cool off before speaking.
“So what’s with the tension?” Wildfire began, catching Dex’s attention. “What’s got you so spooked? How do that griffon and Bast…The Captain…know each other?”
“What, so now you care?"
She spoke over her shoulder at the mercenary, keeping her Captain and their contact in her field of vision as she filled him in.
"He was there when the Captain and I served in the military. He led us on many missions...missions we never lost. It was rumored that the more damage he took during a battle, the more likely we would be to win. Many of the soldiers would follow him blindly, thinking that even if they were completely outmatched Major Battlebeak would lead them to victory. In some cases, they were right.”
She glanced at the pair in front of her, considered her next words carefully, and continued.
“The Captain didn’t take too kindly to laying down his life for Battlebeak, and he encouraged others to disobey his orders. They bashed heads more than a few times, and eventually the whole thing came to a boil. The Captain always has been a good shot...”
She pointed at the Captain, then towards the griffon, and then tapped her nose with her hoof. Wildfire, impressed by his Captain’s audacity, picked up her words where she left them.
“That doesn’t sound so bad, I probably would have done the same thing! If my friends started throwing themselves on grenades for the likes of his feathered ass, I’d shoot him too!" Wildfire chortled, looking a little more kindly towards the Captain as he finished his thoughts.
“Why should he have to follow the orders of a madman? Even if he was a great soldier, I wouldn’t even think to obey anything that old griffon says.”
“We had to, Wildfire," Dextra countered with a quick glance. "He was our commanding officer, we didn’t have a choice. The Captain’s insubordination was punishable by death towards the end of the war, and the officers didn’t look too kindly on the Captain not only shooting his commanding officer, but Battlebeak pardoning him.”
The look of pure confusion from Wildfire which followed her offhanded statement required Dex to elaborate.
“Battlebeak issued the Captain a small force of about twenty to thirty soldiers, myself included. Command thought he was being promoted, but the Major assured them it was something else.”
“What else could it have been?” Wildfire quipped, trying to consider the full impact of being given more responsibility. To him, at least, more responsibility meant more money, especially in the military. Her gaze never left the dirt in front of her as she caught up to her Captain, following a few paces behind, glancing at the bodyguards on their flanks as she whispered to the mercenary behind her, keeping her voice low so that Bastion wouldn’t hear.
“It was his punishment.”
~~~~~
They arrived through a metal door and traveled down a dark corridor to find a furnished office with a large oak desk, polished with an only slightly scuffed finish, with various items and weapons strewn about haphazardly and mountains of paperwork and files reaching towards the ceiling along the back wall. The business chair behind the desk, torn and well used with padding threatening to break free, creaked as it took up the old Major’s weight. The Captain and his two crew-mates stood silently as they watched the old griffon remove an old cigar from a desk drawer, rip apart the end with his shear-like beak, and light it with a flame on nearby candelabra which emitted only enough light to cast dancing shadows on the reflective surface. Plopping a large bag of bits on top of the documents Battlebeak had requested, Bastion slid the two parcels over the desk, his voice cutting through the musky atmosphere as Battlebeak puffed away, smoke curling out of the bullet holes on the roof of his beak.
“You’ll find your cut is all there, Battlebeak, along with all of the documents, just as we agreed. I did, however, remove a small amount from your portion to cover our damages.”
The Captain’s gaze never moved from the aging griffon as the old Major leaned forward in his chair, dumping the satchel full of bits and assorted larger bills on the table in front of him, sorting the currency into its varied denominations. After a moment of mental calculation, his gaze lifted and his solitary eye glared back at his previously-subordinate challenger.
“You dare to cheat me?” the griffon growled, his venomous eye flickering between Bastion’s crew-mates, sensing an imminent attack. His bodyguards, more than familiar with his dealings, readied their weapons as well as various clicks and pings echoed around the formerly silent room.
“I’d recognize your insignia anywhere, Battlebeak. It’s not like your gunships were being very discrete about trying to finish me off once we had the cargo in hand. Next time,” Bastion challenged, looking the griffon dead in his eye as he leaned over the desk, stating his intentions clearly and malevolently into the griffon’s better ear, “...have the common decency to finish me off before you try and screw my crew over.”
Bastion leaned back as the old griffon grinned, raising a wing to usher his bodyguards’ weapons to the floor. His tongue, briefly visible as he dragged it over the holes in his beak, moved the cigar to the back of his mouth as the rest of his mouth opened in a sneer.
“Busssinesss is busssinesss, Captain. I am not in the habit of losssing anything I don’t have to. I will at leassst pardon you for killing three of my boysss.” Leaning back in his chair, he drew the cigar from his mouth and blew little rings from the side. “I never really liked them anyway...”
“I never wanted to injure anyone! They should never have been there in the first place! I don’t kill people I don’t have to...that was always your job,” Bastion shouted in defiance, stamping his hoof on the floor. “I don't see how you not caring about the three lives I had to take just to get that stupid cargo is going to make this better! You made me kill your ‘boys’ when I sure as hell didn’t want to! You put me and Dextra on the firing line, Battlebeak! I should kill you right now for even trying!”
His bodyguard’s weapons flicked upwards, but Battlebeak’s outstretched wings ushered them down again. Holding Bastion’s gaze as he leaned forward, Battlebeak slid some of the bits to the side as he leaned his elbows on the table.
“I know how you operate, Bastion: You have alwaysss been too careful...too protective. You’ve been throwing wrenchesss in my dealingsss for yearsss. You run jobsss for my competition, which makesss thingsss harder for me. I just wanted to make you...reconsssider...”
“So you wasted three lives on trying to buy me?” Bastion snarled in disgust, Dextra behind him readying her weapon beneath her duster as his voice changed tone. “Do you still think throwing lives into a pointless situation is the best course of action, even after what happened during the war?”
They glared at one another only briefly before Battlebeak bowed his head and reclined in his chair, taking a long draw from his cigar and releasing the smoke slowly out of his beak’s bullet holes.
“Ssstill challenging me after all thessse yearsss...jusssst like old timessss. Eh, Sssergeant?” Bastion's griffon rival hissed.
“I’m not a Sergeant anymore, Battlebeak. We both know the war is over.”
“For sssome, the war will never be over."
They shared a glance which filled Dex with more unease. She’d seen her Captain’s leg tense for a brief moment before relaxing, remembering an old wound or an old flight response he’d crafted through years of unending physical pressure. She readied herself, preparing for the worst as her Captain removed his hooves from the desk, not even gracing his former mentor with a nod before turning to make his way back to the door through which they had entered.
“Goodbye, Battlebeak. Don’t contact us again.”
Bastion nodded his silent command to his comrades, his coat splaying out around him as he pointed his muzzle to the door.
“Wait.”
The old griffon rose from his seat, half-finished cigar teetering on his beak, threatening to drop as his beak moved to form his final parting words, an offering he knew Bastion would be a fool to refuse. The griffon made his way around the desk, bags of coin rattling and tinkling from his breast pockets as he made his way after the Captain.
“I have another job for you. It'sss a good one: a little delivery to an old friend of oursss. A competitor, though I won’t hold that against him. You might know him: he wasss in my contingent, jussst like you.”
He made his offer without a hint of malice or clandestine undertones, his tone even and neutral. Bastion stopped in the doorframe, Dex and Wildfire trotting ahead of him, looking back in surprise as their Captain moved his gaze from the floor to the corner of the doorframe, speaking towards no one in particular.
“…And why should I listen to another word you say? I did your little task and you tried to kill me. If that was revenge for-”
The griffon raised a wing, cutting off the Captain as he stood in the doorframe.
“I’m not trying to be your enemy, Bassstion. The war wasss hard on both of usss, maybe even more on me than you. I know I’ve been lesss than truthful to you over the yearsss. If you’ll lisssten, I have another tasssk for you, one lassst job I think you’ll be interesssted in. The pay isss good, and when you’re done...I will honor your requessst and never contact you again.”
The griffon swung his wing back towards the desk, waving his talons in a friendly offering.
“Don’t do it, Captain,” Dextra whispered from a few feet ahead of her Captain, her eyes trained on the bodyguards surrounding the griffon as she looked deep into her Captain’s eyes. “He is going to try and kill you again. Whatever he has to say won’t be anywhere close to the truth, you and I both know it.”
Wildfire, his hooves clicking back the hammers on his own guns, nodded in agreement.
“I don’t like the looks of him. Besides, my tail’s getting itchy, and we both know that means someone’s about the start shooting. Mark my words,” the charcoal mercenary continued, surveying the old griffon carefully, “he’s got something up his sleeve. Let’s just get out of here and back on the ship. His money is no good to us if it means we get killed.”
Bastion cast his gaze once more to the floor. After a few moments, he looked up into the pleading eyes of his compatriots, assessing the weight of his options before arriving at his verdict.
Their Captain turned fully around, his coat trailing and hugging the edges of the frame, to stare at the aging griffon, greyer and less feathered than he had been used to seeing him.
He remembered the proud, stalwart griffon who had afforded Bastion the opportunity to see the system, gave Bastion the power and discipline to destroy his enemies, gave him a brand which he would carry for all of his days, an emotional mark which his crew, save his fearless zebra First Mate, was unaware of.
It was a brand which compelled him to open his mouth and seal their fates.
“What do you need, Major?”
~~~~~
“Well, isn’t this just great!” Wildfire grunted heavily, disregarding the throngs of staring ponies, griffons, and other races as they left the ramshackle market, proceeding with money and weapons in tow after meeting with the lecherous griffon Major. “Now, not only did we just nearly all die because of some winged kitten-freak’s old army grudge against the Captain, but now he lets him go with a pat on the head and a few extra coins?”
Dextra looked over her duster at the offended stallion, keeping herself squarely stationed between the angry mercenary and his target who walked ahead of them silently and, luckily for Wildfire, out of earshot.
“He didn’t have much of a choice, Wildfire. The Captain owes Battlebeak everything he has, even if they don’t see eye to eye on many things…or anything for that matter. He was our superior officer, and he told us how to straighten ourselves out and start taking care of ourselves when our lives didn’t work out. I don’t think a little delivery job to an old friend was too much to ask,” Dextra stated calmly, returning Wildfire’s angry gaze. “Battlebeak saved us, much like the chance the Captain gave you. Keep that in mind next time you challenge him. I already gave you the courtesy of informing you that I will kill you if you face him...”
She turned fully, stopping again in front of the stallion, the tip of her Mohawk brushing the underside of his chin as she looked up into bright yellow eyes, eyes which shored up her strength before lowering slightly to avoid her piercing gaze.
“The Captain won’t be quite so lenient,” she concluded firmly, turning on one hoof and trotting to meet up with her Captain before passing him to enter the ship. Bastion, having reached their destination, was engaged in conversation with their waiting mechanic.
Wildfire’s gaze rose from the ground, his hooves scratching at the broken rocks and dust below as he watched the Captain and Chamomile converse. With a grunt, Wildfire tightened his saddlebags, heavier with his new stock of ammunition courtesy of a local vendor, before following with an injured pride after his Captain.
~~~~~
Chamomile rested with her front legs crossed over one another, surveying her handiwork as he Captain looked on, commentating merrily on her progress as her Captain inspected her progress. “The ship’s tip-top, Captain: I got the lower dents, scrapes, and blaster holes all patched up, though the epoxy will need at least another 20 minutes to set.”
Chamomile’s face sported a new layer of dust and sweaty grime, but her yellow cheeks beamed with pride at the condition of the ship, a vessel which, even though she didn’t own it, she cared for like it was her own child. Enough of her blood had been spilled in the rusty cracks between paneling and on the many thousands of screws and bolts she had to fasten that the ship which stood behind her was almost a family member.
The hull sparkled with an obvious wash and wax job, the blaster scars and residual soot having been scoured away by hoof and machine in his absence. The dented parts, or at least those which were salvageable, had been hammered back into position and adjusted to cover any vulnerable areas. The old armor plates, their replacements gleaming on the hull of the ship, lay in a heap nearby where Windy stood attempting to barter the scrap for extra food money with an old mule whose eyes bounced happily between his new-found sheet metal and the pretty yellow mare who had offered it to him.
With her parasol over her shoulder and her lawn chair carefully balanced on her back, she smiled merrily, proud of her accomplishments for the day.
“We also got a couple new passengers for our journey, and they all paid in advance! Guess that cleaning you suggested paid off, huh?!” she winked, making the Captain smile a little at her excitement. “I’ve never played ‘Hostess’ before, do I get anything special for it? Huh? Huh? Hey! Aaack!!!”
She giggled and snorted with laughter as the Captain whisked her up into a big hug, swinging her back and forth as he stood on his hind legs, his long coat splaying out around him like a thin brown dress as he twirled her through the air. When he was thoroughly winded, he plopped her back on her hind hooves, wiping a bead of sweat from his forehead as the demure little mare sat down hard, eyes spinning and cheeks blushing from his sudden display of affection.
“Geez Captain, I didn’t know shore-leave made you such a softy!” she squeaked, wiping some dust and sweat from her brow as stood dizzily on her hooves. The Captain pulled her again into a little hug, kissed her lightly on the head, and sent her off back to the cargo hold, noticing an extra little jingle in her step as she passed two stallions moving a heavy metal crate inside the ship with the combined powers of their magic.
The two burly stallions grunted with the weight of their cargo: a large metal box laden with stenciled marking and a blinking electronic plate. It stood out when compared to the rest of the ship, but not nearly as much as the stallion who stood but a few feet away from the workers who carried in their magic the package which could only have been his.
“Please be careful with that,” a much smaller green stallion barked lazily from the side, addressing the struggling hired hands The stallion stood adorned in what the Captain assumed was his Sunday best, with a small white vest peeking out from behind the breast of a tailored suit-jacket with long coattails draping over his sea-foam green backside. Little brass buttons were encrusted down the middle, holding it tightly to his body as he surveyed the workers moving his luggage. From what was visible behind his small sunglasses, he looked to be only slightly older than Chamomile, who the Captain could see staring at the new arrival with a little flicker of wonder and curiosity. How so nobly-postured and regally adorned he was mattered not to the Captain, though Bastion couldn’t shake the nagging feeling that there was something off about this new passenger. A gentle-colt like him had no place in this backwater market square, even with the heavy Alliance presence nearby.
A worker carrying another of the strange stallion’s boxes grumbled something behind the Captain, shaking him from his little observations about the new arrival as he moved away to allow the hired hand to continue his work. With a glance behind him to make sure his goods were packed away and not forgotten in the square, he whistled to Windy who, with a nod and hoofshake to the very-excited mule scrap merchant, grabbed a bag of produce and his remaining bits and made his way inside the cargo hold.
“Close her up, Windy,” Bastion yelled over his shoulder as the pegasus punched a large red button on a small terminal near the airlock’s door. At once the whole ramp lifted, pulled smoothly on hydraulic lifts which lifted the Captain along with it as it tilted back in towards the ship. With a final glimpse over the marketplace, Bastion followed the steep decline back into the hull of his ship as the door banged shut and sealed behind him.
As Bastion made his way over to the zebra mare standing on walkway overlooking the hold, he could immediately tell something was off. She pawed the ground nervously, making sure to avoid his gaze at all possible, behavior which he would not condone out of his usually trustworthy First-Mate. As he stopped a few feet from his companion, he allowed a few seconds of silence for her to come clean. When no sound save the rustling of the new passengers gathering and sorting their goods was issued, he turned on his Lieutenant.
“What exactly is it you’re not telling me, Dex?”
The zebra mare shuffled her feet, thinking of the appropriate words to say before raising her head slowly, afraid to make eye contact with her angry Captain. She began to say something, but his gaze caused her to hold her tongue. Eyes searching frantically for something to address, she alighted upon an object on the far side of the cargo hold. With an audible gulp, she quietly whispered, keeping her voice low.
“You don’t recognize that bag over there, do you?”
Bastion turned slowly, his eyes probing his newly cargo-laden hold in search of the object she was pointing out: a small lavender handbag, its tassels ending in glass beads of varying shades of purple, pink, and blue, resembling hanging fuchsia flowers which accented the light beige floral pattern on the exterior. Though he could never have guessed to whom it belonged, he knew that its presence on his ship, in stark contrast to the browns, greys, and steely glints of his drum-like cargo bay, was foreign and therefore of some importance to his own personal well-being.Turning back to his Lieutenant, he cleared his throat.
“No, Dex, I have no clue whose bag that is. Would you mind telling me what in the hell has gotten into you that a little frou-frou bag like that would scare you to the point of hiding something from me?” As his voice increased in fervor and volume, Dex’s head sank lower to the ground at each passing word. He continued his beratement, his words flicking out like invisible slaps to her face.
“You don’t hide things from me, Dextra! You’re not allowed to hide anything, that’s your job! This is NOT the behavior I expect out of my lieutenant, and I will be damned if my First-Mate doesn’t conduct herself as I have explicitly-”
“That bag is mine, Shadow,” came a soft, lilting voice from over his head.
He would have known that voice anywhere.
The rustling of long, trailing fabric flitting over the corrugated floor of the upper landing was accompanied by the soft click of manicured hooves, each hoof tapping softly down the steps as they made their way to the zebra mare below. Reaching the landing on which the Captain and his Lieutenant stood ogling, their latest arrival rounded the staircase and came into the Captain’s clear and unobstructed view.
An explosion of pink and purple cloth heralded the arrival of Violet Satine, a mare who would have looked like something out of a dream had the Captain been ignorant as to her history. Her light and immaculate fuchsia coat was draped in a satin dress of a purple so dark it was almost midnight black, individual strands of a thin silver ribbon tracing whorls and swirls of glinting light in patterns running down her forelegs, the main body of which hugged closely to her lean build. Her hair, a rich purple set in short waving curls which tickled her chin and lower neck, was highlighted by bright magenta stripes which coiled and flowed with the larger mass, almost playfully wrapping themselves around the larger purple strands as it flowed into the long and loose curls of her matching tail. Her eyes of ocean blue were accented by three glittering diamonds set in an only slightly tarnished silver hair clip which held the mass of hair at bay, both freeing her vision and bordering her face to highlight her toned and sumptuous frame. The almost-airy faded purple shawl on her shoulders fluttered softly as she stepped lightly towards the Captain and Dextra, her hooves shod in padded porcelain which gave little muted clinks as they hit the metal floor below.
“She has nothing to do with this, Shadow. My presence here aboard your vessel is my doing, not hers. Therefore I would kindly ask you to unhand her at once!” the new arrival snapped, her eyes locking with the Captain’s as she struggled for some foothold.
Silence reigned in the cargo bay as every pony present stopped what they were doing, watching the proceedings with open mouths, completely flabbergasted as to the sudden presence of the highly ornamented and utterly gorgeous mare before them. More than a few ponies’ eyes drifted lazily towards her flanks, their owners struggling to corral them before her wrath might befall them as well. The ones who did notice the Captain’s icy glare looking back at them continued their work without a word, their eyes focusing on stray motes of dust on the floor as they carried on their business. The ones who did not would come to regret their audacity, but to them that was a worry for another time: her appearance and startling beauty was enough to keep them enraptured as the others swept them along in front of them, clearing the cargo hold an other living souls in the space of 10 seconds flat.
Bastion turned his gaze from his now empty hold to his Lieutenant, his eyes ordering her to leave. It was an order she had seen many times, and one she jumped to obey. He finished his circuit by resting his eyes on the new mare’s neckline where a small jeweled necklace hung, swaying lightly as the mare breathed quietly, the veins in her neck pulsing faster as she stared silently at the Captain.
“Would you mind telling me what you’re doing here, Violet?” the Captain said curtly, fixing his gaze on the wall behind her as he made his way past the unicorn mare, his concentration holding his eyes to the wall as he drew dangerously close to her.
“I signed a contract to engage your vessel for a voyage, nothing more,” Violet muttered as he passed by, her head following the Captain as her eyes tried in vain to make contact with his.
“So, out of all the ships in all the ports in all the system, you just had to sign on with mine?” Bastion retorted, his eyebrows furrowed viciously, momentarily casting his gaze behind him to the visibly hurt mare. She thought carefully before answering.
“I didn’t have much of a choice. There is nothing more for me here in New Bridlesburg. I thought I might be able to-”
“You thought wrong, Violet,” Bastion snapped, cutting her off with a raised hoof as he turned his large body to block the walkway, effectively pinning her movements. “You know I told you I never wanted to see you again, but here you are...again! Was the first time not enough playtime for you? Was my definition of ‘never’ not abundantly clear to you?”
“Listen, Shadow, I’m sorry…it was only an accident, I didn’t mean-”
“Yeah,” Bastion quipped, his temper rising as he confronted the almost-forgotten mare in front of him, unconsciously advancing towards her with a violent intent. “I bet you didn’t mean to do a lot of things, but what you did was inexcusable and you know it.”
She struggled for some purchase, both on the floor and in their dialogue, trembling slightly when she discovered she was unable to find either. The most she could do was hang her head a little and draw her chin towards her necklace, trying desperately to avoid physical contact as she held his eyes in vain to see some sign or flicker of the Bastion she had known, tearing up when she saw nothing there but malice.
“Shadow, I don’t have anywhere else to go...”
“That’s not my problem!” her offender replied gruffly, breaking their eye contact as he spoke to the floor between them. “Listen, I’m sorry things haven’t worked out for you here, but you had so many options for ships...why did you choose mine?”
Violet scuffed her hoof on the floor, looking from the empty hold to the hooves of her attacker as she struggled to explain herself.
“I...I missed her...I missed my shuttle. I missed a lot of things.”
He hadn’t expected that, and as he looked at the beautiful mare before him he could almost remember the lingering memories of her walking the halls, her hooves giving off that eternally annoying clinking sound as she moved through the body of the ship, sometimes with her favorite tea by her side, savoring nothing but the taste of her brew and the humming of the engines and mechanical apparati around her. They made him smile a little, even if they’d long since passed. She’d lived on this ship back when it was still newly re-born...back when she was naive to what lay out in The Black.
He’d felt the same way once.
“Had I the option, I would leave you here and not even give you the courtesy of saying goodbye,” he began, taking another step towards the mare in the corner of the walkway held captive by the bannisters encapsulating the walkway and his own body, which blocked her only escape route. He sighed to himself.
She was never this cruel, Shadow...
“…But seeing as you’ve signed on…”
He peeked a glance at the mare before him, her eyes still locked with his but only slightly wavering as she kept control of her tears.
He exhaled heavily, moving cordially to the side to free up space for her exit. She knew better than to argue, or even to say more than a few choice words.
As she trotted quietly past him, not a sound was heard but the clicking of her porcelain-shod hooves, the brushing of her silk shawl on the nape of his coat, and a whispered “thank you” which courtesy required her to say, even if it was just a formality, even if only for herself to hear.
As she passed, Bastion closed his eyes, shielding himself from her movements as his ears tracked her footsteps as they quietly tickled the stairs and made their way to the far side of the hold. The grating of metal, the swinging of a door, and the heavy clunk of the lock were his cues to open his eyes.
He found himself alone in the empty hold, the only other sounds the ruffle of superheated air followed by a profound silence as the ship, his ship, broke through the atmosphere and gravitational hold of the planet and proceeded silently on an invisible course to their new destination.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Dinner found the crew engaged in active conversation with their new guests, doing their best to make the new ponies feel at ease aboard their well-furnished vessel. Food, drink, and various bowls and plates stuffed to their brims with cheeses, crackers, fruits, and vegetables lined the table as pockets of crew members and passengers alike swapped stories, shared the latest gossip, argued over politics, or discussed the scores of the latest games. All were enjoying the discourse.
All save one.
The Captain drank quietly by himself, only nibbling on the various foods on his plate, compliments of his pilot Wind Dancer. His drink of choice, a private reserve of wine from his home planet which he kept stored beneath his bed, was his reward for his good behavior, or at least his reward for being present during the festivities entirely. He was never known for his enjoyment of social functions, and more than a few times Chamomile would hunt him down from whichever dark corner of the ship he would find himself in and remind him of his foremost duty when new passengers were to be entertained:
Smiling.
Biting into a sesame cracker with a lump of fresh cheese on top, he reveled in the combination of flavors. If there was one single solitary thing which would make him partake in social functions like these, it would have to be food experimentation. Leaning back in his chair to analyze Wildfire’s latest hoof-wrestling gambling scheme, he waved to get Wind Dancer’s attention.
“Windy, would you mind telling where you picked up this cheese? It’s really quite good!” Bastion shouted, moving from the table to get away from the raucous cheers and only slightly drunken rabble as Wildfire’s massive fore hooves succeeded in defeating another opponent who sat in his chair, rubbing his sore foreleg.
“Actually, I didn’t pick this one out, though I wish I had,” Windy began before pointing out a stallion across the room with his free hoof. “That gentle-colt over there was kind enough to pay for his ticket in the food we get to eat tonight, along with half of whatever else we have to eat for the next two weeks. Celestia knows where he got it, I’ve never seen so much gru-”
He continued speaking but balked slightly when he realized that he was speaking to thin air, the Captain having moved to the far side of the room to analyze his latest benefactor.
A light-grey earth stallion in a simple, high-collared black shirt rested against the doorframe, overlooking the tables and its joyous occupants with a steady eye. He almost appeared to be watching over them as it shielding them from predators, wherever they might be lurking. A small yellow sun hung from his neck at the end of a long trail of beads, the bottom of the sun caressed by a silver crescent which intertwined with the sun’s various solar flares and projections. The beads clinked softly as he moved, some chipped and cracked in places, all of them lacking the lustre and shine which new porcelain beads usually held. They were obviously well used, and they matched the color of his cutie mark perfectly: a faded sun of a goldenrod hue graced his flanks, matching the emblem he wore upon his chest perfectly save the crescent moon below which, upon closer examination, was a few shades lighter than the rest of his coat, sparkling with stray pure white hairs.
He appeared much older than most of the crew, a fact which was confirmed as he gave a wrenching cough, turning his face away from the assembled crowd as he went about evacuating his throat of whatever had caused the offense. His creme-colored hair was set in rows of tightly wound dreadlocks held behind his head in a short ponytail. Turning towards his new-found company, he swept his leg forward in an elegant bow which, slight wavering aside, was kept perfectly straight denoting years of practice.
“I believe introductions are in order, Captain. My name is Golden Sun. I am a priest in the local abbey,” the grey stallion began as the Captain peered around, inspecting his flank.
“Golden Sun? Never would have guessed…” Bastion commented to himself, gazing at the older stallion’s cutie mark one last time before moving to the older pony’s side, matching the holy-colt’s gaze over the assembled party. “I heard tell from Windy that you supplied the food and wine. I would like to thank you for that.”
The Captain nodded graciously to his passenger before continuing. “I can’t help but notice you are not partaking in any of the proclivities. Being a priest I can understand if you’re hesitant to engage in the drinking, but the food is good and the crew…”
Bastion glanced over his crew once again, surveying the events unfolding: Wind Dancer and Dextra were engaged in conversation with the elegant unicorn stallion, little Chamomile leaned over her chair’s arm picking up every word the unicorn had to say. Bastion didn’t even think she knew what they were discussing, but the topic did not seem to be the focus of her attention.
Wildfire has finished his hoof-wrestling tourney, counting his winnings as he and some of the passengers, thoroughly inebriated, began singing space-traveling carols of their own construction, wine sloshing on the table as they swayed in unison to the tempo of their shanties.
Violet sat towards the end of the table, reading from a little book and sipping a small delicate glass of wine, both held firmly in the opalescent pulse of her glittering white magic. She had taken great lengths to mask her face and outfit herself in her best, using the few hours since their last encounter to her full advantage. A few of the singing passengers broke from their merry-making, sitting down hard in the chairs as their vision very-indiscreetly eyed the unicorn mare nearby. Though her gaze never left the words before her, a lingering smile betrayed the fact that, somewhere in that icy heart of hers, she was enjoying the attention.
With a nod and a smile, he turned back to the pious stallion and continued.
“The crew is the best you could ask for.”
Golden Sun cocked his eyebrow as he grinned sideways at the Captain, eyeing his new companion with a certain degree of interest.
“Might I ask you the same thing, Captain, if I may be so bold?” Golden Sun queried, swinging his leg wide to catch the entire collected party in his sweep. “You have undoubtedly earned some relaxation; why not take advantage of it? I am perfectly content on my own, though I would be lying if I said I didn’t enjoy the company. Her teachings are enough fuel to keep me occupied tonight.”
He finished with a pat to his chest where an old faded book lay in his pocket, its pages gilded in gold leaf. From where Bastion stood, he could make out that the cover was emblazoned with a little sun, complete with stray solar projections and prominences stamped in solid gold.
“I’ve had enough for one night,” the Captain said with a sense of finality, his eyes lilting over Violet and the passengers ogling her as he did so.
“A stallion after my own heart” was the priest’s reply as the Captain stood beside him, mimicking his gaze over the festivities which had become more and more subdued as the drinks they had had kicked into full and excruciating force. Bowing to the priest, the Captain took his leave, making his way to the opposite door-frame. Wrapping his hoof around the attached stick, he rang the kitchen-side triangle a few times to gather everyone’s attention. When all eyes were upon him, he cleared his throat and began to speak.
“Thank you, everypony. I would like to thank our passenger, Golden Sun,” Bastion said evenly with a note of thanks, gesturing to the priest with his hoof, “for the wine and cheeses…”
A hearty roar from Wildfire’s side of the table and a few more splashing drinks was proof of their appreciation, and the priest nodded slightly in their direction, a small blush on his cheeks. The Captain waited until the fanfare had died down before continuing.
“…As well as our resident chef Wind Dancer for our delicious dinner.”
A polite clapping followed during which Wind Dancer, his face perked up in anticipation of a similar ballyhoo given the priest, looked more than a bit downtrodden. His disposition was remedied a kiss on the cheek from both Chamomile and Dextra and a small, polite clap from the unicorn mare seated nearby, her face beaming in appreciation for his excellent choices of herbs and spices. The Captain, watching his crew from afar, continued his speech.
“My name is Captain Bastion, and I’m glad we could be the ones to get you wherever you need to go.” Silence followed, but that was to be expected.
“Following dinner, Cammy can escort you down to the cargo hold to collect your personals if you wish, though I will have to ask that you don’t go about exploring the ship. The helm, crew quarters, medical bay, and cargo hold are off-limits while the craft is in the air. These are my rules, and I would appreciate it if you obeyed them.”
A warning glance from Dextra and Chamomile was enough notice for him to know that he had said something wrong. He cleared his throat, making sure his next comment was heard by all.
“If you do require access to the medical bay or crew quarters for any reason, please ask the crew and they will be happy to make sure you have everything you need.” A smile from Chamomile signaled that he had recovered.
What would I do without her, Bastion thought quickly to himself.
“So, with that I will take my leave. Dextra, the ship is yours. Goodnight, everyone.”
A few drunken repetitions of “nighty-night” in various slurred versions were heard from Wildfire and his passel of passengers, more than a few of whom had begun softly snoring when the Captain took the floor. While the party continued, it was slightly hindered by the fact that only half of the remaining members were either conscious or in the right mind to continue civilized conversation. Violet, abandoning her place at the table to go back to her own quarters, proceeded past the drunken passengers carefully, taking extreme measures to avoid the spilled wines and food lest they stain her dress.
Chamomile and Dextra, along with the very drunk yet still somehow conscious Wildfire, hefted the sleeping passengers on their backs and proceeded to carry them down to the passenger dormitories. The two friends shared stories about the new arrivals they had met as they made their way down the hallway, Wildfire swaying along behind them as he revised the words to the tune he had made up, balancing an empty bottle of the priest’s fine wine upon his nose.
Wind Dancer, slightly swaying on his hooves, proceeded to begin cleaning the kitchen of various used pots and pans as Golden Sun grabbed a broom between his hooves and began sweeping the floor. When the kitchen was clean and the table reset, Wind Dancer filled up a few glasses of water and perched them on his outstretched wings, gripping a pitcher of ice-water in his mouth as he proceeded to follow his wife and the mechanic towards the passenger bay, watery gift in tow, no doubt, to ease their passengers’ suffering the following morning.
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As was custom when new passengers arrived on his ship, Bastion found himself surveying the presence of the new crates and bags lining the walls of his cargo hold. It was an old habit, one which he never had the chance or desire to give up as each passing day his hold was never the same, the boxes laid out or moved into new configurations. This was the first time in a long while he had seen anything new grace the floors, and as he did every time, he loved poring them over.
He had seen similar things as a child: crates and packages from far-off destinations with various languages, dialects, and codes scrawled on the surface, oblong wooden boxes containing mounted weapons for an airship docked in the spaceport nearby, baskets as large as the little colt himself containing foreign and exotic fruits and vegetables, destined for trade in his local market. They would never sell as much as the staple crops, and they got more and more scarce with every new arriving shipment, but their bright colors and enticing odors had more profound an effect on the little future captain than any boring oat or grain ever could.
His mother used to say that when he started working in the warehouses was when she knew he was destined to fly.
The arrival of an armored griffon adorned in dress-khakis and an armored kilt with stories of faraway conflicts and bizarre enemies was the final nail in the coffin for the both of them. She knew she would never see her baby again, and even if she did, it wouldn’t be the same little stalwart stallion she had come to love with all of her poor heart.
The hum of the main engine and the many varied sounds of the ship’s inner mechanics were not enough to silence the muffled clink, clink, clink of hooves moving up the stairs behind him. Without glancing back, he raised his voice to address his company.
“You know Miss Satine, those shoes don’t really have a place on this vessel.”
A pause filled the space between the two, followed by the ruffling of fabric and a shy whisper which echoed lightly off the walls.
“I know they don’t,” came Violet’s soft reply, “but my others are in my room. It always behooves a lady to make sure she is always looking her best.”
Bastion allowed himself one honest chuckle, recalling that lingering memory when she’d last been on the ship and Wind Dancer, enraptured by her presence even as his new wife glared at him menacingly, had decided to teach her some humor.
“You still remember those puns?”
“Of course” Violet replied, scuffing the floor again as her mouth twisted into a little grin before dying away. “I also remember they used to make you laugh.” With another little grin, Bastion kept his eyes trained on the hold even though her words had prompted him to smile.
“You haven’t changed a bit” he smirked, masking his grin before turning around to face her.
She was standing immediately behind him, only a few paces shy of uncomfortably close to the Captain. Her hair was only slightly disheveled, but given her proximity to Wildfire’s inebriated friends she considered this a remarkable achievement.
“I think you’ve changed more than enough for the both of us, Shadow.”
With a monumental effort on his part, he raised his head enough to make eye contact. His head looked down into the mare’s eyes as she cocked her head to the side, each taking stock of the changes brought on by the years spent hating one another.
Her face had tightened since he had last seen it, no doubt the product of every cosmetic and beautification treatment her profession entailed. The miniature crow’s-feet on the corners of her eyes were almost completely covered by a light dust of foundation, and were more brought on by her obvious sleep-deprivation and her inability to adjust to the rapidly shifting time changes that moving between heavenly bodies required than her age, for she looked, breathed, and spoke just as she had all those years ago.
“I know I might not show it,” Bastion began, his eyes dropping slightly as he pawed the ground. “...But a little part of me is glad to see you again, even if most of me still…well…”
“Hates me?” she provided, shuffling her feet slightly as she counted the number of holes in the walkway beneath her hooves. “…Yes, I feel that way too.”
They stood in silence, neither needing confirmation for their remarks nor willing to provide it, both locked down as their will to stay in the other’s presence dwindled though their hooves stayed firmly planted to the walkway.
“I know that what I said earlier…hurt you, a bit…”
Bastion guessed by her sudden tension that was the wrong descriptor. He amended himself quickly, much to his credit.
“…A lot…I hurt you a lot, didn’t I?”
She nodded lightly, casting her eyes downward as she thought through what he had said, what she had done, the naïveté of it all and yet, despite the years, how much it still hurt them both. It was a flutter of emotion he shared, picked up on, and addressed quietly enough so only they could hear
“I’m sorry, Violet…”
“No no, I deserved what you said…the cornering me off thing was a little rude, but…” she muttered anxious, hesitating to find the right words to adequately convey her emotions. Finding none as time slipped away, she concluded with a simple nod and a glance.
“Apology accepted...and if it makes you feel any better, not a day goes by I don’t think about it. I should have told you what I did for a living. It was wrong of me to avoid telling you that part of my life.”
She broke her eye contact, pawing the steel floor as she considered her next move carefully, trying to make her proposal fall on accepting ears.
“Shadow, I have a question to ask you,” she began, Bastion’s ears perking up as she did. “I have been less than lucky finding work in the city, and my expenses have, well..."
She stopped momentarily, trying to find a suitable euphemism for her situation before continuing.
“They’ve become a little…tight… and I was wondering if I might be allow-”
“On two conditions,” Bastion interrupted as Violet’s look of shock at his disturbance broke as the wave of the meaning of his words slowly overtook her. Looking back into her eyes, he continued softly while holding her gaze to emphasize his words and intentions.
“First, you are never…NEVER…allowed to bring your work home with you. What you do with your clients is your business and I will not have it on my ship. Do you understand?”
Her rapid nodding answered any questions he had if she understood what he meant. As the tiny clip-clopping of her dancing hooves became more and more pronounced, he raised his hoof to continue, silencing her premature excitations as he made his final point.
“Second: I will expect your rent at the first Monday of the month. We will not enter your quarters, as per our previous arrangements, without your express permission. But if I believe that you are not keeping your shuttle in space-worthy condition, I will revoke your lease. Fair?”
A look of surprise erupted from her face before the Captain had even begun addressing the conditions of her rental, and the tapping of her dancing hooves increased steadily and got louder in volume throughout his speech until finally, as he finished his statement, she pounced on him in a close embrace not at all befitting a lady.
The silence which hung in the air of the cargo hold was a dash of cold water on her face, and even before she knew what she was doing she had released the startled Captain and backed away to the far banister, hair frazzled from her rapid movements, the Captain’s back pressed firmly on the railings in an attempt to distance himself from his attacker. The silence continued, disturbed only by the ruffling of her dress and tinkling of her jewelry as she straightened out the creases her joyous attack had created.
Her gaze never lifting from the floor, she whispered a small “thank you” and rushed past the Captain towards her old shuttle, closing the door behind her and locking it firmly into place. His eyes followed her as she went, picking up her little smile and the glint of a solitary tear on her face. It could, of course, have just been her necklace catching the light of the dimming cargo hold, but Bastion knew better.
He waited until the light in her newly rented shuttle went out, then made his way towards the door leading to his room, shutting off the lights in the hold as he went.
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