//------------------------------//
// Chapter 1 
// Story: The Sea's Pearl 
// by lyra_lover777 
//------------------------------//

Fluttershy opened her eyes under water. Shapes swirled around  her and Big Mac. Her lungs were starting to burn when an orange glow emitted from a row of sharp, spine like objects. Bubbles of air surrounded the farmer and the animal lover. Fluttershy gasped in clean, crisp air, her chest heaving. Big Mac was still out cold, but was breathing steadily. She couldn't see their captors because the ocean was dark and the only light she had seen so far was from the spines.
After several more hours of being hauled through the murky waters, it started to become lighter and Big Mac awoke. The looked at each other. Then Big mac started struggling. The net was so slimy, though, that he couldn't get a good grip with his hooves so he couldn't break it. Then Fluttershy saw the first of their captors as the waters grew lighter. It had the head and front legs of a pony, but where its back legs should be there was a large fish tail. The one she was looking at had a navy and gold mane and a pink body. Gills ran on either sides of its head and large spines rolled down its back. It had to large fins where pegasi would have wings. Then it quickly darted away. She saw two more on either sides of her, one that was green with a gold mane and another that had a red body and an orange mane. The red one held the spear that had hit Big Mac on the head.
She saw them talking about random things.She let out a quiet scream. She guessed that she could hear them through the bubble, but they couldn't hear her.  Big Mac reached out and squeezed her hoof. Fluttershy squeezed back. She looked ahead. She wondered how the bubbles had gotten on her head. Her captors, whatever they were, didn't have unicorn horns. So how could they do magic? Fluttershy puzzled over this while they were dragged along. Soon she saw a large shape in the distance. It was dark brown and crumbling. As they got closer, she realized it was an old sailing ship that must have held hundreds of ponies one time long ago, but now was sunken and lying on the ocean floor. A faded banner of a sun and moon hung rotting from a leaning pole. 
The three mysterious "sea ponies" as Fluttershy was now thinking of them as pulled the net into a hole in the side of the old, leaning, wooden boat. After being pulled through narrow tunnels in which they bumped around a lot, the three sea ponies and their captives entered a large room filled with sketchy sea ponies. More than half the room had sea ponies with scars or missing body parts that stood in a crowd. In the other half of the room stood a stage with all sorts of creatures chained to the ground with air bubbles around them. There was a cockatrice, several dolphins, a manta ray, a shark, two teenage sea ponies, and a little filly unicorn who was crying. These sea ponies must be slave traders! Fluttershy curled up in a ball. Big Mac was chained right next to the filly. He held her close and her crying started to wane. Fluttershy was chained down next to him, and she started to ball. Big Mac pulled her close. No one could hear her, but Fluttershy wailed and cried. Her tears collected at the bottom of her bubble and started filling it with water. The red sea pony saw this and his spines glowed orange, and the water disappeared and her bubble became a little bigger. Fluttershy opened her eyes wide. So that was how they did magic! She looked at all the sea ponies in the room. They all had magic spines running down their backs. Did that mean that all sea ponies were like unicorns? Were there earth pony-like sea ponies and pegasi-like sea ponies, too?  Flutterhy shook the thought from her mind when her captors took the stage beside her. A gray sea pony with a pale white mane and an eye patch and a fuschia sea pony with a red mane seemed to be the captors of the rest of the ponies or creatures. They started rattling off the names and ages of their catches and the cockatrice was the first to leave the stage, being bought for a hundred SEASHELLS? Was that their money! A dolphin went for 250 seashells and  the filly went for 500 seashells. As they unchained her, she started to fight back, holding on tight to Big Mac' foreleg. They finally pulled her off and she wailed as she was dragged over to a large white sea pony with a silver mane that was missing his right foreleg. The manta ray and the dolphin went as a package deal for 400 seashells. The dolphins and rays weren't civilized and couldn't speak, but rode them like, well, ponies. One of the teenage sea ponys went for 550 seashells and was taken to a lime green filly sea pony with a red mane. Fluttershy realized that they had cutie marks on their tails, right below where the tail joined the body, where a pony's flank would be. Their red sea pony captor had a golden spear like  the one he held. The lime sea pony had a starfish as a cutie mark. Why would she be buying slaves? As the others were captives were sold, she went to the back of the room and told the teen sea pony something and tied a message to his right foreleg and pushed him out a broken window. The teen swam for his life and disappeared from sight in seconds. Fluttershy returned her attention to the stage. The last dolphin had been sold for 250 seashells and it was our turn. The green one spoke and Fluttershy saw a big green net as his cutie mark. The last of their captors had a whip as his. Then they started bidding for Big Mac. It went on for minutes, the final price being 1150 seashells. He was lead to the one legged sea pony who also had bought the unicorn filly. They started bidding for her. Fluttershy quaked in fear. Her final price was 700 seashells. Just before the red sea pony said "Sold!" the whole side of the ship collapsed and over a hundred gold armored sea ponies wielding spears, maces, tridents, swords, and bows swarmed the slavers. It was chaos. And at the front was the biggest sea pony she had seen yet. He was gold with a silver mane with a single teal stripe through it. A crown of every color of coral adorned his head. He wielded a large golden bow that shot nets. One net encased the green sea pony. The red sea pony zipped away, disappearing from the scene. The pink one watched as two soldiers grabbed her forelegs and chained them. Then she watched as the giant sea pony came towards her, shooting nets and pinning down sea ponies. One of them was the little unicorn filly and big Mac's buyer. Two sea ponies freed them of their restraints and brought them to the big one. He led them towards her. All the other buyers had escaped. The sea pony with the starfish cutie mark clopped hooves with the teen. He must have brought them here!!  The teen then bowed to the big sea pony and swam away. The lime sea pony came up and bowed to the big sea pony, who must be king. He then said" Good work, Secret Agent Limina. " She thanked him and swam away. Then the big sea pony turned to me."Fluttershy, we all need you."