//------------------------------// // Cat and Mouse // Story: The Freeport Venture // by Chengar Qordath //------------------------------// I was not a fan of sailing. I might have been spared from seasickness, but being on a ship just isn’t fun. The food is bad, the beds are uncomfortable, and I was stuck with a bunch of sailors who didn’t seem to care for anyone who wasn’t already a member of the crew. At least Puzzle had put me back on the Venture for this trip, and Captain Weyland ran a tight ship. I was a little unsure about having Kukri along for a mission like this, though. Sure, now I knew she was a changeling, but even if she was a disguised bug, she was still a kid. I guess I should technically be calling her ‘it’ instead of ‘she,’ but I was too used to thinking of Kukri as a filly. Regardless of her species and pronoun, I wanted her somewhere safe if things got dangerous. The trip out had been uneventful. Our cargo had been light on things Mome would be interested in, so we hadn’t been expecting an attack. Our load of fresh sugarcane might have made a tidy profit—there was a lot of money in feeding Equestria’s huge sweet tooth—but sugar wasn’t exactly the sort of cargo that a pirate like Metal Mome would get excited about. What we’d picked up for the return trip, however, would do quite nicely: magically infused gemstones, a selection of alchemical reagents, and several rare metals. The Venture might not be a treasure ship loaded down with gold, but our cargo was plenty valuable, especially to a pony like Metal Mome who would want to get his hooves on golemcrafting materials. I’d stayed on-ship while we were at port in Baltimare. Maybe I was just being paranoid, but I didn’t like the idea of setting hoof on Equestrian soil. Not after my run-ins with the EIS. Besides, there wasn’t much I could really do in the city anyway. I planned on coming back to Equestria someday, but not until I’d settled things. And when I did come back, it would be on my terms, not Celestia’s, and certainly not because the EIS or my parents managed to drag me back. We were on our fifth day out of Baltimare when I went looking for Captain Weyland. I trotted out of my cabin and took a quick look around. An island just barely over the horizon told me that we’d hit the outskirts of the Fillypene Archipelago. Close enough to prey on ships heading into Freeport, but not close enough that their patrols covered the sealanes reliably. Like Puzzle had said, one of the small outlying islands would be the perfect place to hide a pirate base. Not to mention providing cover for a good ambush. I found Captain Weyland on the quarterdeck (among the books I’d picked up was a quick primer on nautical terminology). The no-nonsense mare spared me a very brief glance, then turned her attention back to her crew. After a couple seconds, she grunted and nodded, giving me permission to speak. I threw up a quick privacy spell and got straight to business. “We’re five days out of Equestria and in the outlying islands. This is when you and Puzzle both said we'd probably run into Mome if he's coming after us.” Weyland grunted again, studying the horizon for a few moments before she actually deigned to answer me. “So it is. We're too far out from any port to easily escape to, or from any of the regular patrols from Freeport. All a pirate has to do is park their ship in a nice sheltered bay and send up a couple fliers to keep an eye out for any nice, fat, happy merchant ships loaded down with valuable cargo.” “And if Puzzle did his job right, he’ll be looking for us in particular. We are carrying a load of cargo that's custom-tailored to be tempting to Mome.” It felt a bit weird to call Puzzle ‘he’ instead of ‘it.’ Well, actually, it felt weird either way. Still, I didn’t know if the captain knew the truth about Puzzle’s identity, and I doubted Puzzle would appreciate me outing it as a changeling. If it wanted everypony knowing it was a bug, it would be running around in its natural form. “Our cargo would be especially tempting to a golemancer, yes.” The charcoal-grey mare frowned and scratched her chin. “Most of it would take special connections to fence, but Mome almost certainly has those if he’s keeping himself supplied with gear. And our goods have high value for their weight and volume, which pirates always like.” She paused, then softly scoffed. “Actual pirates, not the scraggly gang of custom officials the Council has been turning most of them into using their code. Once you can make a pirate turn around and sail the other way just by showing them that your paperwork’s in order and your port fees are paid up, they’re not pirates anymore.” She mulled over that for a moment, then shrugged. “Which is probably why Mome went rogue. He’s one of those pirates who believes they should actually be pirates.” “That was my working theory.” I suppose one could almost call Metal Mome an idealist, assuming one was willing to call murder, plunder, and enslavement for profit an ideology. “So are you sure there’s nothing else we need to do to get ready for him?” Weyland stepped out of the privacy spell’s coverage area for a moment to pass along a few orders to her crew, then came back and gave me her answer. “Keep an eye out for the ship. The last thing we want is to be ambushed, especially if they come after us at night. Night attacks are always risky, but any pirate bold enough to go rogue is going to be up for gambling. Not really much to do other than that, unless we spot them. If we do, we act like every other merchie that sees a pirate ship: we start running.” I was a little surprised by that. I’m not an expert on history, but I knew the Doo Trading Company traced its roots back to exiles from the old Doo Clan of Pegasopolis. Running away from a fight didn’t match up with warrior clans that were famously proud to a fault. I suppose she must’ve guessed what was going through my mind, because she snorted and shook her head. “Equestrians. You always think stuff that happened centuries ago still matters. I’m no warrior princess, I’m a merchant captain. My job’s to get my cargo from point A to point B. Fighting pirates, even if we win, doesn’t help me do that. You want a pony who’ll fight just for the hay of it, hire one of my cousins.” Her chest puffed out in pride. “The Doo Companies are still the best mercs in the business. Pity we don’t have any of them here, but a hundred pegasi in full plate would be out of place on an innocent merchant ship. Pirates usually don’t go after ships they think will give them a hard fight; hiring new crew and repairing the ship takes time and money, and there are plenty of soft targets to be had.” It felt a little weird to think of pirates being extremely worried about their bottom line, but it was pretty obvious the captain was right. Maintaining a ship in sailing condition, keeping the crew fed and equipped, and paying off port officials and fences would all eat into the profits. It was probably why the Freeport Code got its start as a way to encourage merchants to give up without a fight. “So we have to act like easy prey and lure them in. Alright, got it. So when do I spring my trap? I know you said your crew can handle defending the Venture for a while, but...” “I’d rather not have to,” Weyland finished the thought. “We’re not equipped for a fight, and they’d have us outnumbered three to one.” She paused for a bit to glower at a sailor who apparently wasn’t working as fast as she wanted. “As for your tactics, I suggest striking once the pirates are certain we’re nothing but a weak, defenseless little merchant ship and get overconfident. They'll probably be faster than us, so after a good enough chase we'll pretend to be surrendering. Once they're close enough, you can hit them.” “Sounds like a simple plan. Just don't let them get so close they can pull up alongside.” I smirked at her. “Fire does have a habit of spreading, after all. I’m not planning on going all out pyromaniac on them unless I’m backed into a corner, but things don’t always go according to plan in the middle of a frantic battle.” “Quite.” Weyland frowned over at one of the nearby islands, remaining silent for several tense seconds. “A lot depends on how far you can hit them from, and how good you are at making it stick. If your horn can back up the promises your mouth’s been making, you should be able to fry that ship before it gets anywhere near close enough to board us.” “I could easily burn the ship down to the waterline from long range,” I confidently announced. Wood and cloth are rather notoriously flammable, and the tar used for waterproofing is even worse. Considering ships were out in the middle of so much water, fire was a surprisingly big threat to them. However, there was one rather big wrinkle with the idea of just burning Mome’s ship. “The problem is, I need proof of death for Mome, so destroying them at long range isn’t an option. I could try pounding them at range for a bit just to soften them up, but even then there’s a risk I’d lose my bounty, or that the ship would burn out of control. I'll probably have to board them if I want to be completely certain I get him.” Weyland grunted. I was getting good enough at reading her grunts to realize that one was not one of her happier ones. “I hope you have a plan for that. Puzzle Piece might be paying me extra to help you on this, but he’s not paying me nearly enough to endanger my ship and crew by pulling alongside a burning ship to rescue you.” No surprise there. Weyland took the whole ‘captain’ thing very seriously “I wasn’t planning on asking you to put your ship in that kind of danger. You've got smaller boats, right?” I glanced over at one of the rowboats. “I can take one to their ship, and for the trip back. And if something goes wrong, they’ll have rowboats too. Or worst case, ice floats just fine, and I’m pretty good at using it.” The captain thought that over, then gave a barely perceptible nod. “You cost us a rowboat, you’re liable for replacing it. If you snag that bounty, then replacing a rowboat’s going to be pocket change for you anyway.” She paused, then flicked her wings. “Though you aren't going to have much time to do what you want. If you go in throwing fire all over the place, Mome’s ship will probably go up like a bonfire. Won't be long before it’s a deathtrap, if you do your job right.” “If I plan on burning that ship until it’s nothing but a floating cinder, it won’t last long.” I shot her a confident smirk. “And as for it being a deathtrap, I don't burn. My control’s good enough that I could jump into an actual bonfire and be just fine.” “Very impressive.” Weyland raised an eyebrow. “So, how good are you at dealing with smoke? I’m told it does rather unpleasant things when you inhale too much of it. And you might not be bothered by fire, but I think you still wouldn’t enjoy it when the floorboards, ceilings, and masts start collapsing. I’ve heard plenty of stories about ponies being dragged down with the ship because they were tangled in the rigging or trapped beneath the mast.” Ugh. “Okay, you’ve got a point.” I ran a hoof over my face and groaned. “I was planning on using fire a bit sparingly anyway. If I can take the ship intact, I could probably sell it for almost as much as the bounty on Mome himself.” Weyland nodded along with that. “A good ship’s worth a lot of money. If you take it and need help getting it back to port, I can offer some crew and repair supplies.” I could guess at the other side of that offer. “In exchange for a cut of the sale money, right?” “Of course.” Weyland did something I’d never seen from her before: she smiled. “But better to give me a share than not get the ship back to port at all, right? One third of the ship’s sale price is better than one hundred percent of nothing. Tempting as it would be to make the sale myself and cut it down to two shares, I’d rather not deny Puzzle Piece his portion. Cheating the best fixer in Freeport is never a winning move.” “Right.” Although from what little I’d seen of Puzzle Piece, it might just congratulate us for beating it in its own game. With all the time and money it had put into getting me set up, I’m not even sure it was making much profit by helping me this mission. I got the impression it was more into playing the game for its own sake than adding another digit to its bank account. In hindsight, I’m pretty sure it had cut me in on the trade profit from this voyage just because my effort at negotiating amused it. Things went quiet for long enough that I’d assumed the conversation was over and dropped the privacy spell. Needless to say, that was when Weyland decided to start talking again, “There’s also a risk Mome will make a run for it when things turn against him. Like you mentioned, his ship will have rowboats of its own. Most smart pirates know how to swim too, and a good swimmer could make it to one of the islands from here.” I thought that over, considered my options, and shrugged. “If he runs, I’ll have to chase him. Maybe he’ll get away, maybe he won’t. Nothing about pirate hunting is risk-free. Though if that happens, he'll be leaving his ship and golems behind. It might not get me a bounty, but losing all of that would put him back to square one. Capturing and selling the ship and golems would make me plenty of money, and Mome would have a hard time replacing what he lost. I suspect the Council could live with Metal Mome being alive but lacking the resources to do any pirating.” “Hard to be a pirate with no ship and no crew,” Weyland agreed. “I think you might be onto something with the Council too. Knowing them, they mostly care about making an example of Mome for not toeing the line. For that, alive and broken works just as well as dead. Maybe even better, in some respects. A dead pirate’s a martyr, but a living one begging on the streets for his next meal is a constant reminder of the price of defiance.” “You might be right about that one,” I conceded. “I think I’ll still do my best to kill than capture him, regardless. While the Council might agree that they get more out of keeping him alive and free after he’s beaten, they’re only paying me a bounty for bringing him in. Letting him get away after breaking his spirit isn’t in the contract.” Weyland’s answer was an affirmative grunt. “The Council didn’t get rich by paying out bits when they have an excuse to keep them.” She frowned and rubbed her chin. “Not to mention that it’d be hard to sell if you do so much damage that it sinks to the bottom of the ocean. That would put it into the ‘less-than-pristine condition’ category.” I’d already reached that same conclusion almost two weeks ago with Puzzle. “That’s another reason I'm going to try and be sparing with the fire if I can. I have other ways of fighting. Besides, if I do need to break out the fire, I have almost perfect control. I'm not some thug pyromancer who just wildly flings fire all over the place.” Weyland shrugged, clearly not the least bit impressed by any of my magical credentials. “I'm just stating how it is. Fires damage ships, you’re a fire user who wants to try and sell the ship after the fight.” I couldn’t really argue against her logic. So instead, I just moved on to the next part of the plan. “So, I was thinking that once the pirates catch up with us and you signal your surrender, I'll head over there to carry the message or negotiate or whatever. That's part of the procedure, right?” “It can be.” Weyland glowered out at the sea, her eyes narrowing at some random bit of water. “There isn't exactly a standard checklist to these type of things. The Council's leashed dogs have their rules, but once a pirate goes rogue, they’re hard to predict. No more code of rules, so it’s all down to what the captain and crew want. Still, sending over an envoy of some sort after a surrender is a pretty standard move. Even if they’re the worst sort of pirates, they wouldn't be against taking a hostage from the crew.” “But playing the part of envoy will at least get me on their ship.” Granted, being on my own on a ship packed with pirates and a pair of killer golems usually wouldn’t be a good thing. I suppose I led a very unique life. Weyland frowned at me. “If that's how you want to handle it. You sure you up for it? Lots of things could go wrong with how outnumbered you’d be. Even if you’re as good as you claim, all it takes is one pirate getting lucky. If your plan doesn’t work, then we’re still stuck out here with a ship full of greedy pirates that’s way too close for comfort. Hope you have a plan of some sort to get out of there if things get too hot for you.” “I’ve got a few escape plans.” Teleporting was definitely an option as long as the Venture stayed close enough for me to make the jump. If that wasn’t an option, I had a couple more exotic tricks I could try. I wasn’t too worried about being chased, at least. “If things go bad for me, the first thing I'll do is throw out the idea of salvaging the ship and just set everything on fire. That should be enough to keep them from chasing after your ship, at the very least.” “Good to know.” Weyland shook her head and sighed. “If it were up to me, I would have you set fire to the whole ship and then examine the remains. Losing the ship as a prize hurts, but trying to take it intact is a big risk, and I’d rather play it safe when it comes to the lives of my crew. Of course, you might not find Mome then. Or he might not even be recognizable.” “And that would be enough to cost me my bounty.” I rather doubted the Council would pay out if I claimed Mome was dead but couldn’t produce any proof of it. I tried to come up with any other huge ship-destroying spells I could manage. I could try conjuring up a big enough block of ice to put a hole in the pirate ship, but we were far enough south that cooling off enough water to make even a small iceberg would take a ton of energy. Not to mention sinking Mome’s boat might end up giving me the same problem—a captain was supposed to go down with his ship, after all. There were a couple other tricks I could try, but most of them ran afoul of the same problem. Whipping up a storm with weather magic would not only sink Mome’s ship, but would probably put the Venture in danger too. Heavy-duty telekinesis wasn’t an option because I lacked any suitable throwing objects. Well, I suppose I could try using some of the metal from the cargo hold, but I doubted that would go over well with the captain. Weyland sighed and rubbed her forehead. “I suppose the Council wouldn’t be paying out a bounty if one or two spells from long range was all it took to do the job. If it were that easy, they would’ve handled it themselves.” “Probably, yeah.” It was possible that the Council could’ve spent their own resources and were just killing two birds with one stone by sending me. I suppose it didn’t really matter, in the end. “They're just pirates. Common criminals, really. I'll manage. Worst case, I'll just fry the ship and we can sort through the wreckage later.” Weyland frowned at me, clearly disapproving of my flippancy. “It's never ‘just’ anything when you're on the high seas, Sunset. Wise up to that, and you might live to a ripe old age. Don’t, and you’ll just be another young hothead who ends up being buried at sea. Seen way too many like you in my time. Think you’re so smart and have all the answers, until you come up against something that’s too much for you.” She scowled at me for a bit, then shook her head. “Still, Puzzle Piece wouldn’t be backing you if he didn’t think you have the chops to pull this off. Just play it smart. You can’t collect a bounty if you don’t survive.” “I know what I’m doing,” I growled back, more than a little testy after that lecture. I was getting tired of everypony treating me like I was a fresh-faced kid. Sure, I’d never gone up against pirates before, but I knew more about magic than everypony else on this boat added together. As long as I could keep slinging spells, the rest of it would all fall into place. I wasn’t in the mood to start a fight with the captain, and she had apparently gone back to running the ship instead of trying to lecture me. I was just about to head back to my cabin and read a book to cool off for a bit when I heard a cry from the crow’s nest. “Sail off the port bow!” Weyland frowned, and her eyes immediately locked onto me. So much for going belowdecks. “Looks like we might be having company soon. Might just be another merchant ship since there are plenty in these waters, but my gut says it’s not. Best make yourself ready.” “Got it.” Not that there was much I could do. I was as ready as I would ever be. Now it was just a matter of waiting to see what came of it. I’d read a few swashbuckling stories, back when I read some light fiction for ‘balance.’ Not anything I focused on, but it’s a reasonably popular adventure genre. Whenever there were ship chases in those books, they were full of clever strategy and cunning maneuvers as the two ships jockeyed for position and advantage. Like an intricate game of chess, except with ships, winds, and currents instead of a board and pieces. Compared to how books handled it, the reality was rather underwhelming. Part of it was just that I didn’t understand the implications of the minor course changes Weyland would order every five minutes or so. Sure, I’d read enough to recognize the nautical terminology and knew basic stuff like tacking into the wind, but Weyland wasn’t stopping to explain why she was making each particular maneuver and how it would affect the overall chase. Real life tends to lack all that helpful narrative exposition a novel can slip in. On top of that, the fact that we wanted the pirates to catch us killed a lot of the tension that would normally be there. Plus, reading about a chase that took three hours was very different from actually sitting through all three hours of said chase. Whatever the case, nervous anticipation rapidly faded into a sort of impatient boredom. I just wanted them to hurry and catch us already so we could get this all over with. Still, it could’ve been worse. Some of those chases I’d read about had lasted for days. It took an hour before we even knew for sure that the ship chasing us was the Granite Heart, Metal Mome’s ship. It was rather hard to spot the nameplate of a ship that was nothing more than a distant barely-visible sail. I’d borrowed a telescope at one point, hoping I could get a good look at the ship and its crew, but all I saw were a bunch of vague specks milling about on the ship itself. I suppose it was too much to hope that Metal Mome would be standing up on the forecastle posing somewhere that would allow me to easily spot him. He was probably too busy actually running the ship to do anything that dramatic. The ship was still so far away that I could barely tell the difference between the equine and gryphon crewmembers when Weyland tapped me on the shoulder. “They’re close enough, and we’re getting late into the afternoon. I’d rather wrap this up with plenty of time before we lose the light. Whatever you end up doing and however this ends up going, trying to do my part of it gets a lot harder once the sun goes down.” She pointed at one of the rowboats, which a couple crewponies were already lowering into the water, then waved me towards it. “Get on with it then. Best of luck; you’ll need it.” “I don’t need luck for something like this, but I won’t say no to any edge I can get.” I trotted over and hopped into the rowboat while the crew finished lowering it into the water. I was vaguely annoyed that I would have to row myself to the pirate ship, but I suppose it shouldn’t have come as a surprise. Captain Weyland had made it pretty obvious that she had no intention of putting any of her crew in peril to help me snag Mome. Just agreeing to the mission in the first place seemed to have been more of a risk than she cared for. Besides, telekinetically controlling the paddles to row myself over was child’s play. As I approached the Granite Heart, I naturally contrasted the ship against the Venture. That comparison didn’t do the pirates any favors. Their ship was smaller and leaner than the Venture, with only two masts compared to the Venture’s three. It also didn’t look nearly as polished as the trading ship; several bits of damage in the hull had just been covered over with tar, and the sails looked like they’d been stitched and patched a couple dozen times. Since going rogue, the crew had obviously been denied the use of the proper dock facilities they’d need to make full repairs, so the pirates had to improvise. Once I got a bit closer, I also noticed how much more crowded the Granite Heart looked. No surprise, given that it was smaller than the Venture, but by Puzzle’s estimate it had three times its normal crew. As soon as I got close enough, the extremely unpleasant smell that accompanied too many beings crammed into close quarters hit my nostrils. Finally, I got a good look at the crew themselves. One thing my books had gotten right: the pirates were a mixed band of just about every race I’d ever seen or heard of, plus hybrids like mules and hippogryphs. Most of them were also wearing enough jewelry to make some of the nobles back in Canterlot jealous, though I suspect that with pirates all the jewelry was less about making a fashion statement than the fact that on a ship full of thieves, the best way to protect your wealth was to keep on you at all times. I pulled up alongside the pirate ship, and after a little bit of awkwardness managed to climb up a rope ladder onto the deck. I quickly looked over the crew itself, taking note of weapons and which ones looked especially dangerous. The zebra with several shrunken heads hanging off his saddle and a large gryphon with a pair of cutlasses sheathed along her sides caught my eye. The pirates backed off just enough to give me room to properly board the ship while staying out of range of any surprise attack I might try to pull, but they were still close enough to close in on me in less than a second, if things turned sour. They weren’t my main concern, though. It was hard to miss the minotaur Puzzle had warned me about. Silverhorns had, unsurprisingly, coated his horns in some sort of silvery metal. Probably not actual silver, since that wouldn’t be very practical for combat. More likely mithril—expensive, but not inconceivable for a veteran pirate. The repeating crossbow strapped to his back looked like it could make my day very unpleasant, as could the large spiked chain he was holding onto. Once the fighting started, I would have to deal with him quickly. No sign of the captain though. At least, not yet. I tried to muster the right mix of fear and attempted bravery to play the part of a negotiator sent over to a ship full of pirates. After a bit of thought, I decided to channel one of those self-important nobles I’d run into from time to time in Canterlot. That would do nicely for setting the tone. “Which one of you is in charge? Captain Weyland sent me over to find out what your intentions are, and what it will take to make you leave us alone.” I turned to Silverhorns. “You seem to be the biggest and ugliest one of the lot, so I’m guessing you’re the leader here.” The minotaur chuckled and shook his head. “Captain always has to make an entrance.” He looked up, and I followed his gaze just in time to see somepony come swinging down from the rigging, landing in the open space between myself and the other pirates. That was when I got my first proper look at Metal Mome. Like any proper pirate captain, he was decked out in more finery than anyone else in his crew. His gaudy, colorful appearance was only enhanced by his bright pink coat, though the grey stripes from his zebra genes offset that color to some degree. His horn stuck out from the middle of his tricorn hat, and the green-and-white dreadlocks of his mane trailed out from the back—his tail had been done up in the same style. He was wearing a bright blue coat, with half a dozen large gems sewn into it. His hat came off his head, glowing orange with his magic, and he offered a mocking half-bow. “Captain Metal Mome of the good ship Granite Heart, at your service.” “Sunset Shimmer.” I saw no reason to hide my name. If I was going to be living in Freeport for the foreseeable future, building up a bit of a reputation wouldn’t hurt. If word got back to Equestria that I was taking down rogue pirates, then so much the better. I’d rather have Celestia know I was putting her training to good use than have her spies trailing behind me and slipping me extra bits every time my funds started running low. “Ah, a fine name for a fine lass.” Mome grinned and put his hat back on his head. “I’d say it’s a pleasure to meet you, but I suspect by the end of the day it’ll be much more of a pleasure for me than it will for you. I like a pretty face as much as the next stallion, but business comes first. So, you want to know my intentions, do you? That’s quite simple: I intend to take everything off your ship that’s worth taking. And since your ship’s worth taking too, I’ll have that as well. Don’t make a fuss, and I’ll have my crew drop you off on that island over there. Maybe even spare enough supplies for you to make a raft and get yourselves back to civilization someday.” He pointed to a distant green smudge on the horizon. “Put up a fight, and things get much less pleasant.” I decided to play the part a bit longer. I hadn’t seen his golems yet, and I would like to get a look at them before this turned messy. “You can’t take all our things and our ship! That’s against the Freeport Code!” Dark chuckles drifted up from the crew, and Mome’s grin widened to the point where it looked like an expression that belonged on a hungry shark. “My dear lady, what exactly gave you the impression that we give a damn about what laws Freeport passes? Maybe some of my fellows don’t mind wearing a collar and taking orders like good dogs, but me and my boys still remember what it means to be pirates. Isn’t that right, gang?” Mome’s crew gave a loud cheer, brandishing their weapons. I still didn’t know where his golems were, but I was starting to think that might not be an issue. If I could take out Mome while he was standing right in front of me, they would never even enter the equation. Besides, playing at being weak and scared wasn’t something I felt like dragging out. “I’ve got a counter-proposal for you. You all surrender and take your ship back to Freeport so I can turn you in for the bounty, and I won’t kill every last one of you.” There was a tense second, until Mome threw his head back and let out a bark of laughter. “Oh, very nice. I like a lass who’s got a little fire in her!” There was no way I could resist and opening like that. “Oh, if fire’s what you like, then you’re gonna love me.” Then I hurled a fireball straight into his chest. There was a bright flash of light when the attack hit, and all of the gems on his coat fell off, charred and broken. I guess he must’ve worked some kind of protection spells into them. If he had, they weren’t anywhere near strong enough to handle me, because not only had I broken all of them with one spell, but enough magic still got through to send him sliding across the deck, his coat and hat burning and smoke wafting up from his body. He was still alive, but there didn’t seem to be much fight left in him. The entire crew stared at their downed captain, then turned back to me. I decided to indulge myself with a bit of dramatics and struck a pose, conjuring up half a dozen more fireballs. “Was that fiery enough for you? ‘Cause I’m just getting warmed up!” Silverhorns let out an enraged bellow and quickly moved to place himself in my line of fire to the captain. Once he’d ensured that I couldn’t finish Mome off, he took a swing at me with his spiked chain. With all fire I’d conjured up by drawing in ambient heat, the temperature around my body was already close to freezing, so throwing up an ice shield to block the attack was easy. I threw one of my fireballs at the minotaur and chucked the rest into the crowd of pirates in the hopes of breaking and demoralizing them. Beating all forty of the pirates in a straight fight would be hard even for me, but pirates tend to have a keen sense of self-preservation. They could probably wear me down with sheer numbers if they were suicidally determined fanatics, but they weren’t. Given the choice between taking me out and dying in the process or running away and living, all of them would pick the latter. It would take a bit more than a sneak attack on the captain to break them, though. The zebra I’d noticed earlier charged towards me, and I quickly iced over the deck underneath his hooves, sending him sliding to the floor. For good measure, I set his tail on fire too. The gryphon came at me next, using her wings to bypass the iced-over deck. I tried a quick fire blast, but she was an agile enough flier to dodge right past it. I had to throw up another ice shield to block a double overhand chop from her two sabres. I tried to follow that up by expanding the ice a bit to trap the weapons, but she saw what I was up to and quickly repositioned her weapons out of harm’s way. To make things worse, Silverhorns switched to his crossbow. I barely managed to put up an ice barrier in time to avoid catching the bolt with my face. Things were not looking good for me. Silverhorns still had several more bolts in his crossbow, and I’d barely managed to block his first shot. Not to mention there was an entire ship full of other pirates to deal with. If I focused too much on the minotaur, one of them would probably stick a knife in my back. I might be surviving thus far, but things could go bad very quickly. If one of them managed to land a solid hit on me, I’d probably get dogpiled by the rest before I could recover. They just needed me to make one mistake, give them one opening, and everything would fall apart. That fact settled into the pit of my stomach like a burning lead weight. This had all been a huge mistake. Strumming was right, I wasn’t ready for this. However, within a moment of that thought popping into my head I remembered one of Celestia’s self-defense lessons. I could practically hear her voice whispering into my ear. Though I hope you never need these lessons, there may come a time when your only choice is to use force to defend yourself. Should that happen, you must remain calm and control your fear. At the time, I’d objected to the idea that I would be afraid, but she laughed that off. Oh, I have no doubt you’re a very brave pony—you’re my wonderful student. However, listen to me anyway. Magic is a weapon of the mind. Whether in battle or anywhere else, the mind has no greater enemy than blind panic. I spared a brief moment to apply that lesson and re-center myself. I tried to look at the situation the same way I would any other problem, and not think about the fact that if I screwed this particular problem up, it would end with me murdered or worse. I needed to turn this fight around fast, or I would get swarmed. I’d planned on holding back my teleportation spell for a getaway or a surprise attack on Mome, but that wouldn’t do me any good if I got dogpiled this early in the fight. Besides, Mome seemed to be out of action for the moment. I quickly teleported up into the rigging, far away from the mass of pirates who’d been trying to box me in. That left a bunch of pirates clustered up on the deck beneath, standing around and looking confused. Silverhorns and the gryphon started swinging about blindly, presumably on the assumption that I’d turned invisible. Not a bad guess, considering invisibility was a much more common spell than Perfect Teleportation. As far as I knew, Celestia and I were the only living ponies who knew that spell. Since I’d bought a few seconds—however long it took until one of the pirates thought of looking up—I put that time to good use. Fire’s usually a better choice for pure wide area destruction, but I didn’t want to burn the whole ship just yet. Especially not when I was still winning the fight. Ice doesn’t have quite as much raw destructive power as fire, but it also doesn’t have a habit of spreading out control. I closed my eyes, concentrated, and drained all the heat out of the nearby air, creating dozens of apple-sized balls of solid ice. Hopefully not bad enough to kill anypony, but considering the mast was more than thirty meters up I was pretty sure my ice balls would pick up enough momentum to leave behind nasty bruises and a few broken bones. Despite my earlier bravado, I’d rather not kill anypony when there was another way of handling it. My ice storm hammered down on the crew, earning me a chorus of shouts and groans from the pirates below, since pirates usually didn’t wear much in the way of armor to cushion the blows. Full plate might be great for blocking swords, but falling into the water was a very real danger on board a ship, and then heavy armor went from asset to problem. Though I think if they had a choice right now, they’d take the risk of drowning over all the injuries I was leaving behind. I decided on one more hit to finish them off. A couple quick, precise bursts of fire severed the lines holding the foresail in place, and a little of precision telekinesis guided it so that it landed on top of the pirates. Hopefully that would keep them all disoriented and entangled while sapping their morale. If they still wanted a fight I could just drop more ice on top of them while they were effectively blind and helpless. Making dozens of hailstones took a lot of power, but I could keep it up longer than they could take it. Hopefully, they would play it smart and give up. Just to be safe, I gave them another round of falling ice, then magically amplified my voice and laid down my terms. “Okay, geniuses, here’s the deal. You’re all pinned down and wounded, I’ve got the high ground and more than enough magic left in me to finish you all off. Anyone tries anything, and you get another helping of hailstones. You all stay under the sail like good little children, and I’ll let you be. Now find your way to the side of the ship and toss your weapons overboard. You know what’ll happen if you try anything.” The mass of pirates stirred around beneath their improvised prison, but nopony tried to cut their way out or escape. After a while I saw cutlasses and other weapons start dropping into the water. I had no idea whether that meant they’d actually given up or they were just playing along and waiting for me to let down my guard so they could try something sneaky. Probably the second one. Any pirate worthy of the name would keep a few hidden weapons on them, and I hadn’t exactly taken a full inventory of their equipment before the fight started. Still, I had them cowed for the moment, and that was enough for me. So, next step. I could collect Mome, teleport back to the Venture to drop him off, and then figure out what to do with the rest of the pirates. I’d probably need to grab Silverhorns too. Take away the top two leaders of the pirates, and the rest might be cowed enough to follow orders back to Freeport. From what little I knew of how Freeport’s justice system operated, the Council would come down on Mome and Silverhorns a lot harder than they would on ordinary crewmembers. First things first, though. Grab the pirate captain. I teleported back down to the deck and went to where I’d seen him last. There was just one problem: Metal Mome wasn’t there anymore. A huge thumping sound came from underneath the deck, as if something very large and very heavy was waking up. The entrance to the cargo hold flew open, and two huge figures jumped out. And I do mean huge. Mome’s war golems were bipeds, as opposed to the traditional quadruped design for Equestrian golems. Maybe the design had been influenced by his minotaur friend, though both of the golems were at least a full meter taller than a minotaur. I was a little surprised to see Mome hadn’t opted for the cold iron plating traditionally used by golems, but I suppose a pirate who worked this far away from Equestria wouldn’t be nearly as worried about protecting his golems from magic. Even without any cold iron to block my spells, I was still up against several tons of solid steel, all very focused on killing me. The deck groaned underneath the golems as they climbed up to face me. One of them was carrying a sword that looked like it was at least twice as long as I was tall, while the other carried a massive shield in one limb and a long halberd in the other. Presumably, the shield-bearer would be the one which focused on protecting him while the sword-carrier tried to slice me into little pieces. Which, if it could swing that terrifyingly huge sword with any kind of effectiveness, would only take one hit. Mome hopped up next to his two war golems, his horn glowing bright orange. He grinned at me like a timberwolf who had just spotted an unattended foal. “Nicely done, lass. Nicely done indeed. I might need to see about replacing some of my crew.” The shield golem stepped in front of him, blocking my line of fire, while the sword golem began stalking towards me. “Respect. You’ve earned it. You’ve put up a good fight and got several nice hits in.” The sword golem took a quick practice swing, whipping its blade through the air way too fast for my liking. Mome’s smile shrank, shifting from cheerful to cold and confident. “My turn.”