“You... uh... you sure you don't need help up there, kiddo?” Rainbow Dash asked, her neck tilted upwards.
“Nah, I've got it!” Nick clung to the mast, several feet above the central hull of the Swan Song. The ship was steadily cruising eastward with a gentle breeze. “Besides, I won't be up here for long!”
“You sure? I've got wings, y'know!”
“I just gotta make sure the structure is handling the wind just fine!”
“How much force can this thing handle before we'd have to... I dunno...” Rainbow Dash shrugged. “...lower the sail to keep it from ripping apart or something?”
“So long as we don't sail into a typhoon, she should handle herself just fine! I built her out of tough stuff!”
“Considering you built this heap before your pussyhooves entered the K.M.C.A., I'm inclined to believe that,” Sinrar grunted from where he sat on the edge of the cabin, hunched over a stretch of maps.
“You know what? I'm thinking I might stay up here a little while longer,” Nick grunted. “At least it'll keep me out of range of some moron's cane.”
“Heh. Suit yourself.” Rainbow said. “Just don't get sunburnt.”
“No promises. It's a soothing breeze anyways.” Nick continued his inspections, humming casually to himself.
Rainbow Dash trotted across the central hull. While Twilight hovered overhead, she squatted by Sinrar's side and squinted at his illustrations. “So... uh... how's the charting going?”
“Shhhhh!” Sinrar hissed, adjusting his beret. “Don't interrupt genius!”
“Dr. Dude, you've been at this for three hours now.”
“And yet you had to remind me...” With a sigh, the old professor used his tight wing muscles to grip a pen, drawing a thine line across a splotch of sea. “Mrmmmfff... the cobwebs are damnably annoying when they want to be. If only my old walks across the campus could have cleared my head more.”
“Want me to kick you in the head really hard?” Rainbow asked with a smirk.
“Rainbow...” Twilight quietly chided.
“That'll get the cobwebs right the buck out!” Rainbow added, winking.
“You would love nothing less, would you, harpy?”
“For serious, Professor.” Rainbow squatted next to him, staring at the map. “How goes it? Are we about to run into any anals or something?”
“It's atolls you illiterate buffoon.”
“I-I knew that!” Rainbow's voice cracked. “I was testing you! No reason to be atoll about it... er...”
Nick giggled up above.
“You stupid youth and your stupid youthisms...” After a breathy sigh, Sinrar leaned back and pointed at the map. “We've gone further south than I had anticipated.”
“So?” Rainbow shrugged. “We can make up for it.”
“That would be most beneficent.”
“Oh? Why's that?”
“Because the last time I traveled out here, several privateers of ill-repute sailed this patch of turbulent ocean just to the southeast of our location. They liked to lay claim to a barren archipelago where they stored their illicit coral supplies.”
“Can't you—like—get coral from just about anywhere?”
“Have you not heard my energetic exclamations these past two days, harpy?” Sinrar grumbled. “There are dirty souls out here who like to abuse the substance. It has a radical effect on the equine nervous system when ingested in just the right quantities.”
“Okay. So... there are some dudes we gotta avoid,” Rainbow said. “Considering you saw them here at one point, I bet it's safe to say that was two generations ago.” She winked. “What are the odds they're still around now?”
“For once, I do not know if you are being serious or simply poking fun at me again.”
“A little of Column A and Column B?”
Twilight rolled her eyes.
“Cute. You are certainly tres sassy when out on the move.”
“It's a living.”
“I bet.” Sinrar drew a line across a patch of islands. “All in all, it'll probably be nothing. There are some shallow reefs that we should attempt avoiding.”
Rainbow nodded. “Shouldn't be a problem.”
“After that, it's going to be three days of open ocean at least.” Sinrar squinted at her. “I certainly hoped you packed something to read.”
“No, but I'm sure I can deal.”
“I brought plenty of books.” Sinrar managed a wrinkled grin. “You could try scouring one of my genius treatises.”
“Ehhh... I dunno, old timer...”
“Oooh!” Twilight grinned wide. “I'm down for that!”
Rainbow held her eyes shut. She sighed through clenched teeth. “I'll... think about it.”
“Indeed... you shall think about it... eh?” Sinrar smirked, glancing back at his maps.
Rainbow squinted at him. “What's that supposed to mean?”
“Only that you strike me as the most curious mare.”
“Cuz of the wings and the curious tales of the West, right?”
“Oh, I'm sure you have curious tales, alright,” Sinrar said. “And so does your friend.”
“... … ….who? You mean Nick?”
“Non. I mean your other friend. The one neither the larva and I could see.”
Twilight did a double-take.
With a straight face, Rainbow muttered, “I don't follow you.”
“Don't be an imbecile... even an adorable one,” Sinrar grumbled. “At first, I thought you were a coral huffer like the rest of the ruffians who get sunbleached outside and under the skin. Those are dime a dozen skin flakes of the ocean... neither here nor there. Bah! But then I saw your... Val Roan artifact, and I heard your Queen. Heavens above, if that doesn't convince me of a much larger world...”
“We live on a magical plane, Dr. Dude,” Rainbow said. “Crazy things happen.”
“Right. And a lot of that craziness evidently happens to you.” Sinrar squinted her way. “Just how is it that you have an innate compass for where you need to go next? For where the next Seed is?”
Rainbow fidgeted. She glanced out the corner of her eye at the shimmering beacon of Yaerfaerda. “That... would take an awful long time to explain.”
“We have an awful lot of ocean to explore.” Sinrar raised an eyebrow. “Are you going to spend all of that time talking to us... talking to phantoms... and talking to both?”
“Look, Professor, I've told you enough so that we can help each other with—”
“Rainbow,” Twilight softly said. “They're sacrificing an awful lot to help us with our quest.” She smiled delicately. “Maybe it would be a nice thing to share the truth about... y'know... me.”
Rainbow sat in place, ears twitching.
Sinrar saw it. “Do the voices summon you once more, harpy?” He smirked. “Perhaps you'd care to share an audience?”
Th-Thap! Nick landed on the central hull. “Whew!” He let go of a length of rope and smirked. “What are we talking about, huh?”
“It... it...” Rainbow's nostrils flared. She glanced at Twilight, then at Sinrar and Nick. “...it can wait.”
“Can it?” Sinrar muttered.
“Uh huh.” Rainbow flapped her wings. “Keep your eyes on the map, and I'll keep my eyes on the ocean.” She hovered up and flew ahead of the ship with a confused Twilight in tow. “When and if we have to... we'll discuss whatever changes have to be made to the chart.”
Nick watched Rainbow fly ahead, then turned to look at Sinrar. “What was that about?”
“Hrmmff... predictability,” Sinrar said.
“Huh?”
The old stallion adjusted his beret and drew a few more lines across the map. “You know... for a mare whose head has every color of the sky, our new friend doesn't like to share much.”
Nick shrugged. “I think she's just fine.”
“You would think that.”