Author: May I Cut In
Co-author: Brother Malachai
Editor: Curious Quill
“A bigger boat isn’t going to help my sister out there. It needs to be the biggest, most giant-rific boat. I’m talking so big, we can build Ponyville on it!”- Pinkie Pie in a meeting with her colony’s engineers the day after the rescue.
Over the course of the next few days, while her friends started to deal with their own problems, Pinkie had nothing to do. In short, she was utterly bored. She had already tried to help out her fellow colonists but after a few incidents they were rather wary of her help. They still completed their work (often ahead of schedule) despite the ‘accidents’, though the looks of horror in their eyes whenever she approached to help discouraged her from trying again. So, she had nothing to do. And an idle Pinkie Mind was Discord’s Workshop, or so the saying went.
She could have, maybe, talked to her sister Maud, if Maud hadn’t already set off on an expedition to study the underwater geothermal vents off the coast of their first city. Pinkie had,of course, provided the best seismic monitoring equipment she could get her hooves on.
So there she was. Bored. But old habits die hard, and she spent the time drawing schematics. While back in Ponyville, it would either have been improvements to her contraptions or new ones entirely. (Her idea of converting her party cannon to “proper” howitzer and mortar use was the basic foundation that the magitech artillery pieces used by their army were based on). Now it would be — hopefully — more peaceful ideas that would improve the lives of her citizens.
Another day, another one spent on nothing but doodling. The hours crawled by with excruciating slowness, but she eventually found herself sitting against a backdrop of the setting sun.
Packing up her blueprints, she headed back to her personal quarters for the night. Lying in bed, she gazed at Boulder, which was on the bedside table next to Maud’s bed. Goodnight, Maud, she thought as she climbed into her bed, I hope you’re having more fun than I am.. Closing her eyes, she felt her heavy eyelids closing—
“Nose Twitch, Wing flap, Pinchy Knee,” Pinkie said aloud to no one in particular, sitting up in her bed, “followed up by an itchy front left hoof and a floppy left ear! This must be quite the doozy!” She immediately got up and started to trot around in a circle. She did not understand the front half of the combo but she recognised the second part. She had had it once before, back in Equestria. And that had been when her family’s rock farm was attacked by Tirek. She quickly grabbed her phone and called the communications team.
“Call my sister’s boat now,” she said as soon as the call connected.
…...
“You said my sister is calling me,” Maud asked while pulling up a probe containing rock samples from the side of the Explorer.
“Yeah, she is,” replied Blue Maelstrom, holding the phone out to her. “You’d better get on the horn. She seems rather discombobulated. Even for her.”
Maud quickly packed the samples into a nearby crate and headed to the bridge. She picked up the phone. “Speaking.”
“Maud, you’re ok!” Pinkie exclaimed on the phone.
“Yeah, I’m fine, Pinkie. What is it,” Maud inquired in her usual monotone.
“Maud! I need you to listen to me! I just got a really big do—” Pinkie started, only for the signal to start breaking up, and for a faint roar to sound off in the distance—a roar which was steadily getting louder—and closer. The strange beasts that were in tow looked mainly akin to giant fish, but also has a pair of horrific mandibles. The look in their eyes indicated extreme rage--and hunger. And it seemed a metallic vessel filled with ponies from another planet was on the menu. The light of the alien suns glimmered off the strange blue-green scales that made up the armor of these cyclopean monstrosities. Drool dripped down from the mandibles into the water below. The eyes of the sea beasts bugged out, eager to chase down the meal that was before them.
“I see some aliens coming. I guess that is what you’re warning me about,” Maud stated.
“Get moving now, sister!” Pinkie exclaimed desperately. But the phone had already been left there hanging.
Maud ran over to the controls and pushed the engine lever to an all-ahead full. The boat lurched forward, but stopped in place with a loud “thud” due to the still-lowered anchor. Another pony nearby, a rather aged stallion by the name of Ol’ Salt merely nodded and rushed over as fast as his arthritic limbs could take him to the anchor controls and pulled on the lever to raise the anchor. It was then that a pink Earth Pony in a heavy diving suit came up to the surface and climbed up onto the anchor as it was being raised.
She then waved at the ponies above and exclaimed, “Hey guys! I just got a nasty case of the twitchies below, so I came up to the surface as fast as I could without getting the bends to tell you and then—AHHHHHH!!!!!!!!”
The same Pink Pony, loaded for bear in diving gear, somehow ran up the side of the ship, across the deck, and dived into a hatch to flee further below in sheer terror.
“Brace yourselves!” Ol’ Salt exclaimed as he saw a series of uncomfortably high waves coming towards the explorer vessel. He felt as if his actions were akin to those of a moronic landlubber greenhorn and outright horrible for leaving the pony below and forgetting to get her, but well, they were kind of in a bad situation and tensions were high. He was sure Maud felt even worse; even if it didn’t show on the outside. He could chew himself out later. If they survived this mess.
The vessel started to move forward. They tried to keep ahead of the pursuing aquatic aliens. But they could not outpace the natural born swimmers. Despite their best efforts, the beasts were closing the gap. Fast.
“They’re getting closer, Captain!” a sailor called out.
“No need to state the obvious,” Ol’ Salt said. He checked the map display for the route that they took previously, “Tie everything loose down quickly! Batten those infernal hatches! I’m going to try and lose these forsaken animals at the archipelago nearby! And you lot better hurry, it’s going to get rough!”
“Aye aye, captain!” came the reply. The captain executed a forty-five degree port turn and headed straight for the group of islands.
The sea creatures were still closing the distance. By now they were just six hundred metres from being able to scrape the hull. “Prepare the harpoon guns! We need to slow them down!” he ordered
Shouts of confirmation came as various firearms and harpoons were passed around. They started to fire at the incoming school of sea dragons. A pair of sailors had the idea of tying ropes to two different harpoons and landed both shots into two different animals, making them crash into each other. But despite that, there were no signs of them being deterred.
By the time they could see the chain of islands, they had run out of harpoons. It was extremely difficult to maneuver at the speed they were moving, but they could not afford to slow down. Ol’ Salt started to look for narrow waterways to thin the hoard chasing them. It was dangerous, as the narrower waterways were flanked by cliffs and small boulders jutting out.
“Captain Salt,” Maud, who had been relatively quiet, said, “See the loose rocks on that cliff?”
“Aye, lass, I hope ye got a plan if I’m doing it!” he exclaimed. He put a hard starboard turn on the steering wheel and proceeded to head towards the cliff.
They sped closer to the cliff, the aliens close behind them. The narrow waterways had thinned out the horde considerably, but they still had some stragglers on their tail. Maud stood at the bow of the craft with a small rock in her hooves. Peering at the pile with a discerning eye, she saw and started to aim at the keystone that was keeping the rocks there. With practiced ease, she slung the large pebble at the identified weak point with a smooth motion of her hoof.
The pebble hit the base of the rock pile and caused it to shatter into pieces. Maud’s shot had dislodged a larger rock, making the pile of stones loose and cascade down the cliffside.
“Almost there,” Old Salt grunted as he tried to get past the avalanche before it hit the ocean and the pursuing sea predators. With inches to spare, they barely cleared the avalanche. The waterway was blocked, cutting the native wildlife off.
The crewmates on the deck started to cheer at the successful escape. The cheer spread everywhere and soon most of the sailors were in joy, thankful for the captain’s expert sailing.
Ol’ Salt remained neutral. He had been on the seas long enough, both in Equestria and on this world to know not to celebrate too early. Like his old landlubber buddy Troubleshoes would say, “If it can go wrong it will. That is the Law of Murphy.” It was then that he heard another loud rumble, not from the beasts they were fleeing from nor from the falling rocks or the choppy waves they produced (which were now starting to calm down). No, it was from an “island” directly in front of them.
“Princess Sisters, how I hate being right,” he grunted under his breath as he made a sharp turn to starboard. He then proceeded to yell behind him, “Maud! You got any more of those rocks on ya!? I might need you to attempt to make another avalanche!”
But there weren’t any. They had already sailed out into the open sea. The ‘island’ in front of them started to flip backwards, revealing a titanic mass of tentacles and a cavernous maw filled with monstrous fangs and drool. It was then that the Captain remembered an old trick from his younger and more daring and risky days. Yes. It was an idea so crazy it just might work!
“More fuel on the fire! We’re going in!” the Captain yelled into his headset.
“Are you loco in the coco!?” exclaimed the pink Earth Pony who had made her way to the deck, now out of her diving suit.
“Maybe, but desperate times call for desperate measures,” the Captain yelled behind him as he turned back towards the living island and stared it down.
“Steady...steady,” he murmured to himself as he made a seemingly full charge toward the beast in front of him, with the other two titanic horrors in tow on his aft side.
“Almost...there!” he growled again as he stared down the mountainous sea best. “Just a bit...closer!”
“HANG ON!!!!,” the Captain yelled aloud as he made a hard turn to the right. He gritted his teeth as he heard the ship screech and buckle under him. “Hang in there darling...we’re almost there!”
As he made his right turn the creatures that were in pursuit still went forward, unable to stop or turn due to both their greater mass and speed and collided into the “island” of tentacles. He heard a monstrous cacophony of screeches, splashes and the clashing of fangs on rock hard chitin. It was then that he heard a roar, but it wasn’t from the beasts. It was the waves that the fight was causing.
“INCOMING CHOP!!!!” he yelled out yet again as he kept going all ahead full.
Meanwhile, back at Carnivale…
The dockmaster shouted out an order, “Get a move on everypony! We’ve got lives on the line here! The sooner we get this ship refitted and seaworthy the better!”
“But Sir,” one of the dockworkers replied in a gruff voice, “This ship wasn’t supposed to be ready for another week!”
“I know! I know! But this is an emergency,” he snapped back. “Just make it happen!”
“Aye Sir,” the worker half-grumbled as he went back to welding.
Pinkie Pie was constantly prancing in place. Wishing that they would just hurry up. It had already been, what? Six minutes? And the fleet still wasn’t ready…
“I can’t wait any longer! I’m going to find my sister,” she announced before taking flight, leaving her guards behind.
Sighing, the captain turned and asked the engineer, “So, can you get the boats ready in four minutes?”
...
“BRACE YOURSE-!,” was all the Captain could get out as the ship was pummeled by a series of tidal waves. He saw the glass slowly crack and give way as the ship was hit by the violent waves. Water slowly started to leak into the command tower and he saw the ship slowly list to its port side.
“Cap’n, whar takin’ water,” the engineer barked on the comms.
“Bail as much as yae can!” the Captain yelled back on his personal set, “‘An if we don’ make it, ‘twas an honour servin’ wi’ ya all.”
“Sir...something’s showing up on-radar,” one of the crewmembers replied.
“Is it th’ sea beasts?” the Captain asked.
“No...no. It’s too small...and it’s flying towards us at Supersonic speeds,” he continued.
“I’m...I’m getting th’...twitchies!” the Pink Pony exclaimed aloud as she started to shake and bounce about the deck, “Floppy ears, all four knees pinchy, bouncing off the hull...it’s-!”
“Our sister,” Maud nonchalantly murmured as she trotted up to the bridge.
……
Pinkie was grateful for the pointers Rainbow Dash had given her about Supersonic Flight back in the day; she had to push herself to get to her sisters in time. She was slowly but surely adjusting to her weakened state upon this new world. Still, it was going to make helping the ponies on the ship a bit...problematic.
She hovered at the spot, trying to gather up the magical energy she needed to keep the waterlogged and damaged ship from going under, as the crew was busy trying to repair their vessel and keeping it sea worthy. Help was coming. But, she didn’t know how far away they were. She just knew that they were making last-minute adjustments as she left.
Focusing, she froze the water near the hole on the ship’s hull. It did the trick and set up a temporary plug to keep more water from going in. It even floated as it was ice. Problem was that it was going to melt at some point.
“Captain, get that patch set up and get the ship moving,” Pinkie said in a tone much more serious than usual. She then flew in between the ship and the brawling sea beasts. The ship slowly limped and chugged away as Pinkie set herself up to join the fray if one or more of the creatures decided to chase after the ship. It was then that Pinkie heard the whirring and revving of engines behind her. She took a quick look behind herself to see that the first of the newly-built torpedo boats and a few tugboats had arrived.
Some of the torpedo boats formed a firing line under her while the others accompanied the tugboats as they helped tow and push the banged-up research ship back to one of her coastal colonies. Pinkie and her escort of torpedo boats were preparing for a fight, but all they saw was the giant Kraken drag away the two creatures it had just fought. Or, rather, the remains of the two creatures it had fought.
After it went off past the horizon line and disappeared, Pinkie breathed a sigh of relief and tiredly replied, “Alright, everypony. Let’s go home.” She landed on the research ship. The fight and the fact that she had been flying at supersonic speeds for a while in the magic-poor environment had made her really worn out.
“I’m glad you are safe, Maud,” Pinkie said tiredly and with a rather goofy grin on her face. Mere seconds afterwards she fell onto the deck with a loud “thud” and fell asleep. She started snoring rather noisily.
Her sister who was already next to her gently picked her up and brought her to the cabins. In that moment, if anyone was looking at the Pie Sisters, they might have thought they had seen Maud smile.
“Sleep tight, Pinkie,” she said in her usual flat voice as she gently put her in a bunk in an unused cabin and tucked her in for the day. It might not have shown outwardly, but she was practically crying on the inside, grateful that she, Pinkie, and the others, were okay.