Bad Mondays

by Handyman

Chapter 62 - Living with Logistics

He stopped when he spotted a small herd of hendriliks leaping across the plains.

While there were many creatures in this world that Handy was well familiar with from back home, be it sapient people such as cows of all things, or the still-thankfully dumb animals like pigs and chickens, there was always the occasional reminder of just how alien this achingly familiar world could be. Hendriliks were one such reminder because of how much they broke with his already altered expected view of the world.

They were a lithe, long-limbed, four-legged animal, known for their distinctively whip-like tails, their long, webbed three-toed feet and their incredibly soft, velveteen fur. Elongated heads rested atop short, sturdy necks that bent disturbingly in a variety of angles you wouldn’t expect. Long bony crests protruded from their crowns, down the front of their faces to where presumably their noses were before their elongated snouts opened to reveal a variety of teeth designed for both tearing and chewing. More of the crest protruded from their lower jaws to a point just before their skull met their necks. They were almost universally grey-furred creatures with only minor variations depending on the local species, from what he had learned, with rare mutants sporting azure coats not unlike albinism afflicting many animals back home. Their crests, however, were prized for their strength, being incredibly hard to penetrate while weighing almost nothing, highly sought after by both tradesmen for tools and working material, and by warriors as a kind of poor-man’s plate.

They also tasted absolutely gorgeous when cooked medium to well with some parsley to garnish it. However, hunger was not what caught his attention regarding the herd of animals. It was the way they more or less flowed across the landscape far below him in a seemingly unnatural way that had first caught his eye. Well, unnatural to him anyway, though upon observation, there was a subtle poetry in how they moved and leaped. It wasn’t long until both their projected path and the airship’s constant motion drew his attention to the breath-taking landscape, though, and he completely lost interest in the alien herds.

They were only a day out of the Dragonlands, firmly leaving the volcanic wastes behind them and now moving into far more hospitable territory, and it was then Handy’s heart began to break. There were none of the majestic, towering mountains to be found here, instead rolling hills leading to low mountains that were far below having a snow line. There were no impossible expanses of forests here—the Everfree was to their south and they had turned northwards once they began hitting the plains that lay north of those woodlands. Instead, there were sparse copses of woods and small forests scattered, almost carelessly, between vast expanses of uneven farmland sectioned by crumbling stone walls put in place by generations of farmers, and simple dirt roads with long furrows dug into them by centuries of passing wagons and carts.

Unlike the plains and rolling grasslands they had covered and were now leaving, the grass here was a shockingly deep and lush green, covering everything, dotted with the innumerable wild flowers of spring breaking up the sea of green. A rolling bank of clouds in the middle distance came in from the north-east, doubtless carried there by the Equestrian weather service. It hung heavy and dark in the sky, pregnant with fresh rain that would meet them in an hour or so and wash the fields lovingly in spring showers to feed the hungry earth and ready it for the planting and the harvests to come.

It wasn’t especially impressive by itself. He had seen many similar vistas of pleasant farmlands, more impressive mountains, more quaint villages, mills and farmsteads scattered in clusters across many a landscape. It struck him nonetheless—the stone cottages, the deciduous trees, the lush green, the smallfolk mountains, the gentle rains, the broken walls. The only thing the fields below him were missing was the occasional fairy tree, and Handy could have sworn he was actually back home for a moment, enjoying a bird’s eye view of the Midlands.

He wasn’t sure how long he sat there, having forgotten the task that had brought him to the bridge and instead seated himself on a nearby crate, just enjoying the view. He was, however, there more than long enough for the heavy rain clouds to finally reach them and wash over the envelope of the airship. The size of the ship’s balloon envelope ensured hardly any of the raindrops hit the windows of the bridge, which was a pity, as he found the sound of rain upon glass and wood rather comforting. It did afford him an uninterrupted view of the now darkened lands below them for a good long while.

No one interrupted his reverie for once, so it took a while before he noticed he was staring at the same landscape for an unusually long time, and when he finally returned to reality, however hard it was for him to turn away from being transported mentally back home for a short while, he finally noticed they weren’t moving. And that he was alone on the bridge.

This was enough of a concern for Handy to actually get up and remember what he had come to the bridge for. He had come to double check the maps of Western Equestria to ensure the routes they had plotted out to head to the Crystal Empire and onwards crossed enough lakes and large rivers on common lands to allow for refuelling of their water supplies. They’d also need to get more coal for the boiler as they hadn’t refuelled since crossing the border into Equestria, as that would have likely required stopping at a major pony settlement prior to Princess Twilight’s little fiefdom. That was something Handy had deliberately avoided at the time to avoid unneeded headaches.

The emergency shutdown he had performed to prevent a pressure explosion tearing through the ship or blowing the entire engine out its backside had caused a certain degree of damage to the engine and a major loss of efficiency in heat regulation. That meant they now had to burn more coal to get less steam pressure, wasting more water through innumerable leaks and patched pipes. The ship now had a constant damp atmosphere that Handy did not care for. So now they had to watch their water supplies more closely and he had to seriously consider making a pit stop at any potential Equestrian town that might have a train or relay station they could buy some coal from.

Fucking dragons.

Now that he actually turned to the now repaired—and firmly secured to the deck and wall—navigation table and recovered maps and charts, and checked their course, he turned to the window again. The heartbreakingly familiar sight below was an illusion, and he knew it, but he still committed both it and its relative location on the maps to memory. Just in case. He closed the cover of the navigation table once he put everything away. No sense letting everything fall out and spill to the windows below again as had done when they had suddenly been attacked. He pulled his cloak closer to himself to ward against the slight chill in the damp air and left the bridge, walking down the central corridor.

That was when it struck him. There was a chill in the air; the dampness was cold rather than humid. He looked at the nearest exposed pipe in the ceiling above him and, very gingerly, rapped on it with a knuckle. It was lukewarm, safe to touch with his exposed palm. That meant the boiler was off and had been for some time. He booked it down the corridor, coming to the stairs into the cargo hold and hurrying down to hear a swearing Silvertalon shouting from the boiler room.

“What's going on? Why are we dead in the air?” Handy asked, coming to the final step. He looked around, spotting Spike on the far side of the hold digging through a pile of supply crates, most of which seemed filled with spare parts for the boiler and pipe work.

“Because you made a right hash out of this job, you overly tall jackanape!” Silvertalon’s clearly agitated, scratchy voice bellowed from within the boiler room. There was silence for a few moments before Silvertalon realised he insulted his employer. “Uh… I mean uh—”

“It's alright.” Handy was more surprised by his outburst than anything. Spike, who had looked up at the shouting, turned back to his work. Handy strolled over to the boiler. The furnace was cold; the water container set nearby was below a third full, which was a bad sign. The boiler should have only started using that if the exterior water tanks were more or less drained in an emergency. How much water had they been losing? “How bad is the damage? I tried to do what you said to do in a shutdown, but I was busy being half-blind when I was down here.”

“I wish I could tell you, boss,” Silvertalon groused as Handy ducked under the door, grabbing the insulated hand holds as he navigated into the dizzyingly complex arrangement of pipework, valves and pressure meters. Silvertalon had been his educator on all things relating to running an airship. He had regretted asking precisely because of just how much you needed to know about just running the boiler room alone, and how much care and attention it constantly required. Silvertalon had promised him that, once he understood the basics, he could adapt to virtually any engine he came across, whether airship, train, or some new-fangled contraption. Handy had taken one look at the copious confusing notes he had taken regarding his education and decided, roundly, that Silvertalon was full of shit and was learning this new, to him at least, model of steam engine setup as he went. He was now receiving proof of that assumption. “I… keep finding more problems the more I look to fix.”

“Can we still get this thing flying again?” Handy asked as Spike wandered over with arms full of brass pipes and several bags of nuts and bolts, several of which fell out as his too-full arms struggled to carry the load.

“Had to shut it all down to get a good look. Might be able to give you an answer in an hour or so, but we’re going nowhere without a refill of the water. I don’t trust our coal reserves to survive both yet another start-up sequence and get us to the empire,” Silvertalon said, lost somewhere in the pipework. Handy could barely make out the bird’s wings in the gaps between the pipes. Handy squeezed the bridge of his nose and let out a frustrated breath.

“Yeah, yeah, I was worried about that. Checked the maps; there’s a lake held in common not too far to our north we can refill at. Coal is… more of a problem. Can we get another day’s flight out of her? If we can, the town of Fettersvale is just to our north-west on the way to the empire. It has a train station. If we land there, we could probably pay for a refuel.”

“I mean, I could just restart the boiler myself. I got my fire back.” Spike gestured with his hand, a casual motion that caused a bunch of metal plates and pipes to spill from his arms as he hurriedly tried to arrest the spill. Handy was painfully aware of the dragon’s assertion, having seen the drake, rather alarmingly, bring a rolled-up letter bound by a thin red thread to the bridge while he had been at the opposite wall monitoring the gas pressure in the envelopes. Bold as you like and proud to boot, having come to the area of the ship with the most space and least amount of flammable objects, the dragon had held the letter up and blew out a burst of green flames that burned the letter. Handy had watched, half in shock, as the ashes of that very same letter had flowed up in an artificial updraft and out of the bridge. He had later learned that the magical gust had carried the letter out of the open airlock and to God knew where.

Handy had berated the drake for breathing fire while they were in a wooden ship in the fucking sky. Spike had sworn that it was safe; Handy hadn’t believed it for a moment, and he knew it was the irrational beast within him demanding he enforce order to assuage it. He had opted to, instead of panicking at the blast of fire, shout at the drake. He had apologised later, explaining he was just overly sensitive given the poor state of the ship. Thankfully Spike had bought that explanation of his behaviour and accepted the apology without further scrutiny.

“That would make start-up easier, but that still doesn’t solve the problem that we don’t have enough coal to burn. Unless you want to stay down here, day and night, breathing fire into the open boiler to keep the steam going.”

“Uh…”

“Yeah I thought so.” Handy sighed. “Where’s Whirlwind? Is that lazy sod even up yet?”

“He went outside to check my stitchwork on the envelope,” Silvertalon explained. “Those two dragons clearly weren’t trying to burst the skin, but they’re big fellows. Some of the skin wore through in some places and there was a light puncture of the starboard side near where it meets the hull. I did my best and we have good material to work with, but I just want to be sure.”

“Wait, Whirlwind’s outside?” Spike asked worriedly. “But we’re so high up; he can’t fly!”

“There’s rigging he can climb. ‘Sides, that lad doesn’t need any wings to fly.” Handy waved a hand dismissively.

“What do you m—” Just then, the heavy sounds of the exterior airlock closing reverberated through the ship, followed not long after by the interior airlock swinging open and slamming closed. The coldness of the damp air increased sharply as a very visible, slow moving bank of wintery mist floated down from the stairs and coalesced in the middle of the cargo bay. The tired, smiling, and sopping wet form of the erstwhile Lord in Winter stood before them. “Oh. Right.”

And at that word, the uncivilized woodland barbarian shook himself free of most of the water he was soaked with, splashing everything nearby.

“Oh what the fuck is wrong with you!?” Handy demanded, covering his face. “Couldn't you have done that when you first stepped into the airlock?”

“Haha, sorry. I was operating the airlock while in Winter. Forgot I was still soaking wet while in that state,” Whirlwind confirmed, chuckling. “Anyway, I got some good news!”

“Yeah?”

“The hull of the ship is absolutely airtight. I checked.” Whirlwind stood tall and proud, all four and a half feet of the fucker, discounting his one remaining antler, with which he just reached Handy’s shoulders. “Couldn’t get in otherwise; had to go back to the airlock.”

“How's the envelope looking?” Silvertalon asked, coming out of the boiler and wiping himself down with a towel.

“Getting to that. Found out why we’re leaking water. The exterior water tanks have a few ruptures, nothing that can’t be patched, but some of them are so awkwardly located, the entire tank will need to be dismounted to access them. The emergency release valves burst during the descent, from what you told me. As the ship took off and flew, we were leaking a small amount of steam the entire time.”

“That’d explain the loss of pressure on top of the water drain,” Handy muttered, cursing. “We’re going to need to land this thing to do some patching I guess.

“About that…” Whirlwind’s pink eyes looked upon them with sympathy as his face betrayed a wince. “The keel is damaged. It doesn’t look too bad, but I don’t know ships. It seems that when the dragons pressed the ship down, the keel didn’t like that too much, and it looks deformed. I don’t see any cracks but, you know, thought I’d mention it.”

At that, Silvertalon cursed, complaining about how the ship was never meant to touch the ground again once off it for precisely that reason. Handy ignored him; it couldn’t be helped and so long as the damage wasn’t too bad, it should hold. They’d just probably better not carry too much heavy cargo in the near future just to be on the safe side until they actually got a proper shipwright to check it all over. Handy groaned; this was turning into an expensive trip and it took an effort of will to push the ungodly horde of treasure that was Meranax’s horde out of his mind.

Sure, he’d pocketed quite a bandit’s gambit worth of precious stones, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t have done with a bit more.

Handy relayed his thoughts about the ship and added, “We’re not going to do ourselves any good refilling the water tanks just to have them empty on us before we get anywhere worth a damn.”

“....About that,” Whirlwind piped up sheepishly, and they looked to the buck. “I uh, checked the envelope like you asked Silvertalon, and there’re more tears. Your patches held but didn’t cover everything. I took the opportunity to sneak inside the envelope. I don't need to breathe when I’m in that state so the gas wasn’t a problem. It's how I found the new leaks to patch and uh…”

“What?” Silvertalon asked, “What else is wrong? So you found leaks I missed, good! That's what I sent you out to do.”

“Well it seems one of the dragon’s talons… dug deeper when it tore through the envelope than expected. It cut a gash in two of the ballasts. When you filled the air ballasts too full to bring the ship down, it strained the remaining four bags, tearing the material and causing further rips while you had the ship grounded for days under stress.”

“So…” Handy began.

“I don’t think we can lower the ship, Handy,” Whirlwind confirmed. Everyone turned to Silvertalon and then to him. Handy silently cursed to himself, rubbing his face with one hand and turning to pace away from the group of them.

“Bollocks…. Bollocks, bollocks, bollocks.”

--=--

It took them a week just to make sure the boiler was fixed up.

What had followed was a lot of pain, a lot of acrimony, and a lot of twisting their bodies into awkward positions to reach in and replace pipework and swinging wrenches and hammers at impossible angles to get things into place. Whirlwind was a Godsend in some regards and a curse in others. His ability to become immaterial while still being able to manipulate tools allowed him to get into some really impossible places and put in new fittings and replacements. That had saved them quite a lot of time and effort that would have otherwise been wasted on outright disassembling entire sections of the room to get access to certain areas and hoping to God they could put everything back the right way before they turned the proverbial key.

However, the world was entering spring now, and he was thus out of his season, which meant his powers were not the unlimited, demigod nonsense he often bragged about wielding back in the Greenwoods. He fatigued easily, often wearing himself out silly after only a few hours’ work and having to all but collapse on the ground by midday most of the time. It was frustrating, but the sheer time and work he saved them warranted forbearance. Spike proved invaluable in checking out the furnace from the inside. Everyone else wasn’t fireproof and couldn’t see in the dark, which meant someone needed to go in there with a lantern. Spike was the sensible solution to that issue. Sure, they had emptied it out of coal, but there was still a shit-ton of dust in there that could cause a small burst of flame that would be dangerous for the others, and particularly lethal to Handy.

In fact, that fear seemed justified as Spike, whatever he had been doing, let out a small bit of fire that caused a loud bang as the remaining coal dust caught light all at once, blasting open the half-closed door to the furnace. This scared the hell out of everyone, and Handy all but brained himself as he shot upright and clonked his crown off of a rather impolite valve. After all the cursing and berating had been finished with, not least of which came from Spike, who was also under stress and was beginning to give back as good as he got, it turned out Spike had found some fissures in the cast iron of the furnace and spent quite a bit of time modulating his fire breath to effectively weld the seams back together.

It was an incredibly useful skill and more than a little terrifying, causing Handy to rethink the wisdom of having this dragon in his service for any serious length of time.

By the end of every day, they were all tired, sore, hungry and more than a little sick of somehow coming out of the room soaking wet from the damp air and trapped water that kept surprising them when they changed pipes. Well, except Spike, who was nearly always high and dry, the lanky bastard. But the job was done, at least as far as the boiler was concerned, and they could finally start splitting up to tackle the more difficult matters, just after Whirlwind was put through his paces in his wintery manifestation to flow through the pipes finding any that were too loose. He was not happy with this job but was the best suited to the task. Handy laughed when he had grumbled it was beneath his dignity as Lord in Winter, and promised to make it up to him somehow. Whirlwind smiled and said he’d hold him to that. That had stopped Handy’s mirth right quick.

“Right, so…” Handy spread out the map of north-western Equestria across a low table in one of the spare cabins that they were using as a makeshift common room. They were all more than fed-up of hanging out in the cargo hold by that point. “The boiler’s about as fixed as it's going to be, right, Silvertalon?”

“Yeah, boss.” The captain had foreleg crossed over the other and his right claw raised to tap the side of his cracked beak. “I hate to admit it, but we’re going to need to keep a closer eye on it going forward.”

Handy groaned. Most of his time spent working aboard the ship, when he was not on the bridge, had actually been down in the boiler room, just making sure everything more or less didn’t explode. He was still woefully under-experienced and was still learning the systems, but he knew enough to know when the pressure in any given valve was getting a bit too low or high and which to turn and when. Most of the time. Sometimes. Okay he’d had to switch places with Silvertalon an embarrassing percentage of the time when he just had no idea what he needed to do. Now they were probably going to need to do a rota to keep a constant eye on the thing as they went to the Crystal Empire.

Spike, thankfully, was lightening the load somewhat. He wasn’t too much more familiar with steam engines than Handy was, but his experience with aeronautical navigation and quick uptake of information regarding the ship’s systems made him invaluable as an extra helping hand running to and fro. It was his insight that helped repair some damaged pulley systems that linked the bridge to certain controls in both the envelope and the boiler, sussing out the panels along the corridor where some of the copper wires used to pull systems back and forth in a rather primitive, if cleverly designed, control system.

Handy was briefly concerned about the dragon learning so much of his ship’s systems, but given his airship was both unarmed and purely designed for peaceful travel—and the fact both he and Silvertalon were also learning as they went—not to mention it was, presumably, an Equestrian model given to him by Fancy Pants as payment, there really wasn’t anything secretive or critical about the ship that couldn’t be readily discerned by asking literally any technician, engineer, or air captain remotely familiar with the concept.

“Guess I really am going to have to hire more crew for this ship one of these days,” Handy groused. Silvertalon raised a talon to object; Handy silenced him with a wave of his hand. “Yes, yes, I’ll let you vet them. Right. Coal, water, gas, air sacks, water tanks. Anything else I’m forgetting?”

“The keel!” Whirlwind happily interjected, apparently overjoyed to contribute. Handy rubbed his eyes.

“Yes, the keel as well. We’ll sort that out at a proper dock if we can find one.” Hopefully it was only slightly deformed, as Whirlwind had said, and not broken, or the ship would be basically useless for carrying anything too heavy in its cargo hold… including the engine. “Anyway, we can’t get any fresh water without moving the ship, and we can’t move the ship any appreciable distance without more coal.”

“Can’t land the ship without the ballasts to lower the tanks safely,” Spike pitched in.

“And we lost a good amount of gas from those tears I had missed,” Silvertalon mumbled.

“Did we lose too much to maintain enough lift?” Handy asked. The griffon shook his head.

“No, it’ll hold us more than well enough, I imagine. Certainly got us this far from the coast without trouble.”

“Can you fix up the ballasts?” Handy asked Whirlwind. The stag shook his head, the loose portion of the crown jingling from the missing antler.

“Not unless you want to tear open another hole wide enough to bring some tools from outside the envelope. The burst ballasts need to be disconnected at their base and replaced entirely. Can’t sew them up and they’re too interconnected to just be ripped and replaced without having to replace the base themselves. The rest can just be patched. I did my best but it was pretty dark in there.”

“We’ll need to go up into the envelope itself from inside the ship,” Silvertalon added. “But there’s only one helmet.”

“It’s fine, I don’t need it while up there,” Whirlwind said. Silvertalon looked at him.

“It’ll take at least five hours to work through the process of replacing the two busted ballasts, never mind the sewing. And you can't open the airlock without pumping the gas exchange. You sure you can do all that while all ghosty and get out in time before you collapse?” Whirlwind looked uncertain at that.

“I’ll do it. I’ll need you and Whirlwind to be our pack mules,” Handy said, jabbing at the map. “Fettersvale. I’ll need you two to fly down here. It’ll be rough, but if you could get us just two or more bags of coal between you, we might, might have enough coal to make it to the lake and then all the way to another relay station to get a proper refuel. Plus we have Spike here to jumpstart the start-up.”

“... That's… a bit of a journey there,” Silvertalon commented. “I mean, it’s more than doable by wing, but I am not looking forward to lugging back coal on my back by paw and then.”

“Buy a cart then to make hauling easier. I’ll foot the bill,” Handy responded. “We can probably get more coal that way too.”

“But how are you going to load the cart on-board?” Spike asked. Handy paused, having not considered that.

“We’ll just abandon it; give it to the locals as a bit of charity, I guess. It’s the coal that matters. I’ll have the ballasts ready by then and we can lower the ship to load everything and begin repairs in earnest.”

“Can’t we help with the coal?” Spike asked.

“You see a pair of wings on either of us, our fella?” Spike looked like he had been stung, and Handy realised he touched a sore subject. “Ahem, right. Point is, they can fly ahead. I need you on the bridge monitoring the ballast controls and air flow. It's an easy job, literally five minutes of work on your part to ensure everything is shut properly and that I’m not going to get a nasty surprise up there. And the same again once I am finished with each ballast to double check.”

“Right. I think I can do that,” Spike said.

“Alright, Silvertalon, you'll handle the money.” Handy reached to his side and pulled out a number of paper bonds. Given he was only going to be in Equestria, or so he had assumed, he thought it’d be wiser using Equestrian-printed bonds rather than Greycoast bonds, unlike last time. He had purchased some directly from the Royal Treasury in Skymount. While the pony capital of Canterlot had no problem accepting Greycoast bonds, out here in the countryside? Might be a different matter. Hopefully the Crystal Empire was as economically tied to Equestria as he suspected, and his money would go farther there.

“What, don’t trust me with your money?” Whirlwind asked, big-eyed and grinning widely. Handy just looked at him for a moment, not dignifying the question with a response and handing the griffon about three notes worth about a hundred Equestrian bits each.

“What if the station doesn’t have any to spare?” the captain asked. Handy glanced down at the map. The nearest train relay station was another days’ travel by airship from Fettersvale and significantly faster by wing, but it was very out of the way. Traveling back by cart was going to be significantly slower for them, and there didn’t really seem to be any local mines or resource centres they could buy in bulk from.

“I’ll trust your judgement on it.”

--=--

Silvertalon alighted on the ground with a grunt, shifting the packs on his sides so they were a bit more comfortable. The skies had been overcast all week, threatening sporadic downpours, and it was hard to judge the time of day, though he knew it was approaching evening. They could get to Fettersvale with a few hours’ flight time, both of them being able to fly faster than the airship could, which should leave them more than enough time to skulk around for some lodgings.

He felt more than heard the deer gust down to the ground. The moving bank of cold crystallising air coalesced and the laughing deer emerged as if from nowhere, prancing from hoof to cloven hoof. The shimmering mail, which he dutifully cared for, had nonetheless seen better days, with entire sections missing and his green cloak torn and frayed. His fur, which when Silvertalon had first met him back in the Dragonlands had once been a shimmering coat of silvery white and subtle blue hues with the hint of brown at the base, was slowly but definitely shifting colours, with the brown becoming more prominent and the blue seeming to shimmer green in places when the light hit it a certain way.

“Ah, it's good to get back on solid ground once again!” he said, laughing and turning to Silvertalon. “Don’t you agree, good captain?”

“I s’pose.” Silvertalon shifted his wings, the wind biting cold. “More of an air nomad myself. I prefer the skies most days.”

“Haha! Well, I can certainly appreciate the call of the wanderlust myself!” Whirlwind chuckled brightly before being quiet for a few moments, gazing up wistfully at the passing clouds. “I sure am going to miss it...”

“What?”

“What? Oh right! The coal, let’s go. I’ve never been to this part of Equestria, and I am dying to know what the local colour is like. Which way do we need to go again?”

Turning around to look from horizon to horizon, Silvertalon took out the folded map showing their little corner of the country alongside a small compass strapped to his claw’s wrist. He looked up and pointed north-west.

“Over yonder; should be there bef—” The deer had already melted away into mist and flew off in the pointed direction, against the wind. The griffon snorted, putting the map away.

“Well, at least he’ll be too tired to cause much bother when we get there.” He launched off the ground with a powerful flap of his wings, soaring off into the sky above.

Spike closed the airlock with a grunt of effort, locking the sealed doors into place and began walking back down the corridor, turning first to look up at the bridge and then back down to where the stairs to the hold were. Just off to the side on the landing of the decking was a sturdy iron ladder that led directly into the ceiling. The heavy trap door was open up and outwards into the interior airlock above, and he could hear cursing coming down from the space up there.

“Hey, Spike, you down there?” Handy called, in-between cursing and the clatter of metal on metal as he fumbled in the darkness above. He tsked and a light shone out, brightening up the room in a pale blue light.

“Yeah. You, uh, sure you know what you’re doing up there?” the dragon asked. Handy harrumphed.

“It’s actually really simple, just tedious as all hell. Hand me up those two spares.” Spike looked down at the pile of semi-circular sections of thick brass segments. There were two sets of four, all connected to two voluminous sacks that were folded many times over on themselves. The ballasts were smooth to the touch and thick and heavy as all hell. The bases being separated into quarters made lifting and tucking them under one arm while climbing the ladder something of an issue, but he managed it. He poked his head up and lifted up the first ballast with some effort and dumped it with a loud clunk on the floor of the airlock. He carefully began pulling up the rest of the first ballast’s sack as it unfolded during his climb.

Spike glanced around the room. The pale blueish-white light was coming from a small, slim, black tablet of some kind that Handy had placed on top of a crate of tools he had carried up. It was pretty bright, and he saw the human reading a sheet with illustrations detailing the process of replacing ballasts.

“You sure you’ll be alright in there?” Handy glanced over the sheet.

“I’m sure. There's only one helmet in any case.” Handy waved dismissively at the heavy brass and iron contraption hanging on iron hooks inside of an oversized lockbox at the foot of the wall. Ordinarily the door would be closed and locked just to keep it in place should the ship endure any turbulence. “Unless you can breathe the gas in there.”

“Uh… Yeah, pretty sure I can’t. You sure you don’t need a lantern? That light’s pretty bright, but it doesn’t look easy to sit upright to help see what you’re doing.” Handy took a few seconds to answer that.

“It’ll be fine.” His voice held a slight edge to his voice that he cleared with a cough. “When you’re done, I’m going to need you to lock the hatch from your side. Do you follow?”

“Yeah I think I got it.” Spike climbed back down to lift up the second spare ballast.

“And you’re going to need to listen out for me. I’ll be shouting down the air hose because, apparently, whoever designed this ship thought that’d be the best way to communicate from the envelope.” Handy snorted derisively.

“Could you think of a better system?” Spike asked with a chuckle.

“Not without transistors, no,” Handy grumbled.

“What?”

“Nothing. Just listen out for me when I shout to test out the ballast air controls in sequence. The last thing we need is to find out that the pressure system that fills these damn things is also busted and then we’d need to literally tear apart the upper decking to fix it all.” He rubbed his eyes. “And my pocket begins crying.”

“It can’t be that bad, can it? I mean, you afforded this ship in the first place—surely fixing it up is better than getting a new one?” Handy gave the dragon a look but said nothing in reply, instead folding the sheet and putting it in the pocket sewn into his leggings. He was dressed in his simplest clothes which were stained from the previous days’ work. He leant down and helped the dragon drag up the sheet of the second ballast.

“Regardless, let's just get this over with. We’ll test the valves just after I finish double checking the integrity of the ballasts that remain.”

“What can I do while I wait?”

“Not much for you to do otherwise; just don’t go burning any more letters on the ship,” Handy admonished. Spike just gave him an apologetic smile as the human dragged everything away from the aperture and began hefting the heavy trap door. Spike retreated down the ladder as Handy gently let it down to close. He turned the crank from his side, locking it into place before stomping on it twice. Spike reciprocated by turning the wheeled handle of the hatch and sealing the airlock from his side.

And with that, Handy sighed. This was going to be fucking awful; hours locked in a huge dark envelope stuck dead in the air. Well, there was nothing for it. He got on his knees and started unhooking the helmet from the lockbox. It was a large, bulbous rounded hunk of metal, brass fittings, and burnished iron, air tight with the exception of the entrance for the worker’s head and a small threaded hole in the side.

A veritable poncho of oilskin hung from the bottom of it, alongside numerous straps. Ordinarily, oilskin was more for waterproofing than keeping the air out, but this helmet was designed to be able to fit multiple races. It meant that once fitted over the head, the straps would be tied tightly across the body of the wearer to seal the oilskin closely to the body so as to let as little air as possible escape and, more importantly, let only trace amounts of gas to enter the helmet.

Handy reached across for the air hose, an ungodly length of toughened leather fastened with iron clasps to hold the exterior cloth covering to the leather. He hooked off the end from where it hung to a catch in the wall, and pulled on the length of the hose from the reel and lifted it over to the heavy helmet. He attached the hose to the helmet’s threaded entrance on the side. Once fitted into place, he reached for what was effectively a pony’s monkey wrench, except it was much bigger and much longer, doubtlessly designed to be used for the awkward logistics of hooved legs pressing down on it to turn things.

Handy didn’t mind, as it made it easier to ensure the hose was tightly fastened. Now he didn’t need to be as concerned with the limited air in the sealed airlock. He quickly donned the helmet and fastened the straps across his upper torso, around and under his shoulders, sealing it in place as much as he could. He took a breath. Alright, no problems so far. He could already taste the difference in the air coming up the air hose from the ship below him.

“Alright, Spike? Can you hear me down there?” The length of the air hose was considerable, and he’d probably be shouting himself hoarse to be heard if he decided to have a long winded conversation. The hose’s iron fittings also had interior fittings, designed to help sound echo down its length. It took a minute but eventually he got an answer.

“I can hear you! Can you hear me!?”

Oh yeah, this was going to go great.

“I hear you, Spike! I’m going to start the air swap! Keep your ears open for when I call you!” Spike replied in due course, still barely audible. Handy cursed—another downside of the air hose system was it basically stopped when it exited out into the airship below, and Spike probably had to shout up at the ceiling or otherwise clamber up the ladder to shout back at him to be heard.

With a grunt of disgust, Handy stood up and wobbled. The extremely top-heavy helmet was throwing off his balance, and that was going to make bending over a dangerous affair inside the balloon. He made his way over to a pair of levers and, rolling his shoulders, grabbed both and began alternating in pushing and pulling both. The process slowly drained the air out of the airlock into a pressurized tank just outside the airlock while pumping in gas from the envelope outside into the room.

The only reason this wasn’t automated from the ship’s pressure systems below was because there was a risk of sucking out the gas into the air canister and then releasing the gas into the exterior air supply when all was said and done. So the painful route it was. It wasn’t that the gas was chemically reactive. In fact, Handy had learned, it was a kind of noble gas that didn’t react with anything, so interacting with air was not a concern or danger. What was dangerous was how remarkably toxic and poisonous the gas was to breathe in. It was odourless, colourless, and deadly in sufficient quantities. Hence why Handy wasn’t concerned about coming up here with no more protection than the air helm.

It was also the single most precious and expensive element of the entire contraption by square foot.

Part of the reason why he had needed Joachim’s help in the initial setup of the airship was precisely in getting his hands on the material needed to create the gas. Some blue and white rock named helemnite that was mined out of only a few quarries in the world, more deposits were being found every year, and the prospecting techniques for them were improving. Still, it was rare and worth far more than its weight in gold ever since the airship industry had started taking off.

Its rarity and cost made it a controlled material where only the wealthiest of guilds or the most influential of individuals could negotiate getting some of it. The rock was nothing special by its lonesome, and alternative applications for it so far were proving to be slim pickings, but splash some water on the rock and that was when the magic happened. One could accurately measure exactly how much gas was released from the vigorous chemical reaction of water and helemnite per ounce to an absurd degree, with only the relative purity of the portion of helemnite making any degree of difference. It made measuring the pressure yields and lift necessary in airship calculations much simpler as well as being a remarkably convenient means of transporting the material before applying it, provided you waterproofed it every step of the way, of course. They had climbed on board and up through this same airlock back when they were first setting up the ship, all the while fumbling about in the deflated envelope, and emptied a canister of water on the helemnite they had acquired and quickly exited back through the sealed airlock to watch the process of expansion take place from the outside.

Handy supposed, now possessing not only one but two Writs of Passage for both Griffonia and Equestria, he could likely now put in his name to buy more of the material if he needed without needing somebody more prestigious to put in a good word for him, but it’d still be ruinously expensive even for someone of Handy’s means. It would have left him destitute the first time on top of everything had Joachim not helped out, hence why Handy had agreed to the king using it should he request such a need.

So now, dear reader, you might appreciate the fact that when Handy had initially learned of the burst air ballasts, and the slow leaking of the gas out into the atmosphere over the course of his stay in the Dragonlands, however briefly, he had put on a very brave face.

And cried on the inside when he considered the costs involved.

He had groused about helium to Klipwing once, who had enquired as to what Handy referred to. Handy had explained it was a noble gas humans had discovered that operated similarly to helemnite but had the added benefit of not being toxic. It was, however, extraordinarily rare and an absolute whore to get a hold of. However, ease of use aside, helemnite gas, like helium, was also non-flammable. Thus he’d never really needed to be concerned about the floating gas bag over his head catching fire at any point when he flew. So there was that, at least.

He finished pumping the levers, having counted the necessary number of pulls to get the measured gas in and out of the room. It was wildly imperfect, but the miniscule amounts of the gas that might escape when the air swap was made again was negligible and would just need to be sacrificed by leaving the exterior airlock open for a few hours to air out the ship.

His first job done, he opened the airlock out into the envelope itself and gazed at the expanse of black in front of him. He lifted the expensive brick and slipped it into one of the straps along the oilskin to hold it in place as he placed the tool box and one of the spare ballasts under one arm. It was quite the load to heft with one arm, and he had a new appreciation for how much muscle that dragon was packing in those lanky arms. He strode into the darkness beyond, and the reel of the air hose made a god awful racket as it spun, the length of the hose extending as far as the envelope was long.

The interior of the envelope was absolutely strewn with the deflated ballast sacks, which looked so much more massive spread out as they were across the deck and on the interior slopes of the envelope. He dropped the spare ballast’s disconnected base on a cleared spot on the deck and lifted his brick to shine on the ground, searching for the painted numbers on the decking denoting which ballast was which.

The two to his immediate right were Five and Six, the sacks in absolute ruins. He glanced over to his right at the envelope and saw the sewn-up tear in the side of the envelope. It was rather substantial, but it was very clear that the dragon had not done it intentionally or else there’d be three or four additional great tears in the structure and along its length. That would have caused a catastrophic loss of helemnite gas and their ship to plummet to the earth and lead to their deaths. Either way, the claw had reached in far enough that it had cut across the ballasts as they were filling with air and torn them open as the ship was descending. The pressure system in the upper decking of the ship, which Handy now stood on, was a complicated affair. It used the steam pressure to manipulate a series of reinforced brass pipes throughout the deck to create artificial vacuums temporarily to forcibly suck in air from the atmosphere outside the ship through a series of vents and push it up into the ballasts. The ballasts, increasingly filling with pressurized air, increased the ship’s weight as they filled the interior of the envelope’s space, allowing the ship to be raised or lowered as the crew desired.

Fortunately, once it had become clear to Silvertalon that the ballasts were unresponsive, he’d shut off the ballasts controls related to them to stop pumping air unnecessarily into the envelope that had no means of escape. However, that didn’t stop Handy from being paranoid that somehow, throughout all of the trauma the ship suffered, sections of the air pump system would need to be repaired, which would require removing the decking from beneath and beginning the expensive and complicated process of finding the flaws and repairing them. That might require finding an actual airship docking tower to get it done properly and the unavoidable loss of helemnite gas involved in it all.

Again, the thought made him cry internally at the costs involved.

He clucked his teeth and set to work, kneeling down carefully so he didn’t throw himself wildly off balance and began connecting the base parts of one of the spare ballasts together. It was disconnected precisely because the connected base was far too wide to easily get up through the airlock hatch and for ease of storage. Handy needed to be careful that nothing would be nicked or bundled up in each segment as he connected the pieces together, otherwise the entire sack was going to tear open the first time it expanded to its fullest extent. The pieces connected together, but that was the easy part. Next came tightening the bolts and latches together which required significantly more elbow grease, ritualistic cursing, the use of various ratchets, wrenches and, out of frustration, hammers.

With the base of the first spare connected, he took a sawed knife out of the tool box and began cutting away at the torn sack of ballast Six. Disconnecting the now useless material, he bundled it into a pile over to the side so it wouldn’t get in the way as he worked on removing its base. He took one look at the base, imagining all the donkey work it’d take to loosen and lift the damn thing… and decided it was time to check the other remaining ballasts instead.

Fortunately, the remaining four ballasts only had minor tears, according to Whirlwind, something even someone of Handy’s limited darning skills could sew up with strengthened cord. Not that he hadn’t been improving, mind you. A few quiet conversations with his personal tailor, Belladonna, back in Skymount had led to several quite insistent lessons on her part so that Handy could maintain his gear out in the field by his lonesome as well as do emergency repairs on his own clothes. It was something for which he was quietly grateful. The memories of him barely surviving the trek from Manehattan to Brightshowers the previous year were still vivid in his mind. Stealing linens and bedsheets from hapless villagers to cobble together primitive winter gear and repairs for his clothes was not his most dignified moment.

He began the tedious process of lifting and sorting the voluminous ballasts, studiously checking them over for tears, however minute, in the pale blue light. Spotting his first, he sighed and reached down into the tool box, opening an interior compartment and set to work sewing the tear before it could threaten the integrity of the sack. He looked up briefly from his work and over to the interior of the balloon. Just searching over these things fully was going to take hours, never mind the grease monkey work awaiting him with the replacements...

Maybe he should’ve volunteered himself for coal duty instead.

--=--

Spike was bored.

And that was a problem.

Ever since he had got his fire back, he had been feeling great, fantastic actually. More energetic than he had been in years. Stronger too. Simply just not being as cloudy-minded as he was before, no longer coughing or feeling so cold, was enough to do wonders for his well-being, and had that been all the difference, it probably would have been enough to make him happy.

Unfortunately, that was not the case. He was now restless, with more energy to burn than he had causes to spend it on. Ordinarily, being told he could spend several hours just loafing around would have been just fine with him, and his younger self would have been more than happy to find something comfortable to lie down in and doze half the day away, maybe with a good book to lazily pass the time. Now he found he couldn’t sit still for more than five minutes if he didn’t have something to keep him focused. He kept finding himself fidgeting, or walking up and down the decks of the airship, flipping through the charts and notebooks of the navigation table on the bridge, just for something to keep his claws busy that wasn’t something more consequential, like the many, many switches and levers of the bridge controls.

Helping repair the ship was a good distraction, and welding the interior of the furnace was a welcome use of his fire which he now had a craving to let breathe free. It had also made him more confrontational, and that made him feel exceptionally strange. When the others, under stress, had been yelling at him, he had cursed right back with a vehemence that had surprised him. It was not that he hadn’t snapped at ponies before, but never that quickly or with such… robust language.

He had detailed the changes to Twilight, of course, sans the bit about the foul mouth. She wouldn’t have approved of that, and he’d rather avoid being lectured about it. His quickness to omit a detail was also another thing he noticed, but it was nothing he hadn’t done before, so he paid it no mind. In any case, he was just happy everything had worked out in the end and had detailed how much better he had been feeling ever since.

As well as the other, more troubling details. He had outlined, almost word per word, his conversation with Meranax, including her title of the Bloody Crest in the hopes that there were any references to such a name she’d recognise. There were a lot of questions raised by the conversation for how relatively brief it was, not least of which was her non-sequitur about magic or what she had meant about Handy’s predecessor. If anypony could tease out the full implications of what she was talking about before they got to the Crystal Empire, it was Twilight.

He had also, on the sly, sent another letter to Twilight, not long after Handy had gone up into the envelope above, to inform her under no circumstances to send him a letter back before they got there or unless he sent her another one stating otherwise. Handy’s reaction had been extremely negative to the use of dragon fire within the hold of the ship. He then recalled how extremely distrustful and paranoid he was known to be, and it would probably be a good idea to not let him know that at any moment he could be speaking to Spike and he’d burp up a burst of fire in his face to receive another magically-sent letter.

However, that was not doing any good for him right now, because without the anticipation of a letter from Twilight any time soon, he was left waiting to be called to test the ballast pumps. He pushed himself away from the table in the common room and stood up, stretching and scratching the scales of his neck and back which had been itching furiously for the past few days now. He wandered around the room, idly checking around the room and the underside of the bed that had been lifted away and secured against the wall when this room was given over to common use, just so they had somewhere other than the cargo hold to eat their meals.

He sighed explosively and went out into the corridor to, yet again, walk the length and breadth of the ship as he heard the occasional clunks and loud thumps coming from the deck above him. He stopped outside of his cabin and, on a whim, entered. It was neatly organized, his pack sitting in a corner of the room next to the cabinet that he had used to store a few books he had brought with him, with his coat and scarf hanging from the lone rail near the top.

He grimaced. It was weird looking back, remembering how cold he always got and how he had needed more and more to keep warm every winter. Now? He didn’t even feel the damp and chill in the ship everypony else was complaining about. He’d probably never need to wear those winter clothes ever again, but would do so anyway. They had been gifts after all, and he was going north to the Empire, which would probably be cold enough to chill him again, even though he had his fire back. He closed the closet and exited the cabin, briefly looking over his books but deciding against perusing them. He knew he wasn’t going to be able to sit still long enough to focus on reading.

He continued down the corridor before he stopped outside Handy’s cabin. It was the second one down from the captain’s quarters which Silvertalon had claimed as his own, and about as big as everypony else’s. It seemed strange that Handy didn’t occupy the captain’s quarters himself if this was his ship, but that was not the problem here. The problem was Spike was bored and was presented with a unique opportunity to, practically consequences-free, get an insight on the mysterious, yet evasive human.

Spike hesitated for a moment. Even in his restless state and despite his natural curiosity, he’d probably choose against trespassing given exactly who it was he would be crossing. However, the conversation with Meranax goaded him. There was simply too much mystery surrounding the human to be easily ignored, which only seemed to grow deeper the more they actually learned about him. It was not as if it wasn’t a part of his mission to find out as much as he could about the human’s magic and circumstances.

So, with a guilty glance down the corridor and up towards the airlock, Spike swallowed, turned the handle on the cabin door, and entered. It was dark inside, unsurprisingly, the porthole window covered and no lanterns to be found within whereas the rest of them had at least two or three. That was the first thing he noticed, only brought to his attention by the lack of light. He wrote it off, seeing as he carried that strange black tablet that emitted light for him on command, seemingly without fuel. It was likely some enchanted trinket he had picked up somewhere.

The next thing he noticed, for how could he not, was the presence of an honest-to-Celestia bathtub taking up one corner of the room. It didn’t look like it had been used, wasn’t hooked up, and there was nowhere for the water to drain in any case. He snickered at the idea of trying to take a bath on an airship when an errant bit of turbulence hit, and figured it must have struck the human as a good idea at the time before he took the time to think about it seriously for a moment.

Looking around, there was a large cabinet taking up one of the sides of the cabin, and next to it was an armour stand hooked to the floor and wall. The armour itself looked nothing like what had been described to Spike before, and tapping one claw against a vambrace, he could tell it was fairly new and untarnished. Taking a moment to consider the risk involved, he breathed a tiny spark of dragonfire onto the burnished metal, not enough to leave a mark but enough for the magic to have an effect, and got no reaction for his trouble. Not the infamous set that could resist Discord’s magic then, it seemed.

He moved to the cabinet next and let out a yelp as he opened the door and another set of plate armour starting falling out, parts clattering to the floor. Spike hissed as he caught several pieces, but a particularly battered-looking helmet bounced along the floor before rolling under the bed. He waited to hear anything, but given no shouting was yet forthcoming from the deck above him, he let out a breath of relief and began packing the armour pieces back into the cabinet.

He paused as he did so, looking over a pauldron in his claws and the other pieces in the light spilling in from the corridor outside. The designs matched the descriptions he had been given but he wasn’t expecting the… extensive repairs that marred the surface of the armour. It was as his claws touched the metal that he noticed something: a faint, barely visible twinkle of light where the scales met plate. Intrigued, he breathed a tiny bit of dragonfire and got blinded for his trouble. Dropping the pauldron onto the ground and rubbing his eyes furiously, he stumbled backwards. Welp, looked like he’d found the magic resistant armour, for all the good it did his bleary eyes. He grumbled before picking up the pauldron and tossing it into the cabinet harder than was strictly necessary.

There was nothing else really of interest there beyond a bewildering variety of tunics, coats, and other clothes, which Spike could tell from spending years helping Rarity with her craft, that were very well-made, albeit seemed more suited for rough wear and travel than fashion. Several bags and bundles took up the bottom of the cabinet that seemed to be filled with various bric-a-brac, survival gear, more clothes, and what looked to be bundles of rope and twine. There was also something which Spike could only presume was a grooming kit of some kind, a sewing kit and materials, a pack full of various tools and, to his horror, what looked to be a flayed cockatrice skin wrapped in oil cloth and preserved with what he could swear was some kind of alchemical concoction,s judging by the smell. Where in Tartarus had he gotten that? Better question was, why was he traveling with it?

He put that mystery to one side, noticing a large, almost triangular, flat, heavy object leaning against the back of the cabinet. He presumed it was Handy’s shield but couldn’t tell, as it had a cloth cover over it that looked tied in place, and he wasn’t planning on leaving much evidence of his reconnaissance by tearing it apart to confirm his assumption. He looked up at the hanging tunics and saw the long, folded hauberk of shining chainmail hanging amongst the tunics. He noticed, much like the plate armour, it had clearly paid its dues in protecting its wearer and was the worse for its occupation. Indeed, there were some loose strings of chains near the bottom of the hauberk that were about to fall off. They reflected the same silvery sheen of the metal that Spike presumed had made up the original armour before its extensive repairs.

A thought occurred to him, and, feeling more brazen than he normally would, he hooked his claws around a weak link and worked it loose, collecting a tiny number of individual chain links in his claws. Maybe Twilight or somepony could figure out the secret of the human’s armour from it, and it was unlikely he’d notice and miss a few links he was going to lose anyway. Closing the cabinet, he turned to the last piece of any note in the cabin. The oversized writing desk was bolted to the floor and shaped to fit against the curved outside facing wall of the cabin. It extended to the cabin’s left side where a number of shelves with thin chains held a small collection of books in place.

Only one of the shelves seemed full, seemingly containing manuals and what appeared to be numerous claw-written journals and notes pertaining to airship maintenance and running. After carefully undoing the latch holding the chain in place and briefly flipping through a few of them, his suspicions were confirmed. Pages after pages of notes regarding air pressure, temperature gauges, diagrams of the inner workings of the ships various systems, and calculations. It was mostly written in the kind of hurried shorthoof Spike was quite familiar with, having to catalogue Twilight’s seemingly endless thesis papers and research notes—there was a good reason why he was the one who wrote letters to Celestia on her behalf so that it was halfway legible. He could tell he was reading plain Equestrian, and that Handy was very used to taking notes at speed when dictated to, given the innumerable side notes telling him to reference another note in some other book. Also, the occasional written curses directed Captain Silvertalon’s way helped cement the impression of a frustrated student.

He replaced the notebooks, affixed the chain, and turned back to the writing desk proper. It had a fair number of books splayed out across its surface, and to Spike’s surprise, absolutely none of them were what he had been expecting. Books on agriculture, horticulture, geology, and gem trading shared the space with what looked to be a bestiary of the various fauna of Griffonia, a book on animal husbandry, geographical atlases, legal treatises and a study of Gryphonic feudal laws, and a recent medical journal straight from High Mount concerning surgical procedures. The only vaguely magically-related work he could find was a small book concerning alchemical pesticides that looked like it had been nearly torn asunder with how used the pages were. There was one dog-eared section opening up to a page concerning Wallowing’s Grievance, a type of naturally occurring alchemical pesticide that could self-replicate if certain plants were in an area and poison the soil if left unaddressed. The section was underlined and circled with a note reading: ‘Get Crimson’s mad-birds on this.’

As worrying and confusing as that was, none of these books were actually front and centre at the desk. Instead, what took the pride of place, lying on top of what looked like a map of the City of Skymount, was a dictionary. In particular, it was an Equestrian-to-Gryphonic dictionary lying closed and partially on top of an open journal filled with pages of words and notes, detailing grammar, diction, and pronunciation, with practice paragraphs written first in Equestrian and then in the rough angled script of the Griffons. It seemed Handy was learning to read Gryphonic script, not relying on all the written materials in Griffonia being available in Equestrian.

Another book seemed to be an honest-to-Celestia cookbook. What puzzled him was a few fruits and vegetables that had no notes beside them, such as apples and carrots, but instead had a simple checkmark and a recurring note regarding something about a kind of tuber called potatoes which Handy couldn’t find. Weird. The only other book nearby looked to be some kind of accountancy logbook, detailing weekly expenditures and income over the past few months during winter, but not detailing what was going where exactly.

Disappointed, he moved on to the drawers, starting with the ones nearest to him before going around the high-back wooden chair to the others on the desk. The first one was filled with spare quills and ink bottles, fastened in place, ready to be opened and used in place. He closed it and opened the second; this one was filled to the brim with spare parchments, more quills and a number of blank journals. The third drawer actually took him by surprise, filled as it was with what seemed to be medicinal supplies.

There were various small jars filled with seeds and dried leaves he couldn’t identify, as well as several tonics he’d need to ask Owlowiscious about to discern what they were for. There was also purified water, jars filled with berries, and what seemed to be a number of mini alcohol bottles. Together with what looked to be a box filled with strange ashy white-grey dust, it made for an eclectic collection, and if it hadn’t been for the mortar and pestle he’d have sworn it was some kind of mini pantry. The only other thing of note was a large sack near the back that seemed filled to the brim with blades of long, broad grass with a yellow stripe in the centre. Odd to be sure, but none of Spike’s immediate concern, so he closed the drawer and moved on.

The other side of the desk was far more interesting, with the first drawer filled with bags of coinage, bundles of paper bonds from Griffonia, the Greycoast, and Equestria. Spike eyed the clawful of sapphires Handy had grabbed from Meranax’s horde before they had fled. He could tell they were good ones too—the real deal, not the stuff that grew in the cliffside caverns. His mouth watered at the sight, though he quickly shook it off and slapped himself. If there was one thing very notable about Handy, it was how seriously he took his money. He’d certainly notice one or two sapphires missing from his mini horde. Still, it was tempting.

He also noticed Handy had kept the circlet of brass Spike had picked at random from Meranax’s horde to tempt the human into doing something sensible when he had apparently lost his mind. It was a pretty thing now that he took the time to appreciate it. The flying creatures were highly stylised and indiscernible, tangled as they were in the knotwork design that surrounded the circlet, with mother-of-pearl embedded in a silver frame attached to the brass. It was tossed haphazardly on the bag piles next to the two amulets he had also snatched, of which only one Spike knew the magical nature of.

The next drawer was a bit of a shock, but he had been warned ahead of time. It was the same plain casket he had put the glass flask in a week or two ago, and he knew what to expect. He had disapproved strongly back when Twilight said what she’d be doing and why, and anger briefly flared up within him towards Handy for twisting her hooves like that. It was sickening, but Twilight had insisted it would help them understand the magical affliction Handy suffered. If it really did have something to do with thestrals, then any clue or information would potentially be vital in preventing anything like it from happening again, let alone just helping the human himself in the long run. He had been informed of the new arrangement Handy had worked out with her just before they left, and did not envy her trying to explain the entire deal with their friends and the princesses. He knew it was very likely Handy planned on using the sample at a time and place where Spike couldn’t at least observe the effects to report back to Twilight. Although after what he saw in the Dragonlands… he wasn’t entirely sure he even wanted to.

He took a breath and reached down to flip open the lid, revealing the flask remained where it lay, full and untouched. Well, if nothing else, the entire ordeal hadn’t been for nothing… yet. He closed the lid and the drawer, opening the third only to find nothing but broken quills, scrapped and torn papers and broken ink bottles. Disappointed at the relative mundanity of everything in the room, fancy armour aside, Spike couldn’t help but notice the lack of certain things. There was not a single piece of correspondence, old or new, to be found anywhere, which was odd for someone of Handy’s supposed station in Gethrenia and the rumours surrounding him being the spymaster on top of the King’s personal agent. Although, if the former were true, the lack of correspondence was probably a point in itself. He was about to leave when he suddenly remembered something.

“Oh, right, the helmet!” He snapped his claws. Suddenly remembering the helmet had fallen and rolled under the bed frame, it’d be embarrassing going through all this trouble to not make it look like somepony had been rummaging through his stuff only for him to find his helmet in a place it most definitely wasn’t supposed to be. He got on his knees and reached under the frame to grab the helmet by the broken wing tip on its left side. The tiny bit of light that emitted when his scales touched the metal made him blink. Weird how it reacted to dragon scales like that. When he blinked his vision back, he noticed a splash of colour on the underside of the bed frame that most certainly didn’t match the mattress’ drab colouration. He pulled out the helmet first before crawling under the bed and reaching up to what had grabbed his attention. It was a small journal, thick with pages and wedged between the mattress and bedframe. The cover was a dark red with black lining on its spine. He pulled it out and scrambled back to his feet, looking over his shoulder nervously for a moment before opening the book.

“What in Equestria..?” It was indecipherable to him, all of it. No side notes, no rushed shorthand, all written in clear, discernable script using Equestrian characters… but it was clearly not Equestrian. At first Spike thought it was some kind of cipher, but the use of what appeared to be some kind of marks over certain letters on some words, but not others, made him think it was a proper language using rules he wasn’t familiar with. The fact that there was the rare word written clearly in Equestrian absolutely stood out like sore scales in the prose. It was clear he was reading a journal of some kind, a personal one, judging by the occasional use of dates. Although to call it dating was generous—it seemed to be going by rough estimates of when in a given month the entry was being written, making it more or less impossible to guess what and when the content was referring to.

Again, Spike thought of a cipher, but it clearly wasn’t, but if it was being written to hide things from somepony reading it, why was the language written using Equestrian characters? It was not unheard of for other nations to have an Equestrian equivalent of their written language if pony influence was strong enough in their culture, if they didn’t just outright write in Equestrian anyway, but it was very rare. They knew nothing of Handy’s homeland other than what he had told them, and it was nowhere near anywhere Equestria or the other major pony nations had influence, from what he heard. Why would he write his language in Equestrian script rather than his culture’s own? Why go through the trouble? This seemed deliberate, but if he was writing a language of his own, Milésian presumably, in modified Equestrian script specifically, who was he really trying to hide the information from if not the Equestrians? When did he have the time to become so fluent to the point of transliterating his own language? Was he going to be doing the same with Gryphonic? Was that why he was trying to figure out how to translate from Equestrian to Gryphonic specifically rather than straight from Milésian to Gryphonic? It didn’t make sense.

“Gah!” He was jolted from his train of thought when he suddenly realised somepony was shouting at him from a great distance. They weren't—instead, he was right above him. It was just the air hose that made the voice sound distant and tinny from where it exited down the hallway, even though it sounded like Handy was absolutely bellowing at the top of his lungs and had been for a minute or two. Spike juggled the journal before letting it drop. He hurriedly ducked and shoved the book under the bed-frame where he’d found it before stopping towards the door, before skidding to a halt. He turned, scooped up the helmet, opened the cabinet, and chucked it in before slamming the door and closing the cabin door behind him.

“Coming, coming!” he shouted up to the ceiling as he barrelled down towards the upper airlock.

“About damn time! Where were you!?” the tinny voice echoed back from the grate next to the airlock that was feeding air to the sealed helmet Handy was wearing.

“I was, uh, up near the bridge. Took me a second to hear you.”

“Right, whatever. I’m done sewing the tears I can find and double checking everything. I need you to go test the ballasts one at a time. Starting with number One, the controls are the series of levers to the immediate right of the helm. I want you to go back to the bridge and pull the control as far to the right as it can go and hold it there for a full minute before pulling the handle towards you to stop the air flow, and then come and tell me when you’re finished. Do you understand?”

“Yeah, yeah, I can do that,” Spike answered easily, scratching the scales on the side of his head.

“Good. Now it's going to be noisy, but I need you to listen carefully. If you hear me bellowing down this thing for any reason before the time is up, pull the handle towards you immediately to seal the airflow. Then in one motion, push it back and to the left, and it’ll start emptying the bag back outside. It's a pain in the ass, but we need to be thorough in checking for tears in the seams.”

“Okay, that makes sense.” Spike was much calmer now as he looked back down the corridor. The door to the cabin was closed and he was careful—Handy wouldn’t notice anything. The armour had already been piled haphazardly in the cabinet and would likely have fallen out anyway even if the human opened it himself. He wouldn’t notice the armour being messed with. “What about the busted ballasts?”

“I got their seals removed and am about to start working on putting on the new ones, but we might as well test the working ballasts first. If push comes to shove, we can limp along with only four ballasts and simply live with it until I can get proper repair work done. But if the pump system itself is damaged, then I’m wasting my time up here.”

“Alright… Okay, I think I can handle it.”

“Good man, now go ahead and pull the lever for One and we’ll work our way through this. With any luck, we might actually get this all finished before nightfall. Silvertalon and Whirlwind should be on their way back by then at least.”

“You think?” Spike scratched the side of his head, stopping as he made his way back towards the bridge. “I mean, it's an awful long way. I know they can fly, but won’t they be loaded down and walking the way back?”

“It's literally just a coal run, and I put Silvertalon in charge of the money since he’s the most responsible. I honestly can’t imagine how they could possibly fuck up the airship equivalent of going to a sundry store and buying flour.”

--=--

They had fucked up.

More specifically, one of them did.

“Wow.” Whirlwind held a damp cloth over one rapidly swelling and bruised eye, thoroughly exhausted and stripped of his chainmail and gear. “That got out of hoof.”

“Mrm,” Silvertalon mrm’d noncommittally, lying across a bench on the far wall of the overcrowded cell they were currently situated in. It was a dismal place, not out of malice but because it was overused for what was, essentially, a small farming town. Thankfully, their little faux pas would only see them spend a night here and pay a fine for their freedom. In the meantime, they had the dubious company of drunks, gamblers, and disturbers of the peace to keep them occupied.

“I mean that really went off the rails there!” Whirlwind dodged his head to the side as a fight broke out on the other end of the cell and somedeer threw a clay cup that shattered on the wall behind him.

“...Yeah, I guess.” Silvertalon turned around to face the wall and shifted his wings to cover his back in case something got thrown at him.

“I mean, I never saw you lose your cool like that at cards back on the ship! You all but clawed his eyes out!” Whirlwind chuckled as the fight on the other side of the cell started dragging in more drunks, and a coterie of guards stumbled down the corridor and fumbled opening the door to break it up.

“...He shouldn’t have cheated,” Silvertalon muttered. “I hate it when griffons try to cheat me.”

“Remind me not to introduce you to Jacques then.”

“That thief that Sir Handy has tagging along with him sometimes?”

“Oh good you already know him,” Whirlwind said without further elaboration. The fight at the end of the cell intensified as the guards tried to get the drunkard and gamblers under control. “You know, we could try to break out. There’s an opportunity right there.”

“No thanks. ‘Sides, I already paid the fine and I am sore. I’m gonna sleep. Let those idiots get their skulls cracked over nothing,” Silvertalon said with finality. “Nothing stopping you though. What's the matter, can’t get your windy nonsense going?”

“Tapped out, I’m afraid.” Whirlwind shrugged, humming as he watched the guards put down the miniature riot and using his hind legs to push off the backs of several ponies who were being pushed back against them by the crush of the crowd. “Between all the flying and the fight in the tavern… Well…”

“And to think, you were talking of breaking out.” Silvertalon chuckled hoarsely before sighing. “Don’t mention any of this to Handy. If he asks, we just stayed the night and went back in the morning.”

“My lips are sealed,” Whirlwind said, smiling.

--=--

As useful as it probably would be to have him aid in their magical research—or more precisely, Crimson’s—the likelihood of the dragon discovering his fatal weakness increased exponentially the longer he remained in his vicinity. He had gotten a decent judge of the dragon’s character, however, and while Handy was relatively certain the younger man was unlikely to leverage that weakness against him, there was precisely zero reason to believe he wouldn’t inform the princesses. By extension, literally all of Equestria and beyond would know his kryptonite.

However, he was also the only potential source of dragon’s blood Handy was ever liable to have easy access to, and dragon’s blood, he discovered to his delight, actually gave him the immunity he sought from his one critical weakness. There was just one problem.

Dragon’s blood made him into a fucking idiot.

Oh, there were other downsides of course: the incredible, bone-breaking pain that had reduced him to a shivering wreck upon the ground. The god-awful cold that chilled him to his core despite the fact his tunic had been burning on his skin, and the repeat horror when the blood eventually wore off and it felt like his entire body was contracting in on itself, his muscles contorting and his bones cracking in a literally blinding burst of pain that had caused him to black out, but not before vomiting forth a fire hose worth of sickly black bile of God only knew what. Those surprise horrors were something he could potentially live with. However, looking back, he struggled to remember exactly what was going through his head while he was under its influence. He came to the rather disquieting conclusion that he simply just hadn’t been thinking. He had been beyond impulsive, ready to jump at the first suggestion that came out of someone’s mouth if it sounded exciting enough.

He had even taken a running start, saw an oncoming cliff edge approaching and immediately thought: ‘It’d be wild if I jumped that.’ He had landed in shallow pools, but had still felt his legs break as he hit the ground beneath the stagnant waters. He remembered that horrific feeling clearly enough, yet had smiled through it as his healing took care of it and he had been up out of the water not long after. Hell, he had been tempted to jump down a fissure into magma to test out exactly how fireproof he had become, where he’d allowed himself to be tempted by just enough to inch to the edge of that pit. Where the idea of literally jumping up and fighting a dragon the size of a fucking mansion was a totally sane and, indeed, thrilling idea.

Madness. Pure and utter Madness.

He had acted on pure instinct and the revelation that one errant bite could loosen his inhibitions was a dangerous one, because Handy’s instincts as he was now were not all that conducive to a productive and functional society. Walking around with that incredible degree of aggression it had given him to such an extent that he could explode violently at the slightest innocuous irritation could lead to all sorts of trouble. As fiery as his temper had been under the influence of griffon blood, he had never actually lost control during that period. Strangely enough, he had felt his temper rise and anger burn but always felt a strange, icy control over himself, and always at the moments when he thought he was about to lose himself entirely. It just was intolerable to have to experience that every second of every day, so he made a personal note to avoid biting griffons as much as possible.

He would be putting dragon’s blood on the list next to griffons as something of a tactical choice in the future. After all, he couldn’t dismiss it entirely. It made him fireproof. No enchanted armour necessary, no downing disgusting, viscous alchemical potions to deaden his ability to be affected by scalding heat, no more constantly mentally calculating how far he was from an open flame every time he entered a candle-lit hall. No more fear of a mere spark ending his existence. No more listening to the shrieking cries of the beast.

If he could mitigate the effects somehow, or if he could learn to keep control over himself and not be overwhelmed by the sheer power of draconic blood… Well, maybe then it’d be time to do some dragon hunting.

That was something for future Handy to consider, as he was right now he was busy staring mournfully down into his plate of the day’s rations: dried bread, crackers, cheese, and ham. It was not a bad dinner, all things considered, just… wearing on the constitution to eat it daily for weeks on end. Still, it had been better than trail rations when he was on the road, and at least he ate in the warm… okay, well at least not freezing conditions of the airship with a roof over his head every night. Spike had no such compunction, however, happily munching away at his rations like a man famished. It had been interesting to observe the rapid transformation of his attitude to meat now that he knew he had been malnourishing himself for years, hesitant at first, and now as unabashed a carnivore as anyone Handy had ever seen.

It took some negotiating but Handy had relented and let him have the rations that would have been put to the side for Silvertalon and Whirlwind that night since they clearly wouldn’t be back before morning. It was as much out of curiosity as much as it was out of pity for the poor creature’s health.

“You gonna eat that?”

Not that much pity however.

“Yes, and how dare you ask me that,” Handy said without changing expression nor looking up. Feeling haggard and exhausted from his excursion in the balloon envelope above them, he could certainly use a good meal so had forced himself to eat. Spike shrugged and chugged down the watered down rum ration he was allowed, another unusual change for the drake but one to be expected honestly. Water being at a premium on the airship, Handy had forbidden using water for meals or cooking or cleaning until they were properly sorted out. That gave Spike a choice of either drinking nothing with his very dry meal or risking finding out just how sturdy his newly reinforced draconic constitution really was. Handy wasn’t going to let him drink more than his ration in any case, but it was still amusing to see how thoroughly he enjoyed the rum once he got going. Apparently he had only ever drunk cider on very rare occasions before and nothing harder.

“So uh…” Spike began as Handy munched away on his very dry sandwich. “About the uh…. The Dragonlands.”

“What about them?” Handy asked, seemingly disinterested.

“I mean, about what happened back there…”

“...And again I ask, what about it?” Spike looked deeply uncomfortable and began tapping his claws together, looking off to the side as he tried to find the words. Handy spared him a glance from his sandwich before returning to his chewing. There were a few lighted lanterns in the common room, casting contrasting shadows across the space as they sat across from each other at the table. Night had long since fallen before Handy had eventually climbed down from the deck above. The rain hammered against the side of the ship. It hadn’t let up the entire day and didn’t sound like it was planning on stopping during the night.

“What… happened to you back there?” Spike asked at last. Handy didn’t respond immediately, happily continuing his meal before clearing his throat with a drink.

“Exactly what it looked like,” he said cryptically, but without elaborating further. Spike drummed his claws on the table.

“And uh… what did it look like?” Handy laughed, almost choking.

“You’re the one who saw it from the outside. You tell me, little man.” Handy smirked humourlessly, not falling for the dragon’s fishing attempts.

“You… Well, you grew.”

“I did?”

“You didn’t notice?”

“I was a bit too much…. in the moment to notice, I suppose.” He remembered the mind-shattering pain but just thought the blood was altering his physiology to be stronger. He didn’t think it had actually made him grow. What, did that mean he actually physically shrunk when it wore off? Was that why he felt like his bones were breaking and reforming? He was so used to towering over everyone that he hadn’t even noticed, or to think to check his height at any point. Well, that and he was terribly distracted at the time.

“And about that, you were not yourself.”

“Oh?” Handy smiled with amusement, “And do you know me so well that you can make that judgment? Maybe I was just enjoying myself and let it get to my head.”

“Did you?” Spike pressed. Handy didn’t answer. “Well?”

“I have made no secret about what I am, Spike, nor about what happens when I feed on others. What you saw is simply what happens when I take from dragons, something you can tell your princess when we see her. Sure, it's not the alicorn blood and it most certainly wasn’t planned, but maybe it might help you fulfil your mission.”

“Mission, what mission?” Spike was suddenly defensive, glancing left and right as he sat straight up. Handy smiled a toothy grin.

“Relax. I don’t care,” Handy lied. “And it can’t be helped in any case. You saw what you saw, and I did what I needed to help us survive. Currently, if it matters to you, you know as much as I do about dragon’s blood in regards to its effects on me.”

“You’ve never taken from dragons before?” Spike asked curiously.

“Never.”

“...Yet you claim to be a dragonslayer.”

“I am a dragonslayer,” Handy said confidently, then looked accusingly at the young drake. “And now so are you, if I am not mistaken.”

Spike immediately looked like he had been struck, rubbing one arm and staring down at the table. Handy was unmoved, however, considering it nothing to be shameful of, especially since that bitch Meranax was one of the Mistress’ warlocks. Spike would just have to get over the guilt of what Handy presumed was his first kill. After all, Handy had had to do it himself not all that long ago.

“In any case, no, I have not taken from a dragon before. I have only killed two. The young one at the tournament in Firthengart, older than you I should add, closer in size to those ones we fought at the springs. I had to leave before I could even think about it. And the bones of the much older, much larger one in Lepidopolis.” Handy chuckled ruefully. “Couldn’t get any blood out of that ancient corpse even if I wanted to. Not that it would have done me any good at the time even if I had.”

“Arenakis,” Spike muttered.

“I beg your pardon?”

“Arenakis the Bright. That was his name.” Handy’s eyes narrowed at him.

“The young one?”

“... No.”

“And how, pray tell, did you know the lich’s name?” Handy leaned forward, his elbows on the table and hands crossed in front of him. “Most have trouble believing I killed an undead. Necromancy being impossible, as they say.”

“Meranax told me.” Spike was moving into territory he really wasn’t sure he wanted to press Handy for details on without first consulting with Twilight. “The elder dragon we, uh…. ran away from.”

“The warlock, yes. She told you that? When?”

“It was while you and Whirlwind were indisposed. She… told me things.”

“What, precisely, did she tell you?” A dangerous tone entered Handy’s voice. Spike fidgeted.

“She said she… knew Arenakis… from back in the day.” Handy kept his peace and did not interrupt him. “Back when she flew with the Justicars.”

“The what?”

“It's what the princesses were called back before they became princesses.”

“Before they became Alicorns you mean?” Handy asked, curiosity now piqued.

“I… Yes? I don’t know. It’s ancient history, and none of the texts I read ever mentioned them not being alicorns.” Spike was suddenly unsure, trying to imagine a younger Celestia or Luna either without horns or wings and utterly failing to do so. Handy was quiet for a moment, as if deeply considering what Spike had said.

“And this Meranax, this… warlock dragon, flew with them you say?” A strange smile crossed Handy’s features as he leaned back on his stool.

“Yes, though… I don’t think I ever read anything regarding her.”

“Well, you wouldn’t have,” Handy commented. “I wouldn’t expect their majesties would remember her either.”

“What?”

“Nothing, nothing. Go on.” Handy waved his hands dismissively. Spike gave him a curious glance. “What else did she say?”

“Well, she said she wasn’t planning on giving you over to that Mistress pony.” Handy suddenly got deathly quiet.

“... Did she happen to say why?” he asked carefully. Spike considered his words.

“Uhm, she said she wasn’t sure when she’d come across something of your like again, so she wanted to keep you.” The stony features on Handy’s face gave way to a distant look as he stared off into the void, mumbling something under his breath about teeth and burning. “Uh, Handy? You okay there?”

“...Yeah. Yeah, just wondering if that would be better or worse than being handed over to the Mistress is all.” He shook himself and focused on the conversation once more.

“About that… she didn’t tell me too much about the Mistress. That's who you’re tracking down, right? The one with all the Old Magic?” Handy gave him a curious look.

“So Sorcha did inform little Twilight about that. I suppose that only makes sense. Yes, she is indeed the target of my hunt. Meranax was a warlock I had not known about nor expected to find, out in the Dragonlands of all places.”

“So what is Old Magic, really?” Spike pressed. “You recognised it immediately back in the cave. You panicked.”

“Well it's not something you want to be unprepared for, and we were very unprepared to deal with a Warlock right at that moment.” Handy finished off his sandwich, turning instead to nurse his rum ration. “And besides, I told your princess all I knew of it at the time.”

“And now? Do you know any more?”

“I might. Enough to know we were not in any position to pick a fight with a warlock.”

“Well, I think we made a good go of it myself.” Spike proudly folded his arms and smiled boldly. Handy was quiet for a long moment.

“Spike, we should’ve died down there,” he said at last, catching the drake off guard.

“Wh-What?” Spike spluttered, his bravado suddenly deflated.

“I’ve only faced three warlocks so far, Spike, not counting Meranax.” He’d quietly omitted Geoffrey from the count. No need to complicate matters by letting that unnecessary secret come to light. He had been little more than a dabbler by Crimson’s reckoning, but that still counted. “One was a mere apprentice, a shadow’s shadow of her tutor by a wide margin and great depth. She almost killed me on the Equestrian express when I first… turned."

“The other you likely know all too well, at least by the trail of destruction he wrought, if not by name or reputation. You wouldn’t now, unless you were told. The one who brought ruination to the Festival at Firthengart, whose wanton destruction would’ve burned down Manehattan had I not alerted the Royal Guard ahead of time.” Handy studied the dragon’s reactions; he seemed to be paying rapt attention. Good, perhaps Celestia through Twilight had indeed informed him of all they knew through Handy. “I could not have defeated him on my own, and I had tried. I tried with help before and got soundly defeated. I almost lost again at Manehattan; we all did. And that warlock, by all evidence, was a bumbling fool, wildly flaunting his powerful magic with abandon, not a calculated tactic in his burning body.”

“... And the third?” Spike asked.

“Some poor sod who blew up a portion of the docklands at Blackport. I say poor sod because I am… not sure about him.” Handy thought back at the poor wretch, whose screaming form tore the sky asunder, ripped streets from the earth, threw ponies around like matchsticks, incapacitating bodies and crippling the souls of all and sundry except for him. “I don’t think he was a warlock.”

“What makes you say that?”

“Because I remember him clearly, very clearly. I presume you know enough to know why that is significant. I don’t think he was a real warlock, more a distraction. Perhaps a trap laid by… What was his name? Thunder. Thunder was the name of the warlock in Manehattan. Somehow he must’ve found out I was coming for him.”

“... And you can remember his name now?” Spike asked with interest, and Handy realized he had let that slip.

“Yes. I was reminded of it by… A source I’d rather not reveal.” Handy cursed himself as a fool for almost exposing his one means of remembering anything the Curse of Doubt erased. Namely his own little pet warlock who was immune to its effects so long as she rewrote her spells as fast as she practiced her craft.

“In any case, back to my point. What do you think Meranax actually was, Spike?” Handy asked.

“An elder dragon? A warlock?” Spike replied carefully.

“Precisely. An elder dragon. How long ago did she fly with the Justicars? How long has it been since your princesses were known as Justicars?” He took a swig of his rum.

“Oh, uh, about twelve hundred years or so?” Handy choked on his drink. “I mean, give or take a century.”

“... Yes, well…” Handy continued valiantly, recovering from his shock with as much grace as his work-worn appearance allowed. He knew Celestia was old, well over a century. If she knew Meranax she was clearly far older, but well over a thousand? Holy shit, what were alicorns really? Was Twilight going to be like that, a true immortal? Could they even die at all? What the hell would an alicorn’s blood even do to him if he drank it? “I believe that makes my point for me.”

“How?”

“Come now, Spike. An ancient dragon, an elder of your race apparently, one who flew with the princesses. How much would you want to bet she knew a shocking amount of ancient and forbidden magical secrets, Old Magic aside?” Handy prompted. “I happen to be a gambling man when I know what odds I am playing with, and I’d wager rather heavily that this Meranax knew a great deal indeed. I don't know any draconic secrets, but I don’t need to in order to make an educated guess. She was venerable in age, power, and experience, and all this before submitting to the twisted knowledge of Old Magic and its horrendous power. A power with which an unlearned earth pony could destroy a city in a fit of pique. I could not have saved us, I doubt Whirlwind in the height of his power amidst winter’s fury could have saved us. I doubt every dragon in the Dragonlands, whelp nor wyrm, could’ve so much as inconvenienced her. It's a wonder she was content as she was to lay in her lair all this time.”

Spike was quiet for a moment, precisely because he knew very well Meranax had in fact known ancient and forbidden magical secrets. She had told him as much himself with her knowledge and experience with necromancers. It was a concept he was still trying to wrap his head around, both it being real and the accusation that Celestia and Luna had wiped an entire school of magical knowledge from historical records. They hadn’t even done that for dark magic. Perhaps not even just them, the other princesses too. Did other kingdoms do the same? Did the griffons?

“Believe me, I have, against my will, become a decent judge of exactly how powerful a wielder of Old Magic can be. We only got out of that cavern alive because she wanted us to,” Handy continued at last, taking a breath and then a drink. “And for the life of me, I cannot understand why. Why even capture us to begin with? Why even let us know she existed at all if she wasn’t going to kill us or hand us over to her Mistress? It doesn’t make sense, and in the end, it led to her death.”

That much Spike could agree with him on. It really didn’t make sense. She had admitted to him that she had taken on Old Magic because it could grant her a kind of immortality, something she sought desperately. However, the price was too much to bear, and her desperation led her to meddling with the Bloodstone Scepter, almost dooming their entire bloodline to a slow, wasting death. Handy pushed away from the table and stood up.

“It hardly matters in any case.” Spike looked up at him. “Her secrets died with her, and if there was anything in her lair that could further enlighten us about them, well, they’re in the Dragon Lord’s hands now… claws, rather. Was there anything else?”

“Hu-What?” Handy glared at him.

“About Meranax. Was there anything else she had to say that was pertinent?” he insisted. Spike thought about it for a minute, wondering if he really should ask Handy about what or who his ‘predecessor’ was. Going by how Meranax had said it, it sounded like he wouldn’t even know, that he should ask the princesses and that even they wouldn’t even know. Was this another Old Magic thing? Another human going by the implication of Meranax’s words, but one nopony could remember. That could be a dangerous thing to ask about, given what he found in Handy’s cabin. What if Handy had been writing secrets in a language that was foreign but also written with Equestrian characters because he was trying to hide it from another human more than he was from ponies? But would he even know about them, if there was one, if Old Magic was involved? There were too many unknowns. He needed Twilight.

“...Well there was one thing,” Spike admitted. Handy leaned over onto the table.

“Go on.”

“Well, it was about Whirlwind. She admitted she was the one who caused the old Lord in Winter to come to the Dragonlands.” Handy snorted.

“Yeah I gathered that much. Whirlwind was pretty happy to have an answer to that.”

“About that… What was that thing about you making him swear an oath about it?”

“Never you mind,” Handy answered stridently.

“But it sounded really serious, something about your kingd—”

“I said mind your own business, dragon.” His voice was low and conversational, but there was the dangerous hint of a snarl lying under his words. “My business with the deer is between us and, as far as I am concerned, completed. What Whirlwind now knows regarding his crown and the bloodstone sceptre, and why Meranax’s machinations had the results it did, is none of my concern. It's also none of yours. I can tell you here and now you’ll not get anything out of him regarding it if you go snooping. I will warn you not to ask after this again. Am I understood?”

The abrupt vicious turn of Handy’s reaction startled Spike. Sure, he had not been the friendliest during the conversation, but this sudden hostility was startling nonetheless. Handy held his gaze unblinkingly for a long moment, seemingly boring into him with a strange, piercing intensity that pinned him to where he sat. Eventually, Spike silently nodded his head, and Handy seemed to relax. He picked up his plate and cup, stepping away from the table and heading towards the door.

“The others likely won’t be back until morning, perhaps midday even, so don’t wait up. And good job today—we can at least rest easy knowing the air pump system works well enough and we have all six ballasts functional. With ample coal, we should be well on our way to getting proper refuelling and towards the Crystal Empire,” Handy said conversationally, as if he hadn’t just threatened the drake. “Good night, Spike.”

“Y-Yeah… G’night.” Spike blinked and shook his head, scratching the quills on the side of his skull as if confused by something. Handy left the common room, making his way to his own dark cabin, something which made him groan every time he entered it and remembered he habitually chose not to have any lanterns in here. Being night-time and the porthole window being covered, it was quite literally pitch black in here. Using a trick he had learned from an otherwise superfluous ability the changelings gave him, he allowed his eyes to glow once more. It was a pitiful amount of golden illumination, but it did allow him to see things roughly a foot in front of him, enough to allow his occupied hands to fumble with the deadbolt to lock the door of his cabin.

Now secure, he moved over to his writing table to place the plate and cup. He briefly thought of using the purified water in his medicine drawer to wash them clean but that was a waste of thoroughly clean water. Instead, he made his way over to his cabinet an—

“Ah, fucking damn it all!” he swore as he opened the cabinet and parts of his magic resistant armour spilled out. His bloody helmet struck against his knee with one of its wing tips on its way, rolling merrily under the seat by his writing desk. He hissed as he rubbed where it had cut him. “Oh no, Handy, you don’t need a second armour stand. You don't have the room! You can fit one in your cabinet when you’re not using either. ‘Sides, you’re almost certainly going to find use for that fucking bathtub on a bloody airship one of these days, right? I hate past me.”

Sighing, he fumbled in his pocket for the expensive brick, turning its broken screen on so that its all-too-bright screen light all but blinded him, causing him to swear once more and blink his glowing eyes back to normal. He then searched his cabinet for a canteen that still had some water in it, used it to dampen a rag—which just so happened to be a shirt he had not worn yet—and used it to clean his plate and cup. The others had more or less done something similar since the water ban, and he figured they must be running out of options as he was by now. They really couldn’t get those water tanks fixed fast enough.

He hunted down his fallen armour parts and stacked them more neatly into the cabinet once more before closing it. Not that stacking them would help them after the next bout of turbulence, but at least it felt like an attempt was made. He turned and looked longingly at the bed and sighed. He wanted nothing more than to flop down on it, chew some tallow’s ear, and fuck off into merciful oblivion until tomorrow became his problem again. However, his conversation with Spike had revealed a few things, mainly a solid confirmation necromancy existed from someone else other than Handy’s own testimony and the dubious witness of changelings. That was worth making notes of, perhaps even worthy of making note of it to High King Aleksander, but it’d require some further investigation than the words of a now-dead dragon who could no longer elucidate further.

Not that Handy had any plans on actually learning necromancy, at least not beyond whatever arcane secrets the study of it could reveal insofar as it pertained to the Veil. The Veil seemed almost as much a physical barrier between worlds as much as it was a magical one. Perhaps it wasn’t magical at all. Maybe it was a force of a kind that was as much different to magic, as magic was from gravity, as gravity was from light, affecting one another, but not the same.

However, that was incredibly uneducated speculation on Handy’s part, based on nothing more than pure supposition. It would explain the poor understanding of it he had encountered in Crimson’s magical lessons, however. If necromancy, true necromancy, was a magical art that could somehow tie a person’s soul, spirit, or memory to a material form, did that not imply it was a magical art that somehow blocked or delayed a soul leaving a body, or even a world? Wasn’t that why conventional mages thought it impossible? If so, would the Veil not be involved, as something a soul would traverse to go to wherever it was destined? Or perhaps souls operated irrespective of the Veil, which was apparently a part of physical creation you could literally pass through and not a spiritual construct? What would it even mean if it were?

He was veering dangerously between magic, theology, physics, mysticism, and philosophy in his musings over the mere possible potential of a magical art he literally knew, approximately, dick all about. He was hilariously out of his depth and he knew it. He shook his head, put his speculations to one side, and bent down on one knee, reaching under his bed frame and searching for the journal he knew was there.

Pulling it free, he then sat down on his writing desk, pushing several books aside and leaning his phone against one pile to provide ample light to write by. He pulled out a quill from the drawer to his left, dipping it in an ink bottle and began scribbling away his notes. He had decided that writing in Irish was about as secure as he could get in writing things privately unless, for some Godforsaken reason, someone in this world spoke and read Irish too. It might be highly unlikely, but not something he could rule out entirely. He had already met far too many people who spoke English and way too many people who spoke French. Jacques was too much for anyone’s tolerance some days, after all. Sure, they didn’t know those languages by those names, but it was still surreal as all hell. Meanwhile, the griffons spoke a language unlike anything Handy knew from experience, the ones who didn’t speak Equestrian habitually due to proximity to the borders anyway. It was like this world existed in a natural environment of evolving languages and suddenly, out of nowhere, someone hit them over the head with the Latin alphabet and the Oxford Dictionary.

He briefly paused in his writings as he mused. He was here, after all, through happenstance. It was entirely possible English had somehow crossed over through some other means. French as well. It was a possibility that had crossed his mind before. How could it not? But why modern English? They sure as shit didn’t speak modern English a thousand fucking years ago on Earth, so how was it Court Equestrian, as it was known, had been spoken for so long in this world? Well, it was what the merchants and nobles and educated cosmopolitan ponies all spoke. They spoke it because the princesses spoke it and, apparently, those girls were immortal. That would explain that its persistence throughout the world, even though he had encountered English dialects and accents of a rougher sort in the more rural parts of Equestria he had passed through, accents that had no correlation to those he knew of from Earth and, even more bizarrely, at least one that did in the form of that orange pony Princess Twilight hung out with. That was disconcertingly surreal.

He didn’t have an explanation for any of that, other than the possibility that some other humans had taught them the language, but if those alicorns were as immortal as Spike implied, they’d remember them. Or at least remember something about them if they were somehow older than they were. And if nothing else, they would not be as alarmed or surprised about Handy being an unknown creature ‘from across the sea’, an unknown agent from an unknown human kingdom. Hell they’d know that for the obvious, blatant lie it was if that were the case, and would not only call him out on it, Princess Galaxia would not be nearly as interested in ‘acquiring’ him because of his claims. If they knew anything about Handy’s true origins, they’d have at least shown some interest, beyond doubtlessly trying to verify his ‘across the seas’ claim as he suspected they’d be doing. If they knew about humans, what humans really were, and where they came from, they’d either be entirely disinterested or consider Handy such a threat that he’d already be buried six feet under by now.

He pushed the matter aside as another imponderable to be deciphered later. He finished his notes about necromancy in Gaeilge, idly doodling a skull beside the note and deciding he liked the idea. It was an easy reference point to string together disparate journal notes down the line at a glance when he had more information to work with and collate.

It might all be in vain, however, as it was entirely possible there were magical means to transcribe, translate, or otherwise simply read written languages you couldn’t otherwise understand. At least it would mean limiting the potential pool of spies who’d be able to read his secrets without expensive magical help. Hell, he had barely found any practical use in his daily life back home studying his native tongue, the enthusiasm of his youth wasted by harsh reality. At least it could profit him here in some small manner.

He closed over the journal and turned before his fingers brushed against something on its surface. It was a divet in the cover he hadn't noticed before and which only a passing glance by the light of the expensive brick revealed a curious, barely perceptible silver sheen in it. It was a chance perception, but it made him pause nonetheless. He brushed his fingers against it. It was a light mark on the surface of the journal, with a slight sheen of silver along a part of its centre where the divet was deepest. His armour immediately came to mind—had he pressed it against the armour’s sides or joints and been unaware of it? When? He only ever took this thing out of its hiding places to write in it when he started back in the depths of the winter months, and only remembered moving it from his manor to the airship as he prepared to leave for Equestria.

He had been wearing his armour at the time but then… He looked over to the stand and the cabinet, reaching across for his phone and shining it on the armour stand. He had been wearing his new suit when he boarded, hadn’t he? It wasn’t silvered at all. Hell, it wasn’t even burnished or acid-etched for the extra bit of vain shininess. He had recovered one of his gauntlets from near the edge of the bed when he had picked up his armour pieces not too long ago, but unless that bounced under the bed, scratched the book and fell back down and landed near the edge outside from under the frame again, he couldn’t see it being responsible.

Apprehension crawled along the back of his neck, and he immediately tore his room apart, opening the cabinet and tossing its contents about after quickly taking a mental inventory of everything he touched. He even tore off the cloth cover of his shield, studying it at every angle to see if there was anything different about it, anything altered or changed. Nothing. His canteens, his clothes, the very boards and nails of the cabinet itself, the pieces of one suit of armour, then the other. His hauberks, the padding, his tools… Nothing was missing or out of place. Nothing was there that shouldn’t be.

He turned paranoid eyes to his writing desk and unleashed his fury upon it, flipping through his books and journals, searching for any alteration, any sign there had been any foul play or invasion of his privacy. Again, nothing. He went through his drawers carefully as his paranoia slowly started to wind down. Nothing was out of place; nothing was missing. Not even a single coin or sapphire from his money drawer. Yes, he counted. He stood back from his desk, rubbing his head and brushing his hair down as he took a breath. He carefully looked through his personal journal again and again. Not one page was damaged, not in a way he wouldn’t notice not being his fault somehow. His paranoia turned towards the others on the ship.

Spike? He’d have reason to go snooping; he had certainly shown his desire to know more when he had asked about his deal with Whirlwind before Handy shot that line of questioning down hard. Still, he found it hard to imagine a dragon with claws like his being particularly delicate with flipping through so many pages and not leaving a mark or a tear. He turned over the journal and studied the divet. No, not a claw mark, not deep enough, and Spike had no silver on him that could rub off on the book.

Silvertalon? Name aside, again, same problem. That and he had no reason to go snooping in Handy’s business, but he was alone on the ship for days at a time. Maybe he could’ve simply gotten bored or anxious, and sought out something to keep his mind busy? An innocent motivation, perhaps, but not impossible.

Whirlwind was always a possibility. That bastard was nosey by nature, or at least seemed to be—hard to tell with deer. He was, however, deathly serious about secrets. He knew that from experience facing the deadly hard glint in the stag’s eyes when the conversation crossed into difficult matters in the past. He did, however, have any amount of silver on his person at any given time, either money, or decorative accoutrements, even what appeared to be a ceremonial dagger Handy had spied sheathed under his cloak. He didn’t think the Lord in Winter had a reason to spy on Handy’s business, and he thought he respected him enough to not do so even if he did. He could not rule out the possibility, however.

Another party perhaps? Maybe the mark had been made before he’d even left Griffonia. Any number of people could have done it. He knew for a fact the Lord Caretaker Herman Sunderclaw, Gethrenia’s real spymaster, kept tabs on him. Hell, that was why he had decided to write a journal in a language he knew no one in Gethrenia at least understood. Changelings? Always possible. Other pony spies, other griffon spies, hell, maybe even one of those two punch-drunk teenagers from the village who thought it’d be a fucking awesome idea to break into Baron Haywatch’s manor on a drunken dare one night. Unfortunately for them, Handy had been moving his coffin into a spare room at the time and had taken the opportunity to make his displeasure immediately obvious in dramatic fashion. He had forgiven them of course, publicly, when their abashed parents came begging forgiveness on their behalf the day after he had sent them screaming for their mothers.

It had been an amusing episode, but an inconsequential one. On a notion, he investigated the bed frame itself for evidence. The frame itself revealed nothing, so he lifted up the mattress itself. It was an expensive one; spring frame mattresses were still a new innovation and they weren’t as comfortable as the ones he was used to on Earth. They were certainly not as comfortable as the higher-end mattresses he had the pleasure of experiencing in the castle of Skymount, but were a damn site more tolerable than the more common hay-filled mattresses he had become used to.

You just had to… get used to the solid steel springs. Speaking of said springs, as he lifted the mattress, he noticed there were indeed various places where springs were partially poking through the mattress. It was entirely possible that what he had interpreted as a silver brush on the divet of his journal was instead the grey of steel, just harder to discern in the harsh blue light of the brick. It was entirely possible he was overthinking this entire thing. He couldn’t shake the paranoia, however, as he replaced the mattress. He couldn’t leave the book there anymore; he would have to take it with him from now on. It meant risking its loss, either by theft or destruction, sure, but it would help him keep his peace until he found a better solution.

Breathing deeply through his nostrils, he turned to clean up his cabin once more, suspicious thoughts turning occasionally to his current crewmates before being dismissed as he worked. Finally when he was done, he looked back down at his journal once more before reaching for his medicine drawer, taking out three tallow’s ear leaves and chewing on them as he sat on his bed. He hadn’t put too many damning secrets into the journal in any case. Just enough to get him hanged, he supposed. He might be better off burning the journal entirely and simply go about his business with everything in his head. He considered it, but instead placed the journal under his pillow. He fucking dared anyone try to sneak up on a sleeping vampire and try to reach underneath his pillow, see how that worked out for them.

His thoughts drifted as the natural sedatives of the tallow’s ear took their effect, relaxing him, making it far easier to drift off naturally to oblivion once more.

The journal was future Handy’s problem.

--=--

The airship, wonder of wonders, slowly but surely lowered steadily to the ground. Whirlwind shifted in his fetters as he pulled the cart up to where the airlock would be closest to them as the ship lowered itself as close to the ground as it was safe to do so.

“Looks like the two of them fixed the ballasts alright.” Silvertalon smiled with not a little bit of pride. He had been honoured the baron had asked him to teach him what he knew about running and maintaining an airship rather than contracting a high falutin’ engineer from one of the schools out east. Silvertalon had been flying these things since they were little more than powder kegs attached to balloons, and he’d be damned if some cracked beaked little know-it-all who learned all his steam trade from books and lectures was going to lecture him on anything. Sure, they were still a fairly new means of transportation, as things were reckoned, but he felt he was hardly preening too boastfully when he thought himself one of the most experienced airship pilots in the entire High Kingdom. Baron Handy was an attentive student if nothing else, and now he had proof of it, the fruits of his labour as a mentor and teacher.

“Why in Tartarus did I have to lug this thing the last leg of the journey?” Whirlwind groused. Silvertalon’s smile and gaze never wavered.

“You lost the bet.”

“You got us put in jail!”

“You promised not to mention it to anygriffon.”

“Correction, I promised not to mention it Handy,” Whirlwind said with a victorious smile. Silvertalon snorted.

“Ya still lost the bet,” he insisted. Whirlwind let out a disgusted breath.

“Nothing gets to you, does it? At least Handy has amusing reactions,” the deer complained, Silvertalon ruffled his wings.

“I’m not Handy, now am I?” The dark grey of the ship’s envelope overshadowed them and looked positively ominous as it blocked out the sun from their perspective. He had eyed the keel that ran along the bottom of the ship as it had lowered. It didn’t look warped, but there was a strange swelling near the prow that he couldn’t account for. He mentioned it to Whirlwind who confirmed that it had been the warping he had spotted himself. He had frowned at that, hoping to the All-Maker that the deer was wrong as he didn’t know ships the way he did, particularly not airships. Whirlwind had protested, acknowledging he did not know shipbuilding, but like any deer of his tribe, he was a master carpenter and knew wood under duress when he saw it. Silvertalon dropped the issue; they’d need to get it seen to in any case. Hopefully their suspicions were wrong.

The airlock opened and a rope ladder descended to the ground. It was easily a fifteen foot climb given the length of the ship from the base of the airlock as well as the distance from the surface. Nonetheless, both the human and Spike descended from the airlock, carrying bags of tools and spare metal sheets. Whirlwind let out a relieved breath and unhooked himself from the cart as the pair approached.

“What took you two so long?” Handy asked in a tone of voice that sounded as if he were glad to see them, but his smile didn’t meet his eyes. Silvertalon raised a brow at that. He knew he didn’t care for the dragon, but he hadn’t figured being stuck with only Spike for company would wear on his employer’s patience that badly. The furtiveness of the lanky drake only furthered his suspicions.

“We decided to stay the night rather than trudge through the night part way through,” Whirlwind lied with an easy smile. Silvertalon shuffled his wings before coughing an affirmation.

“Got ourselves plenty of coal here, sir. Right bargain too.” The griffon gestured to the cart with a wing. There were easily seven bags of coal piled on the cart. Nowhere near enough to get them to the Empire, but more than enough to get both to a lake and a relay station for a proper refuelling of coal.

“Good to hear.” Handy set down two bags of tools to the ground, Spike following suit. “Alright, I saw it's probably better if we dismount and fix the water tanks here while we have the ship lowered. The ground’s relatively flat, the rain finally stopped this morning, and it’ll be easier than fixing them and filling them at the same time by a lake.”

“It's wha’ I’d do milord.” Silvertalon nodded approvingly as Whirlwind turned and waved a hoof at a pair of country ponies who were passing by on a country road pulling a pair of small carts. The ponies looked curiously at the goings on regarding the airship and were, more than likely, some locals who made an excuse to go noseying as close to the airship everypony had noticed parked in the sky overnight. They suddenly hurried themselves when they recognised Handy though, furtively whispering to themselves as they went about their business. Whirlwind frowned at their rudeness of not waving back, however.

“Alright, then let's get started. Silvertalon, I loosened the chains from the inside. They should lower easily once you dismount the burst tanks. Whirlwind, we’re going to need you to direct us to the parts that need patching. Spike here makes attaching the steel plates easy, so we shouldn’t be here for as long as we would be if we were stuck hammering and lacquering the damn thing to make it watertight.”

And with that they got set to work. Silvertalon dismounted the first water tank, slowly lowering it down, pushing it with his rear paw as he balanced precariously on the side of the ship so that it rolled gently down the side of the water tank beneath it and then gently onto the stabilizer fin. It had been locked in place in preparation to gently lower the tank further and more safely to the ground. The hard ridges that lined the front of the wing of the ship were ridged with iron half circles, designed to catch the chains that lowered the tank as it crossed over the edge of the fin and made its way further to the ground to keep it from swaying dangerously.

With the first tank lowered, they set to work, Whirlwind directing the efforts of the other two as Handy hammered the burst metal seams into place, stepping well back as Spike set to work welding the rent metal. Whirlwind helped setting about bending the sheet metals into shape, with Handy holding them in place over the repaired metal while Whirlwind’s ice magic helped freeze them in place. It was an invaluable addition because Handy was wondering how the hell they planned on holding them in place while Spike set to work with his fire breath. Fortunately, the ice held, and while it melted immediately under spike’s flame, it burned too hot and too fast, welding the metal in place before the hard packed magical ice disappeared like so much winter’s snow on a spring morning.

They double checked their work, ensuring the metal would hold under pressure according to the specifications of the ship. If worst came to worst, Handy would simply pitch in for replacements when they made dock somewhere, but hopefully they should hold until they reached the Crystal Empire. Hopefully.

“How do you plan on filling those things, anyway? Do you just lower them into the lake and open the valves or what?” Whirlwind asked from atop the stabilizer fin as Silvertalon worked the chains to begin the process of lifting the repaired tank back into place, with Whirlwind helping lift it over the awkward fin and then again over the lower water tank.

“Tha’s one method fir it,” Silvertalon confirmed as he took to the air in a rush of wind and took flight to get to work on the water tanks. “Heavy as anything when trying to lift them back up, but if ya got some steam in the boiler, you can make an easier job of the chains being pulled by a mechanism in the ship. Just gotta have somegriffon stay out and be prepared to yell at whoever is inside to stop the machine when it gets awkward.”

“What other way could you do it?” Whirlwind continued, Handy sighed.

“Another way is you get a really long, specialised hose, and trick physics into making the lake do the hard work for you and siphon the water up into the tanks,” Handy explained. “It's really awkward and a right pain in the ass to use.”

“Do we have one?”

“Not anymore we don’t,” Handy said with a straight face.

“I still have no idea where I put that thing…” Silvertalon called down from the tanks on the back side of the ship, hidden from view as he was by a rear stabilizer fin. Handy looked off into the distance and said nothing. Whirlwind smiled.

Author's Note:

Fuck you, welcome back to Bad Mondays.

Comments

[Jude]

In retrospect, the Baron should have just called up AA on his cell.

[Handyman]

11264115
You come into MY HOUSE and make THAT JOKE.

[Adamanthys]

Holy shit! I never expected this. Welcome back! I'll probably have to reread this monster of a story first though.

[TheKingIsDead]

Well holee-fucking shit. It's a zombie!

[Jude]

11264116
Yes.

[azereath]

IT LIVESSSSS!!!!

[Asheram]

Ah, welcome home. It's been a long while but this is as dear as when we left off.

[A Predatorial Horse]

Le gasp!
Best hie is back!

[Okamiluver]

Omg, the planets have aligned, the stars have touched, and a prayer answered! Woooot this update made me happy!

[vorxil]

By the gods, what is this?
A conjunction of the spheres!
Do my eyes tell me lies?
A new chapter is here?!

[silentcube65]

Never been happier to see a story update

[Fredrik709]

Well, it's certainly great that the chapter came out on Monday... in a fic called "Bad Mondays" and that I got kicked out of college on that Monday. Coincidence?... I don't think so.
The last chapter of 2018 is the year I got into college on a Monday too. In short, it's kind of weird. This is so, thoughts that no one really needs.
And as for the chapter, well, it’s written well, though I had to re-read the last chapters to remember what happened. Of course it would be interesting to know, what if Handy tries to mix different blood, what would happen?
And even more so when he arrives in the crystal empire.

[Edgeblackstar]

Yo new chapter just drop!!! Now I’m happy wasn’t expecting this today

[AzureShade]

The ley lines have synced, the portal is OPEN.

ALL HAIL THE RETURN OF LORD HANDY THE DESTROYER.

'laughs madly as Handy ends the world'

[Handyman]

11264228
I am sorry to hear you got dropped out of college, man. It must be rough.

In answer to your question, there will be some strange interactions between different blood types down the line for Handy with regards to his vampire powers, so you will get to see something in relation to that in due time.

[solidcrazyy]

I'm glad the story is back in action.

[SPANIARD KIWI]

Holy freaking bucking shit, it's alive! Huzzah!

[Sir Appleslice]

Honestly, at this point, I have to re-read everything, which I will gladly do in between study sessions.

[Sir Appleslice]

11264228
That is one hell of a coincidence. Sorry about getting kicked out of college? How did that happen anyway? Usually, you only get kicked out if you do something illegal, not that I'm saying you've done something.

[Handyman]

>Handyman: Posts a chapter after an agonizing four year hiatus.
>A dozen user accounts who never posted a comment before on the story or blogposts with join dates going as far back as 2014 or 2011 and who've clearly been stalking me silently for almost a decade now:

[Fredrik709]

11264327
To be honest, because of the delay in paying tuition ... it's stupid how it turned out. They would have warned me that I had not paid everything yet, so just a short call and everything was over. :^(

[Heartless2]

Now I’m happy wasn’t expecting this today

[Sir Appleslice]

11264334
Holy shit, that fuckings sucks. My sister almost lost her spot this semester for almost the same reason, the difference was that in Norway it is free, but she had to pay some minor admin fee for around 50 bucks. She would have lost her spot if she wasn't already in the system from the previous year.

Anyway, good luck man, honestly being set back for another year is not the end of the world, unless when it is. But I hope you're not in that situation.

[CommandoDude]

11264333

I'm feeling very called out right now...

[CookieGalaxy]

11264333

who've clearly been stalking me silently for almost a decade now:

Wow that's crazy!
I would never do that

[BronyofMeddlers]

11264333
*whistle innocently*

[Channelcatcat]

I'm glad your back. I wasn't expecting a bad Monday update when I checked my feed today. What a great way to end a day.

[Porfiry Petrovitch]

11264333
Handyman after a 4 year hiatus: Call me LAZARUS

[PuppetXMaster]

it's alive!

[Pensive]

IT LIVES!

[msgunner501]

Hot damn, it is a good day when I see a new Bad Mondays chapter! It's great to see this running again. Now let's see if I actually remember what's going on...

[More Dakka]

Holly, crap! We did it! We made it through the dry spell!

[laple_daple]

As we say in Texas:

"That was pretty good. I thoroughly enjoyed that."

[OhboyTime]

Fuck me, it's alive! The best HiE story on this site...

Now if only I remembered what the fuck is going on. Crazy to think I was still in high school when I first started reading this.

[LordAlastrayus]

11264242
Happy to have you back man, this is one of my favorite stories.

[ALittleUnwell]

Absolutely nailed it with this one, with that opening scene being my favorite. It's about time we got some of Handy's backstory and Irish heritage into play.

[throwawayforanidiot]

You know it's a damn good story when you read 22k words, don't feel bored and wish it was longer. Glad to have you back Handyman.

[JBL]

Extremely disappointed in y'all mfers for missing out my little salacious addition that finally escaped Handyman's ever-watchful eyes.

[The Orthodox Priesthood]

11264679
Save that for Salacious Sodomite September

[D48]

Hey, it worked! I was thinking my push had failed, but it looks like I did succeed in motivating you to get another chapter out, so now it looks like we have a proven method of getting more chapters!

As for the chapter, it was obviously more of a rest period (even if the characters were working their asses off) but there was still a lot of great stuff in it, especially seeing Spike start to integrate with the group. I also noticed you're setting the stage to bring in an engineer to round out the crew and am looking forward to the eventual conclusion to that based on our discussion in PMs a while back.

11264679
Did you ever read the motivational side story I wrote to help get Handyman back in gear? If you missed it, the link is in this comment: 10928583

[DragonBorne]

11264242
*Laugh In Stalker*

[AnOnyxPolygon]

Everyone's reaction in a nutshell:

[JBL]

11264692
I'll have to check it out

[D48]

11264776
Cool. I'm looking forward to your reaction.

[Booster Spice]

At least Handy doesnt have to use a Speed Scoop to refill the water tanks.

[Bones_]

Wew, I'm gonna need some sort of refresher before I properly understand a word of this.

[Handyman]

He’d always been taught to treat others’ sacks gently.

....

JAAAAAYYYY BEEEEEE EEEEELLLLLLLL!

[DRaily]

Fuck me sideways, it's actually back. Well in truth the next update or two will show if it is actually back or not, but if it is I might take my time and reread the story.

[dov]

It's been a while, nice to have this gem back.
...Still shorter than "a short story"

[TruthHut]

Of course you posted this the night I had final exams. Well worth the hours of sleep to read this. And then reread a few previous chapters. Then start reading from the beginning again.

Glad to hear you're doing better, you glorious bastard.