Chapter the Fifth: Getting High
Doing His Duty
A My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic Fan fiction
by Wolfram and Hart
CHAPTER FIVE: Getting High
Snrrrrrrrkt...
Hoiiiiicht...
Ptew!
Flash Sentry and Xander watched with foalish fascination as the gooey green glob of phlegm disappeared into the shifting blue scenery far below.
The two stallions shared a look and a goofy wide grin.
"I love skyboats." Flash said.
Xander nodded in agreement.
"Wanna chuck something else over the side?"
Xander nodded even harder.
* * *
Woosh.
The guards giggled like schoolcolts as the hefty cannonball was rapidly swallowed up into the watery oblivion of Equestria's western sea. The boat was so far up that they weren't even close to hearing it hit the surface.
"Say," Flash said "if a big chunk of lead falls into the sea and nopony is around to hear it, does it make a sound?"
Xander shrugged.
The two continued to stare out at the endless expanse of churning waves. The Tumbling Sea was most definitely not known for its calm waters and stormless nights. Some had taken to calling it the "Sailor's Obstacle Course" simply because everything that could ruin a seafarer's day was present in the stretch of ocean between Maretonia and Equestria; sea serpents, whirlpools, hurricanes, hundred-foot swells, sirens, you name it, the Tumbling Sea had it.
This is why Equestria had taken to traveling over rather than through it. Skyships were a must for making the trip to Maretonia, and so Canterlot's royalty spared no expense. Three flying machines of wood, steel, cloud, and cloth sailed straight and true with the favorable tradewinds. The largest of them was Vas Autem Solis, a behemoth of a boat large enough to pass as a flying hotel that sported a flamboyant white, yellow and orange paint job. She was held aloft by not one, but two full-sized nimbus-filled cloudcatchers that would've each comfortably fit a whale within. This was where Princesses Celestia, Luna, and Cadence rested for their long journey across the sea. As a result, the ship was heavily defended, the three floors of her hull equipped with canons on both sides.
Flanking The Solis were two gremlin-class vessels; ships much sleeker and lighter in design than the aforementioned mammoth-class cruiser. They weren't half the weight and surface area of the boat that they escorted, but they made up for their size by having a ridiculous amount of firepower. With hull mounted full-size black powder cannons, rail-mounted swivel cannons, enough steel small arms to start a military coup, onboard ballistas loaded with oil-soaked bolts and state-of-the-art propulsion engines, size did not matter a damn bit.
The first of the gremlins was The Rocketmare, an older model of airboat that had seen many a refurbishment. No portion of her original construction remained. Her prow sported a snake-eyed selenic figurehead, its pointed fangs bared and leather wings unfurled. "Rocky", as she was often and fondly called by her captain, sported an unassuming grey paintjob with dark green, almost black, trim around the edges. There were some spots where the paint was scraped off as a direct result of her directly ramming into other ships (accidental or otherwise), revealing the oaken planks underneath. Though some would say the scrapes were ugly, one could not ignore that they were like shallow scars on a pony's face: too damn cool and to cover up.
On the other side of the royal vessel was a ship that differed little in shape and size as compared to The Rocketmare, yet bore a showy high profile paint job of jet black with stylized hotrod flames on its hull. This one was called The Intimidator, and its name was rightfully given. If The Rocky was armed to the teeth, The Intimidator was armed to the colon. In addition to a standard defense arsenal, she was equipped by a highly experimental, highly dangerous mana-powered freeze beam cannon designed by Princess Twilight Sparkle herself. This was mounted in the center of the deck to provide maximum area coverage in case it is ever needed. The freeze ray wasn't even all of it. Her thrusters, like all other skyboats, were powered by natural coal. But the coal engines in her belly were treated with various alchemical concoctions, making the furnaces burn twice as hot and twice as bright. It also caused the flames expelled from the thrusters to burn a dark red, and who the hell doesn't love that?
Naturally, The Intimidator was where Blueblood and corps laid their head for the five-day journey.
* * *
Flash and Xander had finally tired of chucking things over the side, so they merely leaned against the railing and stared at the cloudy skies to pass time. The gloomy grey tint of the sky and the sudden chilly wind that ruffled Flash's feathers left a familiar contented feeling in the guard's chest.
"Looks like rain's in the forecast today." Flash said, breaking the quiet between the two.
"Mmm hmm." Xander hummed his agreement
Nopony that Flash had ever met outside the Empire really liked the rain, and some were even deathly afraid of lightning and thunder. He, on the other hoof, loved every drop of precipitation that fell from the heavens. After the Empire's Return, Flash would sometimes spend hours of his days off sitting on a covered porch and watching the snow fall in thick flakes. He hadn't seen water fall from the sky in any form for a long time. It reminded him that things were right again, that the thousand-year haze of maddening boredom was over.
"Should we even be out here like this?" Flash asked, looking to Xander for an answer. "I mean, I won't even be able to protect the prince just twiddling my hooves all day. I don't even know where he is."
The zony shrugged.
"Chill out, rookie." Cotton Swab called from halfway across the main deck. "We had Double B look over every last member of the staff on this ship. He didn't recognize anypony on the boat as a past flame, so there ain't nopony within a hundred miles to get him."
Cotton Swab had been slumped up lazily on the side of the experimental ice laser that definitely might not have blown up at any minute. The machine had a weird shape that looked like a cannon and a telescope locked themselves in a workshop, made a foal, and that foal was adopted by a skyboat. There were a small collection of crudely scrawled phrases carved into the the surface of its armor plating, phrases like "ICE 2 MEET U", "Celestia's Air Conditioner", and Flash's personal favorite "Emergency Beer Cooler".
"Why not come over here and talk?" Flash shouted back. "It's easier not to have to yell!"
There was a long silence from the other end.
"No thanks." He could barely hear her over the low thrum of the ship's engines.
Flash furrowed his brow. That mare was an odd one."Why not?"
Xander bumped Flash in the shoulder.
"Huh? What is it?"
The zony turned his head to look at the long drop over the guardrails, then he turned to look at Cotton Swab, then back to the sea, and finally back to Swab.
Flash shook his head. He was never good at charades."What do you mean?"
Xander let out a long whistle that started high and gradually lowered in pitch. He gestured a hoof to the sea, then to the unicorn.
"Falling.... Cotton?"
The gears in his head turned.
"Oh!" His face lit up like a lightbulb. "Cotton's afraid of heights!"
Xander put one hoof to his nose and pointed at Flash with the other.
"Cotton!" He shouted. "Why are you afraid of heights?"
"I'm not afraid of heights. I'm afraid of falling." The distance between them was not so great that Flash couldn't see the unicorn shuffle her hooves awkwardly. "There's a difference."
"Yeah, right." he muttered.
Xander shrugged.
"Fine." Flash said. "We'll do it your way."
It took them seconds to leisurely trot away from the edge and toward the machine that Flash didn't at all feel safe around.
"Better?" he asked with a trace of humor in his tone.
"Better."
"So what's with this trip anyway?" Flash began "I've only ever heard of Maretonia once or twice back in the Empire. Didn't exist in my time. I never thought it'd be so important that every royal in Canterlot would drop everything to go there."
"Eh, Maretonia's a big deal with the royalty." Cotton said with a great nonchalance.
"Why?"
"Damn you ask a helluva lotta questions." She chuckled. "Guess I've been working with a mute too long. So, you want the history lesson or a quick rundown?"
"Well I've got a thousand years of history to catch up on." Flash said. "Hit me."
"Alrighty, so...." Cotton glanced out at the sea, but shuttered and decided to eye the floor instead. "Maretonia used to be a big ol' Equestrian colony way back when. A big fleet of normal water-floating ships found a kinda-sorta safe route through the Tumbling Sea and made landfall on a whole different continent. Took 'em half a year to get there. They were supposed to be on an expedition just to see what was on the other side. Most of 'em were too sick of sailing this sea to make the trip back, so they planted some crops, built a few towns, and gave the place a name. That was that."
Everypony jumped when a sudden crack of thunder split the skies and stopped their hearts for the briefest of moments. A light rain had started to fall, but the bulbous cloudcatcher holding the Intimidator aloft kept the water off off of them like an umbrella.
"Aaaaaanyway..." the guard went on. "Fast forward to about, I don't know, a hundred and fifty years ago and tons of ponies from Equestria have made the trip over the ocean after hearing what a tropical paradise Maretonia was and all that jazz. Next thing you know, Celestia gets a big scroll teleported onto her desk signed by nearly everypony important over there. The colony got so big that they wanted to be their own country and declare independence from Equestria so they don't have to keep sending their crops over for free."
"What kinda crops?"
Cotton smirked. "Mostly hemp."
"The stuff they make rope and paper out of?"
She and Xander shared a knowing look. "Yeah. That."
They laughed, but Flash remained confused as ever.
"Well," she went on "Celly let them be do their own thing without a fuss. Kuz, you know, she's Celestia. Fast forward again to today and they've got a badass economy nearly as good as Equestria's. The royalty over there has alway been sensitive about our relations kuz we're basically Maretonia's big brother. They always want the swankiest balls with everypony who's everypony in attendance and the ambassadors have to have the finest of cuisine on official visits and yadda yadda. That's why everypony who's even laid eyes on Celestia and Luna is coming to this wedding between the Duke of Maretonia's son and some warrior princess chick from the neighboring gryphon tribe."
"That's an odd couple." Flash remarked. "A pony and a gryphon."
Xander loudly cleared his throat.
"Not that there's anything wrong with interracial marriages." He added quickly.
Xander gave a satisfied nod.
Another crack of thunder shook the ship, but nopony reacted this time.
"Odd as it might seem," Cotton said "it'll do the country a world of good. They've been bickering with the gryphons over territory for, like, ever. I heard BB say that this white wedding will merge their lands together so they could finally share it and stuff."
"Why didn't they just learn to share in the first place?" Flash asked. "No need to set up a marriage for that."
Cotton opened her mouth to reply, but it kind of just hung there for a moment. "That's a good question." she said after a moment. "I dunno."
Their conversation carried on for some time. They spoke at length about the oddities and intricacies of Maretonia, all the little things that made the country what it was. Flash was slowly getting a feel for what to expect for the upcoming wedding. All the while, the rain outside the protection of The Intimidator’s cloudchaser came down in waves, accompanied by the brief flashes of lightning and the rolling roar of thunder. The three eventually lapsed into a comfortable silence and they were content to stand together and watch the rain pound the waves.
* * *
Somewhere below the trio of guards, deep in the belly of the of The Intimidator, a uniformed unicorn squinted at a translucent sphere of glass that floated of its own power atop a silver pedestal. The shifting images and symbols contained within the crystal ball would have meant nothing to an onlooker uneducated in their meaning, but this unicorn was a navigator. He did not see just moving pictures, he saw latitude, longitude, elevation, direction, wind speed, and everything else a ship at sea needed to function. Something new had appeared in the viewing orb, something with no definite word or symbol to represent it. He didn't know what the object was, but the crystal had estimated its elevation to be three thousand feet and moving at fifty five knots.
"Captains!" he said, tearing his eyes away from the orb.
Two pegasus ponies turned their heads away from gazing out of the forward viewing platform in unison. These two were near identical in every way save for the color of their coats. While one sported fur as red as a brick wall and a mane like dark chocolate, the other had a coat that was exactly the same color of his brother's mane, and vise versa.
"What have-" one said.
"-we got?" The second finished
"The VO just picked up something flying at our relative elevation about two and a half klicks to the south." the navigator answered "It's big. Real big."
"Another skyship?"
"Another airboat?"
The captains asked their questions in stereo. They both trotted from their places to look over the shoulder of the navigator.
The unicorn's face scrunched as he took a second look at the sphere just to be sure. "N-no. Not another boat. It's moving too fast to match any vessel we've seen."
"And it's heading-"
"-our way."
The two captains looked at one another, identical expressions of worry on their faces.
* * *
Prince Blueblood stretched and gave a yawn of epic proportions as he stepped outside of his cabin to be greeted by the brisk chill of wet air and the dull roar of a heavy downpour. His nap had been a good one. It had been quite some time since he had the chance to take a rest like that.
He looked over the deck of the ship and his attention immediately shifted to the small crowd of sailors and his guard corps gathered around the side of the ship. They were all looking in the same direction, their murmurs audible through the droning rain.
Blueblood cantered over to Cotton Swab, who had not moved from her spot by the canon since he laid his head down to sleep.
"What's going on here?" He asked. "Are we there already?"
"Nah." she said "everypony's just gawking at something off in the distance. Probably a mountain."
Blueblood cocked and inquisitive brow."A mountain out in the middle of an ocean? I've never heard of that."
Cotton shot the prince a nasty look. "I'm not going out there to find out."
"Here." She turned her away for a brief moment and levitated something from her pocket.
A silver cylinder floated in front of the prince's face. "Why don't you take a look? Come back and tell me, kuz I'm kinda curious."
He took the telescope in his own magical grasp. "Why don't you go do it yourself?"
Cotton's stare was so blank that it could have made a brick wall jealous.
"Fine fine, whatever." he huffed. "You're going to have to get over that fear of heights one of these days."
Cotton's face hardly moved. "Maybe I will when I become the alicorn princess of babysitting royalty and grow a pair of wings. Maybe. But for now, I’ll leave that to the pegasi."
Blueblood rolled his eyes and pushed past the small crowd of ponies. He ended up sandwiched between the ship's guardrail and a few beefy sailors.
"Fancy meeting you here, my prince." Blueblood was suddenly aware of how he was really invading Flash Sentry's personal space. "Can you not step on my hoof, please?"
The prince squirmed a few inches to the left. "Sorry about that."
Blueblood maneuvered the spyglass around the crowd and in front of his face. With a clackity clack, the metal tool extended and was levitated to the prince's eye.
He squinted hard into the lens. Whatever they were staring, it wasn't any kind of mountain or island, it was flying. Though, the darkness of the thick clouds and the heavy downpour made it difficult to see this flying object as anything but a blobby silhouette over the horizon. It changed its shape at a rhythmic pace, bending up and down and up and down. Was it getting larger? Blueblood could have sworn that it was. Funny, it almost looked like...
The milky white stallion’s coat somehow grew paler. "By the silvery moon."
That look on the prince's face did not make Flash feel too comfortable. "What is it?"
Blueblood levitated the spyglass to him.
Puzzled, the guard took it in his hooves and gave the mystery shape a good look.
"Oh shit." He would later apologize to the prince for the use of profanity.
The crew, having seen and heard their exchange as clear as day, collectively stared at the prince and his guard, most of them fidgeting with unease. They all gave each other sideways glances, but nopony breathed a word.
"Um, guys?" one of the younger sailors spoke up. "W-what is it?"
Flash lowered the telescope. Staring out at the grey horizon, he put on his signature guard face.
"It's a dragon." His voice was a dry as a desert.
The sailors took a step back.
There was a brief moment where everypony's heart momentarily stopped at the same time, the silence only broken by the murmur of rain and a crack of thunder.
"Don't just stand there!" Blueblood shouted, causing everypony to jump "Battle stations!"
A dragon, you say?
Airboat naming and premise inspired by this blog post by Rust.
Pretty late chapter, ain't it? Sorry about that, folks. Due to my recent employment as a minimum wage meat-cutter, I have little time for anything but sleeping and goofing off. As a result, the rate at which I churn out words will be slowed significantly. I apologize, but there's millions of other stories out there. I won't mind if you cheat on me.
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Huh... Perhaps the Prince will be snagged by a dragon and then must be rescued by a lady guard... FETCH ME THE ROYAL BOOK OF HILARITY! We may have an entry!
5399382 I only have a half baked idea for what's going in the next chapter, so it's up in the air for now.
5399392
Well, yes, it would be in the air. They're over an ocean. Though I suppose it could suddenly take a dive to the briny depths. However unless the dragon has taken a liking to scuba diving for wayward royal types perhaps th- *WHAM!* okay... I'm sorry... shutting up...
OMFG BLUEBLOOD. TELL ME YOU DIDN'T SHAG A DRAGON!
If the dragon is one of his ex-lovers
... this is going to be good!! 
What lunatic commissioned Twilight to build offensive weaponry? a fricking Freeze Cannon!? I'm surprised half the crew of The Intimidator isn't nervous the thing will explode when fired and entomb the whole ship in ice! Also likely they don't let here make weapons anymore, she probably had ideas for plasma cannons, disintegration missiles and emotion inducing ray guns.
Come on. Who could say no to this face?
derpicdn.net/img/view/2012/9/3/89313.gif
I don't hold it against Blueblood. Not. At. All.
5399758
5399628
5399416
Come on guys, why are you all insinuating that BB went heels-up with a giant winged reptile? It's not like that fits the premise of the story perfectly or anything...
Oh shit. Blueblood must have dicked a dragoness
5403375 jurnalotaku.kilatstorage.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/studiotriggerwuedan.jpg
That was good and I am very much looking forwards to hearing how Blueblood managed to sleep with a dragon, although I did notice one oddity. You said the dragon was at 200 feet and that the airships were at the same altitude, but that is dangerously low for any aircraft, especially when you have such an unstable ocean below them and a storm above. I would expect them to be at least a couple thousand feet up for safety reasons, although 10,000 is probably the highest I would expect them to go because the air will start getting uncomfortably thin. As such, I think it would make much more sense if you tweaked that so it was somewhere in the 2,000 to 5,000 foot range for a cruise like this so you will not have people like me doubling back to check to make sure our memory of the low number is right. Also, the scene at the beginning with them tossing shit over the side does not make sense if they are that low.
5406427 I honestly haven't the foggiest idea of what 200 feet or 2000 looks like in the real world. I'll take your advice and change it to around 3000ish when I get the chance. Thank you for that.
And by the way WHY DOES EVERYONE IMMEDIATELY ASSUME BB HAD SEXYTIMES WITH A DRAGON?
5406875 Happy to help on the first one, and the second probably has something to do with 5400533.
I'm going to assume this was a mistake. If it's not...
5432387 And if it wasn't...?
allfunnyfaces.com/pictures/Creepy_Creep_Smile.jpg
5433815 Then things happen which need to be described in much more detail.
Well, I've finally managed to come back to read this. And the idea of Blueblood on a airship having to fend off a dragon, well, that sounds familiar. What doesn't is the part where he slept with one of those fire-breathing reptiles first.
Are there no limits to your lust, Blueblood? What next?
...Actually, scratch that, I don't want to know. I'm sure it'd be a spoiler that would amuse me for hours on end.
5456794
Familiar how?
5457148 Well, I wrote that scenario into a fic of mine. I was just quite amused to see it going down here too.
...and it was also a fic with a certain amount of focus on Blueblood's character developpment.