The Atlantean-Dominion War

by The Atlantean

58. Voyage's End

Lost Legacy craned his neck to see around the Pharaoh's stern railing. Finally, after four agonizing hours of evacuation, cargo transfer, and failed attempts at stopping the water, DNV Montoyana’s capsized hull dipped beneath the waves. Sixteen trapped ponies went down with the ship, still struggling against the sinking ship to escape. Five others had been killed outright in the Atlantean multi-ship broadside and a dozen more wounded, some seriously. Out of the five ships sent out, four remained.

The next two hours were funerals at sea for those whose bodies they did recover. But once the solemnity was served, the Dominion fleet took to full sail. They still had a job to do.

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Three days after exchanging shots, the faster part of Evergreen’s armada rounded Cape Lune. That “faster part” was made of only Eternity, which managed an astonishing fifteen knots during the transit. The rest of the fleet maxed out at ten knots, and would arrive in two days, wind permitting.

As the small town of Summercrest came into view around the partially-rebuilt lighthouse, an iron-hulled vessel sprinted out of the harbor to greet them. It flew a large Atlantean Navy banner on its aft mast and sported two large weapons on her bow and stern. With a white “01” painted on either side of the bow, just behind the anchors, she looked like a new menace to prowl the seas.

Despite the fact that Eternity’s crew frantically waved the Atlantean colors above their ship, the mysterious ship kept its weapons pointed and hove to at a distance. Its crew flashed a lantern signal, which the voyage-weary ponies answered. After that, the ship pulled closer and deployed a small boat.

Harbormaster Nightmane clambered up the ladder to meet the newcomers. He left Nightmane with a decent commander should anything happen to him, with orders to blow up the vessel if gunshots rang.

“Permission to board?”

“Uh, sure, I guess.” The pony really didn’t know how to respond. “Who are you?”

“Harbormaster Lupus Nightmane, commanding officer of ANS Nightmane, DD-01. She’s the first iron-hulled warship in the Atlantean arsenal. Unless you count Indianapolis, but we didn’t built her. We did build Nightmane, though.” His last words held more than a hint of pride. “So, what vessel is this?”

“We don’t know, sir. We found her in some shallows off the Equestrian West Coast and hauled her back as fast as we could. Dubbed her Eternity.”

“How long have you been away from Atlantis?”

“Fourteen years to the day. We’re from Commodore Evergreen’s armada.”

Nightmane rubbed his head. “Boys, you’ve missed a lot.”

“Yeah, we noticed. Are we at war with the Dominion?”

“Have been for two and a half years. The old monarchy was overthrown a couple years after you left and was replaced by Queen Atlanta. Don’t worry; she’s much better than the old guys.”

“So we serve a queen now?”

“Dude. She’s an alicorn. Seriously.”

“Wait, what? Like the Equestrian Princesses?”

“Yeah.”

“So who started this war?”

“The damn Doms.” There was a flame of animosity in Nightmane’s voice. “We’ve been on the defensive all war. That’s partly policy, but I honestly don’t see us having the resources to rebuild and defend and attack Dom territory.”

“Well then. Do we have the resources to fix Eternity?”

Nightmane grimaced “We might. Pull into the yard and we’ll see what we can do.” With that, he and his party left for the station-keeping destroyer in the distance.

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Eternity, under Nightmane’s still-wary guns, entered the Summercrest harbor on fumes. Her sooty-black smoke, so visible on her run down, had dwindled to almost nothing. The wood her crew used for fuel was gone; the supply died just as she passed the harbor mouth. She was sluggish, which was certainly no condition to fight.

Now that Nightmane’s eyes were trained on Eternity from afar and had the time to scrutinize, he saw the signs of a long, hard voyage and raising from the bottom. Barnacles encrusted much of her exposed superstructure, and most of her formerly wooden topdeck had been eaten or rotted away many years ago. Searchlights, much like Indianapolis’s own, were damaged beyond repair. Rust had taken hold and stubbornly refused to let go, leading to long streaks of orangish metal streaking down the sides of the ship. Patched holes from who-knew-when dotted the hull, and restored, overworked pumps poured water overboard in little streams.
Finally, Eternity came to a steamless halt in the drydock where Nightmane was built and repaired after the tsunami weeks earlier. She gave in to the ocean then, as her crew climbed to the dockyard. Her old, sluiced bow went first, followed by the air-filled engine room and aft assembly.

Nightmane set his ship to the quay and disembarked quickly to tell Captain Middle Road the situation, and also to hear about Commodore Evergreen’s expedition. It promised to be quite the story.

Middle Road pushed a strand of her green mane out of her eyes, which were concentrating on the sunken ship in her drydock. Then she heard the clop of Nightmane’s hooves against the stone street. This had better be good.

“I know, I know, Captain, but they’re from an old expedition,” Nightmane cut her off before she could ask.

“Which one?”

“Evergreen’s. The one that left like fourteen years ago.”

“Is that what they said?”

“Yeah.”

“You can’t just trust that. Remember what happened with Mariner?”

“But that ship literally can’t do anything!”

“It doesn’t matter. Yes, they came in under the Atlantean naval jack, but so did Mariner. Both said they needed help, right?”

“Yeah…”

“That’s my point.”

Nightmane waved his hoof. “No. You don’t understand. Captain, every harbormaster in Atlantis knows which expeditions we have out there and when they return if they do. Ever since I became harbormaster of Summercrest twenty years ago, I’ve known these things. I knew Commodore Evergreen: she’s my second cousin, thrice removed. But the King knew that too, and you know how he liked to break up big families with those big expeditions. At least Atlanta put an end to that practice.”

“You’re wistful, hoping your cousin is truly coming home. You want to believe them. I’m gonna be cautious this time around.”

“Don’t apprehend them, Captain. They need a break.”

Road sighed a long sigh. “Fine. But they stay near their ship at all times.”

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Evergreen let the cool sea breeze flow through her coat as Chesapeake rounded Cape Lune two days later. The battlewagon was towing Cardinal behind her, the frigate too badly damaged by yet another storm to sail under her own power. A corvette had been tossed around and smashed against Whitecap Point last night, and as far as Evergreen knew, she went down with all hands.
Unlike Eternity, which had been greeted by Nightmane, the weary expedition received a much different welcome. The formidable Indianapolis came out herself, as she was the only ship with enough firepower and speed to take on the fleet. Evergreen, unsure what to do next, hove to, and the two forces kept station in the light swell. As time went on, however, Indianapolis gained reinforcements: Nightmane and the corvettes Sundering Sea, Cape Lune, and Dragonheart. For another hour, they sat there, gathering their thoughts while Evergreen and her crews stared slack-jawed at the cruiser and destroyer.

Then a lantern signal flashed from the large iron vessel. Caught up in her amazement, the commodore didn’t even see it. Then the lookout called down and a signalpony wrote the announced code, translating it after he received no more letters.

“Evergreen, they’re asking if this is Expedition Explore from 960 YS.”

“Confirm. Use my code.”

The signalpony flashed his response on Chesapeake’s own signal lantern. “They’re checking the code’s validity. Said it’s being run by some Nightmane guy.”

“That’s fine. Just tell me their response.”

After a minute, he translated. “Checks out, and ‘Welcome back cousin.’ They’ll guide us in.” His face became one of confusion. “Who’s the cousin?”

“Nightmane. He’s my second cousin, thrice removed. It’s nice to see he didn’t forget.” Evergreen turned to the helm. “Follow them in, Silverflame.”

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Summercrest Harbor was currently serving more ships than it was built to support. The standard minimum for any small naval base was to be able to support at least a dozen ships, and Summercrest could hold twenty without trouble. But over two and a half times that were tied to the quay, not including the local defense fleet of five ships, bringing the number to fifty-five. Then the shipyards held Eternity and three more corvettes, this time the new Neptune-class steamers. Neptune herself was on her maiden voyage as a sailing steamer to Manehattan, loaded with merchandise to hopefully equate into steel in a month.

Middle Road had been aboard Indianapolis for the sortie, and returned the cruiser to her massive berth under the amazed eyes of the returning exploration fleet. Nightmane also slid neatly to her pier in front of the cruiser. Sundering Sea and Cape Lune moored beside each other behind Indianapolis, and Dragonheart nestled in her spot behind them. As she walked down the gangplank, she watched the more-damaged ships angle towards the yard, while everything else dropped anchor either in the harbor or along the docks.

As the gangplank came down from Chesapeake, she heard the distinctive tune of an old piracy song. But they weren’t taking it seriously, however, and soon howled with laughter. Even the captain was in on it. Those pirates never did anything anyway, maybe except sing that goofy song about what they didn’t do, she thought.

The Pegasus captain of Chesapeake came down to the pier first. As soon as she gained the land, she was knocked over by Nightmane. They tumbled and laughed, playing with each other.

“Evergreen! You’re alive!” Nightmane said.

“Lupus, you still live in this town. I can’t believe it!” she replied as they picked themselves off the ground.

“Evergreen, I’m the harbormaster. Well, I was. My wife Lunar Eclipse has practically taken that job from me, and I’ve worked myself onto a destroyer.”

The commodore gestured at the iron-hulled ship bouncing in the waves next to the pier. “That thing?”

“Hey,” he protested, “she’s a beauty. We built her ourselves, and all you did was loot a coast.”

“Did you build the big one behind your ‘destroyer,’ Lupus?”

“Nope. Found her in the sandbar, if you can believe it.”

Middle Road tapped him on the shoulder. “Mr. Nightmane, you know her?”

“Why, Captain Road, this is none other than Commodore Evergreen, commander of Expedition Explore.”

“Commodore Evergreen? I’ve never heard of you.”

The mare fluttered her wings. “I guess that’s true for most of Atlantis. I’ve been gone for the better part of two decades.”

“Nightmane told me.”

Evergreen gestured to to Eternity, sitting in the drained drydock. “Can she be fixed?”

The stallion clapped his hoof on her shoulder. “We made one from scratch. Honestly, that thing looks like a walk in the park. Where’d she come from, really? I heard she was found off the Equestrian West Coast, but that’s it.”

“Oh, it’s true. Found her aground on a reef about thirty miles west of Vanhoover. She has a Dominion emblem on her rudder and there was a mostly-destroyed flag that we recognized as Dominion.”

“She’s a Dom vessel?”
“Well, yes.”

A predatory smile spread on Nightmane’s face. “Not anymore, she isn’t.”

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Flawless slammed open the trapdoor to Amyfalone’s southern lighthouse. Reaching the top, he took a deep breath to calm himself and watched as the largest metal warship constructed in this world took to the seas with its consort of smaller fully armed and operational steel ships. Five metal ships were headed to a rally point by the mouth of the Northern Run, where they would undergo final sea trials and wait for reinforcements before steaming towards Cape Lune.

“By Harmony,” he breathed as he watched the largest ship, DNV Devastator, and its escorts (Annihilation, Overpower, Grinder, and Dagger--he knew their names by heart) steam effortlessly against the prevailing winds. “Father’s gone completely mad.”