• Published 14th Aug 2017
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Surviving Sand Island - The 24th Pegasus



An airship wreck leaves Rainbow Dash and Rarity stranded on a deserted island. Together, they must find a way to survive until help comes—if it comes.

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The Princess of Bearing Grease

“So the rubbings are nothing? Really nothing?”

Gyro reluctantly nodded at the pirate confronting her. “Yes, they’re nothing. At least, as far as I can tell. They couldn’t possibly be from here, for the simple reason that they would have to get out for this crew of ponies to even have them in the first place.”

Black Flag scowled and sat down in the sand across from her and Coals. “It’s not possible that somepony could have stuffed it in a bottle and thrown it into the ocean, is it?”

“It… well, I don’t actually know,” Gyro said. “The barrier keeps living things trapped here, but I don’t know about other stuff. I’d imagine there’d be a lot more garbage floating around here if it could drift in from anywhere and get caught inside the barrier.”

“So it’s possible.” Flag shrugged. “That’s all I need.”

“That’s all you need?” Gyro cocked an eyebrow at him. “How does that help you? How does that help any of us? Can you read it?”

Flag shook his head. “Not in the slightest. But it’s good to have something we can at least pretend will help us, isn’t it? It’ll keep us going when this shit inevitably fails.”

Gyro could only bite her lip and frown at the sand in front of her. Sure, it was helpful in the short term to hope that the things they found would be useful, but wishing something was useful and it actually being useful were two entirely different things. “Well, we’re not going to destroy them,” she said. “There’s no reason to. I just don’t think they’re going to help us out. I don’t see how they could.”

All around her, the camp bustled with lethargic activity. The four tired stallions had returned from the campsite to the north with very little to show for it. They’d found a few useful trinkets, like a barely functional compass so filled with sand its wheel could hardly turn, but little else. After combing through the sand for hours, the papers were the only really interesting or useful thing the expedition had found, and Gyro had already concluded that they were practically worthless. Now, they prepared to go beneath the island to the shrine hiding in the stone, leisurely moving about as they did so to rest and recover for what was sure to be another grueling experience.

Flag grunted and shrugged. “Whatever. Maybe we’ll find something beneath this island. At least that’s actually important to what we’re attempting to accomplish, so I’m expecting it to be a little more fruitful.”

“I would certainly hope so,” Ruse said with a sigh. “If this doesn’t come up with anything, then we’re out of luck.”

“We’ve been out of luck for a long time now,” Flag grumbled. “This really isn’t telling us anything new.”

“I don’t know, I’d say it’s been pretty lucky.” The ventriloquist smirked and tilted his head back, where the dying light was beginning to make way for the stars. “We all got to get to know each other better and throw aside our differences in the name of love and friendship and harmony!”

The pirate scowled at Ruse. “You have to be the most un-funniest comedian I’ve ever heard.”

“I’m only a comedian through my medium,” Ruse said with a shrug. “It’s hard to do the whole standup act without getting a little hoofing action in front of an audience. Voyeurism, as the kiddos call it these days.”

Gyro and Coals snickered, and Flag could only roll his eyes and stand up. “I bet you’d be funnier if I shoved my hoof up your ass.”

“Sorry, but you’ll have to wait in line,” Ruse said. “I’m sure there’s a whole slew of ponies who want to do that after any number of my routines.”

“So long as you don’t let that siren do it,” Flag retorted. “I don’t think even an asshole like you could take it.”

For once, Ruse fell quiet, seemingly at a loss for words. “Well… that’s a different matter entirely,” he said.

“Yeah, it is. It’s fucking nasty if you ask me. It’d probably be like sticking your dick into a clam.” The pirate snorted in amusement and began to walk away from the group with a flick of his tail. “I’m going to take a shit before we get down there. Nopony come looking for me, because you’ll probably regret it.”

Gyro watched the pirate go, slowly shaking her head. “I don’t know how we got that asshole to work with us, but I still don’t like it,” she said once he was gone. Her frown turned to Coals. “How did you even deal with this guy for five years?”

“I kept my head down,” Coals said. “Squall usually beat it down if I raised it up too often, anyway. I did my job, the pirates had a good engineer, and that was peaceful enough.”

“I couldn’t have done that,” Gyro said. “I’d probably have blown up the entire boiler in a point of protest and just left the ship stranded for the navy to find.”

Coals chuckled and tightened his grip around Gyro’s shoulders. “Then it’s a good thing for the both of us that I have better survival instincts than you. Otherwise, we wouldn’t be here together.”

“I guess even the shittiest situations have their silver linings.” She sighed and glared sideways at Ruse, who was making kissing sounds with his magic and tapping his hooves together. “You are such a fucking colt, Ruse, I swear to Celestia.”

“Adolescent humor has always been the peak of comedy,” the ventriloquist said. “And you act like you’re perpetually sixteen, Gyro. I was just playing to my audience.”

“I’m gonna be sixteen until I’m sixty,” Gyro said. “At which point, I’m just gonna become a crazy, senile grandma and make myself my family’s problem.”

“I didn’t know you were planning on having foals,” Coals said.

“Only with you, big guy,” Gyro said, nuzzling his chin. “When we get out of here, we’re gonna move to a big house and have like six kids. I always wanted a big family. It means there’s a better chance I’ll make a foal I like.”

Coals sighed and Ruse broke out in a fit of laughter. “You better be careful, dude. You get to screw her raw six times, but she gets to screw you for the rest of your life.”

“I’m not sure that’s a trade I’m willing to make,” he said, teasingly shying away from Gyro. “I was kind of hoping we could just get a dog instead.”

Gyro tapped her chin in thought. “I suppose a dog can fetch your newspapers for you…”

As they chuckled, Ratchet strode closer and looked the three ponies over. “Well, Gauze almost has dinner ready, so we should eat up and get ready to move out,” he said. “Once we get something good in our bellies, we’ll hit the shrine and see what’s down there while the tide is still low. We’ve got some torches ready to give us light, and hopefully we’ll find what we need before the water comes pouring in.”

Ruse sighed and stood up, roughly shaking out his limbs. “You two are lucky,” he said to Gyro and Coals. “You don’t have to do any of the hard work.”

“It wouldn’t be right if I had to, anyway,” Gyro said. “Haven’t you ever heard of chivalry?”

“Chivalry’s dead,” Coals said, “and mares like you killed it.”

“Yeah, well… nyehh!” Gyro stuck her tongue out at Coals. “I just want to be a pretty, pretty princess of steam engines and bearing grease. Is that too much to ask?”

“Yeah,” Ratchet said with an amused shake of his head. “You’re about as far from princess material as anypony can get. Your coltfriend would make a better princess than you.”

Gyro huffed and crossed her forelegs while the stallions shared good-natured laughter at her expense. “We’ll see who’s laughing when I throw you in my lubricant dungeons, how about that…”

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