Tidalverse: The Fearsome Foursome

by Alden MacManx

Chapter 21: Captain Frick, I caught a BIG one!

“Personal log, stardate 1605.02, 1500 hours, Captain Frick recording.

“It’s been one hell of a week, getting the church group here in Pensacola settled. Some of the children had a parent or siblings along, but some did not. Many of them are not ponies.

“The diamond dogs are all related, the mother Anne, fourteen year old Stan and twelve year old Sue. Two of the three Abyssinians are related, Tobias and Gina Mentone, while the third, Carlo Renteria, does not stray far from the other two. The others, be they hippogriffs, griffons, thestrals and an Ornithian, are having adjustment problems. I have relieved Fred and Frieda from ship duties until we decide to leave, so they can work with the children. The rest of us do one day out of four aboard. We have four kids a day come to the boat for personalized instruction, on a rotating basis, so they can learn from the net. We have computers and such there at the basilica, with data on flash drives, but having a working Internet is a bit different. That’s my project for tomorrow.

“Now that enough wagons are built, there are several scavenging runs per day, with two adults and four to six kids each time, in different directions. I’ve got the unicorns up to using their horns for lights and telekinesis, and two of them can open locks. That helps when scavenging. Less breakage, the better.

“We have not seen much in the way of wildlife yet, which is both good and bad. Nothing hostile, but no deer yet. Then again, we don’t stray far, so missing deer is not surprising. Frack and Frieda are working with the flyers to build stamina and recognition, because seeing the city from the air is a lot different from on hoof! The kids come here to fish off the pier. We all like teaching, and the fish helps our diets.”

Frick was about to say more, but a call came from outside. “Captain Frick! Come out here!”

“Gotta go. Will send later. Frick out.” He closed the recording and went out onto the aft deck, where the kids were fishing on the side away from the pier. The Ornithian child, a bright-green plumaged eleven-year-old parrot hen by name of Elena Onca, was holding onto a fishing pole, the line reeling out. “I got it, Elena,” he said, taking the line and reel in his purple glow.

“Thank you, Captain! That made my arms hurt!” she complained, shaking her arms out into wings, a trick she learned in a video conference with Joaquin, the Ornithian they met in Memphis.

“This IS a tough one! You did right in calling me, Elena!” Frick called out as he worked the line. Suddenly, the line slackened, and a rather annoyed hippogriff surfaced next to the boat, the fish hook sunk into her ear.

The hippogriff pointed to the hook in her ear and said rather crossly in French, “Do you mind? It hurts!”

Frick replied, also in French, “Just hold still, I’ll get it out.” With a few purple flickers, the hook was removed from the hippogriff mare’s ear. “Do you speak English?”

“Your French is better than my English, and you do speak good French, sir.”

“Years of practice, good lady. Now, who are you, where are you from, and what do you know? Care for coffee?” Frick asked.

“Please! Coffee would be good! Been underwater for days!”

“Just change back to your land form, and come aboard!” Frick encouraged.

The hippogriff hesitated, one forehoof on the ladder. “How do I do that?”

Frick sighed. It was going to be one of THOSE days. “Katrina, can you dive in and show our new friend how to switch between forms?” he asked the hippogriff chick that was there.

“Of course, Captain! Watch me, miss!” Katrina called out as she dove in off the pier. She shifted between land and sea forms several times before the visitor caught the trick. Once instructed, the visiting hippogriff changed to land form and scrambled up the ladder.

Once settled in the saloon with a cup of coffee in front of her, the hippogriff told her tale. Her name was Renee Noir, a crewman on a fishing boat that foundered and sank right after returning, because the crew could not control the boat nor themselves. Her English was slow, and it took Frick and one of the children helping her when she could not come up with the English word to get her story out. All she could say was that it had been several days since she had Returned, and just picked a direction and swam until she could find land. “Getting hook in ear is not way for to do introductions!” Renee said with a smile on her face.

“I’m sorry for hooking you, Miss Renee. I didn’t know you were there!” Elena said apologetically.

Renee went to the parrot chick and hugged her close. “Apology I accept. Now, I no alone any more! Maybe with you I stay? You and yours?”

Frick stood up. “That, I can get started on right away. Kids, look after Miss Renee while I call the deacon, okay?”

The eldest of the children there, a thirteen-year-old pink and green unicorn, Josie Wells, answered. “I got it, Captain. Go let the Deacon know, okay?”

Frick smiled at the earnestness of the filly. “Will do!”

He went to the pilothouse and keyed the radio. “Cornhusker Base to Cornhusker Two. You at the church, Fred?”

“Cornhusker Two to Cornhusker Base. Yes, I am. What’s going on?” Fred replied.

“Could you have the Deacon come down to the boat? We found another one, and she will need a place to stay,” Frick told his first officer,

“He heard you, Captain. He’ll be there soon.”

“Good to hear, Fred. I’m sure Miss Noir could do with a good home. Cornhusker Base out.”

“Husker Two clear.”

Frick went back into the saloon. “Will you be willing to sleep dry tonight, Miss Renee?”

“To sleep dry? Have food I not chase? Is close to Heaven, it is!” Renee exclaimed, joy apparent. The kids cheered and gathered around her for a hug of welcome.

“Lady, you don’t know just how close to the truth you are…” Frick muttered.

---

That night, at six pm, the four ship keepers gathered at the Deliverance for dinner and talk. After dinner is when the watch was relieved. The watchstander has the duty for the day, caring for kids and the ship, while handling maintenance in their area of expertise.

Frack, the oncoming watchstander, held up a piece of fish on a fork held in his wing feathers. “You know, bro, that hippogriff you found today is a real strange one,” he said before eating the fish.

“Why do you say that, bro?” Frick asked.

“Listening to her talk, it’s like she does not know if she’s a boy or a girl. What little she has told of her past, she says ‘he’ about half the time,” Frack reported.

“I noticed that too,” Fran said. “It’s like she swapped genders. I’ve heard of such a thing, but I’ve never seen it before.”

“Befoah ah got sent to North Point, Ah met a few gender-swapped ponies in New Orleans. Foah the most part, the ones ah met didn’t have much issue with it,” Foster observed. “It happened, they is alive, they can’t do anythin’ about it, so they deal with it. Besides, the difference between genders, in most species, ain’t very pronounced. Marie never made a fuss if a he or a she got a job. If you can do it, you do it. Not like there are a lot of folk around to bicker about it, right?”

“Good point, Foster. Didn’t you say you minored in psychology when you got your law degree?” Frick asked.

Foster nodded. “That, and being a lawman fo’ thirty-plus years, you learn about people. Ah’m just glad Rapides Parish didn’t have quite the problems that Baton Rouge or New Orleans did. You learn how to read people and how to get them to do what you want them to do. Most of the time, it works,” he said around a couple of bites of sea-green salad.

“What happens when it doesn’t work, Foster?” Fran asked.

“You spend time in the hospital, or at a funeral. Too many of those,” Foster said in the flattest tones he could manage.

“Sorry to hear that, Foster,” Frack said.

“I’m sorrier to have to say it, Frack. Just the truth, is all. Don’t regret my career choice at all. Fourth generation in civil service. Mah father was chief of the fire department, while ah took over foah mah grandfather as Sheriff,” Foster told the crew. “Ah learned moah from him about handlin’ people than ah learned at college.”

“Fred would say it’s just plain common sense,” Frick said.

“He has. Thing is, ah agree with him.”

---

That evening, before everypony went to bed, Fred managed to get some time to speak with Renee privately. “Settling in, Miss Renee?” he asked in a kind voice.

“Oui, Mister Fred. After been alone for how so long, different it is to have others near. Objecting not I am, used to have to work on,” Renee managed to say in her rough English.

“Relax, Renee. When I’m near you, I can speak Creole. Speak in that language, if it makes you comfortable,” Fred said in easy Haitian Creole.

“Thank you, Mister Fred. Nobody else here knows Creole.” Renee replied.

“The reason I wanted to speak to you alone can be summed up in one question. You were a man before The Event happened, correct?”

Renee grimaced like she had bitten an especially sour lemon. “Is it that easy to tell?” she asked.

Fred nodded. “Among the Deliverance crew, yes. I do not believe many of the others noticed. It is not unknown for gender change to happen when one Returns. We knew of it from our conversations with the WSU. Foster had met some of the gender-swapped in Louisiana.”

“How have others reacted?” Renee asked.

Fred thought for a moment before replying. “Please understand I have not met anypony who has been gender-swapped before I have met you. I can only report on what I have heard from others, so all of my knowledge of the subject is second-hoof.

“To that end, what I can say is that it all depends on the person who changed. Some are fighting it with all their might, others are soon to bear children, happily mated to somepony they knew before. How do you feel about it?”

Renee looked thoughtful, the feathers around her seagull-like beak twitching. “When I first realized it, I was horrified. In my days after getting clear of the foundering fishing boat, I came to realize that it made not much difference with me. I am still the same Rene Noir up here,” she said, tapping her head with a claw. “The rest of me has changed, yes. I can either live with it, or drown myself. The second option I could not manage, so I chose to go with the first. I will learn to cope, now that I am no longer alone. May I ask, who among the ponies here know, other than your shipmates?”

“Right now, none. I would suggest we get the four adults aside and tell them. The children, they do not need to know yet, true?” Fred replied with a twisted half-grin on his muzzle.

“I agree, Mister Fred. Can you pass the word first to the adults, and they can catch up with me later?” Renee asked.

“I will do so, Miss Renee,” Fred said solemnly. “Now, what did you do on the fishing boat, and what would you like to do in the future?” The pair talked for another hour before lights out, Fred telling Renee more about the WSU, and the eventual plans for rescue, but not for several months.

---

It took another two weeks before the Pensacola colony (for lack of a better term) began to stabilize. When the earth ponies were not needed for physical strength, the seven (plus Fred) started working on gardens, both east and west of the basilica, on open patches of land. They had the guidance of manuals, one printed and the rest on computer files, with every pony getting a flash drive loaded with instruction manuals sent from the WSU. ‘School’, such as it was, is half the kids in the morning, the other half in the afternoon, with at least one of the Deliverance crew nearby to help any student who needed it. The other half of the kids were out helping scavenge, bring, and set up stuff to make their lives more comfortable.

It was decided that they would remain at the basilica, in the basement. Since rescue will come by the fall, it was decided to just stay together. That way, they can centralize food, water, and electric production in one place. The basement was divided up with at first blankets, then by dividers they found at an office supply store, the five adults getting separate ‘rooms’, the three mothers with their children, and the rest of the kids were divided into boys and girls ‘bunkrooms’, along with a common dining room/kitchen and living area. There was also a ‘guest room’ for the Deliverance crew to stay, when they were not caring for the boat.

Renee fitted in well, becoming a respected advisor to the Pensacola community. She also ‘adopted’ the two hippogriff chicks, Katrina and Aliyah, teaching them about the water side of being a hippogriff, while they taught her how to fly. The three also did the bulk of the fishing for the team, Renee knowing many different ways to prepare fish. Frieda and Frack took ‘lessons’ from Renee, learning about the fish that could be found there, as opposed to what was found in the lakes and rivers of Central Nebraska.

On the twenty-third of May, in the morning, at breakfast, Fred led a prayer service on the anniversary of The Event, praying for those who have not yet Returned, and the safety of those who have already done so. After breakfast, Frick stood to address the crowd.

“Ponies, and assorted others, it’s been just short of a month since we all arrived here in Pensacola. Your gardens are doing well, and you will be harvesting the east field this week. I am taking this time to announce that the Deliverance will continue on our voyage starting this Friday. To that end, Uncle Fred and Aunt Frieda will start moving back aboard, we’ll take our generator back, since you already have how many now?” he said with a smile, echoed by a laugh from his audience. They had found two large-size generators and had them set up in the parking lot, rotating units every couple of days, making sure they had plenty of fuel. Deacon Doyle knew how to service it, along with Toby Mentone and Anne Jones.

“We from the Deliverance are going to now focus the next few days on restocking and topping off on fuel. Know that when rescue does come, and it will, we will do our best to be aboard the ship that will rescue you. To do that, we have to hurry and get to Havana before the Rhine Forest is due to arrive, which is projected to be sometime around the end of August. We have a couple of blue-water stretches that, to be completely honest, has got me worried, even though we did some sailing out of sight of land to get here, but crossing from South Florida to Key West, then Key West to Havana, well…” he waved a hoof as the group laughed again, including himself. “It’s faster to blue-water it than shore-hop.

“Deacon, over to you for the daily chores list,” Frick concluded before sitting down, picking up his coffee mug with his glow and sipping some.

“You’re getting better at speaking, Frick,” Fred said quietly as the deacon started outlining chores to his ‘flock’.

“Practice, Fred. Today, you and Frieda move back to the boat. Frieda, I want you to do a full inventory, one that will be ready tomorrow, so we know what to look for before we leave. Frack, I want you to do a full service on the mains, making sure they are ready before shutting down the generator for maintenance,” Frick said before looking to Foster. “Foster, you and me are going to take our wagon and do a Wal-Mart run. Let’s use the one on Navy Boulevard, it hasn’t been picked through as much as the one on Mobile Highway.”

“Uh, bro, I did that already. Yesterday, in fact, when I had the duty. I had to do SOMEthing, right?” Frack said to his brother.

“Why didn’t you say so, bro?” Frick asked.

“You didn’t show up last night for turnover.”

Frick nodded. “True, I didn’t. Foster, what would you like, pulling the wagon there or back?”

“Ah’ll take the first shift, Captain, since you is askin’.” Frick came to regret that, because pulling an unloaded wagon four miles is a LOT different than hauling a LOADED wagon four miles, but he did not complain. To those on the Deliverance, their word is their bond, especially towards each other.

---

“Captain’s log, stardate 0/1605.27 0900 hours, Captain Frick recording.

“With heavy hearts, we have left Pensacola in our wake, continuing on our way to that bastion of safety and civilization, Havana, Cuba.” A perfect horse snort followed that statement. “Never thought I would ever be saying that. I remember the Cuban Missile Crisis. I was in grade school, and I remember all the grown-ups I knew being all concerned about ‘that madman in Havana’. My, my, how times change.

“Our destination today is Apalachicola, about a hundred thirty miles as the crow flies from Pensacola. I’m just glad I found me a case of Jolt Cola, which is securely under my bunk. We’re getting more blue-water sail time in, because we’re going to be doing more of it. Get there tonight, spend tomorrow refueling, then Wednesday sprint down to New Port Richey. By chart, it’s about a hundred seventy miles using the short cut in blue water. Higher power running across the sea. I just hope we are not caught out in weather while blue-water hopping. That’s what scares me the most. May the gods smile upon us. Praise the Lord and trust the computer, right?” Frick let out a contented mix of laugh and whinny. “Frick out.” He did the save and send before kicking back in the chair up on the bridge, looking around the wide blue ocean.

He then reached over with his glow to the computer. Calling up the music, he put on the theme from ‘McHale’s Navy’ on repeat for a few minutes as he watched the Deliverance cut through the waters of the Gulf of Mexico. He was content, happy, at peace with himself and the world.

Frick’s reverie was interrupted by a water balloon to the back of his head, soaking his mohawked mane. “Enough with the repeats, Frick!” Frieda yelled from the ladder to the main deck. Quickly, he shut the stereo off.

“Sorry, Frieda. Got lost in peace.”

Author's Note:

Another colony set up and running, this one on a temporary basis, because a rescue IS planned in a few months. Next port stop is Tampa/St. Pete, an area I KNEW somewhat well ^{forty-plus years ago}.

Our bio for the week- Frieda!

Name: Frieda Haugen Halvorsen
Age: None of your business, buster!
Hometown: Oconee, Nebraska
College: University of Nebraska, Class of 1975, Library Science
Occupation: Chief Librarian, city of Columbus library system.
Personality: Think of that nice, helpful librarian from school who will show you lots of things, but get on her bad side and you'll not only regret it, she'll never forget it! Other than that, she's kind, wise, and happy with her hobbies of handcrafting, cooking, hunting, fishing and sci-fi reading.
Cutie Mark: None. She's a griffon, red-tailed hawk and black panther, with white feathers forming 'spectacles' on her face.
Notable Talents: Very common-sensical, like Fred. As Second Officer and chief cook, she runs the galley with a firm claw and a sharp beak. DON'T get on her bad side!
Other notes: Married to Fred Halvorsen for forty-three years now, and have loved him for longer. The two will not be parted, despite demonic intervention!
Usual Call Sign: Cornhusker Three

Comments

[JDunk1971]

Nice pic of Frieda.

[harts fire]

grate art work of Frieda.

this story has so much and it is all vary detailed. awesome righting team.