Rainbow Dash Around the World

by MagicS

Pirate

Rainbow Dash sat down in the crow’s nest with her tail swishing about behind her in excitement. Today was the day they finally arrived at the Three Spears. According to Breakwater she should even be able to see the trio of islands on the horizon soon. She couldn’t wait. She just couldn’t wait at all. Down below, Gilbert was sleeping in the hold while Senax was at the helm with Breakwater watching over her and Daylight was in the cabin doing who knows what. She thought Gilbert kind of had the right idea, taking a midday nap, but she was a little too wired for something like that.

She wanted to be up here when the islands first came into view. She wanted to be able to whistle down to the others that she saw them so maybe they could speed up in the last leg of their journey. Maybe then she could even fly ahead and arrive at the islands well before they did. Just to give herself something to do and a place to explore.

The spyglass in the crow’s nest was sitting there for her but at this point it wouldn’t be any help. Her eyes were already good enough to see as far ahead to the horizon as possible. Until the islands were actually in view she had no need for it. When they were she could use it to get a more up-close and detailed first look at the islands.

Idly she thought about how she probably could’ve used that spyglass to maybe help herself be a little less bored over the previous few days. She could’ve used it to spot any small islands, clouds, schools of fish below the water, or just spin around and see if anything random was out there when she stopped. After all, even after the lesson, she hardly knew anything about this ocean. She may have found something fun and interesting that she was never expecting at all. Maybe she could’ve found another gigantic whale. Or discovered another ship sailing out here going off on its own journey. This huge ocean had to contain all sorts of ordinary and extraordinary wonders.

With a yawn, Rainbow Dash closed her eyes and took a big stretch. She opened and closed her mouth a few times to get the kinks out and looked across the deep blue waters and the calm skies to the south.

Dead ahead, in the direction of the Three Spears, everything looked perfect. But a frown slowly came to Rainbow Dash’s face as she began to notice something else. The sky was becoming darker to the east, it was the tell-tale sign of an early storm. From what she remembered, the Strip of Storms was in that direction, was this a consequence of it? Perhaps storms occasionally moved away from it and blew elsewhere into the ocean.

Maybe she did have another use for that spyglass right now.

Rainbow Dash unclipped it from its spot and extended it out, looking through the scope at the darker sky to the east. However much this increased her vision by, it was enough for her to see black clouds full of thunder and lightning forming over the ocean, with brackish waves already rolling about beneath, at the mercy of the young storm’s strong winds. While it didn’t look like the storm covered much area it was fairly intense for its size. She studied it as intently as she could—being absolutely no stranger to storms. In fact, she could even be said to be an expert on them.

Going by the winds… the way the ocean is moving…

“Tch,” Rainbow Dash clicked her tongue. “Well that’s just great…”

---

“Aye, you’re right about that, Rainbow Dash.” Breakwater said as he looked through the spyglass on the aft of the boat, peering through it at the dark storm far off in the distance. He sighed and folded the spyglass up. “Big storm brewing there… and it’s going the same direction we are.”

“Do we have to change course? We still need to stop at the Three Spears for fresh water don’t we?” Daylight Gleam asked him.

Breakwater shook his head. “Actually we’re lucky. I know storms pretty well, it’s true that that one’s going to hit the Three Spears but at the speed it’s moving it won’t arrive there until tomorrow. We won’t have any time to relax like we wanted but we’ll still have plenty of time to do what we need to.” He glanced at Rainbow. “Sorry you won’t get to have as much fun at your first island as we were promising, it’ll just be a quick stop and go.”

“I can deal. Just glad that storm’s not as big a problem as I was worried it might be,” Rainbow shrugged.

“Yep,” Breakwater nodded.

“I’m going to go wake Gilbert up and tell him the news,” Daylight said and began walking down to get into the hold.

“So I’m not going to have to sail through a storm?” Senax asked.

Breakwater scoffed. “No, you certainly aren’t going to have to do that. Even if we couldn’t avoid it I don’t exactly trust you with the Heart in a situation like that. No offense.”

“None taken,” Senax said in relief.

Rainbow Dash looked to the east at the approaching storm that was already becoming more visible with just the naked eye. Stupid storm out here trying to ruin her fun. “I’m gonna stay up in the crow’s nest and keep an eye on it or whatever. How much longer until we get to the Three Spears?”

“Two hours give or take,” Breakwater said and hoofed the spyglass back to her. “You’ll see em soon.”

“Not much longer then, cool,” Rainbow said and took the spyglass. “How many bad storms have you been through anyways?”

“Too many. Most were when I wasn’t the captain, I’ll have you know. Dumb bravados thinking they have nothing to fear, or greedy ponies not wanting to be late for a delivery, and sometimes it’s just ponies being unlucky and having a storm bear down on them from out of nowhere. Can’t always avoid it. I’ve been in a couple of wrecks, had one galleon I was a deckhoof on flat out capsize from a big wave even. Yeah I still remember the heavy rain and the howling winds from that night… that’s just how the ocean is.” Breakwater took a moment of silence and breathed in deeply before continuing. “I’m a good captain though, I won’t be sailing us into anything stupid or dangerous that we can avoid. And you don’t have a better pony with you to steer a ship if we ever are stuck in the middle of a bad storm.”

Rainbow grinned. “I kind of felt that way since getting to know you.”

“Yeah, yeah, enough with all that. On the other hoof I still don’t know entirely what to make of you. You’re a weird one no doubt, good, capable, but weird.”

“I prefer the term “awesome” but anything’s better than boring I guess.”

“I don’t think you need anymore flattering.”

“Nothing wrong with some flattery if you’re being honest about it…” Rainbow Dash cracked her neck and ascended back up to the crow’s nest. Quietly she spoke to herself: “And even I could use some encouragement sometimes after some of the stuff I’ve been through on this side of the world…”

“What was that?” Breakwater called up after her.

She smirked and shook her head. “Nothing. Just talking to myself, you and Senax have fun steering the ship.”

She saw Breakwater shrug and get back to watching over Senax, cutting in and instructing her whenever she made even a tiny mistake or didn’t keep the wheel steady. Senax to her credit took everything in stride, knowing it was all for a good reason. In a short second, Gilbert came out of the hold with Daylight trailing right behind. The griffon took a huge stretch the moment he stepped onto the deck and ended up whacking the unicorn in the face with his big wings. Rainbow Dash bit back a laugh when she saw that. Daylight certainly didn’t find it amusing, nor did Gilbert’s practiced apology do much to assuage her mood. With an amused shake of her head, Rainbow turned her attention away from them and opened up the spyglass once more to keep an eye on the storm. It was still moving southwest to the Three Spears. Nothing had changed its course.

Putting the spyglass down, Rainbow Dash whistled as she looked up at the sun too, it was still early afternoon so they’d hit the Three Spears well before it was dark. That was at least one more positive thing to note, since they weren’t going to be spending as much time there now. Her eyes kept shifting between south as she hoped to get a glimpse of their destination at any moment and at the growing storm to the east. Though it was too far for the sounds of thunder to reach them yet, Rainbow Dash could see a few bolts of lightning going off in the black clouds every now and then.

She twirled the spyglass around in her hooves out of boredom. For a moment she thought about flying off for a bit just to move around, or even get closer to that storm to see how impressive storms out on the ocean could be. But rationality won out in the end—she should probably just relax till they got to the Three Spears. Instead she took a gander to the west to see if there was anything out there either. Seeing nothing but open ocean, she turned around to watch over the waters they had traveled through.

Nothing there ei-

“Wait,” Rainbow Dash blinked. She completely moved around the crow’s nest and stretched her head over the backside, peering out back north and squinting her eyes to see as best she could.

There was a dot along the horizon. Directly behind them.

That didn’t make any sense. Obviously they hadn’t passed by anything, she would’ve seen it.

She tilted her head as an obvious realization came to mind. Ohhh… that was another ship. Duh. There was just another ship trailing behind them, probably also on their way to the Three Spears. Made sense.

Rainbow Dash nodded her head a few times and plopped back down in the crow’s nest. Obviously some other ships probably from Malkonrik’s port had the Three Spears as an easy stop to make when they were going further into the ocean. She rubbed her chin and looked over at the large storm to the east. This other ship had to have seen it already too, even though they were far back, were they still coming even though they might get caught in it now? It made her a little concerned for them. Depending on how fast their ship was actually sailing they might still get to the Three Spears and leave before the storm actually hit too though.

Wanting to check it out, she got the spyglass again and aimed it right at the ship to the north. Now it was more than just a dot out there.

Instantly she could tell that what she was looking at was much bigger than Heart of Azure. It not only rose out of the water much higher, but it was wider, there were multiple sails on just the one mast she could see, and she was pretty certain there were multiple other masts on it as well. The bowsprit was carved with the head of a roaring dragon at the end as well. Rainbow Dash bit her lip, she hadn’t seen any ships at Malkonrik’s port with something like that. Another thing… the sails were all jet-black. Why? That was different from all the other ships she had seen too. Glancing up at the opposing crow’s nest, she saw a flag waving from the very top of the mast: a black flag with a pair of golden wings flanking some kind of skull in the middle.

Looking at how the waves were breaking at the front of the ship it was moving pretty fast too. It was cruising over the water at a speed much faster than their own.

Rainbow Dash was getting a bad feeling from all of this.

“Uh… hey down there!” She shouted to the others. When they looked up at her she continued. “How common is it for other ships to come from Malkonrik to the Three Spears?”

“You see one?” Breakwater asked. “That’s nothing strange, we’re on a common route.”

“Okay...” Rainbow Dash nodded. “But how many of those ships have black sails and strange flags flying above them?”

“What?!” Breakwater shouted while the other three all paled and shared a worried look.

Rainbow Dash immediately flew down from the crow’s nest with the spyglass in hoof and gave it over to Breakwater, pointing over the back of the ship to the north. She, Breakwater, Daylight, and Gilbert all moved to the back of the boat and looked out over it while Senax stayed at the wheel. The merpony though was also looking over her shoulder at the rest of them with a concerned look of fear on her face.

Breakwater looked through the spyglass towards where Rainbow Dash was pointing and quickly zeroed in on the large ship directly behind him. A sharp intake of breath soon followed.

“Is it him?” Daylight asked, frowning.

“It’s The Scourge. It’s him,” Breakwater nodded while lowering the spyglass.

“Who?” Rainbow asked.

No one answered her, Breakwater immediately turned around and tossed the spyglass to the deck.

“Senax! Give me the wheel!” He shouted.

“Y-Yes, Captain!” The merpony bowed right out of the way.

“They’re still far back but they’ll gain on us quickly… we can’t match their speed at all. I think we’ll still get to the Three Spears before we come in range of their cannons though,” Breakwater said as he steered the ship onward. “But that’s just going to delay things...”

“I doubt they’ll fall for the same trick as last time either...” Daylight muttered.

“How did he find us again so quickly?” Gilbert asked, stroking his mustache as he continued to gaze back at the approaching ship. “Are we truly so unlucky or is it a sixth sense he has?”

Meanwhile, Rainbow Dash looked back and forth between them all with a frown on her face. “Could I get clued in here a little? I take it that ship—The Scourge—is bad news?”

“That’s putting it very lightly,” Daylight bit her lip. “It’s an… adversary we’ve had a few run ins with before.”

Rainbow Dash’s eyebrows shot up. “Pirates? Is that a pirate ship coming after us?”

“Not just any pirate ship...” Senax said.

Rainbow Dash looked at the merpony and saw that she was practically shaking in fright.

“There might still be some hope for us—if we can get to the Three Spears quickly and hide in an out of the way cove or some hidden spot, we can stay until nightfall and then get out of there!” Breakwater said. “Rainbow Dash, Gilbert, I want you to fly ahead of us and go to the islands. Find what we need and get back here as quick as you can!”

“You got it!” Rainbow saluted with a grin. She was excited, excited that she might get a chance to fight some pirates too.

Gilbert seemed a fair bit less excited but he still prepared to join her, the two of them prepared to jump down the raised aft of the ship while Daylight took Senax by the hoof to walk her down as well.

“Come on Senax, you can stay in the cabin… but I’m going to get the Horn of Listening for now,” Daylight said.

Hearing that word “Listening”. It ticked something in Rainbow’s brain. They had all been panicking and moving around so much that she didn’t notice it until now, but she could hear something against the backdrop of their ship and the ocean winds. She stopped right before jumping up with Gilbert and instead grabbed his front arm to keep him down as well.

“Rainbow Dash?” He glanced at her in confusion.

“I hear something… whistling...” Rainbow Dash frowned. “What is that?”

“Whistling?”

Rainbow nodded. “Yeah, just give me a second. It’s like something moving really fast through the air… or… falling through the air.” Her eyes shot wide open and she looked up into the sky, the sun still coming down almost directly overhead at them and practically blinding her. But she still saw a shadow diving right towards them. “LOOK OUT!”

Her shout came a second too late. Everyone else looked up into the sky just as the thing she saw crashed down onto the Heart of Azure, right on the aft deck behind Breakwater and the wheel. The shockwave from the rough landing rocked the boat and kicked up a cloud of dust. Rainbow Dash, Gilbert, Senax, and Daylight were all knocked away and fell onto the main deck below.

Rainbow Dash stood up quickly and blinked the confusion away, hearing a sharp gasp from Senax to her side she looked up at the helm to see a large figure holding Captain Breakwater.

“C-Captain!” Senax cried.

Breakwater found himself in the grip of a large griffon—with a sharp cutlass placed directly up against his throat. He kept himself as calm and still as he could, but a bead of sweat was still making its way down the side of his head. The familiar griffon himself had a grin on his beak and his golden eyes twinkled as he looked down at the others.

“Well now,” Godfrey said. “I think we’ve been through this enough times for you to know how it goes. So for the sake of Captain Breakwater here, why don’t you all tell me where it is you’re going, and whatever new information you’ve learned about the Necklace and Trident of Ponyseidon.”

“G-Godfrey?” Rainbow Dash looked up at him with an open jaw. “What are you doing?”

Daylight Gleam and Gilbert both shot her a surprised look.

“You know him?” Daylight asked.

Godfrey on the other hoof seemed just as surprised to see Rainbow Dash there as well, an even bigger smile split his beak as his eyes met hers. “Hah! Well I’ll be, I didn’t know you joined up with these guys, Rainbow Dash. Talk about a fun coincidence.”

Her eyes narrowed at him, at the cutlass he was holding to Breakwater’s neck. “You’re a pirate…”

“He’s not just any pirate,” Gilbert said, also glaring up at the other griffon. “Since you’ve seemingly already met, allow me to give you a more formal introduction to him. The Griffon from Griffonstone, Captain of The Scourge, greatest terror of the Grand Ocean for years. The one who smashed the pirate alliance of Sharktooth Island. The one who drowned the Warrior Queen of Turtle Beach. The one who besieged and ransacked the rivers of Ullsorth till they caved to his demands, and the one who tied the tails of Bosche’s navy in knots.” Gilbert’s talons balled into angry fists. “The other reason we came here to the Grand Ocean—and the fiercest and most dangerous obstacle we’ve faced in our journey for Merlantis since. My brother—Godfrey Goldenwing!”

Author's Note:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CX-ZGzVXohs

Comments

[redmar]

This is bad and I wonder how this will end other than Rainbow kicking Godfrey's rear of course.

[RoboRed]

Well, ain't that a twist.