Rainbow Dash Around the World

by MagicS

The Wandering Island II

Rainbow Dash once more happily stood in the crow’s nest of the Heart of Azure as she sailed east towards their newest destination. It was nice to see the ship looking so good for the first time since… well, since they had left Malkonrik the first time. The brand new white sail flowed down in front of the mast as the wind filled it from behind and made their journey even easier. Down below, the rest of the ship had been cleaned and freshly repaired of any minor nicks and scratches. Ballast did good work and the hull of the small vessel may as well have been brand new. The fresh look of the ship reflected the fresh new feeling in the hearts of all the ponies onboard. Things were going to be better this time.

After all, there wasn’t really a way things could go worse.

Rainbow frowned, better not jinx it. She gave Gilbert enough grief for that after all.

Speaking of the griffon, he was sitting at the port side of the ship, watching the blue waters as they sailed past. Probably on the lookout for fish or anything else swimming through the ocean. She was almost surprised he wasn’t down below just writing in his diary—or bothering her or someone else on the ship for some reason. Rainbow wasn’t against maybe going out on a flight, having a race, today but she kind of felt more like napping in the crow’s nest right now.

Senax was at the helm, steering the ship while Breakwater and Daylight Gleam talked near the bow. Rainbow Dash could probably lean down a little and listen in but she seriously doubted they were talking about anything worth eavesdropping on. So with nothing really to look at down there, Rainbow Dash lied down on her back and stared up at the sky.

The middle of the day and it was a cloudy blue above. Not especially cloudy, but enough puffs were up there where she never saw a totally blue sky. The clouds were all a comfortable white color too, no storm clouds, not anything even approaching gray or rainy. It was a good bet that they wouldn’t have any trouble with bad weather for the duration of their trip. Especially since they were more or less hugging the coastline of the Hundred Kingdoms. If Rainbow Dash wanted to she could sit back up again and look north and still just barely make out the coast.

And probably a lot of ships that were traveling the lanes looking to dock. Right now they were off the coast of Ullsorth so there were already a lot of ships that had wanted to stop there earlier that finally could now. Or ones that had left in a hurry and wanted to come back.

That thought brought a grin to her face. She kind of hoped one day she’d hear word about Commodore Redbeard again. It would be fun to teach him that she hadn’t been kidding or blowing smoke about what she threatened.

Moving her mind back to more positive thoughts, she kept staring at the clouds as they drifted by. Counting them, thinking about what they looked like, thinking about what it would feel like to sleep on one of them. That one drifting right above the ship now looked like a turtle…

She ended up falling asleep without even realizing it.

---

“I told you she was out like a light when I went up to check on her. No reason to bother her when she’s having such a nice nap,” Gilbert said as he sat at the table in Breakwater’s cabin with Senax and Daylight.

“Even when we’re eating?” Daylight asked.

“The food isn’t going anywhere,” Gilbert shrugged. “I think she’d prefer to just get rest when she clearly wants to than to eat at the same time as us.”

Daylight shrugged. “Alright, I feel like your brain syncs up with hers better than mine.”

“We didn’t have to eat lunch now but… I really wanted to try out some of the new food we got at Malkonrik,” Senax said. “With all the extra money we had we really went overboard with luxury items...”

Those luxury items included a lot of snacks and candies that you could find in stores all over Malkonrik. Normally Breakwater wouldn’t have wanted them to waste money and storage space on extra stuff like that, not for a serious voyage, but he figured they all could use some comfort food like that. A wide variety of chocolate bars and saltwater taffy now sat in the hold, among other things. Even for their normal meals though they had decided to splurge a bit and get stuff that was of a little higher quality than what they had before. Technically after all it wasn’t just Breakwater’s money anymore.

And technically Senax had done all the hard work. She just wasn’t the type to lord that fact over everybody else. But she was the type to maybe push everyone else to loosen the wallet a little so they had tastier food.

So no stale looking and stale tasting bread for the duration of this journey. They had fresh fruit, fresh pies for dessert, freshly grown asparagus and spinach, butter, honey and biscuits, lentil soup, oats, and some of the best hay and hay products you could find at the Malkonrik port. They had more than enough of the good stuff to tide them over for the short trip to and from the Wandering Island. After that is when they could start minding the money again and buying a little more smartly.

For the moment, since Rainbow Dash was napping and Breakwater had taken over at the helm, it was just the three of them here to dig in and taste test their new food for the first time.

Which they all did with glee and not an ounce of hesitation.

They all ended up eating far more than they should have but they certainly weren’t going to blame themselves for that. Rainbow Dash would’ve been exactly the same if she was down here. They polished off their plates until there wasn’t even the smallest crumb or speck of food left. All that was edible in the cabin now was the portion Senax and Gilbert had also brought out for Breakwater.

Normally Senax would go out and give it to him but she was in a semi-coma from overeating.

“Mmm… that was really, really, good,” the merpony said, her stomach full.

“I agree. Not quite as good as that restaurant we kept getting breakfast at, but it’s better than anything I expected us to eat while sailing,” Daylight said.

“Rainbow will be happy to know that we tested the food for her and it passed with flying colors,” Gilbert grinned.

“I’ll go wake her up when I take Breakwater his food… but just in another five minutes,” Senax closed her eyes and rested.

“Don’t fall asleep yourself,” Daylight wryly grinned.

“Mmm...”

“Someone certainly tired themselves out,” Gilbert said as he stood up from his seat. “As for me, after a meal like that I could go for a flight to burn off some of that excess energy! And maybe go looking for a fish to catch, some meat would also hit the spot after that lunch.”

Daylight rolled her eyes. “Like you didn’t have enough already… but go have your fun, Gilbert.”

Gilbert waved to her and walked out of the cabin. The unicorn then turned to her merpony friend and raised an eyebrow.

“Senax? Senax, did you actually fall asleep?”

Comments

[redmar]

It's good that they were able to get some better food.