Re:Harmony

by starcross7

114 - Coltcatraz

Fleetfoot was sure that her vest was not the cause of the itching. Despite all the warnings, she had readily accepted the same mechanical wing grafting procedure that Spitfire acquired before her capture. She got over the initial pain moments after waking from the surgery. She got over the mental strangeness in trying to move the wings as if it were own. Now, there was a rash where the new wings sprouted from.

It had been a few days since their departure from the Rainbow Falls Mountain Base, and almost a day had passed since she was stuck in this captured luxury yacht painted black to be repurposed into an attack boat. She had thought it not have been worse than riding in an airship against turbulence or on a train on a dilapidated railway. She thought she would be used to being on the ground on her hooves, the swaying and the jerking motion of their vessel made her sick.

It still did not compare to the itching.

Fleetfoot wished she had Maud’s patience. Initially, she saw the hesitation on her stoic face when she told her that they were getting on a boat. She took it in stride, but not before towing onto the deck a rectangular wooden sandbox filled with rocks of all shapes and sizes.

“It’s my bed,” Maud dryly replied on the reasoning for the box. She spent most of her time on the bed of rocks like, well, a rock. From her vantage point of the bridge, Fleetfoot found Maud laying there as if she had not moved since they lazily floated down the river towards the South Luna Ocean. At one point, Fleetfoot swore she saw her eat a random rock, but not the pet rock she affectionately called “Boulder”.

“Are the wings bothering you?” Coco asked.

It still itches.

“It isn’t anymore,” said Fleetfoot.

Even in the black commando sneaksuit, Coco Pommel looked adorable, and the flower-shaped hairpin made it more so. Fleetfoot could sense the strength and determination underneath the cuteness, and she almost wished that she fought against her while still serving underneath Pegasopolis. She was grateful of Coco’s resourcefulness of getting her the set of mechanical wings from the same source where Spitfire got hers. No doubt hundreds if not thousands of captured pegasi were experimented upon to replicate their natural Atmos Arts abilities in these prosthetics. Whether in war or in peace, no pony’s sacrifice was in vain, Fleetfoot believed. She hoped that the captured pegasi died valiantly before Gaea’s cruel experiments.

Now, she had seen too many ponies die unnecessarily in this prolonged war. It wore her down. It wore everypony down. Fleetfoot would rather be friends with a strong mare such as Maud Pie and fly the skies freely without any worry of being shot down. She owed it to Spitfire for showing her the way, and now this operation was the perfect time to repay her life-debt with both Gaea and Pegasopolis distracted in their own problems.

Soon, they along with the rest of their attack boat convoy made it out of the river and into the ocean. Coltcatraz was not far.

“Ahoy, lasses!” cried their helmspony Hoofbeard. “The seas are mighty still for likes of ye.”

“I’ll say,” said Fleetfoot. “Coco, was the lack of the Siren Navy on the report?”

“They should be here,” said Coco. “Sirens and their kelpie allies are capable of submerging themselves several hundred feet below the surface. They’re lying in wait to ambush us.”

“Let them come!” cried Hoofbeard. “I’ll teach them singing witches a lesson for takin’ me Jewel away from me!”

“I promise you Hoofbeard,” said Fleetfoot, “that when this war is over, we’ll help you search for her.”

“Maintain a steady speed over these waters,” said Coco, “and keep your hoof close to the accelerator. The Changeling Cloaker can only shield us for so long before their sharks detect our electrical current.”

The brown stallion of a stallion nodded. His musculature and his wild appearance belie his deep romance of a mermare, and with the war separating them made his heart grow painfully fonder. The offer to search for his beloved mermare was just an add-on to this usual payment of gold and silver.

Hoofbeard maintained a steady speed as he led the other attacks across the perilous ocean past the river’s exit. Fleetfoot found the right time to exit the bridge and walk down to the forward deck where, as expected, she found Maud on her bed of rocks rolling Boulder back and forth on a pit of sand.

“I had to make sure he gets a bath before we go into battle,” said Maud.

“Sorry,” said Fleetfoot. “I know the sea isn’t your element, let alone the air.”

“It’s okay. I need something to distract me.”

“That your sister is a lesbimare?”

“She isn’t one.”

“You kind of yelled it out to everypony before she left. I gotta say though, she is pretty cute.”

One second before Maud turned to face her, Fleetfoot felt a rush of dread tingling each of the hairs of her fur before it reached the bones in her spine. The suppressed frown in Maud’s face voiced her disapproval, if not her displeasure, of Fleetfoot to even think about hitting on Pinkie Pie. As much as she wanted to spar with Maud once more, this would not be the right time nor the right reason. Even if it was just a fleeting moment, Pinkie Pie was off limits.

The worry over being pummeled hard by a barrage of Maud’s hooves vanished when Fleetfoot’s pegasus ears heard an explosion from behind. A rush back up to the bridge confirmed her expected fears. One of their boats in their convoy sank, and immediately afterwards, the ponies on another boat on the rear started to firing their guns and lobbing depth charges into the water. Just as they had done so, their boat exploded, and in no time, the rest of their hodgepodge of a rebel navy began firing frantically into the water.

“We’ve finally been spotted,” said Coco. “Everypony, put on your earpieces. Hoofbeard, accelerate!”

“It’s no Salty Sea Mare, but I’m gonna push her just as hard!” he cried. “Hang on lasses!”

The electronic earpieces Fleetfoot placed in her ears barely drowned out the screams of from their fellow Rainbow Falls Rebels on the other ships, but this system Coco brought in from Gaea was designed to filter out the hypnotic songs from kelpies, Sirens, and the like. Fleetfoot held fast on the railing as Hoofbeard “floored” the vessel’s accelerators while the rest of the crew fired their machine guns and dropped their depth charges.

No matter how fast they went, the kelpies kept up. One by one they began picking off the crew by launching themselves from the water like missiles and then latching onto them with their jaws. Many ponies were snatched and taken into the ocean this way. Kelpies were known to be beautiful creatures, but an angry one were a lot more terrifying than the sharks they commanded. As their crew dwindled, Fleetfoot had no choice but to defend herself in the kelpie onslaught, and of all the times, this was going to be her first trial run of her mechanical wings.

She flipped the switch and gasped. Fleetfoot felt the rush of Atmos Particles flowing into her body. It was a fighter’s high she had not felt since the agoge of her youth. Her wind senses revitalized in time when another kelpie breached the surface and lunged after a stoic Maud. Fleetfoot’s body moved on its own, and she leapt to deliver and aerial punch that sent the kelpie back underneath the waves. She held to the air for a while until she felt some pain in her joints. It had been a while since she flew, and she was almost whole again.

“Keep your sights aligned!” cried Hoofbeard. “Coltcatraz is dead ahead!”

The infamous island prison rose in the horizon like a stone-cold warship. Fleetfoot continued to bat away the kelpies, and eventually Maud and Coco joined the fray. The pegasus managed to keep herself in the air for longer periods with every jump, and although she could now fly again, she would still feel the artificialness of the mechanical wings on her back. Still, she needed this in her effort to rescue Spitfire and aid her friends.

During their speeding through the waters, their boat struck something. They nearly turned around, but thanks to Hoofbeard’s seafaring skills, they righted themselves immediately back to the rocky cliffs of Coltcatraz. They had outrun the kelpies, so they thought, but then they hit another bump, and then another. Holes now appeared on dock, and water began flooding from the cabins below. It may be fortunate that Fleetfoot could fly again, but her wings were utterly useless if she could not carry her friends to safety.

“Hold on!” Hoofbeard cried. “I’m going to crash-land this vessel!”

Fleetfoot had met a lot of crazy ponies in her lifetime, and now she counted Hoofbeard as another. The seafaring stallion navigated his way through the jagged rocks and finally zeroed on a flat area by the cliffs near one of the guard towers. With a mad smile, he redlined the accelerator and launched off a naturally-formed rock as a ramp. The attack boat crashed through the fence and several carts and buggies before hitting a stone wall head on. Fleetfoot had the luxury of floating to the ground. Maud landed on all fours as nonchalantly as possible, while Coco somersaulted out before firing two shots from her hoof-mounted pistols. The two pegasi guards in the tower fell out before they could unleash their Atmos Arts abilities. They weren't bleeding, and their source of their unconsciousness were darts on each of their necks.

Coco and Fleetfoot rushed back to the crumpled boat. They pulled out the few unconscious bodies of their crewmembers, including that of Hoofbeard. First aid was quickly applied, while Maud threw a large boulder (not her pet rock) at the advancing pegasi reinforcements. Coco and Fleetfoot made sure to move their friends to safety. Now they could begin their rescue.

Or so Fleetfoot thought. She thought she was hearing things, but when she saw the distress on Coco and the pegasi flying away, she knew they were in trouble. Quickly they adjusted the noise cancellation dial on their earpieces before they heard another note of an alluring song. Green mist slithered from out from the ocean, and rising like snakes were the three Sirens described in the mission dossier.

Blue, gold, and purple. The upper body of an equine, and the tail of serpent. Fangs. Fins. Scales all over. Each of them had a red jewel embedded into their chest. Fleetfoot's initial impression was not favorable, and heaven help those who are bewitched by their songs. It was said that Sonata Dusk, Adagio Dazzle, and Aria Blaze were the last of their kind. Hopefully, that was the truth.

"Oh, poo," said Sonata. "These three don't like our song."

"The pegasi told us about this," said Adagio. "They're wearing those earpieces that block out the magic that allows us to control them."

"So, what do we do?"

"Remember that time we had to wash the seaweed from your ears?"

"Who can forget?"

"We'll have to the do same thing here."

"You know that'll destroy half of Coltcatraz," said Aria.

"Pegasopolis begged for our help," said Adagio, "and they told us to use whatever means necessary to destroy these land dwellers. Do you have anything against it?"

"Of course not," Aria smiled. "I just find it fun we'll do the same thing again like we did to that one city we flooded."

"Prepare yourself ponies for Act 2!" Sonata cried.

Adagio sang the first note of another one of their dark songs, and she was soon joined by her two cohorts. Then the kelpie navy rose amongst the ruins of Fleetfoot's ragtag collection of attack boats to fill in for their background harmony. She could hear their arcane words, but she either chose not hear them or the earpieces were working perfectly. Whatever spell they sang, a curtain of water loomed around Coltcatraz.

"Coco!" Fleetfoot cried. "Maud! Get to higher ground now!"

She wished she could save Hoofbeard and the rest of the crew, and she prayed to heaven that they would somehow survive the attack. A tactical mare would try to attack the Sirens first, but the waters rapidly came in. Fleetfoot's mechanical wings whirred and whined as she flew alongside her comrades, but they barely made it one level up when the waves crashed down upon them. The three mares held onto walls, fence, or light poles as the water surrounded them. The force and pressure kept them in their place long enough for one breath. The water soon receded, and surrounding them now were flopping fish, seaweed, and debris from their destroyed rebel navy.

"Coco, are you okay?" Fleetfoot asked.

"I'm fine," replied Coco.

"I hope they didn't damage our earpieces."

"Don't worry. These things are rated for depths up to 100 meters. They're essentially waterproof. By the way, where's Maud?"

Maud. Fleetfoot cleared the drenched white bangs from her eyes to visually search for her friend. She was behind them not too long ago hanging onto a stone wall. Instead, she had been swept further back and away, still alive, and still able to move.

Except, Maud's ear pieces had visibly fallen out. She had risen back up with a blanker look in her eyes than usual. The dark songs of the sirens had ceased, but the kelpie kept up the background noise. One kelpie was enough to hypnotize a village at close range. A hundred, however, was what was needed to take control of, out of all the ponies, Maud Pie.

Even with the earpieces active and deep into her ears, Fleetfoot could hear Coco emptying the shells from her hoof-mounted pistols and replacing them with live bullets.

“Coco!” cried Fleetfoot. “We can’t shoot Maud!”

“Of course we can’t,” said Coco. “A pony with so much Geosense power is essentially impervious to bullets. Nothing can stop her!”

“You thought we wanted to hypnotize you two?” laughed Adagio. “Don’t make us laugh! We directed all our power to flood those wretched earpieces out of Maud Pie’s ears. Now we have one of the most powerful Earth Ponies under our spell!”

“Go crush those rebels, Maud!” cheered Sonata.

Maud, whether knowingly or unknowingly, mumbled her acknowledgement, and the proceeded to pull out a large sand-colored boulder out of a natural wall formation. Fleetfoot did not know the extent the sirens or the kelpie had over ponies through their spell-songs, but it was the unknown that made the clipped pegasus fearful. Right now, she did not place much confidence in her new wings, and the fear subconsciously placed her back on the ground and draw out her knife. Before she joined the Rainbow Falls Rebels, Fleetfoot had fought Maud without wings. This was a little too soon to have a rematch against the gray mare.

However, Maud did not lob the sand-colored boulder at her comrades. She instead threw it back to the ocean towards the line of kelpie. The shock and surprise stopped them from the singing, and the few in the boulder’s path scattered them away as it smashed into the ocean. The impact created a large wave, though not as large as the one before, that radiated outwards and back to the cliffs of Coltcatraz.

With Adagio and the other sirens distracted, Maud leapt up into the air socked a good one in the golden siren’s cheek. The golden eyes of Adagio Dazzle rolled back in its sockets as she crashed down into the waters between the jagged rocks. She lay floating and twitching with her tongue hanging over her fangs.

As powerful as that punch was, Maud landed back on ground as soft as a feather. She shook herself dry, and stared back up to the remaining Sirens while making an intimidating challenge gesture with her front hoof.

“How?” gasped Aria. “How were you able to resist our songs?”

“We unclogged your ears!” Sonata cried. “You heard every note!”

“I did hear it,” said Maud. “It’s just that your song really reeks.”

Comments

[Lanigiro]

“I did hear it,” said Maud. “It’s just that your song really reeks.”

maud, its not nice to burn people who live in the ocean

[moonlit scribe]

Go Maud!

Also, why'd you leave us with TWO cliffhangers to deal with?! It was gonna be a PinkPrise fight last time! And now, we can't see Maud beating up Sonata, Adagio, and Aria!

[Crimson Dawn]

Maud cannot seem to make up her mind about Pinkie's sexuality. Considering my favorite straight ship for Pinkie is dead I would be voting for her to be willing to go for the fairer sex.

[opal563]

Sirens ???
Sunsent Shimer, Half Life 3 and Iluninaty Confirmes!!!!
:D

Pleas i need Shimer un my Life

[FiredragonX]

“I did hear it,” said Maud. “It’s just that your song really reeks.”
Oh! Sick burn.

[GMZ_Casper]

C&C:
...the righted themselves immediately back to the rocky cliffs of Coltcatraz.
> Replace the first ‘the’ with ‘he’.