Where in Equestria are we?

by Blackdrag-rose

V: Grand Deception

Trixie groaned as the sunlight hit her closed eyes. She didn't want to see whatever the world had to offer. She wanted to ignore the world and go home already.

"Lads, these ladies will bring no bad luck to the Pearl," a voice said, though Trixie detected that the speaker might have been a very quick thinker, "especially Miss Scratch. You can trust her lads."

Wait, Trixie thought, Miss Scratch? Trixie opened her eyes and was surprised by what she laid eyes on.

Humanoid creatures stared down at her with interest, each of them dressed like the pirates that Celestia despised. Above them was a blue sky, empty of clouds for once. Trixie noticed that there were a couple of sails above them, which now made sense with the sea salt she smelled in the air. She turned over and noticed two female humanoids laying next to her, one of them with large grey wings and the other with a horn on her forehead. Both of them were dressed in clothes that fit those of the famous who lived in Canterlot.

Trixie got up and looked at herself, finding that she was also a humanoid creature dressed in a robe that matched the cape she often wore. She felt her forehead and was relieved to find that her horn was still there. Standing by her was a fourth humanoid creature, but unlike the rest she was dressed in a short shirt with shorts and had a pair of large purple glasses covering her eyes. She had to be Vinyl.

"About time you three woke up," Vinyl said, the other two getting up, "I thought I was going to have to soak you all in water before you finally got up. We're lucky that we landed on the ship of my old friend Captain Jack Sparrow, otherwise we would have been in trouble with whoever we could have met."

"Where are we then?" Trixie asked, looking over the side and seeing nothing but the side of the ship and water.

"Lass, you are on the waters of the Caribbean," the captain, Jack Sparrow as Vinyl called him, said, "and we are a few days away from any port you might want to make port at."

"I don't think we'll need to make port Captain Jack," Vinyl said, "We're searching for a mystical key that radiates power."

"Would this happen to be the same key you were searching for the last time we met?" Jack asked, waving one of his fingers a bit while he spoke.

"Aye, it is," Vinyl answered, "I failed to find it the last time I was here and now me and my friends must find it. Last time we weren't racing anyone, but now we are racing the forces of Oblivion. You remember him right?"

"How could I forget with the description you left me?" Jack said, pulling a large silver key out of his pocket while he spoke, "Though I found this lovely key on an island not far from where we are now. Judging from the markings I'd wager it's the very key you set out to find last time you visited me."

"The Key of Deception," Vinyl said, eying the key and the markings, "This is definitely the key that I have been searching for. Now we have to get back to where it was originally hidden and enter the gateway there to go back to the terminal."

"Is that what that swirling vortex was?" Jack asked, putting the key away, "Huh, who would have thought there would be another portal off of this world that led to another one?"

"Us for instance...wait," Vinyl replied, knowing that something didn't feel right anymore, "what do you mean by 'another portal'?"

"Oh, we met some rather strange people earlier," Jack said, "Mister Gibbs, explain to them what happened while I get us underway."

Another pirate, a rather fatish one with a strange look in his eyes, stepped forward and slightly bowed to the four of them, not that Derpy and Lyra bothered to get up off the deck of the ship anyhow.

"Right," the man said, "allow me to explain..."

-Earlier that day-

The Isle of Lies, a hidden island near the Isle de Muerta, was rumored to be the resting place of the most legendary of treasure in all the world; the Golden Treasure of Atlantis. In order to find the island one must first know where to find the Isle de Muerta, which can only be found by those who have already been there. Then you must lose yourself, which we figured it meant we either stop following the compass or close our eyes long enough for something to happen. We opted for the eyes option and soon we were docked at a island we had never set foot on before.

We explored the island, following Captain Jack deeper and deeper into the island until we came to a giant cave full of golden coins and all the gems we could carry. The island was called the Isle of Lies, but the treasure we hauled off was certainly no lie. Captain Jack found that strange key floating in the dead center of the room and when he removed it the vortex he mentioned opened before us. We carted all we could carry towards the ship and we were soon off, reentering the known world by leaving the mist.

Shorty after leaving the island we began to hear the sounds of pounding on the water, which resembled the sound of Davy Jones summoning the dreaded Kraken. To our great delight it wasn't the Kraken or some other creature of the deep coming to swallow us for taking the treasure, but a fellow pirate ship. It was a ship crafted from the strangest red colored wood with tall masts that bared a simple black flag. When we saw the crew we thought something strange was definitely going on.

-Present time-

"The crew, each and every one of them, was dressed in appeared to be black leather armor," Gibbs continued, "and it's captain seemed to be a well mannered gentleman who dressed in a black suit and had short red hair. They boarded us and the man simply asked us if we had recovered a glowing key from an island hidden in the mists. Now, Captain Jack was witty and he lied to them, giving the captain a lookalike that happened to be sitting next to the real key. Next thing we knew the ship was gone, as if it had vanished into thin air."

"And it looks like their back," Captain Jack said, his eyeglass pointed to the west of the Pearl's location, "Our gentleman friend has returned and he seems to have brought with him some unusual company. Care to take a look Miss Scratch?"

"That's why I wear these glasses sometimes," Vinyl answered, looking to the west as her glasses allowed her to zoom in, "Crafted to help me find the keys and any trouble makers from the world I'm visiting. Now, let's see who Oblivion brought with him this time."

On the ship, standing by the main mast, stood a young woman dressed up in the getup of a cowboy, complete with boots and a fully workable gun. Standing not to far away stood an older woman who dressed as a royal lady of the pirate era, though she was barking orders at the crew. Directly next to the young woman stood a man in metal armor that almost looked like it was fused to his body and made it difficult to tell what he looked like. And standing at the front of the ship was a figure that Vinyl never wanted to see again in her entire life.

The single young woman was dressed in a black robe, which easily blew in the wind regardless of what she did. Her hair was shortly spiked and had a shade of blue going through it. She was even carrying a scythe that had the emblem of an hourglass on it. The woman turned to look in their direction and immediately confirmed Vinyl's assumptions. She knew exactly who the woman was.

"No to be the bearer of a terrible question Miss Scratch," Jack said, "but I must ask; is that woman actually you?"

"You are looking at my Hateful side," Vinyl answered, powering down her glasses and turning towards the captain, "She is known as Death Scratch and we really can't be too close to those people right now."

"I see Applejack," Derpy said, though with a little fear in her voice, "Queen Chrysalis, some metal man, and Oblivion standing on that ship with her. As in Applejack, the Element of Deception, and Queen Chrysalis, Mistress of Deception and Plots. Both of them have that strange hateful look in their eyes like we saw when we visited the dark Ponyville."

"Ponyville?" Captain Jack asked, "We don't have time for this nonsense. Unless we want to be gunned down for deceiving Oblivion I'm opting that we make way for the Isle de Muerta. Mister Gibbs."

"Aye Captain," Gibbs answered, shouting commands to the crew not a moment later.

"Now Miss Scratch," Jack said, "I will take you and your friends to the Isle of Lies, but we will not step foot on that island again. Besides what we left there I see no profit in it for myself and my crew."

"Not even an unlimited supply of rum?" Vinyl asked, just as Jack had his back facing her, "The Terminal has a never ending supply of whatever you could want; food and drink of every kind you can think of."

"Rum you say?" Jack said, Trixie could almost see the gears moving in his mind.

"Get us to the Isle of Lies and join the Warriors of Harmony," Vinyl said, leaning against the mast now, "and in return you and your crew can have all the rum you want."

"And you'll call on us when you decide to fight Oblivion for real, I know your ploy," Jack replied, turning to face her, "but the bloody temptation is unbearable."

He took a couple of steps forward and missed being hit in the head by a cannonball, which fell into the water after hitting nothing. Jack looked back at the other ship and noticed that it's guns were out and trained on their location.

"Mister Gibbs," Jack said, the man appearing like magic a second later, "Make way for the Isle of Lies will all the speed was can muster. We've got an enemy to outdistance and some rum to acquire."

"Aye aye Captain," Gibbs replied, once again shouting orders to the crew.

Trixie and her two reluctant allies moved to the wheel of the ship and stared at the ship that they were quickly outdistancing, though if Jack was right then the ship could potentially catch up in seconds. She, Lyra, and Vinyl could possibly add some extra wind with magic to increase their speed, but they could do the same with Derpy's wings. She noticed that the strange metal man, that she could see with the telescope, was staring in their exact direction and he didn't look happy.

"Any idea who our metal friend is yet?" asked a voice behind Trixie, which turned out to be Vinyl.

"No," Trixie replied, "I'm not an expert on the various worlds like you are Vinyl. All I know is what I learned from our world, our Equestria, and not some of these hateful worlds we've been to."

"You have been to one hateful world so you could see what we're up against," Vinyl said, "Oblivion cannot be allowed to retrieve all the keys, otherwise he'll barge his way into our Equestria and drown it in hatred and darkness. That will, in turn, corrupt all the worlds that are identical to ours. That is if some of them haven't been corrupted already."

Trixie watched the enemy ship as she thought about the power she could potentially wield. If she found the location of all the worlds magic she could learn more than Twilight Sparkle ever could. Then she could return to Ponyville and show her that she was the superior mage once and for all.

The metal man spread what looked like large metal wings and took to the sky, but instead of turning towards their ship he just floated in the air. Suddenly a giant swirling gateway opened in the air and a gigantic mass dropped into the sea, which caused no harm to either ship. Captain Jack looked at the mass and his face paled as if he had seen a ghost.

"Miss Scratch," Gibbs said, "as much as we would love to stay and fight Oblivion...we can't. They just summoned the long thought to be dead Kraken."

"Derpy, Trixie, Lyra," Vinyl said, turning to face the three, "Get your flanks into motion and get us away from here. Trixie and Lyra, you two will help me with the wind. Derpy, put those wings of your to use and speed up the sails."

As the three unicorns conjured more wind, along with Derpy's help, the ship began to move at a much quicker speed. Soon they had left behind the enemy ship and the large tentacle creature they had summoned.

-Enemy ship-

"Is it really okay for us to allow the Black Pearl to leave?" Chrysalis asked, watching the ship vanish into the distance.

"Its what Lord Oblivion told us to do," Applejack answered, popping her hat up a bit as she pulled her gun out, "besides, if everything goes as he has planned it we could have the majority of the Seven Keys at some point."

"I don't know why he is so fascinated with her," Chrysalis said, "I can turn into anything at will, yet he seems to care about that mare more."

"I don't think it's like that Chrissy," Applejack replied, sliding the gun back into its holder, "He already has the sixteen of us at his command. I honestly don't think he needs a seventeenth hateful ally."

"Why do I actually believe that," Chrysalis said, " when its coming from the Element of Deception herself?"

"Because the two of you are allies," the hateful Vinyl said, "and allies don't lie to each other when they serve Lord Oblivion. Besides, I have souls to collect before I can depart, so have fun."

As she faded into mist Oblivion tapped his cane on the wood of the ship, making the metal man land near them.

"Open the Gateway back to our world," Oblivion commanded, "We're heading home early today. That Captain may have handed me a fake key, but soon it will truly come into my hands."

"Aye aye captain," the crew shouted, a giant gateway opening before them in an instant and swallowed the ship whole.

-The Black Pearl-

"I'm surprised that none of you three have heard of me," Jack said, talking to Vinyl's friends, "I figured that if you were friends with Miss Scratch then you must have known about me, the infamous Captain Jack Sparrow of the Caribbean. But, seeing how you don't know about me, I will make you understand when we reach this...Terminal as Miss Scratch calls it...Now where did this come from?"

Resting before the Black Pearl was a huge mass of energy, spinning in a constant circle. The Key of Deception glowed and the mass stopped, opening the way for the ship.

"Scratch?" Jack asked, turning towards the woman, "This that portal you told me about?"

"Aye," Vinyl answered, the ship entering the gateway, "Prepare to enter the Terminal."

That was all Trixie heard as the world went blank yet again.