September 15th, 2013...

Equestria, Manehatten…

POV: Captain John Carson

7:37pm…

The nightlife of the Equestrian city was quiet, due to their being no cars, and noisy trains rocketing around. I decided to take a walk and enjoy the peaceful night. I watch sailors and ponies alike walk up and down the pier, as if we were always here and had not just arrived a few weeks ago, I found it strange but I guess ponies must be prone to change. We’ve been here in Equestria for a few weeks now, and the human and pony population have begun to mingle, because of the lack of language barrier. To keep myself busy, I talk to as many ponies as possible to keep my men and Charlie's men informed about the cultures, religions, and norms of Equestria.

Hell, I even set up a group of four sailors for this, they're called the equestrian archives team. I gave them each a pencil and pad of paper, and told them to record everything they learned about, and every wednesday we would meet and discuss the things they found interesting. All new information would go into a book that I would have on standby at every meeting.

I’ve learned about mostly everything so far, the two princesses, the sisterly war, Nightmare Moon’s imprisonment in the moon, the 1000 year solar empire, the return of Nightmare, and the six elements of harmony. The population seems to embrace the sisters as gods, due to their high understanding of magic and their involvement in the changing of day, and night. They view the six elements and the ponies who wield them as their main line of defense, besides the royal guard. The ones who wield them are Rainbow Dash, Applejack, Pinkie Pie, Fluttershy, Rarity, and Twilight Sparkle. All of which have their own element, loyalty, honesty, generosity, laughter, kindness, and finally magic. It all sounded a little far fetched for me, but then again, so do talking rainbow colored horses.

Walking down the boardwalk watching the sea roll over the sand of the beaches, I listen to voices of humans and ponies talk, exchanging stories of their sea adventures or daily lives. Most of the talking came from the human sailors mostly because, Equestrians are good listeners, and are easily impressed. With hands in my pocket I walk alone going over the copious amounts of information in my head. I wonder how the rest of the human world would react to this, especially in times of war. We wouldn't be able to comprehend such a land if this situation were the other way around. So, let's hope that never happens, ever. My wounds from our entry into this world have pretty much healed up at this point, thanks to some Equestrian forms of magical healing spells, of which I was completely against, if Princess Celestia hadn't done it herself. It felt, and looked strange, like my body was being flushed out, cleaned, and repaired right before my eyes. But afterwards, I felt better than ever.

I looked from the sea to the buildings on my right, the lights coming from the windows and signs lit up the night drenched pier, and those who walked on it. They were little shops that sold many different things, but mostly ale and other spirits. I found it actually surprising that a place like this, could still sell alcohol, let alone so much of it. I looked into one building in particular, one that had a group of Charlie's sailors sitting at a sea side window that looked out over the beach.

“The Rusty Hull Tavern” It said in curvy bold red letters with an anchor for the T in tavern. I guess what surprised me was the sailors that sat inside it were laughing away while enjoying a drink. I felt that it looked out of place, like they weren't supposed to be their talking to ponies and drinking, it didn't look right. But regardless, they were making the best out of the situation at hand.

I made my way to the door and pushed it open, the rustic atmosphere taking over from the cool dark night. The tavern was mostly built from wood with iron rivets holding things together. Lights hung from the ceiling keeping everything bright. And the sounds of piano music serenaded the room in the most humblest way possible. It felt cozy, warm, inviting.

As the door shut behind me one of the sailors that were sitting by the window, turned around and shouted, “Captain Present!” and almost instantly they all shot up out of their seats and turned to me and saluted. Returning the greeting I saluted back and followed it up with a, “At ease.” after the sailors returned to their talking and drinking I made my way to the bar that was past the rows of tables that had ponies drinking, smoking, laughing, and watching, me.

Most of them were male, they wore traditional sailor clothing, striped shirts, dixie cup sailor hats, and white dress pants. Others were part of the royal guard, who wore their armor with and without their helmets. I made my way to the counter and took a seat on one of the stools and almost immediately a bartender pony was right in front of me.

“Good evening their Mr. Human captain sir, what can I get you.” The pony seemed young, but just young enough to work at a place like this. He had a high pitched tone in his voice, which was choppy to say the least. He had his brownish blonde mane pushed up into a curl above his forehead and the rest of the mane hung down to the right of his neck. His fur was a light grey and his eyes were a deep green. He wore a white undershirt and black vest with red bow tie. His name tag was presented right on the left side of his vest. Dalmore was his name.

“Hello there Dalmore, I’m doing fine, but, don't call me Human, call me John.” I said back, resting my right arm on the counter and leaning in. He almost seemed surprised that I “guessed” his name, but then he realized he wore it every day.

“Oh okay then, uh, what are you going to have?” He asked.

Shit… how was I going to pay for this? I didn’t have any money, let alone Equestrian money, nor should those sailors I saw earlier.

“Wait, I don’t have any Equestrian made money, nor should they, how did they pay for their drinks?” I ask thumbing over to the group at the table behind me.

“Oh, well, the owner of the Rusty Hull said that any human that walks through that door would be good for attracting customers, so he said to let any human drink, well, for free.” He said as he cleaned a, already clean glass mug that was underneath the counter that he pulled out. “And from the looks of things, he was right, ever since humans came in here, our sales have gone up 48%.” He stated.

‘Hmmm, risky business tactics’ I thought. “Very well. So what is on the menu?” I asked looking at the wooden hanging list of drinks and prices behind him.

“Well, the more expensive drinks are off limits unfortunately, because we would be losing more money than we would be making, but everything here is yours.” He said lifting up a white menu with black lettering. The list wasn't to big, but it had a decent amount on it. Things ranging from Cider to grape juice, wine, fruit punch, and just water. So after deciding I sat back and watched the ponies talk and laugh away.

For about ten minutes I sat at the counter sipping away at what the bar called a Special Cider and listened to the music of the piano that a pony played with her hoofs. But as time went on certain words I kept hearing stood out to me, more than others. Especially one word in particular. At first when I heard the word, I almost turned around to who said it, then another pony said it again in a different place, then it came again. Finally I turned around to one sailor sitting at a table that was the closest to me. He wore a full dress uniform with the Equestrian flag embroidered on his left shoulder. He had a white and gold bandanna tied in front of him and tucked under his collar.

“Wait” I said, sticking out my hand, getting him to stop. He stopped talking and looked at me with a brow raised. “Did you just say Missouri?” I asked almost petrified that he actually did.

As I say that, half of the people in the bar room, stop talking and looked over at me, with blank faces, others with confused looks. Soon the rest of the quieted down, even the human sailors stopped talking and looked over at me. The entire building seemed to go silent of the course of 20 seconds. They all seemed to look at me.

“Uh yeah, we're talking about a ship that we saw that has become sort of a new legend of the sea, it appeared the same time you humans did. You see, I'm part of a scouting unit for the Equestrian Navy and I was sent to find the ship that others are calling, ‘The Iron Wall.’ otherwise known as Missouri. I just returned from the scouting trip and we just spotted it off the coast of Saddle Arabia. Why?” He asked as the human sailors began to get up from their seats and come over to me.

I looked at them, and they looked at me,

“The USS Missouri, oh my god, if you're telling the truth then, oh god… this isn't good.” Said the leader of the group of sailors. He sat down at an empty chair and put his patrol cap on and leaned it over his eyes in despair.

“If that ship is sailing around Equestrian waters, it’s bound to be confronted by pirates.” Said another pony at the same table as the other one.

“That's not the worst part,” I said, “The Missouri, is armed with 9, 16 inch main turret guns, almost 13 inches of reinforced steel of armor, enough ammo to kill a nation, and enough fire power that if anyone, or anypony finds it. They’ll become the king of the sea.

“So, what you're saying captain is that-” A sailor began to say before I cut him off by standing up.

“We need to find that warship before anyone else does.”

Author's Notes:

Ah, its done another so long. Hopefully you peeps have fun with this one, expect another chapter "soon"