We were currently flying towards the coast, seeing as the kids hadn’t seen the sea before, I thought we’d give them a little bit of a surprise, I was watching Autumn and Saphyrus teach Garnet and Ruby how to fly, Autumn was teaching Ruby, who had pegasi wings and Saphyrus was teaching Garnet, who had dragon wings, I had ordered Frost Fang to fly up really high so they would have plenty of time if something went wrong, we were now currently sailing through the clouds like a ship through water.

“Your tail is just as important to flying as your wings are” Saphyrus told the both of them, as they both had long reptilian tails with those odd splitting blades at the end, Saphyrus the walked over to them and gently pressed down between their shoulder blades, causing two rows of spines to sprout up along their backs, the two twins looked back at their spines and they snapped into one row several times, they looked in amazement at the older dragoness who chuckled “every dragon has their secrets, even half-breeds, those will help you with stability and cornering, control them in tandem with your tail, and you will become impressive flyers, Autumn, if you could take Ruby and show her how to use her wings” Autumn nodded and lead Ruby to the edge of the ship, Ruby poked her reptilian head through the railings and quickly withdrew.

“It’s so high up, what if I fall” Ruby asked, Autumn chuckled.

“Then I’ll catch you” Autumn said “climb on my back and do exactly as I say, okay?” Ruby hesitated before climbing on Autumns back, Autumn then flew off the ship and out of the reach of the energy shield.

“Ruby” Autumn shouted over the wind “I want you to slowly stand up and spread out your wings” she felt Ruby slowly stand up on her back, and started to feel the Kirin lifting off of her back, she looked back to see Ruby’s huge feathered wings lifting her.

“You’re doing great” Autumn encouraged “I’m going to need you to trust me for this next bit, okay?”

“O-okay” Ruby said, Autumn slowly began to lower herself, she then began to bank to one side and ascending until she was flying, or rather gliding right next to Ruby.

“You’re doing great” Autumn said “can you feel all the little air currents flowing around your wings?” Ruby nodded

“Yeah” she said in amazement.

“I want you to close your eyes and just let your instincts kick in” Autumn said, Ruby hesitated “I’m right here, I won’t let anything happen”

“Okay” Ruby said, before hesitantly closing her eyes, after a few moments her wings loosened up and her tail began to steer her, her wings started to flap, that was when Ruby opened her eyes and stiffened up, causing her whole body to tense and sending her spiralling towards the ground faster than Autumn could react “MUM!!!”

Something click in Autumns mind and she dove after Ruby, she put every ounce of strength she had into pushing herself faster, she cursed herself for not putting on her mask or any of her armour, she drew her wings together and burst through the cloud cover before continuing her powered dive, she slowly began to draw closer to Ruby but she was beginning to tire and she could see the ground getting closer

“Ruby!” she shouted “I need you to spread your wings to slow yourself down”

“I can’t” Ruby said, tears starting to stream from her eyes “I’m scared, Mum” Autumn felt an extra burst of strength and began to draw closer, arms outstretched, after a few tense seconds Autumn managed to grab her and spread her wings out, slowing them down, they landed in a field and Ruby clung onto Autumn, trembling and sobbing with tears streaming down her cheeks.

“Shh, shh” Autumn said, hugging her comfortingly “it’s alright, I’m here, I’ve got you”

“I was so scared” Ruby said “I thought I was going to…” she trailed off and began crying anew.

“I told you I wouldn’t let anything happen to you” Autumn said “I’m sorry I didn’t get to you sooner, can you forgive me?” Ruby nodded into Autumns chest, before bringing her head away to look her in the eyes.

“Autumn?” Ruby asked.

“Yes, Ruby?”

“Can I call you Mum?” Ruby asked, Autumn’s eyes watered before she brought her into a hug.

“Of course you can” Autumn said “why would I say no?”

“Because you might think I would forget my real mother” Ruby said.

“Oh, don’t be silly” Autumn said “I’ll tell you something, you know how Vuur Koning said he understands what you are going through with your mother dying?”

“Yeah” Ruby said “why, did his mother die?” Autumn shook her head

“Two years ago he was getting ready to visit his father, when he heard the news that his father had been killed in an accident” Autumn said, Ruby’s eyes widened in shock “he still hasn’t forgotten about him, so don’t worry, I don’t think you will, when we have stopped exploring the southern lands, we’ll visit your mother’s grave on her birthday, okay?”

“I’d like that, Mum” Ruby said, and they both laughed.

“Come on” Autumn said “let’s get back to the ship, I’m sure Vuur Koning and Garnet are worried, and we can try again, but only if you want to, okay?”

“Okay”

Of all the things that could go wrong, this was the…worst…possible…thing!

Now I knew what it felt like to be useless, I couldn’t send anyone else down after them, no one would be able to reach them, Saphyrus had gone down after them, but I knew her wings weren’t built for diving like pegasi’s wings were, all I could do was wait there with Garnet, both of us stood there, watching the clouds for any sign of movement, I was starting to lose hope when I saw three shapes burst through the clouds, one of which was Ruby, she was flying all by herself (!), Autumn and Saphyrus were flying either side of her, making sure she didn’t fall like earlier, they reached the calmer air within the shields of the ship and landed on the decking, Autumn leaned down and nuzzled Ruby.

“I am so, so proud of you” Autumn said, hugging the Kirin, Garnet and I walked over.

“Is Ruby okay?” I asked.

“A little shaken over what happened, but I caught her in the end and she’s fine now” Autumn said, nuzzling Ruby, who giggled, I breathed a sigh of relief.

“Thank Fantasia” I said, Garnet then rushed forward and began nuzzling his sister.

“I was so worried” Garnet said, his eyes watering, Ruby hugged her brother with her wings.

“I’m fine, Mum was there to save me” Garnet gave Ruby a look that someone usually used when they doubted someone else’s sanity “not ‘Mum’ Mum, ‘Autumn’ Mum” I looked at Autumn and raised an eyebrow, she just shrugged and smirked, after some coaxing we managed to get Garnet to start flying, with his dragon wings he was better suited for longs bursts of gliding with the occasional couple of flaps, whilst Ruby was better at sustained powered flight and higher speeds, soon they were playing with each other in the air, at one point Aurora flew over and looked at the two older relatives in awe, I chuckled.

“Go ahead” I said “it’s time you three started to bond properly” Aurora then jumped off of the railing and flew after them, me and Autumn just watched them play, but kept a close eye on them in case anything went wrong, I then heard Footsteps walking towards us, turned around to see Vapaa decked out in his armour with John Henry walking beside him.

“You want to join in as well?” Autumn asked, Vapaa nodded “how good is his flying?”

“Good enough” Vapaa said “at least, according to Baldric”

“Alright” I said, looking at the young, albino griffin “up you go John” he nodded before jumping off the deck and flying, if a little unsteadily, towards them, suddenly we all felt a massive gust of wind and next thing we knew, we were watching in horror as John plummeted out of the sky, Vapaa swore before jumping off of the ship after him we could only look on and hope against hope, suddenly a golden glow enveloped Vapaa and he grew bigger before changing completely into an giant red-yellow-orange winged creature with black stripes and blue crests on its top and bottom jaw, the creature flew underneath John Henry and caught him on its back before banking around towards the ship, everyone on the deck just stared, slack jawed as the creature flew towards us, people scattered as it landed on the deck, John Henry jumped off and backed away from the creature in fear, the creature changed back into Vapaa, whose mask glowed for a few seconds.

“What the hell, how comes you get to become a Toa so easily!?” I asked “and better yet, why can you change into a Great Leonopteryx, as far as I know, there isn’t a Kenohi ‘Can-change-into-Toruk-from-Avatar’”

“No” he admitted, walking over to John and comforting him “but there is a mask of shape shifting”

“You shouldn’t even be able to transform into one of these” I said “they breathe hydrogen and them come from a planet with a lower gravity” he just smirked.

“I’m now a Toa and I’ve got a Kenohi Mahiki, to hell with logic and physics” he said, standing up, I just crossed my arms and muttered under my breath “you’re just annoyed because I’ve got a truly useful mask power, all you can do is create a bubbles”

“I will burn you in a minute if you carry on, mate, and it’s a Kenohi Hau, not a Kenohi ‘Derpy’” he just gave me an odd look “don’t worry, long story, but seriously, it’s great that we have another Toa now, all we have to do now is work out your element”

“Hello” he said “white and gold ring any bells? It’s obvious what element I am”

“Well if you are so sure” I said “then what element is it?”

“Light” it wasn’t Vapaa who spoke, but Mata Nui, who had only just walked onto the deck, I bowed to him, Vapaa had a thoughtful look on his face, before he began changing colour.

“Now that is cool” Vapaa said “yay for chameleon powers”

After a few days we reached the coast, I had made sure the kids didn’t find out about it until the day we arrived, Autumn and I led them onto the gun deck of the ship, covering their eyes, Vapaa was in on it as well, and he was doing the same with John we walked them over to the railings on the side facing the coast, I counted to three and me Autumn and Vapaa removed our hands from in front of their faces, the three kids gasped in amazement.

“Surprise!” I said to the Kirin twins and the albino-griffin “we’ll be spending a few days just outside of a coastal town, with the ship stopping on the beach, think of it as a holiday within a holiday”

“I’m sure there is an inception joke in there somewhere” Vapaa said, smirking.

“oh hardy har har” I said sarcastically, we soon reached the beach and sections off the hull lifted away, revealing insectoid legs that dug into the sand and supported the massive bulk of the ship, I had announced to the crew that this weekend was for everyone to relax and enjoy themselves, and soon they started to pour out of the ship and onto the beach, Frost Fang began to sun himself in the sand, whilst the crownd began to split off into groups to do whatever, whether it was something like volleyball, cricket, or football, the kids charged for the sea, giggling as they ran, I was sat on the beach in shorts enjoying myself, but an arm’s reach away my sword was embedded in the sand, better to be safe.

“You should really stop worrying” Autumn said, laying on a towel, chest down facing the shore.

“With the type of luck that this world is prone to?” I asked “no thanks”

“Oh please” Minion said “it’s not as if…”

“Finnish that sentence and I swear to Fantasia I will bury you in the sand and leave you to face whatever foul creature you would have summoned forth!” I said, he promptly shut his still open mouth “thank you”

“I’ve heard you say Fantasia several times” Vapaa said, not taking his gave off of the children “is that the deity of a religion that you follow?”

“In a manner of speaking” I replied “the Equestrian religion is more like an old world religion, with several gods to ‘chose’ from, I’m not one for religious zealousness, but I love the ‘symbolism’ of the multi-god religions, I follow it loosely, partly because I’ve actually met Fantasia, the ‘god’ of imagination and creation on this world, they have three ‘high-gods’, Fantasia, who I’ve already mentioned, Tempus; god of time and destiny, and Anima; Goddess of nature and new life, what religion do you follow?”

“Christianity” he said “but I’m accepting of others beliefs” he went to say something else when we heard the kids screaming, I looked in their direction to see Ruby, Aurora and John running out of the water.

“Where’s Garnet!?” I asked.

“S-something grabbed him and dragged him under” Ruby said, her eyes watering.

“Stay here” I said, before conjuring my armour, the other Toa did the same, I then grabbed my sword “I hope you all can hold your breath” I then dived into the water, my armour glowed and began to change, it became slimmer, smoother and airtight, the ends of my feet turned into flippers and my mask changed, a re-breather of some kind appeared and I could now breath underwater, the eyeholes and tribal slits on each side merged into two large visors, my hearing improved, sounding less like I was underwater and more like was on land, I heard the other 6 Toa enter the water and saw that they were going through similar changes, Boris and Autumns wings had actually changed into large wing-like fins, and Scars paws had become webbed and his Gatling guns had become two spear guns, Minions armour was less bulky looking and his plasma cannon had changed into a spear gun, Vapaa’s cloak had turned into a thicker material that resembled the wings of a manta ray.

“Every one alright?” I asked, I was surprised when they all responded perfectly clearly “okay, it seems we have adaptive armour” Vinyl lifted up a hand.

“Yeah, what’s adaptive armour?” she asked.

“Kind of speaks for itself” I said “it adapts to suit any major changes to the surrounding enviroment, it seems our bodies also change with it, so long as we wear the armour”

“I wonder if they would adapt to outer space” Vapaa said.

“We can wonder about that later” I said “we need to look for Garnet. Minion, can you see anything?” I heard his lenses ‘hunting’ but he shook his head”

“the temperature of the water is fucking with my thermal vision” he said, slapping the lenses, Vinyl’s mask glowed and I heard a loud ‘ping’, followed by a ripple originating from Vinyl’s mask.

“Your mask power!” Minion said “it’s activated”

“I can sense several individuals heading that way” Vinyl said, nodding to a cave, we all began to swim towards it, Autumn and Boris shot ahead of us, aided by their ‘water-wings’, we soon reached a cliff, which over looked a large underwater canyon, Minion gave a low whistle.

“Bloody hell!” he said “that’s deep, good thing we can swim” I turned to Vinyl.

“Send out another ‘ping’” I said, I heard another audio ‘ping’ sound off and a ripple went over the terrain, I could momentarily see the terrain as the ripple passed over, in the distance I could see three figures swimming towards the cliff, one of which was slightly smaller and being dragged by the other two “Minion, zoom in on that group” I heard his lens zoom in.

“That’s him” Minion said, before he could say anything else me and Autumn rushed forwards.

“I don’t care what reason they have for taking our son” I said, looking at Autumn “if they have harmed him in any way, they…will…BURN!” I then drew my sword, apparently they heard my because they stopped and I could just see them turn around, we swam closer, I could see that they were mere-ponies, and they had tridents in one hand and one of them was holding an unconscious Garnet in the other, I noticed he had a bubble of air around his snout, we stopped in front of them.

“What have you taken our son!?” I demanded, they tilted their heads in confusion and spoke in a language that sounded like a cross between a whale and a dolphin, I pointed at Garnet “Him, our son” I then pointed to me and Autumn, they just looked even more confused, one of them let out a really loud whale song, me and Autumn had to cover our ears, the other Toa swam up to us, that was when a whole pod of them appeared out of nowhere and began to circle us, the one holding Garnet said something in their language before swimming towards to cave and the pod held their tridents in an aggressive manner, blocking out path, the rest of the Toa got out their weapons.

“You can still back down” I said to the other Toa “this is mine and Autumns problem”

“No way am I leaving my family to get killed by a bunch a fish-ponies” Minion said, the others all agreed.

“Well then” I said “WE’RE HAVING FISH TONIGHT!”

And thus, the shit hit the fan.

from now on, chapters will be named after whatever comes to mind