Summer heat is not a friend of ponykind; or those pretending to be a pony either. The summer heat was hot, and even as the days passed closer to Fall, the sun did not seem to let out on the scorching amount of heat that it brought down upon the coated forms of myself and my friends.

Baking in the summer sun, I could imagine the cruel sun tyrant looking through her telescope at the discomfort of me and the girls while chuckling to herself. Unless of course the heat wave was actually the fault of the weather ponies, in which case I imagined a bunch of uptight bureaucrats pushing hot air around towards my general location because I was exempt from weather taxes thanks to my home being in the Everfree. Point was, I was too hot, and in Equestria where everything is managed by ponies, so that meant I had someone to blame for current discomfort that didn’t focus my anger towards the girls I was with.

As for what I was doing at the moment, I was accompanying Twilight, who was accompanying the rest of her friends as they went with Fluttershy to Horseshoe Bay so that she could release some fish she had picked up while over in Manehattan back into the wild.

Apparently the thing had been injured or something, and Fluttershy had seen it as her duty to spend copious amounts of time nursing something that was just going to end up as something else's dinner back to health. Quite frankly, I was proud of the shy little pegasus, she usually just let the animals stay at her place and eat her out of house and home instead of releasing them back where they belonged. The little girl was growing up.

Of course, as soon as Rainbow had heard about her oldest friend’s plan to just run down to the shore and come back, she had hijacked the whole thing and turned it into a last hurrah before our Summer ended. I wasn’t too keen on going to a place where its human counterpart was the equal to an open air flesh bar, where guys went to try and find hot girls and vice versa…but Rainbow Dash had been the one asking, and Twilight thought it was a good idea. The day those two found out I would do anything the two of them asked me, I was screwed.

I was just lucky I had managed to talk Spike into coming along, and Twilight into closing the library for a few days so he could. Otherwise, I would have been the one carrying the bags. Instead, I got to stick close to Twilight while trying my best not to look uncomfortable as I dodged drops of gooey popsicle that fell from above while Rainbow attempted to finish off a snack she had bought at a kiosk back in the little village we just exited before it melted.

“So after we’re done setting the fish free, are there any cool sights to see around here?” I asked, my latent brony coming out at the thought of exploring Equestria’s landscape. All I really knew about Horseshoe Bay was that it was close to Baltamare.

Pinkie threw out her usual suggestion of course. “We could have a back to the sea party!”

Right on top of the deliberation, Rarity added her two cents. “I would like to sample to local foods. Do you think you could make some of those drinks with the little umbrellas Darling? They look absolutely adorable!”

While I was left wondering if Rarity’s sense of fashion had managed to overtake some of her more natural ones, Fluttershy froze up and looked down at the tiny fishbowl hanging from her neck that housed Gill, the fish she had been doctoring for the past week and a half. “Um, well…I was thinking, we need to make sure this is the right time to send Gill back to the sea…and place…and what about the lunar phase? We shouldn’t release Gill back into the ocean if the moon isn’t properly aligned!”

Oh great, so much for the vacation part of this trip, I told myself while Applejack went over to try and talk some sense into Fluttershy. If we spent the next few days trying to talk her into letting go of a fish rather than having fun, I was going to have to start looking for some new ponies to hang out with.

To keep at least some of us on the vacation track, I looked over to the pony who could talk for hours about anything. “So Pinkie, what’s your favorite thing about the beach?”

“I like the crabs, the way they tickle my hooves when they try to pinch me just makes me laugh so much!”

I could barely follow that with a thought. Huh, that was…different? I asked myself. It wasn’t Pinkie weird random, since I guess it did kind of make sense she would like being tickled. It was just so…different than what a human would say I couldn’t help but be thrown off a bit. Apparently, my adjustment to Equestrian society still needed some work.

The others quickly joined in on Pinkie’s comment though.

“I just love to relax with that sea breeze blowing through my mane,” Rarity proclaimed.

“Them pineapples make fer some mighty fine drinks…long as you can take the side effects,” Applejack commented, drawing my attention for a moment. Hell, I didn’t even know pineapples existed in Equestria…and a few jokes involving them and Applejack I could remember from the time I had access to a computer were now useless.

“I want to take a look at the local geography!” Twilight exclaimed before she opened up her saddlebag and pulled out a map to unfold it, using her magic of course. The thing wasn’t like the ones found in travel brochures or…anything modern Equestria had. The damn thing looked pretty old.

At Twilight’s declaration of her wish to also go sightseeing, I just reached over with a wing and put it across her back since nuzzling while walking was a good way to get tripped up. “Have I mentioned how much I loved you?” I asked while ignoring what the rest of the group was going on about. The thought that me and Twi’s wants aligned so perfectly was just awesome.

“Only since this morning when we…umm, ehehe,” the alicorn laughed nervously when she looked around. A second later, and I noticed that all the other ponies were looking at the two of us.

“You get it on three times a day, we know already,” Spike said after Twilight went quiet.

As the real alicorn’s face reddened, I just glared at the dragon. “No need to broadcast it, geeze.”

“But you guys do broadcast it,” Pinkie spoke up. “Especially that first night before we all found out Fae-Fae was a girl. Twilight was really loud! I heard her all the way from Sugarcube Corner.”

Twilight seemed to shrink in on herself. I just gaped at the pink pony.

“The two of you did used to cause quite the disturbance Darling,” Rarity added.

Rainbow Dash let out a ‘pfft’ and flew down to float beside us after finishing her snack. “And just why is it Twilight’s the only one ever hear anyway?” she asked while giving me a frown.

Oh Luna, kill me now, I prayed to the moon goddess as all eyes fell to me.

“F-Fae’s just a little nervous about intimacy on her end okay?” Twilight explained quickly as she took a sledgehammer to what was left of my self image. “And why’re you girls bringing this up now?”

Rarity giggled. “Oh Darling, did you think we wouldn’t be poking a little fun at the first one of us to get into a steady relationship? You must allow us to vent our jealousy somehow.”

The declaration of the reasoning behind their actions made Twilight’s ‘defend girlfriend’ stance turn into a panicked clenching of teeth and wincing as she looked around at her friends. “J-Jealous? I’m sorry! I’m sorry, I didn’t think any of you would be-”

“Okay Rare, I think you can lay off her for a little while,” Rainbow said, stopping Twilight’s mental meltdown before she looked over to the two of us. Even I blushed, or had some blood rush to my face in a very manly fashion, under the pegasus’s smirk and found a very interesting cloud to look at. “Now come on girls, let’s get to the beach before the sand runs out.”

A part of me wanted to tell Rainbow we were going to a beach, not an hourglass, but I was just thankful she saved our collective plots and coaxed Twilight into the air to follow me and cut their good-natured jokes short.

Thankfully, the beach we had chosen to spend our short vacation at was devoid of any other ponies, most likely do to its size. The whole thing spanned less than two hundred yards, and was littered with pineapple trees (yeah, they have those in Equestria apparently, but on trees) rather close to the shoreline. It seemed to be more of the scenic type of place where ponies would stop and take a picture of rather than stay for relaxation. However, for our group, it was the perfect size.

A few minutes after we arrived, Rarity was drinking some pineapple juice and lounging on a deck chair she had Spike bring with us while her dragon slave fanned the pony with a giant leaf. Applejack was off picking pineapples up from the ground where Twilight and I had ripped them from the trees for her to make into more drinks. Pinkie had found some small crabs to attack her, and Rainbow was playing a solo game of frisbee by using a boomerang and flying around to catch it. As for Fluttershy, she was down by the shore, probably saying goodbye to her fish.

However, at the moment, I didn’t give much of a damn about any of that. Twilight and I were busy planning a sightseeing date tour using her old history books and a compass she had brought with her from Ponyville. I honestly didn’t know what excited me more: the adventuring through old Equestrian sights, or just spending a day out doing something new with her. Although we had been together for a month, the list of new Ponyville activities we could share had started to run dry and I was looking forward to a change of scenery since the whole cuddling thing didn’t work too well in the summer heat.

“So I was thinking we could start with Plummouth Rock, then head over to the Sapphire Hills and see if we can find anything using Rarity’s gem finding spell,” she said while glancing between the map and her book that described the area. “It would be nice if we could find something to remember this trip by that we didn’t get in a store.”

I nodded before glancing at her map. “Anything interesting in the Hayseed Swamps, or maybe further down?”

My suggestion got a curious eye raise from Twilight. “Why would you want to go to a…” she said before her expression turned to one of one of suspicion. “Wait a minute…" She paused in thought for a moment as she studied the map, then looked back up at me. "We are not going to see where the Battle of Discord was fought.”

I don’t know whether to be impressed, or a little creeped out she can already tell what I’m thinking like that, I thought to myself before giving her a disarming grin, followed by a peck of a kiss on her nose. “Okay you win,” I told her. It looked like if I was going to see anything really cool on this trip, I would just have to sneak off after dark and peek at it later.

A loud splash, followed by a scream got our attention, and both of us looked over to the beach where Fluttershy had been putting her fish back in the water. My mouth nearly dropped to the ground at what I saw.

They say that some people can get so wrapped up in what they’re doing that they tune out the rest of the world. I had always thought this to be a pretty stupid theory, as no matter what you’re doing, there is always a vast amount of sensory input that tells you what’s going on around you no matter how focused your attention is on the purple pony in front of you.

But that is the excuse I’m using for not noticing the 28 meter-high ship that nearly crashed right onto the beach, right where Fluttershy was standing. However, the slightly more disturbing thing than its sudden appearance, although well below the way it got my hackles up for scaring the hell out of Fluttershy and nearly crushing her to death, was the giant skull and crossbones that adorned both its flag and sails. Even with the way Equestrian coincidence worked, all I could think was, a pirate ship? Are you fucking kidding me?

A few seconds later, an earth pony with a peg leg and a cutie mark that matched the skull and crossbones on his sail exactly swung down from the railing and landed next to the frightened pegasus. “Sorry about that bit of water lass, that’s what happens when you tango with the sea,” he said before spitting the rope out of his mouth and turning to the rest of us. “Now, have you wee fillies seen any crew-worthy stallions round these parts?”

In the ensuing silence, I managed to get a better look at the pirate, and although his braided beard and tail had me dreading this was some sort of Jonny Depp amalgam pony pirate, the rest of his clothes spoke otherwise. He wore a bandanna, but it was just covering his brow, and the pony was wearing more gold necklaces than Jack Sparrow ever did, along with a black vest made of a material that had me wondering if it was some kind of leather along with an eye patch that completed his ultimate cliché pirate outfit. The cutlass at his hip was also a bit of an oddity, as I had never seen a pony use a sword before. Their mouths didn’t seem to be made for it.

The boomerang Rainbow had been playing with came around to smack her glasses off and seemed to knock Dash out of the stupor we had all been stuck in. However, instead of ramming into the idiot who scared Fluttershy half to death and breaking every bone in his body like I was planning to do, she just got a look of childish glee on her face. “Ohmygosh! A real pirate!” Rainbow exclaimed. “And hey, if you need a crew, then we’re the best ponies you could possibly hope for pal!”

Uh oh, I thought to myself while Twilight stepped forward and held up a hoof with a placating laugh. “Oh don’t mind her sir. I’m afraid my friend has flown a bit too close to the sun today,” she told the pirate. “But I’m sure you can find a few good stallions in the resort town nearby. We can give you directions if you want.”

“Are you kidding Twilight?” Rainbow demanded as she flew down to get eye-level with the other mare, “we could be pirates, living the dream!”

Apparently, Rainbow’s argument managed to convince another one of our number. Pinkie jumped up, knocking away most of the crabs that had been trying to claw their way through her hooves off. “Let’s do it! I’m always one for making dreams come true.”

A second later, Rainbow was off selling the rest of her friends on their skill sets as she moved from pony to pony. “Applejack here can cook all kinds of food with any kind of fruit, Twilight is a brainiac when it comes to maps and all sorts of other stuff, Rarity would be awesome at gearing us up all piratey, my girl Fae probably knows a million things about being a pirate, and Spike here will come in loads of handy! Come on girls, this will be a way more awesome adventure than just sitting around getting sand in our coats!”

As Rainbow made her sale, I felt a strange feeling wash over me, and shook my head to fight it off. It was weird. I remembered Rainbow Dash’s episode where she had managed to round up every pegasus in Ponyville for that tornado, then get them all back into it when the whole thing seemed hopeless. So, I knew she had a bit of charisma but…I had been around charismatic people before, and what Dash had was something…more. So much so I found myself wondering if she had some sort of emotional affecting ability like Fluttershy’s Stare that simply worked via encouragement instead of intimidation. By the time she was done, even Twilight looked to be seriously considering going out to sea, judging by the chapter of islands off the cost of Baltimare she had opened her book to.

Then, to seal the deal, Rainbow looked around for the final mare of our group. “Now where’s Fluttershy she-”

“What’re you all waiting for let’s cast off and set sail!”

That sounded like, I managed to think before looking towards the sound of Fluttershy’s voice coming from the direction of the ship. Then the thinking part of my brain kind of shut down when I noticed the yellow pegasus was already standing on the ship and motioning us to come aboard!

The only thing I could manage to comment on the situation was a hearty “Bwaaaaa?”

Twilight managed a much more coherent response. Apparently, seeing the pegasus act so…not Fluttershy had knocked her out of the excited daze that Dash had sent her into. “FLUTTERSHY? What are you doing!?”

“Um…pirating?” she replied in her normal Fluttershy way.

A second later, Rainbow Dash was back in the air. “Well if she’s going, I’m going!”

The thought of Dash running off to go gallivanting around with pirates and risking her life for God knows what managed to snap me out of my daze. I teleported Dash back to my side and wrapped the girl in my telekinesis to keep her from getting away while being as careful as I could not to hurt her. Being black magic based meant changeling TK wasn't as gentle as Twilight's, and messing with living creatures was always hard.

“H-Hey lemme go!”

Ignoring the overenthusiastic pegasus, I glared at the pirate who tried to sucker my friends into slaving away on his ship. As Dash had surmised, I did know quite a bit about life at sea back before things like engines had been invented. None of it was fun as Hollywood made it out to be. “Go find some other ponies to be your lackeys,” I told the sea horse before looking over to the last member of our little group. “Fluttershy, get down from there.”

A soft ‘okay’ from the other pegasus reached my ears as Peg-leg Pete the Pirate Pony let out a loud humph. “Yeah, I thought you looked too chicken to be accompanying me on a voyage to the Galloping Ghost Islands.”

My eye twitched in irritation at the pun of a name, but the bait didn’t tempt me in the slightest.

“Did you say the Galloping Ghost Islands? But they’re supposed to be a myth!”

However, judging by the words she just said and the sparkle in her eye, Twilight was more than willing to bite. Then the pirate took one look at her, her compass and map next to the multiple guidebooks, and smiled. “Aye lass, only the brightest and cleverest of navigators can find it. Know where I might find one?”

I released Rainbow from my hold, and wondered if she somehow switched personalities with Twilight as the alicorn accepted the challenge. A second later, Applejack was up next to me to whisper in my ear. “Look Sugarcube, something you ought to know about Twi and Dash is, once this sort of stuff starts happening, its best to just let em go at it and follow along to keep em outta as much trouble as ya can.”

Stupid sensible Stetson-wearing pony, I thought to myself while sighing in defeat.

Applejack had a point of course. I was their friend, not their parent. If Rainbow Dash wanted to go off and get herself killed facing certain doom, that was one thing, but I sincerely doubted even a pony pirate was going to be able to give the girls more trouble than they had become used to.

“Fine, let’s go,” I grumbled. But if anything did happen to the girls, I was going to turn this stupid wannabe sea pony inside out before sucking every last bit of life from his veins no matter how bad he tasted.

Ten minutes later, and we were setting sale. I took one last look at the beach, and frowned at the empty fishbowl laying on the sand that Fluttershy had brought her fish in. The sight made me look back to the yellow pegasus with a frown. She hadn't been there for Dash's speech, so... Just why in the hell was she going along with this anyway?

A few hours into our journey, I was getting a bad feeling in the pit of my stomach. It wasn’t the feeling of creeping dread that usually accompanied stuff that came with being put in danger, I was literally queasy. Considering I didn’t have a stomach anymore, it was quite the feat if I do say so myself.

The others were faring much better. Inside the three tons of luggage Rarity had brought with her, she had managed to cobble together seven ‘pirate’ ensembles for each of us with varying degrees of dress. Pinkie had a white and black striped shirt with a red bandanna that covered her usually poofy hair, Applejack’s role at the ship’s cook had left her wearing a black chef’s hat with a pirate symbol on it while hair nets covered her mane and tail, Twilight’s purple collared shirt was a shade darker than her coat and covered her wings, while a hot pink and black striped bandana covered most of her hair. Rainbow Dash simply had on a dark gray vest that allowed for her wings while Rarity and Fluttershy only wore hats, with the unicorn’s being a tri-cone hat I would have expected to see in a swashbuckling move with all the fancy feathers it had, and Flutters had a giant beast that only a naval commander would be caught dead in.

In contrast, the pink Hawaiian shirt that the unicorn had dug out of the bottom of her bag made me look pretty damn out of place on a pirate ship. As for Spike, he was his usual nude self, but his size and ability to talk made the captain appoint him the ship’s parrot. Ironically, the dragon's job was to drop a bottled message in the water nearly every hour. Even after being freed from Twilight's Library, he still just sent messages. Poor guy.

Despite the change in clothes to help make me more festive, I found myself next to Twilight, as she was leaning over the edge beside me while I looked out the stern of the ship in case I really did start to vomit up my green resin. The alicorn running her hoof along my mane and back helped my peace of mind, if little else. “You know, I’ve read the center of the ship is the best place to be when you’re feeling sea sick. Do you want me to help you down to the galley?”

“It’s not like I have any lunch to lose Twi,” I told her with a halfhearted smile before looking behind me to give the damn captain a glare. “Besides, I like to stay where I can keep an eye on our so-called captain.”

“Oy! Navigator, get yer lily-livered plot over ‘er and chart me a course!” Jack Sparrow stand-in pony ordered.

“Coming!” Twilight politely said before her expression turned sour and she whispered in a voice only she and I could hear. “I thought it was the captain’s job to plot the courses.”

I leaned in to kiss the mare on the side of her ear. “Well, you do have the best plot on the ship.”

The comment got an eye roll from Twilight. “I think this salty air is affecting your brain,” she told me before leaning back in to kiss me on the lips. “But yeah, we are definitely having sex tonight. The motion of the waves should make things pretty interesting.”

As Twilight trotted away from me, I slunk down and leaned against the railing while stifling a groan. What really sucked beyond the lurching feeling in my stomach was that my legs felt so weak I couldn’t even stand without them shaking, and a killer headache would probably keep me from using any magic. All of that together spoke of more than just some simple seasickness, but I didn’t want to ruin the others good time, so I kept my mouth shut.

A few seconds after Twilight got out her maps and began correcting our course, Fluttershy made her way up to where the three of us were standing and peered over Twilight’s shoulder. “So, are we going along a current right now?” she asked barely loud enough for me to hear.

“Yes,” Twilight replied without looking up from her work.

Apparently getting the answer she wanted, Fluttershy looked over to the captain with her irresistibly hopeful eyes. “And how fast is this ship captain? Can it…outrun a school of fish?”

The pirate pony puffed out his chest a moment later. “Very fast girly. The Salty Sea Mare can outrun any fish in the ocean! Especially now that we be in the Castaway Current.”

“Amazing!” The pegasus exclaimed before mumbling something I couldn’t overhear. However, it did seem to catch Twilight’s attention, and the alicorn looked up from her work a moment later.

“Gill? You mean that fish you set free? What about hi-”

“LAND HO! Oh mare, this is so awesome!”

With Rainbow Dash’s announcement, whatever conversation Twilight was trying to have with Fluttershy was cut short as the captain let go of the wheel to address the girls on the main deck. “Okay, listen up you scurvy scalawags!” he shouted while knocking a hoof on the railing.

“Hey! There ain’t no scurvy on this ship!” Applejack exclaimed before she took off her chef’s hat to pull out an orange fruit out of it. “Made sure we were all stocked up with tangerines before leaving port…er, beach.”

The captain just waved her off. “Anyway…we’ll be hitting port before nightfall, so yer quest be two-fold! Find me former crew and get back me magical map they stole!”

Behind him, both me and Twilight frowned at the last two words. But with me feeling like Angel Bunny could take me down at the moment, she was the one who asked the question. “Magical map? What’s magical about it?”

“And that brings me to the third bit of yer assignment, mind yer own business, savy?” he said while shooting the two of us a glare.

Despite my…condition, I managed to glare back at him. “You know captain, a pirate leader isn’t a dictator. If anything, he’s first among equals,” I told the three-legged stereotype without much fear. If he tried anything, I could always hide behind Twilight and let her beat him up. I was perfectly fine letting my goddess of a girlfriend fight my battles for me, thank you.

“Ignore him, we need to get you to land anyway,” Twilight said as she sat down next to me and pulled me into an embrace that lasted until we were ready to dock. Just being in Twilight’s presence, being able to breathe in the mare’s scent while I rested my head on her shoulder and snuggled my muzzle against her neck helped me immensely. I closed my eyes and blocked out the part of the world that I couldn’t smell or feel with my hooves.

When our journey finally ended and we pulled into port, I shook from the effort of having to restrain my urge to kill the idiot who interrupted my time in paradise with his words. “Alright bilge rats! I need ye to be headed to the tavern to find me crew, and get back me map!”

This time, it was Rainbow Dash who pointed out the problem I had with the captain’s logic. “What? You’re not going with us?”

“Course not! I be staying on the ship where a captain belongs!”

A minute later, and we had sorted out who was going to look for the map, and who was staying on the ship. Fluttershy had volunteered to stay behind on her own accord, while Applejack had also done so to keep an eye on things and try to wrangle some answers out of our mysterious captain. Spike was also stuck on the ship as a hostage with the captain keeping him on his back like a real parrot despite Twilight‘s attempts to bring him with us. So Pinkie, Rarity, Rainbow, Twilight and myself headed onto the island.

Whatever had been keeping me down had apparently cleared up a little in the past hour enough for me to walk, but Twilight still insisted I put a wing around her for support. The PDA drew Rainbow’s attention a second she bothered to even look our way. She flew down and gave me a good-natured grin to show she was just teasing. “So, you’re turning our adventure into a date, huh?”

Out of all the girls, I hung out with Rainbow Dash the most since using clouds to keep away from crowds was an option with her. It also helped she was still giving Twilight some coaching on her flying, and had started to do the same with me. I would never attempt any stunts since the way my insect wings worked was too different than the pegasus versions, but it was fun to just relax with Rainbow and watch her work from time to time. I had even kept her from a few scrapes and bruises with my magic when she was practicing her insane version of flying. The shared interest in that and attempts with the two of us and Twilight to find just how much of the Daring Do books were factual had kind of made her my de facto best friend in Ponyland since I showed up. Twilight didn’t count what with being in a physical relationship with me and all.

I just chuckled at the comment and bit back a ‘jealous much’ reprisal. However, Twilight seemed to take the comment at face value and glared at the pegasus. “Fae is sick Rainbow! The wing is for helping me keep balance, not a hug,” the alicorn shot back.

Almost immediately, the humor in Dash’s body fled and she dropped out of the sky to walk next to us. Now that my head was clearing, I could feel her growing guilt for not noticing it sooner, and rising panic at seeing a friend in trouble. “She’s what?” the pegasus asked before looking back to me. “Why didn’t you say something before we got on the boat? Hay, the train even!”

“Nothing was wrong until I got on the boat,” I told her while trying not to sound annoyed. If I had been too sick to go, then I definitely would have said something. “Besides I’m fine now.”

To prove my point, I took my weight off Twilight and moved a few steps forward by myself. “See? I just needed some time back on dry land,” I said before taking in a deep breath of the fresh air. Almost immediately, my vision doubled and I was left shaking my head to try and clear it. Thankfully, I didn’t stumble or fall over. That would have gotten Twilight on my case faster than Rainbow could fly.

“Now come on, let’s go see what this place is like!” I said while trotting down the dock. After a few steps, an odd notion popped into my head and all I could think was…eh, fuck it, might as well if Dr Whooves isn’t going to turn up. “Allons-y!”

Rainbow Dash let out a sniff. “Yeah, yeah, you know Prancy, I figured it out after the third time you tried to show off.”

As we made our way into the mysterious legendary Galloping Ghost Island, I developed a theory after looking at the dock, the buildings, the road, and the numerous shops. “You know, for a mysteriously legendary island…this place sure looks like it’s seen population.”

“Well, it had to have been discovered by somepony for it to be known at all Fae. But what happened to them?” Twilight asked as she looked around the dilapidated dock, the old buildings, the empty road, and the looted shops. “Is it possible that nopony is even here anymore? We could be the first Equestrians to step hoof on this island since it was abandoned! Think what kind of discovery we could make!”

Before I could comment that our captain might have very well been here before since we were looking for his crew, Pinkie pushed past us and I noticed her ears were flopping around like crazy while she practically radiated excitement. “Hey girls! My Pinkie Sense is picking up a party!” she exclaimed before looking around. Oddly enough, as she did, her ears started to point forward, then came together like she was actually dowsing for something. “And it’s in that building over there!”

I groaned as Pinkie took off in a blur of motion that made me wish I hadn’t been looking. A second later, she was followed by Dash and the others, including me once I had made sure I wasn’t going to just keel over if I moved too fast.

After I caught up with the others at the door to one of the larger buildings in town, a place I could hear quite a racket coming from. What I saw made me nearly collapse from the sheer oddity of the scene. It also got my snarky comment distributor working again. “Hey you’re right Princess, we really did make a discovery…right after everypony and Applejack’s bucking grandmother discovered it too!”

Twilight didn’t seem to be paying me much attention. She was too busy gaping at the Cutie Mark Crusaders as they danced around singing ‘It’s a Pirate’s Life for Me’ while Big Mac and Granny Smith sold what appeared to be pies made from pineapples.

As for me, the scent of sweat, blood, and pineapple assaulted my senses as dozens of other pirate types sat around barrels drinking, playing cards, and chatting with waitresses. Mugs with foaming cider clanked together in toasts involving anywhere from three to ten patrons while a trio of stallions apparently compared tattoos that were somehow inked into their coats, inches away from a fight.

It was a glorious sight of which I had been in search of since coming to settle peacefully in Equestria. So overcome with joy, all of my earlier pains were forgotten as I leaped into the atmosphere and raised my forelegs in joy. “It’s a bar!”

“Yeah, yeah…a bunch of stallions with big muscles and minds with only half the usual brain cells thanks to copious amounts of alcohol,” Twilight grumbled as she trotted past me and cleared her throat. “Excuse me, but has anypony seen the crew of…um…Rarity, do you remember our captain’s name?" She paused and looked around for the unicorn. "Uh…Rarity?”

After recovering myself, I looked around along with Twilight to find that the white unicorn had cornered the three singing fillies near the pineapple pie stand where Granny and Big Mac and were giving them a stare that would make Fluttershy proud. “And just what in Equestria do the three of you think you’re doing here!”

“We’re trying to get our piracy cutie marks,” Sweetie Belle tried to explain before Granny Smith cut her off.

“Ah lay off ya prissy pants unicorn. They wus doin' just fine till ya stuck yer horn in!”

Despite the fact that I was half a room away, and it had a din of racket made from a thousand little noises all around, I could still hear Rarity’s teeth grinding at the older mare’s comment. “While I may not have grounds to tell you how to care for your own grandchildren, when I leave my sister in your care, I expect her not to be brought into a den of scum and villainy such as this!”

"Just how in the hay did they get here anyway?" I mumbled to myself before a travel brochure was shoved in my face, courtesy of Pinkie Pie. "Come see the rediscovered Galloping Ghost Islands, live the life of a pirate and hunt for bootee."

Pinkie giggled. "Yeah, they apparently rediscovered it three years ago...Twilight really needs to update her books about lost islands and junk if they've already been found."

As the fight between Rarity and Granny began to degrade, Twilight made her way over to me, grumbling. “I can't even understand what half these ponies are saying. I swear, it’s like everypony here is speaking a completely different language!” she said before taking in a deep breath.

“HEY! CAN I GET SOME HELP OVER HERE?”

Apparently, an alicorn shouting at the top of her lungs was enough to get the attention of the room. I watched every pirate in the bar slowly turn towards us. I gulped, and then quickly made two steps to the side in order to get away from Twilight. However, all male eyes in the room followed me, not her, and I got a very bad feeling in the pit of my stomach when a small crowd of pirates approached me from every direction.

From the look in their eyes, I got a sudden sinking suspicion that my female body’s virginity wasn’t going to last the day if they had anything to say. And of course they think I was the one shouting, I thought to myself as the crowd closed in. After all, I was the hot, dark chocolate alicorn princess with her wings covered up by a Hawaiian shirt that had been putting out enough pheromones to make any stallion that hadn’t been gelded so hard they’d beat themselves to death from underneath by running too fast. Thanks a lot Twilight.

“Hey now, I got plenty of help to give to a pretty little filly like you.”

“Come on back to my love boat, and I’ll show you a good time.”

“I don’t need no boat, that table over there will do just fine!”

While I was trying to pick out which one of these pirate ponies to kill first, a rainbow blur dropped onto the floor, and Dash put up her forelegs in a fighting stance while her wings kept her erect. “Anypony that touches her has to deal with me!”

“Two fer one says you?” I pirate pony with half his teeth missing said as he stepped forward. “Hay of a deal says I!”

At the mention of including Dash in their little gangbang, I reached over to the last idiot who talked and pulled him in so close out lips were almost touching. While resisting the urge to gag on his breath, I gave the lust-filled stallion a predatory smile as Dash, Pinkie and Twilight looked on in shock at my forwardness. “Okay, stud, but I’ll get something from you first.”

The emotion of lust was nothing like love. Lust was all about being selfish, about wanting to take another for their good looks and physical pleasure rather than give, or share in each other’s life as love was. So, it wasn’t nearly as filling…but it went down well enough, even if I had to nearly devour all of his essence to make a decent meal.

As the other ponies surrounding us watched the one pirate go from mid thirties to mid nineties in seconds, I gulped down the earth pony pirate’s essence, then tossed the breathing corpse aside a second after Dash reached forward with her mouth to grab the pirate’s cutlass. Then, once the pirate hit the ground, I cast a spell that swallowed by body in a nimbus of green, blazing light.

A second later, I was feeling a bit taller, with wings that could flap several times faster than a pegasus, and fangs in my mouth meant for tearing through meat. Safely covered in my exoskeleton that was more than enough to stop some stupid swords, I looked at the gasping ponies with a fanged grin. “Okay…who else wants some?”

“CHAAAAAAANGELING!”

Almost all around the tavern, the pony pirates who consisted mostly of earth ponies drew their swords and looked towards the two of us. Even the few stallions who hadn’t bothered to look my way, and a few of the mares that were in the bar took up arms to kill the invading pseudo-pony that was me.

“Ohmygosh! We’re actually getting to swashbuckle! Thank you Fae!” Rainbow Dash cried out before squealing in delight and diving into the crowd.

Then the fight was on.

With her ability to fly, Rainbow Dash was easily able to avoid attacks and get out of trouble when the pirates attempted to surround her. Despite the fact that she was holding the sword in her teeth, the pegasus was able to quickly disarm several of the ponies who went after her before giving a kick to their empty mouths that easily knocked them out.

I guess since some of the pirates had seen her come in with our group, Rarity was attacked by the ponies who had been waiting in line to buy Granny Smith’s pineapple pies. She managed to let out a scream and get two steps before the ponies behind her suffered broken bones from a crushing amount of telekinetic force courtesy of the real alicorn princess in our group.

“NOPONY HURTS MY FRIENDS!” the purple pony princess shouted before she turned her attention to a group of pirates that were trying to pin Pinkie down as she bounced around the room, then stopped in confusion when all the pirates around her were turned into tiny plastic figures I expected to be in the pink isle of Toy’s R Us instead of a bar.

The almost feral amount of rage I detected coming off Twilight made a shiver of fear run down my spine as I remembered something Rainbow Dash had said about a month ago. When Twilight had thought I died, she went completely ballistic. The little alicorn had turned a small army of ponies into shrubbery, changed an ancient temple to sand before melting it into glass, then shrunk the servant of a god to the size of a gerbil with the intention of feeding it to the same piranha she thought had eaten me. Seeing her standing there over a swarm of rats that had once been the group of ponies lucky enough to dodge her initial attack told me the princess still had some anger issues to work out.

Well, so much for having fun, I thought to myself before channeling a fair amount of mana through my horn and releasing a powerful concussion wave that knocked out the last ponies standing around me. Fighting when you didn’t have to worry about getting hurt actually made the whole experience enjoyable. But, from the looks of things Twilight needed someone to talk her down from an adrenaline high…

And Rainbow Dash got there before I did by flying in from above her. “Hey Twi-AAAAHH!” she screamed when the alicorn whirled around to blast the oncoming pegasus.

As the Rainbow disappeared in an explosion of white smoke that hung in the air, my entire body froze. For her part, the alicorn face slowly went from one of barely contained rage to dreadful shock, and then her eyes widened in absolute horror when the vest Rainbow had been wearing fell to the floor. Its owner was nowhere to be seen.

Twilight fell back on her haunches, and just stared at the cloud where Rainbow Dash had been. In the following seconds, her whole body started to tremble.

A blow to the back of my neck knocked me out of my shock, and I looked back to blast the idiot who just tried to cut my head off. With a quick look around telling me the rest of the pirates had either fled or found a place to cower from the demigod who could wipe them all out with a thought, I ran over to the alicorn and tried to shake her out of her stupor. “Twilight! Twilight, what did you just do?”

Glancing at the cloud as it began to dissipate, the more panicky side of my brain brought back images of the War of the Worlds movie when everyone was being blown to ash by the alien machines. My breath seized up, and a crushing weight on my chest kept me from taking in more oxygen.

“I…I don’t know!” Twilight exclaimed after finding her voice. She looked up at where our friend had been, and tears began to form in her eyes. “I…I just…I was so angry when those ponies tried to hurt Rarity and…and Pinkie, and…I just reacted and…Oh Celestia! What have I done?”

Twilight broke down into a crying fit, and I honestly didn’t know what to do. It tore at my heart to see her as she was, but an even louder voice in my head was shouting that she deserved all the guilt her heart could muster up and more. After all, she just killed Rainbow Dash! If it weren’t for the sheer amount of shock running through my body to stifle the building rage, I would have already blasted her through the wall.

The seconds ticked by, and I was dimly aware of Pinkie singing in the background a she finished off what was left of the pirates. Rarity stayed in a nearby corner, alternating between staring at the spot Rainbow had been, keeping an eye on the CMC, and looking for any more ponies who wanted to mess with her.

“Okay egghead, geeze, stop it with the water works already!”

I froze for an instant, then looked up where the familiar, if high pitched, voice was coming from…then blinked when Rainbow Dash landed on my muzzle. Okay…that’s…weird, I told myself my eyes just about crossed to keep the pegasus in view and look her over. Despite only being three inches tall and naked once again, Rainbow Dash didn’t look any worse for wear.

Twilight had just about the same reaction I did. She stared at the tiny pegasus for a few seconds in disbelief, then hope slowly returned to her eyes as her mouth slid upwards into a smile. “Rainbow! You’re okay!”

“Uh…I will be when you turn me back. Now hurry up! Flying when I’m like this is hard, and I don’t want Fae sneezing me off!”

I wisely kept my mouth shut so that Dash could keep her balance and Twilight could aim. As the alicorn’s horn lit up, I got a very bad feeling and realized there might be a problem with this whole situation. Wait a second, if Dash is standing on my nose, and Twilight turns her back to normal, then won’t she-was all I managed to think before there was a flash of light and a weight too much for my neck to bear made us both come crashing down to the ground.

With Rainbow’s ass crushing down on my face, I wanted to make some embarrassing quips, but…I was just too damn stunned by happiness over the fact she was alive to think of any. Then, from the sound of Twilight practically screaming her name, and the extra weight that was added to Rainbow’s I guessed Twilight had grabbed the pegasus in a hug.

“Dashie’s okay!” Pinkie chirped before hooves impacted my back as another pony joined the group hug, and I let out a groan as the voices of three fillies shouted in joy before the trampling continued.

“Hey…anypony seen Fae-Fae?”

“…I hate you all so much right now,” from beneath the group hug pile.

After the girls had gotten off me and Twilight dried her tears with a handkerchief Rarity had stowed away…somewhere, the princess stepped forward and looked around the room with a glare that had all the pirates flinching when it fell on them. “We’re looking for a magical map with a wandering X, the first group that comes forward with information or the map itself gets their friends turned back to normal, and I’ll forgive you for assaulting a Princess of Equestria! The rest of you can sit around until the guards to show up, or run and wait for those transmogrification spells to wear off in a few dozen years!”

Wow, when did Twilight get a nasty side to her? I asked myself as she glared at the various ponies, toys, rats, and pirates in need of a doctor. Then, I noticed something odd out of the corner of my eye, and turned to look at a rather odd scene.

“One life holds thirty six worldly desires. Two lives hold seventy-two. Three lives hold one-hundred and eight worldly desires. Three swords style: One-Hundred-Eight Caliber PHOENIX!”

“Stupid green-coat! Take this! Fried Assortment!.”

I rolled my eyes at the pirates turned toys being used to reenact a scene from the pink pony’s imagination. “Pinkie! Stop playing with the dolls!”

In response, Pinkie looked back at me with a scowl and held a pair of plastic ponies that bore a striking resemblance to Roronoa Zoro and Sanji from an anime I used to watch. “Hey! These are Straw Hat Pirate Pony action figures!”

The fact that she actually called them that made a shiver of fear run down my spine, and I turned away from the scene before I could start questioning just how the hell something so…impossible could exist in Equestria. Indiana Jones pony, I could buy… One Piece was stretching it. It’s just Pinkie being Pinkie, I told myself over and over again.

“Hey guys, we found some pirates who’re gonna lead us to where the map is!” Rainbow Dash called out. “Come on!”

As it turned out, the pirate ponies that had agreed to lead us to this map were indeed our current captain’s old crew and a bunch of ponies Rainbow Dash had beat up during the big brawl. So, none of the other pirates got to take Twilight up on her offer to remove the spells placed on them, or given clemency. The minute we left the bar, dragging the Apples and rest of the CMC with us, she put a force bubble around the building and gave Pinkie a letter written on a napkin for Princess Celestia to read that explained why we needed a group of guards sent to the island as well as its location before sending her back to the boat. Rarity also left our little group, deciding that she needed to make sure Granny Smith and Big Mac actually got on the small boat they had taken to the island instead of finding someplace else to sell their pies since Sweetie Belle had been dragged along for the trip.

Unfortunately, it wasn't all good news. While my sea sickness that had managed to follow me onto land had put itself on hold inside the bar. Once everything had calmed down, I was to feeling like crap again.

The three ponies that Dash had managed to drag out with us were a trio of earth ponies, one guy and two mares. All of them had a few scars in their coats and looked like they had seen better days. Only the biggest stallion, who had a light sea green coat and a mane of the same color in a darker shade spoke. “The map ye be searchin fer is down in a clearing at the end’o that path leadin' outta town,” he explained while pointing a hoof to indicate just which path he meant.

“But, I’ll give ya a bit of friendly advice,” Sea Green added when we looked away from the path. “If ye be featchin' that map fer who I think, ye be better off leavin' it where it lay. The pirate who yearns for that map be mad!”

Rainbow Dash let out a snort. “Oh yeah, just what makes you think you know who we’re working fer?” she asked in a fake accent.

“Please,” the pirate scoffed before he raised a hoof to indicate us each in turn. “A fake pirate, a purple princess, and a changeling! It’s the only crew that Hoofbeard could get!”

Well, at least its not Jack Sparrow, I told myself with a frown while Rainbow’s reaction was a little more…fangasm. “Hoofbeard? THE HOOFBEARD? I mean, I knew he looked familiar but… He’s like the coolest pirate ever!”

“And the mangiest, craziest, and evilest!” the pirate pony countered.

The last descriptive drew Twilight’s attention away from wherever her mind was wandering. “What do you mean evilest?” she demanded with a curious frown.

Apparently, a curious frown from the being he had just seen take out an entire bar of pirates was enough to cow the Sea Green’s growing attitude, and he shrunk back. “Beg yer pardon Princess. But…me and me mates here were once a part of his crew, seeking treasure using the map ye seek. However, that map never led us nowhere! It’s called the Map of the Wandering X because the X moves! Every morning it was in a different spot, always out of reach, and casing it drove the captain mad! We snuck off the ship one night while stopped for supplies because he would have keel-hauled us if we tried to leave. We even up and took the map with us so he couldn’t rope any other fools into his crazy before setting his ship adrift.”

As Dash started to taunt the pirate for being a coward, I looked over to Twilight with more than a bit of apprehension on my face for this whole ordeal. “You know, the more I hear about this, the less I like it,” she mumbled.

“Do you want to call it quits?” I asked her before turning my attention to Dash to make sure she hadn’t heard me. After a month of hanging out with her, I had learned the pegasus had freakishly good hearing.

Already, I was working on a plan in my head to get us back to the mainland. If Granny and the others were still around, then it would be simple for us to get back to Equestria on whatever ship they took to get here. The problem was the hostages that our Captain had with him, and there was no doubt in my mind that was exactly what Spike and Fluttershy would become the moment we decided to take the ship.

“No.” I blinked at the words, then looked over to Twilight, and followed her gaze back to Rainbow. “At least…not yet,” she added. “Let me at least take a look at the map first.”

Because I was back in my natural form, I had to turn on my emotional senses to get a read on Twilight. She was a mix of apprehension, fear…and a whole lot of guilt. A part of me wanted to change back into my pony form and wrap her up in a hug, but…the part of me that still had the most say put that on hold.

If Twilight had fired off another spell and turned Rainbow Dash into a glass figurine, or some kind of fruit like a tomato that would have splattered on the ground… I wanted her to feel the guilt for what had happened without someone there to shield her from it.

An hour of walking into the forest, and I was in a sour mood. My headache was back, and I was starting to feel a little woozy again. On top of which, it turned out a tropical island in the Summer trumped anywhere in Equestria for the muggy heat that was bearing down on us. Twilight didn’t look much better, having shed her clothes ten minutes after we went into the trees.

If it wasn’t for the breeze Rainbow was making for us as she floated in the back of our little group, I was pretty sure I would have voted to abandon this little adventure and head home.

“Why is it when I go on an adventure with you two, we end up in someplace that’s impossibly hot and having to fight cliché bad guys?” I grumbled. “First Aztecs and now pirates…if ninjas appear the next time something weird happens, I’m just going to go back to bed.”

Twilight head dropped a little, and the somewhat cool breeze suddenly stopped as Rainbow zoomed up to match pace with me. “Dude, seriously? You’ve got to remind her about that stupid temple now?” she demanded with clenched teeth.

I flinched at the pegasus’s tone. “Okay…sorry,” I mumbled before trying to think of something else to talk about. “So…you feeling okay? I mean, must have been kind of weird when Twilight cast that spell and…you…what?”

Rainbow Dash had gone back to glaring at me so hard that I stopped moving. “You really need to shut up now.”

The anger practically radiating off her made me flinch, and then Twilight spoke. “No…I lost control again. I… Rainbow! Are you okay?”

Deciding to cheat a bit, I turned my extrasensory senses over to the mare and frowned. Rainbow was a mix of anger, fear, and a tiny sprinkling of guilt. I could guess where most of the anger was directed towards me, but the fear and guilt kind of threw me for a loop. Just because I knew what she was feeling didn’t mean I knew the cause of it all.

“Just fi-”

Twilight cut her off. “I know you’re afraid of me Rainbow.” That got my attention, as well as made the pegasus drop from the sky. “And you have a right to be. I…I lost control again and I almost…oh Celestia! I’m so sorry!”

“Twilight,” Rainbow managed to get out before the alicorn went on.

“What if I had turned you into something breakable? What if I hadn’t used transmogrification and just gone with a normal attack spell? WHAT IF I HAD KILLED YOU?” she screeched before breaking down into sobs.

Oh crap, I thought while my conscience kicked me in the gut. How long ago had I been wishing for her to keep feeling guilty? Why? Because I had thought Twilight Sparkle hadn’t realized what she had almost done? Because ponies didn’t carry their guilt around like I used to? Because it just made me feel like the morally superior one for once?

Apparently, Rainbow Dash had realized that I sure as hell wasn’t going to be doing anything to comfort my girlfriend like I was supposed to, and trotted up to the mare before putting a hoof on her shoulder. “H-Hey Twilight come on, I’m not scared of anypony, least of all some egghead who can barely fly.” she said before looking up at me with an expression that demanded I do something to fix her.

Yeah, Dash is really out of her element here, I told myself before taking a deep breath…and instantly regretting it when the world spun around for a moment. Oh good, fucking God…I was fine in that stupid bar! What the hell?

Doing my best to push the problems my body was having to the side, I tried to think of something to say. “That was just an accident Twilight,” I told her. “And Rainbow’s fine, see?”

“Yeah…and it was kind of cool, seeing everything blown up like that,” she added with a fake chuckle. Without my empathy, that would have sounded pretty weak. But since it was on, the spike in fear as she mentioned being shrunk down to the size of a dragonfly screamed lie. The whole experience had no doubt scared the hell out of her, and I even found myself wondering if she had been trapped in that cloud the spell had made before she landed on my nose.

Twilight hung her head. “Don’t lie to me Rainbow…you’re terrible at it.

“And this isn’t the first time something like this has happened,” she mumbled before looking away from the two of us. “Don’t tell me you’ve forgotten what happened in Sun Valley Rainbow, and then there was Everfree Castle just last week.”

The mention of my home got an eyebrow raise from me. “What happened at my castle?” None of the changelings had mentioned anything in the past couple of days, and I hadn’t seen any big holes in the wall.

While Twilight just pulled in on herself, Rainbow Dash cleared her throat and did her best to look in my direction without meeting my eyes. “Uh…yeah about that…you need better door…changeling guys.”

“What?” I asked, tilting my head in confusion.

A second later, Rainbow Dash looked up at me with a frown. “Well that’s not Twilight’s fault those stupid goons wouldn’t let us in and she had to make them!” the pegasus explained. “Then they wouldn’t tell us where you were, just kept saying you disappeared and…she um…kind of thought the changelings were hiding something…so…she asked them-”

“I threatened them all with petrifaction!” Twilight corrected her rather harshly.

“Twilight that’s nothing,” I assured her while dismissing the comment with a wave of my hoof. “I threaten to wipe out the changelings at least three times a day. You need to do it to get them moving in the right direction.”

Both the ponies gave me a look of surprise, and I had to stop myself from rolling my eyes before I closed the distance between myself and Twilight to look her in the eye. “Okay look, you had an accident,” I said. “Happens all the time with us. No pony is perfect.”

“But-”

“And Rainbow knows what happens when you get a little freaked out. Hay, she’s even a little scared of it, that’s a good thing,” I told her.

The pegasus didn’t seem to agree, judging by her scowl and harsh words that followed. “Hey! I’m not afraid of Twilight!”

“I’m not saying you’re afraid of her! I’m saying you know what happens when she starts to lose it,” I corrected Rainbow, my tone becoming a little harsher. “The rest of us stood around and did nothing, but you actually saw what was going on and tried to calm her down!”

“AND BECAUSE OF THAT SHE ALMOST GOT HURT!” Twilight shouted in my face before looking back down at the ground. “I hate this! When I became an alicorn, I thought I would finally have the power I needed to protect my friends, but all I’ve seem to be able to do is hurt them! Sometimes, I wish I never became a princess. You’d all be better off.”

While I tried to think of a logical argument against the pony who had turned Fluttershy into a vampire during the last time we were all together that she didn’t cause her friends undue suffering, Rainbow Dash just went with her strengths when it came to dealing with this kind of stuff: anger, and yelling. “Don’t you ever say something like that again!” she yelled in Twilight’s face before she began to hover off the ground and get some height advantage.

“Do you have any idea how awesome it’s been since you’ve gotten wings?” she demanded before pointing her hoof at me for a moment. “Since your stupid royal guard brought the bug queen here? Since I moved to Ponyville, I have been trying to find somepony to fly with me, but I couldn’t ask the other pegasi because I’m the bucking head weathermare! Now I finally have two friends that I can share the most important thing in my life with, AND YOU’RE SAYING IT’S SOME KIND OF MISTAKE!”

Twilight backed away as Rainbow yelled into her face until she tripped over a vine and fell on her plot, getting a cry of surprise from the princess as her wings spread out wide, while Rainbow dropped to the ground with a hurt expression. “Don’t you ever say something like that again.”

The three of us sat in silence for a minute giving me time to organize my thoughts before I could finally come up with something to say. It was probably the lamest thing I could tell her too. My experiences never really prepared me for talking to purple ponies newly ascended to godhood. “Twilight…I really don’t have anything to tell you this time to help pick you up or make things better,” I said. “You made a mistake, we all do. Hell, mine almost ended all of Equestria when I didn’t have the courage to tell you all the truth! You at least had the brains to use something non-lethal when you accidentally blasted Dash, and if you’re still torn up about it, then…I don’t know…aim before readying the spell or something.”

Frankly, Twilight’s casting speed was just plain nuts. It took me a good three seconds to ready and aim a normal spell, and in that time she could teleport, fire off a blast of magic, and then protect herself with a force field. I might have been able to match her for muscle thanks to all the love I’d been sucking off of her every night, but she’d kick my ass to the curb in a real fight if all things were equal.

“Yeah Twilight!” Rainbow Dash quickly agreed. “You can’t become a great flier without a few crashes. So…um…cheer up!”

I groaned as Dash apparently ran out of ideas a second before running out of words, and then reached for Twilight’s hoof to help her up. “So come on and let’s finish this adventure, okay?”

As Twilight reached out to take my hoof, Rainbow let out a hesitant moan before speaking up. “Actually…if you guys want to go home…you know what? Forget the adventure and lets just go home.”

If I hadn’t been pulling Twilight back upright, I would have collapsed from shock. It took my brain a few seconds to even process just what the hell was going on. Rainbow Dash was…turning away from an adventure? I actually found myself making sure the Rainbow in front of us wasn’t the changeling I got to fill in on her weather duties.

When her identity was still confirmed to be Rainbow, all I could do was ask for clarification. “Come again?”

“Look,” she began hesitantly. “I’m not stupid. The only reason any of you are here is because I dragged you along. Twilight’s whole Galloping Ghost Island discovery turned out to be a bust. Rarity’s freaking out over her sister’s safety. This Hoofbeard guy was apparently such a jerk his whole crew up and left him, and you get sea sick!

“Let’s just go back to the ship, tell him where to find his stupid map, and head home on whatever ship Princess Celestia sends to transport those pirates back to Equestria.”

Beside me, Twilight managed to pick her jaw up from the ground long enough to speak, albeit in a dumbfound fashion. “Who are you, and what have you done with the real Rainbow Dash?”

The comment earned a glare from the blue pegasus. “I’m not blind Twilight!” she exclaimed before looking away. “I saw nopony but me really wanted to be there, I just thought it would be fun to have one last adventure with you girls before the Fall weather season started and I’m busy six days out of seven making rain and kicking clouds. Not to mention how everypony else is going to be busy with AJ’s last harvest, Fluttershy showing the newest birds where they’re supposed to fly, Rarity switching out her whole store’s wardrobe, and we all remember how many harvest parties Pinkie had to plan last year on top of her usual birthdays and other junk.”

How in the… After that little speech, I couldn’t even form a coherent thought. Although I loved her like nobody’s business, I would have voted Rainbow Dash for most oblivious pony. The fact she wasn’t so focused on her own self to notice all the other ponies doubts about what was going on just had me floored.

With me still being a little out of it thanks to Rainbow’s…summarization of her friends future activities, Twilight took up the slack. Apparently, seeing a friend in distress gave her something to focus on, and overcome those anxieties she was feeling; or at least push them to the side for the moment. “Well if Rainbow Dash wants one last adventure for the summer, then that’s what Rainbow Dash is going to get!”

Me and Rainbow shared a look of slight bewilderment, then followed the alicorn down the path and into the clearing where the map was supposedly hidden. The questions of just where the hell we should start looking died when I noticed the giant pit in the middle of the sandy open area.

As we approached it, the ground began to shake, and all three of us took to the air and hovered. A few seconds later, something began to emerge from the pit. The first thing I saw were its claws. Two giant blue pincers big enough to cut cars in half rose from out of the ground as a giant blue crab twice the size of a dump truck with a faint glow emerged from the hole. Thanks to the few times I had spent around Fluttershy’s cottage trying to get to know her a little better and look for a pet without making her super-freaky excited, I could tell when an Equestrian animal was giving me the death glare.

“Oh...well of course there’s a giant monster guarding the treasure map,” I deadpanned. To be honest, I would have been kind of surprised if there hadn’t of been.