Spike sat bolt upright and belched out a gout of green fire. Then he flopped back into his hammock, groaning, "Not another one!"

The flame resolved itself into a scroll with a pop.

"Sorry, Spike," I said, smoothing back his head spines with a gentle touch of my magic. "Try to get back to sleep."

"It's okay, Twilight," he said, rubbing his eyes. "You'll probably want to send a reply pretty soon. I'll stay up."

I leaned over and gave him a nuzzle of thanks as I levitated the scroll from the floor. I quickly broke the seal and scanned the message before turning back to my bleary-eyed assistant. "It's okay. I already answered these questions. You can go back to sleep. There shouldn't be another message for…" I did a quick calculation. "...for at least three hours or so."

Messages sent by dragon fire aren't instantaneous. The enchanted smoke created by immolation has to actually travel the distance between sender and recipient, at about the speed of a hawk in full flight. From the coast of Zebrica to Canterlot, that meant an average delay of a couple of days, making a quick exchange of news very problematic. As they often crossed each other, it was sometimes difficult to immediately discern which letter was an answer to which.

My first message to Princess Celestia about Chrysalis's secret hive got an answer almost exactly four days later, which meant I had just enough time to catch a distant glimpse of the Great Library of Naghdad before a panting crewpony intercepted me with the return message as I was passing the Emir's palace.

Dear Twilight,
This news comes as quite a shock, as you might imagine. How sure are you that the changeling spy told you the truth? It is not like you to leave out details, so I assume that you have told me everything you know about the matter so far. Is there any way you can convince the changeling to give you more information?
I hate to ask it of you, but could you return to Canterlot as soon as possible? I am taking preliminary steps to address this matter, but I would like the opportunity to question the spy in more detail before I commit to certain courses of action.
Your help and support in this matter would be invaluable to me.
Yours,
Celestia

I had picked up several "colorful" words and expressions in the Zebrican trade pidgin and, when I had finished reading the letter, I employed one of the less savory ones.

"Begging your pardon, capt'n?" the crewpony asked.

"Never mind." I let the scroll roll shut and stuffed it in my vest, then dragged him into a nearby alley for privacy. "When you get back to Nebula, tell Mr. Fairlead to round up the crew and prepare to set sail. I want to cast off by sunset, understand?"

"Yes, ma'am, but…" He cast a doubtful glance at the late afternoon sky. "I'm not sure I can even make it back to the ship before then."

"Don't worry." I said, crafting a teleport matrix, "you will."

I knew approximately where Pinkie Pie and Rainbow Dash were, so I went to fetch them myself. I found Pinkie outside a café, literally trying to talk Dash down. There was an overturned table, several tiny broken white cups, and a dozen interested spectators surrounding the two. Dash's wings were beating so rapidly that they were barely visible and her eyes were horribly bloodshot.

"What the hay is going on here?" I shouted.

"Huh?" Dash spun in midair. "Twi! This guy called me a 'colorful cutie!'" She stabbed a hoof in the general direction of the crowd.

"Dashie," Pinkie called up to her, "you are cute and colorful!"

Rainbow Dash sputtered for a moment and then said, "Yeah, but it's the way he said it! And what was that comment about me not wearing a saddle? The guy's a creep!"

Pinkie sighed and then turned to me. "I told her the coffee in this place was strong, but she wouldn't listen."

"How many cups did she have?"

"Seven."

I used the word again.

"Hey!" Dash called down from where she was jittering through the air. "Are you guys talking smack about me?"

"I don't have time for this nonsense!" I wasn't going to teleport us all back to Nebula with so many witnesses looking on. Unicorns who can master the spell are few and far between, and exactly none of them would stoop to working as a lowly merchant aeronaut.

I grabbed Dash out of the air and hauled her down until she was muzzle-to-muzzle with me. "Ms. Rain Storm!" I bellowed out in my best Displeased Captain impersonation. "You were due onboard at four bells! You are coming back to the ship with me now, and you'll be lucky if I don't stop your pay!"

"What? What the hay, Twilight?! You're…" She made a muffled grunt as I squeezed her mouth shut.

I flung a hoofful of coins onto the table to pay for the damages and turned to go, Dash floating in my wake. There was a good deal of laughter from behind us, and Dash struggled futilely to escape my levitation field. When we got onto the broad avenue that led to the port, I let go of her mouth and let her vent her frustration on me.

During one of her few pauses for breath, I broke in. "Yes, you're right, that stallion was probably working up to propositioning you, or worse, offering to pay you. And yes, he probably thought of you as a 'loose' mare because you weren't wearing a saddle and bridle.[1] You had every right to get angry."
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[1] Saddle Arabians customarily use various sorts of tack to indicate marital status, class, and even profession. A horse wearing nothing at all is usually very poor, working a job that is considered "distasteful", or deliberately being provocative.
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"Huh? I did? I mean, yeah, I did!"

"But," I continued, "you didn't have a right to break up the café's furniture and dishes or take a swing at the creep. A mature mare would have put it down to cultural differences and laughed the whole thing off." I paused and floated her around until we were nose-to-nose. "A coffee overdose is no excuse. You seriously need to learn some self-control!"

She took a deep breath, but I was fairly angry myself by then, and in no mood to get into a prolonged argument in a crowded street. I clamped her mouth shut again and kept it that way until we got back to Nebula.

Three days later, over the ocean and out of sight of land, Rainbow Dash still wasn't speaking to me. The first day, she was suffering from horrible caffeine withdrawal and didn't say much to anypony. The second day, she concentrated on her resentment and understandably vented to anypony who would listen. The third day, she went about her business, seemingly her old self, but managed to be on the other side of the deck from wherever I happened to be, and took her lunch off to eat privately when I joined the rest of the girls for the meal. I'd never seen her hold on to a grudge that long before.

"I suppose I should go apologize to her," I said, poking at my food.

"Best wait a mite longer," Applejack advised. "She's still got her tail in a knot. Give her some time to cool off."

"I guess so. I just… I was in a hurry… I didn't mean to…"

"Yup," Applejack nodded. "Tell her all o' that when she's in a mood to listen. She'll be…"

"Captain Blackmane?" Acorn called from the quarterdeck, a bit hesitant to interrupt me at my meal.

"Yes, Mr. Acorn?" I shoved my plate away and stood up. I wasn't hungry, anyway.

"Lookout reports a vessel ahead. Says she looks a bit battered."

Overtaking other airships wasn't unusual for us. We were under powered flight and, despite her antiquated appearance, Nebula could really move with her engines at Full Ahead. We'd passed four other craft along the northern trade route since we'd departed Naghdad.

"Battered?" I asked. "There haven't been any storm systems moving through that I know of."

Acorn looked uncomfortable. "There have been some stories of pirates in these skies, ma'am. More of them lately, it's said."

"You think the ship might have been attacked?"

A whistle from the speaking tube to the topside cupola interrupted us and I flipped the cover up. "This is the captain. Go ahead."

"Vessel ahead, Captain. Two points off the larboard bow. She's drifting, and looks a right mess. May be ponies on deck, but I can't be sure yet. You should be able to see her in a minute or so."

"Very good. Keep an eye on her." I flipped the cover of the tube shut. "Mr. Acorn, come two points to larboard. We'll intercept and offer assistance if needed."

Belladonna was a 'right mess.' She was an old-style ship with her hull hung beneath her gasbags, and we could clearly see the broken crates and tangles of line that covered her open deck shortly after we were near enough to read her name on her transom.

Rainbow Dash flew over to take a look and zoomed back after one pass over her deck. "There's some ponies on board. They all look hurt, and some of them..." She swallowed nervously. "Some of them might be dead, Twilight!"

"Thank you, Dash," I said, and leaned over the rail to the main deck. "Fluttershy! Get a couple of medical kits and go with Rainbow Dash. Do whatever you can to help them. We'll get there and get the doctor on board as soon as possible!"

The crew rapidly got out the boarding ramp and grappling lines, and we adjusted our altitude to match the crippled ship as we made a careful final approach. What few of Belladonna's crew were on their hooves helped secure the lines and ramp when we came alongside.

A big unicorn stallion with a loose, torn shirt came across the ramp as soon as it was in place. "Thank you so much, Captain!" he called out to me as he stepped onto Nebula's deck. "We're very glad of your assistance, as you might imagine!"

If I had been a more experienced captain, I might have caught on right then. Another two ponies from Belladonna followed, both also offering effusive thanks. Then several more appeared and made for the ramp. But what they did not do was ask permission to come aboard.

It might seem like a small thing, a courtesy forgotten in the midst of a dire situation, but it was a custom so deeply ingrained in sailors and aeronauts that they would be likelier to forget to breathe than to forget to ask leave before stepping onto a ship's deck.

"Somethin's not right about them," Applejack whispered in my ear as two more of the foreign crew came aboard.

I craned my neck, trying to get a glimpse of Rainbow Dash or Fluttershy on Belladonna's deck, but they were nowhere to be seen. "Just stop there, if you please," I said to the big stallion.

He didn't stop approaching, and he didn't stop grinning.

I didn't want to possibly further injure an already hurt pony by grabbing him with my magic, so I hesitated, and that's when they attacked.

The pegasus stallion that had crossed over just after the big unicorn flipped something out from beneath his wing and flung it at my head. It whirled through the air and hit me, wrapping around my horn. Something dense and heavy whacked me on the side of the head.

I brought up my magic and… it was like trying to take another step down past the end of a staircase in a dimly lit basement. A pulse of pain went through my head, and my magic backed up on me with a jolt.

I saw what the thing was when the pegasus threw another one of them at Rarity. It was a length of barbed silver chain between two metal weights, thrown with a spinning motion so that it would wrap around whatever it hit. The barbs made it nearly impossible to scrape off and the silver was no doubt enchanted and acted as a magic suppressor ring when in place.

Rarity dodged the one thrown at her and jumped the pegasus, putting him into a very painful-looking wing lock within seconds. Then she snatched up a belaying pin in her magic and went to work on another of the stallions. Both crews were at each other almost immediately, cutlasses, boarding axes, and knives suddenly appearing from beneath the supposedly wounded crew's clothing.

The silver chain wasn't as sturdy as a real suppressor, and after a pulse to test its strength, I knew I could burn through it in a couple of seconds if I concentrated my magic correctly.

I didn't get those seconds. I had built up a focused blast of energy and was just about to release it when I heard Fluttershy scream.

"Drop your weapons or I'll cut her throat!" yelled a voice from Belladonna's deck. The fighting ponies drew apart and I could see a stallion at the rail, holding a heavy blade just below Fluttershy's chin.

The crew looked to me and I gasped out, "Do it! Surrender!"

Weapons clattered to the deck and the pirates all began to smile. One of the pirates dragged a bound and gagged Rainbow Dash onto our deck and dropped her in a heap. The big unicorn in front of me lifted my muzzle with the tip of his cutlass and sneered. "Now order your ponies to bring out all your gold and gems, and you can watch as I share them out to my crew."

"I've got my treasure already!" called out the stallion who held Fluttershy. He ran a hoof down over her belly. "Ain't that right, pretty filly?"

She whimpered.

"Don't you dare…" yelled Lee Helm, taking several angry steps toward the boarding ramp.

The pegasus pirate next to him slid his sword into Helm's chest as quickly and casually as if he were putting it back into its sheath. The old stallion froze and gasped, but never took his eyes off of Fluttershy's. The pirate pulled out his blade with an easy twist, and Lee Helm dropped, his blood flooding out onto the deck.

The big unicorn made a tsk tsk sound. "That's how fools end up, my ponies. Don't any of the rest of you be foolish, now."

There was a moment when I felt as if I were floating, when I knew that I'd cast my spell of destruction even if the pony in front of me ended my life at the same instant.

That's when Ket saved us.

"Run!" screamed the duplicate of the pirate captain. "Back to the ship! Flee! They're cursed! Run, you fools!"

Some of the pirates jumped at the sound of their captain's voice, some ran, some just backed a pace or two, looking back and forth between both captains in confusion. It was enough.

I jerked my head down, cutting a line of red along the underside of my jaw on the tip of the captain's sword. When my horn was in line with his face, I pushed my spell with all of my strength.

Breaking through the enchanted chain took me enough time for his eyes to widen in surprise, and for him to raise his cutlass for a decapitating stroke. Then, the searing bolt of magic spattered molten silver across the quarterdeck and blasted him up and over the larboard rail.

The rest of the pirates all recovered their wits and went for killing strokes, but I caught them all in my magic before anypony else could be hurt.

"Doctor!" I screamed. "Get the emergency case! Now!"

It seemed like it took forever. I eased my grip on the weapons, and my crew went about disarming the pirates.

Dr. Woundwort returned with the red and yellow striped box and knelt beside Lee Helm, gently pushing a weeping Fluttershy aside. "Look away, everypony!" he said sharply. Then, he held the box in front of the old stallion's face and opened the lid. There was a long moment where nopony made a sound. The only thing to be heard was the angry cockatrice hissing and struggling against the restraining wire mesh inside the box.

Then there was the thump of the lid closing, and the sound of Dr. Woundwort clearing his throat. "I'm sorry, captain. He's gone."

Fluttershy's wail nearly broke my heart.

I forced myself to look down. There should have been a statue of a kindly old stallion, awaiting revival by the best mages of Canterlot, but we had been too late. He had known so much about sailing an airship, and trading in foreign ports, and gentle encouragement, and… how could such treasures simply vanish from the world?

"Captain?"

My crew were waiting for me.

"You," I hissed, lifting the trapped pirates in my magic. "None of you asked my leave to board my ship! GET OFF OF HER!"

With all of my strength, I threw them at Belladonna. The ship's timbers shattered, her shrouds snapped and fell, and her envelope ripped and tore. There was a groan as her hull and keel twisted, spilling gear, cargo, and bodies, and she dropped out of sight.

But there was one pirate I had held onto.

I turned to the pegasus who had so casually killed Lee Helm. "You have a lot to think about," I said, as I wrenched the red and yellow case out of the doctor's grip. "And you will have a lot of time to think about it... down in the cold and the dark."

I shoved the box into his face and opened the lid. I had to peel his eyelids back and turn his eyes in their sockets to get him to meet the cockatrice's gaze, but his green coat finally turned gray and hard.

I dropped the statue overboard and gave the emergency case back to the doctor. "See to the wounded, please," I told him.

I was the captain. There were things to be done, and it was my responsibility to see that they were. Grief would come later. Numbness was my friend.

"Mr. Acorn, resume course for Canterlot. Make all possible speed.

"Khaatarrekket, please drop your disguise. It's alright, nopony will harm you.

"Everypony, this is Ket's true form. She is a changeling of the Great Desert Hive, and we all owe her an enormous debt. She is to be treated as an honored guest, and anypony who offers her the least discourtesy will incur my deepest displeasure.

"Mr Fairlead, see that Mr. Helm is taken below and treated properly. If anypony knows what his wishes were in such an event, you will make them known to me and I will make arrangements.

"Mr. Hitch, see to it that the deck is cleaned, and those weapons properly stowed.

"I am going to retire to my cabin and explain... " My voice nearly cracked and I had to pause for a moment. "I will explain the situation to Spike, and then I will return to the quarterdeck to stand watch."

"Pinkie, I think that Spike may need somepony to be with. Could you please…? Yes. Thank you."

"Twilight, you can't just…" Rarity began.

Applejack stopped her with a hoof laid on her shoulder. "Leave her be, Rares. Trust me on this."

I gave AJ a nod of thanks and got to work.

Pretending to be the captain.

Pretending to be okay.

Author's Notes:

N.B.: Because of new rules on FimFic, I can't thank every person who faves any of my stories without risking a ban for spamming. But believe me, I notice every fave and up-vote, and am very grateful to everyone who gives me such positive feedback!

Thanks to PresentPerfect, statoose, and Princess Woona for editing and pre-reading this chapter!