I listlessly stared off the side of the ship and watched the grass land fly past on our voyage back into the wastes. My life sucked, that was for sure.

I shook my head and counted what few blessings I had. Maybe...

What if I was going about this the wrong way? What if I was SUPPOSED to act without any real regard for my safety in the interest of having fun?

Fun.

That was what I was missing.

This land ran on friendship and companionship and I had gone the most of it without a single bit of laughter. It was the missing variable in the equation and it was one I could easily account for. I wasn't having fun. I wasn't happy here.

A few small trees went by down below us and I smiled. The smile then slipped from my face when I saw a sad troop of ponies being led towards the wastes by a group of dogs.

And then it hit me.

"Catastrophe. Stop the ship." I said loudly, though not shouting. "Lower the ship to ground level." The griffon obliged me without a word, probably thinking of something besides her job. Couldn't really fault her, it seemed like a boring job after a while. "Boss!" The dog shook from a conversation with Canary and looked at me. "You still up for killing a few slavers?"

I felt a smile blossom on my face. Doing good deeds was supposed to make you feel good, right?

"Of course." She chuckled. "Thought I was going to go insane from idle." She drew her sword.

"Not quite yet." I scolded good naturedly, a plan forming. I walked over to a large chest on the deck of the ship and slammed it open, pulling out a slaver flag. I unfurled it and walked to the edge.

We were only fifty or so feet above the ground and the slavers had stopped to look at us. A lead dog, looking to have the better armor out of all of them, pointed up at us and spoke something, though we were too far away to understand.

I waved the slaver flag in the air and kicked off the ladder. "Descend further so that they may board." I yelled to my pilot.

She looked at me curiously but did it without a word.

I nodded at Boss. "Get ready." She smirked.

"Greetings." I yelled out to the dogs. "We have much to discuss."

One of the dogs nudged another and one started for the ladder. I nodded at him and waited til he was on board before getting a close look at him. He had a net on his back along with a few vials of odd potions. I tried not to let my evil smile grace my face. I was feeling better already!

"What do zebra want?" He asked me, his breath rancid. I was suddenly reminded of exactly why I hated dogs.

"I think that if we both traveled together we could get to our destination all the faster. In fact, get your crew up here." I scuffed the ground with a hoof while being as aggressive as possible with my tone. The aggressive tone hopefully got rid of the babyish tone I might've been half hallucinating. Sometimes therapy does pay off, I guess.

He paused and looked down at the rest of his group thoughtfully. "Sounds like good plan, but me no think I should make decision."

I laughed lightly. "Well, you see this is a ship. Inside, I have a capable crew who also happens to have a few cannon balls loaded in their appropriate weapons, all of them trained on the rabble below. I would most certainly hate for them to get a misunderstanding about just how hostile you were, if you are following." I motioned lightly at Boss who took the non verbal cue to approach him from the side.

"Uh... I wouldn't like to be misunderstood." He smiled, showing me his rotting teeth. I barely resisted the urge to retch.

"Good. Now go back down and lead your merry band of mongrels up here so we can have a better discussion." It felt so good to be in charge of something at last, even if it was because I was bluffing.

Actually, I had done things like this. It had been back on Earth, where the stakes had been a bit lo- Wait. Not really. Back on Earth I had thought the stakes had been lower, but with that girl's suicide and the circumstances on how I had got to Equestria, maybe I really was dealing with the exact same situation.

The dog looked pained to do so, but climbed down the rope ladder to the rest of his group. There was some sort of chatter between them and the prisoners were shackled to some sort of mechanism to keep them in place. The rest of the dogs slowly climbed into the ship.

The lead dog stood before and also towered over me, reminding me of just how short I was. I didn't let my unease at the difference in height showed and nodded. "Right... so you are slavers?"

The lead dog nodded. "Yes. So are you, or you wouldn't have flashed colors." I saw his reasoning and I felt like laughing. Were all dogs really this stupid?

I extended a tendril of magic to my pouch and let a certain fire spell take hold. "Would you like to do a slave exchange?" I asked politely, turning my head slightly to look at the door to below decks.

He nodded slowly. "Course."

I walked away from the rest of the dogs and carefully looked around for where my group was. Boss was still looking lax, though her non prosthetic graced the hilt of her sword. Catastrophe was nowhere in sight, which was a better sign than I had thought.

I led him away from the better lit portions of the ship to a small room. "In here, I'm afraid that we only kept a few on our last run."

If he was suspicious, he didn't show it. I calmly opened the door and waited.

"Isn't zebra going in first?" He asked, his eyes alert.

"We are friends, and the gentlezebra lets the guest in first, does he not?" I asked lightly, showing only a faint smile as if the presence of the imagined slaves delighted me. I would probably need a bath after this.

He shook his head and shrugged. "If zebra think stupid enough to fall in trap..." He threatened, and walked inside.

I nodded. "Why would I-" I shot him in the back with a fire ball, burning through his leather ill fitting armor and melting a great portion of his back at the same time. I sniffed the air and took in a deep breath of the sizzling flesh, taking in the smell of my victory. "-Ever do that?" I finished. I walked over to his still body and turned him around to see his eyes still glaring hatefully at me. I smashed into his throat with my right hoof, and then grabbed the top of his head with the other, snapping his neck.

The crack it made filled me with delight. It felt good when a plan worked. I grabbed a few vials off of his body and put them in my satchel with a bit of levitation, using one of Cata's feathers for a focus.

I walked outside to the deck and nodded at the dogs. "He'll be a minute. He wanted to take care of one of them personally." Lying was fun.

"Say... isn't he zebra that look like bounty?" One said in broken Equestrian. Understanding them is like trying to understand a five year old, if I had to make a comparison to my understanding.

Another dog nodded and broke free. "We should."

Another broke free from the ranks.

I flung the vials out of my satchel and let them smash against the ground the contents vaporized in a visible cloud and forced the dogs into sleep. I smiled wider. "That could be useful..."

I motioned at Boss. "Deal with them." She descended upon them in a flash, her blade lashing out and carving them up like cows on a rack. She took a certain satisfaction in it, like every cut was a blow against whatever inner demon was bugging her. Catastrophe descended on the ship and carried with her the head of a dog, blood still slowly dripping from it.

"I missed the party?" She asked, disappointed. I ran around her and stopped in front of the last dog before Boss could have her fun.

"Let's try and get more information out of this one. I'm sure Catastrophe can handle that." I closed my eyes and tried not to stare at the griffon. Her disappointed face made me feel like I had taken a punch to my stomach. Whether it was a normal crush or a god spider making it happen, I didn't feel like disappointing her.

Something warm wrapped around me for a brief second, like feathers against my body. I opened my eyes to see that Catastrophe had literally hugged me, her warm body momentarily gifting me with a feeling of being secure. I savored it for a long time and tried to ignore everything to get lost in a moment. Sadly, I found myself all too soon.

She stopped hugging me, her sadistic grin in place. "Perfect!" She stopped and clicked her beak together before snickering. "When you stop blushing do you want to watch me work?"

My face was a deep red and I was a bit too busy reeling from how good she had felt, how good contact with her had been to really pay attention.

I nodded. "Y-yeah..." Oh fuck I just stuttered.

Canary padded out from where he had been hiding, looking around with a frown. "Right... I'm out of fireballs. And shouldn't we do something about the slaves?"

I blinked and looked from him and the griffon, switching back and forth. The feeling of security faded and I nodded. "I'll give them the offer I had planned."

Catastrophe frowned. "Keep the dog tied up." She ordered without much command to Boss. "I'm going with you."

I smiled at her. "Thank you." Instead of wasting time on exchanging friendly chat, I walked over to the side of the ship and began to descend the ladder.

I approached the chained slaves and smiled sincerely at them. "Hey."

They all seemed to turn as one to look at me, though a foal began to cry loudly. I frowned. "HEY."

"What the hell do you want?" A scraggly older looking pony said, looking down. "Just kill us already."

I rolled my eyes and looked at Catastrophe and began to walk away. "Right. Then I won't free you and I'll leave you here without letting you hear my offer."

The griffon nodded. "Such a shame."

The ponies stopped moving. "Free? Why didn't you say so?" The elder pony, the apparent elected leader of the would be slave group, or maybe the only one ballsy enough to express anything, kept talking.

I looked back at him. "I took care of the slavers and have an offer." I cleared my throat and watched the slaves get to attention. "Now, I have just enough food to get us where we need to go. If any of you want to hitch a ride on my ship I completely expect you to hold your own and help out on the ship. In exchange, I'll drop those of you who want to leave the ship off at the next town we stop in." I wanted to go to Oblivion next, but telling them that would be against the point of the matter. God. I felt great to play the badass for once.

Catastrophe merely nodded and I felt a faint blush hit my cheeks as I imagined her body against me.

"And what of those who don't want to work?" The leader said, looking over the group.

"Then they get to hike their way home without our protection." Bluffing was easy.

I looked at the griffon. "Free them." She drew a rather overly ornate key from beneath her wing and began freeing the slaves.

In the end, I got three recruits. A pegasus, another pegasus and a stubborn looking earth pony. I didn't really learn their names at the time, I had quite another thing in mind.

We waved good bye to the rest of the now freed ponies and took off in our air ship with me in a better mood than I had been in ages.

When Cata descended upon the dog with her claws she seemed to take on an entirely more... sensual tone. Watching her made me feel like I was in the presence of a predator and her supple frame looked all the better while she made the dog cry and scream.

She made him bleed out while I got a nice picture of exactly what the dog had been doing. I did more watching of her than I did listening, but who could really blame me?

I really would go into more detail but really, all that happened was that we both enjoyed ourselves and a dog was mutilated for the greater good. There was also purring involved.

Hm. Could that be considered a date? I really wasn't that clear on the whole baseball metaphor thing. Was I heading for first?

Gathering slaves for Rej, hmm..?

I had a dozen or so beakers that all seemed to contain sleeping gas or some other vile vials. I had an idea. I was confident.

I found the secret to Equestria.

Fun ruled over fear.

And I would smile my way through all the battles to come.