Empty Horizons: Sea of Stars

by Insipidious

First published 29th of August, 2019

The Admiral spent her youth looking to the stars and wondering what secrets they hid. Now she commands a submarine, and if she dives just a little deeper, maybe she'll find out.

Sanctaphrax, the city of knowledge. Wherever there's a question, there you can find the answer.

For the right price.

Unlike most of the citizens of The Ivory Island, the Admiral doesn't concern herself with economics. Her wealth comes in knowledge and the never-ending struggle to pull the future into the present. As long as she has the bits to keep Algol's Shadow running and its crew fed, she dives, and Sanctaphrax pay is more than enough.

When a routine salvage job leads to a discovery that could change the way the world sees the sunken ruins of Equestria forever, she can't help but get a little excited. She can hear the future knocking, just another dive away. The very stars themselves might as well be in her grasp.

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This story takes place in the world of Goldenwing's story Empty Horizons, but it can be read without context.

I - As Below, so Above

She was going to fly.

She’d decided it earlier that night. As the moon rose over the world, she told herself she would accomplish that. Climb up the edge of that brilliant, deep blue and look down upon the ponies below. That was the place for a pony to be seen: the realm of the clouds.

It had taken her almost all night to muster the courage to do it, but here she stood. Her hooves made hardly any noise as she snuck along the wooden dock jutting from the edge of the jungle-laden island she called home. Some might say it was odd there was a dock jutting out of the seemingly endless wilderness, but she would tell them they weren't looking close enough.

She only hoped the eyes in the jungle weren’t watching her now. They’d try to stop her and she couldn’t have that. How would she ever fly if she didn’t take a risk? That was how it always worked in the legends, after all. At the edge of a pony’s rope, their purpose was revealed.

Her favorite told of the pegasus who couldn’t fly but lived in the mythical cloud cities of old nonetheless. It was a silly story that made no sense—who would live in those places if they couldn’t fly?—but it was the best one. Because, just before she hit the ground, the birds grabbed her and showed her how to be strong.

With any luck, the water would make a good substitute for ground. At least it was softer, right? Right…

Time to be like the ponies of legend.

She spread her wings, catching the moonlight in her thin, leathery appendages, creating a spotlight for the rest of her body. Normally she would flinch away from this since it reminded her of her bright, obvious, attention-grabbing white coat. Today, she felt no fear of her brilliance, allowing herself to shine for the dark night. Strands of amber hair sparkled at the edges of her vision, framing her view of the open world before her.

For the first time, she didn’t feel ashamed of her appearance. She was beautiful. And the night would see her.

The ponies in the jungle would too, apparently, since she started to hear shouting.

Cursing to herself, she knew it was now or never. She flapped her wings and jumped off the dock. After a moment of weightlessness, she was plunging toward the waters far below.

The experience of dropping like a stone threw her stomach into her throat even though she was falling face-first. For a moment, her mind contemplated how little sense the sensation made, able to reason that it was backward before the panic set in. With the panic came the tumble; for while her wings weren’t helping her fly, they were certainly able to toss her around like a cyclone.

She had no control and she lost her previous meal of mangoes and snake within the first ten seconds. After this, however, the panic began to fade as the sensation of falling became familiar. Taking stock of herself, she knew she wasn’t dead. She also knew the water was rising to reach her quickly and hitting it at this speed was probably a terrible idea.

How did birds do it? They flapped, right. She forced herself into an upright position and began to flap as hard as her wings could manage. To be fair, her descent slowed, but given the tug of her mane on her scalp she was still falling way too fast. Taking a moment to think, she spread her wings wide for balance.

To her shock, the air caught under her webbing, turning her dramatic fall into a slope. The initial jerk from the wind tugged at her joints but she managed to hold her wings steady. Slowly, what had been a straight dive into the water turned into an angled one, until her mane was no longer pulling angrily at her scalp.

Flight.

With a toothy grin and the wind in her ears, she looked around.

The moon sat on the horizon, reflected in the eerily perfect calm of the ocean. For a moment, there was no up or down; the reflection in the water was so crisp. Before her was a full moon and all around were brilliant, shimmering stars. Sharp, blazing holes against a sea of darkness.

They were just like her.

She was a star.

There was no ocean, no floating islands, no lost history beneath the waves. There were no legends here, no ponies at all. The realm of the stars was beyond all that.

But she was a part of it.

A brilliant streak of white crossed the sky, shattering into numerous smaller chunks above her head. There was a thunderous boom as the cosmic event captured her imagination, but she scarcely heard it. She felt it, a tingling sensation running through her veins. This was it. This was the moment. She knew.

Carefully, she shot a glance back at her flanks.

Beautiful, white, perhaps even cosmic.

But still blank.

Her heart sank and she let out a hiss of anger. That was it! She’d been certain! Had she been Gifted, that… that would have been the moment that marked her destiny.

...Who needed to be Gifted? Who needed the stories of old, the magic, or some mark on their butt to tell them what their destiny was? If she wanted this moment to be her destiny, it was going to be her destiny! She would forge her own path. All ponies should forge their own path! Stop fixating on all those stupid legends. The ponies of the past had their chance.

Now, it was hers. She would fly right up to those stars a—

Wait. She didn’t get a mark. She didn’t have magic. How was she flying?

The moment she thought to ask that question she realized she wasn’t. With rising panic, she noticed she was simply falling slightly slower than usual and was about to hit the water. Remembering her training at the lake, she folded her wings back and pointed her hooves forward into a proper dive. Her reflection rose up to meet her, and for a moment she saw the terror in her eyes.

The lakes had trained her well, so the feel of cold water on her coat wasn’t startling in the slightest. The massive influx of salt in her mouth and nostrils was unlike anything she had ever experienced. Part of her thought it was fascinating while most of the rest thought it burned. A small part of her decided it would make a good seasoning. She wasn’t sure what to do with this information.

Ignoring her mind’s tendency to go the weirdest places at the least convenient times, she used her wings to swim to the surface, finding them very effective under the water.

If only there had been stars beneath the waves. Instead, there were only a few small fish that were quickly running away from the massive splash she had just made. Down here, the world did not accept those who were bright. Just like the jungle.

She breached the calm ocean surface, sucking a breath of air into her lungs. After rubbing the water from her eyes, she glanced around. The moon was still there, as were the stars… but they felt oh so far away. Not even the gift of flight would have gotten her to them.

Turning herself back the way she’d come, she noted that she had actually traveled a significant distance from her island floating above. It was still possible to make out the dock, though that was only because the others had lit the fires at the edge of it. She watched a light drop from the dock.

They were dropping ropes with fire at the end, hoping she’d see them and grab on.

With a sigh, she began to swim back, her wings propelling her forward like a torpedo. They were never going to let her hear the end of this. Probably grounded from the hunt and forbidden from eating mangoes. It was going to suck.

Feeling something brush against her leg, she decided getting eaten by a deepfish would suck a lot more.

Pushing herself, she dove slightly under the water and jumped out like a fish, spreading her wings wide to catch the air. She was far too heavy with all the water in her coat to glide like she had been earlier, but there was a second or two of extra airtime because of the maneuver.

If she had bigger wings, maybe…

That was something to think about later. Right now, she needed to get out of the ocean.

It didn’t take her anywhere near as long to get back as it had taken her to drift out. She spotted one of the ropes with a burning end just before it hit the water’s surface. She leaped onto it, latching on with her sharp teeth and all four hooves at once. That was enough of a jerk to get their attention—the rope began to move upward, slowly pulling her out of the ocean.

There were somewhere around ten meters of extra rope dangling under her. They had certainly made sure the rope would reach her no matter how far the wind may have taken it, even though there was absolutely no wind tonight. Looking up, she could see the bottom of her island.

She’d never seen it from this angle before. There were no trees, but it was still jungle-like in appearance with snaking vines that covered almost all the rocks and even a few flower buds awaiting the coming of morning. As she adjusted her eyes to take in the full scene, the island became a round spot of darkness surrounded by a halo of stars.

Never before had she felt so small.

She wouldn’t have expected herself to feel excited at the idea even if she had.

Her reveling in her size was interrupted by the rumbling of the waters far below. The calm, reflective sea had begun to churn with frothing, aggressive bubbles. The terrible maw of a deepfish erupted from the depths, lined with teeth larger than her entire body. The fish couldn’t reach her.

It could reach the bottom of her rope. The massive, interlocking jaws slammed shut on the dangling tip of her lifeline, giving her full view of its face.

The eyes were so much worse than the teeth. Each milky sphere was the size of a house, wrinkled like the skin of an old mare. There was no movement in the eyes whatsoever and caked pockets of blood had coalesced at their bases, looking more like a forest of some red parasite than a natural part of the fish. Its massive scales reflected the moonlight far better than the white thestral’s coat ever could.

She saw what was going to happen. The deepfish would start falling and pull on the rope with more weight than anypony could deal with. The dock would shatter after even a second of trying to hold this massive fish and she would fall with it. It would be certain death for her and whoever else up there didn't react quickly enough.

So she bit the rope and pulled back as hard as she could. At the end of her sharp motion, an immense pain drove through her jaw. She couldn’t help herself—she let out a bloodcurdling screech that would have shattered any windows on the island had they been present. Something had snapped in her mouth—a fang?

Forcing the scream down her throat, she bit on the rope again, not to cut it, but to allow herself to work through the pain and get a stronger hold on the only thing anchoring her to life.

Only then did she realize that she had succeeded. The bloody end of the rope below her was not connected to a deepfish.

Somehow, through some trick of fate, her broken fang was still there, dangling by a single, loose thread. She picked it up with her wing, folding it close to her body.

She spent the rest of the ride up trying not to pass out from the pain.

II - As the Leviathan Feeds

Leviathan Wakes moved with the sea. This included every wind, every wave, and every storm. Ponies could attempt to steer the boat city as much as their resources would allow, but it was impossible to avoid every tumultuous brew the weather would throw at them. Sails were down, chains were fastened, and most sane ponies were huddled indoors.

It wasn’t the worst storm ever. Boats weren’t capsizing but the various scaffoldings that kept the mobile settlement unified were being strained considerably—not to the point of falling apart but creaking enough to keep everypony in a tense state of uncertainty. Anypony who’d been through a storm before knew the city would survive and they would too, so long as they weren’t stupid enough to go outside and risk getting tossed into the ocean.

Cotton Fluff was one of the ponies who liked to live on the edge just a little bit. Instead of hiding within his broken down ship apartment like most ponies, he was out on the deck holding tightly to the railing. Granted, he had a rope tied around his midsection that was affixed to several rungs inside his apartment, but he liked to tell himself that being out here at all made him a daredevil.

The rain crashed down all around him, having flattened his usually puffy white mane long ago. His coat was a dull blue that he believed went well with the ocean despite what his marefriend told him. After all, he was Cotton Fluff, he knew better.

With a creak, the wooden railing gave way a little, prompting Cotton to move to a more stable-looking area. Satisfied that the post he was on wasn’t about to give out, he looked up at the rest of Leviathan Wakes. It was impossible to see all of it in the storm given the rain, but he could see far enough to consider it a spectacle. At the furthest reaches of his vision he saw one of the most massive ships of all, the Cadenza, rock as a wave passed under them. The chains and boards that connected the Cadenza to the rest of the city pulled taut, straining some of the other ships. However, the chains had been measured out properly, so shortly after the chains were pulled the other ships began to roll up the incoming wave. A few rocked so far that massive quantities of water poured over their decks, but that was par for the course.

He should probably get back inside, given the size of the wave. Even with his rope getting hit by that wouldn’t be comfortable. As he took one final look around, he decided he’d had enough of being out in the storm.

Just as he was turning around, he saw them. Two ponies walking along a rickety line of rotting rafts below the railing of Cotton’s apartment ship. He wouldn’t have seen them at all were it not for the brilliant white coat of the lead pony—a pegasus, given the protrusions on her sides, though it was hard to see details in the rain.

“Hey!” he called. “Are you stupid!? The wave’s coming! I—UGH!” Before he really knew what he was doing, he slipped out of his rope and tossed it down to them. “HURRY!”

The rope hit the white mare on the head, upsetting her hat. She said something Cotton couldn't hear over the din of the storm, but she grabbed hold of the rope and began climbing.

Looking up, Cotton saw the wave getting too close for comfort. Without the rope around his barrel, it could very easily sweep him away and kill him. He retreated back to the open door of his apartment and began to pull on the rope from there. This way, if the wave hit him it would just shove him into his apartment. Painful, yes, but not deadly.

He closed his eyes and strained himself as much as his legs would allow, pressing two against the edges of the doorframe and using the other two to pull. Eventually, the rope went slack. Since there had been no sharp jerk from breaking, he assumed this meant the ponies had gotten over the edge of the railing. He opened his eyes.

The two of them had gotten over the railing, all right. But so had the wave. The next thing he knew his vision was replaced with the sense of salty burning. The water slammed him into the back of his apartment hard, hitting the knobby doors of his dresser. That didn’t knock the wind out of him, but the pressure of two mares slamming into his stomach did.

For a while, the world was spinning. He was vaguely aware of the rush of water leaving the apartment and somepony closing the door.

Eventually, he could hear voices.

“—this apartment is ruined,” one said with a light tone that Cotton decided was “cute.”

The other’s voice was deeper, but more dignified and authoritative. “He was the one who saved us. Plus, there’s not really much in here to ruin.”

“Saved? Really?” The cute one let out a childish giggle. “You and I both know we would have been fine out there. The Trinity was all of ten meters away!”

“So? Rope dropped from the sky. I seized the moment.”

“Yes, yes… oh, I think he’s coming back around!”

Cotton’s vision was, in fact, panning out. In front of him was one of the most beautiful mares he had ever seen, putting even his girl to shame—a thought that made him feel more than a little guilty. Her legs were thin, yet well toned. The water matted down her bright pink coat to make the presence of her muscles easy to see, giving her an alluring mixture of strong and delicate elements. In contrast, her mane was such a deep red it was almost black, so long that it was trailing along the floor and tied around one of her hooves. A few beads dotted the hairs here and there.

Her face, while no doubt just as beautiful as the rest of her, was shrouded by the damp mess the rain had made her mane, so all he could make out was her red irises. He soon decided it wasn’t worth staring at her eyes anyway, for on her bare flanks he could see the rare sight of a cutie mark—and what a mark it was! An exaggerated crimson eye with a star-shaped pupil and waves across it.

“Wow…” Cotton said, dumbly.

“Yeah, it’s something, ain’t it?” she laughed, and Cotton noticed soft sparks of magic around her horn. “Name’s Sparkler Depths. Thanks for tossing that rope.”

Cotton blinked. “But… didn’t you say…?”

Sparkler had the decency to look sheepish. “Heard that, huh? Yeah… sorry, we probably would have been fine. But it’s the thought that counts! You put yourself and this… place at risk just to help us!” When she gestured at the apartment, Cotton could tell she did it with a little disdain. He wasn’t surprised—she was a Gifted, after all, she probably rarely had reason to step into a place this cheap and run-down. Not to mention the fact that it was soaked.

It was going to take forever to air out the blankets.

“We can compensate you for the water damage,” the other voice said, reminding Cotton that there had been two mares. “This fun diversion was worth that much.”

“Th-thanks. I didn—” He stopped speaking the moment he laid eyes upon the other mare. She was white, all right, he hadn’t misjudged her color out there. But she definitely wasn’t a pegasus. Her wings had no feathers to speak of, replacing the natural fluff with harsh, leathery webbing. The water clinging to her coat revealed an angular posture, more predatory than any normal pony. No mark graced her flank and her luscious amber mane was just as messy as Sparkler’s, though nowhere near as long.

Despite the nest of hairs, he couldn’t look away from her eyes. Amidst her ghostly white form, the pale yellow within her irises sparkled like citrine gemstones. Where he had hoped to find a normal, round pupil he instead found an angry slit running from the top to the bottom.

A thestral.

His breath caught in his throat and he began to tremble in fear at the almost mythical creature before him.

At his response, she grinned, revealing a mouth full of sharp teeth. He had enough of his wits about him to notice that a tooth was missing—and subsequently realized that the missing fang hung around her neck on a white string. Out of her mouth it somehow looked sharper.

“S-stay back!” he stammered, pressing himself as far as he could into the damp wall, trying to run away. He glanced toward the door. Dare he take his chances out there, in the storm? If these two had ways to survive out there, maybe he could. It would be better than sharing a room with a monster.

“Sure,” the thestral said, sitting down on his soaked bed. She took a moment to adjust her pearlescent sailor’s cap, combing down the points on her ears in the process. “Guess I’ll just sit here, then, since I can’t leave without getting closer to you.”

Thestrals are tricksters. They toy with their victims from the shadows.

“How long do you think we give him?” the thestral asked. “Two minutes? Three?”

Sparkler shrugged. “You’re the Admiral.”

The Admiral smirked. “True, but this isn’t exactly a nautical decision, now is it?”

“I say the less time we waste, the better. I’d rather get as far away from those leviathans as fast as possible. It’s like they’re always watching me.”

“I suppose we’ll have to disregard our fine hero’s wishes, then.” She jumped off the bed.

Cotton glared at her. “I kn-know when I’m being toyed with.”

“Good boy.” She reached under her hat and tossed him a few bits. “Now you’ve got some bits. Might want to consider getting some wits, lest you fail to live up to your city’s reputation.”

“Lay off the poet speech,” Sparkler suggested.

The Admiral shrugged, jumping to the door and swinging it open. Her grin widened as the rain pelted her face. Sparkler followed her out, shooting Cotton a pitying smile as she closed the door.

Cotton heard a wave crash into the door a few seconds later.

Somehow, he knew they were just fine.

Why was a monster like that walking around in the open?!

The Admiral did not have far to travel through the stormy weather to get to her destination. She would have gotten the Trinity much closer so there would have been no need to travel anywhere at all, but sadly that wasn’t an option when going to Jester’s. There was a policy about not having subs of any kind beneath her ship and Jester had enough of a reputation that ponies actually followed it except in dire circumstances.

Thus, a trot through stormy weather. They were knocked into the water a few times despite their best efforts, but the Admiral’s leathery wings were excellent under the waves, allowing them to surface long before another wave came along. Absolute worst-case scenario, they’d have to go deep and signal for the sub to come get them.

As expected, the mini-sub did not need to be called. The Admiral and Sparkler arrived at Jester’s soaking wet but smiling nonetheless. Her ship was of a decent size and painted with notoriously bright colors. Usually, there would be torches lit around it to draw attention, but the downpour kept the festive exterior from lighting up. Even the bright pink doors they were standing in front of were muted.

The Admiral checked behind her to make sure this entrance wasn’t about to get bombarded by a wave. Upon convincing herself it was safe, she allowed herself to grin.

“...We’re not knocking, are we?” Sparkler asked.

“No. You know this is my favorite part.”

She whirled around and kicked the doors in, prompting light to flush into the grime outside. With her head held high and a smirk that showed off her fang she marched right in, wings spread.

Jester’s was a bar, though not the sort a pony would usually find in a city like Leviathan Wakes. There was far too much color, the drinks behind the counter looked like they might be the magic potions of old, and it was abnormally clean aside from the water pooling around the door.

The Admiral made it all of three steps before the first glass fell to the floor—the drink of a young green mare who was clearly trying to decide if she was hallucinating or not. The Admiral passed her by without so much as a pitying glance while the rest of the patrons of the bar slowly realized what had just walked in their doors. The regulars either groaned or tipped their drinks at her in respect. Others weren’t lucky enough to have context and there was a mixture of dropped jaws, drinks, and even a few heads as ponies passed out.

She carefully watched the one pegasus stallion in the corner who looked angry at her existence, but it didn’t appear like he was going to do anything due to the pressure of the other patrons.

Sparkler closed the door behind them, smiling awkwardly. “I think she broke your latch again, Jester!”

“I’ve learned to keep spares,” Jester said, sliding into view on the other side of the bar. She was a white unicorn with a short, pale pink mane resting below a pointed hat. Today, the hat was baby blue, but everypony knew she had a million different colors stored elsewhere. Reaching into the bar’s drawers, she pulled out an extra latch and tossed it to Sparkler, who caught it in her telekinesis and began affixing it to the door.

Wordlessly, Jester took out a golden brew from behind her and set it in front of the Admiral. Pulling a small pouch from her hat, the Admiral responded by dropping a handful of bits on the counter.

Jester raised an eyebrow. “They broke more glasses than usual this time, Admiral.”

The Admiral chuckled—a strange noise made with a slightly eerie hiss in the back of her throat. She tossed another bit into the pile. “I’d think the entertainment would be payment enough, Jester.”

“You may never think it gets old, but let me tell you about how Gruff went on a rant about you last week.”

“Wh—hey!” an old drunk stallion grunted.

“Shush, not talking to you, Gruff, just about you.” Jester winked. “So I’m afraid the price for your little power-play has gone up slightly. I’m sure you can afford to part with an extra bit with all that Sanctaphrax money of yours, hmm?”

The Admiral shrugged. Wordlessly, she removed a small black box from her satchel and set it on the bar counter.

Jester stared at it. “You really are insane.”

“You’ll get it to where it needs to go?”

“Obviously! But… I mean I know this has a reputation for being a safe place, but you’re just being ridiculous.”

“Nopony would dare mess with you. I think we’re good.”

Jester rolled her eyes “Well, yes, but it’s the principle of the thing. Stars, I swear, you either have more wits than anypony or none at all.”

“I think it’s a coin flip on any given day,” Sparkler said, taking a seat next to the Admiral. “Milkshake, please.”

“And you never drink anything alcoholic. You’re worse than she is.”

“Probably.” Instead of levitating her drink directly, Sparkler levitated her hair like a limb and picked up the shake, beginning to obnoxiously slurp it.

“Monsters… monsters!” a blue mare in the back shouted.

“Oh, quiet!” Jester shouted at her. “These are some of my best customers, shut your yap! ...No, don’t leave it hanging open, that attracts flies.”

“In this weather?” the Admiral asked.

“You know what I mean.”

“So, got anything juicy for us?” Sparkler asked, giving everypony a blessed moment of reprieve from her slurking.

“Juicy…?” Jester tapped her hoof on the counter as she refilled Gruff’s drink. “Well, there’s a particularly crazy rumor about a bunch of mares from Old Canterlot, frozen in time. Probably nuts, though, right?”

“And not worth our time,” the Admiral said. “Look where the old ways got us.” She gestured at the door. “We’re lucky we’re able to live through that.”

“Eh, it was just the most interesting thing I’d heard.” Jester shrugged. “Unless you want to hear about the falling rumors.”

“Already picked that place dry,” Sparkler said. “Where did you think we were?”

“I don’t know, the moon?”

A smile came to the Admiral’s lips. “I wish.”

“How’s that whole thing going for you, by the way?”

“It exploded. Again.” The Admiral downed her drink. “But you always learn from failure.”

“I wouldn’t know,” Jester chuckled.

“Oi!” Sparkler blurted. “Ya know everythin’, ya might ‘s well own up t’ it!”

“Accent slipping, dear.”

Sparkler flushed. “Er…” She coughed, indicating to the Admiral that she should change the topic.

“We’re heading back to Sanctaphrax after this,” the Admiral said, tipping her glass forward to get it filled up again.

“Not going to stay for the after-storm festival?”

“Too much cargo, too many thieves with wits and no bits.”

Jester raised an eyebrow. “You think a bunch of thieves are going to be able to storm the Algol’s cargo hold?”

“Oh, no, I just don’t like extra bodies.” She slid her drink to the side. “Contrary to popular belief, ponies taste terrible.”

A dramatic silence fell over the bar.

“Speaking of, got any mangoes?”

Jester laughed and grabbed some dried mango slices from under the counter. “Don’t have any fresh right now, storm and all, so half-price.”

The Admiral paid. It wasn’t anywhere near as good without the juices but it was still amazing. Most plants were boring and dull tasting, not worth her time if she had a choice. Mangoes were the exception. Their lavish flavor, the grainy texture that pulled into strands, th—

“You’re spacing again,” Sparkler interrupted her.

“I swear, it’s like drugs to you,” Jester said.

The Admiral shrugged, downing the dried fruit.

“Anyway, going back to Sanctaphrax? I might have something for you.” Jester walked over to a cork board and pulled off a small piece of paper. “Ship went down that direction. Not much valuable besides a family heirloom that this Violet Bow wants. Not much pay, either. Nopony’s picked it up because of that. Buuuut… you like raw materials, don’t’cha? Hmm? Free refined metal, sittin’ at the bottom of the ocean!”

Taking the note, Sparkler read through it. “That’s not far out of the way… Think we can get Orange off The Button long enough to jury-rig a net of some kind?”

“He’ll do it if I tell him to,” the Admiral said, taking the note and pocketing it. “We’ll do it. Let Violet Bow know it might be a few weeks before we get her heirloom back.”

“Caaaaan do!” Jester sang. “Now, I know my internal clock’s a bit off, but I think Rummy will be around soon for a game. He really wants a rematch.”

The Admiral made a show of thinking deeply about her response even though she knew exactly what she was going to say. “...I suppose I could be convinced to play if he would up the ante a bit this time.”

“Good,” Jester giggled. “Good…”

III - As Dark as a Starless Night

Beneath the rocking waves, the ocean appeared peaceful. Under natural circumstances it should have been dark beneath Leviathan Wakes, but the subsurface life of the city was anything but natural. Under the haphazardly rummaged together ships there were massive waterproof chains running back and forth. Deeper down, these chains fused with each other into even more massive restraints until a chain link was roughly the size of a pony.

At the bottom, these chains affixed to the two largest beings known to ponykind, the leviathans. Massive fish so tremendous in size that, no matter the quality of the water, nopony could see both ends of the scaled behemoths at once. It was these two beings that dragged Leviathan Wakes along through the ocean, guided by the fish dumped by the ponies above. The black one had slightly more girth than the red one, which had smoother skin and more graceful fins. Yet, nopony was entirely sure which one was larger, if any. They never exactly extended to their full length, and some ponies swore they were still growing in size.

Regardless, the deepfish monsters of the open ocean didn’t dare challenge the great leviathans, and so Leviathan Wakes was allowed to flourish.

While the surface ships suffered from the storm, the submarines below experienced little more than some slightly annoying jostling. They sat there, lights on, chained to one part of Leviathan Wakes or another, sitting and waiting. While it was dark above, below the subs blessed the sea with light. It was just a little less convenient to move through the water than the planks on the surface.

Unless a pony had access to an agile mini-sub, which the Admiral did. It was a small brass egg-shaped craft with a single reinforced window in the front and a large propeller in the back. The tube that usually ran from its top back to a source of air wasn’t present, but it didn’t need it since the journey wasn’t going to be long.

There were two seats within the sub and a small place for cargo in the back. The pilot—a young stallion by the name of Lime Lick—sat in the front with the Admiral, while Sparkler sat in the cargo hold. Though ‘sat’ was a bit of a stretch, since she had used her hair to tie herself to the ceiling and hang upside-down like a bat.

“You know, when I was a kid, I used to tell myself thestrals did this,” Sparkler said. “Then you came along and ruined that dream.”

“What were we going to hang onto the ceiling with?” the Admiral asked. “Our tails?”

“I was six and thought you were magic genies that gave me money for my lost teeth.”

“And thought we ate eyeballs.”

“Yes, our legends were very contradictory, woo.”

“Coming up on the Algol’s Shadow now,” Lime Lick tentatively announced.

Looking out the window, the Admiral saw her ship—and what a beauty it was. Most ships were long, pill-shaped things that had no flavor to them whatsoever. Hers was not only far larger than the standard sub, but it also had so much more character. Instead of a long barrel that looked like armor for a snake, the Algol’s shape was more ovoid, giving it substance and girth. Numerous bronze spikes studded out of the hull, illuminated brilliantly by the spotlights dotting the ship. Access ports stretched out from its main body, though there were currently no other submarines attached to them.

The mini-sub lowered itself under the Algol’s Shadow. “Trinity, requesting permission to dock,” Lime said.

“Granted,” an old, gruff voice barked from the other end.

The Trinity entered a small, square depression in the bottom of the Algol’s Shadow where five other similar mini-subs rested, all with an air tube connecting them to the larger ship. The Trinity docked at port number three, affixing its top to the small port jutting out of the Algol.

Sparkler whipped her mane off the ceiling and onto the hatch, using it to stabilize herself while her telekinesis turned the valve. On their side, the valve popped downward. They had to wait for a member of the crew to open the other side of the valve, twisting it up.

“Welcome back, Admiral!” a brown pegasus said, extending one of his wings down to help Sparkler up. “Long time no see!”

“In your mind, maybe, Granite,” the Admiral said, climbing out of the Trinity without any assistance from the pegasus.

“My mind is an endless maze of corridors and treasure for those who care to explore it.”

“Oi…” Sparkler grumbled.

“So, do we have any new jobs? Huh?” Granite tapped the ground excitedly. “My boys are getting a little itchy…”

Sparkler gawked. “Itchy? You raided a sub last week! A sub! That was one of the riskiest and most unusual things we’ve done and you’re already…”

“Keeps him eager and willing,” the Admiral said, putting down Sparkler’s complaints. “We’re still heading to Sanctaphrax.”

Granite deflated. “Damn intellectual pricks…”

“But we do have a stop we’re going to make on the way. Nothing fancy, so I don’t want you to get your hopes up, but some poor mare wants us to get a family heirloom that sunk to the bottom of the ocean. We get to pick up the excess scrap metal for our own uses.”

“I’ll take it,” Granite said, forcing a smile. “We don’t have any room left in the holds, though.”

“Which is why I need to see Orange. Know where he is?”

“The sky room, if I had to guess.”

The Admiral nodded, gesturing for Sparkler to follow with a wing. She grabbed onto a metallic rung and pulled herself away from the lowest level of the Algol.

The interior of the Algol, for the most part, was unimpressive compared to its powerful exterior. The passages were all dark while everything was designed with function over beauty. Ladders were simple, bulkheads were bare metal, and the lights were only enough to see by, giving a general ominous ambience. Everypony was used to it at this point.

To get to the sky room quickly, they had to pass by one of the main engines: a massive turbine fed by pressurized steam. Right now, the moisture in the room wasn’t oppressive, but when they kicked the engines into high gear the entire place became a muggy mist that only the engineers could stand. The Admiral nodded curtly to the engineers, showing them the respect they deserved for their position.

After climbing up another ladder, they ended up in the only place in all of Algol’s Shadow that the Admiral thought looked nice. The sky room. It was an almost perfect hemisphere with the stars painted on the ceiling, complete with names, nautical notes, and even faint paths that traced the locations of the sun and moon. In the center was a small clockwork piece of art that showed a globe with a chunk of marble and obsidian moving along the outside that represented the current positions of the sun and moon.

As a bonus, there was a little triangle at the bottom that showed the time.

The Admiral approached the central globe and examined it. Only a very small area of it had any detail whatsoever—marking the Canterhorn, Fellis, Sanctaphrax, and other locations. Leviathan Wakes was inscribed as well, though it had more of a ‘general area’ circle than a precise point.

“How little we know…” the Admiral said, turning to look at the stars painted above. “And how much less we know of them.”

“Ahem,” a small orange stallion with tar-black hair and glasses said. “Welcome back, Admiral.”

“Orange. Got a job for you.”

The frail earth pony nodded, closing the book he had been scribbling in. “That’s why I’m here.”

“Let us push The Button,” Sparkler said, grinning. “Come on, you know you want to…”

“No. Admiral, what is this really about?”

The Admiral smirked. “There’s a shipwreck on the way to Sanctaphrax. We’re going to pick it up.”

“Cargo holds are full.”

“I know. That’s why you’re going to get the nets together to hold a small ship. I think we’ll arrive in about four hours, you have until then.”

Orange nodded emotionlessly and trotted off, presumably to get to work.

“Is that the future of ponykind?” Sparkler asked. “As magic reduces to nothing we all tragically lose our personalities?”

“He’s good at his job.”

“But at what cost…?”

“No cost for me, that’s what,” the Admiral chuckled. “Let’s get to the bridge and set course. The less time wasted, the better.”

The bridge was at the second to highest level of the Algol, situated behind the observation deck and a half-meter of reinforced plating just in case something ever broke the windows in the observation deck. The bridge itself contained six seats and a lot of flashing lights that meant absolutely nothing to the average pony but were the distillation of Algol’s Shadow’s very essence.

A general rule was if there were no red lights and a lot of green ones, everything was fine. If there were ever more red lights than any other color, it was time to get worried.

Currently, there were only two ponies on the bridge. A bored-looking white mare who was staring intently at the pressure gauges and a silver, bearded stallion with a pipe in his mouth. There was no smoke coming out of it, since smoking in an enclosed space was something no considerate stallion would do. He refused to go anywhere without the pipe, however, so there in his jaws it remained.

“Captain,” the Admiral said.

“Admiral,” the Captain said.

“I’m gonna have to take control of the ship again.”

“She’s yours. Always is, always has been.” The Captain stood up from the Admiral’s chair and took his own position at the front console. Everypony called it the “wheel”, but there wasn't a wheel in sight among all the dials, buttons, and cranks used to point the Algol in the right direction. “Sanctaphrax?”

“A general heading, yes, but we also have to go here.” She handed him the note. “Small operation, assuming Orange does what he does best.”

“He’s proven to be quite the little tinkerer. Reminds me of ol’ Socket. In intelligence. The kid is as dry as a stump. Socket, now, there was a fiery mare…”

“Oh look, Orange isn’t at his console!” Sparkler grinned. “I wonder if he left the key in?” She jumped to the weapons control station and found that The Big Red Button to the left of the console wasn’t glowing. “Aw…”

“He’s not that careless,” the Captain snorted.

“I want to see what it does… You can’t tell me you’re not curious.”

“We will press The Button when the situation calls for it,” the Admiral said. “Not because you’re afraid of some giant fish watching you.”

“They are!” Sparkler blurted. “See, let’s do this…” She lit her horn, increasing the intensity of her spell. The Admiral felt the slightest twinge in the back of her mind, a feeling she’d needed to train herself to detect.

Sparkler’s horn dimmed down. “Okay, so, there’s a ton of fish, ponies, a griffon, and one of those unknown 'jabberwock' minds in the south sector of the city. Of them, only you two are looking at me. Then there are the leviathans. Yep, they’re looking right at me. So long as I’m in here. It’s creepy!”

“Their heads are facing the wrong direction,” the Captain pointed out.

“Then they’re looking at me in some other way, I don’t know!” She glared at the leviathans through the floor. “I hope you become sushi.”

The Admiral rolled her eyes. “Captain, take us away.”

“Aye, Admiral.”

The engines of Algol’s Shadow spun up, activating its many propellers. The chains that affixed the submarine to Leviathan’s Wake retracted into the sub and it cast off into the depths.

The wreck sat at the bottom of the ocean, far below a depth where any sunlight penetrated. It was a small collection of loose processed metal that had once been a great airship but had now folded itself down the middle, ending up a bit like a crinkled taco.

For the first time since it had reached the bottom several months ago, the wreck was graced with light. The rusted metal did a poor job of reflecting the light of Algol’s Shadow, but it did better than the dead seafloor.

The call went up from the lower decks—they had a visual on the wreck. The signals made it all the way to the bridge, where the Admiral sat with the Captain, Sparkler, and Orange.

“Sparkler,” the Admiral said. “Check as far out as you can.”

Sparkler nodded, focusing all her energy into her magic for a moment. Her horn went from barely glowing at all to a shining beacon of arcane energy. Her ping went out, tickling the Admiral’s mind.

A second later, she returned her horn’s glow to barely perceptible levels. “Wreck is abandoned except for one signature, a… well I think it’s a seapony based on how it’s moving, but the brain doesn’t feel quite right. There’s also a deepfish that has sensed our motion and is heading our way, I recommend a diversion torpedo at… thirty degrees port and sixty degrees up. Orange?”

“Confirmed,” Orange said, pressing a few levers on his console. “Torpedo away.”

The Admiral felt the familiar thunk of a torpedo being fired out of the Algol’s weapons bay. There was no way to physically see it from their location, and eventually it would be out of range for them to detect at all. She patiently waited two minutes before turning to Sparkler again. “Check.”

Sparkler flashed her horn. “Deepfish is now going to where I assume the torpedo exploded, not us. We’re good!”

“You hear that, Granite?”

“Loud and clear, ma’am!” Granite’s voice came from the other side of the radio. “The boys are ready to go!”

“There’s a single creature down there. Possible variant seapony. Be cautious.”

“Just one? Psh, we can handle that. C’mon Wiffle and Lob, let’s get down there and find ourselves an heirloom!”

“Also, subs two through five, prepare Orange’s netting. You’ll pick it up when the team confirms it is safe to do so.”

“Roger,” four voices returned.

The Admiral could see it playing out in her head. The Uno took Granite and his team down to the surface. The cabin slowly filled with water before the mini-sub’s hatch opened, allowing them all to climb out in their hard suits. She had been on many dives herself. When Granite said, “hatch open, heading out: harpoons ready,” she could almost feel the harpoon gun in her hooves.

Meanwhile the other four subs were doing something a bit harder for her to visualize. They took four parts of a net and spread it out along the Algol’s bottom, creating a sort of covering for the wreck. The moment they were given the clear they would descend and scoop the thing up, being careful not to tie their air hoses together.

Orange assured her it would work, and the Admiral trusted him. She definitely couldn’t do the kind of math required to ensure the giant net's function.

“Ship's in good shape, considering,” Granite said. “Main cabin’s still intact, though the door’s gone. Going in. Careful, boys…”

The Admiral knew neither Granite nor any of his boys were actually being all that careful. She knew his type—thrill-seeking adrenaline junkies who got a kick out of running into dangerous situations. Normally, she would chide him for it, but this wasn’t a dangerous location. One seapony, no matter how ferocious, wouldn’t be able to take out the squad.

She heard the clanking of their hooves upon a metallic surface. Granite told her no details, and consequently a familiar, tense feeling filled the Admiral. Every time she was listening to an audio feed from a team once they entered an unknown location, the slight sinking in her stomach arrived. They knew the situation better than her at this point and she had to wait for them to relay whatever they thought was pertinent.

The clanks stopped. “Well, that was easy,” Granite said. “Found the heirloom, right in the little black box.”

“Anything special about it?” the Admiral asked.

“It’s just a pink-diamond horn-ring. I’m no Gifted unicorn, but I don’t even think it’s magical. Missing that fancy spark, y’know?”

“And no sign of the seapony or anything?”

“None at all.”

“It’s right outside, guys,” Sparkler said, horn dimming from a recent cast of her spell. “It’s not acting like a seapony.”

“Well, whatever it is, it’s about to meet good ol’ Stabby.”

“I thought it’s name was Pointy?” Sparkler asked.

“I have more than one harpoon.”

“Focus,” the Admiral said. “Do you see the seapony?”

“Looking…” Granite reported. “I’ve got nothing, Admiral, it’s all normal out h—HOLY FU—”

There was a thunk from the other side of the line, followed by a few grunts and yelps of surprise, followed by an eerie silence. In moments like this, it was pure terror being up in the captain’s seat. Her mind began to spin several possible sequences of events, most of which were unreasonably bloody and involved a gruesome evisceration of pony organs by a ravenous seapony. It wasn't hard for her to imagine such things, given her experience on the matter.

She realized she could hear breathing from the other end.

“Report!” the Admiral demanded.

“This... is weird,” Granite said. The Admiral instantly knew nopony had died or even gotten injured.

“How so?”

“It hasn’t attacked.”

“...Come again, Granite?” the Captain muttered. “A seapony that didn’t attack? What did it do, serve you tea?”

“It’s currently cowering behind the loose door, shivering like a filly. Looks scared.”

The Admiral turned to the Captain, finding her utter bafflement mirrored in his expression. She didn’t even need to ask him to know he hadn’t even heard of anything like this in his decades of experience.

“I’m not gonna hurt you…” Granite’s voice came back over the radio.

“Granite, what are you doing?” the Admiral asked.

“Trying to talk to it.”

“Granite. You are in a pressurized suit. It isn’t going to be able to hear you.”

“She. Very clearly a mare.”

“She isn’t going to be able to hear you a—” The Admiral’s ears twitched. “And it is a damned seapony! What are you going to do, train it to play fetch?”

“Well, I don’t know, how about we see if I can calm her down first? Here seapony-pony-pony…”

“It can’t hear you.”

“Pony-pony-pony…”

“For the love of… look, Granite, if you’re determined to do this, at least tell me what it looks like and what it’s doing?” Trying to picture a seapony being scared was a bit beyond her mental faculties at the moment. Simply accepting it as fact was boggling her.

“Well, she’s poking her head out now—come on, I won’t bite. Quite a bit more colorful than your normal seaponies and as a bonus she doesn’t look like a rotting corpse. Her eyes still have irises, though I can see the blood lining and sharp teeth. I can’t believe I’m saying this, but those fins look mighty pretty.”

“Granite’s marefriend is a seapony,” Sparkler deadpanned. “That’s it, I’ve heard it all.”

“She just swam out, inching toward us like some lost puppy—that’s it.” The Admiral strained hear ears to pick up anything aside from Granite’s voice, but all she heard was the heavy breathing of his boys. “She’s got a cutie mark. Looks like a castle tower.”

“Don’t let her eat you,” the Captain cautioned. “This one might just be smarter.”

“If it was smart it would know it couldn’t take all three of us. Lob’s got a sight on her, don’t worry. A—” He paused. “She’s holding out a hoof.”

“Granite...” The Admiral sighed. “You already shook its hoof, didn’t you?”

“Yep!” Granite declared. “Seems pretty happy about it too, doing this fancy swim-dance. Looks like I’ll go down in history as Granite, seapony tamer!”

“If she doesn’t bite your lips off first,” Sparkler snorted.

“You wouldn’t do that, would you little… Tower?”

“Tower’s a terrible name. Seriously, who’d name their kid Tow—”

“Rook,” the Captain said, coughing. “Call her Rook. That’s probably what her mark is.”

The Admiral frowned. “What does that mean?”

“It’s from ancient game we salty captains used to play at the Ringer Dinger back in the day. One of the pieces was called the rook. Looked a lot like a tower.”

“Well, Rook,” Granite said. “We’re gonna take this ship if you don’t mind.”

“She can’t hear you,” Sparkler reiterated.

“Eh, body language gets it across. Leaving the wreck now.” A few seconds later, he spoke again. “Yep, she’s following me. Nothing can resist this charming face.”

“It has no attachment to the wreck?” the Admiral asked.

“None at all. Seems much more interested in the Algol, actually.”

“Keep a close eye on it. Mini-subs two through five, you’re clear to scoop the wreck.”

“Roger,” four voices said at once.

The Admiral tried to focus on the descending net for a minute, but the mystery of the seapony kept returning to her in full force, distracting her with all the uncertainty around it.

...But maybe it didn’t have to.

“Granite, do you think you could bring it up to the observation deck? I want to see it.”

“Let’s see if she’ll follow me in the sub,” Granite responded. He laughed a moment later. “Crazy girl just tried to get in the sub. No, out, shoo, there’s going to be air in here! ...She’s giving me a pouty face though the main window.”

The Admiral couldn’t believe it. Wouldn’t believe it, not until she saw it. This was simply beyond everything she knew.

And yet, when Granite brought Uno up to the observation deck, the seapony followed. The Admiral slowly rose from her chair and stepped through the metal hall, arriving in a room made mostly of glass, Sparkler close behind.

The seapony trailed Uno, swimming around playfully. She was the size of a full-grown pony and was a soft pink color. At first glance, the Admiral thought her front half was completely normal for a pony with two hooves and a normal face. Closer inspection revealed the blood clots under the eyes standard for monsters of the deep, through her eyes didn’t look dead. They locked with the Admiral’s own, telling of something more than animalistic intelligence. She smiled and waved.

The wave was cute.

The smile revealed her rows of sharp, rigid teeth.

“What a bundle of contradictions,” Sparkler commented.

Rook waved her tail a bit to turn around, giving the Admiral a good look at her cutie mark: a brick-red tower. Before she could consider it further, the Admiral realized Rook was pointing with one of her hooves, gesturing with her tail for them to look.

“Which heading is that?” the Admiral asked.

“One degree off of Sanctaphrax,” Sparkler answered. “...You’re thinking of following her, aren’t you?”

The Admiral nodded slowly. “If it’s on the way…”

“I smell a trap!” the Captain called from the bridge. “She’s a monster just like the rest o’ them seaponies, just smarter than the rest. Knows how to get everypony lured to their death. Reason we don’t hear about her is because everypony who’s met her is dead!”

The Admiral nodded. “Operate under that assumption. Orange, put out a bulletin for the crew, tell them to be on alert. Captain, set course one degree off from Sanctaphrax. We’ll follow her, but we’ll stop if she leads us beyond the Chain.”

“Yes, Admiral,” the Captain and Orange said without any fuss.

There was absolutely no way Rook could hear anything the Admiral just said. She smiled anyway, as if she understood they were going where she wanted.

The Admiral didn’t trust her in the slightest. But it wasn’t proper to throw anomalies like her away, even if they were dangerous. It was impossible to know how much could be learned without investigation.

IV - As Sanctaphrax's Chain Trembles

Rook was not happy when Algol’s Shadow turned away from her path to Sanctaphrax. The Admiral had expected this to mean rage-induced aquatic screams and murderous bites all over the Algol’s hull. Barring that, disinterest.

Instead, Rook had placed herself in front of the main observation window, crossed her arms, and fixed the Admiral with a pouting expression. Since the Admiral could see the observation deck from her seat, the pink face was always present, albeit distant.

“I have to hand it to her, she’s good at communicating her feelings,” Sparkler said.

“She’ll just have to deal,” the Admiral said, returning Rook’s pout with a steeled glare of her own.

“I’ll talk to her!” Granite said, climbing up the ladder to the bridge.

“...Talk?” Sparkler snorted.

“I shall endeavor to communicate with the maiden of the sea and tell her that we’ll be back on her path after we take a pit stop!”

“How do you plan to do that?”

Granite held up a small rock in the tips of his wings. “Why, through gestures and props, of course!”

Sparkler facehooved.

“Give it a shot,” the Admiral said.

“If she eats through the glass, we’re letting you drown,” the Captain added.

“Hah! Me, drown? We’re near the surface, I’ll beat her in hoof to hoof combat!”

The Admiral put her wing to her face and let out a sigh.

“Fine, fine, I’ll get on with it.” He trotted over to Rook and waved. Her pouty expression vanished, replaced with a warm smile as her attention fixed on him. In one wing, he held up the rock. In the other, he had a pointed piece of metal that represented the Algol. He had the Algol follow a straight path until it was about to pass the rock. It turned sharply, went to the rock, and then went back to its path.

“There’s no way she gets that,” Sparkler said.

Rook proved her wrong by taking some of the clotted blood from under her eyes and smearing it on the window, tracing the path Granite had just outlined.

“Well how about that!” Granite laughed. “You’re a regular genius!”

Rook tapped the detour on the path with her hoof and nodded while she traced it to the circle that represented Sanctaphrax. She shook her head when she traced it back up. Quickly, she moved her hoof along the path, went down to Sanctaphrax, and then went off Sanctaphrax at an angle.

“And she’s suggesting we don’t backtrack. Mare knows how to navigate.”

“She lives at the bottom of the ocean and hasn’t gotten eaten yet, of course she does,” the Captain said. “At least she’ll stop giving you the puppy-eyes, eh, Admiral?”

The Admiral tapped her wingtips together. “It’s acceptable. Are we approaching the Chain?”

“Should be in sight range soon,” the Captain reported. “Just a little longer…”

He was right—soon the pink of Rook was eclipsed by the massive girth of a chain link as large as if not larger than the ones used to anchor Leviathan Wakes to their massive fish guardians. Rook noticed it immediately and swam away from the Algol to investigate, swirling in and out of the links with ease.

“Begin general Sanctaphrax docking procedure,” the Admiral ordered.

“Already underway,” Orange said. “Channel open.”

“This is the Admiral to Sanctaphrax Chain Operations. We’re ready to deposit cargo. More than just the standard offload: we’ve got a netted wreck and a seapony. Recommend equipping six hooks to the platform, and give us the large tank with wheels.”

“Order received,” a slightly garbled but understandable voice came from the other end. “Deepfish status?”

Sparkler cast her spell. “Fifteen minutes away, roughly.”

“Roger. Splashdown in ten, message if status changes.” The feed cut off.

Granite glanced at the Admiral. “You’re going to try to get her in a tank?”

“I want Vespid to have a look at her.”

Granite stared at her slack-jawed.

“Relax, I’m not going to let her cut up your marefriend, we need her to take us wherever it is she’s been pointing this entire time. I’d just like some information.”

“I’m not sure she’ll want to get in a tank to begin with. I m—” He was interrupted by Rook tapping on the glass. She pointed at the chain and then pointed up. Granite was stunned for a moment. To make sure, he pointed at her with a confused look and then pointed upward. She nodded. “...I swear, it’s like she knows what you want.”

“She’s smart,” the Captain said. “She’s figured out we’re going up. She’s either curious about what’s up there and trusts us to keep her safe or, more likely, she wants to put herself in our hooves so we’ll trust her more. Maybe you should let Vespid cut her up.”

“She may also be seeking information,” Orange suggested.

“I said ‘curiosity’, Orange.”

“The curious drive is a very different one from tactical information gathering.”

“There are simply too many unknowns with this seapony,” the Admiral declared. “So I’m taking her up there to get as many questions answered as possible.”

Sparkler let out a giggle. “And, as a bonus, you’re going to parade around a friendly seapony to everypony that’s gotten far too used to seeing you walk around.”

“Well, yes, but that’s just a bonus.” She stood up, ruffling her wings slightly. “Sparkler, you’re with me. We’ll suit up at port three. Granite, you’re staying here. I want to see if she’s really willing to trust us or just you.”

Granite frowned. “Not sure that’s a good id—”

“Also, you’re getting too attached to the fish. I need to separate you for a bit.”

Granite’s wings sagged. “Yes, Admiral.”

“Glad we’ve reached an understanding. Sparkler, let’s go. Captain, ship’s yours.”

They made their way down to the edge of the deck below, taking their suits off the walls. The Admiral’s was a standard hard-suit with a bronze exterior and no decorations whatsoever. She could easily be mistaken for any other diver in it. Sparkler, on the other hand, had coated hers in dark red stripes with pink dots because she insisted it made her more threatening to everything that might want to eat her. No matter how many times everypony told her that was unfounded, she would just scoff. In her mind, she was still alive, so that must mean it worked.

The two of them stepped into a cylindrical room and closed the round pressurized hatch behind them.

“Go ahead and open us up,” the Admiral said, radioing the bridge. “No use wasting time. Might as well meet our new pet.”

“Venting now,” the Captain responded.

Water began to fill up the cylindrical room, starting at their hooves and slowly rising to the ceiling. The metallic exterior of their suits ensured they felt nothing as the water rose unless they tried to move, at which point they detected the added resistance of water. It wasn’t even difficult to see—the glass on their helmets gave them roughly equal visuals on the room both above and below the surface.

Once the room was full, Sparkler swam over to the other pressure door and opened it. Usually, when somepony left this way, there was another submarine on the other side. Today, though, it was just open ocean in front of the Chain. Algol’s Shadow was close enough to the surface of the ocean that the water was blue here, not black.

Strictly speaking, at this depth they could have made do with simple scuba apparatus, but the Admiral wanted the armor in case Rook decided to try something.

The Admiral pulled herself up over the edge of the Algol’s docking port. Soon she stood on top of the cylindrical protrusion and taking a look around. Here, she could easily see everywhere except behind the Algol itself, a state of affairs much preferable to being stuck on the bridge. Below, she could see four mini-subs detaching the net with the shipwreck in it from the Algol’s lower spines. The two other subs were at the Algol’s side, carefully removing a massive gray box with several pressure doors all along the outside. One of the cargo holds, ready to be dragged up to Sanctaphrax. They had three full holds this time, so loading would be a bit slower than usual. They still had plenty of time according to Sparkler’s earlier deepfish status check.

Rook swam over to them the moment she noticed two ponies walking on the outside the Algol. At first the seapony was excited, but she froze when Sparkler hefted up a harpoon gun.

“Sparkler, we do want her to go with us,” the Admiral reminded her. “Alive.”

“Fine…” Sparkler muttered, lowering the weapon.

Rook looked Admiral and Sparkler over with uncertainty. Despite this, she moved closer, waving tentatively.

It was outlandish to see a seapony moving toward her like a nervous colt trying to muster the courage needed to ask a mare out. Uncanny.

“Splashdown incoming,” the Captain called. “Hold onto something, we’re going to need to move.”

With a smirk, the Admiral grabbed hold of a rung on the Algol with a hoof, using another to point up. Rook followed her hoof with her gaze.

The splash was so large it pushed Rook about a half-meter away. Above them a massive donut-shaped basket descended into the ocean, the Chain going through the hole in its center while six smaller chains affixed to the railing kept the basket adhered to something far above the surface. There was enough space on it to hold six of the Algol’s cargo holds all in a ring. The basket itself was made out of a thick wire mesh that allowed water to pass through the holes but prevented all solid material larger than a golf ball from following the torrent.

To her delight, the Admiral saw everything she had asked for added to the basket. There were six anchor-like hooks placed in a circle on one edge of the basket, exactly what they needed to tie down Orange’s net. And, of course, there was the large tank, four times as large as Rook. As usual a massive tankard of fresh oxygen sat in the basket. The Algol didn’t need it since they had restocked at Leviathan Wakes, but it was standard procedure to drop one down every time and the Admiral wasn’t about to refuse it.

The Admiral let her subs get to work loading all the cargo and tying the net—they knew how to do it quickly. They had to, since every time the basket hit the surface it summoned every deepfish for leagues. The song and dance was always the same: unload everything quickly and then run away. Let the deepfish gnaw on the Chain for a while, they never got far into it. They’d grow bored after an hour or two and another drop could be made.

Activating her air jets, the Admiral jumped from the Algol to the basket. She trotted up to the tank as the two mini-subs dropped the first cargo crate onto the metal mesh. The tank itself had four wheels on the bottom though they were useless at the moment since each one was tied to the basket to keep it from rolling in the turbulent loading procedure. Glass lined four sides, with a metal floor and an industrial strength lid with a pressure valve on it. Luckily, the tank was already open, so the Admiral didn’t have to mess with the annoyingly rusty hinges these things tended to have.

“Say hello to your new home!” Sparkler chirped, gesturing at the tank with both of her hooves.

Rook looked at her with an unimpressed glare.

Sparkler pointed at the tank, pointed up, and then proceeded to grab her throat to mimic choking.

Rook nodded, a hoof to her chin. Slowly, she began to circle the tank, examining it. Eventually, she stopped at the hinges of the lid. Glaring at it, she bared her teeth.

Sparkler and the Admiral reached for their weapons when Rook lunged but she didn’t go for either of them. Instead, with two quick bites she broke the hinges on the lid, removing the potential to seal her within the tank. Upon completing her mission she spat out a few shards of metal and climbed into the tank with an innocent smile.

“...I guess she wants to go up on her own terms,” the Admiral noted.

“She does realize she’s still stuck in that tank while we’re up there, right?”

“Probably. Maybe she just doesn’t like the idea of being literally sealed in a box.”

Sparkler shrugged. “Weird.”

The Admiral found herself wishing an exasperated glare could be given through the suits.

The second cargo hold was deposited onto the basket and the netted wreck had finally finished being tied. As they waited for the last hold, the Admiral looked up to where the Chain vanished. The surface of the ocean. She hadn’t been above water since Leviathan Wakes, and before that the Algol had been in the depths for over a week. It would be nice to finally see some sunshine. She’d remove this stupid helmet and absorb the rays with her face.

In the midst of her daydreams, the third cargo hold was deposited on the basket. Immediately, the Algol’s engines activated and turned away, ready to play chicken with some deepfish. A few seconds later, the cage lurched and began to rise. The Admiral and Sparkler stood firm to the sides of the tank while Rook looked up with awe.

With an almost deafening cascade, the basket lifted out of the ocean dripping waterfalls onto the waves below. The sun shone down upon the endless sea, reflecting in Rook’s eyes.

She wore one of the biggest smiles the Admiral had ever seen on anypony.

I’m starting to think of her as a pony…

Slowly shaking her head, the Admiral reached her hooves to her helmet and twisted it to the side. Without the pressure of water on it, the seal around her neck popped with ease. She gently exposed her head to the air outside and breathed in. Unlike the stormy smog of Leviathan Wakes, the calm air out here smelled fresh. A good, long breath filled her lungs with cool, clean air and her nose with the smell of a calm sea.

It was a normal day with nothing to look at aside from the chains leading up into a cloud far above, but that didn’t matter. It wasn’t under the water and it was calm. That was all that mattered.

As soon as the basket was completely free of the water, it started rising faster, no longer pacing itself to escape the clutches of the ocean. What had once been a painfully slow motion gathered speed. Even with three boxes and a shipwreck tied to the basket it still wasn’t at full capacity, so the acceleration continued for quite some time.

Still, their destination was an absurd distance above them. They would not arrive for several minutes.

Rook tapped on the glass to get their attention. With a sigh, the Admiral ended her enjoyment of the open air and turned to the tank, more than a little surprised to see her head out of the water. “...I thought she couldn’t breathe?”

Rook shook her head, pointing at the gills on her neck below the water.

Sparkler gawked. “You… you can understand us!?”

She nodded in confirmation, winking at them.

“Can you talk?”

Rook frowned and shook her head. Opening her mouth she made a scratchy gurgling noise and shrugged.

“So… do you have a name?” the Admiral asked.

Rook nodded.

“Is it Rook?”

With a roll of her eyes, she shook her head.

“Have any way to tell us what it actually is?”

The seapony seemed stumped by this.

“Then you’re Rook until you think of something.”

The newly re-christened Rook folded her hooves in indignation and stuck out her forked tongue, reminding the Admiral that she was still talking to a monster. ...A monster that stuck out its tongue like some child.

This raised so many questions she wasn't sure she wanted the answer to.

Rook tapped on the glass again.

“What?”

She pointed up and cocked her head, asking a question.

“Sanctaphrax is up there. Smart ponies. They’ll know more than me.”

Rook rotated her hoof, quirking an eyebrow.

“And then we’ll go wherever you were leading us, yes, that’s the plan.”

“Oh, what’re you leading us to?” Sparkler asked.

After a particularly splashy facehoof, Rook pointed at her mouth.

“Right, so we’re going to have to play something like twenty questions. Is it treasure?”

Rook thought about this for a moment before nodding slowly.

“Yes!”

“There’s more than just treasure,” the Admiral commented. “Right?”

Rook confirmed this.

The Admiral narrowed her eyes. “Danger?”

Rook nodded slowly, biting her lip nervously. For a moment, a twisted expression of rage crossed her face. The Admiral was concerned for a moment, but all Rook did was angrily point at herself and flick her tail aggressively at apparently nothing. The rage faded shortly afterward, replaced with an aura of exasperation.

“You have arguments with yourself too, huh?” Sparkler asked. “Real annoying when you know what your best points are, isn’t it?”

Rook stared at the unicorn like she was the strangest thing the seapony had ever encountered.

“Not even the monsters of the deep appreciate me…” Sparkler put a hoof to her head and faked a swoon.

At this point the cage entered the cloud, surrounding all of them in fog. This visit through the puffy white area of the sky was brief, for the basket was moving along at a brisk pace now. Surfacing out of the cloud was a lot less dramatic than rising from the water, but it gave way to far more interesting sights for those riding.

Floating above them was a massive rock, the chain anchored to its narrow bottom. Since they were directly under the island, it was impossible to see what structures were built atop aside from the two massive airship docks that jutted out from opposite sides like comically undersized wings. This was not to say they couldn’t see anything on the rock. Where the chain affixed, there was a massive ball of chrome with a donut-shaped hole for the basket itself to slide into. Next to this was a complex series of pipes that snaked all the way up the island, used to pump air to the higher elevations where it was needed.

This was Sanctaphrax, island of the academics.

With a whoosh of air, the basket lifted into Sanctaphrax. Gone was the sun, sky, and sea—now replaced with a harsh metal rod in the center and rocky earth on the outer edge. The basket started to slow as it neared its final destination, decelerating smoothly until it came to a gentle rest somewhere deep within the rock.

Six massive reels billowed nebulous clouds of steam, releasing all the pressure they had used in the process of winding up the lengthy chains. They hadn’t seemed like too much while the basket was lifting, but spooled up they took up more than twice the space of the basket itself. Between these spools were metal walkways, each of which led into a different cave system within the island. Ponies stood at all six of these points, waiting for the stability of the basket to be confirmed. The moment it was, six planks flopped onto the basket and the ponies flooded onto it, beginning the long and slow process of unloading everything.

“It seems you’ve brought something unique back with you.”

Recognizing the voice, the Admiral was more than a little surprised to be receiving attention from so high up so quickly. Turning, she bowed her head slightly. “High Academe Iota, what brings you to the basket?”

Iota was a middle-aged mare of an unnaturally green color that screamed life and energy; traits that were completely absent from her blank, spectacled expression and wrinkled face. She had no mane or tail to speak of. The Admiral had no idea why this was. She never asked.

“An opening in the schedule, nothing more,” Iota said, turning her attention to Rook. “What’s unusual about this one besides the color?”

Rook waved and winked.

“Communication and higher intelligence. Unheard of. Good catch. Taking her to Vespid?”

“As soon as possible,” the Admiral said. “She knows the location of something.”

“What?”

“She can’t talk, we don’t know. Part of it could be understood as treasure. Barring unusual circumstances, I’ll be taking the Algol to investigate on my next outing.”

Iota nodded slowly. “Granted. Tell Vespid she cannot perform invasive experiments, no matter how much she thinks she may gain from it. I task you with uncovering the mysteries of this seapony myself.” Iota fixed the Admiral with a stern glare. “That is what you wish to extort from me, yes?”

The Admiral had to force a smile. “You see right through me, as always.”

Iota nodded slowly. “You are fortunate that your desires seem reasonable. My previous statements still stand. Before you take her, however, I wish to see what you’ve brought besides raw materials.”

“Sparkler?” the Admiral asked.

“On it!” Sparkler bounced away to the cargo hold labelled three and popped open one of the smaller doors. She took two long black cases out of the compartment with her mane and trotted back to Iota and the Admiral. “Here you are!”

The Admiral opened the latches on the first case, revealing it to be filled with nothing but unicorn horns, most of which were in excellent condition. “Found a town filled with them,” the Admiral explained. “There’s more than just this case, though these are of the best quality.”

Rook stared at the disembodied horns. Not in fear, but in thoughtful fascination.

“Excellent,” Iota said, her voice remaining emotionless. “The other?”

Sparkler popped the latches on this one, pulling it open with her mane. It wasn’t full like the last case, but what was inside more than made up for the lost space: three bright rubies that glittered with unnatural fires inside.

“We have no idea what these are,” the Admiral admitted. “But they’re magic, and strong at that.”

“Leyline will be most appreciative. Did you fail to procure any of the items we requested?”

“Only the eye of the golden deepfish that Bonzai asked for.”

Sparkler coughed. “Let’s be real, we were never getting that.”

Iota nodded. “Good work. Your payment will be with you tomorrow morning when you are ready to return to your ship. Enjoy your stay in the meantime.”

“Thank you, High Academe,” the Admiral said. “Vespid awaits.”

Iota dismissed them with a noninterested wave of her hoof.

Sparkler carefully removed the latches keeping Rook’s tank rooted to the basket. Using her hair to get a grip on every square inch of one of the sides, she carefully rolled the tank up a ramp and into Sanctaphrax proper. Some of the water sloshed out, but nowhere near enough to cause Rook any concern.

“Time to ride another basket!” Sparkler giggled, pointing at the elevator shaft. “Isn’t that exciting, Rook?”

Rook let out a bubbly sigh as her tank was carted into a small basket large enough for maybe six ponies. The doors closed and they began to rise toward the surface of Sanctaphrax.

V - As the Schools Research

If there was anything Sparkler loved about Sanctaphrax, it was how ridiculous it looked.

From afar, it could have been mistaken for a palace. For whatever reason, the original architects had decided “towers are awesome” and built every major structure as tall stone pillars that rose into the sky, coming to bright pointed tips or domes depending on the mood at the time of construction. These tips were almost always wider than the towers supporting them, giving them a feeling not unlike heads on a pin. This image of Sanctaphrax proper was eccentric, to be sure, but not ridiculous.

The ridiculousness came upon taking a closer look.

Because Sanctaphrax was at an exceedingly high elevation, air had to be pumped from below to ensure ponies had enough oxygen to go about their daily lives. It was safe to go outside for a short time, sure, but extended periods would result in suffocation, not to mention sunburn. However, the oh-so-wise academics of Sanctaphrax had decided the short amount of time it took to walk from tower to tower in thin air was unacceptable.

The solution?

Create glass tubes with color-coded stripes for ponies to walk in. Who needed to go outside? Just waltz through the glass tunnels, get some sun through the UV-blocking walls, and arrive at your destination without getting cold, running out of breath, or dealing with windy weather. Snow wasn’t a problem either, since the tubes were heated just like everywhere else and the white fluff could never build up.

The tubes were once confined to the ground where they didn’t interfere with the skyline; or so Sparkler had been told. When she first set hoof on Sanctaphrax all those years ago the tubes were already snaking through the sky in erratic patterns, sometimes coming together in small glass hub rooms, other times twisting around each other in a ridiculous attempt not to interfere with any other walkways. What resulted was a maze of endless glass with stripes of color that might once have looked ingenious but now appeared more like a foal had thrown color into a drawing randomly by smacking a crayon around in the blank spaces.

When the elevator rose to the surface, arriving in one of the ground-level tube nexuses, Sparkler turned to Rook with a grin. “So. Honest opinion, how does it look?”

Rook’s expression of wonder quickly turned to one of confusion and bafflement. The question “why?” was evident on her features.

Sparkler chuckled. “I’m telling you, it’s ridiculous.”

“It’s the way of the future,” the Admiral asserted, as she always did. “You won’t find this anywhere else.”

“Yeah, because it’s ridiculous!”

Rook pointed at Sparkler.

“Me? Ridiculous? Psh.”

Rook turned away from Sparkler dismissively. With a shrug, Sparkler pressed her copious mane onto the tank and started pushing. She followed the Admiral carefully through the tubes. Not that she needed any help figuring out where to go; at this point she knew Sanctaphrax’s lower tunnels like the back of her hoof. However, the Admiral was the boss, and she always lead. Sparkler didn’t mind—it was just how their dynamic worked.

They went right for the School of Medicine, a set of four massive towers tinged with the green of their school. Only one of the towers was topped with the proper vibrant green—the others were in different states of fading. This high up, the sun did a number on the paint and it had to be reapplied every so often. At one point, all the towers were painted at the same time, but as the years dragged on drift occured and now a tower was only painted when it was blanche white, creating a gradient effect.

The three of them entered the tallest tower, the Main Medicine Offices.

A crowd of medical students were expected to go into a bit of a frenzy over seeing a normal seapony dragged into their School. A seapony that waved back only heightened their reactions from fascinated to ecstatic.

“What is that thing?”

“Admiral’s really outdone herself this time!”

“How does it maintain mental cohesion down there?”

“The eyes aren’t blank, but the clots are evident…”

“Where did you find this beauty?”

“I see she’s brought another monster in for company.”

Sparkler winced at the jab to the Admiral’s race. She knew the Admiral sucked the attention—good or bad—up like one of the vampires of legend, but it still grated against Sparkler like a piece of splintery wood tangled in her hair. Out of respect for the Admiral, she didn’t shout out a biting remark. She did shoot the heckler a death glare, though, and that got him to shut up.

Parting the crowd with a hoof, the Admiral guided them to the lift. It was considerably nicer in appearance than the rickety wireframe thing that had brought them to Sanctaphrax’s surface, being made of smooth metal etched with elegant ponies. Sparkler rolled her eyes at the frivolity. She swore School of Arts only existed to make the others look good.

The Admiral pressed the second-to-highest button and waited. Through the ceiling, they could hear a muffled hiss of steam as the mechanisms pressurized.

Sparkler giggled and winked at Rook. “Hang on.”

Rook cocked her head just in time to get smashed into the floor of her tank as the lift rocketed to the highest part of the tower. Sparkler and the Admiral both winced as the pressure on their legs increased threefold, but they maintained composure.

The lift was merciful; it came to a stop slowly, letting out a soft ding as Rook rubbed her head in annoyance.

“I love this elevator,” Sparkler giggled. “The day they fix it there will be less beauty in the world…”

The Admiral gestured at the frivolous designs on the lift.

“That’s just mass produced decorum for ponies in fancy hats!” Sparkler huffed. “Real beauty doesn’t come from a factory… Real beauty comes when the factory messes up!”

“So progress isn’t beautiful then?”

“Uuuuugh, why do you have to be so literal-minded all the time? Look. There’s… spirit in this little lift.” She wheeled Rook out as she ranted. “But these little pony designs… there’s no beauty here. Maybe the first one had spirit, but they’re in all the lifts! That’s not progress, that’s stagnation, or… something.” She twirled some of her hair in the air. “But I don’t really know what I’m talking about. It’s not like I took any classes or anything.”

“But the idea of works of art having spirit is a curious one,” a new voice said. Standing before them was a middle-aged pegasus mare with a dull yellow coat and dark green mane streaked with pink. “And I would love to discuss the implications of such at a later time. Or, well, I would discuss it now, except you seem to have brought me the most beautiful creature I’ve ever seen!”

Rook waved nervously.

“Oh, and it communicates! Fascinating!”

“Her name’s Rook,” Sparkler offered.

“Hell-o Rook!” she said with a pitch that wavered so much it might as well have come from two different ponies. “I am Dean Vespid Pin of the School of Medicine, and I can’t wait to learn more about you!”

Rook glanced nervously at the Admiral. Coughing, the Admiral tapped Vespid on the shoulder. “Iota’s ordered you to not cut her into slices of bread. We need her alive to lead us to a location at the bottom of the ocean.”

Vespid’s left eye twitched ever so slightly. “Well… yes, I suppose Iota would have doubts about my ability to maintain this specimen’s health. It’s not like it’s my job or anything.” She flared her wings, no doubt wishing to impress upon her visitors that her surgeon’s feathers were up to any sort of complex task. While they were no doubt impressive and meticulously cared for, Sparkler had grown tired of Vespid’s pride in her profession ages ago.

“But nonetheless I shall listen to our High Academe’s wishes. A standard pony checkup will do - and yes, that will involve drawing blood and you all can shut up. If Rook here’s squeamish that is not my fault.”

Rook looked scared for a moment, but her face quickly became overcome with a twisted anger.

Vespid rolled her eyes. “I see numerous lacerations on your person, tears in your fins, and scars from bites. Suck it up and get pricked by a needle that won’t cause any lasting damage.”

Rook glared at her. She bared her sharp fangs, rising out of the water aggressively.

“Not so safe after a—”

Rook bit down on her own hoof, drawing viscous, red-black blood on her own terms. She shoved the hoof in Vespid’s direction, dousing the dean’s face in the substance.

Using a hoof—because Princesses forbid she get her precious wings sullied—she wiped her eyes clear. “Not completely mentally stable. However, I appreciate the spirit! This sample will do nicely.” She smirked. “Thank you.”

Even Sparkler could hear the venom in that voice. She made a note not to leave Rook alone in the same room as Vespid. Rook got the same idea, given the glance she shot Sparkler.

“I’ve gotcha, don’t worry,” Sparkler said.

“Vespid, checkup?” the Admiral asked.

“Right, right. To my terrarium!” She trotted down the nondescript hall until she arrived at a large door at the far end. Pushing it open, she led them into a large, semicircular room with a wall made entirely of glass and trees growing within. Only about half the trees were green; others were purple, orange, or slowly shifted colors. There were plants in here Sparkler had never seen anywhere else. A truly royal garden.

Contrasting this peaceful image were numerous cages and tanks filled with angry - and sometimes dead - creatures. There were at least four normal seaponies. Their flesh was all torn, their eyes blank white, and their muscles so ragged they looked like they might fall off. Monsters, pure and simple.

Rook shared some features with them: the blood under the eyes, the fins, the tail, and the sharp teeth. While she may have been scarred, she didn’t look ready to fall apart in a decaying mess like her fellow sea-creatures.

Vespid reached into a wall and pulled out a vial, holding it out to collect some of Rook’s blood drip. “So, she’s got somewhere to lead you, does she?”

“Yep!” Sparkler confirmed, taking a moment to tap the glass in front of the seaponies. The one that responded broke a tooth trying to bite through the reinforced wall.

“Somewhere further south,” the Admiral explained. “Treasure and something else. She can’t talk, so we aren’t sure what else is there.”

Vespid stood up on her hind legs so she could get her front hooves in Rook’s tank. “But she can communicate clearly, which is unheard of for wyrded beings…” Vespid pressed her hoof to Rook’s leg, feeling an active pulse. “Actually, it might be possible for her to prove my theories! Tell me, Rook, were you always a seapony?”

Rook shook her head.

“Were you a pony before?”

Rook nodded.

Vespid clapped her hooves. “Great! Great. Oh, but you’re not a normal seapony, it may not apply to them…” Thinking for a moment, the doctor pointed at one of the caged seaponies. “Did they used to be ponies?”

For a moment, Rook pondered this. Then, with a shrug, she nodded.

“Absolute confirmation of the existence of the corrupting wyrd influence. Yes!” She pulled a notebook off of a nearby wall and started scribbling in it furiously with one of her oh-so-agile wings. “They’ll have to give the theory some credence now, and real, proper research can begin…”

“What are you gonna do? Cure them?” Sparkler jived.

“Hah! Stars above, no, even if it were possible to remove the corruption the psychological damage is irreversible, and there’d be the annoying addition of having to treat the subject as a pony afterward, which severely limits progress.”

Sparkler shrugged.

“The point is, it’s knowledge. If we can isolate the pathogen that causes it…”

“It’s probably magic,” the Admiral pointed out.

“Then I’ll bring Leyline in on it, once I confirm that,” Vespid huffed. “Really… open your mouth, please.”

With a roll of her eyes Rook opened her mouth and allowed Vespid to put the popsicle stick on her tongue.

“So, what do you make of her?” the Admiral asked.

“Well, she’s either resistant to wyrdness or developed the equivalent of a mutated strain.” Vespid flashed a light into Rook’s eyes, blinding her temporarily. “Either way, she didn’t develop to the final stage. Or… I suppose she could be a recent patient.”

Rook shook her head.

“Live in Old Equestria, did you?”

With a smug, toothy smirk, Rook leaned in and nodded in confirmation.

“Fascinating… I’ll need to corroborate that somehow with the School of History at a later date. The chances of two sets of Old Equestrian minds surfacing at nearly the same time… Have you heard of the relics unearthed in Canterlot recently? Apparently there’s a unicorn who c-”

“We have Rook,” the Admiral interrupted. “There is literally no reason to go track any others down.”

Sparkler looked to the Admiral, a frown on her face. Are you really going to sideline Rook just because she’s from the past?

“Still, rumors are interesting,” Vespid said as she checked Rook’s ears. “She’s definitely got partial wyrdness, and I suspect she has some psychological disorder, but without further study there’s no way I could determine if that’s from the wyrdness or just being alone at the bottom of the ocean for a thousand years.”

Rook shrugged.

“If she were a normal pony I’d say the only concerning thing about her physical health is the blood under her eyes.”

“And the fins,” Sparkler pointed out.

“There were natural seaponies before the world flooded. We’ve found skeletons.”

Sparkler facehooved.

“Regardless, I’d like to keep her for observation overnight,” Vespid said, returning to her wall cabinet.

“I’m staying with her,” Sparkler said.

For a moment, Vespid’s smile was replaced with a scowl barely visible in the reflection of Rook’s tank. “Ah, well, unnecessary, but I doubt I can talk you out of it.” Vespid put a surgical glove over her wing and trotted over to a tank with a dead seapony in it. She plunged her wings expertly into the seapony’s exposed chest cavity and removed a small, blue crystal from it. “Silver, the reports on seapony decomposition are put on hold for now. We’re going to be watching this ‘Rook’ now.” She tossed the crystal ball to Rook. “There you go, have a toy.”

Rook poked it with a raised eyebrow.

“It just looks at you. Nothing else. Silver calls them ‘eyes’ anyway, so you might as well think of it like one.”

The Admiral turned to Sparkler. “You’ll be fine here?”

Sparkler smiled. “I mean, don’t abandon me forever, send one of Brusk’s kids to relieve me so I can sleep. Otherwise, I’m good.”

“Then have fun and keep the two of them out of trouble.”

Vespid snorted. “I’ll be keeping miss mane-iac under control if I know her…”

“Ooooh, such a creative nickname,” Sparkler snorted. “Did you get it off the school playground?”

“How could I? You never attended.”

Rook made a sound with her mouth that sounded vaguely like sizzling.

“Et tu, Rook?” Sparkler whined, faking a swoon.

Rook shrugged while Vespid let out a terse sigh. The Admiral, rolling her eyes, left the three of them to whatever annoying antics they might get up to.

Who was Sparkler kidding? Would get up to.

The Admiral’s last stop of the day arguably didn’t even take place during the day. This was intentional, on her part. For as much as she had rebelled from her nocturnal instincts, her favorite part of the world was hidden from sight by the glory of the sun. Only when the fiery master of the heavens dipped beneath the waves far below did the stars peek out from the blue shroud of sky. Only when darkness descended could the real beauty of the universe be seen.

Even though Sanctaphrax was well-developed and heavily industrialized, there wasn’t much in the way of artificial light to distract from the stars. The stars needed to be studied by many of the professors, after all, and light pollution wouldn’t do the School of Navigation any favors.

Speaking of which, that was where the Admiral was headed; walking through one of the highest tubes in Sanctaphrax to the Tower of Navigation. The School only had the one black-tipped tower, but it was taller than most of the others and outfitted with numerous windows. No doubt dozens of them had ponies looking out at the stars, charting maps, and taking careful notes on what the sky told them.

This was her destination, but it was not what drew the Admiral’s gaze. In this darkness, the glass around her might as well have been invisible. She was floating in the air with the stars above and the ground far, far below. If she spread her wings she could almost feel the wind whipping in her mane…

The time will come, she told herself. Patience.

Eventually, the black tip of the School of Navigation eclipsed the sky, bringing her focus back into the present moment. Entering through the highest door, she found herself in the main observatory. Extremely smooth glass lined the edges of the walls, each segment designed so that it could fold out to accommodate the excessive size of the massive telescope.

Speaking of, the device took up the majority of the room. Currently, only its tip was sticking out one of the windows, examining something only a short way above the horizon. The bulky lens took up the majority of the telescope’s front face, narrowing slightly as the encasing dark metal tube reached the telescope’s base. This base was anchored to the floor on a rotating track that allowed it to point in any direction. There was a mechanism beneath even that which could push the telescope all but out of the observatory entirely, allowing it to angle nearly straight upward, though the Admiral had only seen that done once.

In the center of the telescope was a seat, one occupied by a black, elderly earth pony stallion with unkempt white hair and an impressive, wiry mustache. He wore a thick white coat, which was to be expected given the altitude, and a small oxygen mask rested on his muzzle to counteract the thin air. The Admiral glanced at a pile of masks near the entrance but decided she wasn’t going to stay long enough to need one.

Littered around the edges of the observatory were various star charts, diagrams, and even a clockwork model of the world with the sun and moon around it not unlike the one in Algol’s Shadow. The Admiral passed a fresh diagram showing the orbits of the sun and moon that commented on day shift.

The black stallion noticed her before she spoke. Immediately, he popped the mask off his face and grinned widely. “Admiral!” he greeted with a voice full of energy, though it also scratched with age. “Welcome back!”

The Admiral shot him a genuine smile. “Been a while, Meteor.”

“Oh, it has, it has! Please, please, you simply must look at Ensa, it’s absolutely brilliant tonight.” He pushed her into the chair, all but smashing her eye into the tiny lens at the tip of the telescope.

Focusing, the Admiral was able to make out a soft-blue crescent shape in the center of the view with a small blue ring around it. “We must be at the perfect angle.”

“We are! In a few minutes the sun will move behind Equis and we’ll lose it. You really did come at the best time!”

“Learn anything knew about it?”

“Distance calculations are proving difficult without cooperation from the Baltimare Observatory, but I think I can use the rate of solar dissipation and relate it to the diameter of Equis to get a rough idea. It would help if we had a better estimate for Equis’ diameter…”

“You should get back to observing, then,” the Admiral said, jumping out of the chair and shoving Meteor back in much the same way she had been. “Who knows, you might miss something incredible!”

“Yes, yes…” Meteor chuckled, returning to his examinations. “Tell me, Admiral, how goes the quest?”

“For you? Found a store of ancient oil already packaged. The Chemists should be cooking it into kerosene for you as we speak.”

“Absolutely excellent! That should be the last of that we need. I trust it wasn't too difficult to get?”

“Granite blew up the foundry.”

Meteor let out a sigh. “Wasted materials… the secrets to large scale manufacturing could have been there.”

“We can rediscover that on our own,” the Admiral said with a smile. “After all, we’re doing something they never did.”

The Admiral strolled to one of the windows, looking down at the edge of Sanctaphrax. Near the western dock, on a patch of rock without any complex towers, there was a flat octagon of shaped metal. Littered around the edges were several small, metallic spikes with fins at the bottom. One of these silver objects stood in the center of the pad, pointing at the sky.

“How long until you test that one?” the Admiral asked.

“As soon as the sunlight fades from these rings,” Meteor said, squinting his eyes. “Which… it’s doing right now. Excuse me for a second, I have to get the timing down…”

He was silent for a moment as he scrawled a note with a pen. During this, the Admiral looked up slightly and blinked in confusion. There was what appeared to be a flat barge made of haphazardly slapped together materials floating out a short distance from Sanctaphrax, held aloft by propellers of all things. That had to be impractical. Then again, the Algol’s Shadow wasn’t exactly practical, either, so she supposed she couldn’t complain too much.

“I see you found Bonzai’s latest project,” Meteor said, having finished his notes. “The emergency platform, he calls it.”

“Why?”

“Paranoia, I suppose. An island fell into the sea recently, as I’m sure you’re aware, and the brightest minds are thinking of what to do if Sanctaphrax starts to drift down. That platform is Bonzai’s idea. The only other one that’s getting any traction is the expansion of the Cloud Loft. Hired a gifted pegasus to do nothing but fuse stone into clouds all day long. I’m surprised the fellow’s putting up with it.”

The Admiral grinned. “Before too long he’ll be making insulting cloud statues of the High Academe. She won’t be able to do anything to them.”

“Oh, if you get clever enough, anything can be destroyed,” Meteor chuckled.

“...Is our project safe?”

“Nopony has any reason to interfere. The worst that happens is we explode and destroy the launchpad. We have most of the materials; all that remains is some processing and last minute work before the big day.”

“Assuming it works. I remember last time.”

Meteor smirked. “Well… allow me to demonstrate.” He jumped over to a small radio in the floor and pressed a button. “Experiment R-17, begin.”

The spike in the center of the platform began to tremble. Had they been at the launchpad itself, they would have been witness to a countdown, but up here they got no such thing. They watched with anticipation as the experiment trembled, spurted some smoke… and then finally unleashed an immense burst of fire that pushed it into the air. Gaining speed alarmingly quickly, the pointed device itself was soon lost in the sparkling fire as it rose higher and higher into the sky - until it looked like the reverse of a shooting star, the noxious smoke trail all but vanishing in the dark night.

The Admiral narrowed her eyes. She had seen the devices last this long before, but, invariably, around this point they would explode and shower the sea below in fiery shrapnel. Time and time again Meteor’s precious work would be reduced to nothing.

This time, however, it was different. No explosion came. Instead, The Admiral was able to watch as the streak of fire became a curve that, minutes later, ran out of fuel and fizzled out—but it hadn’t exploded.

“A success!” The Admiral said, bouncing onto the tips of her hooves.

“Third one, actually. Got a few off while you weren't here. I’ll need to test a few more, naturally, just to be certain - but I think I’ve got the final design now! The Engineers are already machining the parts, I’ve got all the control mechanisms…”

The Admiral noticed he was trailing off. “What are you missing?”

Meteor sighed. “Silver’s not convinced he should give up one of his eyes for this. After all, if we succeed… it’s going to be stuck forever. He doesn’t think it’s worth it…”

“I’ll convince him,” the Admiral said. “I’ve got some time tomorrow morning before I head off. He’ll give up his eye one way or another.”

“Don’t be too rough with him, now.”

“This is the future of ponykind here, I’ll be as rough as I want. If we pull this off we’ll prove that we can take what the ancients couldn’t—the stars themselves. We’ll finish this rocket and we can finally turn all this nonsense around. A stingy stallion’s magic isn’t going to get in the way of that. If I need to I’ll call in…” she licked her lips. “Favors.”

Meteor nodded. “Only if you absolutely need to, you understand.”

“Naturally.”

“...Admiral, I do want to thank you for all you’ve done. Before you arrived, astronomy was a joke.”

The Admiral gave him a smug smile. “Just get us up there and that’s all the thanks I’ll ever need.”

“Oh, I will!” Meteor chuckled. “If it kills me, I’ll get this done…”

“The world will turn to the stars instead of the sea.” The Admiral tapped her hoof excitedly as the prospect danced in her mind.

Meteor tore his gaze from the window, turning to some paper with orbital sketches. “Speaking of the sea, anything of interest this time around?”

“A seapony that apparently wants to be our friend or something.”

Meteor stared at her.

“I’m serious. I’m still not sure what to make of her.”

“Well… I’d like to meet this seapony before you leave. Sounds like a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.”

“I’m sure Rook would appreciate you.”

“She has a name!?”

VI - As Silver Stares

When the Admiral returned to Vespid’s office she was surprised to find Sparkler still there, chatting with a very bored looking Rook.

“...and she never removes that hat! Can you believe it?”

Rook glanced at the Admiral and smirked.

“See? You get it. You understand me, Rook. You have got to go diving with us sometime. I’ll have to think of some excuse to get out with Granite’s boys…”

“All you have to do is ask,” the Admiral said, tapping Sparkler on the back with a wingtip. Her massive mane stood on end and she jumped back, hiding behind Rook’s tank.

“S—you scared me!” Sparkler put a hoof to her chest, breathing slowly.

“Also, the hat is amazing.”

Sparkler groaned. “Sometimes I forget that you do know how to sneak…”

“There’s moments where it helps.” She took a moment to adjust her cap. “So, I thought I had one of the students relieve you?”

“You did, I just got back early because. Well. Rook!” Sparkler gestured at the seapony’s tank. “She gets me, y’see? I talk a lot, she doesn’t talk at all. Match made in the stars!”

The Admiral looked at the disgruntled seapony. “It would be even harder to get her up there with all the water…”

“Not like we have to worry about that or anything. Your little experiments aren’t getting ponies up there anytime soon.”

“You don’t have to worry,” the Admiral smirked. “Rook and I, though…”

Sparkler rolled her eyes. “Speaking of the stars… I hear I missed a rocket launch that didn’t explode?”

“You would have been bored. They’re more interesting when they blow up.”

“But… rocket!”

Rook tapped on the glass, making sure the two of them knew she was confused.

The Admiral cleared her throat, entering the well-known ‘lecture mode.’ “A rocket is a machine that uses explosive materials to fly through the air, leaving the world behind and entering the realm of the stars.”

Rook’s eyes widened, sparkling slightly at the edges.

“I think she’d like to hear the speech,” Sparkler said, nudging the Admiral carefully.

Tilting her hat up, the Admiral’s eyes lit up with childlike wonder. “In our current world, we are fixated on the past. We spend all our resources trying to reclaim what Old Equestria once had, diving beneath the waves to pick up remnants of a failed civilization. I understand it’s needed, but it has also brought a curse into the minds of our current generation. Ponykind, as a race, thinks only in terms of what is and what was. We don’t give the slightest pittance to what will be.”

She trotted to one of the windows of Vespid’s lab, pointing at the rising sun. In the sky around it were a few sparkling airships. “Even here, in the learned isle of Sanctaphrax, we don’t realize what we’ve done. Old Equestria didn’t have advanced airships, steam engines, or any complex manufactured industry! Yet we fixate on Medicine, Navigation, and History to bring society ‘back’. Bah. We already have society. We don’t need them anymore. We need to do something that’s truly us, to break beyond everything the past ever conceived of doing.”

Jumping on top of a crate of leaf samples, she pointed to the sky with her wing. “And to that end, we are going to launch something so high into the sky that there is no air. With so much force that it won’t fall back down. A new era that turns away from the ocean and toward the stars.” She grinned, pressing her face into Rook’s tank. “You in?”

Rook nodded quickly, jaw hanging open in awe.

“Great, you just indoctrinated a seapony into your wild daydreams,” Vespid muttered, walking into her lab. “She’d be much more useful as a subject of study than stuck with that sub of yours.”

The Admiral frowned, deciding it was best to just get to business. “Have you learned anything new?”

“Lots, mostly stuff you wouldn’t care about. I’ve been gathering information to substantiate Rook’s claims and have distilled several interesting chemicals in her blood. She is from Old Equestria, knows the names of all the major cities we know about. Even knew what Griffonstone was, bizarrely enough. How she knows that and yet was never taught to write is beyond me…” Vespid shook her head. “She’s an intriguing little mystery and I can’t wait to see what she brings back. I call dibs on any others like her.”

“Dibs? Really?” Sparkler groaned.

“Consider it my mission to you. If you see a sensible Wyrd, you’re bringing it back. The sooner, the better, so shoo.”

“We’re stopping by Silver’s first,” the Admiral said.

“Fine, fine, just get on with it, hmm?” Already she was bored of them and driving needles into a seapony carcass for some presumably scientific purpose. They left without another word.

Silver’s abode wasn’t far from the School of Medicine. One elevator ride later they were at Sanctaphrax’s surface. This time there were fewer ponies in the lobby interested to see Rook, but the moment they left the School they were mobbed by students of every school.

“Ugh, he must have blabbed,” Sparkler muttered. “Maybe I should have stayed there all night…”

“I need you awake.”

“For what? We’re just taking care of this and going back to the Algol! I could have slept it off in my cot.”

“We both know you don’t use the cot.”

“‘Scuuuse me if a’ don’ say ‘hair-hammock’ in public!”

The clamoring crowd stopped talking to stare at her in concern.

“Oi! Back off!” She shaped her hair into a fist. “Any o’ you wanna piece o’ me? Ay’ll show ya some real hair-hammocks if yer so curious!”

The students collectively took a step back.

At this point Sparkler realized her accent had slipped and was blushing furiously. Clearing her throat, she lowered her hair-first. “We need passage to Silver’s. Clear the way?”

The herd decided it was a good idea to listen to her request, parting to allow them passage through one of the main tubes. This did not stop them from getting as close as possible to stare at Rook, but they weren’t impeding their progress anymore.

Rook bared her fangs at them, but this did not have the desired fearmongering effect. If anything it made them more curious to get a look at her insides.

However, the crowd was gone by the time they arrived at Silver’s. It was no secret that the stallion hated noise and nopony wanted to upset him. His home was one of the few buildings in Sanctaphrax that wasn’t a tower; little more than a circular stone house with no windows and only one iron door. Somewhat unexpectedly, the door was ajar. Somepony was already visiting Silver.

The Admiral didn’t bother waiting for whoever it was to be done. She waltzed right in, gesturing for Sparkler to bring Rook in as well. Despite having no windows, the interior was well lit with an eerie, unnatural blue aura. It was a mess with massive rolls of paper everywhere—the walls, the shelves, the floor, even coiled up into rolls and wads in random places. Virtually every inch of the paper had some sort of intricate, lifelike illustration on it. A few images of Rook could be picked out alongside the inside organic structure of a dead seapony, several leaves, some careful gear-mesh designs, and endless charts and graphs the Admiral couldn’t hope to discern.

There were two ponies in the room.

One was an extremely elderly stallion whose every last hair had turned white, wrinkles invading every inch of his body. Despite this, he gave off an aura of power with his crimson hat and robe literally sparkling with magic and studded with ornate gemstones of a half-dozen colors. One would think he was the last true wizard in the world, and for the most part that assumption was correct.

He was not Silver. His name was Leyline and he ran the nearly defunct sub-School of magic.

Grumbling in annoyance, he left, barely registering the Admiral’s presence. “If we don’t find a new adaptable magic talent, Silver, the practice of spellcraft ends here! Maybe think about expanding your sights!” He stormed out, not waiting for a response.

“I hope he kicks the bucket soon…” Silver breathed. “Almost as much as I hope to get peace and quiet so I may WORK!”

He slammed his brown hooves on his desk as he stood up, facing them. His mane was a soft black, but nopony would notice that first. The fact that he had no eyes was so jarring most ponies became dumbfounded in his presence. Instead of normal ocular organs, two smooth glass spheres took up his sockets, giving a clear window to the inside of his head. Their purpose, to keep two marbles of blue light rolling around in his skull.

The crystal ‘eyes’ jostled around as Silver’s face poked in the Admiral’s direction. “You. The star coot sent you. Ugh, why must I be constantly assaulted by all the pointless—”

The Admiral slammed her hoof on the desk, making Silver jump. “Let me put this simply. We need one of your eyes.”

“You and everypony on the island, mutant sky rat.” To emphasize his point, he produced a small jar filled with a half-dozen of the magic marbles. “You know how this works. I own the spell, you own the fancy experiments that need to be watched all the time.” He pointed at Rook without batting an eye, and then at his own cutie mark. It was hard to see in the blue light, but his mark was three small, blue dots arranged in a triangle. “And then you give my eye back when you’re done.”

“Oooooh, I see the problem,” Sparkler said.

With a shake of his head, the marbles in his skull clattered around. “Of course you do you daft c-”

“What would I have to give you to launch the eye into orbit?” the Admiral interrupted.

“No amount of money. Iota couldn't get me to give it up.” Seemingly thinking the conversation was over, he returned to his pages. With a levitating pen, he began to fill in more details of a fish one of his far-off eyes were presumably watching.

“Do you see this seapony? Of course you do, Vespid used one of your eyes to observe her all night. You know exactly what she is and what she’s doing. I’ll bring you something back from where she’s taking us. Something unique, something that you can have and none of the scientists here.”

“I’ll make the decision when you get back,” Silver huffed, not looking up from his drawings. “It’s going to have to be something really impressive to launch part of me into a star. I can’t make more. I can only see what I see. Being that high up is bound to get boring after a while. So whatever this mysterious ‘super-treasure’ is, it better be legendary.”

“It will,” the Admiral said, glancing back to Rook, who nodded in confirmation. “And then you’ll give us that eye.”

“Let me guess, or else?”

“I’d rather it not come to that.”

“Oh, it won’t. Now get out.”

Before leaving, the Admiral leaned closer to Silver’s ear. “You’d make more history here than anything else you’ve ever done… think about that.” She backpedaled and followed Sparkler out.

“...That guy’s a piece of trash,” Sparkler muttered after the Admiral closed the door behind them.

“Absolutely. But he has the eye spell, and we need a way to get data back from the stars. It’s the only thing that’ll work.”

“He’s got this entire island eating out of his hooves.” Sparkler huffed. “Let’s just get back to the ocean already. I can feel him watching. Yes, I know none of his eyes are here, shut up.”

With a curt nod, the Admiral led them back to the Sanctaphrax cavern, soon to return to the Algol.

VII - As the Islands Float

The Admiral knew it was night. She had just been on Sanctaphrax and had already regained an appreciation for the cycle of day and night. Looking up and out of the Algol’s observation deck, there was nothing but darkness.

Last night she had seen the stars and had watched a machine rise to be with them. No beauty as they traveled through the ocean now. Just darkness.

And Rook. Staring at her. Creepily.

“What do you want?”

Rook pressed her ear to the glass and motioned for the Admiral to repeat herself.

The Admiral waved dismissively. “Doesn’t matter.”

Pressing her hooves to the glass Rook opened her mouth and scraped the outside of the glass, making one of the most shrill noises the Admiral had ever heard.

“Don’t scratch her!” she shouted.

Rook pointed to a much larger and glaring scratch made by a deepfish three months ago when they’d been particularly unlucky. The Admiral’s only response was a huff and a return to staring at the inky blackness outside.

Slowly, Rook drifted back into the Admiral’s field of view.

“What?”

Rook shrugged.

“You don’t know what. Great.”

“She’s just missing her favorite stallion in the whole wide world!” Granite declared, trotting into the observation deck, rolling into a slide he probably thought was suave when, in reality, he looked like he was doing a slug impression.

Rook rolled her eyes, though she pressed her ear to the glass anyway.

“See? She likes me! I’m what she needs to keep her boredom stave-”

With a scowl of rage that came seemingly out of nowhere, Rook swam out of sight.

“Remind me to try hitting on her to get her to go away next time,” the Admiral deadpanned.

“You’re no fun. Either of you.” Granite sagged against the back wall, looking out at the same dark murk as the Admiral. “I bet it was nice, seeing the sun for once.”

“I’m partial to the stars myself, but it was freeing,” the Admiral admitted. “...When was the last time you went to the surface?”

“Lost track at this point. A year?” He chuckled sadly. “It’s always ‘dive this’ or ‘dive that’ and then I don’t really need to go up anywhere. No action in Sanctaphrax, no action in Fellis…” He stretched his wings while he paused. “Maybe I should have gone up in Leviathan Wakes. Probably coulda got something at Jester’s. Ho humm.”

“I can probably get you surfaced next place we stop at.”

“Nah. I wanna get to lil’ Rook’s prize more than anything.”

“Then when we return to Sanctaphrax, remind me to take you up. The Captain doesn’t need you to keep everypony in line like he needs Orange.”

“The Captain keeping us in line? Hah. You’re funny. We all know Orange has us tied up in his web of cold hard logic. The moment he takes his hoof off the knot everything explodes.”

“I ran this ship just fine before he came around, thank you very much.”

“Oh yeah? Then why’d you need me?” The moment the words were out of his mouth he clamped his hooves over his face. “Th-that is to say, uh, well,”

“Whatever you two were about to argue about, we’ve got a situation,” Sparkler said, poking her head into the observation deck. “And by ‘situation’ I mean ‘Baltimate’s finest’.”

“For the love of…” The Admiral let out a sigh. “How far out are they?”

“Far enough we can outrun them. Not far enough to avoid radio contact.”

“Have they found us?”

“Do you hear incoherent babbling on all the public radios? No? Then they haven’t found us y—”

“HEEEEEEEL-LO my sweets!” One of the highest-pitched voices any of them knew screamed through the various radios. “Looky looky looky at the batty’s entourage, in our waters again!”

“...Respond?” Sparkler asked.

“Hell no, that’ll just give her reason to keep talking,” the Admiral muttered.

“Aww, no hello? Nothing at all? Why are you so ru-u-ude?” An exaggerated sniff came from the other end. “And here I am spending my Gift to talk to you! I wouldn’t want any magic to go to waste, would you?”

“Does she do this to everypony, or just us?” Granite asked.

The Admiral sagged. “Everypony, but we’re the only ones she can identify easily.”

“Why don’t you drop by Baltimare? It won’t be that much of a diversion on your… southbound course? My my, Admiral, what have you found? Swimming past the borders of Equestria? Let me check the maps…”

“Can we shoot a torpedo at her? Please!?” Sparkler asked. “Pretty please?”

“Tempting, but no,” the Admiral said.

The annoying rant continued. “...Yeah, nothing down there but Lynx Isle, and that’s a worthless hunk of nothing. Barely large enough to stand on. Planning on some more flying practice, little bat?” She paused, expecting a response.

The Admiral kept her expression as level as possible.

“Well, you certainly seem determined to keep swimming into the abyss. Have fun down there, and do tell me all about it when you get back! Hailing Fog, out!”

After a few seconds of silence, Sparkler let out a groan. “I hate that radio-filly’s guts! Next time I see her I’m gonna wrap her little neck and snap i-”

“Oh, and do tell Sparkler to stop all those filicide fantasies, can’t be healthy.”

“SHE WANTS A PIECE O’ ‘E!” Sparkler shouted. “LEMME AT ‘ER! I’LL DRIVE THESE HAIRS RIGHT THROUGH ‘ER EYE-HOLES I SWEAR BY ME-”

The Admiral let out a shriek right in Sparkler’s ear, stopping her short.

“You’re letting her get to you. That’s what she wants.” The Admiral trotted back to the bridge. “Let’s just try to forget her for now, hmm?”

The next day, Sparkler found something.

She didn’t know what it was, except that it was in the middle of the ocean and teeming with wyrds and kinds of minds she had never before encountered. She had no idea what to make of it.

They’d asked Rook if it was what they were looking for. Rook responded in the negative—their goal was on the seafloor quite a ways further south. She had no idea what this could be.

She had taken it… well when the Admiral had decided to take a slight detour to investigate. Which was to say she had created three new scratches on the observation deck’s glass and growled at nothing for a while before deciding to do a mixture of sulking and pouting on the Algol’s hull.

Algol’s Shadow sped off at a brisk pace through the unchanging sea until it arrived.

Turning on the Algol’s massive main spotlight, they solved Sparkler’s little mystery. They had found an island. One completely submerged and floating in the depths of the ocean. Upon realizing this, the Admiral glanced around at her crew, finding all of them to be wearing similar baffled expressions.

“Orange, let me pick that brain of yours,” the Captain grunted. “You know of every island we’ve discovered, right?”

“Yes,” Orange confirmed.

“Any of them so much as touch the water?”

“Not without artificial measures, such as Sanctaphrax’s, no.”

“Right. So, I know we’re south of all maps at this point, but we are not the first to be down this far. I find it very unlikely that none of the ships that passed through here had some kind of scanning spell or something.”

“Implying those ships are all unlucky…” the Admiral frowned. “Or they never made it back to tell anypony.”

“There are a ton of wyrd on the island,” Sparkler said, wrapping up another ping spell. “Hundreds, though they’re mostly coalesced in the center of the surface.”

“Must be something there…” the Admiral muttered.

“Permission to take Granite’s boys to find out?” Sparkler asked.

“Sure you want that, lass?” The Captain leaned forward in his chair. “Any one of those nasties could bite you in half, and then where would we be?”

“A normal submarine?” Sparkler scoffed. “I’ll be fine. We’ll take a mini-sub and everything!”

The Admiral nodded. “Go ahead. Granite’s in charge, you supervise. Don’t let him charge into the open maws of any giant reptiles.”

Sparkler giggled. “He is never going to live that down.” She jumped to the ladder and slid down to the lower deck.

The Admiral cleared her throat and pressed a button on her desk, leaning in to the radio pick up. “Granite, get two of your boys and Sparkler, you’re taking a mini-sub to the rock.”

“Yes’m! Soon as Sparkler gets down here.”

“HERE!” Sparkler called from the other end. “Let’s do this! Which one we taking?”

“Hex,” Granite explained. “Been a while since she’s been out…” his voice trailed off as he left the lower radio station to enter the sub.

The Admiral took the moment of quiet to lean back into her seat, letting out a sigh.

“Wish you were going?” the Captain asked.

“A little,” the Admiral admitted.

“You’re still young. You should take some while you can.”

The Admiral didn’t respond, instead focusing intently on the lights on the console in front of her. Hex had just been connected to one of the air tubes.

“Launching…” Granite said over the radio. “Four crew accounted for. Heading to the rock’s top.”

“Surface,” Sparkler corrected.

“Doesn’t matter. Going ‘up’, and there are four of us. Done and done.”

“There’s actually five.”

“Five? How in- oh.” Granite laughed. “Seems like Rook wants to come along!”

“She could be useful,” the Admiral admitted. “Watch her.”

“Oh I will,” Granite chuckled. “Anyway… Up up up…”

‘Up up up’ continued for a few minutes. As it became obvious that the air tube wasn’t long enough to give the Hex full range of motion, the Aglol ascended slowly. Still relatively far from the sub and the island’s surface itself, but getting closer all the time.

“It’s a jungle up here,” Granite reported. “And I mean that literally. It looks like an actual jungle. Trees and everything. So far, nothing else of note. I—” his voice was overcome with static for a moment. “—ook looks happy.”

“Connection issues,” Orange said.

“What was th—” Granite cut out.

“Connection issues! I repeat, connection issues!”

“—come bac—”

“Remain in the sub, stay near the edge,” the Admiral ordered. “I repeat, remain in sub. Stay near edge. Remain in sub. Stay near edge.”

“—ube stuck on tre—k-k-k-k-k—’s wrong w—k-k-k-k-k—wh—k-k-k-k-k.

His voice didn’t return.

“Start winding it back,” the Admiral said.

“...Trying,” Orange said, frowning. “Something’s pulling on it with a lot more force than the Hex should be able to produce.”

“They’re stuck in a tree! How could something be pulling them?”

“The island could be moving,” the Captain offered.

“Don’t be ridiculous.”

The Captain pointed down the hall to the observation deck where, even from their distance, it was pretty easy to see the island’s rocky side moving up, past them.

“That’s impossible,” Orange said, eyes narrowing slightly. “Islands don’t move.”

“This one is!” the Admiral shouted, jumping out of her seat. “Captain, you have the Algol. Take us up as fast as you can.” She slammed a button on her console. “Crew! Prepare to go vertical! This is not a drill!” She removed her hoof. “I’m going to access port two. Be prepared to blow it on my signal.” Without waiting for a response, she slid down the ladder and jumped to one of the access ports. Before she arrived, already she could feel the floor tilting out from underneath her as the Algol pointed its tip upward. Granted, the propellors didn’t offer anywhere near as much buoyant force as the ballast itself, but using both at once ensured maximum speed.

With a wing, she latched around the door to the access port. She made sure to pop the door open first before even considering grabbing her dive suit. Carefully, she tossed the helmet into the door, the rest of her suit and a harpoon gun following shortly thereafter. When she threw herself in, she slammed the door shut behind herself and sealed it shut.

Speed. She jumped into her suit. Legs first. Don’t adjust the tail. Fold wings back. Roll to seal the back. Snap front. Helmet. In her job, she was one of the fastest. It still took her a solid minute to place the helmet on her head and seal it. “Report!”

“No contact,” the Captain answered. “Island’s starting to move faster. We’re faster right now, though the engineers are panicking about overtaxing the engines.”

Needed more ponies with me. No time now. “Blow the port. Don’t pressurize, blow.”

“Aye, Admiral,” the Captain said. “Hold on.”

The Admiral latched a rope to one of the access port’s walls. “I’ll try.”

The manual hatch that led to the sea could not be opened in these pressurized conditions. However, in emergencies, there was a system in place to cause a purposeful breach around the circular exit. The Admiral heard a sharp hiss, followed by a pop and gallons of water rushing in with enough force that she was not only tossed to the hatch she’d just sealed moments before, she was also torn back out and tossed into the sea—only the rope keeping her attached to the Algol.

“I’m… out…” the Admiral managed, hoping that the pain in her wing didn’t mean it was broken. She let herself drift until the rope was taut, leaving her near the ‘stomach’ of the Algol, where the air hose was affixed.

“They’ll be surfacing soon,” the Captain reported. “We won’t be able to follow for much longer.”

The Admiral let out a shrill hiss. Using her suit’s air jets, she leaped for the air tube, wrapping all her hooves around it as tight as she could. “I’m on the tube. Sever it!”

The Captain sputtered. “Excuse me?”

“Sever it! We can’t drag the Algol above the surface!”

“...I’ve given the order. But Admira—”

“Do your best to find what Rook’s been looking for and give Silver something unique so he’ll give Meteor one of his eyes.”

“Admiral—”

“Captain, Orange, I have every intention of coming back, but we don’t have much time, so I’m covering my bases.” The Admiral felt the tube go slack. Looking down, she saw Algol’s Shadow receding into the depths as she was pulled higher by the tube, now connected only to the island.

“What are our orders?”

“Hang around here for… two days before continuing on. Loop back to Lynx Isle to get word to… Baltimare about a moving island. Then continue on Rook’s path, follow the seafloor.” The Admiral noticed the water was turning blue. They really were close to the surface, now. For all she knew the top of the isle had already breached.

“...Understood.”

“With any luck, we won’t have to wait long.”

“You’re being irrational,” Orange offered.

“And that’s why I’m in charge and not you,” the Admiral chuckled. “I’m going to have to ditch the suit. Salvage it if you can. I won’t be able to talk to you after.”

“Luna’s Speed, Admiral,” the Captain wished.

“Thanks.” Judging by the brightening of the water, she was probably safe to remove her helmet now, even though the pressure still wasn’t going to be pleasant. “See you soon!” Wrapping the hose tightly around her back leg, she placed her hooves to her helmet and took a deep breath.

The helmet popped off without too much difficulty. She tossed it to the side quickly—it would be best if she could get out of the suit before she breached. It would be heavy enough to cause problems in the open air, especially when dangling from a hose. She popped the chest lock first, allowing her to worm her front legs out. Tying her now free front hooves into the tube, she untied her back hoof so she could squirm out of the rest of the suit.

For a moment, she stood naked in the ocean save for a harpoon gun and the necklace that held her fang. The bright blue of the sea spread out before her framed by strands of her amber mane.

She breached, rising out of the water with only the air tube keeping her from falling. The sun had recently risen on a calm ocean. Behind and above her, the massive island soared higher and higher, dripping vast amounts of seawater onto the water below, essentially raining on the Admiral in the middle of a sunny afternoon.

Eventually, though, the dripping stopped. The motion of the island slowed.

The Admiral was hanging from a floating island by what amounted to a rope.

Looking at the fang around her neck, she sighed. Instead of waiting for somepony to pull her up, she started climbing. Her wings turned out to not be broken, so she used the extra limbs to their full extent, scrambling up the tube as fast as she could.

She’d save herself this time.

VIII - As the Jungle Groans

“It’s a jungle up here,” Granite reported. “And I mean that literally. It looks like an actual jungle. Trees and everything.”

He wasn’t lying. As the Hex puttered through the water, the trees below swayed with the currents of the ocean. It was a bit strange that the trees were normal in appearance with a few palms and gum trees here and there, despite living underwater. The pressure should have killed them.

“So far, nothing else of note. I guess Rook looks happy.”

“Con—” Orange’s voice came from the other end before it was absorbed in static.

“What was that?” Granite asked.

“—ion i—k-k-k-k-k—t, conne—”

“Should be come back? Repeat, should we come back?” Granite asked, ears swiveled directly to the radio so he could pick up everything he could.

“-ain in th—k-k-k-k-k—edge, I repea—k-k-k-k-k-”

“Remain in sub, stay near edge,” Sparkler translated.

Suddenly, the entire Hex jerked like something was pulling them back.

Granite frowned. That wasn’t the jerk of them reeling the tube back up, that was the jerk of the tube getting stuck on something. Probably a tree. What a time to have that happen.

“Tube stuck on tree!” Granite reported, twisting the Hex around to get a look at the impediment. He found the tube stuck in a tree canopy, all right, but the ground wasn’t in the orientation he remembered. “Something’s wrong with the ground.”

“It’s moving,” Sparkler said.

“What? Don’t be ridicu—”

The Hex hit the top of the forest canopy. Instead of bouncing up as the effectively weightless craft should have, it continued to sink into the trees.

“Okay, ground’s moving,” Granite agreed. “Up.” He pulled back on a lever, ordering the Hex to ascend. The propellers and air jets twisted it upward but he was too slow. The speed of the rising island had begun to increase faster than the sub could deal with, and it was soon pressed into the ground.

Granite took his hooves off the controls. “Well, boys, looks like we’re in for a bumpy ride! Make sure your suits are secure and you’ve got something to hold onto!”

Sparkler folded her hair into her suit. “Not that I have anything to hold on with…”

“The rest of us have to make-do without freaky hair-legs, deal.” Granite’s two present boys - Wiffle and Lob - nodded in agreement.

Sparkler sealed her helmet without another word.

A knock came at the main viewport where Rook was slamming her hoof furiously to get their attention.

“Yes, I know there’s a problem!” Granite said, finding it a lot harder to gesture with only hooves in a heavy suit.

Rook pointed up in panic and grabbed her throat, feigning choking.

“Oh. Crud.” Granite bit his lip. “I…”

Cozy started drawing on the window, creating a ‘V’ shape with the ripples of water in the top. She pointed to herself, and then to the ‘V’ shape.

She’s going somewhere with low elevation that’ll keep enough water.

“Lower!” Granite nodded, pointing down. “I got it!”

Rook forced a smile before crawling off into the blue murk, the acceleraiton keeping her from properly swimming. They were approaching the surface at an alarming rate.

Glancing at the radio, Granite frowned. Still nothing but static. Something had to be interfering with the radio, no doubt whatever was making the island rise. What could even do that? Islands didn’t move! It was unheard of.

The thought of discovering something completely new made him grin. This was shaping up to be quite the eventful outing… and it looked like he’d get to see the sun today.

“How long until we surface?” Granite asked.

Sparkler sent out a ping, using the relative location of fish minds to determine the location of the water’s surface. “Twenty seconds? Less?”

“Hold on, try not to get washed away!”

“We’re inside a mini-sub, how exactly are we going to do anyth-”

The top of the island breached the surface of the ocean, sending a massive wave through the rippling water. The rush washed over the Hex, twisting it around a nearby tree trunk and pulling the hose so tight that it ruptured, spewing pressurized air into the tormentuous sea. The remaining woven fibers of the tube held fast, tying into several knots as the Hex embedded upside-down in the rich, muddy soil.

Light.

The sun shone right into Granite’s eyes from the window, lighting up a blue sky dotted with calm, wispy clouds.

For a moment, Granite forgot that he was on an island shooting into the sky. All he could see was the sky.

How often he had told himself he never needed it, ignoring his instinct, only to feel complete ecstasy every time he returned. Ponykind was meant to be under the sun, not under the waves.

Unfortunately, his moment of bliss could not last, for the increasing acceleration of the island was starting to be painful. It wasn’t anywhere near as bad as some of the island elevators he had been on in his life, but the metal edges of his suit were poking into his limbs with enough force to be mildly concerning.

The pressure of acceleration lessened, allowing Granite to breathe.

“Well, boys,” he said, attempting to stand up in a pile of three other suited ponies. “Let’s go exploring.”

“Wait for it,” Sparkler said.

“Wait? Wh-”

The island’s deceleration began in earnest as Granite started to feel lighter. It didn’t reach the point where he felt like he would leave the ground, but it was certainly disorienting to feel no heavier than a cat.

“Ah, right, island probably isn’t calibrated to… whatever it is you and the Admiral are always on about,” Granite mused.

“Gravity,” Sparkler answered. “It’s an acceleration and any upward movement will assist or counteract t—”

“Uuuuugh,” Wiffle muttered. “Science…”

Sparkler tapped her on the helmet with her hoof. “Get used to it, physics like this is the way of the future! A—wait a minute, you two were educated, you know what gravity is!”

“Yeah. I just needed to stop you from going to explain-town.”

“...Great…” Sparkler grunted.

The light feeling in Granite’s stomach eventually ended, indicating the motion of the isle had ended at long last.

“Can I open the door now?” Granite asked.

“Yes, yes, get on with it.”

Granite moved to the hatch - currently residing in the ‘wall’ rather than the ceiling—and threw it open. On the other side, there was grass. Vibrant, green grass that had no right to exist under the ocean, but somehow managed to survive to give this new land a green carpet dotted under the wet, luscious trees covered in bright flowers and dripping leaves.

He hopped out. The ground was exceedingly muddy and adhered to his suit’s legs, but he didn’t care. He was in the air.

With a swift twist of his helmet, he removed the offending barrier so the salty breeze of fresh air could make it to his nose. He took in a sharp breath, getting a mixture of sea smell with mud, foliage, and what was likely the pollen of some flower he couldn’t identify.

He sneezed, but he loved it just the same.

Sparkler popped her helmet off as well to free her hair, though Wiffle and Lob kept theirs on.

“It’s a jungle,” Sparkler deadpanned.

“Yep,” Granite said. “So, first order of business, radio…” He poked his head back into the Hex and found it still sputtering static. “Second order of business, Rook. She said lower elevation, so we’ll need to follow the land a-”

“I’ll just find her,” Sparkler said, sending out a magic ping. Instantly, her confident smile was replaced with a look of horror. “Magic interference.”

“How bad we talking?”

“I can sense the three of you and a few fish that got stuck in that puddle over there. Anything further out is… fuzzy.”

“Jams radio, jams magic, just our luck,” Granite muttered. “Going down the old fashioned way it is!” He glanced around, looking for the steepest slope he could find. This task was mildly difficult given how flat most of the jungle was, but he was able to locate a small slope and set out. His suit was ridiculously heavy and even with it’s hydraulic assistance it was difficult to move in, but it gave him some protection from the ever-present mud so he opted to suffer the added strain. The rest did the same.

Shortly after they began their journey, they started to hear a rhythmic clack from somewhere nearby. Clack clack-clack clack clack-clack-clack clack clack-clack clack.

“That’s a pretty clear pattern,” Sparkler observed.

“I know what it is,” Granite said with a laugh, turning sharply to the left and following the sound. It took all of a minute to come to the shore of what appeared to be a massive lake where Rook was busy smashing a rock into a much larger rock embedded in the shore.

“Hey!” Granite called, waving. “Glad you could make it!”

Rook glared at him, dropping the rock unceremoniously into the salty lake water.

“Ouch, don’t shoot the messenger, I didn’t know this was going to happen! Islands don’t move!”

Rook let out a series of sharp grunts in a mockery of Granite’s comment.

“Aww, you two are sooooo adorable,” Sparky jabbed.

Rook picked the rock up again and threw it at Sparkler, missing by a mile. Sparkler stuck her tongue out.

“So, boss, what now?” Lob asked.

“Well… let’s see…”

Rook facehooved and pointed at the far side of the lake.

Granite’s jaw dropped.

There, situated atop a rocky hill in the midst of the jungle, was a stepped pyramid of a brilliant golden sheen, reflecting the sunbeams brilliantly in all directions. Massive amounts of moss and lichen grew around the edges, but somehow the golden shimmer was rendered all the more impressive. At the very top of the pyramid rested four curved spikes angled toward the center. It was almost as if the ancient structure was designed to hold the sun itself.

“What are the chances the magic interference is coming from that?” Granite asked.

“Pretty high, I’d say,” Sparkler said.

“Then it looks like we have our mission. Raid the temple, stop the interference, and get back to the Algol.” He grinned. “Been a while since I’ve done anything on land!” He excitedly tapped the ground with his suit hooves. “Can’t wait to see what this jungle throws at us!”

Rook stared at him, jaw hanging open.

“Yes, he’s insane,” Sparkler confirmed. “You’re the one who decided you liked him before even having a conversation with him.”

Rook started looking for another rock to throw.

Her search was interrupted when a nearby tree fell over and smashed into the ground next to them, sending splinters everywhere. A black, furred thing pulled itself out of the tree’s canopy, demolishing many of the trees branches with an excessive arrangement of deep red claws. As it arched its back, it revealed a tail that ended in a serrated blade that appeared to be made of metal. The soulless, blind, bloody eyes of all wyrd creatures were present on its angular face, the blood streaks dripping into its multiple rows of pointed teeth and angular whiskers.

The creature itself was not blind, however. Situated between its two useless spheres of gelatin was a singular, slitted eye with a white iris that sparkled like diamonds.

It looked right at Granite.

“...Is that a cat?” Granite asked, unsure what to make of the thing.

The “cat” answered his question by attacking, extending its claws to lengths over a foot long. Coming at Granite from both sides, it went for his exposed neck.

At the edge of the newly floating jungle, the Admiral heaved herself over the rocky outcropping and onto a flat, rocky surface mostly devoid of mud. She flopped onto her back and breathed heavily, taking several minutes just to regain some stamina.

Climbing up a rope that long was hard enough. Climbing up a weaved hose that had no proper hoofholds was much, much worse, even with her wings. She was so glad she decided to ditch the armor when she had. Even with its enhancements she might not have been able to climb all the way with it on.

She knew she needed to get up. Needed to go find Sparkler and rescue them from… whatever it was they needed rescuing from.

That could wait. Charging into the jungle right now wouldn’t help anypony. She was here, and that was what mattered. Just her, a harpoon gun, and… that was it.

Meanwhile they had a submarine, several suits that could function as armor, and possibly even Rook.

With a pained groan she put her hooves over her eyes.

They were better equipped to survive up here than she was. She didn’t have anything on them aside from her wits.

...Which included being raised in a jungle not unlike this one.

Okay, so maybe my coming here wasn’t pointless. She took a deep breath. I’ll just… get to it in a minute.

Letting out a deep sigh, she allowed her mind to wander and body to rest.

IX - As the Cats Chatter

The “cat” encircled its claws, creating an arc of sharp edges. Retracting them, it prepared to decapitate Granite’s neck from behind.

Two hisses of steam rang out as harpoon guns fired, embedding two pronged javelins into the feline beast. One lodged itself in an arm, the force flipping the cat over, pushing the retracting claws over Granite’s head as a consequence. The other harpoon punctured where a heart should have been, prompting a burst of black ooze studded with diamond dust.

It didn’t die. It didn’t react beyond a grunt that was forced out when it hit the ground. Leaping up, it pointed its claws at Granite again, this time extending them forward to stab him through the heart. His response was to shoot his harpoon into the monster’s open mouth, flipping it head over heels into the muddy ground once more.

Now with three rods of angled metal driven into its flesh, the creature was having a little difficulty moving around. It saw a mass of fist-shaped-hair coming for it and was unable to even attempt a dodge. Once again, it went flying—but this time it landed on its back legs. Using its unharmed paw, it extended claws at the closest target: Wiffle.

Wiffle, having already shot his harpoon, could do little to stop the claws. He rolled, but one of the bloodied blades drove itself into his armor, puncturing the hard metal with laughable ease. A stallion of muscle, Wiffle was not one to cry out when injured, but the sight of his blood let everypony know it wasn’t a shallow wound.

A splash rang out.

The next thing the furred wyrd knew, a pink seapony had driven her teeth into the back of its neck, tearing out the spine. All contact between the head and the body ceased, retracting all claws into the body—a state the wyrded creature was no longer meant to occupy. The fully retracted claws tore up its paws, reducing all four legs to stumps.

The head kept yowling until Rook sank her teeth into its third eye, prompting a gush of sparkling, silvery liquid to pour out onto the ground. Rook spat it out, gagging.

“Heh. Bet you wish you had one of these!” Granite laughed, hefting up his empty harpoon gun.

Rook didn’t stop gagging. She curled up and began flopping around frantically.

“There’s no way it tastes that bad…”

“She needs water, idiot!” Sparkler shouted, running to Rook with hair outstretched. She hit the seapony like a bulldozer, throwing her back into the lake.

A moment later, Rook’s face surfaced again, shooting Granite a death glare.

“In all fairness it looked like you were choking on the silver stuff,” Granite said, holding up a hoof in surrender. “Which definitely isn’t normal.”

Rook shot him a “no, really?” look.

“Heh… Wiffle, how’s the injury?”

“Hurts like an Ambrosian Savage Weasel,” Wiffle said with a bitter laugh, popping off the leg on his suit to get a look. It was a deep, but relatively small gash just under his shoulder. Not exactly life-threatening if treated, but a heavy hindrance in a tense situation.

“You’ve never been bitten by an Ambrosian Savage Weasel, have you?” Sparkler asked.

“What, have you?”

Sparkler raised an incredulous eyebrow. “I’m from Ambrosia, you daft twit. Of course I have. Getting one of those things on you is like having the raging fury of Celestia on your plot for hours while ants crawl through your bloodstream. ”

Wiffle stared blankly at her.

“Oi for the… just lemme patch you up.” Sparkler used her hair to pull out her miniature medical kit and set to work. She split her hair into several fine strands and took out a needle, holding it up to make sure it was clean. “Vespid don’t got anything on me.”

“Just get it over with,” Wiffle muttered, laying down, wound pointed upward for easy access. With a disturbingly calm and gleeful smile, Sparkler cleaned the cut, prompting Wiffle to hiss in pain.

Granite looked away from their semi-psychotic “medic” and turned to the corpse of the cat-beast. “I have seen a lot of wyrded things in my time. I even saw some cats before, though they were more catfish than anything else. I’ve never seen something like this. And that eye… that isn’t normal.”

“Something’s clearly up with this island,” Sparkler said as she lifted the needle and plunged it into Wiffle. “Stay still!”

“Has anypony heard anything about shiny eyes?” Granite asked, glancing around. Everypony shook their heads, including Rook. “Any idea what this place is?” Again, nothing. “Then it’s time to collect samples for the bigwigs at Sanctaphrax. Lob?”

Lob trotted up to the cat’s carcass and took out a few bottles, filling one with the creature’s blood and the other with the sparkling liquid that came from the eye itself. It sloshed around in the bottle rapidly, faster even than water. “Doesn’t feel like there’s anything in here,” Lob said.

“Hah! They’re gonna love that!” Sparkler chuckled. “What laws of chemistry?”

Granite didn’t care about the viscosity or weight of the material—that didn’t change their situation. Turning back to the golden temple in the distance, he set his jaw. “Wiffle, lock yourself in the Hex. Keep checking the radio. If they get through, tell them where we went.”

“Yes, s-AAAA—!” Wiffle screamed.

“Whoops! Hit a nerve!” Sparkler laughed nervously. “But hey, you’re stitched up! Good as new!”

Wiffle let out a groan.

“Well, you will be. Eventually.”

Granite continued. “Sparkler, Lob, Rook, we’re going to that temple. Be on guard for an attack. See a cat, aim for the eye. Sparkler…”

Sparkler sent out a ping. “Still can’t see far. Won’t be much help. Though when my spell wasn’t being blocked, most of the minds I detected were in the center. I’m betting that’s the temple.”

“Then we’re charging right into danger…” Granite grinned. “Excellent.”

Rook let out a grunt.

“We’ll figure out what to do with you when we get to the other side of the lake.”

Rook rolled her eyes and sighed.

The Admiral hadn’t been in a proper jungle in years. At first, she was a little concerned she would be rusty.

Her worries were unfounded. After setting out into the jungle she had identified a proper climbing tree and latched onto it with her wingtips, climbing to the canopy. She perched on one of the branches and glanced down at the forest floor, examining the wet ground for signs of life. Despite the rushing water that came through here recently, the plants still looked as though they were part of a proper jungle and she could already make out a few sets of animal tracks. Rodents, birds, snakes… and a copious amount of bugs.

None of which looked like they should be able to survive underwater. But here they were nonetheless.

It didn’t make any sense. She wasn’t complaining—if it did make sense she wouldn’t be specially suited for survival.

Sparkler mentioned the center of the island as the place where all the minds were congregating, so that seemed as good of a goal as any. Spreading her wings, she jumped to the next tree like a nimble monkey, latching onto branches with the tips of her wings and tossing herself forward. She may not have been able to fly, but wings were amazing for jump control if a pony knew how to use them. The harpoon gun slung over her back made things slightly more difficult, but not enough to concern her.

Her confidence faltered when she saw a massive paw print that left gashes in the ground below it. Some kind of feline creature with paws larger than the Admiral’s hooves and outrageously proportioned, numerous claws. A wyrd of some kind, clearly, though not one the Admiral was familiar with. The only wyrd creature she had seen with feline features had been catfish, and those were pretty rare. They wouldn’t make the track she was looking at, that was for sure.

The tricks for luring pumas away might not help very much here. She prepared herself for a sudden ambush.

What does it say about me that I know exactly how to prepare for a predatory ambush in a jungle? the Admiral thought to herself, laughing inwardly. We should have hunted those pumas to extinction, but no, had to keep the natural order of the island… It’s what Luna would have wanted, they said…

She shook her head to stop herself. Don’t dwell on the past. Don’t.

With a burst of speed, she swung to another tree, and then another, making brisk pace to the center of the jungle.

She stopped the instant she heard a yowl in the distance. Instinctually, she backed away to the densest portion of the tree, surrounded by so many leaves and branches it was difficult to see out, let alone in. It’d be hard to find her even if something was looking for her.

As it turned out, she likely didn’t need this level of stealth, since the wyrd cat had other things to worry about besides a nice meal. It barrelled through the jungle at high speeds, making as much noise as it could—not out of fear, since a wyrd couldn’t really feel such an emotion. No, it was calling for help.

The Admiral wondered what could cause such a massive, deadly mess of hair and claws to think it needed help. A massive wyrd creature? A dragon, perhaps?

No.

Just a pegasus.

The dark, feathered shape dropped out of the sky, pinning the cat against the Admiral’s tree. Here, the Admiral could make out the cat’s third eye, watching in disgust and fascination as the peagsus’ bony wingtips punctured the silvery organ, spewing an unnatural liquid all over the ground.

The pegasus itself was clearly a wyrd of some sort, with the blank white eyes with pooling red clots. It had gills like a seapony, but its mane was full and it had no fins to speak of, instead keeping both of its wings—even if said wings had more bone visible than skin or muscle, they somehow still allowed flight. All four of its hooves were cracked and sharpened along the edges, covered in dark blood and diamond liquid that definitely wasn’t its own. A compass rose cutie mark in almost perfect condition stood upon the wryd’s flank, but it was far from the most distinctive feature of this unnatural beast.

Not only did it have a third, silvery eye like the cat, but it was also wearing something. A hat. Pale in color, with a green wrap around the center. It looked almost new, as though sitting at the bottom of the ocean hadn’t even waterlogged it.

A jungle that shouldn’t exist and now a hat on a wyrd pegasus in perfect condition. What kind of ridiculous magic is this?

The pegasus turned from the Admiral’s tree and flared its wings at the jungle. As if on cue, three wyrd cats jumped from the foliage, thirsting for revenge.

They were no match for the pegasus’ sharp wings. Its first attack stabbed two of the cats in the eye, spewing the silvery substance over everything. The third cat extended its claws with the intent of cutting the pegasus through the stomach, but the wily wyrd jumped the claws and brought a bony stake to the last remaining eye.

Four dead cats in less than a minute.

The pegasus looked around for more opponents. For a moment, the gaze of its third eye rested on the Admiral.

All her nightmares came rushing back to her. Sitting in a tree, hiding with all the thestrals of the tribe. Deep within the shadows of the tree, they looked like nothing. Except her. She stood out like the moon itself and the pumas would find her and then the—

The pegasus turned away. It took off, flying away at high speed.

The Admiral’s fear turned to jealousy.

Even the monsters can do it...

X - As the Paths Confuse

To everyone’s shock, they made it to the other side of the lake without incident. No wyrd attacked them, be they cat, pegasus, or otherwise. The jungle itself was filled with the sounds of tropical birds and the occasional jaguar call.

Rook let out a harsh growl to grab the attention of Granite, Sparkler, and Lob.

“I know, I know,” Granite said, refusing to look at her—his gaze was planted firmly forward on the temple glistening in the brilliant sun. “We’ll find a way for you… or…”

“That is a lot of gold,” Sparkler observed. “That is a lot of gold.”

“Who makes temples out of gold?!”

“Anyone with enough gold. And it’s probably just a gold coating.”

“That is still a lot of gold.”

Rook let out a gurgle again.

Sparkler turned away from the temple, frowning. “You need water. We need to get into the temple. This is a problem, Rook.”

Rook nodded—registering for the first time that she was thinking of herself as Rook now—and started gesturing frantically for Sparkler to find some kind of way for her to go along.

“I don’t know exactly how we would do that…”

Oh, so I could have been Cozy all this time?

Not right now, Rook thought, I mean, yeah, sure whatever, you win, be Cozy.

It’s been a thousand years! I’m used to Glow already! And you just decide that, ooooooooh, they’re calling me Rook, that sounds GREAT!

Would you be quiet? I’m trying to listen to her.

She’s useless.

We already had this conversation.

Not in general. I agree that she has many qualities worthy of our purpose, she’s just blabbering about nothing right now.

She is not.

“—and, basically, the rivers flowing through here all have some kind of diversion quotient to them…”

“What on Equis are you talking about?” Granite asked.

Sparkler binked. “Uh…”

Lob coughed. “She’s stalling. She just doesn't want to tell Rook we have to leave her here.”

Surprise, surprise, Rook thought, grinding her teeth. Any chance you can get those vocal cords back so I can chew them out?

Not as of now. And it’s better if we can’t speak.

It would be more cathartic…

It most definitely would, and the devastation on their faces would be absolutely delicious, but we have bigger purposes. We cannot answer all questions.

I hate it when you’re right.

The feeling is mutual.

“...Rook? You in there?” Sparkler asked.

Rook splashed Sparkler. With a hiss, she pointed dismissively at the temple, telling them to just go already before disappearing beneath the waves. If she wasn’t going to be able to follow them, she was going to explore this lake she was in.

To her shock, she found a stone passageway built into the lake edge, absolutely waterlogged, but stable.

Convenient.

Yeah. I swear, this entire trip is just convenience marred with coincidence.

Maybe those magic theories aren’t completely bogus...

Rook didn’t respond, instead swimming deeper into the tunnel. It was devoid of any carving or decoration and went on for quite some time. Onward she swam, having no difficulty seeing in the darkness. She’d lived at the bottom of the ocean for centuries; this was nothing.

Eventually, the tunnel turned sharply upward in a perfect corner. Following along, she soon surfaced in a large room made to look like a sphere despite being built out of massive hard-edged bricks. There were massive stores of gold artifacts, precious gems, weapons, armor, and even a few magic artifacts dotted around the treasury.

However, what drew most of her attention wasn’t in any of the treasure piles. It was an orb of silver floating in the center of the room. Numerous rings of the bizarre liquid she had seen in the cat’s third eye orbited the orb. After squinting, she found that the orb wasn’t featureless—rather it looked like an eyeball with a clock instead of an iris. The clock wasn’t ticking, but it did have a purple, jagged crack across it.

It didn’t look at her. Rook wasn’t even sure it could see, it might have just been an inert magic artifact.

The third eyes.

Yes, but what do the third eyes DO?

Something to wyrds, perhaps indirectly. That cat was not standard.

No, really?

Indeed… The running of its fluids was… curious.

Rook rolled her eyes. She poked herself out of the water, intending to start harvesting some treasure and magic artifacts. She was here, why not get started? Maybe she’d even find something that could mess with the floating eye, stop this whole fiasco with the mysterious moving island…

An invisible magic barrier blocked her path.

Oh, come ON! She gave the barrier a death glare and screeched with the hatred of an Ambrosian Savage Weasel.

And you say I’m the violent one.

I swear I will find a way to devour whoever did this and crush them to DEATH an…

Just absorb it, moron.

Oh. Right… Focus…

Rook closed her eyes and tapped into her inert, oft-ignored pegasus magic. Even after all these years at the bottom of the ocean, it was still there, ready to be used. And with all this time, she had gotten at least some use out of it. She tapped her fins to the invisible barrier and let out a sharp breath of water.

With a shimmer and a pop, the barrier vanished, flooding into her body. Success!

The silver eye was looking right at her now.

...I think we tripped the security measures.

FACE THE EYE! REFUSE TO BACK D—

Whatever senseless act of violent power was about to be suggested, it died in the divided brain of the seapony when a monster rose from the gold. With fur as black as night and blank eyes where nostrils should be, it might have been mistaken for one of the cats if it weren’t so massive. It’s third eye occupied most of its forehead, far larger than any other feature on its face. As it neared Rook, drooling blood, she saw its tail.

It was a hand burning a deep, blood red flame.

I like the idea of running better.

Cozy didn’t object as Rook swam back down the tunnel.

The eye shot a beam of silver energy at her.

Ponyfeathers.

The entrance to the temple was wide open, which was to say it had no doors and likely had never had any doors. Right in the center of the golden steps was a square portal leading directly into the glittering maw that promised both treasure and danger.

They hoped there was more of the former.

Sparkler ran her hair across the smooth gold finish of the temple. “This should have been tarnished long ago. At least a little bit.”

“Almost no sign of damage at all,” Lob agreed.

“Unnatural.”

“Good news for us, it means there’s more gold!” Granite chuckled.

“It means there’s something mysterious and we should be on guard.”

“I’m always on guard,” Granite said, trotting into the temple.

“GRANITE, N—”

Granite shot her a look. “Yes, I see the trap, geez, what do you take me for, a rookie?”

Lob blinked. “...Trap?”

Granite pressed his hoof down on a stone slightly to his left, prompting a wall further in the temple to open up and shoot several dozen arrows at the opposite wall. Granite released his hoof, allowing the trap to close back up. “That trap.”

Sparkler pursed her lips. “You know you could have told me you saw that…”

“Why?”

“I don’t know, to keep me from stepping on it!?”

“You clearly saw it, so I don—”

“‘At’s not ‘e point ye daft loon!” Sparkler forced herself to take a long breath. “The point is that I thought you were going to get yourself killed!”

“Aww, I didn’t know you cared!”

“I swear, I don’t know why you’re in charge of exploration…”

Granite smirked. “There’s a fire trap activated by that brick over there, a pitfall triggered by a tripwire I presume is hidden by magic since I can only see where it attaches, and a tack coated with lethal poison on that wall.”

Sparkler stared at him.

“I make my keep, Sparkler.”

“...Right… Sorry.”

“No harm, no foul. Now, let’s enter this temple!”

They carefully made their way past the traps Granite had pointed out, triggering none of them thanks to his careful adventuring eye. It would not have been wrong to call Granite an idiot, but it would have been wrong to say that was all he was. The Admiral chose her ponies well.

After they passed the initial traps, Granite stopped short and laughed. “Oh, this is a fun one.”

“What?” Sparkler asked.

Carefully, Granite touched a brick ahead of them with his hoof. A few seconds later, the ceiling itself crashed from above and slammed into the hall in front of them with a force powerful enough to crush skulls.

“...Fun…” Sparkler breathed.

“Very fun,” Granite chuckled, pressing the brick a few more times, playing with the smashing hall as if it were some kind of large drum. “Heh.”

Sparkler swatted his hoof. “Let’s just remember where that is and keep moving.”

“Geez, fine…”

They walked forward. After the crusher, there were no more traps—apparently the designers had decided that was enough. Instead, the hall began to transform. Gone was the darkness lit only by Sparkler’s horn, in its place a hall lit by torches alight with a magical red fire. The walls now bore art instead of simple gold, ranging from ponies to dragons to impossible multi-headed creatures that snaked around the frames of other images. Most everything was carved out of precious metal, stone, or gemstones.

“Jackpot…” Granite grinned, peeling some of the precious gems off the wall. “Magic island that’s never been looted…”

“Too good to be true if you ask me,” Sparkler commented.

“I’m still taking them; there aren’t any traps attached.”

They continued to walk along the abandoned hall, finding no sign of habitation whatsoever. It was sparkling clean and perfect, but devoid of life. Who was here to clean such a place?

They eventually came to a large, black curtain blocking their way forward. Carefully, Granite pulled it aside with the tip of his harpoon, looking through to the other side.

The room was massive and perfectly cubical. Ruby dust was on every surface, enhancing the eerie light that came from the blood red torches. Multiple layers of balconies swirled around the cube’s edge, the railing carved from some kind of black marble, providing a place for an audience.

The stage in the center was empty. The audience was not.

Hundreds of wyrd cats sat at the railing, their silver eyes staring right at Granite and his friends. It was almost like there was only one cat looking at them through hundreds of bodies.

“...Run,” Granite whispered.

Lob, Sparkler, and the cats broke into a sprint at the same time. Granite took a second to fire a warning harpoon before joining them in the flight.

What had seemed like a comforting hall of treasure before looked like the run of death now. The monsters on the walls glared at them with intent to kill, their empty gem-less eyes seeking revenge for what had been done to them.

The three ponies didn’t care. They ran as fast as their hooves would carry them, stealing only occasional glances at the cats behind them. Not all of them had followed, merely a dozen, but none of them were under the illusion that they could take a dozen of those monstrous wyrd cats.

One of them was on fire, somehow. Granite didn’t want to figure out what that meant.

It was very fortunate for the ponies that they were ponies: creatures naturally designed for running for extended periods of time at high speeds. The cats had longer legs, for sure, but their mutated claws and soft paws made it difficult to keep up with the ponies.

“Suck it!” Granite called back to them. “You ain’t got nothing on u—”

The fiery one shot a fireball at them. It was a horrible shot, but the message was clear: the cats were still a threat, even back like this.

However, they were nearing the edge of the tunnel. The torches were behind them and they could see a light in the distance.

“Watch out for the traps!” Sparkler called.

“I plan on it,” Granite said.

“What?”

Granite slid to a stop and turned to face the cats.

“Granite what’re ya doing!?”

“This.” Granite pushed his foot down on a particular brick.

Several of the cats stopped short, realizing exactly what he was doing. But it was too late—the ceiling dropped on them like judgement from on high, shattering all their skulls to dust. The eyes that housed their unusual power were squished, spraying the silvery liquid everywhere. The cat with flames dissipated into nothing but ash as its body was pulverized.

Just to be sure, Grantie crushed them three or four more times.

“...Wow.” Sparkler blinked. “...Good work, Granite.”

“I aim to please. Now, we need a new plan for getting in here. Those cats clearly don’t use this entrance, there must be an alternative.”

The Admiral discovered that it was really easy to follow the pegasus around. Just follow the sound of screaming wyrd cats. It was almost comical how the outlandish wyrd dove from the sky, letting out a call not unlike a falcon before sinking its wings into a poor cat’s third eye.

All the wyrds on this island had that third eye. The Admiral still had no idea what it meant, but she knew it was important. It was clearly some kind of bizarre magic, perhaps related to the island itself…

These thoughts were pushed out of her mind when she saw the Hex tied around a tree, dented in a few places, but otherwise fine. She swooped down from the tree and tapped the door with her hoof.

Wiffle opened the door. “...Admiral? Admiral!”

“Yes, it’s me. Report?”

“Island rose out of ocean, Hex grounded, they went to investigate temple, Rook’s okay, as are all the others.”

“All right…” The Admiral scratched her chin. “Temple?”

“Massive golden stepped pyramid, we think it’s the center of the island.”

“I know where I’m going…” The Admiral frowned. “You’re injured.”

“Cat.”

“Weird things…” The Admiral pushed her tongue to the roof of her mouth, thinking. She wanted armor, but Wiffle’s was far too large for her, and she already had her harpoon gun. She’d have to do this the hard way.

“What are they thinking, running into some random temple…?” The Admiral grumbled.

“A way to get off the island and stop the magic from jamming Sparkler’s senses?”

“...I see. Wiffle, rest up, I’m going to the temple.”

“It’s that direction. ...You’re alone, aren’t you, Admiral?”

“Yes.” The word came with an unspoken command not to ask for details. Wiffle nodded in understanding and sat down, attempting to relax in the confines of the Hex as his superior left.

The Admiral jumped back into the trees and swung in the direction Wiffle had indicated. It was a surprisingly short time later that she saw the lake and the temple, the latter before the former. How beautiful the golden steps were to her.

Now THAT is a big payday. Silver won’t be able to say no to the treasures in there!

Before she could fully begin her journey to the temple, however, she noticed a pink form at the edge of the lake: Rook. She was driving a sharp rock carefully into her forehead, drawing copious amounts of sludge-blood from herself.

What in…?

The Admiral set down upon the ground, trotting up to Rook. Just as she arrived, Rook completed her task. With a powerful screech she stuck the rock into her flesh once more and tore away quickly. There was a burst of dark magic sparks from her fins and an un-equine shriek from her throat as she removed a tiny, silver object from her skull. The Admiral could make out holes in her now-exposed bone where silvery threads had once been.

The small, marble-sized object itself landed on the shore at the Admiral’s hooves.

It was a silver eye, quickly dissolving into nothing more than liquid.

The Admiral stared at the seapony with a massive hole in her head. The wyrd sludge was doing its best to reshape the wound, but for now the seapony was debilitated. Had she not been a wyrd, such a wound would ensure death from blood loss in less than an hour. Even with her nature, Rook was still barely able to stay conscious—she wasn’t even floating in the water, she had latched herself to the shore with a few rocks to ensure she wouldn’t move.

“What…?”

Rook let out a pitiful hiss and laid her head down, breathing water through her gills rapidly. She made no attempt to communicate anything further.

XI - As the Temple Gleams

“Wiffle!”

“AUGH!” Wiffle pointed his harpoon at the open door, ready to assault whatever was shouting at him.

The Admiral kicked the harpoon away. “I need your helmet.”

“Wh…”

“Wiffle. Helmet.”

“My suit’s not made to your specifica—”

“Not suit, Wiffle.” The Admiral tapped her head with the tip of her wing. “Helmet. Just the helmet.”

Wiffle stared at her.

“Just give it.”

Wiffle removed his helmet and handed it to her. She placed it atop her head and bounded away, leaving Wiffle alone with the Hex once more.

It was no longer convenient to hop to and from trees with such a bulky helmet on, but the trek to the lake wasn’t long enough to worry about stealth or the small speed advantage. It felt wrong to walk through the jungle so obviously with nothing more than a readied harpoon for protection, but she knew that was just instinct screaming at her.

She’d gotten really good at ignoring it over the years.

When she arrived at the lake, Rook was sitting on a rock, her eyes just above the water. She had wrapped a long strand of kelp around her forehead, covering the wound. The wyrd tar-blood was still leaking down her face, but it was no longer covering her eyes and blinding her. Her expression was one of… exhaustion.

Yet another face she’d never seen on a wyrd. One that showed weakness.

“It’s under the water,” the Admiral said, tapping her helmet. “Where?”

Rook looked at her like she was insane.

“They would have went through the front doors, they’ve got that avenue covered. You clearly found an alternate path. If I know anything about my ruins, the secret entrance is usually the best.”

Rook gestured angrily at her kelp bandage. With a smirk, the Admiral tapped her helmet. Considering this for a moment, Rook grumbled in defeat. Moving away from her wound, she waved her hooves like claws and let out a growl.

“I can handle a cat.”

Rook shook her head and held her hooves out wide.

“How much bigger we talking?”

Rook pulsed her gesture four times.

“...That’s a big cat.”

Rook rolled her eyes. Clearing her raspy throat, she made a noise that vaguely resembled a bark, if the dog in question had been run through a meat grinder while a static radio was playing in the background.

“Big dog. Does it have the eye?”

Rook nodded.

“Then all it’ll take is one carefully placed harpoon.” The Admiral secured her helmet and hefted her harpoon. “I’m going in. You can stay here and rest.”

Given the incredulous eyebrow, Rook probably wasn’t going to let the Admiral go alone. Fine by her.

Before the Admiral entered the water, a shadow passed over the two of them. It was the pegasus—flying directly for the golden temple, paying them absolutely no mind.

Rook looked at the dark form with longing.

“...Used to be a pegasus, huh?”

She responded with a slow nod.

“Who knows, maybe Vespid really will find that cure.”

Rapidly, Rook shook her head.

“You don’t want to go back? Why not?”

For a moment, Rook glanced at the receding pegasus. With a shake of her head, she bore her sharp teeth with an amused grin. She gestured at herself and laughed like a scratching record.

“You want to be a sea monster?”

Rook nodded vigorously.

“...You know, I wonder if that’s why you’re not completely off the deep end.” She took a step into the water. “Every pony I know would lose it if that started happening to them. You… like it.”

Rook shrugged, tapping herself in the side of the head.

“Vespid did say you probably had a condition.” For some reason, this made the Admiral chuckle. “But then again, who doesn’t?”

The scratchy laugh came to her ears once again. With a silly salute, Rook dove into the water - leading the Admiral across the lake.

Sparkler’s faith in Granite was falling rapidly.

“You sure you can find another entrance?” She asked, tracing the edge of the temple with her massive hair.

“There must be something,” Granite muttered, carefully examining the stepped temple’s exterior. “I’ll find it eventually.”

“We’ve walked around it twice,” Sparkler pointed out. “Nothing. Considering how quickly you saw those traps, I’m beginning to think there’s nothing here.”

“Impossible… how did those cats get in, then? There has to be another way.”

“Magic? There’s more than enough here to do some crazy crap.”

“No one has ever found a teleportation construct,” Lob reminded them. “They probably won’t start now.”

“Thank you, Lob,” Granite said, smiling. “We just have to find i—”

“Up!” Sparkler shouted, pointing her harpoon gun into the air. A… pegasus was flying overhead, approaching them but not going right for them.

“A pegasus that can fly…?” Sparkler dropped the harpoon gun. “What in…”

“That’s a wyrd,” Lob said, aiming his weapon.

“That’s not a seapony.”

“Doesn’t matter.”

“...It’s not after us,” Granite observed. “I’m sure it can see us, but… it doesn't care.”

Sparkler twitched. “Oi, everypony, Imma magic island, none o’ th’ rules matter on me! Lemme just right screw with ya’ ‘till your noggins esplode! BOOM!”

The pegasus flew over top of them and landed on the temple a few levels above them. With open jaws, they watched the wyrd tap a brick with its wing and reveal a secret passage. It waltzed right in.

Sparkler twisted her hair into a hand, pulling herself up the stepped temple to the pegasus wyrd’s previous location. Carefully, she tapped the brick on the wall.

It opened up a secret passage without much fanfare.

“Well. I think we have a way in.”

“Little help?” Lob asked, trying and failing to climb up the massive temple wall.

“Oh. Right. Hold on…”

Author's Notes:

Sorry for delaying this so much, there was a lot of stuff going on. However, the next two chapters are drafted, so updates should pick up once again soon!

XII - As the Rivals Clash

Rook stopped just short of the end of the tunnel, refusing to go up into the temple itself. The Admiral would have asked her to elaborate, but both of them were underwater, so there wasn’t going to be much in the exchange of words. Rook gestured upward with her fin, made a neck-cutting motion, and pointed at her eye.

The Admiral nodded, keeping her helmet squarely on her head with her wing. There wasn’t much air within the bowl, but there was more than enough for her to swim through this small channel. Using her hooves and free wing, she kicked up, rising to the surface with Rook far behind.

The spherical room of treasure captured her imagination: so much gold, jewels, and other precious artifacts she couldn’t even begin to gauge the value of. And, of course, there was the centerpiece. That brilliant silver eye floating in the middle of the air, casting its gaze upon all the precious jewels.

And the massive wyrd dog, though that was currently sleeping like a dragon on its hoard.

Carefully, the Admiral rose from the water, keeping one eye on the silver eye at all times. It either didn’t notice her, or simply didn’t care.

I’ll grab you soon enough, the Admiral thought. But first, the primary obstacle. She lifted her harpoon and aimed right at the wyrd dog’s silver eye. If it was anything like the cats, a devastating blow to the extra organ would take it out. If not? She could always run back into the water. Even if it could swim, that tunnel was a little small for it.

She pulled the trigger with her wing.

The dog’s tail-hand grabbed the harpoon in midair and threw it to the side. All of the creatures’ eyes opened, bringing a guttural growl with them. The dog lashed out with the fire of its hand, the dark heat singing the Admiral’s exposed fur.

In the middle of the attack, the Admiral bolted for the water. She did a backflip into the pool she’d come out of, sinking beneath the waves. The beast’s paws plunged into the ripples after her.

One got her tail.

Oh for the love o—

The dog tore her out of the water, tossing her into a pile of gold coins. She hit hard enough to partially bury herself in the treasure. This did not deter the dog, for it jumped overtop of her, noxious saliva dropping down its face onto her.

“Nice doggy…” the Admiral said, cursing inwardly that she couldn’t load her harpoon while covered in gold. All she could do was lift the weapon to block the incoming attack, skewering the dog’s paw with the gun’s tip.

Like most wyrds, the pain wasn’t much of a deterrent. The flaming hand grabbed the harpoon gun and threw it away, leaving the Admiral defenseless.

So she grabbed a nearby diamond and threw it at the dog’s silver eye. The pointed section of the gem broke the silvery membrane—not enough to do any real damage, but enough to get the dog’s attention. In a half-panic, it lifted its front paws to its eye, assessing the damage.

Enough of an intelligence to feel threatened. What is it about this island? She glanced at the floating silver eye. What do you do?

Pushing the thoughts aside, she ran for the watery escape again, leaving her harpoon gun behind. She may have been plucky and clever, but this was an unknown wyrd she didn’t have the firepower to gun down directly.

She didn’t make it to the pool, but she didn’t need to. The wyrd pegasus dropped from a hole in the ceiling, landing on the back of the dog’s neck and driving its pointed wings into the dog’s rotting flesh.

The Admiral smirked. Thanks, whoever you are.

The pegasus whirled out of the way of the dog’s hand, not caring in the slightest about the fire’s heat. It sunk its wings into every point on the dog’s body it could reach—but it notably couldn’t reach the silver eye. The dog was protecting it religiously, while occasionally swiping out in an attempt to hit the pegasus’ eye.

The Admiral snuck over to her harpoon gun and picked it up. She loaded it once again, pointing the harpoon right at the dog’s eye. It was certainly a massive target, but the haphazard motion of the wyrd battle kept it from being an easy one. The Admiral closed one of her eyes, lined up the shot, and waited for the perfect moment.

The pegasus tossed the dog to the ground, exposing its eye. The pegasus would not be able to capitalize on the weakness, but the Admiral would.

She pulled the trigger…

Sparkler, Granite, and Lob fell out of the same hole the pegasus had come out of. They didn’t land on the Admiral, but their sudden appearance threw her aim off. She hit one of the dog’s normal eyes rather than the silver one.

“Admiral!?” Granite shouted.

“Shoot the dog’s eye!” the Admiral hissed, having shot both her harpoons.

Granite and Lob raised their guns and launched their spikes. The dog was already up, however, and took the shots in the chest rather than the eye. With a roar, it charged them.

Sparkler picked up a massive platinum scepter in her hair and smacked the dog across the face with it. “Back off, ya smarmy mutt!”

“Smarmy?” Granite raised an eyebrow.

“Pretty sure the word doesn’t apply here,” the Admiral added.

Sparkler cracked the dog’s skull. “Ain’t my problem!”

The dog opened its mouth wide, revealing rows upon rows of razor sharp teeth. Several of these teeth popped out like bullets, flying at the ponies. The Admiral was able to duck out of the way while Sparkler created a makeshift shield out of her locks. Granite’s armor protected him, but one of the teeth broke through a weak spot in Lob’s leg, knocking him down.

The pegasus apparently knew about this toothy attack, for it capitalized on it the very instant the dog started using it. It skewered the underside of the dog’s jaw, poking a bony wingtip through the beast’s tongue. Swinging around, the pegasus punched a wing through the top of the jaw as well, piercing the bone under the creature’s long muzzle.

The wings had missed puncturing the eye, but the Admiral suspected the pegasus hadn’t been trying to puncture the eye, anymore. It was trying to limit the dog’s movement… so the ponies could shoot the eye.

The Admiral rolled to the side, picking up Lob’s harpoon gun. It still had a second bolt strapped to it, lucky for her. While she reloaded, Sparkler assisted the pegasus wyrd by wrapping her hair around the dog’s mouth.

The dog, in turn, lifted its tail and unleashed a burst of fire. Sparkler was forced to release, but the pegasus held strong, keeping the head still.

The Admiral shot through the noxious smoke. Her harpoon flew true, spearing the dog directly in the silver eye. A flood of shimmering goop rushed out of its body, covering the treasure of the room.

The pegasus removed itself from the writhing body and sat on the gold, paying the living ponies no mind at all as it watched its ancient enemy suffer.

Several cats poured in at this point, ready to serve their dog. They stopped short, however, when they saw their master’s dead carcass on the treasure. Every last one of them looked up at the silver eye expectantly.

The artifact flashed. Every wyrd with a silver eye—dead or alive—was petrified into what appeared to be solid silver. Every last one became motionless and harmless.

Sparkler gasped. “My magic! It… it works again!”

“What was that?” Granite asked as he tended to Lob’s leg. “Seriously, what?!”

The Admiral looked at the floating eye. “...This thing. It’s done something to the wyrd.” She glanced at the dog and the pegasus. “It… did this, somehow. And now it’s done.”

A sinking feeling came over the Admiral, a sensation soon compounded by a feeling not unlike starting an elevator ride down.

“Grab the eye and get us out of here!” The Admiral shouted.

“The exit is up there!” Granite said while Sparkler grabbed the eye with her hair.

“Put on your helmets, we’re leaving this way,” the Admiral pointed at the pool of water. “Rook’s waiting for us.” She grabbed Lob, made sure his helmet was secure, and dove into the tunnel.

Rook was more than a little surprised to see her carrying Lob through the tunnel, but the seapony had enough awareness about her to know they had to move fast. She helped the Admiral move Lob along, giving them enough speed to keep ahead of Granite and Sparkler.

The temple wasn’t falling apart and they were not being pursued—but they were falling. And the further they fell, the less chance the Admiral would have to get the air she needed. The others had full suits available, all she had was a helmet. If they sunk so far the pressure became too much…

There was a thunderous rumble. No doubt the island had just hit the surface of the ocean. It would take some time for it to completely submerge, but there wasn’t much they could do to go any faster. It was just the five of them, swimming through an aquatic tunnel. The rumbling continued, but the Admiral heard no one. There was only the water pushing across her fur as she moved.

Just as she started to feel the weight of the water increase, they popped out of the tunnel into the lake. The Admiral looked up, relieved that she could see light coming from above. All she had to do was swim to the surface and breathe.

If only she hadn’t been exerting herself so much over the last few minutes, this would have been easy. As it was, there wasn’t as much air in her helmet as there should have been and she was using up what was there absurdly fast. She dropped Lob, trusting Sparkler to take care of him. Should have passed him off long ago…

With both of her wings, she surged upward like a furry torpedo, focusing on nothing but the light above her. She ignored the fact that her visor was fogging up something fierce and that she was starting to feel like her deep breaths weren’t restoring any of her energy. How much of that was psychological? What point did she need to force herself to stop taking in air to combat hyperventilation?

She wasn’t sure. Whenever she was in tense situations like this, she either had some way to read her oxygen levels, or she had no oxygen to speak of and just held her breath. In many ways, this may have been worse: how could she tell if she was exerting more energy attempting to breathe than she was getting back?

When her vision started to go fuzzy, she forced herself to take one more breath and hold it. She knew it was too late at this point: there was hardly any oxygen content left in the sweaty air. She closed her eyes, focusing on flapping her wings.

Flap.

Flap.

Flap.

She was flying…

Something hit her from behind, hard. The shock made her exhale and open her eyes, just in time to see the sun as she was thrown out of the ocean. She popped her helmet off and took in a breath of air before she hit the surface with an impressive splash.

Just below the water was the Hex, piloted by Wiffle… and led by Rook. Rook gave the Admiral a salute paired with a cheesy smile.

The Admiral would have laughed if she didn’t feel the pressing need to get more oxygen into her lungs. She poked her head above the waves and gasped several times before calming down.

“I really, really should have kept the full suit,” the Admiral muttered.

“That would probably have been a good idea,” Sparkler admitted, rising to the surface. She opened up the folds of her hair, revealing several precious gems, coins, and the silver eye. “What are we going to do with this thing?”

The eye reacted now that it could see the outside world again, pointing itself right at Rook. The seapony panicked, ducking away, but Sparkler sealed it within her hair before it could do anything.

“Keep it away from Rook,” the Admiral ordered. “It does things to wyrds. Other than that… I think this is the little toy we can give Silver when we get back. Something truly unique, he wanted.”

“If you think it’ll work…”

The Hex surfaced completely. Wiffle popped the hatch and called out excitedly. “Guys! I’ve got the Algol on the radio! They’re coming to get us!”

Sparkler sent out a pulse of her spell. “...And they’re a lot closer than any deepfish. We’re going to get out of this!”

Rook pointed at the Admiral and then to the south.

The Admiral nodded. “Yes, don’t worry, we’re going to finish your quest. I can’t imagine there’s much more between us and the goal, right?”

Rook shook her head—but after deliberating with herself for a moment that involved a glare aimed at seemingly nothing, she shrugged.

“...Then we can hope there won’t be any more interruptions.”

High Academe Iota of Sanctaphrax raised the part of her head where her eyebrow should have been, scowl deepening. “Leyline. You are wasting my time.”

Dean Leyline of the largely defunct School of Magic slammed his hooves on Iota’s desk. “I am not long for this world, High Academe! I need an apprentice, and I need one soon, or else the art of spellcraft will be lost forever!”

Iota glanced at the crystals Leyline wore around his neck. “Surely, if they had your artifacts and your books, they could learn. You have my word: the next unicorn with an adaptable talent will be given your resources.”

“Your word…” Leyline let out a bitter snort. “We all know how good your word is.”

“I say what I mean.”

“You change your opinion when convenient. Bah.” Leyline put a hoof to his horn, rubbing it to soothe the soreness. “There is more to magic than books and studying. Some of it must be taught. Experienced. I am the last wizard. I need an apprentice.”

“Magic is dying. You should be thankful your art lasted this long.”

“You have heard of the relic mare.”

Iota nodded. “Twilight Sparkle. I am aware of the rumors. I believe them. They are reasonable. If the more foggy details are to be believed, she has already received formal training in the art. More so than you ever will.” Iota leaned in. “You can teach her nothing.”

“I am…”

“...not the last wizard.” Iota pressed her hooves together. “There is no further need for us to put funding into your desperation.”

Leyline took a few steps back. “You just want to get rid of me.”

Iota said nothing.

“Wait for the old stallion to croak, is that it? Get rid of the last vestiges of proper magic in this world? I won’t have it! I…” He coughed hard enough to fall to his knees. “I’ll…” A clouded look came over his eyes. “...What am I doing here?”

“The usual,” Iota deadpanned. “You had just been dismissed.”

“I… right… right…” Leyline hobbled over to the elevator, leaving the High Academe’s presence. As he descended, he felt a surge of anger. Why was he so angry? It was unbecoming of a Grandmage to have such outward emotions. As his master and his master’s master, he needed to keep composure. Always.

He pulled a small locket out of the folds in his robe, holding a picture of a massive white mare with a solar eclipse cutie mark. The High Academe of Sanctaphrax while he had been a student here… back then, magic was respected. The hoof-full of students who studied the art were of the elite. She was given the position as the Dean of Magic.

Now, here he was, all that was left. The only remnant of her teaching. A failure who couldn’t keep the flame burning.

He exited Iota’s Engineering tower on a middle level, trotting haphazardly through the tunnels. He was not conscious of where he was going, but that was normal. Invariably, he would always end up in the Tower of Magic.

Or, the Tower of History and Magic, these days. The small schools had been folded together with continual cuts. Strange, how Sanctaphrax grew in profits, schools still had to be downsized so much. He knew it was all about the money, now.

What he wouldn’t give to be there when Sanctaphrax was new and founded purely on the ideas of learning. Just a few towers with ponies obsessed with the knowledge of the past and future.

Who could remember that, aside from himself?

With a sigh, he entered his School.

Meteor was there, talking with a brown earth pony Leyline had never seen before.

“And then we’ll need to ship the explosive components carefully,” Meteor was saying. “And we’ll need t—oh! Leyline! How’s life treating you?”

“...I remember the old days…” Leyline said, wistfully.

“Times change,” Meteor said. “As our mutual friend the Admiral is always saying, we have to look to the future, not the past.”

“...Mhm…”

“Do you need anything?”

“No, thank you.” Head hung low, Leyline shambled into his office. It took him a few seconds to realize there was a pony sitting in his seat. “...Who…?”

“Dean Vespid. You know. Medicine?” The yellow pegasus raised an eyebrow. “I haven’t exactly had this position for too long, but it’s been years.”

“Ah. Yes, yes, I remember now.” He couldn’t. “What can I do for you, Dean Vessel?”

Vespid twitched. “I have confirmed through rigorous testing and use of your prescribed methods that wyrdness is, most assuredly, a magical process. Using samples from ‘Rook’ and the captives in my terrarium, I was able to extrapolate a difference in progression.”

“We already knew it was a curse,” Leyline muttered. “Told you that years ago.”

“Yes, but this is quantifiable and is able to rule out a biological pathogen. I’ve introduced the two samples to each other; they are identical. The mutated cell structure is the same in ‘Rook’ as a full wyrd, there’s no biological reason it shouldn’t have completely converted her. In fact, from the cellular level, as far as I’m concerned she is completely converted. Something else must be driving the transformation since the cytoplasmic ret—” She shook her head. “Never mind, not important. What’s important is that I need your help finding out the exact mechanism behind this curse. The effect is largely biological, but the source…”

“Send me your observations,” Leyline said. “I will perform an analysis therein. Though if my current theories are correct, it will be affixed to the life-force itself.”

“...What?”

Leyline smirked. “For a pony of medicine, you lack knowledge in critical areas…”