Secret of Andalantis

Chapters

Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 1
Epilogue

Chapter 2

Dinky stared at the octopus shuffling along the seafloor. The cephalopod suddenly realized it was being observed and it quickly disappeared in a crevice between rocks that seemed ridiculously too small for the creature to fit. Dinky giggled at the spectacle.

“I wish my friend Snails could have been here, he’d have love to see all this,” she said, looking at her half-sister.

Amethyst Star smiled. “He’s miss Raindrops’ little brother right?”

“Yup!” answered Dinky with a smile. “He collects bugs and other crawly things. He knows a lot about them,” she added, spreading her forehooves wide to put emphasis on ‘lot’.

Sparkler suppressed a shiver at the mention of creepy crawly things. “He sounds really smart. How about, when we get back to the beach, we go look for sea shells to bring back to him as a gift?”

Dinky looked up to her half-sister and give her a big beaming smile. It was such a bright smile that even Trixie, floating fifty feet away, could spot it. It distracted her as she was observing the slow gliding of a nearby ray. She chuckled at how outrageously cute the kid could be sometimes and returned to her observations.

The teeming wild life of the coral reef was already giving her an incredible amount of ideas for her next magic show. With some more info from Lyra she could easily create an entire show based around the theme of underwater adventures. Visions of nautical themed tricks (Tricks with seashells! Knots on a rope! Fishes magically moving from one bowl to another!) and aquatic illusions were flashing through her mind at the very moment.

Trixie was already listing supplies she could acquire while in Cayo El Bayo when a voice behind her called her name. She didn’t take the time to identify the voice and simply turned around. She turned only to see a dark shape, engulfed in a lavender glow, fill her field of vision. Something slimy, sticky and heavy was gripping her face!

“Aaah! Get it off! Get it off! Get if off” she cried, her voice somewhat muffled by the attacker, as she flailed her hoofs around in a panic.

“Trixie! Calm down!” suddenly called Lyra.

“Get it off! Get it off! Get it off!”

Her field of vision was suddenly awash with a golden glow, revealing a frightening round mouth with tiny pointy teeth inches away from her eyes, thankfully protected by the diving mask she was wearing. She couldn’t help but close her eyes shut and screech in terror, just as Lyra pulled away whatever monstrosity was trying to eat her face.

“You have a horn you know,” said an annoyed Lyra.

Trixie opened her eyes, finding her unicorn friend glaring at her. Next to her, still held aloft by her golden telekinetic field, was a big starfish.

Trixie rubbed the back of her head sheepishly. “It took me by surprise,” she said weakly.

The sound of someone finally giving in to laughter they were holding back filled the water around them. Trixie scanned the nearby area and found a certain white unicorn holding her sides as she laughed her head off. Wind Sailor was swimming by his companion, looking rather sheepish.

“Rarity! You did this?” asked an enraged Trixie, her blushing cheeks puffing in anger.

Rather than answer the other unicorn just kept laughing, much to Trixie’s anger. She briefly considered lobbing the starfish back to its sender, but in the end Trixie decided on a different angle of attack and began to weave a spell, causing her horn to glow in its signature glow. The spell then flew off toward the pranking mare, temporarily blinding all those around her. The target of Trixie’s spell blinked away the blindness and took on the surprised look on Wind Sailor, Lyra and Bon Bon’s face, as well as the smug look on Trixie’s.

“What? What…what did she do?” she asked, concern creeping into her voice.

“Now stay calm Miss Rarity,” began Wind Sailor. “I’m sure it’s just temporary…”

The unicorn then saw something float into her field of vision, something green. She reached up and pulled her hair into view. Instead of a luxurious purple mane, a mess of thick green hair met her surprised stare.

“You…you made my hair green?” she said quietly.

“I made it look like kelp, but I guess that level of detail would just be…splitting hair,” said Trixie with a smug smile.

Lyra groaned at the bad pun. “Trixie, I think you spend way too much time with Pokey.”

Trixie didn’t care. She knew from personal experience with Rarity that the fashionista couldn’t stand green, or someone messing with her mane. She kept staring at the strangely still mare, expecting her to break into an an angry diatribe or maybe an anguished wail at any second. She was sadly disappointed when it didn’t come.

“If that’s the best revenge prank you can think of, that is rather pitiful, Miss Lulamoon,” said the now green-haired mare as she cast a spell of her own, returning her hair to its violet color and curly form. “Besides, you’re not the only unicorn who knows a thing or two about illusions.”

The slacked jaw look of surprise on Trixie’s face made the nearby Lyra and Bon Bon chuckle in amusement. That’s when Sparkler and Dinky swam back to the rest of the group.

“We heard you scream, what happened?” asked the older sister.

Trixie was glad for an excuse to turn her back on her nemesis of the day. “Nothing, just this… this… pouffiasse de fille de pute that’s causing trouble,” she answered.

“Three things, Miss Lulamoon,” came an irritatingly chipper and haughty voice, “ sounds carry very far in water, my father was from Prance and don’t assume my mother was anything like yours.”

Trixie froze into place, nearly sinking down to the bottom before Lyra pulled her up with her magic. She was fighting really hard not to blow up in front of Dinky and make even more of a fool of herself. She took a few deep breathes to calm down and eventually managed to resume swiming unassisted. Lyra gave her an amused glance, which was quickly curtailed by Trixie's own furious glare.

“I didn’t know that about your dad Miss Rarity,” said Dinky, completely missing the true nature of the exchange. “Sweetie Belle told me your parents are from Minneighsota.”

The white unicorn coughed a little at that and smiled awkwardly at the little filly. “Oh that’s quite true my little darling. Father moved there when he was younger than you, but his parents made sure he knew the language of his homeland even if he doesn’t have any memories of it.”

Lyra cleared her throat, attracting the attention of everypony present. “How about we head back to the ship for a snack before heading back to shore?”

There was a moment of silence and finally all the adults present agreed it was a good plan. Wind Sailor even threw in a stomach growl for good measure. There was just one problem with this plan.

“Hey, where’s momma?” asked Dinky.

Ditzy opened her eyes to find herself staring up at a strange rocky ceiling. There was a small patch of green fluorescent algae right above her, but sunlight was also streaming into the room from somewhere. Ditzy reached a hoof up to her eyes and suddenly realized she was wearing a diving mask.

Everything that had happened to her previously suddenly flooded her memory and she quickly bolted upright. Or at least she tried to do so but found herself fighting against the water resistance. Her head complained about the sudden movement by throbbing painfully, but Ditzy ignored it, scanning her surrounding looking for those freaky sharks that had chased her and her friend who had showed up to save her.

The room she found herself in wasn’t part of the tunnel system she had rushed through however long ago it was since she had lost consciousness. She was lying on the sand in a rather small circular cave, about three pony length in width and two ponies in height. Part of the wall to her left was actually made of coral rather than rock like the rest of the room. There, in the rock, were carved a few holes, presumably to act as storage units. Over the mouth of each hole attached, through methods Ditzy couldn’t grasp, a type of net made of woven green fibers, preventing the items within from just being dislodged by water current. A similar type of weaving was acting as a curtain over the triangular doorway left at the base of the coral structure. The curtain’s slow undulation allowed sunlight to shine into the small room.

Ditzy didn’t understand why Lyra would bring her to this strange underwater cave instead of heading back to the boat. Plus this place looked like somepony lived in it.

“I’m going to check up on her!” said a cheerful voice from the other side of the curtain.

Ditzy didn’t recognize the voice and quickly got up on her hooves, or at least managed to float upright. The creature that swam into the room was certainly sporting the right colors, but she definitively was not Lyra.

It, or rather she, was roughly the size of a pony and floating upright, with a body like that of a seahorse, but with the head of a pony. She had a curly tail, two little translucent fins on each side and a delicate dorsal fin. She sported a smooth green coat that matched perfectly with Lyra’s own coloring, and her short spikey mane was very similar in color but lacked Lyra’s near-white streaks. There was also no sign of a unicorn's horn. Her eyes, rather than the warm golden yellow that Lyra sported, were a vibrant magenta. Those same eyes grew in surprise when their owner realized her guest was awake.

Ditzy and the sea creature stared at each other in stunned silence for a few seconds. After a while the creature broke into a wide smile and her eyes sparkled with joy and excitement.

“Hi! My name’s Sea Cucumber! What’s your name?”

"You're a seapony!" blurted Ditzy, recognizing the creature.

The seapony, Sea Cucumber, swam up to Ditzy and used her tiny fins to take hold of Ditzy's forehoof. "Nice to meet you Miss Yoora Seapony... what a weird name, especially for a dry pony!"

"What? No! My name is Ditzy, Ditzy Doo. I meant that you're a seapony! I... I never met a seapony before!"

Sea Cucumber chuckled, her grin growing bigger. "That's great, because I've never met a pegasus pony before! Com'on, I'll introduce you to everypony!"

And with that, Sea Cucumber swam out of the small cave.

Trixie got back to the group just in time to see Wind Sailor plunging back into the ocean. The pegasus stallion had been sent above the ocean to look for sign of Ditzy, by the way his date was patting his shoulder and his own sad expression, it wasn’t hard to deduce that he hadn’t turn up any lead.

“What do we do now?” asked Amethyst Star, holding on to the worried Dinky.

There was no need to ask any other question, the lack of Ditzy made it obvious no one had found the missing pegasus.

“Miss Trixie, you’re going to find momma, right?” asked Dinky, hopefully looking up at the blue unicorn mare.

Trixie nodded. “The Great and Powerful Trixie swears it, kiddo!” she said before turning to Lyra .“How long is your enchantment going to hold?”

Lyra looked uneasy. “I’m not sure.”

“Lyra!” gasped Trixie.

Lyra crossed her front hooves and looked a bit frustrated. “Dangit Trixie, I’m a musician not a mage! I only had to take one mathemagical calculus course and it was my worst score of all my university years. It should hold for roughly a day but I can’t give you a more precise timing.”

Everypony present let out a sigh.

“You could have said that first, I was starting to worry I would suddenly drown!” commented Wind Sailor, speaking for everypony present.

“A day is plenty enough to find Ditzy,” added Bon Bon, smiling at Dinky.

Lyra looked at the little filly, who seemed to have calmed almost immediately. Lyra, not for the first time, contemplated the idea that her marefriend would make a wonderful mother one day. For now though, she had to be a foalsitter and keep Dinky from panicking. Lyra looked at Trixie, who seemed to be pondering the same thing, and reached out a hoof to Bon Bon.

“Sweetie, how about you take Dinky back to the boat for a snack?” she suggested.

Bon Bon looked at her marefriend, understanding where she was going with this. She wordlessly asked Lyra if she was certain and the green unicorn gave a similarly wordless answer.

“Be safe,” simply whispered Bon Bon, giving Lyra a quick peck on the cheek before turning to Dinky. “Let’s go eat some candy Dinky!”

While the pair left toward their boat, the rest of the older ponies formed into a closer circle. Sparkler looked back at her departing half-sister with a guilty look on her features.

“How are we going to find Miss Doo? It’s not like she left hoofsteps to follow,” said Wind Sailor, looking at the white mare at his side.

Said mare was rubbing her chin with her fetlock, deep in thought. “Maybe we could use a detect magic spell to follow Miss Heartstring’s enchantment?”

Trixie was somewhat taken aback by the helpful suggesting. “I can do that,” she blurted after a second.

Before Trixie could think she had an easy solution to the problem at hand, Lyra went and put a damper on her enthusiasm. “We’re underwater Trixie. Water is notorious for not holding magic well.”

The other two unicorns nodded in agreement, while Wind Sailor looked a bit perplexed.

Trixie shrugged “Let me try anyway.”

Trixie turned back toward the general area of the coral reef they had all frolicked around for the last few hours. Her horn flashed and her eyes took on the telltale glow of her magic sight. She studied the scene before her, her brow furrowed in confusion.

“That’s strange,” she mumbled to herself.

Trixie turned back to her group, magic sight still in effect, and gasped. In addition to Lyra’s enchantment being all over them, she saw something else very interesting.

“What? What is it?” asked Lyra, confused.

Trixie turned off her spell and shook her head before answering. “You were right about water… wait… where’s Rarity?”

The stallion and two mares suddenly realized Rarity wasn’t amongst them and looked left and right.

“Sorry!” came a familiar posh voice from above as the white mare swam back down to the group. “I was making sure Miss Bon Bon and little Dinky were in the boat… so Miss Lulamoon you saw something?”

“Ah yes. Water is playing havoc with Lyra’s enchantment. It’s like leaving a trail of sand in a windy area. I can still pick up traces of her magic, especially if somepony was swimming close to rocks or the sea floor, then the residual magic would sort of bleed into them,” explained Trixie. “The real interesting stuff is there were a couple of incredibly clear tracks, like ribbons floating in the water. I didn’t understand it until I turned and looked at Wind Sailor here.”

“Me?” asked the stallion, confused.

“Of course! Pegasus magic!” said Lyra. “Pegasus magic is the only type that can interact with water! It’s how they can mold cloud and make it rain!”

Trixie pointed at Wind Sailor’s wings. “Every time you use those big magical appendages of yours to swim, you leave behind traces of your magic. Between Ditzy’s pegasus magic and Lyra’s enchantment I should be able to track her down. Won’t be perfect but we can at least get into shouting distance of her.”

The pegasus smiled broadly and flapped his wings. “Great! Fire up your spell and let’s go!”

A white hoof reached out to his shoulder and yanked him backward. “I don’t think so Sailor.”

“What do you mean Miss Rarity?” he asked the unicorn, confused.

“Aside form the fact you’d probably throw off Miss… Trixie’s spell with your own magic,” she said, “you’re the only one of us with wings. Somepony just disappeared in the ocean, we need you to fly back to shore and warn the coast guard.”

“I can’t believe I’m saying this, but Rarity’s right,” said Trixie as she caught sight of Sparkler looking in the direction of the boat. “Amethyst Star, can you work a sending spell?” she asked, catching the jeweler’s attention.

“Huh? Yeah I learned how to in school,” she answered, whipping her head back to the de facto leader of their little group.

“Good. My hat is enchanted to send messages to Princess Luna’s office in Canterlot. If we’re not back by sunset, I want you to send her a message explaining the situation. In the mean time you should be with your sister,” explained Trixie.

“If we run into trouble before that I’ll summon my lyre, so keep an eye on it.” Added Lyra.

“You can count on me! Thank you Trixie, please find Ditzy,” said the pink unicorn, smiling slightly.

Trixie nodded, giving her a wordless promise.

“I’ll escort the two of you back to the boat, Lady Rarity, and then I’ll head for the coast,” suggested Wind Sailor.

However the object of his attention had other plans in mind.

“You’re quite the gentlestallion, Wind Sailor, but that won’t be necessary as I’ll be accompanying Miss Trixie and Miss Heartstring in their search,” she said.

“You’ll what?” asked everypony else at the same time.

“Why would you do that?” asked Trixie.

The white unicorn gave her an incredulous look. “Ditzy Doo is one of the Elements of Harmony. She’s a hero who saved us all from the Tyrant Sun, and if something were to happen to her she wouldn’t be there when that crazy alicorn shows up next!”

“I guess you want to repay Ditzy any way you can Miss Rarity.” commented Lyra, remembering the events of the latest Longest Night.

The other mare nodded. "Or any of you six, my dear,"

Trixie groaned. “I can’t talk you out of it, can I?”

A vigorous head shaking was her answer. Ultimately Trixie didn’t feel like wasting precious time arguing the point with the other unicorn. After saying their goodbyes and working out a few other details the three unicorns, one blue, one green and one white, were ready to depart.

“Wind Sailor, Amethyst Star, good luck with your tasks. If all goes well we should see you guys shortly,” said Trixie, turning a pair of glowing eyes toward the vast ocean and the last place Ditzy Doo had been seen. “Let’s find our friend!”

Author's Note

AUGH! The writer's block hit me so hard. I feel terrible for only having THIS measly chapter to offer after ALL this time! I wanted to have more before the end of the chapter but I felt like I left you guys hanging long enough, so have a truncated chapter.

Chapter 3

She grumbled softly so that the other two unicorns wouldn’t hear her. She didn’t have anything against Miss Doo, but this was some really unfortunate timing.

This day was just getting worse and worse. Her client was clearly not paying her enough for all these extra-curricular activities… hay; she had half a mind to ask for an extra for having had to deal with Lulamoon today. At least she managed to play a little prank on her. The starfish prank wouldn’t repay all the trouble the Representative caused her in the past, but it was a start. She could always get her more embarrassing subscriptions to colt-cuddler magazines later. Direct revenge was much more satisfying off course, but, in her line of work, vengeance was a risky luxury that was best to avoid.

It was supposed to be a simple day of swimming in the sea and checking out corals, but then that insufferable mare and her friends had to pick the same day to go see the reefs! Playing the part of the vapid fashionista was starting to grate on her nerve. Having to play the dumb bimbo to seduce that cute pegasus was fun enough, playing the part in front of Trixie and her posse was just tiring. And now that clumsy pegasus had gone off and got lost or something.

The other unicorns had seemed doubtful, but unlike a lot of things she had said so far today it was the honest truth: she felt she owed a debt to Ditzy Doo. Well all the Elements really, but helping rescue one of their own would satisfy her inner ledger. One thing she had learned in her career is that nothing in this world is free. Every favor, every gift, every smile, comes with a cost of some kind, regardless of the giver’s altruism. It was her personal policy to always anticipate such costs and always reimburse them on her term rather than hope they would disappear. The Elements of Harmony saved the world from Corona, and it was time to pay them for their work.

Plus without the grey pegasus the world would probably be doomed. Only a fool who didn’t witnessed Corona with her own eyes would think of herself first in such a situation.

“Hey Rarity, are you swimming or just pretending?” shouted Trixie from up ahead, breaking her out of her musing.

Two exasperated blue eyes rolled. “I’m coming, I’m coming,” replied the pearlescent mare as she caught up to her two companions.

“If you’re heart is not into this, you should just go back to the ship,” added the blue mare.

Two white cheeks puffed in anger. Trixie was too busy tracking Ditzy’s movement to see the angry glare the unlikely member of their trio was shooting her way.

“I already told you Miss Trixie,” began the flustered mare, “I am here to repay my debt to Miss Doo, and nothing will stop me. Not even your incessant nagging.”

Lyra, aware that things could escalate quickly, decided to change the subject. “How’s the tracking going Trixie?”

“Not perfect, but not too terrible. It seems like coral soaks up magic like a sponge! If I was the researcher type I’d probably be interested in it, but for now I’m just glad it gives me signposts to follow. This way,” said Trixie before veering down into a field of kelp and then between two sandy cays.

A cold blue eye glanced discreetly around. She had seen a shadow move amongst the kelp. It didn’t look like any of the fishes they’d seen so far.

Before the three mares opened a large expense of sloping sea floor. They were clearly getting closer to the edge of the continental shelf. All around them were a series of small rock outcroppings with various corals growing on them. Wordlessly Trixie pointed into a direction and the other two followed her. They swam down closer to the sandy floor and began to slalom between those formations. After a while Trixie suddenly stopped mid-water. Her face was scrunched in a mixture of anger and confusion.

“A problem?” asked Lyra.

“It’s gone! Ditzy’s magic’s gone! It’s like… I was following a trail of sand and suddenly something disturbed the trail. There’s only faint traces and that’s all,” answered Trixie, shaking her head to stop her spell. “And now I have a headache from overusing my sight.”

Lyra was flabbergasted “That doesn’t make sense! This should be the most recent magic! How could it just scatter here? It should be the easiest to spot!”

Their companion also had something to say, but she was a lot more discreet about it. “We have another problem,” whispered the white member of their little trio, “we’re being followed.”

“Rarity what are you talking about?” Trixie said.

She almost turned around but the purple-haired unicorn brought a hoof around her shoulders and forced her to look forward again.

“Don’t look back, it might tip them off,” she whispered with an annoyed tone to her voice. “Trust me, something’s been following us since that kelp patch and it’s big.”

She had to be careful not to let her put-on Canterlot accent break: now was not the time to get sloppy and break character. Already pointing out they were being followed was straining credibility, but it was a small price to pay for some help.

“Are you sure it isn’t just some fish?” asked Lyra.

“Well one can never be too careful, darling,” said the stressed out white unicorn.

“Where are they now Rarity?” asked Trixie.

“I don’t know, there’s plenty of space to hide around here,” she replied, shaking her head, “We need to set up an ambush or something.”

Lyra nodded in agreement “Trixie, think you could turn us all invisible and replace us with illusions?”

“Too much strain to pull it off effectively, but I could turn invisible and put a copy of myself as decoy. You two keep following me, and I’ll fall back while invisible to keep an eye out for our stalker. When my illusion disappears, double back and come lend me a hoof.”

“Sounds like a plan, darling.”

When Ditzy emerged from the cave she had been resting in, she found herself into a roughly round depression in the sea floor, surrounded by tall rocky walls partially covered with coral formations. Many cave openings were visible all around the campsite, many partially covered by braided kelp drapes, or large clamshell pieces. There were about half a dozen seaponies of various colors milling about in groups; mostly females but Ditzy spotted two males. All of them stopped talking and stared at Ditzy.

She felt a little self-conscious about it, but had to remind herself that, for a change, no one was staring at her because of her strabismus, but rather because she was as strange and alien as they were to her. Regardless of the reason that many stare felt a little intimidating.

“Hey everypony! This is Ditzy Doo, she’s a pegasus! Ditzy Doo, these are my friends! Those three are Sea Racer the daredevil, and the twins Sea Light and Sea Shimmer,” she said waving to a group of one blue male and two pink females. “Over there you have Sea Stone the stoic one, and Sea Shell the packcrab, making sure we have enough food,” she continued, pointing to a grey male and a beige female looking over a couple of braided bags, “And finally in the corner you have Sea Wave and Sea Youaround, she’s the joker of the group,” she finished, looking over a pale purple female and a magenta one.

Ditzy waved awkwardly at the assembled seaponies. All of them just stood, or rather floated, there in silence. Sea Cucumber then took the initiative and swam behind Ditzy to push her along toward a specific opening flanked by two big empty seashells.

“Com’on Ditzy, our leader will want to see you!” she said happily.

Ditzy swallowed audibly, getting a taste of sea water at the same time, as she looked at the dark cave in front of her. It was a rather ominous gaping hole in the rock surface. Soon after entering she found herself faced with a wall with alcoves carved into it containing pottery and broken pieces thereof. She realized the cave had an elbow that turned to her right, leading to a doorway closed by another kelp curtain. Sea cucumber swam ahead and pulled it aside, revealing a well lit room. She entered to find a seapony with her back to her. Her body was a pale yellow, not unlike Fluttershy’s coat, and her mane, coiffed into an elegant bun held together by pearl inlaid jewelry, was a deep royal blue.

“Hello Chari!” greeted the enthusiastic Sea Cucumber; “the dry pony is awake so I brought her to you!”

The seapony turned around, casting a warm and motherly gaze with her deep brown eyes over Sea Cucumber and Ditzy. While the other Seaponies she had met so far all seemed to be around her age or slightly younger, this one was obviously older. Not quite old enough to be Ditzy’s own mother, but old enough to be a mother in her own right. She stared at Ditzy like the others, but she had the good sense to catch herself doing it and blush in shame.

“I’m sorry, where are my manners? My name is Charybdis, I am the de facto leader of this group and I welcome you to our humble little camp,” she said giving a little bow of her head.

“I’m Ditzy Doo,” replied the pegasus, bowing as well"Thank you for taking care of me...how long was I out?"

"About two hours. Sea Cucumber tells me you hurt your head pretty bad trying to escape from a pair of Kaosharks, but I don't think you have a concussion," replied Charybdis.

Ditzy gasped. "Two hours? Everypony must be worried about me! Thank you again for the hospitality but I'll have to go."

"Wait!" called out the Seapony leader, "It's dangerous out there, and you might get lost, let me send a guide with you."

"That's very nice of you Miss Charybdis," said Ditzy with a smile, "but I'll just surface and fly back to our boat, I can't be that far," she added, flaring out her wings to make her point.

"Well if you want to take the way of the sky I must then ask you go break the surface away from our camp. Our enemies know we rescued you, and they'll be watching the sky, if you fly up from here they'll be able to find us."

Ditzy frowned at that. "Your enemies?"

Charybdis didn't have time to answer, as another seapony male, this one orange with a rather big yellow mane, burst into the chamber. He looked scared and was bruised at multiple places, and a part of his tail was wrapped in pale blue algae. There was a dark red stain visible through the improvised bandage.

"Charybdis! It's terrible,” he said, visibly out of breath as he stopped swimming and let his momentum carry him forward.

"Sea Lion! What happened?!" gasped the seapony leader, catching the male in her flippers.

"They...they took Sea Chanty! I tried ...to...to fight but there were too...too many..."

Sea Cucumber gasped. "Sea Chanty! No! We have to go rescue her!"

Charybdis gave Sea Cucumber a very sad look. "You know it isn't possible... we tried before and couldn't find anything... we can only keep going forward. Once we find Andalantis we..."

"I don't care about your stupid city!" shouted Sea Cucumber in anger, her voice cracking. "I don't care about finding a place that doesn't exist! I want my friend back! I just... I want my friend."

And with that she left, sobbing softly. Ditzy felt terribly uncomfortable, she wasn't sure what to do now. She looked at the sea floor beneath her, sadness etched on her face, her ears dropping. She felt really bad for that little green seapony. She wasn't sure what kind of mess she had gotten into, but she knew one thing: she wanted to help them.

"What...what's going on?" the pegasus asked, breaking the heavy silence that had befallen the cave.

"The Kaosharks... the creatures that attacked you... took another one of my little pony," replied Charybdis, lowering Sea Lion down on the ground.

There was pain in her voice, the pain of a mother who had lost a child. Ditzy wondered if it was possible to cry underwater. Sea Lion seemed to have used the last of his energy to return to camp as he had almost immediately fallen asleep once laid down.

"We don't know where the Kaosharks come from, but we do know one thing: they work for our worse enemies. They are the soldiers in their genocidal war against us. Anypony taken by the Kaosharks simply dissapears..."

"Who would do such a thing?" asked the pegasus.

Charybdis' feature visibly hardened at that question, and she glared angrily at an enemy she was the only one to see. "The merponies."

Trixie’s little plan had worked extremely well in the end. She had turned invisible and simply sent her illusionary decoy ahead with her companions. Companions might be too strong a description for the white unicorn that had invited herself along, but Trixie figured that with Lyra being a genuine friend ‘companion’ was a pretty decent average between the two points to accurately describe the pair.

She briefly wondered why she had to make that justification to herself in the first place, but then brushed it off when their pursuer had revealed itself.

Coming out from a patch of kelp came a shape unlike any Trixie had ever seen before. It looked a lot like Octavia, or her sister with blue eyes, had traded in her rear legs for a long fish tail with matching dorsal fin. This half-pony half-fish could only be one of Lyra’s aquatic pony. Whether it was a seapony or merpony, Trixie didn’t know or cared enough to make the distinction. Whatever that creature was, she needed to be caught so they could find out what she wants and if she had seen Ditzy somewhere. Trixie quickly dismissed her illusionary self and charged the aquatic pony.

The surprised fish-like pony struggled against Trixie’s grasp while protesting loudly at being grappled like that. Just when the grey stalker was about to get loose that pretentious purple-maned prissy princess showed up out of nowhere and showing some surprising skill managed to pin the aquatic pony to the seafloor, holding up one hoof behind her back in the process.

“Let me go! Let me go!” said the pony, whipping her tail about and kicking up a cloud of sand.

“Oh my stars!” declared Lyra, “It’s a merpony!” she said, solving the mystery of their pursuer’s tribe.

"Why were you following us?" Asked the surprisingly authoritative white unicorn.

"Yeah! What she asked," said Trixie, in a futile attempt to establish herself as the leader of the group in front of the merpony.

"I was just curious, please let me go," replied said aquatic pony. "I've never met a dry pony before."

"Let her go Miss Rarity, I think it's okay," said Lyra, "I never saw a merpony before myself, so why don't we try to be friends?"

The white unicorn sighed but did as asked and let go of the grey pony. The merpony moved a respectable distance away from the one who had pinned her to the sea floor,but made no further motion to run away.

"My name is Rock Beauty, I'm sorry I scared you."

"Nice to meet you, my name is Lyra, Lyra Heartstrings and these are Trixie and Rarity," said the mint unicorn, extending a hoof to Rock Beauty.

"Pleasure to meet you! Wow this is so incredible! I've seen some dry pony on boats before but this is the first time I get to talk to any! I thought you guys couldn't breathe underwater," said Rock Beauty, swimming around the trio excitedly.

"Normally we can't,” explained Lyra, “but I used a spell to let us breathe down here."

Rock Beauty's eyes grew in size while she opened her mouth wide, clearly impressed by what she just learned.

"Magic! That is so cool!" she said doing a little looping. “Merponies can’t do magic! I’m so jealous.”

“Not that chatting up with a member of a long lost tribe of pony isn’t fun,” began the unicorn that had only a few seconds ago been holding Rock Beauty in a lock, “but aren’t we on a mission to find somepony here?”

“Right!” added Trixie, swimming up to Rock Beauty. “We’re looking for a friend of ours, she came over here and we lost track of her. She’s a pegasus, grey with a blond mane, golden eyes that look in two different directions at once. ”

Rock Beauty shook her head. “I told you, you’re the first dry pony I’ve ever seen… maybe my friends have seen yours! I’ll take you back to our camp!”

“That’d be wonderful!” said Lyra, excitedly.

“Altough…” began Rock Beauty, suddenly looking sullen for a moment. “She might have run into trouble out here. Maybe she ran into…them.”

“Them?” Asked the three unicorns at the same time.

The merpony nodded grimly. “Yes, them… the evil seaponies!”

Author's Note

Yes still alive. I'm still chugging along, SLOWLY, on this story. I don't know what it is but it's just really hard to write this, event though I got all my story beats down until the ending.

Luckily, I got my new iPad and a writing program on it so I should be able to get some work done during downtimes at work. Should help in the next few weeks.

I hope you guys don't mind another short update, I wanted to proove I hadn't been sitting on my butt all this time... though there was a lot of that still.

Thanks for sticking with me despite the delays!

Chapter 4

Ditzy watched in silence as Charybdis began to carefully remove Sea Lion’s makeshift bandage, using her fins, mouth and surprisingly prehensile tail all at once.

“Can I help you with anything?” she finally asked.

“Yes, bring me the blue jar, as well as one of the big pale blue seaweed leaf, from the bag over there,” said Charybdis, pointing to a seaweed bag hanging in the corner, “then I’ll need you to hold him down while I clean up his wounds, I don’t want him flinching too much.”

Ditzy quickly located the jar in question, a hoof-sized pot apparently carved from blue stone with a seashell used as a makeshift cork, as well as the bandage, apparently the same type of plant used by Sea Lion.

“These are very good at absorbing blood and accelerate healing. If you’re ever wounded out in the kelp forests, look for it to stem any bleeding,” explained Charybdis while Ditzy got into position.

Charybdis opened the pot and used her tail to pick up a type of green salve from it, applying it to the wounds of the seapony male. As predicted he started to flinch from the touch, though Ditzy didn’t know if it was from the salve stinging or simply the pain of being touched.

“Is he going to be okay?” asked the concerned pegasus.

“His wounds are superficial, they’ll take time to heal but they’re not dangerous. He’s mostly exhausted, probably having swam for a long time to escape pursuit,” answered the seapony leader.

Ditzy was relieved but she still frowned. “What’s going here? You talked about a war? What are those kaosharks things and the merponies attacking you?”

Charybdis sighed loudly as she finished bandaging Sea Lion’s tail.

“Kaosharks are abominations, a strange fusion between sharks and all sorts of animals, both of the sea and dry land. As I said earlier, their nature is a mystery, as is their motivation in this conflict, but I do know they are dangerous brutes who work for the merponies,” she began, placing her jar back in its original bag. “I can’t provide answer on these creatures but I can tell you about our current predicament, if you have the time.”

Ditzy gave the seapony a sympathic look and nodded.

"It all began roughly a hundred years ago, when my great grandmother was roughly my age. Back then the merponies and us seaponies lived in villages near one another. It wasn’t a perfect peace, but everypony was generally left alone. My great-grandmother was something of an archeologist, obsessed with finding our ancestral home of Andalantis, and one day she had a breakthrough: she found the ruins of a trading outpost used when Andalantis still traded with you dry ponies. In the ruins she found a map, an incomplete one mind you, but still an exciting discovery. The map showed the locations of other trading outposts from the perspective of the dry ponies.

“The map itself lacked the location of Andalantis, back during its glory days or otherwise, but it showed that such maps could have survived to our day and that a more complete map might be found at one of the other outpots.

“The merponies accused us of wanting to keep Andalantis for ourselves, they wanted us to give them the tablet. Discussions didn’t go quite that well, from what I know, and soon seaponies began to go missing, presumably taken out by the merponies. When my great grandmother and some elders managed to organize a parlay with the merponies, they were instead met by one of them leading a squad of kaosharks.

“Half the party didn’t make it back to the village. Soon afterward the village was attacked, and the tablet taken. Seaponies aren’t warriors, and faced by an army of kaosharks there was nothing to do but flee, and scatter, leaving the ravaged village behind. Luckily a copy of the tablet had been made, as a possible peace offering to the merponies.

“A foolish seapony managed to whip some of the survivors into a frenzy and lead them on an attack of the merpony village. None of them were seen again. After that, settling down became next to impossible as the kaosharks and their merponies handlers hounded us to every corner of the sea, scattering our already dwindling population to the four currents. Still today we are mostly nomads, hiding until the kaosharks find us and then run away. Sometimes we meet survivors from other bands, like Sea Cucumber, and sometimes we find the remains of a camp, like we did here.

After my great grandmother’s passing, my grandfather and mother kept up her mission. My family has been exploring the various trading outposts since then, hoping to find Andalantis.”

While Charybdis had told her story she had finished dressing the minor cuts and wounds found around Sea Lion’s body.

“I assume you didn’t find it then,” said Ditzy, her ears drooping.

“None of the outposts had a map of the sea floor that showed where Andalantis used to stand, without that information it’s not possible to figure out where it is now…” began Charybdis, searching in another one of her bags, “However, I did recently found some really interesting artifacts!”

The seapony began to pull out a few items, motly pieces of painted pottery, a few metal tools, hairpins, and what looked like a doorknob. She then produced a larger object and showed it to Ditzy, who was slightly confused for a second before her eyes grew in size and she gasped. The item was a large bronze colored metal square, roughly a foot wide on each side. At its center was carved a circle and on that circle were lines and tiny points in various patterns. In one part of the circle, somewhat more crudely than the rest, somepony had carved three concentric circles.

“I know what this is! It’s a star chart!” she said.

“A star chart?”

Ditzy nodded. “Yes! It’s a way to navigate when out at sea or far from civilization, you use the stars to guide you. And this here, I’ve seen it in the brochure for the Cayo El Bayo museum, it’s the pony symbol for Andalantis!”

Charybdis stared silently at Ditzy, her eyes the size of dinner plates and her jaw hanging open. After a few seconds she managed to get over her shock.

“Can you read this map? Please Miss Doo, it would mean so much if you could lead us to Andalantis!” said the seapony, taking hold of Ditzy’s front hoof with her fins.

Ditzy looked down sadly. “I’m sorry, I can’t. Star charts get changed whenever Princess Luna reorganizes the heavens and moves the constellations around. There’s supposed to be a trick to using old charts but I don’t know what it is.”

The two stayed silent for a moment.

“Well you might not know, but maybe you could find someone who can?” suggested a hopeful Charybdis.

“Of course! My friend Trixie is Princess Luna’s personal student, maybe she can! All we have to do is find her.”

The seapony leader nodded. “Yes, I’ll assemble a group to escort you and go find your friends. They’re probably looking for you by now and I wouldn’t want them to run into the merponies.”

The trio of unicorn had followed the excitable merpony for about fifteen minutes by now, by Trixie’s estimate, and they had changed course almost 20 times by now. Whatever path they were following, it was purposedly complex, and the merpony was obviously following secret markers only she could spot. Trixie had tried to keep her eyes opened for a repeating pattern on the rock faces and various seaweed formations they had passed but so far nothing really seemed to stand out. Wherever they were going, somepony didn’t want others to remember how to find it.

A familiar white shape swam up next to Trixie and spoke in ushered tone, “You don’t really trust this little fish do you?” she asked.

Trixie shurged as best she could while following Rock Beauty,“I don’t know, she seems genuinely happy to see us and get to know us.”

“And that whole story about their enemies working with monsters to hunt them down?” asked the other unicorn.

Trixie raised a confused eyebrow, “Is it really that hard to believe? Exotic creatures can look pretty monstrous if you don’t know them.”

“I guess you do have a point there, but try not to make them think of our magic too much, it might come in handy to surprise somepony by suddenly moving objects with our telekinesis. I find that if you don’t remind them of it, most non-magical races will often forget about a unicorn’s potential because prisoners of their own race can’t pull the same tricks we can. Griffons rarely have magic-proof prisons for example.”

Trixie balked at the implication, “Miss Rarity... did… what…how…”

The unicorn in question chuckled, “Oh don’t get too flustered Miss Trixie, I didn’t mean to imply I had been incarcerated in the griffin kingdoms. Don’t be silly! What would a fashion designer such as moi be doing in such a dreary place?”

“I’m starting to think you read too many spy novels, Miss Rarity,” commented Trixie. “But I guess I’ll keep my horn to myself for now, if only so you don’t bug me with your paranoia.”

The white mare gave her a sly smile and swam off to have a somewhat similar conversation with their minty green companion. Lyra was just as trusting of Rock Beauty as Trixie, but similarly agreed to keep her spell casting to a minimum while in the company of the merpony.

Not soon afterward they dove toward the sandy seafloor and began to slalom between rocks, then go through a curtain of kelp before stopping in front of a rock face. The rock face was littered with barnacles, oysters, bright sea anemones, and the floor around it was home to half a dozen pony sized clams. Rock Beauty looked around, making sure the coast was clear, before she used her hooves to move one of the giant clams, revealing a tunnel in the rock face.

“This way, this way, my friends, discoveries awaits,” she said as though she was about to burst into song.

Trixie was thankful that it was not the case. Once the three unicorns entered the tunnel Rock Beauty hid the entrance again before resuming to lead her friends. The tunnel was lined with a type of bioluminescent algae that gave everything a creepy green glow. It was still fairly dark but it was enough to navigate the tunnel the short way through to a distant shaft of sunlight.

It didn’t take long for the quartet to emerge into a large room, a room that turned out to be the hold of a sunken ship, the rock they had traversed was breaking through a significant portion of the hull and floor. The whole ship seemed to be listing towards them. Above them was a hole in the hatch that used to cover the way into the hold, and it was through that hole that sunlight came into the old vessel.

“Wow, this is so cool!” commented Lyra, looking around the wooden room.

“Yeah, we were pretty lucky to find this big ship, the tunnel was a pretty nice bonus since it means nopony can tell we live in here,” explained Rock Beauty with a big smile.

Something caught the eye of the purple-maned unicorn and she moved in to investigate, finding a partially corroded silvery plaque lying in the silt on the floor. With her hooves she carefully cleaned up the plate.

“This ship was the HMLS Comet, apparently, and she was christened around 150 years ago,” she commented.

“Are you sure it’s safe?” asked Lyra, eyeing the nearby support beam.

“Oh yeah, we’ve been here a month and the place barely creaks. It’s stuck between two large rocks that support and also protect it from water currents. It’s also pretty hard to spot from the wrong angle, especially now that we took down the old masts.”

“Her,” interrupted the pony that had found the nameplate, “you normally refer to a ship in the feminine.”

Rock Beauty smiled, “I didn’t know that! Nifty!”

“So where are the rest of your friend then?” asked Trixie.

“Just over there, give me a second to get them ready,” explained Rock Beauty, swimming over to a door miraculously still attached to its hinges at one end of the room.

“Hey everypony! I’m back and I got a surprise!” she called, disappearing through the opening after opening the door.

“You know darling, she could be setting up an ambush for us.”

Trixie shook her head, “Don’t be so dramatic Rarity.”

The other mare looked at Trixie with a dubious air,

“Of course I’m serious,” said an irritated Rock Beauty, poking her head back into the room, “Come in, and prove to my friends I’m not lying!”

Lyra beamed a big smile and eagerly swam ahead, while her two companions rushed to follow her. They emerged into another part of the boat, this one also featuring a rock face breaking through one of the hull, although on the opposite side from the previous room, it had a large crevice in which material had been stockpiled. The room was partially lit by sun filtering through cracks in the ship’s structure and by clusters of the same luminescent algae they had encountered in the tunnel. The room featured a series of hammock hanging between supporting columns, but most importantly it also featured a group of gaping and staring merponies. Trixie quickly counted eight, nine if you included their guide. They had obviously not expected their friend to bring back a trio of unicorns. Lyra floated there with a big smile, staring with fascination at a species she had thought long extinct, but before she could say anything a blue form swam before her, spreading her forehooves wide open.

“Greatings brave merponies! The Great and Powerful Trixie is here to dazzle you with tale of the dryworld! Come one, come all and have all your questions about this strange world answered!” she declared, furthered stunning the amassed merponies.

“I will forego the kettle and pot analogy, for the moment, as it is no time to start slinging accusation at one another, Great and Overdramatic Trixie,” whispered the white unicorn next to her.

Luckily the green one decided to go for a more personable approach. “Hi! My name’s Lyra, and this is my friend Trixie and this is Rarity. It’s nice to meet you all.”

“See? I told you I wasn’t kidding! Isn’t this amazing!” declared Rock Beauty. “Let’s do the introductions properly! These two are the siblings Triggerfish and Angelfish,” she began, pointing to a black male and a yellow female.

“Just Angel is fine too,” said the mare in a soft voice, blushing slightly.

“This is Damsel, Three-stripe Damsel,” continued Rock Beauty, pointing to a pale blue female wearing a seashell necklace.

“Charmed,” she simply said, flicking her paler blue mane that featured three black stripes.

“Stargazer, Halibut and Dusky Jack,” the grey merpony continued, pointing to a white male, an orange female and a violet male.

All three of them waved back with a small smile.

“And those two are Fire Squid and Peppermint Shrimp, or Minty for short,” finished Rock Beauty, indicating a bright red male with a spikey mane and a really small and mousy-looking pale green female.

“This is pretty darn cool, I didn’t believe Rocky here when she said you guys could breathe water like us, but there you are!” said Dusky Jack, getting closer.

“They used magic!” pointed out his grey compatriot, extanding a hoof toward Lyra.

“Radical! Do you know any other magic?” he asked the minty green unicorn before a white form blocked his field of vision.

“Yes magic is quite impressive but let’s not forget the real reason we are here.”

Trixie nodded in approval, “We lost one of our friends. Her name is Ditzy and she’s a grey pegasus.”

“Pegasus? That’s the ones with the weird fins that swim in the sky right?” asked Triggerfish.

“They’re called wings, and you use them to fly,” corrected his sister.

Trixie was about to ask if any of these guys had seen Ditzy when a new voice came down from the ceiling. It was another female voice, one that sounder older and carried authority.

“What’s going on down there?”

Trixie looked up to find that the ceiling had a hole, leading to what the unicorn suspected had been the captain’s cabin on the ship. In the hole the head of another merpony appear. This one was a deep dark blue in color and her short-cropped mane was a brilliant shade of yellow that really contrasted with her darker coat. Her red eyes widened at the sight of the three newcomers in her home.

“One of you better come up here and explain to me what’s going on before I start hoofing out blames at random!” said the blue merpony, retreating from the hole.

Rock Beauty let out a sigh and floated up to the hole in the ceiling.

Lyra was the first to ask the question. “Who’s that?”

“That’s Scylla, she’s our leader,” explained Dusky Jack, “She’s really strict about security. Plus she’s always cranky if you interrupt her naptime. Don’t worry though, she’s actually really nice once you get passed the abrasiveness.”

There was a tense minute spent in uncomfortable, as nopony on either side really knew what to say, even Trixie. The three unicorns shared a description of Ditzy, but sadly none of the merpony had seen her. Finally Scylla reappeared and beckoned the trio to enter her parlor.

The room was indeed the former captain’s cabin. A large overturned desk lay in the corner; the space under had been filled with beddings made of kelp, while the drawer space had been used to store various bags of material. A large antique globe of the world had been jammed into one of the three large windows at the back of the cabin, preventing anything from entering or exiting through it, while the other two were barricaded with what remained of the captain’s bed. Any other artifact in the room had been pushed off to one corner, having been judged of little value. Trixie couldn’t help but notice that the captain’s sword, still in its scabbard, was prominently sticking from the pile of junk, ready for use. This room, being closer to the outside world, was entirely lit by sunlight, some of the beams of light were refracted by the few crystals left on an old chandelier barely hanging from the ceiling, creating colored spots all over the room.

From upclose Scylla looked somewhat taller, yet stockier than Rock Beauty, and she certainly looked older. Her hard gaze reminded Trixie of nothing else but a strict schoolteacher she had had back in Neigh-Orleans, and considering that groups of fishes were called referred to as a ‘school’, Trixie figured the image might not be too far off for the leader of this little band. Still, seeing her, floating there, with hooves crossed over her barrel and red eyes staring dagger at the three of them was a tad unnerving.

“You’ve really put me on the spot here, Rock Beauty. How am I supposed to react when you bring strangers in our secret hideout like this?”

“Com’on Scylla, they’re not seaponies, they’re unicorns,” pleaded Rock Beauty.

“How do we know unicorns haven’t struck an alliance with the seaponies?” snapped Scylla, “Now you’ve robbed me, and the rest of our group, the chance to decide if we wanted to show these stranger our precious home or not. Need I remind you finding a secluded hiding spot is not easy?”

Scylla sighed and looked back to Trixie and her friends. “My foolish little pony tells me you lost a friend, if it is true then it is a tragedy and I’ll do what I can to help.”

“We’re not asking for much, just to know if one of you saw her,” began Trixie, before explaining to Scylla how they had come to this area for simple pleasure and how their friend Ditzy had simply gone missing after swimming off.

“I found them following her trail at the edge of what we think is seapony territory, while on patrol,” provided Rock Beauty.

“This could be a problem, your friend could be in the clutches of the seaponies, probably being manipulated into helping them! Or worse!” commented Scylla, swimming to take a look through one of the opening of the back wall. “She could very well be trying to spot us from the sky right now, and I still have a scout out and about.”

Scylla was putting up a brave front but Trixie could tell that underneath the hard exterior laid the heart of a worried mother. Now that she thought of it, it had turned out to be similar with that strict schoolteacher from her childhood too, and Princess Luna.

Lyra put a hoof to her face. “This whole mess is my fault! Why did I have to cast that spell? To think I even talked about Andalantis earlier today, and now I got Ditzy stuck in the middle of its century old war!”

“You…you know something about Andalantis?” asked the merpony leader, whipping her head back to look at Lyra.

“Well, mostly legends, like about it’s fall and it’s disappearance,” replied the unicorn, “The stuff your people told our people at least.”

Scylla seemed to deflate slightly, “Oh. For second there I let myself hope you knew where it was… if we could find Andalantis, we could finally be safe from our enemies,” she said.

“Speaking of war, what’s with those seapony guys? And what’s this we hear about monsters?” asked Trixie.

“They sounded quite… outlandish,” added Trixie’s white tagalong.

“The kaosharks are no joke,” said the blue merpony, with a soft grumble, “they took away too many of my friends, too many of my family… they are real believe me. If you want I can tell you the story of our current conflict, and what misery the kaosharks brought to us…”

The three unicorns nodded, in almost perfect unison. Scylla took a deep breath and casted a glance at one of her bags, seeing a precious memento no one else could.

“It all began, roughly a hundred years ago when my great grandmother was younger than I am now. Back then we had a proper home, a village with large houses where we lived with our full families. While we never really saw eye to eye since the Great War, we had managed to gain a truce of sort with the seaponies. Small conflicts would arise here and there from time to time, but they would tend to be solved in harmless fair competition rather than out and out war.

All that changed when my great grandmother, something of an archeologist, stumbled upon old ruins from the era of Andalantis and a certain artefact…”

The merpony’s story was interrupted when a new shape bolted out of the hole in the floor. This merpony was a pale, almost white, green, with a much darker green mane that flowed like seaweed behind her as she quickly began to swim around her leader.

“Scylla! Scylla! Scylla! It’s terrible! Terrible I say, very very very bad! Just plain terrible! The seaponies Scylla, the seaponies, I saw one with some kaosharks while on patrol! It’s bad, they did something really bad!” she began to ramble, obviously in a panic.

“Lute! Calm down!” ordered Scylla. “We have company.”

The one addressed as Lute stopped dead in her track and her blue eyes locked on to the trio of stranger before nearly leaping out of her skull as she gasped in shock.

“More dry ponies!”

“More?!” everypony in the room asked at once.

“Oh yeah, I saw a seapony with two kaosharks totally capture another one earlier today,” explained Lute. “They knocked her out with a rock and dragged her out to their sinister hideout. Though that one didn’t have a seashell stuck on her forehead, she had big weird fins,”.

“Ditzy!” Gasped Lyra and Trixie.

Author's Note

AUGH! This took FOREVER! And it's not even good, or very long, and it's mostly boring exposition and talking heads scene! I did my best so please slog through this, something's gonna happen soon... I hope. Hopefully you can sort of see what I'm going for here.

I'm sorry I procrastinated for way too long on this. I've revised the timeline of events for this story like four or five times now, and I'm not even talking about the events Trixie and her friends will live. Speaking of which, I hope Lyra doesn't come off as too passive in this.

Now I'm gonna keep working hard and try to not take monthes before the next chapter. I should run out of exposition eventually.

Chapter 5

“Are you sure about this Charybdis?” asked Sea Stone, his voice deep and rumbling. “I don’t know what we’d do if…”

Sea Stone looked away from his leader, letting the implications hang in the water. Ditzy could detect worry on the faces of all the seaponies that were going to be left behind.

“Yes I am. Don’t worry Sea Stone, I’ll be careful. Even without me, I’m sure you would endure,” replied Charybdis, before swimming next to Ditzy. “I will go with Sea Youaround and Sea Racer to escort Ms Doo. You all stay here until we come and get you, and please take care of Sea Lion.”

Strapped to the seapony’s back, carefully wrapped in seaweed, was a very precious cargo: the map that could potentially lead them to Andalantis. One of Ditzy’s eyes trailed the cargo as Charybdis moved passed her, while her other remained on the group of worried ponies left behind. This scene made Ditzy even more certain of her goal. She swore to herself to bring those poor refugees to a peaceful home, no matter what.

The small group waved goodbye and then left the small depression the seapony called home. Ditzy realized it was in the middle of a thick field of kelp that obscured her vision almost immediately. The large sea plant was reaching nearly to the water’s surface in this relatively shallow area of the sea, making it a perfect hiding spot if you were hiding from things that could swim. The group, lead by Charybdis was taking a very tortuous route through the thick underwater forest, making it that much more difficult for anyone trying to follow their movement.

“Don’t lose sight of us miss dry pony, you don’t want to get lost,” mentioned Sea Racer as, true to his name, his blue shape pulled ahead of their little group.

“How do you know how to maneuver in here?” asked the confused pegasus.

Sea Youaround pulled up next to her, performing an aileron roll. “That’s our best kelp secret!” she said, giggling like a certain party mare Ditzy knew.

Sea Racer groaned “Ouch! A pun like that could split an oyster open!”

“Geez, don’t flipper out Sea Racer, no need to tell me to clam-up because of a few jokes!” replied the giggling female, much to her companion’s dismay.

Ditzy made a mental note to never let Pokey and Sea Youaround meet.

For the moment tough, Ditzy had other ponies to worry about, and not just her Ponyville friends. “What about Sea Cucumber? Is she going to be okay? The others said she left on her own.”

“Sea Cucumber can handle herself. She is my best scout and has a long experience avoiding kaosharks,” explained Charybdis, a sad tone to her voice.

“We found Sea Cucumber five years ago, after the kaosharks had driven us from our last hideout… she had been left alone when all of her own clan had been taken by the kaosharks and had survived on her lonesome for six months,” explained Sea Youaround, sounding suddenly very serious. “We had just lost many of our own so we let her join our clan.”

“That’s awful,” whispered Ditzy.

“Sea Cucumber gets very emotional when we lose somepony, far more than any of us. She always goes out looking for them but always manages to come back, safe and sound, but even more depressed than before. The best we can do is make sure it never happens again by finding Andalantis.”

Ditzy couldn't help but thank the stars to have been found by such a brave little sea-filly as Sea Cucumber. She shuddered at the idea of what could have happened if the Merponies had gotten to her first. She hoped her friend hadn't run afoul of them yet.

“You got to take us where you saw her!” said Lyra, suddenly grabbing hold of the pale green merpony’s shoulders.

The merpony stammered, sending bewildered looks to her leader and then looking back at the unicorn before her. A white shape came along and pulled Lyra off her.

“Maybe we should let…what was your name again?” began the white unicorn.

The merpony looked to Scylla, who nodded her ascent, before answered. “Lute…Lute Turtle.”

“…Lute Turtle tell her whole story, and then we can decide on a course of action. Let’s try to not scare our only link to poor Miss Doo.”

Lyra sighed at the suggestion. “You’re right Miss Rarity,” she said, turning back to Lute with a sad smile, “I’m sorry I startled you Lute. I’m Lyra, and this is Rarity and Trixie. We lost our other friend and we ran into Rock Beauty on our search. We’re hoping you can help us find her.”

“And if what you’re telling is true, this search party just turned into a rescue mission,” added Trixie, frowning.

“Rescue? But…but you can’t, it’s too…” began Lute, before a glance from Scylla made her stop and sigh, “I guess I can at least tell you what I saw. It wasn’t much really. We’ve been scouting to find trace of seapony activity and I think we got the border of their territory figured out for now, so I was over there when I spotted a seapony! It was alone, which is really rare, so I hid and watched what it was doing. It looked like it was guarding some type of cave. It held a big piece of rock, or coral I couldn’t really tell, in its fin. After a minute somepony swam out of the cave at full speed, and the seapony just whacked her behind the head with what she was holding! It was a grey drypony, with the funky fins like I said, and she had a yellow mane and golden eyes.”

“That’s Ditzy for sure!” commented Lyra, gasping at the idea of her friend being brutally knocked out like that.

“Then what?” asked Trixie

“Two kaosharks came out of the hole afterward. There was the one with the tiger head and the one with the crab claws! The seapony gave them some orders, getting the one with arms to carry their prize while the other one was sent back on patrol,” continued Lute, “I waited for them to get out of sight before heading back to tell Scylla, but the blue kaosharks was still around and I kept getting delayed because I had to hide. I’m sorry I couldn’t do anything to help your friend, or be here sooner.”

A green hoof patted her on the shoulder. “It’s alright, we just got here anyway. Now you can lead us back to that place and we can track down Ditzy!”

Scylla picked that moment to cut in. “That would be foolish of you. The kaosharks are way too dangerous to tackle, and I’m not risking any of my ponies helping strangers.”

“Your concern is touching, Scylla, but we’re not giving up on our friend. All we ask is to be lead to the place your scout saw Ditzy last, we’ll handle any tackling ourselves,” simply replied Trixie.

“Then you’ll disappear too,” added the merpony leader, crossing her front hooves.

“Funny you should mention that, because you see I can…” began Trixie, before a white elbow painfully lodged itself into her side.

She glared at the owner of that elbow who just glared back at her. Scylla looked at the two glaring unicorns in confusion. The paler of the two unicorns realized it and quickly moved in front of Trixie.

“What my dear friend Trixie is trying to say is that you shouldn’t underestimate us. We are quite capable in a scrap, isn’t that right dear?” she said, turning back to Trixie.

“Trust us, Trixie and I are Elements of Harmony you see,” added Lyra, puffing her chest.

A white hoof met a white forehead with a subtle groan, while a single gasped resonated throughout the room. Scylla looked at Lute with a raised eyebrow.

“Lute, Do you know what the Elements of Harmony are?” Asked the merpony leader.

“No…” admitted the pony, looking down sheepishly. “It just sounded so important. I thought I should sound impressed.”

Scylla sighted a little before looking back at the trio of unicorn, her face cold and distant. “I don’t know anything about any Elements of Harmony, so brandishing some made up title around isn’t going to convince me that you aren't complete fools for wanting to take on the kaosharks.”

“Made up title! Now see here, I’m Princess Luna’s personal protégé and I…” began Trixie, swimming forward before a pair of hooves, one white and one green, held her back.

“We just need Lute to show us where she saw her friends and we’ll be out of your mane,” said Lyra, turning a pleading eye to Scylla.

“I can…I can go with them, it’s not a bother,” said Lute herself.

There was a moment of silence as all present looked to Scylla for an answer.

After a second or two she finally spoke. “No.”

Trixie was about to object when the merpony continued, turning to Lute as if the unicorns weren’t in the room. “I’m not letting you go back to kaoshark infested waters without back-up. Let me see if I can find two or three volunteers and I’ll accompany the lot of you there myself, that way you’ll be safe on the way back.”

“Thank you! Thank you very much!” said Trixie, smiling while clapping her hooves together.

“Don’t make me regret it,” simply grumbled Scylla, disappearing down into the common room below.

Trixie was then suddenly pulled away into a huddle by a white hoof draped over her shoulder. She was really starting to regret having brought along the purple-maned diva of a mare.

“Are you really that stupid?!” the ivory unicorn whispered in her ear, her put-on Canterlot accent slipping in her anger.

“What the hay are you talking about?” asked Trixie, in the same ushed tone.

She glanced back at Lute who was chatting with Lyra, the minty unicorn doing her best to show how ponies walked on land. It wasn’t easy while floating in water, but it was enough to make the merpony giggle. Confident that they wouldn’t be interrupted, she went back to the temporary member of her group.

She found a pair of cold blue eye glaring at her “You were about to tell her you could make yourself invisible! After I specifically told you to keep our magical ability under their radar in case we need a wild card! What kind of stage magicians reveals all her tricks before even doing them?”

“Since when are you this paranoid Rarity? They agreed to help us! We’ll be escorted to the bad guys territory and then we’ll find Ditzy! Then we can find someway to help them back. I’m sure Luna knows something about Andalantis she could tell them,” said Trixie with a pout.

An exasperated sigh, sounding rather odd underwater, came out of the unicorn before she spoke. “And since when are you this gullible? Of course they’ll escort us, but only when they outnumber us. They talk about these fancy kaosharks enemies but we haven’t seen hide nor fin of those things so far, and what makes you so sure their enemies are the bad guys?”

“You’re really acting strange, once we get back to land I think I’ll buy you a drink. You have to learn to trust ponies more. These merponies are clearly in trouble here, even if their enemies aren’t really bad guys, and they’re not entirely truthful with us, they can’t afford to make enemies out of us. For all we know we could easily talk some sense into the seaponies and find some way to solve this without too much scuffle,” explained Trixie, putting a reassuring hoof on the other mare’s shoulder.

“You got it all figured out huh? What about that one?” she said, pointing to Lute Turtle, “She apparently doesn’t know the diference between fins and wings, but somehow she can recognize a tiger’s head on a chimeric creature? It doesn’t add up, I think she’s smarter than she would have us believe.”

Trixie opened her mouth to answer but stopped halfway, her mouth gaping open.

“That’s a good point,” she finally said.

She looked around, to make sure no one was listening in on them, and she leaned forward, casting a low grade spell to mute their talking.

“Look, Rarity, maybe there is something suspicious going on, but right now we can’t do anything. Let’s just keep our eyes peeled and our ears open so we can react if something goes down. I’d rather avoid fighting those guys.”

“Of course, Miss Lulamoon,” simply replied the other mare as she swam toward Lyra and Lute Turtle, quickly joined by the perplexed Trixie.

Lyra was explaining to Lute Turtle the concept of Cutie Marks and what her own meant.

“No, my Cutie Mark doesn’t mean I can only play the lyre, or the harp, or any other string instrument, or that I instantaneously knew how to play it. It means I have a deep appreciation for music, and the History of music. I’m a musician in tune with the sounds of the past, I can compose new pieces using instruments some would call outdated, and I’m always curious about the events surrounding a musical piece,” explained Lyra with a big grin, “music doesn’t exist in a vacuum you know? There is always a context, circumstances, around compositions. Sometime it’s an Historical event, like Zaldian occupation of Prance in 448, or simply the personal one like when I composed a new piece for Bonnie’s birthday...but I think I might be prattling a little bit too much here. Point is a cutie mark is much more than just a…a…

“Butt emblem?” provided Lute Turtle, giggling.

Lyra returned the giggle, “Yes! That too!” she said, grinning, before motioning to the approaching unicorns. “Miss Rarity here has a Cutie Mark of three jewels and she can find gemstones, but her real talent is in bringing out the hidden beauty in everything, like the jewels hidden inside a plain rock. She’s really good at it, you should see when she gets Trixie into a dress!”

“You’re too kind, but I do try to do my best, despite the limited material I am given,” she said, taking a bow.

“And what is that supposed to mean?” asked Trixie, glaring.

Any further discussion was interrupted by the return of Scylla, accompanied by Rock Beauty and the violet male merpony they had been introduced to earlier, Dusky Jack.

“Hey dry pony girls!” said Dusky, flicking a strand of his dark blue mane out of his eyes. “I heard you were heading for trouble? A gentlestallion like me can’t possibly let three beautiful mares head into danger alone.”

A strand of purple mane was moved out of cold blue eyes as a mocking imitation of his previous move. “Thank you, but don’t get any ideas,” replied one of those same beautiful mares he was eyeing.

Lyra couldn’t help but giggle, as Dusky’s smile seems to falter at that comment.

“I found you guys, so I kinda feel like it’s my responsibility to volunteer!” explained Rock Beauty, a determined look on her face.

“Enough dallying, let’s get moving so we can get this whole mess over with!” said Scylla, gathering everyone’s attention.

“I’ve been meaning to ask something…” began Ditzy, swimming next to Charybdis.

The pegasus and her escort had been swimming for a while now, taking all sorts of detour and keeping low to the ocean floor, all in an effort to keep out of sight. For quite a while now they had been swimming in silence, even Sea Youaround had stopped with the jokes, and Ditzy felt like there was enough time to sate her curiosity.

“Yes?” replied the seapony leader.

“If you don’t mind me asking…how come you don’t have ‘sea’ in your name like everypony else?”

Charybdis looked a bit forlorn and nostalgic at the question, sighing subtly and looking off in the distance before she began to answer.

“When a seapony is born, it is a momentous occasion. A new life is brought into this world, and seaponies who were but children themselves become parents. To denote this change, the parents take on a new name, while they give one, sometimes even the one they had previously, to their newborn child,” explained Charybdis.

Ditzy smiled, “I’m a mother too you know. I have a daughter named Dinky. She’s with my friends and her half-sister right now… did I meet your kid at your settlement?”

“Sea Jewel was taken away last year,” simply answered Charybdis.

Ditzy felt terrible for asking now. It must be very painful to bring it up and for a while she didn’t know what to say. She knew what it felt like to have your own flesh and blood taken away from you, even for just a short while.

“My daughter was kidnapped once,” she mentioned, not daring to look at Charybdis and instead staring forward. “I risked it all to get her back and succeeded. It was a dangerous journey but I had friends with me, and together we saved the day and I got my little muffin back.”

For a second she considered to add some encouragements and telling the seapony not to give up, however she couldn’t help but feel those words were unnecessary. Charybdis didn’t look, or feel, like a pony that had given up hope. All that mattered was that they understood each other’s pain and fears. They continued on in silence until they crested a short hill and found themselves before a vast field of kelp. The small group stopped and stared, shocked at what they saw across the undulating seaweed.

Three unicorns and four merponies were staring at them in shock.

Trixie decided that she had stared at the violet tail and white backside in front of her long enough by now and began to swim harder in order to pull ahead and change her view. After leaving the merpony hideout Scylla had insisted they take a very convoluted path through winding underwater canyons and confusingly similar coral reefs, all in a paranoid effort to make it impossible for the unicorns to find their way back. Trixie had been lost on the second turn, so she didn’t quite understand why they had wasted so long going through this charade.

Besides, she reasoned, it probably wouldn’t be difficult to spot a wrecked ship from above in the crystal waters of the southern seas.

Lyra had taken to Rock Beauty like a fish in water. The grey merpony had turned out to, surprisingly, know quite a lot about music. Her education wasn’t as thorough or formal as Lyra’s, but the two had since devolved into an esoteric conversation on comparative music theory, trying to grasp how much common ground they shared. Lute turtle was interested as well, but seemed to only have a basic understanding of what was being discussed, yet seemed content to remain on the periphery of the conversation, asking a few questions from time to time. Dusky Jack had, likewise, taken to question the third unicorn in their group. She, in turn, would, in a teasingly flirtatious and breathless voice, completely deflect his questions, which seemed to both deflate him and encourage him at the same time. The whole thing would be fascinating to Trixie if it weren’t so disgusting. Scylla had remained silent, for the most part, only barking an order to change heading every once in a while, or to remind her troops to not get too loud in their discussions.

“We should be getting close!” declared Lute Turtle as they crested the top of a coral reef, revealing a large field of swaying seaweeds.

The whole group stopped suddenly when they spotted another group, way out on the other side of the kelp forest. Lyra and the merponies gasped and Trixie quickly guessed that the three seahorse looking creatures ahead were seaponies. What made Trixie react though was the presence of Ditzy along with them!

“Ditzy!” she gasped.

There was a second of silence that was shattered by the panicked screams of Lute Turtle, signaling the moment where the metaphorical gates of Tartaros flew open.

“AAAH! SCATTER! SCATTER!” she shouted, grabbing onto the nearby Lyra and dragging her into the undulating mass of seaweed below.

“Wait for me!” called Rock Beauty, diving after the green pair.

Before Trixie could react she was grabbed by Scylla and pushed into a different direction down into the underwater forest. The last thing she saw before her field of vision was filled with green was Dusky Jack also dragging her final companion into the seaweed. The white mare didn’t look happy at all.

“Go, go, go! Don’t let them catch us all together!” insisted Scylla.

“Stop panicking! My friend is right out there, I need to get to her,” replied Trixie, breaking free of Scylla’s hooves.

“No time, any second now and they’ll…” began the merpony leader before a new voice, resounding over the entire field was heard.

“Kaosharks! Capture them!” called a decidedly female voice.

“Oh barnacle!” cursed Scylla, pushing Trixie away. “Go that way and keep moving!”

Trixie stared in confusion as her merpony escort vanished amongst the kelp in an instant. The whole area was thick with the stuff, making it impossible to see more than a few feet ahead, and the taller strand partially blocked the view of what was aboe. It made for excellent cover but it was also very disorienting. The blue unicorn wasn’t sure what to do when a large shadow fell upon her.

She looked up and saw, gliding through the water with ease, the shape of a shark blocking the glare of the sun. To her horror she realized that shark had huge crab arms sticking from the sides! She swallowed and quickly turned herself invisible. It didn’t take long for the creature to just swim away, without noticing her, and so she returned to being visible. She needed to find her friends. Her eyes began to glow as she casted, again, the spell that allowed her to see magic. It didn’t take long for her to spot the familiar trail of Lyra’s water-breathing enchantment. She followed the trail through the thick green mass until, somehow, the trail vanished. It was not unlike following hoofstep in the sand and finding an area where the sand had obviously been disturbed to mask the trail. It wasn’t in anyway subtle, but it still meant she lost the trail. She grumbled a little, wondering if she should keep going in the same direction or try something else.

“Miss Trixie! I’ve finally found you!” came a familiar, if annoyingly snobbish, voice from behind her.

Trixie turned around, expecting to see the fashionista from Ponyville. She still had her magic sight activated and it made a simple fact plain as day:

The white unicorn before her was not Rarity.

“You!” She gasped, pointing a hoof at the pony wrapped in subtle illusion before her.

“What…what did you just say?!” Asked Lyra, staring in disbelief at the inconspicuous form of Lute Turtle before her.

The merpony had her back turned to Lyra, but the unicorn could still see from her angle a smirk growing on her face. She was simply floored by what had just transpired. First the elation of seeing Ditzy, then the surprise at the sight of the seapony, followed by the confusion and then panic when Lute had dragged her away. And just as they had found a decently clear spot in the forest of seaweed, something even more confusing happened right in front of her.

“Don’t you mean, what did I just shout?” asked the merpony, in a voice far more mature than one would expect from her, “I just ordered the Kaosharks to capture you and your friends of course. I wasn’t very subtle.”

Lyra wasn’t sure what she was going to do, but she still prepared a spell nonetheless. Just as her horn began to glow, something smashed into the back of her head. She was losing consciousness as a large pair of hairy arms took hold of her, and the last thing she saw was the form of Rock Beauty emerging from the forest of kelp.

The merpony was struggling against the tentacles of some unseen creature that was binding her limbs and holding her muzzle closed. And all the while, the one who called herself Lute Turtle chuckled to herself.

Author's Note

Now we're kicking things into high gear! By knocking someone else into unconsciousness... I gotta think of better transitions that don't include the risk of concussion...

I'll try to do better but with my luck I'm probably gonna take six months for the next one too >< but I hope you enjoy this bit.

Anyway this chapter is probably full of typos and grammatical mistake, but I'm tired and you guys waited long enough! So just mention all the mistakes you see in the comments below and I'll fix them up!

Chapter 6

Trixie really didn’t want to deal with this right now, but the pony pretending to be Rarity was not one to underestimate.

“You!” repeated Trixie, pointing a hoof at the impostor before her. “What are you doing here? Where is the real Rarity?”

“What might you be talking about, darling? I don’t understand,” said the white unicorn, feigning ignorance.

Trixie swam slightly away. “Don’t play games with me, Zizanie! I can see through your illusions clear as day!”

The facade of shock disappeared from the other unicorn’s face, replaced by a scowl of contempt. Trixie suddenly realized that the eye color had been wrong all along. Rarity had rich deep blue eyes, but Zizanie had kept her natural cold piercing pale blue eyes. Her facial structure seamed to flicker, the illusions masking the subtle difference in cheek bone structure between Ponyville’s seamstress and the spy barely holding on before reaffirming themselves.

Zizanie growled in anger and frustration. “I don’t know how you can so easily see through illusions, you annoying juvenile nag! Whatever trick you are using is incredibly unfair, and I hope you won’t spread it in court,” she said, stopping whatever trick she was using to modify her voice and speaking in her own.

“Enough! Answer me: where is the REAL Rarity?” Trixie asked again.

Zizanie let loose a mocking laughter, switching back to Rarity’s voice halfway through. “Welcome to Carousel Boutique! Where everything is chic, unique and magnifique!”

Trixie gasped. “You mean she's still in Ponyville? You’ve been Rarity this whole time?”

“Bravo, inspector Lulamoon! I arrived the day before you and your little friends did. Darling.”

Trixie didn’t understand how, but Zizanie managed to make the word ‘darling’ sound downright threatening, and more than a little insulting. Trixie hadn’t realized at first but the two of them were now swimming in a circle, making sure not to let the other get close.

“So, were you sent here to spy on us? Did whoever hired you kidnap Ditzy? Or maybe you did and are just covering your track?”

Zizanie scoffed. “Please, I’m a blackmail expert. I don’t do ‘kidnapping’. Taking care of secrets is much easier than taking care of live captive. Besides, we’ve been together since we dived.” The spy suddenly kicked her legs and was now nose to nose with a surprised Trixie. “And for what its worth I was being honest before when I said I owe you one. You and the other member of your merry little bands have saved Equestria from Corona, as such I owe you a favor. I don’t like to let debts unpaid for too long, and helping you find your wall-eyed friend will satisfy my principles.”

Trixie pushed her off with both front hooves. “And you expect me to believe that?”

The white pony rolled her eyes. “Frankly, darling, I don’t give a damn what you believe. I’m helping you bring Ditzy Doo back to her daughter in one piece, and once that happens I’ll go back to my business and let you enjoy your vacation in peace. It’ll be much easier to get to the happy ending with my help.”

Trixie glared. “Your business… you mean you’re in Cayo El Bayo to spy on Wind Sailor?”

Zizanie chuckled, shifting back into Rarity’s voice. “Possibly. Poor Wind Sailor, he’s a nice boy but a little too gullible. Don’t worry, I’ll make sure not to break his heart too much when I disappear. Anyway what I do on my own time is none of your business…unless you wish to share Wind Sailor with me? I admit he’s a lean athletic fellow, and rumors tell me he’s quite the beast in the sack.”

At Trixie’s flustered expression the other unicorn let loose another mocking laugh. The following pout and glare didn’t really help matters either.

“Stop imitating Rarity! The show’s over,” said Trixie, steering the conversation away from an embarrassing topic.

“Tsk tsk tsk. A showmare such as you should know that isn’t right. The show is never over, for the whole world is a stage,” began Zizanie, shaking her purple maned head. “Scylla already doesn’t trust us very much, and you want to admit you brought a spy, an imposter, into the midst of her camp? Do you think she will take my duplicity well?”

There was a tense silence for a minute. The blue mare wasn’t sure she could trust Scylla to react in a reasonable fashion. It would be much easier to just keep up the charade as Zizanie as suggested. After all, nopony else knew about it before and it didn’t change much. The merponies didn’t know the real Rarity so it’s not like she was actively deceiving them by pretending to be someone they knew. Right?

For some reason that didn’t sit right with Trixie. The merponies had shown them their secret hideout, something important, and Scylla had agreed to trust, if only a little, a group of outsiders. If the merpony leader were to eventually learn the truth, the betrayal would probably hurt more if it was discovered that Trixie knew all along and said nothing. She also didn’t want Zizanie to keep deceiving her friends and would prefer to expose the spy now. Taking away her secret identity would probably go a long way in stopping any potential schemes.

“No,” she finally said. “We’re telling the merponies the truth once we meet up with them. You’ll tell them that your trick had nothing to do with them at all. It’ll make things more complicated but it’s the right thing to do.”

Zizanie let loose a sigh but didn’t protest further.

“Now, let me check if those sharks are gone,” continued the blue unicorn, turning herself invisible.

But before Trixie could poke her head off the top of the kelp forest, a loud voice rang out.

“Miss Doo! Are you alright?” asked Zizanie, once more in her role as Rarity.

A panicking Trixie reappeared in a split second. “What are you doing?! The kaosharks will be on us in seconds!”

Zizanie shrugged. “I’m pretty sure they left around the time you discovered my little secret. I heard a couple of large shapes swim away and they stopped patrolling above us.”

The blue unicorn was reminded of their last encounter, and how Zizanie had sworn that Trixie would one day regret ever meeting her. She assumed today would be that day.

“We don’t even know what they’re capable of!” she declared, looking upward as if she expected to be attacked by one of the chimeric sharks.

“Maybe, but they don’t know what we are capable of,” replied the white unicorn.

“Rarity?” came the distant voice of Ditzy Doo.

“Ah! Miss Doo, pleasure to hear you darling! Are you unharmed?”

“Yes! I’m with the seaponies. Are you three alright?” Replied Ditzy.

“We both are anyway. Lyra, what about you?” asked Trixie.

There was an uncomfortable silence after that question. It got more and more worrisome as the minutes went by. Finally, after what felt like an eternity to Trixie but was probably only two minutes, she finally swam above the kelp and looked frantically around the area. The green mass of the kelp forest was impenetrable, if her minty friend were below it would be impossible to spot her with her eyes alone, but this did not prevent Trixie from attempting it anyway.

If Trixie hadn’t already been submerged in water, sweat would be dripping from her brow by that point as she kept calling for her friend. “Lyra? LYRA! Where are you? Anypony seen Lyra?”

“I saw her last with Lute Turtle. Lute, where’s Lyra?” came the voice of Dusky Jack, somewhere in the kelp below.

There was once again no answer.

“Trixie what’s going on?” asked Ditzy, worry evident in her voice.

“Rock Beauty, have you see Lute or Lyra?” asked Scylla, only to find no one to answer her.

Trixie was surprised when the merpony leader emerged from the kelp forest at full speed. Scylla looked enraged, her pupils had shrunken down to pinpricks and she looked every which way like a predator on the hunt. Dusky Jack quickly followed her. He tried, without success, to get her back under the cover of the seaweed.

“Seaponies! What have you done with my clan members? Show yourself you bastards!” she hollered. “Bring all your kaosharks, I don’t care! I’m not gonna let you get away with it this time! Not with me here!”

Ditzy spoke up again, this time her worried voice also tinted by confusion. “Trixie please! What’s going on?”

“Ditzy, get out of there! Your new friends just sent their kaosharks after Lyra and two of the merponies!”

“What madness is this? The kaosharks work for the merponies! This is all a ruse, don’t go Miss Doo!” came an outraged female voice Trixie didn’t recognized.

“Liars! Don’t listen to her!” added Scylla. “Why don’t you stop hiding behind your monstrous goon and fight me directly instead?”

“And fall into a trap? I don’t think so, merpony!” replied the voice.

“Trixie, the seaponies didn’t do anything! I was with them the whole time! The kaosharks appeared from over the right only after your group disappeared into the kelp!” explained Ditzy.

“Obviously they were already on our tails by then,” suggested Dusky, still trying to calm Scylla who seemed ready to dive into the green mass below and fight on her own.

Trixie was about to talk when Zizanie swam past her.

“I’ve heard enough,” she first said softly, before she then moved on to shouting, “Miss Doo, you need to get your friends to come out of the kelp so we can all talk face to face. I believe I understand what’s going on.”

“Talk? I don’t want to talk with somepony who just took two of my youngest pony away! Who’s been taking my family and friends for years!” growled Scylla in complain.

“You took Sea Shanty! You took my little ponies; you took my mother and my daughter you monster! Don’t take our tragedy like they were your own,” replied the female voice Trixie assumed was a seapony.

Zizanie was gritting her teeth, clearly she was getting tired of this. “ENOUGH! Ditzy, there’s no kaosharks around, now get up here so we can stop shouting!”

There was silence for a minute, and finally a small group came out of the writhing forest at the bottom of the ocean. There was Ditzy with three seaponies. One was yellow, another was magenta and the finale one, a male, was blue. Trixie wasn’t sure what Zizanie was getting at. She was glad to see Ditzy again, but now they had to hunt down Lyra! Who knew where she was now. Trixie still took a moment to rush and embrace her friend in a hug.

“I was worried!” she said after letting go of the grey pegasus.

“I was too. I hope Dinky isn’t too scared. Where is she?” asked Ditzy, somewhat worried.

“Bon Bon, Amethyst Star and Wind Sailor went back to the boat with her. She’ll be fine,” answered the unicorn. “Now we just need to find out where Lyra was taken, maybe it’s where they took you? What happened with you anyway? I heard you were attacked by kaosharks and taken by the seaponies and now you’re all chummy with them?”

“I was attacked by those things, but the seaponies save me! Sea Cucumber, another seapony, saw me and rescued me from my attackers. The merponies are the one controlling the sharks Trixie!”

“What?”

While the two had talked the seaponies and merponies had approached each other and maintained a respectable distance between them. With some prodding from Zizanie the two leaders introduced themselves and their group.

“I’m Scylla. This is Dusky Jack.”

“My name is Charybdis. These are Sea Racer and Sea Youaround.”

“Good, this is Miss Ditzy Doo, and Trixie Lulamoon, and I am…” began the fake Rarity before being interrupted.

“Zizanie. Her name is Zizanie,” declared Trixie, much to Ditzy’s shock.

“Wait, I thought her name was Rarity?” asked a confused Dusky.

“That’s what I thought too. She fooled my friends and I by impersonating somepony we knew. Zizanie came to this area to spy on an important pony, and it was just bad luck that we ran into each other. It doesn’t really matter now,” explained Trixie. “What’s important is that some of our friends went missing.”

Scylla glared at Trixie. “What do you mean it’s not important? How can we trust her? For all I know she could be working for the seaponies! Oh abyss! Why should I even trust ANY of you? Dry ponies never did anything to help us!”

Charybdis shook her head. “You’re delusional!”

Zizanie interrupted the budding argument before it could get any further. “SILENCE!”

The two aquatic leaders turned their angry gaze toward her.

“Now, before I let you fools tear each of you apart,” she began, all of her illusions dissolving away as she spoke, “let me ask you both one simple question..."

The seaponies and merponies were obviously surprised at the change. Gone was the curly violet mane and the jewel cutie mark, replaced by a straight lavender mane and a black envelope. Her face was also slightly different, with a narrower muzzle, higher cheekbones and sharper eyes. Zizanie’s voice also lost the fake put on Canterlot accent and soft tones of Rarity, becoming colder and more patronizing. Trixie herself only had very little exposure to Zizanie’s true self, and she took a second to just look at her. Finally she proceeded with her question.

“When was the last time any of you spoke to the other side? Any of you personally?”

The two leaders opened their mouths at the same time to speak, but they both stopped, looking confused and obviously searching their memories.

“I don’t… I never spoke to a merpony before,” admitted Charybdis. “I don’t think I ever knew anypony who did either.”

“I never either…” said Scylla. “Why do you ask that?”

Zizanie shook her head. “You poor fools, can’t you see? What about you Trixie? I’m sure a stage magician, even an amateur like you, could spot such an obvious misdirection a mile away!”

Trixie looked from Scylla to Charybdis, and back again. Both looked sincerely angry at each other, and none of them had any obvious tell when they were ranting earlier. She mentally replayed the conversation they had shared since Lyra’s disappearance and realized what Zizanie was referring to. Her eyes bulged as the realization hit her.

“They are both certain the other controls the Kaosharks! Then it must mean…”

Zizanie smiled and shot Trixie the kind of look you give a small child who just complete his first math homework. “Exactly!”

“What? What are you two talking about?” asked an annoyed Scylla.

“I’ve seen this situation before, darling, maybe not on such a scale, but it was certainly the same con. I’ve even been the initiator a few times myself, that’s why I can say with confidence that,” the spy said, her smile turning into a grin at her own dramatic pause. “There is a third party at work here. Somepony is controlling the kaosharks and manipulating you into believing the other is responsible for the attacks.”

Lyra felt herself being jostled around as she woke up. Her eyes were still closed and she wondered what Bon Bon was up to. Her marefriend was usually much better at getting out of bed without waking her. Light was filtering through her eyelids so reflexively she tried to grab a blanket to wrap around her head, only to find out her hooves trapped against her barrel. That’s when she realized she wasn’t in her warm comfortable bed, but actually in the clutches of some unknown creature. She opened her eyes just in time to realize that said creature was now throwing her toward a wall!

Lyra gasped and brought her hooves forward, the momentum of the sudden action breaking her forward surge and sent her careening upside down in the water. This sudden shift in perspective reminded her of her current predicament as all the events of the day rushed back in to her memory. She had been attacked by those kaosharks that Lute Turtle had sent on the offensive… but she had also caught Rock Beauty! Why was the merpony turning on her own people? What was going on?

“Miss Lyra, you all right?” asked Rock Beauty, helping her get back to an upright position.

Lyra took a second or two to take in her new location. The two of them were still at the bottom of the ocean, in what appeared to be the ruins of a building. On one side was a wall of carved stone about three ponies tall, all that seemed to remain of a building, with parts of two more walls visible on each side. Most of that wall was covered with barnacles, coral and other sea life, but a section had been cleared so ancient carvings could be seen more clearly. Against this wall had been lain large, and long, stone slabs, possibly part of some other ruined structure, at a regular interval. The large stones were separated by a hoof wide gap through which sunlight could filter, but which rendered any sort of escape impossible. The place was effectively a cage. Against one end of this triangular prison, where one of the two side wall was its smallest, seemed to rest a pane of rusted metal with a door. The door had a small circular window that was cracked. The door in question was closing with the sound of creaking metal. The metal pane seemed to have once been part of a bigger structure, possibly some type of boat hangar, but now was just used as an easy way to keep prisoners into this makeshift cage. A quick glance at the other end of the prison revealed a boulder blocking the way.

“Yeah, I’m fine…a bit confused but fine,” finally answered Lyra, “How long was I out and where are we?”

“I think you were out for about fifteen minutes. I don’t know where they took us, they kept me blinded while they carried me,” answered Rock Beauty, looking defeated.

“We’re in the secret base of the kaosharks and their true mistress,” said a new female voice, coming from somewhere in their cage.

From behind a stone block that used to be part of the wall a new form timidly emerged. It looked like a seahorse with the head of a pony. Her body was a nice aquamarine color and her short mane was streaked in white and pink. Lyra immediately recognized one of the seapony, but it was clearly not one of the three she had glanced alongside Ditzy a short while ago.

“A seapony!” said Rock Beauty with a gasp. “Are you here to torture us? I’ll never talk!”

The seapony seemed to flinch and backed away. “What? No! I would never hurt anypony! The sharks captured me earlier today, just like you two. My name’s Sea Shanty.”

“I’m Lyra, Lyra Heartstring, can you…” began Lyra before she was interrupted by Rock Beauty pushing past her.

“Why would they do that? The kaosharks work for you seaponies!” she said, coming up to the other side of the stone Sea Shanty was using as a barrier.

“No they don’t!” quickly answered Sea Shanty, before she looked down dejectedly. “Or at least, they only work for one of us…when they captured me I found out my very best friend was behind the attack! She could order the kaosharks around like they were her pets!”

“Why should I believe you? That’s just a story you’re telling us to get us to talk!”

Lyra placed a hoof on Rock Beauty’s shoulder. “Is it really that hard to believe, Rock Beauty? It was Lute Turtle who ordered the attack that got us caught.”

Beauty’s expression saddened at that reminder. “Lute… why would she do this to me? Why would she work with the kaosharks who keep attacking us? What’s going on here? I don’t understand!” she said, pounding the stone block with a hoof.

“Don’t worry, we’ll figure it out,” said Lyra, before looking to Sea Shanty. “We’re all in the same situation, so let’s stick together for now, okay?”

Sea Shanty nodded grimly, but then she suddenly gasped as her eyes began to almost visibly shimmer.

“Oh my goodness! I just realized I’m talking to a dry pony! A real, bonafide, in the flesh, dry pony of the unicorn kind! I have so many questions about your world! I’ve never talked to a dry pony before! This is so amazing!” she said, her voice full of excitement.

“I know right?” added Rock Beauty with a big grin.

The two aquatic ponies looked away from each other at the same time, suddenly feeling self conscious about the situation.

“You know, it’s the first time I've spoken with a seapony,” commented Rock Beauty.

“Me too,” replied Sea Shanty, “I mean… I’ve never spoken to a merpony, not that I haven’t spoke with a seapony before, that would be weird. I’m not weird!”

“I understand. My name’s Rock Beauty by the way.” The merpony tentatively extended a hoof to the seapony.

After staring at it for a second she took hold of it with her little fins and shook the proffered hoof heartily. A grinning Lyra then offered her own hoof for Sea Shanty to shake.

“Good! We’re on our way to become fast friends, and if there’s one thing I’ve learned since becoming an Element of Harmony is that there’s nothing you can’t do with friends by your side! Even turn into a naked hominian and back,” said Lyra, much to the confusion of the two ocean dwellers.

She decided to ignore their confused stare and swam up to one of the gap in the wall of their cell.

“Let’s see if I can spot anything useful… By the stars!” she gasped.

Rock Beauty quickly joined her, but Sea Shanty remained behind. She clearly had already seen what had shocked Lyra. Rock Beauty swam above Lyra’s head and peered through the gap. She too let out an exclamation at the sight beyond.

They were clearly at the edge of a larger complex of underwater ruins, sitting atop a natural hill carved in the sea floor. In the plain below they could spot a dozen or so structure that had been excavated, with two more where figures were clearly seen moving rocks, sands and debris away. The figures were a mix of seapony and merpony, all clearly shackled by the neck. Four shark-like figures, all grotesquely deformed with incongruous body parts attached to them seemed to watch over the improvised dig site.

“Oh my gosh! That’s Puffer Fish! I’d recognize that teal and yellow mane anywhere! He disappeared a month ago!” said Rock Beauty.

“My mother is down there…” timidly added Sea Shanty. “I haven’t seen her in years, but I’m sure it’s her down there.”

The merpony turned and clearly regarded the seapony in a brand new light. Without saying a word she went and gave her new friend a hug. Lyra regarded the scene with fondness, glad that the two had so quickly put aside their tribal animosity in the face of this new situation. Whoever was running this slave camp had a lot to answer for. The unicorn turned back to the scene and examined the surrounding. The plain below came to a sudden plunge as a giant dark chasm seem to open into the ocean floor. It was wide but didn’t seem like the edge of the continental shelf because she could, barely in the pervading haze, make out its edge in the distance. Off to the side of the camp the seafloor turned into a sheer wall that climbed up and disappeared above the water. From this angle Lyra wasn’t certain but she could swear she could see the shape of Lucky Seagull Island looming over the plateau and the nearby hole.
She wondered if the fact that no boats ever crashed against it might not be coincidence but might just be the slavers trying to keep nosy dry ponies away.

“What have we gotten ourselves into?” Lyra quietly asked herself.

She was contemplating how to stage an escape when the painful sound of metal scraping against metal caught her attention. The door to their improvised cell was opening. Lyra quickly swam back to the center of the room to stand by her new friends.

The first figure to enter was the one that had captured Rock Beauty. It was a grey shark that had apparently seen his entire tail section replaced with thick grey colored octopus tentacles. It bare its teeth at the trio, making the merpony and seapony flinch in fear. The next figure to enter was much different; it was a pale green seapony, a color not unlike Lyra’s own coat, and with darker green mane. Lyra didn’t have much experience with the seaponies but she looked small and young. However, the scowl she wore on her face and the cold calculating gleam in her eyes made her look much more experienced than one would assume. This was a pony in charge.

“I’m sorry I had to make you wait, I had to change before seeing you,” the newcomer said, chuckling a little at a joke only she understood.

“Sea Cucumber! What are you doing?” demanded Sea Shanty.

“And where is Lute Turtle?” added Rock Beauty.

The one called Sea Cucumber only laughed in answer. It was a cruel and mocking laughter with a very sharp staccato rhythm to it that grated on Lyra’s ears.

“You’re in no place to demand answers,” simply stated the seapony after being done with laughter. “I’m in charge here. You would do well to remember that.”

Once again her voice betrayed a pony with more experience than her look would suggest. Her voice was high pitched but it was filled with a cool confidence, like she had done this multiple times in the past.

“The only reason you three aren’t out there moving rocks with the others is because I need your skills,” she began, pointing in the general direction of the work camp with her fin. “You will do as I ask, or else!”

Lyra couldn’t ignore a pitch like that. “Or else what, you overgrown sea monkey?” she asked defiantly.

Sea Cucumber glared at her, then she turned slightly toward the door before speaking. “Number 4…” she said simply.

A second kaoshark entered the cell, this one had the spotted body of a leopard shark, if not the appropriate size, and its fins had been replaced by the large hairy arms of some type of ape, like a gorilla. It brought a massive fist into his other hand and audibly cracked his knuckles. Lyra wasn’t quite sure what that was supposed to mean, but the way it and its octopus-like counterpart now stood at the ready was definetaly threatening.

“I control the kaosharks, if you displease me you will have to contend with them.”

“What do you want anyway, you traitor?” asked Sea Shanty.

“Don’t worry, it’s nothing particularly dreadful. I just want you to decipher some wall carving,” explained Sea Cucumber, extending a fin toward the piece of wall that was the main feature of their cell.

“I uncovered those carvings recently. They appear to be a type of ancient musical notation. Decipher the song for me.”

“Why should we help you anyway? What’s in it for us?” asked Lyra, glaring dagger at the seapony.

“You’ll have the satisfaction of helping solve one of the greatest archeological mystery of all time!” Sea Cucumber replied, spreading her fins wide.

Lyra smirked. “So what? Are you going to give us credit in your next Journal of Archeology paper?”

“Don’t push me, little unicorn!” snarled Sea Cucumber, “after all, a little boat, all alone on the big ocean… any creature could go and attack it. Isn’t there some ponies you care about on there?”

If Lyra’s glare had been filled with anger before, now it was filled with unbridled rage. She barely managed to hold herself from attacking the seapony before her right there. She remembered that she wasn’t alone in this and so managed to calm herself a little.

“You wouldn’t dare,” she said.

“I would, if you push me too far you little brat. As for you two,” she began, turning to her other two prisoners, “I hope you realize your little hideouts are not in any way secret, and they remain undisturbed through my good grace.”

Sea Cucumber was about to add something when her octopus hybrid was suddenly shaken by twitches as if in a seizure. It’s jaws opened wide, revealing sharp teeth as it let loose some sort of plaintiff moan. Arcs of energy suddenly began to course over its body. This new development was rather frightening for the three prisoners, but only seem to annoy Sea Cucumber.

“Not again! Number 4, grab number 8, time for a top up,” she said with a groan.

She turned toward the door, leaving her servant to its task, but she didn’t leave before one last warning to her captives. “You three better remember that the fate of your friends, all your friends, is in my hooves. I will be back in an hour and I expect some type of progress report,” she said, “don’t think you can fool me either.”

And with that she exited the room, followed by the sharks. The door closed with a loud noise once more before locking. Lyra quickly went to prod the door and see if the old rusted wall had any give to it, but there was nothing. Peering through the cracked round window embedded in the door she could spot the shape of a third shark creature guarding the door. This one had large crab arms jutting from the side. Lyra let out a sigh and slumped against the door at best she could underwater. She considered using her magic but she wasn’t sure if she could pick whatever locking mechanism was blocking the door without a line of sight, and she wasn’t sure she could take on those shark things in an underwater fight. There was an uneasy silence in the cell for a while, before Sea Shanty decided to break it.

“Hooves…” she muttered.

“What?” asked Rock Beauty.

“It’s just… I know it’s silly but I find it so odd. Sea Cucumber… or whoever she really is… she said the fate of our friends was in her hooves…”

Lyra raised an eyebrow at the odd topic. “So?”

“She doesn’t have hooves!” pointed out Rock Beauty. “You’re right, that is weird.”

Lyra shrugged. “That’s just another mystery to add to the pile. Not much we can do about it now. How about we take a look at those carvings?”

“You’re just going to let her threaten you like that?” asked Rock Beauty, surprised.

“I’m not saying we do exactly as she say,” said Lyra. “We’ll bide our time and think of a way to get back to our friends. In the meantime, these carvings could tell us more about this place or what Sea Cucumber and Lute Turtle are after.”

The seapony and merpony looked at each other, and at once they nodded in agreement. The trio of them went over to take a look at the wall.

What had been uncovered was a long rectangular section. Above and below it were stylized waves held between two lines, the whole shape still having specks of some shiny blue scales left in them from a set of inlay that had long since been washed away by erosion. At the far right of the section, which Sea Shanty assured the other two was the traditional reading direction for old Andalantean, was a series of pictograms depicting the three tribes of aquatic pony surrounding a circular depression being grasped by the interlocking tentacles of two jellyfishes. One above and the other beneath the circular hole that Lyra suspected once held some sort of decoration, possibly a pearl, at some point in the far past. She recognized the shapes of seaponies and merponies, but she took a few seconds to appreciate the little pictograph of the plesiopony. It had an oval for a body with fins at the front and back, a little stubby tail, a long neck and the head of a pony.

“Plesioponies must have been quite the sight,” she said outloud.

The other two nodded, silently. It was sad to consider that a whole civilization had disappeared in the mist of History like that. Lyra’s mind quickly returned to the carving though. One thing that was odd about the placement of three little pictographs was how, rather than equally placed around the jellyfish formation, there were a seapony and merpony on the right side and a single plesiopony on the left side. All three of the figures were looking away from the circle.

“Is this depicting the war that destroyed Andalantis? When your three tribes fought over the jellyfishes?” asked Lyra, pointing at the depiction.

Rock Beauty and Sea Shanty looked at her, with raised eyebrows.

“Fighting over the jellyfishes? The jellyfish is, or at least was, the symbol of unity between the three tribes,” said Rock Beauty.

“Oh yes, it was a creature that needed all three tribes to survive, back when our people still tended to ocean life,” added Sea Shanty, wistfully.

“That there is the classic symbol of the real cause of the war,” continued the merpony.

“An artifact of untold power that was entrusted to the Andalantean to be safeguarded, never to be used,” said the seapony.

“The Jellyfish Lantern,” they both said at once.

“Jellyfish Lantern?” asked Lyra, surprised.

“Oh yes! I don’t know how much is true but there is a lot of legends about it, but all the ones I know about the war tell of how it was over control of the Jellyfish Lantern,” said Rock Beauty.

“I’ve never heard of it,” said Lyra, tracing the shape with her hooves.

The seapony and merpony looked at each other surprised. “Really? But you seem to know a lot about us.”

Lyra shrugged. “Most of it has been distorted by the ages… I guess some of our stories about your war don’t really match up with your own knowledge of it. It happens more often than you’d think. You’d think Princess Luna would speak up when she can."

“Well do you know where seaponies and merponies come from?” asked Sea Shanty.

“I assume that when a mommy seapony and a daddy seapony like each other very very much they…” began Lyra, not sure where this question was going.

Sea Shanty gasped, and began to blush furiously. “No no no! I mean where we come from as a race!”

Rock Beauty giggled softly, causing Lyra to smile.

“Legend has it our ancestor were dry ponies, just like you,” continued Sea Shanty, “but at some point their island began to sink into the ocean, so they tried to run away by boat… some of them made it and were lead to Equestria by the Sun and the Moon, but a group of them got lost at sea and were sunk in a storm. Nereus, the spirit of the ocean, took pity upon them and used his power to change them into seaponies, merponies and plesioponies. Then he tasked his daughter, Thetis, to take care of us, teach us how to live in the sea, and protect us.”

“The Jellyfish Lantern is said to be a crystal lantern that holds all that’s left of Nereus’ power today,” said Rock Beauty, picking up the story, “There’s a bunch of different stories about how he died, or was torn to pieces by an evil monster from the abyss, and I don’t know what’s the right one, but I know that eventually this mystical ball of light was entrusted to the Andalanteans. It was a powerful artifact that was said to have the power to reshape the world!”

“I heard it could grant wishes to the pure of heart!” added Sea Shanty. “Some story even call it the Heart of the Ocean and say that Nereus used up all his power to save us, and that’s why its his daughter and not him who watched over Andalantis.”

“Point is, all three tribes were suppose to watch over it, but then the seaponies wanted to keep it for themselves,” said Beauty.

“No way! It was the merponies who wanted it!” replied Shanty.

“No, the seaponies!”

“It was the merponies!”

“Seaponies I tell you!”

“Merponies!”

“Seaponies!”

“Merponies!”

“Seaponies!”

“Stop!” called Lyra. “Don’t you see that’s what the bad guys want? You guys have apparently been manipulated all along by the kaosharks into fighting each other! Accusing each other of something that happened so long ago isn’t going to solve anything. Let’s just agree that someone, somewhere, wanted the big bad artifact for themselves. Something tells me that was just a single individual and not the whole tribe that pony happened to be from. I’m guessing that’s what started the war?”

The seapony and merpony looked a bit sheepish at their bickering, but they both nodded at Lyra’s deduction. The unicorn turned back to the pictographs and pointed at the three simplistic representations of the aquatic tribes.

“So I guess this represents the point where they stopped working together, but why aren’t they facing the lantern and fighting over it? Or even fighting at all? And what is that symbol above the plesiopony?” she asked, pointing to some three tiered triangle hovering above said pony.

Rock Beauty moved clover and used her tail fin to remove some pieces of grime from the triangle. “I’m not sure why they are turning away from it either, and I don’t know that symbol, do you Sea Shanty?”

“I think I’ve seen it before, I think it means ‘ghost’, or ‘spirit’ or ‘departed’. I think that means there aren’t any plesioponies anymore,” replied the seapony.

They decided to move on to the rest of the carvings, which then moved into a section more familiar to Lyra. She had seen a similar musical notation systems when studying the few pieces of pre-classical era music that had survived - mostly found in foreign libraries- the only difference being that this one was written right to left instead of left to right. It was a series of lines going up, or down, ending in sharp squares and then starting up again. At the beginning of each section, possibly measures, was an odd symbol she assumed was the name of a pitch or note. There was a few other symbols all throughout, but the essential was pretty clear.

“This is a differential notation system isn’t it? It indicates the changes to a pitch, starting from the one here at the beginning of the measure. Probably for a vocal performance considering the style,” she said.

“That looks about right! It’s using a few symbols I’ve never seen before though, like this one,” said Sea Shanty pointing to one above a section.

The merpony got closer to it. “I think I know that one, it means the notation below is not to be sung but used only as a guide for the following note. I think all of us together could decipher the song easily, not sure if we should tell Sea Cucumber, or whoever she is, about it though.”

Lyra nodded her agreement. She turned back to the music sheet and tried, as hard she could, to hum a crude version of the song. It wasn’t easy to essentially read a piece of music backward, but there was something strangely familiar about it somehow. She decided to move on to the last section of the wall that was uncovered.

After the musical notation was, once again, the image of the plesiopony spirit, this time standing side by side with the merpony and seapony as they all looked toward a new form. It was a squashed oval, on top of which a jagged line was rising, like a forest of pine trees or an exaggerated mountain range. Within the oval was a simple symbol of two concentric rectangles with rounded edges, and below the oval was another pictograph of a plesiopony. This one had its head dipped down and didn’t have any sort of spirit pictograph associated with it.

“What is that supposed to be?” asked the unicorn, pointing to the important symbol.

“I’m not sure, though I know that symbol in the center is the sigil of Thetis, Nereus’ daughter and our ancestor’s protector,” said Sea Shanty.

Lyra nodded. “So you think the song is an ode to Princess Thetis?”

Rock Beauty snorted and rolled her eyes. “Thetis wasn’t a princess, silly, she was our caretaker and guardian. She wasn’t our leader. You dry ponies and your princesses.”

Lyra ignored the remark but took note of the proper way to address the mythical figure of ancient times. “And what about this other plesiopony?”

“The only time I’ve seen one with a dipped head was whenever Aquarius, the last plesiopony, is depicted,” answered Rock Beauty, a statement that Sea Shanty confirmed with a nod.

The three considered the picture in silence for a while. Why was this song so important that Sea Cucumber and Lute Turtle would want to get the seapony and merpony musical experts and then grabbing the unicorn bard at the same time? Why risk attracting more attention to their operations when the dry ponies were around? And what was its link to Thetis and that jagged line?

Lyra thought back to what Sea Cucumber had said about archeological discovery and it all became clear.

“Girls? I think I know what this song is for, and why Sea Cucumber wants it,” began Lyra, grabbing the attention of the other two ponies, “this song will lead to Andalantis!”

Author's Note

BOOM! Update RIGHT IN YO FACE!

YO FAAAAAAAACE!!

Hope ya like it! I'm on a roll with this new 1000 words a day schedule. Let's see if it holds! :D

I know not much really happened in this chapter, it's lots of talking, but I hope it was satisfying. A few mysteries are unraveling, but there is still more unknowns.

Chapter 7

Ditzy gasped at the idea that a third party could be involved in the war devastating the lives of her new seapony friends. This would certainly be a good thing if it meant the two aquatic tribes didn’t have to fight each other anymore. Maybe with Trixie’s help they could find Andalantis all together and broker a new era of peace? Possibly defeat whoever was behind this evil plot. Charybdis, Sea Cucumber, and all the others deserved to live without being constantly chased.

“You expect me to believe that wild theory of yours?” asked Scylla, angrily.

Charybdis eyed the spy pony with suspicion, she was clearly not sure if she should be so trusting of this dry pony. “I’m not sure I’m ready to believe it either.”

“Please Charybdis… wouldn’t you prefer if it was true?” pleaded Ditzy, “that this feud was all but a ploy by somepony else and not the fault of the merponies?” she said, also glancing back at the merpony leader, “and you Scylla, wouldn’t you rather be at peace? Why don’t you give Zizanie’s idea a chance? If she’s right we could all go home friends instead of enemies, and if she’s wrong…”

“And if she’s wrong?” asked Charybdis.

“If she’s wrong… either the merponies took your daughter away, or you have been lying about it to get on my good side,” the pegasus said, her eyes allowing her to perform the incredible feet of glaring at both leaders at once, “either way whoever is in the wrong will get a very STERN talking to from me!”

There was a tense silence until Trixie cleared her voice to ask a question. “So why don’t you explain how this whole thing works if you’ve done it before?”

“I’d rather not reveal all of my secrets to you,” said Zizanie.

“How about you keep it vague then?” replied Trixie, clearly annoyed.

“Very well then. The principle is simple: fabricate a conflict between two allies while making sure neither of them realizes you are behind it. You create an original incident in confusing circumstances, then make sure to control communications between the two groups, lie to both sides, set up other cons, or in this case ambushes, until they no longer talk to each other on their own. From then on you just keep fabricating minor events and proof of the other’s involvement. After a while it kind of sustain itself fairly easily, the hardest part is to get it started. When was the last time you tried to communicate with one another?”

“Before I was born,” answered Scylla, getting a nod from Charybdis.

Zizanie allowed herself a smirk. “See what I mean?”

“Why would anyone do this?” asked Sea Racer.

“Normally, in the political games I am but a small bit player,” said Zizanie, causing a derisive snort to come from Trixie, “you break apart allies so they cannot push their agenda as effectively as they could together, allowing you to gain center stage.”

Dusky Jack was the next one to pipe up “So it’s to weaken us then?”

The spy nodded, “That would make sense to me.”

Trixie was the first to ask the obvious question “How many of those things are out there anyway?”

“There’s the one with the octopus tentacles, the one with the hairy limbs, the one with the crab pincers, the one with the weird face…” began to list Sea Youaround.

“Last time they attacked our camp there was 10 of them,” said Scylla, interrupting the seapony.

“Sounds about right,” replied Charybdis.

“They’re stronger than any of us though, there’s no way we could stand up to them,” said Sea Racer.

“But together you might be able to,” pointed out Ditzy.

“Friendship’s done wonder for us,” added Trixie.

“Why would they keep this going for a hundred years? Who could play out a long game like that? Shouldn’t they be coming for us already? There’s barely any of my clan left,” said the merpony leader, sounding frustrated.

“Our family…my clan… it’s also very small, we can’t do nothing but flee before their attacks,” added Charybdis.

“I doubt the originator is still around. If I had to guess I’d say whatever objective they had was already accomplished and they let the whole thing runs itself before ditching you guys to your squabble,” said the spy.

“Why would the kaosharks still be around then?” asked Dusky.

“He makes a good point. The kaosharks I’ve encountered before weren’t particularly bright, I doubt they could run this sort of con by themselves after some mastermind left,” agreed Sea Racer.

“I bet this whole war is actually ran by a secret cabal of merchants who want to keep a strangle hold on all seaweed export to Equestria,” began Trixie, much to everypony’s confusion. “You know the spa ponies are always complaining about the monopoly on good seaweed for beauty wraps that Zaldian merchants have! It’s probably them. They have some sort of sorcerer controlling the kaosharks. Maybe it’s the tapirs! They’ve been known to have views on nearby coastal areas and have a strong navy. It’s possible the kaosharks are some sort of secret weapon they want to use against Equestrian and Cavallian ships and your war is a long-winded trial run! Maybe both are allied!”

There was a moment of silence as nopony was sure how to interpret Trixie’s outburst. Mostly the seaponies and merponies didn’t have much concept of the troubles found in the surface world.

Finally Zizanie’s laugh cut through the silence. “Your imagination is getting ahead of yourself, Lulamoon. Why don’t you leave the conspiracy theories to those with some actual knowledge of the political world?”

“Don’t patronize me, blackmailer! It could totally happen!” insisted Trixie.

“You’re just a delusional kid who thinks she can make it in the big league!”

Charybdis decided to interrupt the exchange before it could devolve further. “Let’s assume for now that this common enemy of ours still exists in one form or another. One thing interests me Miss Zizanie: how does one control communication in the early days of this… con of yours?”

“Easy, you have ponies on the inside, on either side, to send fake messages and intercept the real ones,” simply answered Zizanie.

The implication hung in the waters around the group like a dark cloud.

“That’s an outrageous claim!” shouted Scylla. “Who in their right mind in my people would side with someone like the kaosharks?”

“I have to concur,” said Charybdis “Plus it would require someone to stay with the same group for years, while it never happened in my life time it did happen at multiple times during the last century that we tried to exchange messages.”

The white unicorn simply shook her head; “It can’t be the same pony during the entire time…”

“It would be way too easy to figure out! Would make the operation risky,” added Trixie, getting where Zizanie was getting at.

“Of course when I say ‘same pony’ I mean,” continued the spy, smirking at the blue unicorn.

Trixie returned the smirk with a glare, before finishing Zizanie’s sentence “the same identity. It can be the same spy but under a different name and different magical disguise. That’s the sort of thing you do for a price, isn’t it?”

The white unicorn just smiled mysteriously at that statement.

“But we don’t have magic,” pointed out Sea Youaround.

“Point taken,” agreed Zizanie, “I suppose in your case it’s probably a group of spies sharing duties. Some leaving, probably as one of the victims, just before or after a new spy comes in.”

There was an uncomfortable silence once again. Ditzy felt a sense of dread in the pit of her stomach. She didn’t want to speak up about it, but she knew the seaponies probably wouldn’t raise that point themselves.

“Charybdis…” she began.

The seapony leader interrupted her, “Miss Doo, I know what you are about to say, and I fully trust her. She’s way too young to be some sort of spy! ”

“I wasn’t… I mean I would never…she saved me!”

“What are you two babbling about?” asked Scylla.

Ditzy sighed. “Charybdis told me she took in a stray seapony a while back.”

Dusky and Scylla shared a look, before the merpony leader spoke up. “We’ve done that sort of thing from time to time.”

“No way! I won’t believe that!” said Sea Youaround, getting a nod from Sea Racer.

“Sea cucumber is too young to be a spy, that’s ridiculous and I’ll have none of that,” said Charybdis in a tone that clearly stated she would not entertain the thought further, ”The point still stand that at many points in our history…we probably let some sort of spy into our midst…”

“Same here,” said Scylla with a sigh.

“We still don’t have a motive,” pointed Trixie, rubbing her chin with her hoof, “what have you guys been up to for the last hundred years, beside being chased by monsters?”

Both leaders looked at each other, engaging in some sort of staring contest. Silently they seemed to be trying to convince the other to speak up first. The two were clearly not used to the idea of having such casual conversation in the middle of nowhere with their enemy of many generations.

Trixie crossed her forehooves over her barrel, “One of you is going to have to speak out first.”

“Ah oyster shell! I’ll go first,” declared Scylla angrily, “I can’t let miss calm and fancy over there get all the good parts. I’m a leader too so maybe I should show I can be mature too. We’ve been looking for Andalantis.”

Charybdis gasped. “We’ve been doing the same thing!”

“That must be why they took Lyra! She’s super knowledgeable on tons of legends, she probably knows a thing or two about Andalantis that could be useful!” declared Trixie, “How they knew she knew that stuff though…”

“I still think you’re wrong thinking there is still a mastermind at work on this,” said Zizanie, shaking her head.

Ditzy placed a hoof on Charybdis shoulder to grab her attention. She looked at her and the pegasus motioned to the seapony’s bag and then at Trixie. The silent exchange was enough for Charybdis to understand.

“In fact, my search for Andalantis is the very reason I’m even out here today,” she began, “I have something important to show Miss Trixie here. Something that might very well help us find our missing friends. If our enemies are indeed looking to solve the secret of Andalantis, they will certainly be exploring some of the areas on the map I’m carrying with me.”

The merponies, and Ditzy’s friends, gasped as one. “You have a map to Andalantis?!” asked Scylla.

“Yes, or more precisely, I have a star chart,” replied the seapony leader.

Trixie realized what this meant rather quickly. “Oh! You need the Great and Powerful Trixie’s secret to unveil another secret? Well as personal student to her majesty Princess Luna, it is true I know the secrets to her star charts and I will be happy to help, but…”

“But?” asked Zizanie.

“But I’ll need a more recent map to compare it to…”

“I don’t see the problem, Captain Sunset Beard surely has one on the Autumn Delight. Let’s go see him, and I can see my little muffin again,” said Ditzy with a smile.

“But… but…” began to stammer the blue unicorn.

“Spit it our already, would you? Real politicians don’t stammer in public!” berated the white unicorn.

“I don’t want to tell Bon Bon I lost her marefriend!” finally admitted Trixie.

Lyra, Rock Beauty and Sea Shanty were making some good progress on the song. There were a few symbols that were chipped and so they weren’t quite sure which way it would go, but the song had a relatively simple structure and they extrapolated from other segments. There were an awful lot of silences though, and Lyra felt it was a tad odd to include so much early on in a song. She also just couldn’t shake the feeling that what they had worked out was somehow familiar. Then they hit the main chorus and it clicked.

“I know that song! Or at least a song that’s very similar to it,” she declared.

Both the seapony and merpony expressed surprise at the statement and asked her to elaborate.

“It was in the musical play, Legend of Andalantis I played in back in school. The play is a few hundred years old and the songs are supposed to be based on actual seapony and merpony music. This chorus is part of the opening song of the play! The beginning was a little richer though. I wish I had an instrument with me so I could make you listen to it…” she said rubbing her chin with a hoof.

She looked around, taking stock of what was available to her. There were mostly just rocks and a few pieces of broken coral. She considered summoning her lyre but she wanted to keep that as a last resort surprise, and she didn’t want anyone nearby to hear it well enough. She positioned herself and began to tap a hoof on a stone to create a beat. Once satisfied she began to whip her tail making a soft and barely audible whooshing sound. Once that was done she began to hum the melody of the song, her tail adding accents from time to time. When she got to the chorus, Sea Shanty and Rock Beauty stopped her.

“It reminds me of an old traditional song!” said Sea Shanty.

“My grandma used to sing me a song like that too,” added Rock Beauty.

“Why don’t you go first?” suggested the seapony.

Rock Beauty nodded and began to sing. It didn’t have any lyrics, only sounds. To Lyra it sounded rather soothing. She had to remind Rock Beauty not to sing too loudly, but in the whole the performance seemed flawless. There was definitely something similar about this song, but also some bits were different. Of course being limited to one note at a time created silence.

As Sea Shanty began to sing her own song, once again very similar, even down to the chorus section. All the while she sang Lyra had her eyes closed and counted time in her head, visualizing the song as sheet music in her mind. The song itself was certainly similar to the opening to the play, but it was much closer in simplicity to the song on the wall.

Once Sea Shanty was finished, Lyra asked Rock Beauty to repeat her performance. Once against Lyra counted the notes and visualized the song in her mind. When that was finished she went to examine the wall once more. She smiled broadly and turned to the pair.

“Whoever this Sea Cucumber really is, she picked the right ponies to tackle this. Cracking this little mystery was fun, but I think it’s about time we planned our escape!” she said.

“Wait…what?” asked a confused Rock Beauty.

“How are we going to get past the guards?” asked Sea Shanty.

Lyra’s smile turned into a smirk. “A little cunning, a little luck, and a little helping of magic!”

At that her horn began to glow, much to the fascination of the two aquatic ponies.

“Lass, ya better stop pacing before you wear a hole in me boat!” complained Sunset Beard.

“Sorry…” said Bon Bon sheepishly, sitting down beside Sparkler.

The captain grunted before turning back to Dinky as he regaled her with tall tales of the high sea.

“You shouldn’t worry so much, I’m sure… I’m sure everything will be fine,” said the unicorn, sounding only half-convinced herself. “It hasn’t even been two hours yet.”

“I know… normally I don’t get this worried but right now there really isn’t anything to take my mind off the situation,” said the earth pony, looking forlornly at Lyra’s lyre.

As soon as they had come back to the boat, Bon Bon had taken the instrument out of its storage bag so she could see it disappear, should Lyra call for it.

Amethyst Star turned to where the captain was entertaining Dinky. “I’m glad Mr. Sunset Beard is helping on that front, maybe you should go listen to his stories too?”

Bon Bon hung her head. “I tried earlier, but his talk of storms made me feel seasick again, so I had to bail.”

“When was that?” asked the Unicorn.

“When you were fluttering your eyelashes at Wind Sailor,” replied Bon Bon with a smirk.

Sparkler began to stammer and blush. “I was just worried! It’s a long flight back to Cayo El Bayo without a map and I was making sure he was taking some water with him to keep him hydrated!”

“He’s a pegasus, he could easily drink water right out of a cloud,” replied Bon Bon, rolling her eyes “and it’s not that far for a young, athletic, pony like him.”

“Oh yes, very athletic…” replied the blushing younger mare, staring into the distance.

Bon Bon chuckled. “I see someone’s caught the feather flu… you do remember he came here with Rarity, right? Unless you’re banking on a threesome.”

Sparkler gasped, “Bon Bon!”

Bon Bon’s giggling was interrupted by the voice of someone calling Dinky’s name. It was very faint at first but it was getting closer and closer. The little unicorn raced out to the edge of the boat, looking expectantly at the sky.

“Momma!” she called out, spotting the familiar grey form flying towards them.

Hearing her daughter’s voice seemed to multiply Ditzy’s speed and with a burst of acceleration she was on the deck of the boat, hugging her daughter, fast enough to make Rainbow Dash jealous.

“Momma!"

“My little muffin!”

“Ditzy! I’m so glad to see you!” said Amethyst Star.

Bon Bon came up and gave the mailmare a friendly pat on the shoulder “Same here! You had us all worried. Where were you? Did you see the others? They went looking for you. Oh geez! We forgot to think up of a way to contact htem if you returned on your own what are we going to do?”

“Don’t worry Bon Bon,” began Ditzy, “the others found me. They just sent me ahead.”

“What happened down there?” asked Sparkler.

Ditzy finally let go of her little Dinky, “Muffin, why don’t you go get us that bottle of apple juice in my bag?”

“Will do Momma!” said Dinky with a smile that could melt a glacier as she sped up to the bags.

“It began when I was separated from the others and got attacked by a couple of strange shark creatures…” Ditzy began, quickly getting through the scarier parts of her tale before Dinky could hear it.

She told those present of her encounter with the seaponies, their dire situation and their war. She told of how they had met up with Trixie’s group who had encountered the merponies on their own, and, with some difficulty, about how Lyra and two of the merponies disappeared. Before Bon Bon could voice too much concern, Ditzy quickly mentioned Rarity not actually being Rarity and how she had deduced the war between the two groups was staged.

“And now Trixie is coming over here to compare the seaponie’s map to your maps, Captain,” finally concluded Ditzy.

The captain looked a tad stunned. “Well I’ll be…actual seaponies and merponies! I’ve never even caught glimpses of one before!”

“Oh Lyra, you fool, you crazy beautiful and charming fool, what have you gotten yourself into this time?” asked Bon Bon, looking up at the sky with a heavy sigh.

A couple of splashing sound brought her attention back to the sea, where two horned head were popping out of the water. One was Trixie’s; the other was the mysterious impostor’s. Behind them, beneath the surface of the water, were two groups of shapes. Bon Bon and the others who had stayed on the boat gaped at their first sight of seaponies and merponies. A violet colored merpony waved a hoof while a magenta seapony did a flip under the water as a form of greeting. A broadly smiling Dinky happily returned the greeting with an excited wave.

“The Great and Powerful Trixie has returned! She brings back the lost tribes of aquatic ponies! And a blackmailer,” declared the blue unicorn, glaring at her white companion.

“Hiya Miss Trixie!” greeted Dinky. “Hi lady who’s not Rarity!”

“Guys, this is Zizanie, Zizanie you’ve deceived the guys before right?” dryly said a very wet Trixie as she climbed back onto the boat.

“Charmed,” simply said Sparkler, glaring at the older unicorn.

Zizanie proceeded to do the most annoying thing possible: ignoring the jeweler and grabbing a towel to dry her mane.

“I see Wind Sailor is off to find the coast guards?” she asked Bon Bon.

“Yes,” the candy maker replied, still gazing in surprise at their aquatic friends.

“Don’t think I won’t tell him about you when we meet each other again,” shouted Trixie from the captain’s piloting station.

“Why aren’t they coming up to meet us?” asked Dinky, referring to the seaponies and merponies.

“They lost the ability to breathe air when they lost their magic long ago,” explained Trixie, a hint of sadness in her voice, “but, with what we have, we might even solve that problem!”

“And find Lyra?” asked Bon Bon, icily.

“Of course!”

Trixie signaled to one of the seaponies, presumable their leader Charybdis, who then proceeded to bring a stone carved map up to the underside of the boat’s glass floor. From this position Trixie could study the map without bringing it out of the water, which would risk damaging the centuries old artifact. She and the captain began to compare the two star charts and the Autumn Delight’s modern map of the Cayo El Bayo region. Meanwhile, Dinky had begun a funny face contest with the magenta seapony that Ditzy identified as Sea Youaround.

“I don’t get it…” began Trixie, looking off the side of the boat towards Lucky Seagull Island. “It’s not on the old map. Is the island volcanic?”

“I doubt it, this isn’t a volcanic area,” commented Sparkler, peering at the map inquisitively. “This entire region is a leviathonic cove formation that was carved out of sedimentary rock that was revealed after the last flood age.”

Trixie looked at the jeweler.

“What?! I work with gem stones, I need a basic knowledge of geology for my job!”

“Well whatever this island is, it’s right next to where the star chart says you can find Andalantis,” commented Sunset Beard.

Ditzy came over to the group, but kept an eye out on Seagull Island. “Are you telling me we were this close to their lost city? Could it really be this easy?”

Trixie shrugged “I don’t know Ditzy, our best bet is to go check it out.”

“Trixie!” came Bon Bon’s panicked call.

Everypony turned toward the confectioner in time to see Lyra’s instrument be surrounded by a golden light and lift from the ground before it vanished into thin air. It took a second for everyone to process what that meant.

“Lyra!” gasped Bon Bon, Ditzy, Sparkler and Trixie.

The latter’s horn quickly flashed as her eyes took on their blue glow once more. Trixie took a second to realize this was the first time she ever used this spell so intensively over such a short period of time.

“I got a lock on her strands of magic, we have to go before it fades!” she declared, turning toward Lucky Seagull Island, “She’s that way! Ditzy, Zizanie, let’s go!”

A cream colored hoof held on to her shoulder before she could jump back in the water.

“I’m coming with you,” said the earth pony, in a tone so matter-of-factly that she might have been stating the color of her fur or Princess Luna’s name.

Trixie only took a second to make sure that Bon Bon’s water breathing spell was still properly bonding to her before nodding.

“Good luck momma!” called Dinky as two unicorns, a pegasus and an earth pony disappeared back beneath the water.

Author's Note

Back to a shorter chapter, in RECORD time though, but I felt this was a decent cutoff point. Next time things might be a bit more frantic you see?

I know I don't have GrassandClouds2's talent for the musical scene, but I hope this is enough. As always I'm looking for someone to tell me where I made odious crimes against grammar and synthax so feel free to point them out so I can fix things. Now I'm heading to bed and I'm leaving you with a little something I felt might be appropriate.

Shoo bee doo shoo shoo bee doo

Chapter 8

Trixie was getting tired of swimming all over the ocean, but Lyra was in potentially grave danger and she felt like Bon Bon would not appreciate her voicing her complaint. Of course Bon Bon had spent the last hours sitting on her rear on the boat while Trixie and the others had kept busy, but pointing that out felt hazardous to Trixie, somehow. In the end she elected to suffer in silence for the sake of friendship. Trixie being the only one to clearly see the threads of magic they were following meant she was at the front of their pack, and it was clear with the way Bon Bon and Ditzy were sticking close to her that they wished they could speed ahead.

“This way!” called Ditzy, banking to the right.

Everypony followed but Bon Bon was the first to speak up.

“Why?”

“The current’s stronger over there, it’ll take us toward the island faster! I can feel it,” the pegasus answered, adding the last part to silence further questioning.

And she was right, only a few meters off and Trixie could feel the water pushing against her back. It certainly made travelling less tiresome.

“Can you still track Lyra?” Asked Bon Bon.

“Oh yeah, we’re not far enough to lose sight of her magic,” said Trixie, keeping her eyes on the trail.

Truth was, even if the magic were to dissipate, it was such a straight forward spell that they would just need to keep heading in the same direction and would eventually get to Lyra.

Trixie just hoped Lyra would be able to hold on until then.

The tense silence of the swim was suddenly broken when a small green shape came out of nowhere and tackled Dusky Jack.

“CHARY! EVERPONY! SWIM! I’LL HOLD THEM OFF!” The newcomer shouted, desperately trying to push against the bigger male merpony.

“What is this, Some sort of ambush? You treacherous seaponies!” Complained Scylla, shaking a hoof at her seapony rival.

“Calm down Scylla! Sea Cucumber, it’s alright!” pleaded Charybdis, obviously stressed by the situation but still acting with a certain amount of calm.

Dusky, meanwhile, looked rather dumbfounded at what to do with the little green Seapony bumping repeatedly against him. The new seapony looked a lot like an inverted color version of Lute Turtle, same shades of green and everything… but the most surprising thing to Trixie, who did not turn off her magic sight, was the way magic clung to her form.

“Sea Cucumber! Stop it! You don’t understand!” pleaded Sea Racer, wrapping his tail around the other pony’s midsection and pulling her away. “They’re not our enemies.”

“What? That’s impossible!” Replied Sea Cucumber, clearly confused.

Ditzy swam up to the diminutive female and gave her a big hug. “I was worried about you! Why did you leave on your own?”

“I’m sorry, I was just so sad… I wasn’t thinking straight… what’s going on?”

While Ditzy and the seaponies explained the new situation, and Zizanie’s theory, Trixie swam up to the white unicorn.

“I don’t think she is what she claims to be,” whispered Trixie.

“No kidding,” replied Zizanie sarcastically, “I spotted her five minutes before she pretended to attack foolishly. She’s been following us. I’d bet you five hundred bits that she’ll try to convince us to turn back.”

“You don’t know the half of it,” simply said Trixie. “She’s wrapped in some sort of transmutation magic. This isn’t her real form.”

Lyra’s instrument appeared in a flash of golden magic after a long minute of concentration. She felt a little dizzy after pulling her lyre from so far away so she took a couple of seconds to settle down while her rapt audience was stood in silent amazement.

“That…was…incredible! Real magic! Can you believe it?” asked Rock Beauty, turning to Sea Shanty.

“It was so beautiful!” simply replied the seapony.

“You’re incredible Lyra!” added the merpony.

Lyra, now feeling better, gave her two friends a cocky smile. “The Majestic and Lovely Lyra Heartstring is always ready to entertain!” she declared, before breaking into a hearty laugh.

Rock Beauty looked at her aquamarine companion and cocked an eyebrow. Sea Shanty just shrugged in response the best she could.

“I guess I needed some levity… sorry about that. Feel free to slap me if I ever start referring to myself in the third person. Now, it’s time to perform our prisoner’s duty and make with the escape!”

“How?” asked Sea Shanty.

“Oooh! Can you blast the door down and use it to knock out the guard on the other side? Can you turn us into ghosts to let us pass through the walls? Or, even better, teleport us away?” As Rock Beauty, obviously excited.

“In short order: yes but it’s too noisy, I don’t know anyone with that spell and I don’t know that one. I think we’ll just use some subtlety here,” explained Lyra, beckoning the pair to follow her up to the ceiling of their prison.

The three were standing a pony height below the spot where the massive stone slabs that made their prison were leaning on the piece of ruin they had been asked to study. A smaller, but still enormous, stone block had been added to block a large gap in the structure just at the top of the wall.

“I’m going to use a spell and move the stone here out of the way, while holding up the one leaning on it. When that happens we’ll have to quickly swim out, I’ll put things back and no one will know how we got out,” the unicorn quickly explained.

Lyra got into position and began to strum her instrument with her hooves, but after a few notes she frowned.

Sea Shanty swam closer to her, “Is something wrong?”

“It’s just… I can’t… I can’t swim AND play my lyre at the same time, it’s messing with my timing,” she admitted.

“No problem!” declared Rock Beauty, positioning herself beneath the unicorn, offering the space between her dorsal fin and her neck as a seat. “You do your magic-y thing and me and Sea Shanty will bring you outside!”

Lyra nodded and began to play, closing her eyes.

Basic unicorn telekinesis has its limit, both in weight and number of manipulated elements at once. Some ponies are better with one or the other, or sometimes both. Lyra had seen Rarity use her telekinesis on up to fifty items at once in her shop, though all of them were quite small. Meanwhile she knew a pony in Canterlot who could move a whole chariot without breaking a sweat but had trouble holding up a parchment while manipulating a quill to write on it. When a unicorn wants to move things somehow exceeding her natural limits she has to use a spell instead. Even with her university education Lyra had trouble explaining to non-unicorn the difference between natural telekinesis and a telekinetic spell. Suffice to say the difference was academic in many ways until the moment you needed to move a giant boulder while holding up one weighing more than your house.

Luckily Lyra knew a spell or two for just this sort of occasion. She set up a simple bass line, using its pitch and rhythm as the template for the spell allowing her to hold the top boulder in place, then, with her other hoof, she began to play the glissando of the telekinetic spell that allowed her to gently move the other one aside. Not a whole lot, but enough for their little group to slip through.

Lyra didn’t even bother to open her eye as her new friend carried her out of their cage, held stable with some help from Sea Shanty. She quickly put the boulder back in place and added a little flourish to the music before cutting off the base spell. That had been more taxing than she had expected at first. It seemed like she hadn’t recovered all the magic she had poured into her water breathing spell just yet. It would probably be prudent to not waste any more juice. Ether plants don’t grow on the ocean floor.

“I didn’t know spells could sound so good!” commented Sea Shanty once Lyra had opened her eyes again.

“The music acts like a guide for my magic,” explained Lyra, “most unicorns do spells by… how should I put it… molding their magic in a certain way, like making something out of clay… I’m just not really good at that, so instead I use my music as a reference. To keep with the clay analogy it’s like I sculpt an object out of wood and then apply the clay to it to make the object I want.”

“Why would most unicorns not do like you? It sounds really good!” asked Rock Beauty.

Lyra shrugged. “It’s just not the fastest way to cast a spell, plus not everypony is good with music like me. To some unicorns magic is an art, to others it’s more like math, everypony is different.”

Sea Shanty looked on to the field of slaves sifting through the sea floor, “So what do we do now?”

The unicorn and the merpony looked at each other and shrugged.

“Let’s see if we can sneak closer to the shackled ponies and free them, we’ll improvise once we get there,” suggested Lyra.

Rock Beauty pumped a hoof “Alright, let’s jam!”

The white unicorn hadn’t expected that news.

“What do you mean she’s not a seapony?” asked Zizanie in a hushed tone, “What is she then?”

“I don’t know… it’s not like your amateur illusions,” began Trixie, “I can see she’s been changed but there’s nothing underneath the spell, it’s pure transmutation. Really powerful stuff, it clings to her like a layer of sticky taffy on a baked potato.”

Zizanie repressed a shudder at Trixie’s bizarre culinary analogy and moved the conversation along. “So what do we do? Do you want to play along and try to spoil whatever trap she’s cooking?”

Trixie shook her head. “Nah, I say we destabilize her. If we confront her and break her spell she’ll panic and make mistakes. Whoever she and her co-conspirators are, they’ve been in control for too long. Time to shake it up a bit.”

The white unicorn blinked “Surprisingly I agree with you, for once. Can you break her spell?”

“Me? No way! What about that trick you used to break my illusions and make my horn vanish for a while?”

Zizanie looked visibly disturbed by the mention of how their previous encounter had ended. Using that particular ability came at a cost too great for Zizanie. The last time she had used it in anger and greatly regretted it. Normally she could spend months, or even years, without even considering her particular ‘gift’, as one may call it, but whenever she lost control of her emotions the lure of its power became impossible to resist. That way laid nothing but madness, chaos and pain. She looked away, pretending to study their target before she could speak again.

“No! I mean…no… it would cancel our water breathing spell too. “

She omitted the real reason why she didn’t want to use that ability, or even discuss its exact nature with the clueless blue mare, but she wasn’t lying. Cancelling magic wasn’t something one did with finesse. At least not without the already limited amount of control Zizanie possessed over that particular ability.

“I can’t make them see what I see either, they’d have no reason to believe me,” added Trixie.

“We’ll just have to trip her up verbally. Whatever story she got to share, it’s probably full of holes we can exploit to expose her. I’ll handle the clever web of words, and you try not to get in my way too much.“

Before Trixie could reply, Ditzy and Charybdis had finished filling in Sea Cucumber (or whoever she was) and the pegasus was bringing her over to the pair of unicorns for presentation.

“Sea Cucumber, this is my friend Trixie and… her acquaintance Zizanie,” explained Ditzy, struggling to introduce the white unicorn. “This is Sea Cucumber, she’s the one who saved me from the kaosharks and brought me to the seaponies’ hideout.”

If Sea Cucumber was surprised the unicorn was no longer in her Rarity guise, she did not let any hint betray that. Zizanie was impressed by the control over body language this newcomer had, of course it helped that the blackmailer was in no way familiar with seaponies to begin with.

“Real unicorns! That’s amazing! It’s nice to meet you!” said the seapony, shaking the two unicorns’ hoof.

That gesture struck Zizanie as another oddity, but she schooled her feature and hoped she was as good as this newcomer.

“Now that we’re done with introductions, let’s keep going, Lyra isn’t going to wait much longer!” added Bon Bon, obviously nervous.

“No! You can’t keep going! The kaosharks are this way!” declared Sea Cucumber.

Trixie and Zizanie shared a look. It was a tad disconcerting to be so easily on the same wavelength when it came to this matter. They still hated each other, and Trixie was still pretty much an amateur when it came to court games, but she knew how to fool an audience.

“They’re the ones we want to find, they have my Lyra!” replied Bon Bon.

“And your friend Sea Shanty!” added Ditzy.

“But it’s a trap! I saw them; they’re all there and ready to attack! You can’t trust the merponies they’ll turn on us!”

Dusky had to hold his leader back, as she angrily charged forward “What? How dare you say that after we lost two of our own to the last attack? You’re the suspicious one!”

Zizanie decided the time to act was now, lest the situation devolve and the tenuous alliance they had form collapse. Sea Racer was midway through hurling insults back at the merponies, but she wasn’t paying attention anymore. Now was the time to take control.

“Maybe we SHOULD listen to miss Sea Cucumber,” she declared, loud enough for everypony to take notice.

Bon Bon was obviously the first one to object, “You can’t be serious!”

“I always am, after all, this is the pony who saved our friend Ditzy from those kaosharks before! There’s probably tons of tricks she can teach us,” added Zizanie.

Sea Cucumber was actually taken aback by that comment. Zizanie allowed herself a small smirk before launching into the next part of her speech, but Trixie didn’t feel like letting somepony else hog the center stage.

“Oh yes the brave seapony who saved Ditzy! You must know everything there is to know about defeating those beasts! After all you took down two of them right?” said the blue unicorn, wrapping a forehoof around the small seapony’s shoulders. “A hero for the ages I’m sure!”

“Well… no… I … I didn’t beat them,” stammered Sea Cucumber, freeing herself from Trixie’s hoof “I just grabbed Ditzy and booked it!”

Trixie swam behind sea cucumber, disappearing from the seapony’s field of view for only a few seconds before reappearing on her other side. Zizanie could swear she saw the other unicorn just… flicker…

“That’s still very brave!” she said.

“Without you I wouldn’t be here,” pointed out Ditzy.

“Sea Cucumber isn’t my best scout for no reason, she can outrun any kaosharks.” Explained Charybdis.

“Or evade any of them!” added Sea Youaround.

“We could do with some evading tricks actually,” said Bon Bon.

Dusky Jack seemed interested by that train of thought “We know the kaosharks are ahead, we could maybe give them the slip and find their base!”

“HOWEVER!” suddenly shouted Trixie, taking control of the conversation before it drifted too far off subject.

All the other ponies looked at her like she had grown a second head. She allowed herself to bask in the attention for a second before continuing.

“However I doubt what you have to tell us would be useful…” she continued.

Sea Cucumber was shocked by that and looked ready to start crying “What? Why would you say something like that?”

“Because your story is bogus,” stated Zizanie, much to Trixie’s annoyance.

“This is preposterous! How dare you to aim such wild accusation at poor little Sea Cucumber?!” asked Charybdis, a tinge of anger creeping in her voice for the first time since Zizanie had met her.

Zizanie didn’t trust ponies who never got angry, so she took this as a good sign. Angry ponies were usually more honest, even if they still tried to lie. Trixie for her part ignore the outburst and turn to Sea Racer.

“Sea Racer, you’re a big strong stallion, why don’t you try to abscond with miss Doo here? And Bon Bon you give chase!”

“What are you getting at, dry pony?” asked Scylla.

“This is no time to play tag, Trixie!” complained Bon Bon.

“I think it’s the perfect time for this. It’s no time to walk into a dangerous situation if trust is too strained,” pointed out Zizanie, swimming next to the earth pony.

Charybdis took a stone cold expression and, without looking at him, gave Sea Racer the go ahead. Ditzy sighed but didn’t protest too much before going limp and letting Sea Racer grab her midsection with his prehensile tail.

“Now run! Run for you life!” Ordered Trixie.

Zizanie gave Bon Bon a push and the other mare took chase. It didn’t take that long for her to catch up to Sea Racer and tag him. It’s only once she did that she realized what it meant.

There was a pregnant silence floating around the group as everyone reached, some faster than other, the same conclusion as Trixie and Zizanie: there was no way the smaller Sea Cucumber could evade the pursuit of two kaosharks if Sea Racer couldn’t outrun a simple dry pony who doesn’t swim all that often. There was only one way Ditzy could have made it back to the Seapony hideout…

“Sea Cucumber…I…I can’t believe it…” began Charybdis, reeling from the feeling of betrayal.

“Tell them it’s a mistake!” added Ditzy, look between her savior and the two unicorns.

Sea Youaround and Sea Racer were stunned into silence at the realization.

The little seapony was trying it best to look confused and innocent, but everypony could see she was slowly inching away from the glare of the group.

“That’s…that’s not the same thing! Sea Racer’s obviously tired and…and I was on adrenaline…” she began to stammer.

“Kaosharks are much faster than miss Bon Bon,” simply said Scylla, surprisingly softly.

The merpony leader looked at her seapony equivalent and, for the first time in many years, a feeling of connection between the two was created. The feelings of hurt and betrayal visible on Charybdis’ face couldn’t be faked.

“I admit you’re pretty good kid, but you’ve been at the same gig for too long and adding Ditzy to your narrative disrupted your habits. You clearly improvised and got shoddy,” said Zizanie dramatically pointing a hoof toward the great seapony, “but there is no denying it now. It’s the only logical explanation! You, whoever you are, are working with the kaosharks!”

Sea Cucumber glanced at every member of their little group. The hurt seaponies, the suspicious, yet sympathetic, merponies, the disappointed Ditzy Doo, the stressed and angry Bon Bon, and finally the two unicorns who had exposed the flaw in her story. Without a word she turned away and began to swim away from the group.

“Hey! Get back here!” called Dusky Jack, the first to visibly react.

Zizanie knew this was coming, but instead elected to stay where she was. She wasn’t feeling like wasting energy when, if her instinct was correct, Sea Cucumber wouldn’t be going very far.

Indeed the smaller mare suddenly bumped into an invisible mass that resolved itself into the shape of Trixie, who grabbed hold of the seapony with her hooves. Zizanie rather enjoyed everypony’s surprise when the other Trixie disappeared. This seemed like a classic Trixie trick to leave an illusionary double while the real one slinked off under the cover of invisibility.

Sea Cucumber struggled in Trixie’s hooves, and before anypony could reach the pair to lend the unicorn a hoof or a fin, the green seapony let loose a surprisingly powerful roar that startled all present. It was almost enough by itself to force Trixie to let go, though what came next did.

Three kaosharks came out of nowhere, obviously called by the resounding roar of their ally, and headed straight for the small group, teeths and claws bared aggressively.

“I don’t need any of them alive anymore! RIP THEM TO SHREDS!” declared Sea Cucumber, or whoever she was, her voice sounding harsh and much older all at once.

This wasn’t how Zizanie expected events to go down.

Author's Note

BOOM! Merry Christmas y'all! Phew this took a while to write for no reason...

I'm sorry it's very short, dialogue-heavy and doesn't really accomplish much except get Lyra out of her cage, but I thought it was more important to get a chapter out again than making super long. I hope this is enough for now. There is still some problem with the chronology of upcoming events that are troubling me, but once that is solved I should be able to finish this before yet another year passes us by. This is getting ridiculous...

Chapter 9

The first thing Trixie noticed was that, to her augmented senses, the kaosharks were wrapped in the same type of magic as the so-called Sea Cucumber. The second thing she noticed was that the magic clung to them and didn’t bleed off into the water and leave a trail, but it did disrupt the trail of Lyra’s magic they had been following!

The third thing she noticed was that a great white – literally white - shark with polar bear arms was bearing down on her!

“EEP!”

She reflexively pushed herself away with her back hooves, using Sea Cucumber as a springboard. This sent the pair spinning head over tail in the water. Trixie managed to right herself just in time to swim away from swiping claws. In a flash she pulled up her invisibility spell, all the while cutting her magic sight in order to conserve energy. The kaoshark looked confused for a moment at the disappearance of its target. Trixie took a moment to look at her friends.

The kaosharks had them nearly surrounded, except for having left them a blatantly obvious escape route that headed away from Lucky Seagull Island. Trixie knew misdirection when she saw it, and this was rather obvious.

“We have to swim away now!” Called out Charybdis.

"Not while they still have my Lyra!" declared Bon Bon holding her position in defiance of the looming danger.

“This is for Lyra you monsters!” she called out.

She swung and delivered a powerful earth pony punch to the creature’s jaw, but the impact barely did any damage, instead sending her spinning away from her target. Fighting under water wasn’t going to be easy. The shark recovered first and reared back to strike.

“Look out!” cried Ditzy, flaring her wings.

She caught stray water currents and surged toward Bon Bon, pushing her out of the way of the attack. Before it could turn around and attack the tumbling mares, two shapes – one blue and the other magenta- collided with the tiger-headed creature. Sea Racer and Sea Youaround quickly took advantage of the beast's momentary distraction as a chance to ram it from the side, causing the shark to roar out in a mixture of fury and pain.

Bon Bon in the mean time swam down to the sea floor and planted her back hooves solidly in the sand. With one mighty push she threw herself, front hoof outstretched, at the tiger-headed creature and caught it right below the jaw before kicking herself away from the kaoshark. It still wasn’t Bon Bon’s full strength, but it sure made it roar in pain and bolstered the rest of their group. Using her wings and her sense of the current around them Ditzy began to move in the water with the same speed and grace as the seaponies. Together they began a series of hit and run from various angles, hoping to keep the creature in place so that Bon Bon could repeat her previous performance.

“Yeah! That’s the spirit!” shouted Scylla, excitement in her voice, “We can totally do this if we work together! Everypony! Attack!”

Meanwhile the polar bear shark was looking around trying to locate the vanished unicorn.

“She’s still there you idiot, just use your other senses to track her!” ordered Sea Cucumber.

The confused kaoshark closed its eyes and quickly turned its head straight toward Trixie. She gasped as its next swipe barely missed her and dropped her invisibility spell, since it didn’t do her much good. Its next swipe was stopped when Dusky Jack came in from nowhere, tackling the shark and grasping it in his front hoof just behind its bear arms. The violet merpony began to wrestle with the beast.

“Not so tough now that I got the drop on you right? One way or another we’re getting all our friends back today!”

Trixie chanced another look at her own friends. Ditzy and Bon Bon were teaming up with the seaponies to take turn and tackle the tiger-headed shark from various angles. The tactic seemed to work well enough for now. Charybdis wasn’t faring as well, realized Trixie with dread. The yellow seapony leader was struggling in the grasp of the grey kaoshark’s octopus tentacles! She resolved to go help her out but the wrestling Dusky and kaoshark suddenly swam right in her path, blocking her for a moment.

Much to the unicorn’s relief, and surprise, she saw none other than the royal blue shape of Scylla engage the octopus-shark hybrid in close combat to rescue the rival leader! The merpony grasped one of the ensnaring tentacles and pulled, just before biting on the appendage and causing the kaoshark to recoil away from the pair in pain.

Trixie’s attention was suddenly grabbed by Zizanie shouting.

“You’re not getting away that easily!”

The white unicorn had tackled Sea Cucumber, or whoever the light green seapony was, and was trying to pin her to the bottom of the ocean floor. That was easier said than the done, since Zizanie had to not only hold a fighting opponent but fight her own natural buoyancy in order to properly push her down. The sandy floor was kicked up by the struggling Sea Cucumber and Trixie could barely make out her form wriggling in Zizanie’s front hooves before the two were obscured.

A split second later Sea Cucumber, using surprising strength dragged Zizanie out of the sand cloud, her prehensile tail wrapped around the unicorn’s throat. Zizanie was clearly fighting against the grip but couldn’t seem to get any good hit on the seapony to force her to let go, and while her horn was glowing it seemed to not amount to much as panic clearly made her lose her focus.

“Foolish dry pony! The ocean is my domain, you can’t win against me here!” she laughed, slowly tightening her grip.

Sea Cucumber had a manic grin and an evil gleam in her eye. Trixie really didn’t like the blackmailer, but there was no questioning her need to protect her fellow unicorn. Zizanie was a thief, a spy, a con artist, and in every other way a completely untrustworthy pony, but even she didn’t deserve this. Still it would be so easy to not act until she fainted and get her out of the way until she could be arrested…

“Zizanie!” finally called Trixie, casting a shadow spell over Zizanie’s eyes.

The other unicorn didn’t really need any protection, her eyes already shut because of the pain she felt. One short casting later and a blindingly bright burst of light went off, with the sound of a firecracker, mere inches from Sea Cucumber’s deranged eyes! The green seapony reflexively reeled back, bringing her fins to her eyes. The movement gave Zizanie just enough give to slip partially out of the chokehold and bite down on her opponent’s tail. Sea Cucumber howled in pain and began to try to slam Zizanie against the sea floor, kicking up more sand in the process. Trixie once again lost sight of the pair during the struggle, but it was clear the seapony was unable to find a hard surface to hit Zizanie.

Too concerned for the struggling pair, Trixie failed to notice the other nearby fight between Dusky Jack and the bear arm shark until it was too late. The kaoshark had dislodged the merpony and with its mighty arm slammed the violet male into Trixie, pinning both of them against the seafloor. Trixie was stunned for a moment, stuck beneath the struggling Dusky Jack in the kicked up cloud of sand she couldn’t see their opponent. She could easily imagine it raising an arm, ready to maul them both to shreds though. There was a brilliant multi chromatic flash and the pressure on her back was released. She got up and saw the polar bear-shark hybrid holding its head in pain and Dusky Jack just charging again into the fray, trailing a few wisps of blood. Zizanie appeared in Trixie’s field of vision, scuffed, but generally unharmed. The white unicorn helped her right herself and the two began floating back to back.

“What was that flash?” asked Trixie.

“Magic missile,” explained a panting Zizanie.

“Impressive, do you think you have a few more left in you?” asked Trixie, surveying the multiple battles around them, and the form of a visibly enraged Sea Cucumber swimming out of a settling cloud of silt.

“I’m not a mage, Lulamoon,” replied the white unicorn in lieu of a direct answer.

Trixie knew what that meant though. Casting spells outside of one’s specialty meant lots of training that not many pony bothered with, and usually spent far more mana than something more familiar. It was even a wonder Zizanie knew that simple attack spell in the first place, but it was clear she wouldn’t be able to cast it again for the next few hours, maybe even not before a good night’s sleep.

“Right…” said Trixie, looking around at the ground around them before spotting what she needed, “But THEY don’t know that,” she added with a whisper “Think you can fake it?”

Zizanie raised an eyebrow as she looked at Trixie, but she nodded. “I’m not as good as you with illusions but something shapeless like that? Yeah I can fake it… Why?”

“A true magician always keeps the audience guessing. Just follow my lead!“ softly said Trixie with a smirk before facing Sea Cucumber and loudly announcing: “Time to let loose Zizanie! Show her what we dry ponies can do!”

The white unicorn shrugged, but she figured some trickery wouldn’t hurt. “With pleasure!”

Zizanie’s horn began to glow and a shimmering cone of light appeared before her and with a grunt she sent it flying toward Sea Cucumber!

This was the trickiest bluff Trixie had done in a while, at least since that time she used illusions to pay for a train ticket last winter. With her horn glow made invisible she had wrapped an nearby piece of rock in an invisibility spell, adjusted as best she could to the watery medium, and with swift telekinesis sent it flying inside the illusionary magic missile. The trick was to make sure it hit Sea Cucumber at roughly the same time as the flash of light, to convince her the attack was real.

The way the seapony recoiled and gasped at the impact seemed to imply she had fallen for it though. She looked at Zizanie, shocked. Trixie decided to keep going and turned to the battling pair of Dusky Jack and the shark.

“Another one Zizanie!”

With a sigh the blackmaller obliged and fired an illusonary magic missile while Trixie hurled her stone in the same path. The attack hit the creature right in the nose, causing it to squeal in pain.

Meanwhile, Charybdis and Scylla had come up with a rather ridiculous plan, where each grabbed hold of one of the shark’s tentacle with their teeth and then drag it into a path so that it formed a noose. They pulled as tight they could before the shark’s struggles managed to make them let go of the appendages. The creature was distracted by the effect long enough for the pair to double team it and ram it on both side of the head at the same time before it could be done untangling its tentacles. The impact clearly stunned the creature.

Sea Cucumber made to go to her henchshark’s help when another flash of light appeared in her peripheral vision and she was hit in the side of the head by the ‘magic missile’. She looked back to the unicorn pair, and the still struggling bear shark behind them. Her attention though was grabbed by something off to the side. Trixie looked and spotted Ditzy, Bon Bon and the other two seaponies swimming away from the tiger headed shark as it started to convulse wildly. Something was obviously wrong. A quick flash of her magic sight showed that whatever spell was altering its form was starting to come undone. She could literally see the magic ‘cracking’!

“It’s turning back to normal I think,” she said to a confused Zizanie.

Sea Cucumber gritted her teeth in annoyance. “That’s enough, time to retreat! GRAB NUMBER 5!” she barked, her fin extended toward the convulsing shark.

“Don’t let them! We need that prisoner!” said Zizanie.

Trixie wasn’t sure why Zizanie cared, but if there was one thing the blackmailer was good at it was digging up secrets. If she wanted the prisoner it probably meant there was a secret to be had.

“Regroup!” called Charybdis, as she and Scylla swam to Bon Bon, Ditzy and the seaponies.

Trixie and Zizanie sent another ‘magic missile’ to the polar shark, leaving it distracted long enough for Dusky Jack to steer it down onto a rock and then kick himself off with his tail. The trio reached the others and formed a screen.

“Time for our trump card…” whispered Trixie, winking at Zizanie. “Time for the Magic Wild Storm!”

The white unicorn smirked “With pleasure.”

A single missile appeared again, but soon multiple copies began to appear out of nowhere. A literal wall of multiple magic missiles, all of them illusions brought forth by Trixie really, occupied the water between the ponies and the sharks and their mistress.

Sea Cucumber seemed hesitant to move, seemingly waiting for the coming onslaught. Trixie was aware she was bluffing big with this. If the sharks decided to press it she didn’t have the skill to control enough rocks at once… but maybe it didn’t matter…

One by one the missiles began to fly in different directions, hitting the sea floor and causing it to explode into clouds of silt and sand. Zizanie quickly caught on to Trixie’s play, much to the blue unicorn’s surprise, and decided to add to the illusion.

“It’s too much power! I can’t aim correctly!” she shouted over the fake sound of fireworks explosion.

“Just keep firing, you’re bound to hit them at least once if they come closer!”

Trixie used the rock trick to hit the nearest kaoshark straight in the nose again, causing Sea Cucumber to finally make a decision.

“RETREAT!” she ordered.

The remaining two sharks and their leader swam off, as the missiles kept flying around them. Before they disappeared over a crest, the green seapony shot an angry glare at the unicorn pair.

“This is not over!” she said.

Trixie waited for a tense half a minute, the only sound heard being the weird noises produced by the kaosharks as it was wrecked by spasms, before she dispelled her illusions. Everypony seem to visibly relax once the ‘missiles’ vanished.

“Woah… what just happened?” asked Sea Racer, noticing the clouds of sand that had been displaced by the missiles just disappeared.

“It was just a little illusion work, nothing…nothing too complicated for the Great and Powerful Trixie! Zizanie doesn’t really have the kind of power we showed Sea Cucumber, we just had to trick her into believing she did.” replied Trixie, suddenly becoming keenly aware of how tired she was getting.

This little scuffle had been draining on her, and it was bound to get worse if Sea cucumber came back with reinforcements. They had to go after her quickly before she could regroup with her troops and come up with a way to use their hostages against them.

But first…

“Everypony, look! What’s wrong with it?” asked Ditzy, pointing a hoof at the kaoshark who was just now wriggling on the sea floor.

Its body was being coursed by cackling energy and dark glowing cracks seemed to form all over it. Trixie took another look with her magic sight.

“The magic surrounding its body is coming undone! Everypony stay back!” she warned, putting herself an extra pony length away from the creature.

The others did the same just as a bright flash, followed by a loud cracking noise, erupted from the kaosharks. Once the light died down a surprise gasp came out of the mouth of each member of the group as they looked at what had been revealed.

Where once was a blue kaoshark lying on the sea floor was an unconscious blue seapony with a grey mane!

“Cetus!” gasped Charybdis, swimming to the his side.

“Cetus?” asked Ditzy, turning to her seapony friends.

“That’s…that’s Sea Lion’s father! I saw him being kidnapped by the kaosharks almost two years ago!” explained Sea Racer, dumbstruck by the revelation.

The implications were huge. If the transmutation magic that Trixie had recognized had been used to turn a seapony into a kaosharks, then it was possible ALL the kaosharks were former seaponies, and possibly, merponies. And what about Lyra and Rock Beauty? Trixie turned to Scylla, expecting the merpony leader to accuse the seaponies of being behind everything, but instead she saw her swim to help Charybdis with Cetus.

“How is he?” she asked.

“He’s alive, but unconscious…”

Scylla turned in the direction that Sea cucumber had fled. “That witch! She’s turning our own people against us! Turning them into…into abominations! We have to take her down NOW!” she declared.

Dusky Jack, Sea Racer and Sea Youaround all nodded in agreement.

“We have to get Cetus back to our camp, we can’t bring him with us,” began Charybdis. “Sea Racer, Sea Youaround, I want you two to get him back to his son.”

“But Chari! We want to help you!” protested Sea Racer.

“And you will Sea Racer. I want you to come back with everypony else! We will need all their help if we hope to win and save our kin who were turned into monsters.”

“Dusky Jack, escort them to the edge of their territory, then you go get the others as well,” added Scylla. “We can’t risk our enemies getting to our clans before we can bring them the truth. Merponies and seaponies need to fight together, and I need you to convince the others to do just that.”

The male merpony turned to his seapony equivalent and extanded a hoof. Sea Racer grabbed the appendage between his fins and shook it once, staring into Dusky’s eyes. Somehow, fighting like this had brought them closer than their two tribes had been in hundreds of years.

Trixie and her friends had kept quiet, realizing this was an important moment for the aquatic ponies, but now was the time to get back on track.

Bon Bon was the first to pipe up, glaring in the direction of Seagull Island. “Let’s take the fight to that witch and get our loved ones back.”

There was no hesitation in that statement, no hint that this would be dangerous and risky, just an unflinching certitude in their success.

Lyra had to question the sanity of whatever being, immortal or mortal, had thought it was a good idea to put a crocodile’s head on a shark. It felt like needless overkill, considering that it didn’t offer the kaoshark any advantages over a regular one, unlike the other one she could see that sported a scorpion’s tail. That said the scorpion’s tail wasn’t as good for swimming and the shark was clearly struggling to move at a decent pace. Counting the one still guarding the cell, completely oblivious to their escape, Lyra had spotted 8 kaosharks so far, though she had yet to see the octopus hybrid again and that made her wonder how many more of these creatures were around.

The trio of escapees were hiding behind a cluster of rocks near the edge of the slave camp. They could see them working on two major areas. One of them was some sort of platform on the sea floor, maybe what was left of a building or a plaza? It was a partially buried circular construction of stones with what looked like a triangle carved into it, though one of the point hadn’t been uncovered from debris yet. The other structure actually looked like some sort of conical building made of cut stone with a circular opening at the front, probably a door. The 40 or so slaves were shackled at the neck in pairs, with long chains being run through hoops attached to giant boulders between them, usually with two or three other pairs sharing the same rock. The chains were clearly from different sources, with various styles, thickness and level of rust.

“This is gonna be tricky…” muttered Lyra.

“Wow, seeing them up close like this… turns out I know pretty much all of these merponies!” mentioned Rock Beauty.

“Same here…” added Sea Shanty.

Lyra was looking around the area, searching for something “We’re going to need the keys to free all of them…but where can they keep them?”

“You two stay here, I’ll go ask one of the prisoners! Distract the guards if they risk to notice me!” simply declared Rock Beauty.

“Wait! That’s…” began Lyra, trying to grab the merpony but she swam off before she could do anything.

“She’s really brave!” commented Sea Shanty, following her new friend sneak around between boulders.

“I’d call that reckless…I really don’t like being stuck as the responsible one,” complained the unicorn.

The aquamarine seapony patted Lyra on the shoulder. “I know what you mean, I feel like that sometimes when I hang out with my friend Sea Youaround, while I’m usually the silly one with Sea Lion… until we learned Sea Cucumber wanted me for my musical knowledge I thought I had been caught instead of him because of that. Anyway you shouldn’t worry, if her life is like mine, Rock Beauty must be used to hiding from kaosharks.”

The two watched in silence as she progressed from hiding spot to hiding, even hiding under the sand at one point. Lyra was rather scared she would be spotted from the cloud of silt but it settled fast enough that the patrolling sharks didn’t spot her. Her grey coloring made it easier for her to blend with the cut stone rubbles strewn around the place. Finally the merpony reached a spot where she could speak to one of the prisoners, a dull brown male merpony with a yellow and teal mane, the one Rock Beauty had identified as Puffer Fish earlier. He visibly jumped when she spoke to him but he managed to school his feature before the guards took notice.

Lyra took a moment to study the carving on the large triangle. She could swear one of the nearby glyph was shaped like the seapony carved on the wall of their makeshift prison. Was it some sort of reunion area? Maybe it was some sort of festival ground?

Her musings were interrupted when Sea Shanty tugged at her and got her to hide down against the ground, avoiding detection once again. It didn’t take long for Rock Beauty to come back. She looked sad, but still hopeful.

“He’s okay but everybody’s being worked ragged… he says the keys must be kept over there,” she explained, pointing to a small cave on the side of the dig site. Luckily the entrance itself was unguarded, but it was still in the line of sight of a couple of kaosharks.

“How do we sneak in there?” asked Sea Shanty.

“Puffer Fish said he’ll provide a distraction so we can slip in, but we have to get into position quickly,” explained Rock Beauty.

It was another tense minute of slipping between rocks, avoiding detection and constantly being on the look out. Once they were in position Lyra chanced a look at the brave merpony who was helping them. As if he had caught site of them he dropped his tool and just stopped working quickly getting the attention of the nearby Kaosharks. As one approached to force him back to work he began to insult the patchwork creature, casting rather colorful aspersion on its parentage, very loudly. Once all the creatures turned their head towards him, Rock Beauty, Sea Shanty and Lyra slipped inside the evil lair of their captor.

Lyra tried to ignore the grunt of pains coming from the brave slave who covered for them. Puffer Fish was probably getting a beating for his insolence, all that to help them get inside. There was no time to lose! Lyra lead them inside, clutching her lyre, ready for anything.

The cave was rather gloomy, with a few spots of the wall covered with phosphorescent blue moss, with some sort of purple glow emanating from deeper into the cave, around a bend in the tunnel. There was shelf space carved into the rock, with many artifacts lying there, and some larger one just standing on the floor. Stone tablets, pieces of broken pottery, carved coral implements, and many large lidded storage jars with colorful sceneries depicted on them in the style of the rock carvings they had seen. Those scenes showed the aquatic tribes of ponies tending to the creatures of the ocean together, in harmony. It was sad to think this harmony had been broken somehow. But no sign of the keys!

“Huh… girls…you should see this,” called Rock Beauty.

The merpony was staring in shock at something beyond the bend.

“Did you find the keys?” asked Sea Shanty.

Rock Beauty raised her hoof, lifting a big rusty ring holding about a dozen different keys from a nearby rock outcropping, all the while maintaining her sight on the mysterious object.

Sea Shanty moved in close to get the keys but her curiosity made her look further into the cave “What are you looking…at…oh.”

“What? What is it?” asked Lyra, swimming to catch up to the aquatic ponies.

Beyond the bend was the source of the mysterious purple glow, resting atop a circular stone table. It was a large purple crystal, about the size of a watermelon, held at the top and bottom in the interlocking tentacles of two jellyfish carved from pink coral. Even without Trixie’s magical sight Lyra could tell this thing pulsated with incredible power.

“Is that…” she began, not believing what she was seeing.

“The Jellyfish Lantern!” said Sea Shanty, gasping.

Rock Beauty finally gave up her staring contest with the legendary artifact of her people. “That’s where it’s been all this time? In the fin of those two traitors Lute Turtle and the other one?”

“Should…should we steal it?” asked Sea Shanty. “I don’t really feel like touching it for some reason.”

The other two nodded, sharing the feeling.

Lyra’s ears suddenly perked up.

“Did you hear that?” she asked, swimming back towar the entrance.

“What?” asked the seapony, following with a confused expression on her face.

“Nope,” added Rock Beauty.

“I don’t care!” came a thundering voice from outside.

It was Sea Cucumber and she was mad, really mad.

“They can sit on their bottom for the rest of the day for all I care, it’s not like they can swim away! What’s important is getting every shark we have to the main entryway! Those little fools have begun working together because of those BLASTED dry ponies! Just go and hold them off while I try something else!”

“We gotta hide! Quick!” whispered Lyra, moving behind one of the larger artifacts.

The three went out of sight just in time to see Sea Cucumber appear at the mouth of the cave. She stopped and turned back toward her minions to shout one last instruction.

“One of the dry pony can make herself invisible so keep your nostrils open for any intruders!”

Lyra realized that it meant her friends were coming. There were coming for them and would probably encounter a wall of ferocious kaosharks… they had to even the odds! Silently she pointed the keys and pointed out toward the entrance to the cave. If all the kaosharks were sent to deal with the incoming introders, leaving the slaves to their own devices…

Sea Cucumber swam toward the back of the cave, where the Lantern was…but more importantly where the keys weren’t. She was obviously grumbling under her breath, possibly wishing harm to come upon Trixie and all her potential progeny, but it was important she not realize the keys had been snatched before all the slaves had been freed!

“I’ll distract her,” whispered, as softly as possibly, the unicorn.

Rock Beauty and Sea Shanty weren’t given a chance to object, as Lyra quickly moved to follow Sea Cucumber. The pair left just as the unicorn reached the corner in the corridor.

Lyra was there just in time to catch a remarkable sight. Sea Cucumber was floating in front of the Jellyfish Lantern, back to the entrance, fins extended outward. The Lantern’s glow intensified, but also turned to a much darker color as nearly black tendrils of magic, slithering like a snake made of ink, reached out and began to wrap around Sea Cucumber. With a flash from the Lantern the tendrils plunged into the seapony’s body, causing her to grunt in pain. The glow of the tendrils extended all over her body and the now glowing shape of the seapony began to transform before Lyra’s eyes. In a second the glow subsided, leaving behind not Sea Cucumber the seapony… but Lute Turtle the Merpony!

Lyra could not help but gasp in surprise. Sea Cucumber and Lute Turtle were one and the same! But which identity was the real one? Or maybe neither? Whoever she was, she turned toward the entrance when she heard Lyra.

“You!” she said, anger in her voice.

She quickly turned and reached out a hoof toward the Lantern. The unicorn was not going to let the obviously evil whatever get her hoof on the evil artifact of legend capable of changing a pony’s tribe! She quickly ran her hoof over her lyre, producing a few notes of the telekinesis boosting song and using its power to pin Lute Turtle harshly against the far wall of the room. It wasn’t Lyra’s full power, like she had used on the giant rocks, but it was good enough to hold one small pony for a minute or two. The unicorn maneuvered herself so as to obstruct the merpony’s – or whatever she was – of the empty shelf where the keys to the chains used to lay.

“Alright, time to come clean: who and what are you?!”

The pinned pony just cackled “ I don’t know how you managed to escape but if you think this little trick is enough to gain the upperhoof on me, you got another thing coming! Any minute now my minions will…”

“Reach the edge of your little camp to face my friends. I heard you, no one’s coming to help you any time soon so why don’t you talk?” said Lyra, interrupting her captive.

The so-called merpony gritted her teeth. “And what about your little cellmates? I doubt you left them behind…”

“They swam off,” lied Lyra, “Now enough games! You’ve been using this thing to infiltrate both sides, and you got all these slaves digging up ruins… I want answers, whoever you are!”

“I don’t owe you anything, you meddling dry pony! I should have dumped your stupid little friend on a beach somewhere!”

Lyra played a riff on her lyre, causing her captive to move off the wall before slamming her back against the rocky surface. The creature closed her eyes and grunted in pain. When her eyes opened her face twisted in anger. It looked so different to how gentle Lute Turtle had looked before. The unicorn held the creature’s gaze with intensity.

“No one calls my friends stupid! Now tell me what you are and why you’re abusing the seaponies and merponies?” asked an obviously angry Lyra.

“Why do you care? This world is not yours; these merponies and seaponies are complete strangers. None of this concern you or the surface world. If you grab your little friends and swim back to the surface I might be lenient.” Simply replied the creature, smirking.

Lyra shook her head before glaring at the merpony-shaped being. “That’s where you’re wrong, it does concern me. You see, you trapped me with two nice ponies in a cell. We talked, we shared, we laughed, and we got to know each other. These are my friends now, and I’m not going to leave my friends to be abused by some nameless monster who pretend to be one of them! Once again, who are you?”

The creature rolled her eyes. “Foolish little dry pony… I tried to be nice one last time but I guess it won’t get me anywhere…” she said, sighing. “But I will be polite and reveal to you who I am. I am Ek’idna, Daughter of Phorcys! And all the oceans of the world, and all the creatures within are my BIRTHRIGHT to do as I please!” She declared, getting louder as she went on.

At the last second she suddenly peeled herself from the rock surface, much to Lyra’s shock, and with a hoof touched the Lantern. It reacted and before Lyra could recast her spell a dark tendril shot off the lantern towards her! Lyra dodged to the side, the attack barely missing her. However, by moving she revealed what she had tried to hide.

“THE KEYS! Where did you put the keys?” asked Ek’idna, enraged, grabbing the lantern with both hooves.

It was Lyra’s time to smirk as she righted herself. “By now my friends will have freed all your slaves.”

A growl began to build up in Ek’idna’s throat. The lantern’s glow began to turn darker and darker, as if answering Ek’idna’s rising anger. By the time Ek’idna’s emotions were let out in a frustrated roar, tendrils of dark magic were whipping about the small cave, threatening to overcome Lyra who began to back away from the enraged creature.

“I’ve had ENOUGH! You, and all your little friends, will feel the full brunt of my power!”

Lyra swallowed.

“I know this place!” had commented Ditzy, as they kept swimming toward Lucky Seagull Island. “It’s where I first got attacked by the kaosharks.” She had explained, pointing to a nearby rock formation with a tunnel dug in it.

“You must have gotten too close to their base,” had suggested Zizanie.

And it was true. Avoiding the tunnels because of their ambush potential the team had made it to the crest of a coral reef near the island. An invisible Trixie peeked over the large formation before ducking back under. A whole welcoming committee of Kaosharks was waiting for them.

“How many?” asked Bon Bon, shaking a little.

“I’d say about a dozen?” answered Trixie.

“That’s not a lot of troop for this whole operation…” commented Zizanie, rubbing her chin.

“Maybe they ran out of idea for weird animal combinations,” said Trixie, “Seriously, whoever thought it was a good idea to add a crocodile head to a shark? It’s totally redundant and doesn’t give it any advantages! Or the horns? Aren’t the shark’s own teeth a good enough weapon already?”

Everypony else politely ignored her outburst.

“Come to think of it, I don’t recall seeing that many more of them either at once… I guess that’s why they kept us divided, they didn’t have enough bodies to face us all together,” said Scylla, gritting her teeth. “Whoever is responsible will pay…”

Charybdis meanwhile looked pensive. “I guess Sea Cucumber, or whoever she is, doesn’t have enough power to change ALL the ponies she captured, otherwise there would be way more of those things. There’s still too many of them for a full on battle until the others arrive, and we don’t have the luxury to wait. Maybe we can sneak through and free the other prisoners to help us?”

While the two aquatic leaders, Trixie and Zizanie talked about how to get through the line, Ditzy turned to Bon Bon and extanded a wing over her friend.

“You okay?” she asked.

Bon Bon leaned on the grey pegasus, closing her eyes and taking a deep breath. “I guess? It’s just… it just dawned on me how scary these things are… earlier I was full of adrenaline and thinking only of Lyra but now that I’ve seen them up close… and the idea of getting into another fight, maybe ending up as one of those creatures myself…I just don’t understand how you, Lyra, Trixie and the others Elements handle it?”

“Handle what?”

“This! The whole hero thing! You guys are so brave…”

Ditzy considered how to answer the question. “I guess it’s how you said earlier, I just think of the ponies I’m helping. My little muffin, my close friends, like Lyra and Trixie and you, but also the more casual friends like Charybdis and the seaponies. I don’t occupy my mind overthinking what could go wrong; I just think of what could be better, “ she said.

“Sea Cucumber lied to me… pretended to be so nice… but the rest of their tribe really suffered because of her. That was no lie. I could see it that they lived harsh lives; hanging on through solidarity… all the while she walked…or swam among them. To think the source of all that misery had just stood there, pretending to share it… It just makes me so mad! How could someone be so cruel? Now that I know more of the situation, I couldn’t turn my back on their suffering!”

“I guess that makes sense… but I’m still just a candy maker… I don’t know if I got what it takes like you and the other Elements of Harmony,” added the earth pony mare. “I’m not a hero.”

“I don’t know about that, you got a pretty mean left hook,” said Ditzy, smiling.

Bon Bon chuckled at that.

The moment was broken by Scylla “Are you daft?! Those creatures are our friends and you want to hurt them?!”

“We have to! They won’t listen to reason in their current state,” replied Charybdis. “I’m not happy about it but we can’t hold back against the Kaosharks just because they are our transformed friend and family.”

“She’s right,” said Ditzy, moving away from Bon Bon to return to the conversation, “Your friends probably all want to be freed from this transformation, and we know it can run out with time. If we knock them out, or incapacitate them without severe injury we have a better chance of getting them back than if we go easy on them and just get captured ourselves.”

Scylla sighed. “I guess I have no choice. Now, how do we get in there without an army?”

“Wait… do you hear that?” asked Zizanie, turning toward the enemy base.

Everypony got silent and listen intently, their ears standing at attention.

“Sounds like shouts…” said Trixie, turning herself invisible to poke her head above the coral reef again.

What she saw was obviously quite surprising to her, because she let out an audible gasp.

“Guys… I think we got our army, Let’s go!” she declared, reappearing and swimming toward the enemy.

“Wait! Trixie!” said Ditzy, following her.

When she crested the reef she understood exactly what Trixie had meant.

Somehow all the prisoners had been freed! The mass of assorted seapony and merpony were charging the surprised kaosharks from behind. Many of them were wielding digging tools like shovels and picks and some were swinging heavy chains around. The 40 to 50 prisoners physically slammed into the group of kaosharks, sending them into disarray. If they knew of the origin of the creatures they showed no sign of Scylla’s earlier doubt about harming their former friends. Flanks were tackled as hard as possible, heads were bonked with the flat side of digging tools and various appendages wrapped in heavy chains.

The sight of both tribes charging into battle against the kaosharks was pretty impressive. Still it was no time to just stand there and gape. The rest of their team charged headlong into battle, creating a pincer formation on the center of the group of kaosharks. As she got closer she realized many of the former prisoner looked malnourished and weak, some sporting bruisings from recent beatings. This battle wasn’t a sure shot, even if they had the advantage of number now with about 4 ponies to every shark. Bon Bon had gotten over her earlier issue and teamed up with Trixie and Zizanie in attacking a shark with a fierce looking scorpion tail. The white unicorn was grabbing the creature’s tail in some sort of wrestling hold, while Trixie pelted its eyes with flashes of light and Bon Bon tried to knock it out with her hooves. Ditzy tackled a hammerhead shark with griffin talons alongside Charybdis, just as it got into a fight with an older male seapony. The seapony leader quickly went to his side, clearly recognizing him.

“Phooka, where’s my daughter? Where’s Sea Beauty?” asked Charybdis, frantically.

“The witch took her to add to her army!” answered the seapony, pointing to one of the nearby sharks, the grey one with tentacles from the earlier fight.

Charybdis winced and looked away. Ditzy saw the hammerhead shark come in again for a charge and tackled the seapony leader out of the way. Phooka began to distract the creature while Ditzy shook Charybdis by the shoulder.

“Don’t forget what we just talked about! You can’t save your daughter if you get caught!”

Charibdis nodded and joined Phooka in swimming around the kaoshark. Ditzy’s attention was diverted when she heard the voice of Rock Beauty rising over the din of the brawl.

“Scylla! Scylla!”

“Rock Beauty! Thank the Spirit of Nereus you’re alright!” the merpony leader said, getting into a somewhat uncharacteristic hug with the younger member of her clan.

“It’s terrible! Lute Turtle is working with the kaosharks! And the bad guys…they have the Jellyfish Lantern! And Lyra is still out there trying to distract the bad seapony!”

Scylla’s eyes grew as big as dinnerplates. “They have WHAT?! Oh this is not good…not good at all.”

“What’s going on?” asked Ditzy, not sure what this lantern was all about.

Scylla looked around at the crazy brawl as one of her own was thrown into a nearby rock by one of the sharks. “No time to exposit, we have to get to your friend, fast!”

“Trixie! Bon Bon! We know where Lyra is!” souted Ditzy.

Her two friends, and Zizanie, disengaged from the scorpion shark just as it tried to trap them between a nearby stone and its own body. Instead the creature just managed to hit its own head against the rocky surface.

“You two go, I’ll stay here to help Charybdis and the prisoners,” simply stated the white unicorn.

Trixie shrugged. “As you wish!”

The smaller group managed to weave their way out of the fight, adding a worried Sea Shanty to their little expedition. They soon arrived at the site of a work camp, Rock Beauty quickly explaining the prisoners were forced into labor, clearing up the ruins. There were a ton of discarded equipment and chains, left where the slaves had been freed. There was no sign of Lyra or Sea Cucumber, meaning they were still in the lair Rock Beauty mentioned.

As they approached there was a loud sound, like an electrical discharge, and a green form was thrown out of the cave and crashed into the sand a few feets away, a lyre flying within reach of their shocked group.

“Lyra!” shouted Bon Bon, heading for her marefriend.

Lyra, laying on the sea floor rose up from the cloud of sand and extended a hoof out in warning.

“Stay back!” she called, as some sort of dark energy coursed through her body, clearly in pain.

Bon Bon stopped, more out of surprise and fear than genuine desire to obey.

“Listen! ARG! Sea Cucumber…Lute Turtle…same…GAH! Same creature!” she began, clearly fighting back against whatever spell was attacking her body. “Ek’idna! ACK! Uses…lantern to switch! ARRRRG!”

With that the dark energy covered her entire body, and, much to everypony’s horror, began to transform her. In a flash the energy dissipated, revealing a green kaoshark with paler spots along its back. To add insult to the terrifying injury, it was equipped with four spindly green arms, not unlike those Lyra had had when transformed by zebra magic.

“LYRA! NOOOOO!!!” screamed Bon Bon, stepping away in terror.

A mad cackled rose above the work camp, as if delighting in Bon Bon’s horror filled scream. Ditzy looked all around until she spoted the shape of Lute Turtle - or rather Ek’idna – exiting her lair. She held a strange crystal contraption in her hooves, probably the Jellyfish Lantern mentioned earlier. Dark tendrils of inky magic were reaching out from the object, dancing all around her body. Unlike with Lyra the magic didn’t take over her body, it seemed to drain out of her, peeling away like it had done from Cetus earlier and flowing back into the lantern.

It left behind a creature unlike any Ditzy had ever seen! It looked like a giant dark green anglerfish, but with a head and forelegs like that of a boar! It had three rows of sharp tusks jutting out of its massive lower jaw, sharp looking fins coming out of its boar elbows, and its dorsal fin and tail looked jagged and ripped in places, like they had went through hell and back. The most striking features though were the lure sprouting from its forehead, like an aquatic unicorn horn, with a glowing purple orb at the end, and its eyes. Its eyes were completely blank orbs of pure gold, no pupil to be seen and yet Ditzy could still feel a malevolent glare washing over her.

“I’m done with subtlety! Submit or share her fate!” declared Ek’idna, baring her giant fangs in the process.

Author's Note

What a place to leave off huh? I hope you enjoyed this one... it's been a long time coming and for that I apologize again. I'm terrible at keeping up a correct pace aren't I?

Anyway this current version is probably filled with gramatical error and spelling mistakes... but I REALLY didn't want to make you wait any longer... so point out all my mistakes and I should fix it when I come back later... I got a wedding to attend today! :pinkiehappy:

Chapter 10

“Lyra! Please! You have to fight it!” pleaded Bon Bon as the kaoshark that used to be her marefriend swam toward her, strange arms flailing about.

Just before the four appendages could grab her, Trixie, floating next to her, pulled her along by the tail. The green kaoshark turned and tried to reach Bon Bon again with its thin and elongated arms but only managed to grasp empty water as Trixie changed course at the last second. Bon Bon lost sight of the Lyra-kaoshark for a few seconds before she found herself face to face with Trixie, the unicorn holding her by the shoulders. She could hear Ek’idna’s laughter echoing across the ocean; clearly amused by the dance they just did with her new minion.

“Take hold of yourself!” said the blue mare, glaring, “We KNOW this spell isn’t permanent. We just have to keep her away from that…that monster over there long enough and she’ll turn back to normal!”

Before Bon Bon could answer she was quickly pulled aside by Trixie, this time not to avoid one of her marefriend’s new arms but to dodge a blast of dark magic aimed at the pair of them. This movement, however, put them in a direct collision course with said transformed mare.

Ditzy came out of nowhere with Scylla, and the two caused the Lyra-Kaoshark to crash into the sea floor, kicking up a cloud of sand that obscured her form for a second.

“How many times do I have to say it today?” Asked Ditzy, panting from exertion, “You can’t help her if you get captured! Don’t make me repeat myself again or I’ll be VERY cross.”

For an instant Bon Bon felt like her mother had just scolded her. She took a surveying glance around her. She saw Trixie, whom she never really gotten that well with in the past but was a true friend to Lyra, of that there was no doubt. She had known Ditzy for years and knew the pegasus had a protective streak a mile wide when it came to those she cared about. Then there were the two new ponies, Rock Beauty and Sea Shanty, who had apparently met Lyra while they were all captives of the kaosharks. They hadn’t known Lyra long but she had made a strong enough impression that they were willing to come back here to help her. Finally there was Scylla, who was a rather rough type but Bon Bon wasn’t fooled by her tough act: the merpony leader clearly cared for her clan. Bon Bon mused that she reminded her of Raindrops in a way.

These musings only took about a second to flash in her head, but it was just enough for the earth pony mare to reestablish her resolve to save her Lyra. She was still scared, and she still didn’t feel like a hero, but she wasn’t going to run away now! Not without the love of her life!

And now Scylla was charging the mad monster with the magical doodad.

Score one for the Raindrops comparison. Then again it was far more reckless than the stoic weathermare usually was, so maybe score one half?

But Bon Bon didn’t have time to appreciate the reminders of home. A slender green arm shot from the cloud of sand and grabbed the nearby Scylla by the tail fin, slamming her into the ocean floor where she disappeared in the kicked up silt!

“SCYLLA!” Called a panicked Rock Beauty as she dived into the cloud, only to find herself swatted away by a slap of the kaoshark’s muscular tail.

The little merpony ended up being caught by Sea Shanty in mid trajectory before she could hit a nearby rock.

“How about you join my army, Scylla?” asked Ek’idna, her toothy maw distorting into what Bon Bon assumed was a sneer.

A struggling Scylla was raised from the bottom of the sea, held up by the four arms of the creature that used to be Lyra. The menacing half boar creature held up the Jellyfish Lantern, clearly intending to use it.

“I won’t let you! Zizanie’s not the only one who can do Magic Missiles!” boldly declared Trixie, grabbing the two monsters’ attention.

Her horn glowed and five shimmering rainbow projectiles appeared around her, all aimed forward. Ek’idna didn’t seem to feel threatened by the display however. As if in response, the round lure at the tip of the stalk sticking out of her forehead glowed a dark violet color and a high-pitched hum began to resonate in the ocean. This confused Bon Bon for a second before she heard Trixie wail in pain. The blue unicorn was clutching her head, clearly suffering, and the shimmer of magic around her horn flickered. The five magic missiles vanished as quickly as they had appeared, Trixie unable to maintain the illusions.

“Trixie! What’s going on?!” asked the earth pony as she felt on the verge of panic.

Again.

Trixie was clearly in no position to give a coherent answer. “It hurts! It hurts! Make it stop!!”

“You think you’re the first unicorn I've encountered you infantile blowhard? Now that I am in my true form, none of your little tricks will matter!”

Bon Bon turned to Ditzy for guidance, only to gasp when the pegasus vanished! The earth pony had no idea when Trixie had replaced their friend with an illusion, but she didn’t have time to wonder where the real Ditzy was because she appeared only a few feet to the side of Ek’idna. The pegasus was swimming like a mare possessed and closing the distance fast! Ek’idna spotted her but couldn’t react in time. With a show of anger Bon Bon had never seen the mailmare display she landed a fore hoof right on the side of the monster’s face. Bon Bon would swear to her dying day that she saw a smirk on the gentle Ditzy’s face when the hit landed, and that one of the creature’s fang was broken on impact. The violet glow around her lure went out immediately, Ek’idna’s own spell clearly disrupted by the sudden assault. Ditzy’s wings then suddenly flared out and the unseen force of a stray current pushed her forward. With the kind of ease that would put to shame any professional hoofball player, she grabbed hold of the mysterious Jellyfish Lantern and made off with it.

“Get back here you pest!” growled Ek’idna, turning her entire focus on Ditzy.

Bon Bon was stunned to see the whole confrontation suddenly devolve into a schoolyard game of keep-away. Ek’idna sent a tendril of violet energy out of her lure to grab Ditzy, only for the pegasus to pass the prize to Rock Beauty. The kaoshark that used to be Lyra threw away Scylla like a rag doll to give chase, only for Sea Shanty to get involved. Scylla, who quickly recovered her bearing, immediately joined the game. The poor candy maker felt even more out of place than usual, and thus when the crystalline orb was sent her way she was caught completely unprepared. Seeing the two monstrous forms of the kaoshark and Ek’idna turned toward her caused Bon Bon to panic. She knew she couldn’t let the bad guys have the item, but they were now blocking any passing opportunity… and so she did the first thing that came to her mind.

She smashed the ancient, millennia old, relic of untold power against a rock.

“THERE! Now you can’t have it!” shouted Bon Bon, triumphantly, as shards of crystals flew off around her in slow motion.

Everybody else at the scene just stared at her in shock. Even the bad guys had stopped moving. Trixie’s jaw looked like it wanted to scrape the bottom of the ocean, and Scylla’s left eye looked ready to vibrate out of her eye socket. Ek’idna’s face though seemed to have been frozen in horror.

“What? Did…did I do something wrong?” asked the earth pony, confused.

She looked at the piece of the Lantern still in her hoof but recoiled in surprise as a pulsating ball of purple light floated out of the bowl-shaped piece of carved coral. She tossed the piece aside and watched the odd phenomenon in awe. It was about the size of a cantaloupe and seemed to fluctuate in hue to the beat of an unseen force inside the ball itself. It looked like something trying to hatch from an egg made of gum. The orb seemed to float in place for a moment before slowly making it’s way toward Ek’idna and her minion. Bon Bon thought this was bad but to everybody’s surprise the villain started to swim away in terror.

“No! Stay away! Stay away!” she pleaded.

The kaoshark then began to moan in pain, dark energy coursing throughout its body in a manner similar to what had happened to Cetus earlier. Bon Bon looked on with a mix of relief and worry as the energy was seemingly ripped out of Lyra’s body; flying to the orb as it passed by. The passing orb left behind her marefriend, back to her normal self. Ek’idna and the orb were forgotten at the sight and Bon Bon simply rushed to Lyra’s side.

“Lyra!”

“What’s going on? What’s happening?” asked Trixie, confused.

“The power trapped in the lantern… it’s trying to become whole again!” commented Scylla.

“And that’s bad, right?” asked Trixie, “I assume it’s bad because the bad guy who would want that power is running away from it now.”

Scylla nodded. “Very bad.”

Ditzy looked between the pair and the orb. “What do we do?”

Ek’idna had turned tail, forgetting all about her enemies, and was swimming away as fast as she could, only for a tendril of energy to shoot out of the ball and grab her, making her convulse in pain and halting her escape. The creature screamed and pleaded with the strange energy as they were drawn closer and closer together. From over the ridge more tendrils of energy seemed to fly from the sight of the nearby battlefield.

“There’s nothing we can do,” grimly answered Scylla.

Zizanie was panting.

Fighting underwater was hard! She couldn’t get the speed on her strike she wanted, she constantly had to make sure she had something solid under her before attacking, and there was just so many of those darn monstrosities! Some of them didn’t even seem to make sense! Whoever put a crocodile head on a shark was clearly running out of imagination! Charybdis and her were doing their best to coordinate the freed prisoners but none of them were in top condition.

But they had to hold on, as Dusky Jack and Sea Racer were bound to show up soon enough with a combined force of seapony and merpony.

Though at this point Zizanie just wanted an opportunity to slip out. They had found Ditzy Doo and the others were currently rescuing Lyra Heartstring at the same moment. As soon as reinforcement arrived Zizanie figured that was enough to repay the debt she felt she owed the Elements bearers. Plus all this saltwater was going to wreak havoc on her mane! She wasn’t particularly vain by nature, at least not more so than any other good looking mare was, but it just wasn’t possible to impersonate a high society airhead without a properly maintained mane!

Zizanie’s musing were interrupted when a high-pitched hum began to resonate throughout the ocean, coming from somewhere beyond her line of sight. She gasped in pain as the sound seemingly resonated through her horn and straight into her skull. It was incredibly painful and distracting, a perfect combination for stopping a unicorn from casting any spells, or from doing anything for that matter. In reflex she grabbed her head and found herself grabbed by one of the kaoshark. She couldn’t clearly see which one, her eyes shut in pain, but it was one with big hairy arms.

And then, almost as suddenly as it had started, the hum was gone and her captor was hit in the back of the head by one of the merpony. Unfortunately this did not result in Zizanie being freed. Instead the burly kaoshark decided to use her as a bludgeoning weapon and she was swung around to swat away the offending merpony.

That was a thoroughly unpleasant experience and Zizanie wished more than ever that she had never come to Cayo El Bayo in the first place. Still disoriented from having been weaponized, Zizanie found herself thrown into a group of fighters and ended up in a pile of hooves and flippers at the bottom of the ocean. When she freed herself from the limbs of her allies and the cloud of silt they had kicked up she found all the kaosharks convulsing in pain. The energy of the spell holding them in their unnatural form was apparently trying to escape their bodies. As one the magical energy flew out of each kaosharks as long tendrils of purple energy. They left behind a group of unconscious seaponies and merponies, all of them immediately besieged by their families and friends seeking to help their missing loved ones. It was a fairly surprising miracle, but not an unwelcomed one.

“Sea Beauty!” cried Charybdis, rushing to a younger seapony’s side.

Sea Beauty was a light grey seapony with a unkept looking tuff of yellow hair on her head. Zizanie mused that she looked a bit like Ditzy Doo, explaining maybe how the seapony leader had so easily taken to the Ponyville mailmare. Zizanie wasn’t usually into the mushy stuff, but even she had to admit it was heartwarming to see, what she assumed was, a mother reunited with her child like that. The problem with that scene is that it made Zizanie think of her own family, and she couldn’t have any of that.

“Well I better go… “ She said to herself, dreading the journey.

The shore wasn’t particularly far; it was just going to be a long walk to get back to Cayo El Bayo. Hopefully, with a little luck and lots of charm, she could find another boat and hitch a ride back.

“Good luck with the rest, Lulamoon.”

Lyra had a headache. It wasn’t a terribly fun sensation to wake up to, but she’d partied with Cheerilee in the past so it wasn’t a particularly new one. The taste of saltwater on her lips reminded her that she was still underwater, but there was also a certain hint of sugar thrown in. There was a familiar smell, and also a familiar presence punctuated by happy sobs. She opened to her eyes to realize that Bon Bon was holding her tightly.

“What happened to me? I feel like I missed something…” she said, groggily.

Lyra intentionally omitted the detail that she also felt hungry and the only thing coming to her mind was fish. Why was she hungry for fish? This wasn’t the first time she felt a craving for some other animals’ flesh and she felt that twice was entirely too often during a pony’s life! Had she been transformed into something carnivorous again because that was not a habit she wanted to pick up!

“There’s nothing we can do,” she heard Scylla answer somepony.

Bon Bon began to answer between sobs, “That…that monster she… she…”

That answer would have to wait because a howl of pain distracted both mares. Lyra spotted Ek’idna, a fair distance away, being faced by a ball of energy the same color as the Jellyfish Lantern. Crackling arcs of dark energy were flying from the ball and into the mishmash aquatic monster, each one causing her to scream in pain. She was clearly trying to swim away from the ball of energy but it kept following her, slowly catching up to her every time she was wracked by pain. More swirls of the mysterious magic were flying in from beyond a nearby ridge and they would orbit the pair, creating a rapidly swirling ring of light that seemed to constrict as Ek’idna slowed down.

Lyra could only say one thing at the spectacle. “What the hay?!”

“Your marefriend here broke the Jellyfish Lantern! The magic inside is trying to find a vessel and it picked Ek’idna!” explained Scylla, having to raise her voice over the combined cacophony of crackling and pained scream. “This is the magic power of an ancient being, maybe Nereus himself. Its original host is long gone!”

“No! It’s too much! TOO MUCH!” howled Ek’idna as the last bit of dark energy from over the ridge joined the whirling ring.

Ek’idna tried to run away by swimming over a rock formation but the magic caught with her and began to enter her body. The screaming half-boar creature fell to the bottom of the ocean beyond the rocks and a sound, not unlike an explosion, resounded as a large cloud of silt was kicked up.

All became silence.

Everypony stood stock still, staring at the cloud and the rock formation, still reeling from the recent confrontation Lyra had clearly missed. Finally it was Trixie who broke the silence.

“Did…did she just blow up?” she asked, confused.

As if to answer her a… a sound was suddenly heard. Lyra’s first instinct was to describe this sound as a roar, but it didn’t resemble any roar she had ever heard. More like two metal blades rubbing against each other, inside a metal box or barrel. Whatever the sound was, it just felt inherently unnatural, twisted and plain wrong!

Rock Beauty gasped. “Look!” she said, pointing to the cloud.

A dark shape began to rise from beyond the rock formation. A dark green sinuous shape, like a snake or a sea serpent, as thick as a pony’s barrel and about six to eight feet in length. Its head broke through the cloud and let out a howl, similar to the sound heard previously but without the bizarre echo from before. Its head was pointed and the top covered by what seemed to be a thick layer of shiny reflective armor in a darker green. It was devoid of eyes entirely and its maw, opening when it howled, revealed at least two row of small but sharp triangular teeth.

“I don’t think she exploded Trixie,” commented Ditzy.

The blue unicorn was visibly stunned by the turn of event “She turned into a sea serpent?!”

“Maybe not just one…” said Sea Shanty as a second head rose from the bottom.

And then a third.

And a fourth.

And a fifth.

All five heads roared in unison, producing the exact same sound that heralded the appearance of the first head. Lyra realized that this wasn’t five different creatures, but rather one single, five headed, entity! Before she could share this revelation all five heads rose up, revealing a massive shape beneath them. It was a large round mass, easily as wide as a train cart was long, vaguely shaped like the bell of a jellyfish, all in green and darkening on the bottom half with the five heads positioned evenly around its shape.

“This is definitely not good. Not good at all…” commented Scylla, slowly backing away from the massive abomination.

Before their eyes the massive shape began to shift, the body slowly moving toward the surface while the heads bent downward. When the body was aimed directly facing Lyra and her friends a massive eyeball blinked open. It was bigger than Lyra herself, bulging out slightly, with a green iris set within a disturbing golden sclera. The massive eyeball shifted erratically, its unexpressive glare running all over the landscape before it focused directly on the ponies that had caused it to appear. Lyra felt like the glare was piercing her right to her soul. The pupil shrank and it once again howled, its entire body seemingly shaking with rage.

“Yeah… I think I’m done being a hero now,” said Bon Bon.

Author's Note

A bit of a short one this time, compared to last one, but I think I made you all wait long enough.

And also debuting a new cover image I drew myself!

Chapter 11

The roar of the creature formerly known as Ek’idna really didn’t help Lyra’s pounding headache to go away, but at the moment the sight before her was enough to keep her distracted from it… At least a little.

The massive monstrosity maneuvered itself to float upright, with its large eyeball staring, unblinking, straight up. Its heads, for lack of a better term to describe a tentacle with a shark’s mouth, began to whip around in an erratic pattern, sending the assembled mass of ponies scrambling for safety. One of the heads snapped its maw toward Ditzy who dodged at the last second, much to everypony’s relief. Another one scraped the bottom of the large depression that used to be the center of Ek’idna’s slave work camp, kicking up large amount of silt and sending larger pieces of debris flying around as it did so.

Bon Bon grabbed her marefriend and pulled her behind rock outcropping just as a piece of a fractured column hurtled through the water towards them. Lyra sighed in relief and gave the earth pony a hug and a quick kiss on the cheek. Being reunited after all those stressful hours felt amazing, but it was no time to bask in that feeling. Channeling her magic Lyra recalled her lyre to her side. She wasn’t sure where it had floated of to after her confrontation with Ek’idna, but she didn’t want it getting broken in the confrontation. She might need it before this was all over.

“We could really use your fancy magical friendship beam right about now,” commented Bon Bon, peeking over the outcropping at the jellyfish like creature.

“Can’t happen unless Princess Luna suddenly teleports in with the others in tow,” replied Lyra, secretly hoping for just that to happen, however unlikely it might be.

“I’d take Princess Luna too, I’m sure she could take care of this thing.”

“Well she’s not here…” grimly said the unicorn.

The unicorn also looked over the outcropping and gasped, quickly strumming her lyre and unleashing a brilliant golden lasso of magic. It wrapped around Sea Shanty and pulled the aquamarine seapony out of the way just before she could be hit by one of the heads swinging about. Rock Beauty was actually coming up behind her for the same reason and the two collided mid-pull, ending up landing next to Lyra and Bon Bon in a heap of limbs.

“Oh… sorry about that, you okay girls?” Asked Lyra, wincing.

Sea Shanty got up first, her eyes more misaligned than Ditzy’s, “Yeah…yeah…better this than that… thing…hitting me,” she managed to say before straightening her gaze with a good shake of her head.

Her white and pink mane went crazy and obscured her vision before she could move it out of her field of vision.

“Sea Shanty, Rock Beauty, meet Bon Bon, my mare friend,” explained Lyra. “Bon Bon those are Sea Shanty and Rock Beauty, we were prisoners together.”

“Nice to meet you,” replied Bon Bon, thinking this was an odd time to do proper introductions, but humoring her marefriend nonetheless.

“The gray one over there is Ditzy and the blue one is Trixie,” added Lyra, looking at Sea Shanty.

The grey colored merpony piped up and pointed at Scylla. “And the dark blue merpony with a yellow mane is Scylla, the leader of our pod!”

Lyra smiled brightly. “Great! We’re all up to speed now!”

Ek’idna’s choosing that exact moment to roar, followed by the sounds of rock crashing, brought that smile down in a second.

“Sooo…what are we going to do now?!” asked Rock Beauty.

“What are we going to do now?!” Asked Scylla to no one in particular.

Scylla, Ditzy and Trixie were swimming at best they could around the former Ek’idna, constantly trying to keep her from moving far in any direction. The question of what to do next felt to Trixie like it had been asked a hundred times since the morning.

“Just…AH! Keep it distracted so it doesn’t go after the free prisoners…” called Trixie from another flank of the monster, dodging a head. The monster’s head were faster than one would expect of a creature that size, but the smaller ponies proved much more maneuverable underwater, keeping them ahead of the heads, at least for the moment. The creature was growling and letting discordant roars go at various interval, clearly annoyed by all the little creatures swimming around it.

“How long do you think we can last?!” Replied Ditzy, her wings catching a strong current and carrying her in a circle around the creature.

The merpony leader and Ditzy were keeping up fine but Trixie was showing signs of fatigue. She really needed to step up her exercise regimen if she was to continue saving ponies on a regular basis…

Trixie’s horn began to glow “I can try something!”

At that about half a dozen copies of Trixie appeared all around Ek’idna’s now deformed body, waving at its various heads. The blue mare was confident her experience underwater had already improved her illusions, making them feel a lot more natural. She hoped those simple images could keep the behemoth from chasing off after its former slaves long enough for their group to come up with a plan.

The illusions did nothing. None of the heads seemed to react, and one simply shot toward Ditzy, barely clipping the side of an illusion.

“Trixie! It’s not working!” Shouted the Pegasus, just barely keeping out of reach.

Scylla brought her forehooves down ontop of a nearby head, using the leverage to push herself away from its razor sharp roes of teeth. “Those things have no eyes you idiot!”

Trixie took a second, if not less, to feel dumb, then she quickly switched gear. Trixie concentrated, bringing to her mind the sound of her friends’ voices. She hadn’t been around Scylla, Rock Beauty and Sea Shanty enough to be able to mimic them, but she sure knew Lyra, Ditzy, and even Bon Bon, well enough. Soon phantom sounds came out from all around Ek’idna.

“Over here!” Came Ditzy’s voice,

“This way!” Called Lyra’s voice,

“Hey!” Shouted Bon Bon’s voice,

“Can’t catch me!” Added Trixie.

The monster’s heads roared in unison and began to trash about blindly, grasping with their maws at the impossible voices moving all around it. One head smashed into a small conical building by the side of the work camp, shattering it to pieces, while another hit the ground and causing a low sound to echo across the sea. Scylla, Ditzy and Trixie all swam toward the hiding place of their friends for a quick meeting.

Lyra observed the failure of Trixie’s visual illusion from their little hiding spot by the rocks. Thankfully her headache was subsiding and she could start thinking a bit more clearly. She had no idea what Ek’idna was supposed to be as she had never heard of a creature like this, or anything even close to it, in any legends. The heads did remind her of the leviathans, a species of sea serpent thought to have gone extinct around the founding of Equestria, but there was nothing in those legends on how to defeat one if you didn’t happen to be a dragon or possess the sheer power of Clover the Clever.

“Let’s run away. Why aren’t we running away yet?” asked Bon Bon, sounding slightly panicked. “Or I guess it would be more appropriate to say swim away? Yeah let’s do that. That thing’s probably not fast enough to catch us right?”

“But we can’t leave Scylla and the others behind,” said Rock Beauty.

“We’ll just tell them to follow us!” replied the earth pony mare.

Lyra shook her head. “If we leave this thing unchecked it will probably keep rampaging…Attack the settlements underwater and then move on to Cayo El Bayo.”

“And the escaped slaves were fighting the kaosharks over the ridge…” said Bon Bon, more to herself than to the others.

This was mostly news to Sea Shanty, Rock Beauty and Lyra. Bon Bon quickly filled them in on what they had seen on their way in.

“So that means there’s a bunch of weakened workers and ponies who used to be kaosharks? Lyra was one for only a few minutes and it took a lot out of her, who knows how long those poor souls were transformed,” mused Sea Shanty.

Rock Beauty gasped, “Someone should go warn them!”

Trixie had moved on to audio illusions and the monster really didn’t like the confusion. It destroyed the small building that had been uncovered and another head slammed down onto the bottom of the bowl they were all in. Rather than crack the altar like structure Lyra knew was sitting beneath the kicked up silt, a sound, not unlike a gong, echoed. The altar was much more solid than it appeared, possibly even was an enchanted piece. Lyra didn’t know Trixie’s magic sight spell, but she knew the plain spell detection spell that most unicorns referred to as ‘detect magic’. It really only worked on certain types of constructed and molded magical product and didn’t detect magic in its raw state… but in this case it was enough for Lyra to see that the altar was indeed faintly enchanted. A giant triangle seemed to glow from beneath the sand to Lyra’s senses. Combined with what she had seen earlier a plan was finally forming into her head. It was a long shot but it was all they had.

“I think I have a plan!” she declared, turning to her friends, “and I’ll need you two to help me!” she added, pointing a hoof to the aquatic ponies

Rock Beauty and Sea Shanty looked at each other confused.

“What’s this about a plan?” asked Trixie as she and the others swam behind their cover.

The blue unicorn seemed to wince and brought a hoof to massage the base of her horn.

“How long are you going to be able to keep casting that many illusions?” Asked Lyra, worried.

Trixie shrugged, “I’ll manage, just organize that plan of yours already.”

Dizty put a hoof on her friend’s shoulder “Don’t over extend yourself, we don’t want you fainting on us.”

“You guys will need to run interference on that thing while Sea Shanty, Rock Beauty and I sing…” began Lyra.

“Sing?! What good is that going to do?” interrupted Scylla, frustration in her voice.

Lyra was about to explain when their attention was drawn to Ek’idna. Her head had begun to roar in unison once more, but this time the sound began to change pitch, growing higher and higher.

Trixie knew what was coming.

“Oh no! Protect your ears Lyra!” she called, before she began screaming in pain.

Lyra had never heard a noise like that before; it was like ten times as painful as metal nails scraping on a chalkboard and seemed to assault her horn, clearly making it impossible to cast anything. Forcing her eyelids open she could see Trixie failing to swim and just beyond the rock formation all five heads of Ek’idna had turned toward their screams. Just as suddenly as it had started the noise became somewhat muffled as somepony stuffed something in her ears and she could feel the familiar presence of Bon Bon at her back. Her marefriend had parted her fluffy mane and turned it into a pair of makeshift earmuffs. It wasn’t perfect but it was enough relief to allow Lyra to brute force her way through the situation.

Now was no time for subtlety or holding back.

She took hold of her lyre, lit up her horn and let loose the mother of all power chords. It was shoddy, it was painfully discordant, it made her non-unicorns friend cringe, and it also blasted right through Ek’idna’s roar, completely cancelling it and making the creature recoil in surprise and confusion.

This gave them a quick respite, maybe not even a minute by Lyra’s count.

“No time to explain! We act now! Bon Bon, go update the others over the ridge! Sea Shanty, Rock Beauty, we form a triangle around it, I’ll mark the beat with my lyre, just sing what you sang to me in the cell. Everypony else, keep that thing where it is! GO!” She quickly ordered.

She had just enough time to kiss the nearby Bon Bon on the nose before swimming off with her musician friends. The others were a bit taken aback by the sudden command in Lyra’s voice and it took a second for them to react.

“Get to it everypony!” declared Ditzy, getting everybody else, including a grumbling Scylla, to spring into action.

Scylla quickly followed Rock Beauty while Ditzy took off after Sea Shanty, leaving Trixie to trail behind Lyra. The unicorn didn’t have to look back to know that Bon Bon had went off to perform her duty, but she did take a chance to glance at her, admittedly very nice, departing backside. This was a perfect chance to get Bon Bon away from danger, all the while having someone perform a crucial bit of communication. Things might get worse before they get better.

“Hmm…my name’s Sea Shanty by the way,” she heard her seapony friend say as her and Ditzy swam ahead.

Ditzy and Sea Shanty dodged a head, going above and under it, respectively and then dodged a second one by swimming out of its reach. Scylla meanwhile tackled a head just as it was about to reach Rock Beauty and sent it off course just enough to avoid the grey merpony. Lyra heard Bon Bon’s voice coming from a short distance to her side, as Trixie used another illusionary sound. This time she wasn’t going to get greedy and would limit the number of voice to make it seem like it was just one pony avoiding attacks rather than a whole swarm.

Lyra got into position and saw Scylla and Ditzy begin hit and run tactics on the nearby heads. It wasn’t doing much damage on the creature’s thick skin, but it was enough to annoy. Trixie had thrown her own voice into the mix and had two of the heads distracted at once. Her friends were in position so the unicorn went for her lyre and began to pluck single string to start the rhythmic base. Once the basic tempo was established she switched string, as a signal to her friends and they all began to sing.

Rock Beauty and Sea Shanty’ song were fairly plain compared to the grandiose opening to the musical she had participated in years ago, and so was the piece on the wall but they were all fairly familiar. In fact Lyra had quickly theorized that the three songs were actually three component of the same piece. It didn’t take more than two measures for Lyra to mentally celebrate on being right. The three pieces of music played off each other instantly, supporting each other wonderfully. The three were pretty much lost in the music by the time they hit the first refrain and their three voices joined in harmony.

Lyra began to feel something, some sort of tingling feeling pulling her horn. She could also feel in her mind’s eye as if magic itself was beginning to surge around her, as if coming out of the ocean itself!

And then there was a loud roar and Trixie tackled her out of the way of an incoming head. Her eyes shot open as the two spiraled out of control and disappeared into a cloud of silt, landing on the sandy ocean surface in a soft thud. Despite the spinning Lyra had managed to see Ek’idna thrashing about as if in a fury, not unlike when Trixie had used multiple phantom sound. Once they swam out of the cloud of sand and regained a clear view, the two unicorns could see that both Sea Shanty and Rock Beauty had also been knocked out of alignment.

“What happened?!” asked Lyra, confused.

“It was fine ignoring your singing until you hit the chorus, and then the…stone altar thing under us began to softly glow this weird pink light in a triangle shape and the monster just freaked out! It went straight for you and ignored my illusions!”

The monster’s frenzy seemed to have subsided a little, now that the three pony had stopped singing, and it let loose a powerful roar. The creature then began to furiously slam all five of its tentacle heads onto the stone altar, causing loud muffled thumps to echo.

“Whatever it is you were doing I think it was working,” said Trixie.

Lyra raised an eyebrow “How can you tell it was working if you don’t know what I was doing?”

“Because the bad guy hated it,” the blue unicorn replied, matter-of-factly.

Lyra gave the answer a smirk and shot a glance to the other side of the altar. Ditzy, Scylla and the other two performers had regrouped and seemed to be discussing something. Everypony seemed pumped to try something again. The little huddle broke off and the duo headed back to their positions.

“Let’s get back out there!” Declared Lyra.

“Are you nuts? That thing won’t let you finish your song!”

Lyra had to admit it felt good not being the most responsible member of the team anymore. And now they knew exactly how to win this, it was just a matter of not being interrupted again by the giant monster they were trying to sing into defeat! They had spent most of the day unsure of how to proceed, unsure of what the situation was, now there was no doubt in Lyra’s mind that, today, victory began with a song!

The minty unicorn shot her friend a cocky grin,“I’m sure you of all ponies should understand, I can’t let a performance go unfinished like that.”

Trixie sighed but returned the grin. “The show must go on!”

And with that they both took off again.

“Well that did something after all,” admitted Scylla, “I can’t say I mind being wrong on that point, but this… Thing isn’t going to let us have our recital in peace.”

Scylla, Rock Beauty, Ditzy and Sea Shanty had all converged together on a nearby flank of the work camp pit after the frenzied monster had almost grabbed the two singers.

Ditzy was frowning. “I spent all day not sure of what to do next and how to help the seaponies that had been so nice to me, and then I met you merponies and things got even more complicated because I didn’t want you all to keep fighting. Then Lyra went missing and we were all worried about her and we didn’t know how to find her or even how to save her…”

“But?” asked Rock Beauty, guessing there was one there.

“But now we KNOW how to win! That song you were doing was clearly not something the monster wanted to hear! We just need to keep it off you three somehow.”

The merpony leader growled a little, “Easier said than done, that tackle I did earlier probably did more damage to my shoulder than that creature’s face. It’s been crushing rocks with those heads without flinching, I don’t think we can do damage to them!”

Ditzy focused both her eyes to glare at the creature, now pounding the sea floor and the structure found beneath the silt. One of her eye wandered and she could spot Lyra and Trixie on the other side. This gave her an idea. She wasn’t one for fighting but this might give them a chance to come out on top.

“Then maybe we can go for other parts of its body? Maybe that’ll distract it enough.”

“What other parts? That thing is nothing but five heads and a chunk of flesh!” replied Scylla.

“Don’t you remember when it showed up? There’s an obvious weak spot at the top,” said Ditzy, pointing a hoof at the main body of the creature, “We just have to target it. I bet it can’t even reach us with its tentacles up there.”

Realization dawned on the dark blue merpony’s face and she smirked. “That’s a great idea! Time for some payback then! But we’ll need to bring some real pain when the girls start singing otherwise it’ll just ignore us again.”

“Well I have an idea for that as well but…” began Ditzy sighing, “I’m really not looking forward to it and I don’t even know if it’ll work.”

Scylla stayed silent for a beat before speaking up again “Then don’t do it. I can’t force you to do anything crazy for our sake; you have your own family to think of after all. I’ll do the dangerous stuff and you can just watch out backs. This monster’s been playing with our feelings, endangering the lives of my kin and making slaves out of them! I’ll do anything to make sure this all stops right here, right now,” she said, anger in her voice.

Ditzy realized that, while rougher in attitude than the seapony leader, Scylla was as much of a mother to her tribe as Charybdis. Earlier in the fights with the kaosharks she had seen the two leaders help each other, and she hoped they could become great friends going forward. Ditzy had no doubt this was going to be the case now. The two of them had a lot more in common than one might think.

Ditzy shook her head, “I didn’t say it was too risky for me, I just don’t know if it’ll be as effective as I hope… but I’ll still try it anyway.”

“Then it’s decided! We’ll get back in position,” said Rock Beauty, earning a nod from Sea Shanty.

Everybody nodded and they took off. Sea Shanty and Rock Beauty went to retake their position and Ditzy and Scylla swam off toward the top of the creature. It was too focused on trying to smash whatever was buried in the sea floor to notice their maneuvers, so the ascent was fairly easy. Before cresting the giant saucer shaped mass of monster flesh Ditzy caught sight of Lyra and Trixie getting back into position as well. Finally the merpony and the pegasus could see their target: the monster’s giant unblinking eyeball! They ducked low when the pupil swept around in their general direction, but its completely erratic movement continued so they considered themselves safe.

“Let’s wait until Lyra plucks her lyre first,” whispered Ditzy.

It didn’t take long, the first few notes began to ring out, setting up the tempo for the coming song.

“Go!” called out Ditzy, taking off upward while Scylla charged the giant eyeball.

She got to it just as he creature’s frantic beating of the seafloor stopped. Clearly it had noticed Lyra’s opening and was about to focus its attention on the singers. Ditzy saw Scylla deliver a nasty tail slap to the eyeball, eliciting a roar, just as she breached the surface of the water and took flight. She ascended high in the sky as fast as she could to the necessary height to get terminal velocity. Flight school was a long time away but she could guess just how far she needed to rise. As she reached what she assumed to be the correct altitude she looked down and saw the creature’s mass looking like a massive dark shape looming under the surface of the water. It was crazy to think how dangerous the situation was down there, considering how peaceful the surface was. A couple of seagulls even saluted her as they flew by.

“Well… It probably won’t be pleasant but let’s do it,” she said to herself as she dove back down, forehoof first, toward the dark shape below.

Slapping that giant eyeball wasn’t a very pleasant sensation. It was rubbery and squishy and felt super slimy. Scylla’s mind conjured up an embarrassing memory of being caught in a pile of decomposing kelp as a young kid. But it had gotten the creature’s attention. Its massive pupil swung around to stare at the merpony who responded in a dignified and reasonable fashion as befits a wise and benevolent leader.

She stuck her tongue at it and punched it in its stupid non-face.

It was still slimy but infinitely more fun, because now the monster knew she did it. The whole mass of the creature seemed to writhe in a combination of pain and anger. The pupil seemed to run away from the attack and Scylla could see the large heads peeking over the edge of the saucer section, futilely trying to reach her. Just as anticipated the tentacles were just too short! Snickering she chased the pupil around to attack it, distracting it some more. And just below the trio of performers had reached the first refrain. This was going to be the critical point where they needed a big painful hit to make sure the monster couldn’t go after the singers right away. Scylla could see flashes of the pink light they had seen before coming out from below the saucer section!

And that’s when Ditzy Doo came splashing into the water from the air above. The massive creature wasn’t that far from the surface and by taking a perfect diving position the pegasus barely lost any speed as she fell straight into the massive eyeball. The entire thing went concave for a few seconds and Scylla half expected it to burst like a bubble. It –sadly, or thankfully- didn’t, but it did spring back into shape, sending Ditzy flying back upward, spinning like crazy. The grey pegasus disappeared above the surface for a short while before falling back in the water and being caught by Trixie.

Ek’idna went nuts, the whole mass quaking as discordant roars came from the five heads, and they began to beat furiously at the edge of the creature’s own main body, attempting to just swing further inward. Scylla had to bail as the creature began to roll over, maybe intending to crush the offending creatures against the sea floor with its bulk.

But it was too late, for the musicians had finished the first refrain and were well into the second couplet of their song. Scylla cleared the main body, deftly swimming between two berserk heads, just in time to see the pink light of the altar flash and blast upward to engulf the whole monster.

“That was pretty bold of you,” commented Trixie, as she let go of Ditzy, “I like that side of you, you should be bold more often.”

Ditzy’s instinct had been right, touching that thing was even more unpleasant than she had anticipated, and her shoulders were probably going to ache for days after that from the force of the impact. Good things pegasi were built to handle crashes. The spinning hadn’t been all that fun either, but by opening her wings at the right moment she caught a straight current of wind that slowed her spin enough to allow her to fall back in the water, away from the monster this time.

“Don’t get used to it…”said Ditzy as she got her bearing and sense of balance back.

By now Lyra, Sea Shanty and Rock Beauty had finished their beautifully harmonious refrain and were back into a different couplet, further than they had gone earlier. The music was incredibly enchanting; with one voice seemingly chasing the other up and down the musical scale, with the third one jumping in and out and then the voices would switch roles. It was like…it was like kids chasing each other as they played with no clear rules to stifle their fun.

The start of the second refrain was accompanied by a magnificent blast of pink light from the sea floor that engulfed the larged monster. It seemed to stop in mid tumble, frozen in place, and began to visibly struggle against some unseen restraint. Ditzy found herself transfixed by the sight of the shimmering pink light emanating from the triangle formation at the bottom of the sea. Lyra and her friends were also glowing and it was as if their song had gotten louder, and Ditzy felt soothing warmth spread throughout her body.

Trixie gasped “This song…we’re not actually hearing it with our ears! I don’t understand how, but it’s being transmitted directly through the magic in us! The song is actually calling out to the magic in all of us and the ocean itself!”

And that’s when they appeared.

Hundreds, then thousands and then ten thousands of jellyfishes! All the moon jelly they had seen earlier in the day and then more than Ditzy had ever thought could live in the entire area… all of them were glowing with the same pink light from the ritual and it was pulsating to the rhythm of Lyra’s lyre! They were all floating towards the site of this strange ritual, like a field of pink stars flying toward them. Trixie and Ditzy stood there, transfixed and silent, as the swarm of shining jellyfishes danced in the current and began to circle the still struggling Ek’idna. Soon the entire monster disappeared behind a sphere of glowing jellyfishes.

Their light began to intensify, no longer pulsating to the sound of Lyra’s lyre, and soon there was nothing else but a bright giant ball of pink light left in the middle of the seafloor depression!

The song began to slow down, and, as if answering to it, the ball of light also began to shrink. It shrank smaller and smaller, compressing into a single point. As it shrank long single files of jellyfishes just floated out of it, now back to their normal selves, and danced away like enchanted ribbons. The voices of the three performers died out, the warmth left Ditzy’s body, and in a final brilliant flash the ball of light turned back into the lantern Bon Bon had smashed earlier. Now, however, it was filled with a pink glow instead of darker purple glow it had in the hooves of Ek’idna.

Of Ek’idna there was no trace.

Ditzy and Trixie swam back to the bottom of the work camp, where the lantern now laid, and met up with Scylla, Sea Shanty, Rock Beauty and an exited Lyra.

“That….WAS…AMAZING!” She cheered, spinning on herself. “I can’t believe we just did that! You girls were perfect! And the way this song works just blows my mind!”

“It’s incredible, I feel like something’s awakened inside of me! It’s like a hole I had no idea was there was just filled up!” commented Sea Shanty.

“I know! Also it…it feels like… like we really connected during that performance,” added Rock Beauty, bringing Lyra and Sea Shanty into a hug “Thanks a lot you two!”

"It...it was nothing," replied Sea Shanty, blushing.

“So that’s it then? We won? The bad guy is trapped in here or something?” asked Ditzy, gingerly nudging the ancient artifact.

The group was distracted by the sounds of cheers and hollering. They turned to see the group of escaped prisoners, Charybdis and Bon Bon at the front, swimming down the slope towards them. Many of the prisoners were helping to carry clearly weakened members of the group, and Bon Bon was actually helping Charybdis carry a young seapony who looked a lot like the leader. Ditzy guessed the ones being carried were the former kaosharks and that one on Bon Bon’s back was probably Charybdis’ daughter. Soon all the merponies and seaponies were crowding around them. What followed was a solid minute of hugs, cheers, congratulations, Trixie boasting, with Bon Bon and Lyra locking lips all the while.

The elation was shorted lived though, because that was when the shaking and rumbling began.

“Oh what now?!” asked an angry Scylla.

That was when a massive piece of rock fell off Lucky Seagull Island and crashed into the sea.

Author's Note

Finally! We're almost there folks! I can't belive how long it's taken me to write this story. I promise next time I write one I'm not going to go into it without a clear plan. This has been probably even more frustrating for me to write than it was for you to wait for, trust me.

I want to apologize again for how bloody slow I am at this. Normally the story should wrap up neatly by the next chapter, maybe an extra epilogue? I hope you enjoyed this chapter and will enjoy the next one too.

Now this chapter is probably still messy despite my best efforts, so feel free to point out my mistakes!

Chapter 12

Amethyst Star felt really nervous but did all she could not to let it show in front of her little sister. When they had first gotten back to the ship Bon Bon and Wind Sailor had been with them and that had helped Amethyst Star stay calm. Now she was left with the stoic captain Sunset Beard and did not know how to feel. Things had gone worse when the weird pink light started to shine from the ocean floor near Seagull Island. Also the unicorn could swear she saw Ditzy Doo breach the water and rise in the air before diving down in the ocean.

Then after a bright flash of pink light from under the water, a loud rumbling sound was heard. All the seagulls suddenly taking flight and fleeing their island soon followed the sound. The sheer mass of them was casting a sinister shadow on the boat and its occupants.

“What in the briny depths was that?!” Asked the captain, emerging from the piloting cabin, Dinky in tow.

“I don’t know… I think it came from over there?” replied Sparkler, pointing at the island.

Sunset Beard and Sparkler’s eyes grew as wide as dinner plates when a large chunk of rock spontaneously shattered from the island and was ejected into the water! The piece of rock, about the size of a large chariot landed with a giant splash that caused a shockwave to travel along the water.

“Hang on to something!” ordered the captain.

Soon after the wave rolled under the Autumn Delight, rocking her fiercely but not enough to threaten to flip it over.

“Lass, you and the wee one still have that fancy water breathing spell on right?” asked the Captain once the boat was stable again.

Amethyst Star was confused by the question. “Yeah, I know enough magic to know how to do a basic detect spell…Why?”

“Because you might need it if I don’t get us away from that island quickly enough,” replied the Captain, rushing to raise his sail.

“What?! We can’t abandon the others!” complained the Unicorn.

“Yeah, what about mommy?” asked Dinky.

The Captain wordlessly pointed out to the island and Sparkler turned, just in time to see another chunk of rock, this time thankfully smaller, fall off the sharp structure. The fallen rock had revealed a strange gleaming white surface that shimmered in the sunlight with all the colors of a rainbow. It was like a mountain coated entirely in mother-of-pearl! It was fascinating to behold, but the beautiful sight was marred by massive cracks forming all over the island’s surface.

“Lasses, the others are probably safer down there than we are… if a bigger rock splashes down, we might get washed away by a tidal wave!” explained the Captain, already finished with his sail, “If anything goes wrong just dive to the bottom and try to avoid the debris. I can make it out if I don’t have to worry about you two. Now stop asking questions and secure your belongings in the cabinets over there so they don’t shuffle around and trip us up!”

Before Sparkler could protest a loud cracking sound resounded and an even bigger pane of stone slid off the incredibly shimmering surface underneath and fell into the water.

The Captain looked grim as he took the wheel. “This is going to get tricky!”

Sparkler and Dinky rushed to quickly secure their luggage and silently hoped that the Captain was right about everypony else underwater. They had just barely enough time to finish when the first minor waves began rocking the boat. The two unicorns gasped at the sight of the oncoming wave, as it was big enough to obscure their view of the increasingly shimmering Seagull Island.

Soon all of Amethyst’s field of view was filled with water and she grabbed hold of Dinky with all her might.

The small ship was picked up by the wave and raised in the air and crested the wave. Sparkler felt like she was in a roller coaster for a second as the front of the boat hung in mid air for a second before crashing down with a splash. She was relieved to find the boat still floating upright, even if a little shaken.

“Whee! That was fun!” said Dinky, none the worse for wear.

“This bring me back to my days crossing the ocean to Zebrica!” declared Sunset Beard.

“Good for you Captain, but let’s put more distance between us and that island okay?” asked Amethyst Star.

What was going on with that island?

Trixie wasn’t quite sure who first started the mad scramble that could be generously called a retreat, but she didn’t really care. She had grabbed the Jellyfish Lantern in her telekinesis, not trusting anypony to physically hold the thing, and booked it like everypony else!

“What’s happening?” asked Ditzy to her side.

“Maybe Amethyst Star was wrong and Seagull Island really IS a volcano!” suggested Trixie.

“All the pounding on the ground woke it up?” asked Lyra.

Ditzy looked back toward the island, worried, “Is that even possible?!”

“I’d rather not risk it if you don’t mind,” replied Trixie.

The rumbling and cracking continued as they made their way to the edge of what was Ek’idna’s secret work camp. They were trying to move as fast as possible but they had a number of wounded and weakened ponies with them, slowing them down considerably. Soon enough, emerging from the kelp, everypony saw two groups coming towards them. It was Dusky Jack and Sea Racer with the rest of the aquatic ponies, with a few missing on the seapony side due to recent wounded. Both groups were clearly eyeing each other with a mix of curiosity, fear and suspicion, but the two males at the front only showed worry and concern. A lot of faces in that group lit up at the sight of friends and family long thought lost. Trixie wished she could take a moment to appreciate the reunion, but they didn’t know how safe they were at this distance.

“Charybdis!” began Sea Racer.

“Scylla!” said Dusky Jack.

“What happened?” they asked at once.

“No time to explain! We need to evacuate!” replied Scylla, clearly addressing both groups.

“Everypony in good shape help with the wounded!” ordered Charybdis, in a tone that brooked no objection.

There was a louder rumbling and everypony turned to see an even larger chunk of rock sink into the ocean. From their perspective they could see the water being pushed away by the massive debris, creating a great wave above them. It was quite a spectacle. Trixie saw realization and fear dawn on Ditzy’s face.

“Dinky!” she gasped.

“Hey, don’t worry, Dinky and Sparkler still have the same spell on them that we do,” said Trixie, putting a hoof on her friend’s shoulder.

“Plus Sunset Beard actually has lots of experience crossing the ocean. He used to captain merchant ships,” added Bon Bon, who had spent most of the morning listening to the old sea dog’s stories.

“But just in case, feel free to go check up on them, we’ll be along with everypony else,” said Trixie.

Ditzy nodded and took off, emerging from the water and taking to the sky beyond. A new sound echoed through the depths of the ocean mere seconds later. It was like a steam train exploding out of a wall. A collective gasp rang through the assembled crowd. Trixie could see a large cloud of silt had exploded from the underwater cliff at the base of Seagull Island… and something was coming out of it! Everybody’s jaws dropped at the sight.

“No…way,” she heard Bon Bon say.

“What is this?!” asked Charybdis, confused.

“No! No, no, and, also, no! Tell me that we are NOT doing something crazy like that last fight again!” said Scylla, angry and panicked all at once.

Trixie had a surprisingly calm tone when she spoke up, addressing her unicorn friend without looking at her. “Lyra…you ever heard of something like this?”

“Well…hmm… I’m not sure?” replied the minty mare, sheepishly.

Trixie turned to face her friend with an expression that spoke for itself, yet Trixie felt the need to add some words.

“What do you mean you’re not sure? You’re our bard, our lore master! For stars sake, that island just sprouted a fin! Please tell me you know of a creature that can look like an island and if it’s dangerous or not!” said Trixie, pointing to the giant cream-colored paddle shaped fin emerging from the mass of Lucky Seagull Island.

“Well it’s just…” began Lyra, before she was interrupted by the sound of another fin emerging from the surface.

This one was further down the length of island and much stubbier. This was clearly a hind leg. Soon two more deflagration sound could be heard, but muffled and more distant. Trixie didn’t need to see it to guess that the island now had symmetrical load out of fins.

“Islands that turn out to be alive are usually types of whales! And they don’t turn to stone or sleep for longer than a pony’s lifetime! This isn’t a whale!” explained Lyra, over the ever-increasing sound of stones falling into the water.

“It looks more like…” began Scylla.

“A sea turtle,” added Charybdis, looking toward her fellow leader.

“You thinkin’ what I’m thinkin’ Chary?” asked the merpony.

“If what you think I’m thinking is what I am thinking then yeah. We won’t need to fight, Scy-scy.”

Trixie leaned in close to Lyra to whisper in her ear. “Since when have those two been using nicknames like that?”

The other unicorn shrugged.

At this point the massive fins began to move. The rumbling sound that had been heard since these new strange turns of events occurred began to steadily increase in volume. It took roughly thirty seconds before the first massive undertow caused by the movement of the towering fin reached the group and caused most ponies to tumble backward heads over tails, including Trixie herself.

“Are you certain we won’t have another stupid fight on our hooves?” she asked Charybdis while she righted herself.

“No, you see I think…” the seapony leader began before she was interrupted.

The entire underwater portion of Lucky Seagull Island disappeared from view when silt and debris appear to explode out of the massive rock, a deafening cracking noise accompanying the event. The group quickly found themselves engulfed by a moving wall of kicked up sand. It was like being hit by a miniature sandstorm. Almost everypony began to cough and spit out sand. Small shards of rock began to rain from the sky, as if the island’s section above the surface had just exploded to pieces!

Another strong undertow cleared away the silt and Trixie regained her vision. She could clearly see the island again… except it was no longer an island. Lyra had been right that this thing wasn’t a whale.

It was a giant sea turtle.

And it was moving.

Ditzy emerged from the water and only quickly glanced toward Seagull Island before heading back toward the Autumn Delight and her daughter. The island looked like it was shedding, with pieces of rock falling off and revealing a shimmering white structure underneath. She didn’t give it much further thought as she scanned the horizon for their little ship. She quickly spotted it, its sail raised, not far from where they had left it. Thankfully everything looked fine despite the sea being choppier than it had been last time she had visited it.

Her attention was brought back to the island though when she heard a strange crackling sound. It was like someone rolling a cart over broken dishes. Turning to take a glance Ditzy could see what remained of the island’s rocky ‘shell’ was being overrun with tiny cracks. The whole surface was being divided into tinier and tinier pieces, to a point where Ditzy couldn’t make them out anymore. What she could make out was the way the whole thing was vibrating.

Ditzy only had a second to bring up her fore hooves to protect her face as the whole thing simply exploded! The tiny shards of rock flew off and began to rain into the ocean. Ditzy was surprised that the debris felt more like having uncooked pasta thrown at her than being pelted by gravel like she expected. It wasn’t pleasant but at least it didn’t hurt.

When it finally stopped she chanced a look at what was left of Lucky Seagull Island and she gasped at the sight. She was now staring at what looked like a cluster of conical structures, each with many holes going up and down their height, protruding from what looked like a giant turtle’s shell! They were all made of a white stone material that glimmered in the sunlight with all the colors of the rainbow. Some of the bigger cones had sub-spired sprouting up near their top, each decorated with spiraling pattern in various coral colors. The central and biggest cone featured a triangle made of gold embedded into its side, brightly reflecting the glare of the Sun.

Ditzy hung in mid-air, staring at the incredible display, until the whole thing began to move. She could see, beneath the surface that the giant turtle was swimming off towards the deeper parts of the ocean.

The pegasus’ maternal instinct then kicked in and she recalled why she had flown up into the sky in the first place. With one last glance towards the incredible giant turtle she took off towards her daughter.

Trixie was just flabbergasted at the sight before her, and so was everypony else because no one dared make a sound.

A giant sea turtle! Bigger than any living creature Trixie had ever witnessed. Bigger than Raindrops under the effect of the poison joke, bigger than any dragon, bigger than the Ursa Minor, it was just too enormous to contemplate. Its head was now plainly visible and she could see it had a massive blue gem in a diamond cut embedded into its forehead, with a much smaller round one at the front of its nose. A pink material that expended outward into swirls surrounded both and linked them together. The giant softly, almost gently, moved its fin and began to swim away from what had been its resting place, leaving behind only a pile of debris where an island once stood. The fact it could move at all was ludicrous. It was like if Canterlot Castle had decided to get up and go for a walk!

They all watched in silence as it swam towards the deeper parts of the ocean and slowly began to sink into the water. As it did so it revealed a cluster of conical structures on its back, white and iridescent like mother-of-pearl.

Rock Beauty chose that moment to break the silence that had overcome the group.

“Andalantis!”

Gasps and murmurs descended upon the group at this comment.

Lyra gasped. “Of course! It all makes sense! When the legend said Andalantis disappeared ‘beyond the waves’ it meant it from the point of view of the aquatic tribes! It never sank, it rose above the water surface!”

“You’re telling me the mythical Andalantis was on the back of a giant turtle all this time?! And it was right there, near Cayo El Bayo all along?!” asked Trixie.

“It’s hard to believe, but some of our legends do mention the city being capable of moving,” explained Charybdis.

“Did…did we wake it up with our song?” asked Sea Shanty, confused.

“Maybe, how about we go check in person?” said Scylla, pointing a hoof toward the giant as it continued its slow sink into the ocean.

Bon Bon stared at her like she was crazy. “You can’t be serious… you want to go near the giant creature?!”

Scylla shrugged “Stay here if you want, I think Chary and I both want to go, right?”

The seapony leader nodded.

“I want to see it too!” said Sea Shanty.

“You’re not going down there without me,” added Rock Beauty.

“Or me!” said Lyra, much to the surprise of absolutely no one.

Trixie sighed, “I guess I’ll go too. If it’s really Andalantis then as the sole representative of the Night Court available it is my duty to officially restore diplomatic ties with the legendary Aquatic Pony Nation,” she said, puffing her chest.

Bon Bon and Lyra rolled their eyes.

In the end Bon Bon had decided to stay behind to keep Ditzy updated should the pegasus return from the ship. She was also left to guard the Jellyfish Lantern, after Trixie made her promise not to smash it again. Lyra had kissed her goodbye before once again parting with her.

Everypony else amongst the seapony and merpony had been left to tend to the wounded and exhausted. There was still quite some distance left before each of the two clans’ homes and these homes weren’t actually equipped to handle a sudden influx of population. There had been talk of returning to previous, bigger, hideouts now that there was no longer the looming threat of the kaosharks and their mysterious mistress, but with Andalantis possibly within their grasp Scylla and Charybdis had decided to see for themselves first before settling on what to do.

The giant turtle with the city on its back had sunk low enough for the tallest spire to be completely submerged and had stopped swimming, making it much easier for the six ponies to approach.

“Over a thousand years, and it was just right there in plain sight,” said Sea Shanty.

“I’m still confused that no one noticed an island popping out of nowhere on the surface,” added Trixie.

“Cayo El Bayo is a fairly recent settlement, the whole area was pretty much an empty stretch of cliff a thousand years ago,” explained Lyra, ”Equestria’s just not much of a naval nation.”

“The turtle spotted us!” said Rock Beauty.

Indeed, the eye of the giant was clearly following their movement. Yet the creature didn’t move a muscle, or even twitch or blink. It just observed them in silence. That made the whole thing even creepier to Lyra. She could feel a deep intelligence behind those house-sized eyes and it was like the creature was judging her. Would she be deemed worthy to enter these hallowed waters?

Scylla shrugged “As long as it doesn’t do anything crazy I think it’s safe to continue,” said the dark blue merpony.

They continue to approach and got an even better feel for the sheer ridiculous scale of this beast and its cargo. The smaller spires on the edge of the massive turtle’s shell were thicker and twice as tall as Ponyville’s city hall! The central tower, looming over the entire city looked more like a mountain than a building.

The six ponies swam between the first two towers an entered the city proper. Each of the spires was covered with finely carved stylized images of sea life of all kind, and many of the intricate carvings featured coral inlay that hadn’t been visible to the naked eye at a distance. Even now Lyra had a hard time telling what material these towers were made of. It shimmered like mother-of-pearl, looked thick and solid like marble, and yet the whole towers looked smooth and seemless. All over the spires were large circular doors allowing entrance into the various sub sections. A lot of old tattered curtains remained to give those apartments a semblance of privacy. It was rather remarkable how preserved the city was. Everywhere satchels and circular clay pots were laying about, as if dropped in a hurry. Some larger bundles were gathered around the corners of the various ‘streets’ between the buildings, and even a few metallic objects of dry pony making were lying about in the layer of silt and rock fragments making up the floor of the city. There was even a few stone structures that looked like market stalls, their merchandise either long gone or having been washed away when the city sank earlier.

“It’s beautiful,” said Charybdis, in a respectful whisper.

“But it’s also sad… it’s so empty,” added Sea Shanty.

Finally they reached a large ring shaped plaza surrounding the central spire. This part of the city had slabs of grey stone paving the floor and brightly colored algae, surprisingly still alive after a thousand year, were planted at regular intervals in large seashells all around the exterior perimeter. The central tower was unique in that, unlike all the other ones in the city, it had a large pair of circular double doors. The doors appeared to be made of wood, and each one had a large inverted triangle made of gold bolted to its center, the stylized image. At each point of the triangle was a piece of the white stone that made up the spires, each featuring a carving like those Lyra had seen in her prison. It was the symbols for each of the aquatic tribes, looking toward each other.

Before anypony could speak up the double doors began to open, the loud creaking of millennia old hinges straining to move after centuries of immobility broke the silence and momentarily stunned the six ponies. Even more stunning was the figure that emerged from those doors.

The first word that came to Lyra’s mind was ‘alicorn’, for it was what the figure looked like at first. About the size of Princess Luna, she was a very light blue and had four long slender hooved legs, a long neck, a wavering coral pink mane and a horn, but that was where the similarity ended. She didn’t have wings but rather large segmented fins like those of a lionfish, stripped in the same color as her mane, and her tail was like that of a betta fish. Little fins adorned each of her hocks and her ears were shaped like fins as well, but each had a little earring adorned with a pearl. Around her neck hung a golden peytral adorned with a blue diamond cut gem and two pearls. She gracefully swam out of the door and let her hooves rest on the sea floor. Her eyes, which had been closed until now, opened, revealing pools of perfect blue that gave Lyra the feeling of staring into the depths of the ocean itself.

“Greetings,” she said with a soothing voice despite not opening her mouth, “I am Thetis, Guardian of Andalantis and its Tribes.”

After the initial shock Charybdis was the first to speak up.

“Guardian Thetis, it’s an honor to…”

“Hold it!” interrupted Trixie, her eyes aglow, “This is just an illusion!”

Scylla stared dagger at the alicorn, “What? Who’s trying to trick us now?”

The image that claimed to be Thetis simply chuckled. “Forgive me, I did not wish to mislead you. Can I assume that you are Princess Luna’s student?”

“Yes…but how?”

The image smiled. “Only someone who apprenticed under the Mistress of Tides should be able to see through this form. However I think ‘illusion’ is somewhat of a misnomer. I much prefer the term projection, for, you see, it is simply impossible for me to interact with you in my true form.”

And with that the image of the pseudo-alicorn wavered and was replaced by the image of the giant turtle’s head before returning. Lyra’s eyes grew as wide as dinner plates and she could hear her friends gasp.

“Thetis is a giant turtle? I mean you’re… I mean we’re standing…”

“On my back, yes. The last act of my father Nereus before fading away was to place Andalantis on my back and telling me to watch over it.”

“She’s telling the truth… the magic is coming from beneath us, I can see it now,” added Trixie.

Charybdis, Sea Shanty and Rock Beauty swam closer to the figure and bowed slightly as a formal salute.

“Guardian, it is an honor, my name is Rock Beauty.”

“I am called Sea Shanty. I can’t believe I’m in your presence at last!”

“I am Charybdis, leader of the seaponies. Guardian, I have so many questions for you,” said Charybdis.

“Like why in the Abyss did you disappear for so long?!” suddenly asked Scylla, anger in her voice.

She swam closer to the projection and pointed an accusatory hoof at it. “You left us to waste away! Stripped of our magic, stripped of our home, we kept feuding for a thousand year and nearly got destroyed by some…some half boar thing who used the Jellyfish Lantern to turn our own against us! Where were you during all this time?”

“Scylla! Please, it’s not like she intended for this to happen!” pleaded Rock Beauty, grabbing hold of her leader.

Scylla pushed her off, “Well she didn’t do much to stop it!”

There was a tense second of silence and Thetis seemed to visibly sigh as she closed her eyes and inclined her head.

“Your friend speak the truth, I wasn’t there for you in your time of need. I failed in my role and I apologize,” she said, before looking up at the sky above. “Over a thousand years. I slept far longer than I had anticipated. I had no choice at the time but to go, but I had hoped my little ponies would be able to awake me much sooner…”

“What happened?” asked Lyra, her and Trixie joining the others near the projection.

The guardian glanced at the pair of unicorns.

“Oh, my name is Lyra, Lyra Heartstring and this is my friend Trixie.”

“How much do you know of the events before my disappearance? And then what happened since?” asked Thetis.

Lyra recounted as best she could the story that she knew, adding the new element that the aquatic ponies had fought over the Jellyfish Lantern rather than the jellyfish themselves. The seapony and merpony let her finish without even piping in to blame each other for the war. Afterwards Charybdis mentioned how the Jellyfish Lantern had disappeared, only to be found roughly a hundred years ago by her ancestor, only for it to be stolen by a being she now assumed was Ek’idna. Scylla also had a similar story, and the two realized their ancestor probably worked together on the search for the Lantern. They told Thetis of what had happened with Ek’idna and the Kaosharks, and the destruction and following restoration of the Jellyfish Lantern.

“And I guess we woke you up?” said Sea Shanty, finishing the tale.

Thetis had a far off look in her eyes as she contemplated what she had learned. She seemed to be glaring at something in the distance, beyond the ponies around her.

“If you don’t mind me asking…what IS the Jellyfish Lantern anyway?” asked Trixie.

“It is, in a way, a tomb,” began Thetis. “My father Nereus was a powerful spirit of the sea, he saved sinking ponies by turning them into merponies, seaponies and plesioponies.”

She raised her hoof and conjured a stylized image of a large turtle and figures of a pegasus, unicorn and earth pony being turned into the three aquatic tribes. Then the image shifted to the seapony growing algae on the seafloor, the merponies guiding a school of fish and finally the plesioponies, at the surface, creating waves.

“He gave them a home and taught them how to tame the seas… He fancied himself the ruler of all the oceans, but he wasn’t the only one claiming that title. The demon Phorcys also claimed it, and while my father was a benevolent ruler fostering harmony amongst all the creatures of the ocean, Phorcys wanted nothing more than to dominate the sea and conquer the surface world.”

The image of Phorcys appeared, made of blood red lines. It was a large fish with the head of a boar and to its side were dark murky figures lined up like an army.

“The two engaged in a fierce battle and while father destroyed Phorcys’ body, his foul magic was still capable of harm. Father could not stop it for he had been weakened in the fight and so he sacrificed himself to bind the foul power to a piece of his own. Father and Phorcys both had formidable transmutation powers. In fact their magic was so alike I often wondered if they were not brothers. Then, using the Song of Harmony, he sealed their combined magic into what would become the Jellyfish Lantern. I received what was left untainted of my father’s magic, and the city, before his consciousness left us.”

The form of Phorcys and Nereus were seen clashing before then being reduced to a single bright point. Two jellyfish floated into the image and grasped the point, turning into the symbol of the Jellyfish Lantern. Another turtle was seen, the shape of the city seemingly being lifted from the seafloor and landing on its back. The images then disappeared.

“But even sealed up in the Lantern their power could still be used then?” asked Scylla.

Thetis nodded. “Yes, and for a time the Aquatic Tribes kept watch over it, and every year they would gather and sing the Song of Harmony together to renew the seal. There was no need to do it yearly but I still encouraged the ritual as it help create a sense of community and also rejuvenated me.”

“Rejuvenate you?” asked Lyra.

“With my father’s power coursing through me I am quite powerful, but I am not an immortal being of his, or Princess Luna’s, caliber. Time will one day claim me and I will no longer be able to perform my duty. However, time stands still for me whenever I sleep, as such I spend most of my time in a slumber. I usually slept for months at a time, and one of the only ways to forcibly awake me is the Song of Harmony. It’s magic gives me the energy I need to wake up. “

Scylla crossed her hooves, still fuming a bit. “That’s all well and good, but you didn’t regularly turn into an island for months at a time right? What happened?”

“No I did not, I simply laid on the sea floor. At some point while I was asleep Ceto, mate to Phorcys, sought to seek revenge for her departed husband. After spending centuries perfecting her magic, somehow, she reached out to Aquarius, leader of the plesioponies. I am not sure what she whispered in her ear, or what weakness in Aquarius’ heart allowed the seeds of deception to take root, but soon Aquarius desired to be the sole ruler of Andalantis. She seized the Jellyfish Lantern and like Ek’idna used it to make monstrous soldiers. Only she used her own people as canvas to her grotesque work.”

Everypony gasped in shock.

“She used it to turn her own people into kaosharks?!” Asked Scylla.

“I’m afraid so. The merpony and seapony fought valiantly, despite Ceto continuously undermining their alliance with her strife magic, they held on. After months of war, both sides were on the verge of collapse when Ceto at last made her move. She swept in and took the lantern for herself and then tried to use its power to wrestle from me what was left of my father’s power. This action however, broke her hold on Aquarius, who realized the monster she had become. Pleading with the merponies and seaponies she found two charitable ponies to join her in song and they awoke me at last.”

“What happened then?” asked Lyra.

“I was already under attack by Ceto. I battled with her in the astral plane for five days and five nights, all the while the creatures that used to be the Plesioponies kept attacking my little ponies. In the end I defeated Ceto and casted her into Tartarus. The spell over the plesioponies was broken, but their body did not handle the stress…”

Charybdis brought fin to her mouth, “Then you mean?”

“Yes… Aquarius saw her people perish from her own action.”

A heavy silence hung over the conversation. This was quite a tragic tale that Thetis was sharing now. Lyra could hardly imagine what kind of sorrow Aquarius was feeling.

“What happened then?” asked Sea Shanty, her voice barely a whisper.

“I needed to slumber, deeper than I had ever done before. I needed to hide away for at least ten years so as not to offer too easy a target. Ceto and Phorcys had a progeny, and I was sure the thirst for vengeance from that bloodline would not be slaked easily. In fact I am positive the monster you fought, Ek’idna, is of that bloodline.”

Scylla groaned. “Oh great, there could be more of them?”

Charybdis oferred her a small smile. “We’ll handle them when they come, Scy-scy.”

“I had no choice but to turn myself into an island… I gave the Lantern to the survivors of the war for safekeeping, and told them to hide it. I asked them to get together after ten years to sing the Song of Harmony, even if they had to chose someone else to be the third voice.”

“Something they obviously didn’t do,” commented Trixie. “My guess is that…none of them wanted the other group to be seen as better by having two singers instead of one.”

“I will not judge those who are not here to defend themselves. It is a possibility but what is done, is done.”

“And what happened to Aquarius?” asked Rock Beauty.

“Aquarius… why, she came with me.”

And with that Thetis stepped aside and swept a hoof toward the interior of the spire. Large crystalline structures within the cavernous interior began to light up, powered by the magic of the guardian herself, bathing the room in a soothing blue glow. There at the center of the room, in a ray of light coming from above, stood a giant crystal shaped like an urn, and a bright red shape could be seen suspended within. The six ponies swam toward the urn and were shocked to discover the shape was a plesiopony. She was upright in the crystal, her long neck holding her head high and her stubby tail and hind fins dangling. Her eyes were close in a mask of serenity, but scars all over her body betrayed a harsh and violent past. Her mane was a lighter shade of red and spread around her like a flower.

What was more stunning was what her curled fore fins were cradling. About a dozen clear orange spheres the size of a grapefruit, each holding a tiny shape the size of a kitten that looked vaguely like a plesiopony but lacking a mane. Lyra had no doubt what those were, but she had to ask to be certain.

“Are…are those Plesiopony eggs?!”

“They are the last of their kind. Aquarius wanted to forfeit her life as punishment for her crime, but I needed her alive for the next generation of plesioponies… so she came with me. Not today, but in due time, once the city is settled again, I will take her out of stasis and we will hatch the eggs. With hard work, and a little help from new friends, we should be able to maybe… just a little, make up for our past mistakes.”

Charybdis brought a fin to the surface of the crystal and stared at the eggs with the kind of look in her eyes that Lyra had often seen in Ditzy’s own eyes. Silently Scylla joined with her and placed a hoof on the crystal as well.

“Let’s try to do better, and not lose our Harmony,” said the merpony.

“We’ll work together to give those little ones, as well as our own, a bright future,” added Charybdis.

Rock Beauty swam up next to her and also placed a hoof on the crystal. “You better!” she said with a wink.

“We’ll be there to make you keep your word!” added Sea Shanty, swimming next to her leader and also placing her fin on the crystal.

Lyra, followed by Trixie, decided to join in, each on one side of the line up.

“Don’t be afraid to call us if you need some help! I’m sure we can set some communication channel up,” said Trixie.

Lyra nodded. “Yeah, we’re friends after all! And friends can count on friends when there's trouble.”

The six ponies smiled at each other. This was a brand new beginning for Andalantis, one the seapony and merpony clearly wanted to be for the better.

Rock Beauty was the first to move as she went to grab hold of Sea Shanty and pull her along toward the exit “Let’s go get our friends!” she said.

Author's Note

Whew... that was a LOT of exposition, wasn't it? I hope it wasn't too confusing and it helped straighten out the whole story! I tried my best to make it interesting but I had a LOT of ground to cover.

This is pretty much the end, all that's left is a few loose end to tie up in a short epilogue! It shouldn't take too long to come out either. I can't believe how many words this story has and that it took me FOUR friggin' years to finish it. Never again, I swear!

Finishing this feels SO great that I couldn't hold it back so it's probably still littered with silly mistakes as usual, so feel free to point them out. In the meantime I need to sleep because I got work tomorrow morning.

Hope you enjoy!

Chapter 1

Cayo el Bayo.

The name alone evokes sparkling ocean waters and a beach the color of the moon. A vacation destination where pretense of class, nobility and station are meant to be left behind, a place where rubes and riches rub rumps to enjoy the delights of this sea-side paradise together. Cayo el Bayo was, originally, a mundane small town atop sheer rocky cliffs overlooking the southern sea. However, nearby the cliff had been eroded away into a charming crescent shaped cove, creating a beach shaded by tall grey walls. The dominating walls cast a safe shadow over the beach for a good deal of the day, creating a peaceful haven to enjoy the ocean. Over time the cliff face had been carved into a dozen flights of stairs and many a shop and restaurants had been dug into the rock wall itself. Cayo el Bayo beach had brought prosperity to the small town and it was among the top 10 vacation spots in Equestria.

This was the location Trixie Lulamoon, personal student of Her Highness Luna Equestris, Representative of the Night Court of Luna, and Element of Magic, had chosen for what she felt were well-earned vacations. After dealing with a mad alicorn, a malicious griffon prankster, Night Court spies, a swarm of voracious parasprites, and even a rampaging star bear, not to mention all the other strange happenstance that just seemed to be part of daily life in Ponyville; she felt it was time to take a week off somewhere. With only a little pleading she had managed to convince Luna to lend her a cottage owned by the royal treasury, one big enough to house all her friends. This time of the year was hardly high season and thus the train tickets had been pretty cheap.

Right now Trixie was reclining in a beach chair under the reassuring shade of the cliff, hat and cape discarded. A mojito was floating on her left and the latest Ace of Clover book hovering in front of her eyes, both held aloft by the blue glow of her magic. This latest book was a pretty decent mystery, revolving around some divorce case going sour on the gritty private detective main character. The sound of the waves and the laughter all around her made for a decent soundtrack to her relaxation. Knowing her luck this perfection couldn’t hold all day. On every clear night a little rain must fall.

“Miss Lulamoon! What a coincidence!” declared a cheery familiar voice from behind Trixie.

Trixie flinched at the mention of her last name and turned to look at the intruder. “Miss Rarity?”

Ponyville’s most fashionable mare stood behind Trixie, a white hat perched atop her purple mane, big gaudy red-rimmed sunglasses adorning her face.

“I had no idea you were here Miss Lulamoon! When did you get here?” asked the white unicorn.

Trixie was hoping to have left Ponyville behind for the week, but fate seemed to have other ideas.

“Yesterday,” she finally answered, putting her bookmark into her novel.

The mare’s purple curl bounced slightly as she smiled “How wonderful, I just arrived this morning myself. One of my Canterlot contacts is hosting a beach party later this week and I am hoping to do some networking there. What about you Miss Lulamoon? What might bring you here in Cayo el Bayo? Some type of official Night Court business perhaps?”

“No… just a nice vacation, with my friends,” said Trixie, hoping to discourage the nosey unicorn from trying to strike a conversation with her by remaining stoic.

“Oh,” simply responded the other mare, suddenly sounding disinterested. “Good for you Miss Lulamoon. After all the work you do in Ponyville, you deserve this.”

“Yes, it is true I do a lot of important work for Ponyville. The Great and Powerful Trixie is always on hoof to save the day! Like the Ursa Minor incident! If the Great and Powerful Trixie hadn’t been there to take charge, who knows how much damage that beast could have done,” bragged Trixie, swelling with pride.

“Indeed,” said the white unicorn, half-heartedly.

Luckily for both of them, Dinky trotted up to Trixie, full of youthful excitement.

“Miss Trixie! Miss Trixie! Lyra and Sparkler are going to teach me beach magic-ball! We need a fourth player. Do you want to play? Oh hello Miss Rarity.”

“Oh hello… dear.”

Trixie looked beyond the foal to see the jeweler and musician taking turn throwing a clear inflatable ball over a net with their magic. Inviting Amethyst Star hadn’t been in Trixie’s original plans, but when Cheerilee, Carrot Top and Raindrops had been unable to free themselves for this trip Dinky suggested using one of the spare train ticket to invite her half-sister. Amethyst Star had been reluctant but Dinky proved convincing. Trixie herself found it almost impossible to say no to foals, and whatever quality made foals irresistible was apparently multiplied ten-fold within Dinky. Even right now, beaming up at her with those hopeful eyes, Trixie could find no reason why her book couldn’t wait for her.

“Well Miss Rarity it’s been a pleasure running into you, but my assistant requires my presence on stage,” said Trixie, finishing her mojito in one gulp before turning to Dinky. “Let’s play ball!”

“Yay! Nice seeing you Miss Rarity!”

The white unicorn rolled her eyes behind her sunglasses.

“Useless as ever,” she said under her breath before resuming trotting toward her original destination.

That destination was the nearest beach bar. The bar was mostly a slab of stone used as counter with a colorful tarp used as a roof, but it was there that a certain stallion was waiting for her. The beige pegasus stallion swept nervous green eyes around the beach before he spotted the white unicorn. He waved her over with an awkward smile that she returned warmly.

“He…Hello again Miss Rarity!” the stallion said, stammering just a little.

“Hey there, Sailor,” she replied, lowering her sunglasses so he could see her eyelashes batting.

Wind Sailor blushed at the attention of the beautiful mare. The two exchanged a few pleasantries about the weather and the recent train trip they had shared and they both ordered a drink.

“So tell me, Wind, is your boss… what was his name? Brigadier-General something?” she began.

“Brigadier-General Gloom Wing,” answered the pegasus.

“Yes Brigadier-General Gloom Wing. Is he still as stressed now that you two have arrived?”

The stallion sighed. “More than before, this deal is very important to him. I barely managed to get this break from him.”

“You poor thing, I know you’re his aide but he should be more considerate. This is Cayo el Bayo! You need your chance to have some fun on the beach,” the mare said, winking at him over her sunglasses. “What would a high ranking army official be doing here anyway? I don’t understand what kind of deal can be done here.”

Wind Sailor blushed again and moved in close to whisper his answer. “He just needs to be out of the way of prying eyes. He came to Cayo el Bayo so everypony thinks he’s on vacation.”

The unicorn gasped. “How exciting! You must be a very important pony if the General trusts you!”

Wind Sailor chuckled, blushing while he rubbed the back of his head in embarrassment. He was about to speak up again when a loud shout interrupted him.

“Look out!” Came the unmistakable voice of Trixie Lulamoon.

Wind Sailor watched as his date turned around just in time to receive a clear inflatable ball right in the face. Far off on the beach, by the net, a certain blue unicorn was on her hindlegs, waving, clearly hoping for the ball back.

“Are you…are you okay Miss Rarity?” Wind Sailor asked.

Without saying a word the mare threw the ball up in the air with her forelegs, then when it came back down she smashed it with her fore hoof, sending the ball flying like a cannonball. Trixie’s eyes bulged when she realized what was going on, but the ball came too fast for her to move as it hit her in the face as well. The showmare fell backward into the sand. Wind Sailor has surprise clearly etched on his face. Before he could ask his question again they received their drink.

The unicorn surrounded her glass with the lilac glow of her magic.

“Now, I’m okay,” she replied, taking a sip.

My little pony, My little pony
Ahh ahh ahh ahhh...
My little pony
Friendship never meant that much to me
My little pony
But you're all here and now I can see
Stormy weather; Lots to share
A musical bond; With love and care
Teaching laughter; It's an easy feat,
And magic makes it all complete!
You have my little ponies
How'd I ever make so many true friends?

It was a little while later and - after a quick dip in the waves - Dinky and Sparkler were both trying to use their magic to sculpt sand into a castle. Trixie watched Dinky grow ever more concentrated as she shaped the wet sand in her telekinetic field. Beads of sweat were rolling down the filly’s head and she was slowly going cross-eyed. Suddenly her power spiked and she crushed the sand structure. The little spray of sand shooting from the top of the structure startled Sparkler who also lost control of her gripping strength. They looked at each other, blinking in confusion, before laughing.

“I’m so happy my little muffin is getting along with her sister,” said Ditzy from her resting position on a towel next to Trixie.

The mail mare had such a happy smile on her face that Trixie felt a grin of her own developing. The mother’s happiness was truly infectious. Ditzy had spent quite a while just playing in the waves, often flying up in the sky before performing what she called a seagull dive into the water. Sometimes she would fly really low, skimming the waves and letting her hoof break the surface of the water. Apparently she was quite the adept swimmer, but just rarely had the time to truly indulge in the activity. Trixie decided she could now go back to her book and turned to call it to her. She saw Lyra lying on her stomach, Bon Bon draped over her back, examining a few brochures she had acquired. The other unicorn turned to Trixie and levitated a brochure toward her.

“The weather program says there will be rain the day after tomorrow. How about we visit the Hippocamp Museum they have in town?” said Lyra with a smile.

“Hippocamp?” repeated Trixie.

Lyra nodded a few times “Hippocamps! You know, Aquatic Ponies, the tribes who live beneath the waves.”

Trixie lifted an eyebrow at Lyra’s enthusiasm “Like the Seaponies? Sounds a bit boring.”

Lyra gave a cute pout at that response. “It’s not boring, it’s really fascinating! It’s been a century at least since Ponies have had contact with Seaponies! Longer with Merponies… and it’s been over a millennia since the last recorded sighting of a Plesiopony!” said Lyra, her smile returning as her eyes began to sparkle. “There’s barely any artifact from them but they feature prominently in works of other tribes from that era! The brochure says Cayo el Bayo used to be a trading point between the Hippocamps and Equestria, that it was the point closest to their legendary city of Andalantis!”

Trixie’s book levitated back to her and she opened it up, still looking at her eager unicorn friend. “You sure seem to know a lot about them.”

“In my sophomore year at the Academy we staged the Fall of Andalantis opera. It’s such a tragic story and the opera is such an influential piece that I read a lot of related material. I read the original legend; I read all about archeological findings and what was known about Aquatic Ponies. I also read a lot about the opera itself. It’s one of the great works of the Esperia era and radically changed the narrative structure of operas. Did you know it was the first opera written in Equestrian rather than Cavalian? That radical departure from tradition caused a minor scandal at the first presentation. It almost ended Wagnhorse’s career before Princess Luna gave the work her blessing.”

“You’re such an egghead,” commented Trixie with a grin.

Before this could go any further, Bon Bon piped up. “Lyra played Shining Pearl, the ruler of the Seaponies! It was the first time I saw her sing in front of such a large audience. Her Sea Pony costume was really cute too,” she said, nuzzling Lyra’s cheek.

Lyra blushed, while Trixie rolled her eyes at the display. It was possible Trixie had heard Luna mention the Hippocamps before, after all she would have known them personally, but Trixie couldn’t remember every little History lesson her mentor had given her.

“When I realized it was impossible to meet any of the Hippocamp tribes I just stopped reading about them but…” Lyra began, blushing a little. “After we met those evil Sirens I decided to go check what books on Hippocamps were at the Ponyville library and I’ve been reading up on them since.”

“I’m up for the museum,” commented Ditzy

“I’m curious to see what kind of jewelery Aquatic Ponies had,” added Sparkler.

“I guess it’s as good as any a way to spend a rainy day,” said Trixie, shrugging a little, turning her attention back to the mystery in her book.

“We also spotted something interesting for tomorrow,” said Bon Bon, distracting Trixie from her book again.

“Oh?” simply replied Trixie, another brochure floating up to her.

“They organize boat rides out to the coral reef! I hear it’s really beautiful and if you dive in the fish swim right up to you,” explained Lyra.

“That sounds great! I like swimming,” said Ditzy.

“Oooh I’d love to see all the beautiful corals and colorful fishes! I could use the inspiration,” added Sparkler, still trying to make a castle, but this time by hoof.

Dinky had a big smile as she made her opinion known. “I want to see the fishes!”

Trixie sighed and just waved her hoof “Fine, we’ll do the boat thing too. Now can I return to my book?”

She thought it was a foolproof plan. Fate, and fools, can be so cruel. Off course, with her around, it was no wonder plans would be lead astray.

The boat for the excursion was a bright red single-mast sail boat with the ridiculous name of Autumn Delight and belonged to Captain Sunset Beard, an older bright red Earth Pony with an orange mane and beard. Trixie and her friends had woken up early to take part in the morning tour, the boat being scheduled to return for midday, with a second tour in the afternoon. Lyra had assured Trixie the morning trip was usually empty, but as the showmare walked up the pier toward the boat she could spot a beige pegasus and a certain familiar white pony.

“Miss Rarity, what a happy coincidence,” said Trixie, not looking, or sounding, happy at all.

“Oh! Hello Miss Lulamoon. You’re all going to see the reef?” asked the white unicorn, looking at the six ponies before her, all decked out with hats and sunglasses.

“Hi Miss Rarity! We’re going to see the fishes!” called Dinky, from her perch on her mother’s back.

“Are those friends of yours from Ponyville, Rarity?” asked Wind Sailor.

“We’re more like acquaintances,” answered Lyra in a neutral tone, her face an expressionless mask.

“Well, my name is Wind Sailor and it’s a pleasure to meet you all,” said the stallion, beaming like an idiot. “Let’s make sure to have fun on this excursion.”

“Hi! I’m Dinky and this is my momma Ditzy, and my sister Sparkler!”

Sparkler smiled at the stallion.

“I’m Lyra and this sweet thing here is my marefriend, Bon Bon,” said the musician, putting her foreleg around the cream colored mare’s shoulders

“And I am the Great and Powerful…” began Trixie, stricking a dramatic pose, her cape fluttering in an otherwise non-existant wind.

“Trixie Lulamoon,” said Rarity, interrupting Trixie’s little number. “She’s the Night Court representative to Ponyville.”

Wind Sailor seemed to flinch at the mention of the Night Court.

“The Great and Powerful Tri…” she tried to say, only to be cut again.

“Miss Trixie is Princess Luna’s prodi…pote… protej… personal student, she’s also the greatest magician ever,” added Dinky, standing on her hindlegs on her mother’s back.

Wind Sailor seemed to brighten up a little, a spark of recognition in his eyes. “Oh! So you’re that Trixie! You’re the one who caused all that flooding when the ice pala–”

Trixie’s blue hoof shot forth and plugged Wind Sailor’s mouth.

“Yeah I know, I know. I was there. Now let’s get on this piece of painted flotsam they call a boat and let’s go see some fishes,” said Trixie, glaring at Wind Sailor.

“Did I hear somepony badmouth my ship?!” asked a stocky red Earth Pony who suddenly appeared on the deck of the boat.

Trixie, to the delight of a snickering white unicorn, put her other fore-hoof to her face in embarrassment.

“Guess Sailor’s isn’t the only mouth you put your hoof in,” she said, trotting onto the boat.

Lyra had her forelegs over the side of the boat as she watched the waves speed by with trepidation, an excited gleam in her eyes. The sea was shimmering under the gaze of the Sun. This was the kind of day that made a pony regret even more that Corona had turned the life giving Sun into a symbol of devastation and pain. Lyra wondered what it would be like to be able to enjoy the Sun on a seaside beach without the threat of the Tyrant Sun hanging above one’s head. It wasn’t easy to contemplate so she turned her attention back to what laid beneath those sparkling waves. She was really looking forward to diving in the coral reef. A Bon Bon clad in an orange life jacket walked up to her and leaned against her.

“I like to see that spark in your eye,” She said, closing her eyes. “It makes me forget my seasickness.”

Lyra turned to her marefriend, blinking. “I didn’t know you got seasick! I’m so sorry!”

“Don’t be, I didn’t know myself until today,” said Bon Bon, nuzzling her neck. “The captain gave me some pills, said I should feel better soon.”

“Miss Lyra, Miss Lyra!” called Dinky, bounding up to the pair with her mother and sister in tow.

“Can you tell us the legend you talked about yesterday? The legend of Atlan…Anta…Andalantis?” The little filly said, her face scrunching up as she navigated the unfamiliar word.

Lyra smiled broadly. “I’d love to,” she said, before turning to glance toward Trixie who had just finished enchanting her life jacket to match her cape. “Unless somebody object to a little History lesson.”

Trixie took on an exagerated expression of offense. “Object to education? Moi? I’m shocked you would think so!”

Lyra raised an eyebrow. “I tried to teach you all about the founding of Ponyville and you fell asleep five minutes in,” said Lyra, causing the group to laugh.

Trixie’s cheeks puffed in anger while they turned red with embarrassment. “That… that was different! I hadn’t slept well because that was when I was spying on that spy! Besides… besides Ponyville History is boring!”

Trixie’s timing was off by a few weeks in reality, but Lyra just grinned and let her get away with her little lie. The problem with the Representative wasn’t so much that she lied a lot, almost out of pure reflex at time, but rather that once you knew her enough she was painfully obvious to read. Lyra had come to accept this part of her friend’s personality and just found it amusing how she would cause trouble for herself that way. After laughing at the blue unicorn’s antics she simply closed her eyes, casting a familiar spell. In a flash of golden light her precious lyre appeared and was instantly grabbed in her golden telekinetic field. The flash attracted the attention of Wind Sailor and his date, both wearing those gaudy orange life jackets, and they both came to join the improvised show. Lyra sat down in her peculiar way, back against the side of the boat, and she began to strum a few whimsical notes on her lyre.

“Hear me one and all, listen and learn of the lost city of Andalantis. It’s lost splendor and the tragedy that took it away from its people,” she began, matching the rhythm of her flighty notes to the cadence of her words.

Long, long ago, before the reign of the Royal Sisters, three tribes of Hippocamp lived in the oceans.

The majestic Plesioponies, marshals of the waves and currents, the playful Merponies, sheppards of all that swam, and the diligeant Seaponies, stewards of the sea floor. Together the three tribes lived in a majestic city constructed by Princess Thetis, goddess of the oceans, called… Andalantis! That city was said to glimmer with a thousand color be the source of art and music the likes of which the land had never seen.

All three tribes lived in harmony, each performing their duties to help the ocean thrive. However, the Merponies and Seaponies did not always see eye to eye on where their duty ended. Merponies wanted Seaponies to limit themselves to seaweed and corals, while the Seaponies wanted to take care of all the creatures that crawled on the sea floors, and the fish that called their majestic coral reefs home. Always, the gentle Plesioponies would calm their brethren and settle disputes, and all would be harmony again.

At this point, Lyra’s notes went from high pitch and happy to a lower octave and invoked anger. Her words came at a harsher pace.

But then, the Bringer of Strife appeared, and wanted nothing more than to shatter that beautiful harmony. The Bringer of Strife gave birth to a new creature, harmless in its appearance and demeanor, but whose very nature would cause clashes between the rival aquatic ponies! The creature would grow from the seafloor like seaweed, but as an adult it would swim throughout the ocean without ever stopping. Both the Merponies and Seaponies wanted control over the new creature. Stoked by the demon watching from the shadows, the two tribes began a terrible conflict!

The Plesioponies pleaded with the two sides to stop, but no one would listen to them. They called upon Princess Thetis, but the secretive goddess was impossible to find. Thus the Plesioponies took it upon themselves to stand in the line of fire and stop the two tribes. Sadly, their heart empty of Harmony, the Seaponies and Merponies could no longer recognize the Plesioponies as friends.

Once again, Lyra shifted her cadence. Her words were soft, almost a whisper, and yet thanks to her magic all present could hear it clearly. Her words and notes came more slowly, and were tinted with sadness and melancholy.

When finally Princess Thetis appeared, all the Plesioponies, save for one young filly, had been sacrificed to sake the Bringer of Strife’s thirst for carnage and conflict. Upon the grim spectacle the goddess of the sea stripped away all magic from the Hippocamps that remained, rendering the oceans wild, untamed, and hostile to the ponies. No longer would animals or plants obey the aquatic ponies, and their great city was cast away, far beyond their reach. They would have to survive on their own from now on, to grieve together for their lost family. The spirits of the departed Plesioponies became one with the waves and currents they had controlled, remaining forever a monument to the lost tribe. The pain of having lost so many of her precious ponies caused Princess Thetis to fall into terrible despair, and her tears began to fill the oceans.

Soon the oceans were overflowing with the tears of the goddess, threatening to swallow the land. The ponies of the land tried to plead with the goddess but her tears were forever flowing and would not stop. Her pain was too great, the depth of her sadness as profound as the oceans themselves. The unicorns, pegasus and earth ponies came together and created an enchanted vase they gave to the grieving goddess. The enchanted vase would forever contain her tears, no matter how much flowed from the goddess, so that the oceans may never overflow, so long as no pony removed the cover. The goddess entrusted custody of this powerful artifact to the last Plesiopony that remained. The young Aquarius took the vase and was allowed to rejoin Andalantis, disappearing into the mist of myth, never to be seen again.

Lyra closed her eyes as she finished her tale. She took a deep breath and opened them. In her excitement to share her knowledge she had glossed over the fact the legend was terribly sad. When she opened her eyes she could see that Dinky had tears flowing down her face but she looked fascinated. Ditzy was hugging her daughter tenderly. Both Amethyst Star and Wind Sailor were fighting away tears of their own. Lyra turned to Bon Bon who gave her a soft hug while the two other unicorns gave her a polite hoofstomp.

“Darling that was very well done! You are quite the bard I must say,” said the white mare, patting the pegasus stallion on the back to calm him.

“If Princess Luna had told me that story like you just did I bet I wouldn’t have forgotten it,” said Trixie, rubbing her chin. “Say, how about we work together on my next show?”

Lyra’s eyes bulged wide. “No, no, no, and absolutely not!”

“Don’t worry! I’d just want you to do some narrative framing for my show! I’d do the magic on my own and you would do music and story telling like you just did! Beside you could use the work right?” explained Trixie.

Lyra groaned. “Trixie, how any times will I have to tell: I get plenty of work.”

Bon Bon giggled at Lyra’s frustration with the showmare.

It was half an hour later when they finally reached their destination, right in the middle of the coral reef. Not far from the boat’s location stood a rocky island, jutting from the sea like the mountains around Canterlot. Even from a distance it looked imposing. The captain caught Lyra staring at the island. He explained to her that the island was called Lucky Seagull Island because, despite being a dangerous navigational hazard, nopony in recorded history had ever crashed a boat against it. The waves and water currents would always push boats away from the inhospitable rock. Then the captain pointed out that Lyra’s friends were already gazing down the glass bottom, and that she should join them.

Lyra thanked the captain, happy to have learned some new lore, and did as he said. Near the back of the boat a large part of the bottom had been removed and replaced by a thick panel of glass, allowing the passengers to gaze at the sea floor. Trixie was trying her best not to get to close to the panel while still getting a good view, muttering about her rotten luck with windows. The sea floor was covered in large coral formation of various colors: large green mounds, skinny pink tree-like formations, white ones and blue ones, all covered in anemones, colorful seaweed and hosting many fish.

“Look momma! Look!” said Dinky, pointing to a clown fish that darted through a patch of colorful sea anemones.

“Clown fish like that are immune to the sting of the sea anemones, so they hide in them to protect themselves,” said Lyra.

“You seem to know a lot about sea life Lyra,” said Ditzy, one of her eyes trailed on the glass panel while the other looked to the green unicorn.

Lyra beamed. “My roommate for junior year was studying marine biology, she taught me tons of interesting stuff.”

“My friends were telling me I should be jealous of her because Lyra kept mentioning her in her letters,” said Bon Bon, poking her marefriend in the flank, “but then I showed them who was right when you wrote to me about helping her find a birthday gift for her coltfriend.”

The two giggled at the anecdote. “Last I heard they’re getting married,” said Lyra.

Bon Bon look thoughtful “Think she’ll invite us? I wouldn’t mind catching the bouquet,” she said, winking.

Lyra began to blush and stammer, much to the amusement of her friends.

“Woh! Look at that stingray! It looks so graceful. It’s like it’s flying underwater,” commented Sailor, bringing everypony’s attention back to the sea floor.

“Those starfishes are giving me ideas,” said Sparkler with glee. “That reminds me, Miss Rarity...” she began, turning toward the white unicorn.

“Yes dear?” she replied, batting her eyelashes.

“Dinky tells me you have a gem finding spell, I was wondering if you would be willing to teach it to me? For a fee off course! It would certainly help my business if I didn’t have to buy all my raw material,” answered Amethyst Star.

“My gem finding spell?” repeated the unicorn, blinking in a confused manner “Well it could be possible… how about you come see me with a formal business proposal once we are all back in Ponyville. I’m sure we could come to some arrangements that would prove beneficial to both our businesses beyond a simple spell.”

“You’re a businessmare too, Miss Star?” inquired Wind Sailor.

Sparkler nodded at the stallion. “I recently opened a jewelry store in Ponyville. I’m a jeweler.”

“Sparkler makes the most beautiful jewelry ever!” said Dinky with a bright smile.

“Amethyst Star’s jewelry really is something,” added Ditzy, wistfully.

Sparkler and Ditzy exchanged an awkward smile. While the two weren’t quite what one would call friends, they always seemed to get along fine as long as Dinky was there, acting as a bridge between the two. Sometimes Ditzy would use her full name and sometime her nickname. The way she switched between the two felt like a constant reminder of the bittersweet circumstances around their recent reunion. Wind Sailor completely missed the silent exchange, distracted as he was by a school of silver fish suddenly racing by.

“You don’t say. Maybe I should make a quick shopping trip in Ponyville one of these days. It’s not far from Canterlot and it could be an excuse to see you again Miss Rarity,” said Sailor, winking at his companion.

“But off course dear,” she said.

Trixie rolled her eyes at the obvious lie. It was clear to the Representative that the snooty unicorn didn’t really care that deeply for the guy. He made for decent arm-candy, or at least she supposed, and he apparently had connection with some Canterlot big wigs. Trixie figured the fashion designer was probably fishing for business contacts. Speaking of fishing…

“We’re going to be diving right?” asked Ditzy, fishing a blue diving mask and snorkel out of one of the bags they had brought along.

Lyra nodded with enthusiasm, “Yes! In fact, I’ve got a surprise for everypony!” she said, grabbing hold of her lyre with her magic.

“What kind of surprise?” asked the grey pegasus.

Lyra stood proudly, closing her eyes. “I know a spell that will let us breathe underwater.”

All of her friends were impressed, and a little excited. Ditzy was dancing in place.

“Really? That’s sounds amazing!” she said, taking flight to hover above Lyra. “I didn’t know a spell like that existed.”

“Neither did I,” added Trixie, raising an eyebrow.

“It’s a fairly obscure spell so it’s normal neither of you heard about it. I would actually be more surprised if Trixie had known about it,” said Lyra, with a smirk.

“Hey! What’s that supposed to mean?” asked Trixie.

Lyra just ignored her and grabbed hold of a bright yellow diving mask with her magic. “The spell won’t make it easier to see underwater so you should all put on a mask,” she explained.

Everypony quickly went to pick a mask but a certain white unicorn was taking her sweet time to pick between two differently colored ones. Finally she selected a yellow one and levitated the white one she didn’t want over to Wind Sailor. Meanwhile Ditzy convinced Trixie it would be best to leave her hat and cape behind.

“Gather around me everypony!”said Lyra, plucking at her lyre.

Lyra’s specialty when it came to magic was spellsongs, spells recorded in the form of pieces of music. To perform the spell the caster would simply have to match the harmonic frecquency of their magic with the music. Her horn glowing with golden light, Lyra began to perform a series of five notes, her lyra pulsating with magic. Soon the sound of her linstrument was joined by the phantom sound of a type of flute, as the five notes were repeated three times before coming to a soft finish. Like a wave of water the magic washed over the assembled crowd of pony.

Ditzy brought a hoof to rub her neck. “Did it work? I was expecting to grow gills.”

Lyra nodded. “Trust me, it did.”

A pair of white hoofs clapped politely. “Quite impressive dear, this was no ordinary spell!” said the fashionista, getting an approving nod from the jeweler.

Trixie however looked at her friend, her face furrowed in concentration. “Was that the Serenade of Water from The Legend of Epona?”

Lyra blushed. “All the magical pieces of music in The Legend of Epona are proper spellsongs! I did a research project on the musical score back in school!” she said, glaring at Trixie.

“Okay, okay professor, don’t snap at me,” said Trixie, backing away.

“Wait, if they all work… what does the Bolero of Fire do?” Asked Sparkler, rubbing her chin.

“You don’t want to try that one,” answered Lyra, looking sheepish as Bon Bon began to giggle.

Trixie made a mental note to inquire more about it later. Now it was time to dive in the water, and she was taken with the irrepressible urge to throw a certain vain unicorn mare off the side of the boat. She briefly wondered if Lyra and Sparkler would want to help out. Sadly Wind Sailor had decided it was time to be bold and had grabbed on to his date.

“Com’on Miss Rarity! Let’s try that spell!” He said, taking flight with her.

“Wait! Wait no!” she cried out as he dived head first into the water with her.

“Hey! I wanted to do that!” complained Trixie, shaking a hoof uselessly toward the water surface.

Then she felt hooves wrapped around her midsection from behind. A quick look back revealed the smiling face of Ditzy Doo. For some reason that face sent a chill down Trixie’s spine.

“You just had to ask, Trixie!” she said, also taking flight.

Trixie could only scream as Ditzy and her dived toward the water at a reckless speed. Soon the pair was submerged in cool salt water in a loud splashing noise. The mares and Dinky, left in the boat, laughed at the display and soon joined the rest of the group in the water.

In the end the dive hadn’t been so bad. It felt a little frightening at first, but turned out enjoyable. Trixie had to admit this had been a good idea after all. Swimming like this, while not being worried about running out of air, felt very liberating. She briefly wondered if that was close to what a pegasus would feel while flying, and resolved to ask Ditzy about it later. All around her was a rainbow of corals, fishes, seaweed, anemones, starfish, crabs and even a few turtles and squids! The large masses of colorful corals were like mountains on the sea floor, creating shallow valleys were all sorts of creatures dwelled. She swam through a school of blue fishes that scattered as she went through, only to return to a cohesive mass afterward. Lyra and her marefriend were apparently playing hide-and-seek amidst the reef. Right now Bon Bon was hiding behind a large curtain of dark green seaweed, but Lyra had been more clever and had headed closer to the surface and spotted her from her higher angle.

Meanwhile, much to the dismay of his companion, Wind Sailor was following the stingray he had noticed earlier (or one like it), obviously fascinated by its graceful swimming. Sparkler in the meantime was skimming the sea floor, kicking up silt in grey clouds, as she looked with wonder on the various shades and shapes of starfish. One particular large red one with a ridiculous amount of arms impressed her greatly. Dinky, for her part, was swimming in circles around a large sea turtle; her giggles reaching Trixie’s ears loud and clear even from a long distance. She stopped harassing the poor turtle when a couple of moon jellies floated by and attracted her attention. She floated in front of them and reached out a hoof, only to be stopped by her mother.

“Careful Muffin, a jellyfish can sting!” she said, sternly.

Dinky retracted her hoof quickly, but kept on observing the nearly translucent creature. Lyra, having heard the warning swam up to them with a big grin.

“Only the tentacles are dangerous though, so you can still do this,” she said, giving a gentle bump to the top of the jellyfish, sending it floating in a different direction. “Jellyfish are really weird creatures, they have no brain and are made mostly of water. You remember, in the legend I told, that the Bringer of Strife created something that grew from the sea floor and swam like a fish?”

The mother and daughter duo nodded at the same time.

“Well most experts think the legend is talking about jellyfishes. You see, when a jellyfish larvae is ready to grow up it digs into the sea floor and becomes what is know as a polyp,” said Lyra, pointing a hoof downward. “Then the polyp grows bigger and bigger, like a plant, until the uppermost part detaches, flips around and becomes a new jellyfish!”

“Oooh… so does that mean jellyfishes were made by a demon Miss Lyra?” asked Dinky, eyeing the creature warily.

Lyra shrugged. “No one knows for sure Dinky, but even if it was it’s pretty harmless to ponies.” And with that the unicorn gave another bump to the nearby moon jelly.

Bon Bon took that moment to hug Lyra from behind, claiming to have finally found her. While Lyra was complaining about not actually having had time to hide, something else caught Dinky’s attention. A small squid swam by at full speed. The little filly smiled and launched herself in pursuit.

“Dinky wait! Don’t go too far Muffin!” called Ditzy.

Sparkler put a hoof on Ditzy’s shoulder and smiled at her “Don’t worry Ditzy, I’ll go keep an eye on her, you just enjoy yourself.”

And with that the jeweler swam off after her half sister. Ditzy giggled and broke into a big smile. She did a loop in the water and then swam off on her own. Reading water current, as it turned out, was just as easy to her as reading air current. She did a few barrel rolls, some loops and then dived to the bottom of the ocean, following a current in a groove between two young sandy cays. On the other side she found that the sea floor was slowly descending toward the edge of the continental shelf, and more rock formations began to appear. As she let the water carry her between pink coral branches, she did not notice the eyes glaring at her from behind a nearby by wall of kelp. Her left eye spotted something shining nearby that caught her attention. When she went to investigate she found the entrance to a tunnel in a rocky formation where glowing algae were growing in patches. The patches were like a series of neon green night light lighting up the twisting passage. Ditzy could feel the water current pushing her into the tunnel at a slow pace, indicating there was an exit somewhere.

She hesitated. This could be dangerous but at the same time she was really curious to see where it went. A blue colored fish swam past her, darting into the tunnel with apparent familiarity. In the end she decided to go check out beyond the first bend and then come back if the exit wasn’t in sight by then. She let herself be carried by the current, spreading her wings to catch the flow of water and slowly advance down the tunnel. The green glow of the algae gave off an eerie feeling. The pegasus could feel her heart accelerate slightly from the excitement. She turned the bend and exhaled a breath she hadn’t realized she was holding. Beyond the bend the tunnel was splitting in two, one taking another bend to disappear out of sight, while the other led toward a patch of sunlit ocean. With a smile Ditzy headed for the light. She hoped she had found a hidden lagoon on a small island where she could grab some tropical fruits and fly them back to the boat as a snack. Ditzy had to briefly wonder what a mango and coconut muffin would taste like.

That’s when that light became partially blocked by a dark shape. The pegasus stopped dead in her tracks. The figure was a long lean fish with a distinctive tail and dorsal fin. The shark was cast in darkness because of the bright light behind it, but Ditzy could see two eyes reflecting the glow of the algae… and then two more opened. She gave a little startled yelp and the shark swam toward her, entering the tunnel and letting the algae illuminate its dark blue shape. It was no ordinary shark. Rather than the long snout associated with sharks, this nightmarish abomination had the head of a blue tiger with four yellow beady eyes! The creature licked its lips with its large tongue, letting its fangs show, and then growled. Ditzy strangled a scared cry and quickly backed toward the entrance.

That was not meant to be. She turned only to find herself blocked at the split by another monstrous shark, this one a pinkish red color. This one had an ordinary head, but she barely avoided the large pincers attached to the crab arms growing out the side of this one as they snapped toward her. Thinking fast she swam down the third corridor, hoping it would lead to open ocean where she could swim upward and fly above the wave to escape those creatures. The two sharks were growling and snapping behind her but Ditzy found herself slowly gaining distance. However, if a third one were to block her way…

She shook her head to chase that thought away. She had to escape and get to the others fast. It didn’t take her long to spot a clear exit in the distance and she gave an extra burst of speed. This time there were no monstrous shark blocking her way and she escaped the confined tunnel, turning sharply upward.

Her world exploded into light and pain. She spun toward the sea floor, broken piece of whatever coral structure she had hit following her slow descent. Ditzy tried to move, but the only thing swimming was her vision. As she fought to hang on to consciousness she saw the two blurry shapes of the sharks exiting the tunnel and heading toward her. She lost sight of them during one of her rotation, and when one of her eye turned their way she saw a bright green shape between her and her pursuer.

“Ly…ra?” she asked, before everything faded to black.

Epilogue

“The sunset looks breathtaking from up here!” Said Sea Shanty, her eyes wide open in wonder.

Rock Beauty threw a hoof over the seapony’s shoulder “Well you know we can come up whenever you want now! We should make it a regular thing!”

“That…would be nice,” replied Sea Shanty, blushing.

Lyra observed the exchange from the dock with a smile on her face. It turned out that the Song of Harmony had indeed restored the seapony and merpony’s magic to its former glory so now they could come up to the surface and breathe the air just like their land dwelling cousins. There was more to their magic of course, but it would take time for them to relearn how to use it. Thetis had claimed the magic was never gone, simply dormant, just like her, and that if they kept working together they would be able to reclaim control of their environment. Lyra was glad she had played a role in this happy ending.

“What are you looking at?” asked Bon Bon, laying across her prone marefriend’s back and barely acknowledging the beautiful sunset on display.

“Nothing…or maybe something? I’ll keep you posted,” answered the unicorn.

The mood was ruined by the sound of snoring. The two mares looked to the side at the sleeping form of Trixie, laying on her back in a most ungraceful pose. The blue unicorn had collapsed from exhaustion on the spot when they had disembarked from the ship and hadn’t moved since.

“You’re carrying her,” deadpanned Bon Bon.

“Let’s just leave her there,” replied Lyra, just as stoically.

The two held on for a few seconds before softly giggling.

After reuniting with Ditzy, Dinky and Amethyst Star at the Autumn Delight they had been greeted by a detachment from the local coast guard. It had taken a while to explain where Lucky Seagull Island had gone to, but Thetis’ projection had helped a lot in speeding up the explanations. By the time they had made it back to port it was already time for sunset. While the other seapony and merpony were settling into their new home, Rock Beauty and Sea Shanty had insisted on following their new friends back to civilization and were now sitting on a rock in the shallows, enjoying their first sunset on the surface.

Not far from them, on a bigger rock, sat Wind Sailor and Amethyst Star. The brave flyer had insisted on being there to see them into port. It had been a bit awkward to explain where his date had gone off to, but Sparkler had been more than willing to help mend the pegasus’ broken heart. Seeing the way the two sat and talked together Lyra judged he was getting over ‘Rarity’ pretty quickly.

On the other side of the dock Dinky was sound asleep on her mother’s back, as the pegasus also enjoyed the sunset. The stars were beginning to perform their daily dance as they settled into position in the darkening sky and Ditzy stifled a yawn, betraying how tired she really was. It wouldn’t be long before she would head back to the beach house for the night.

Thetis and Ditzy had a talk on the way back. Thetis believed the spirit of the departed plesioponies were still guarding over the ocean currents and they had helped Ditzy, for she could sense their intent with her special talent. It’s possible it was they who had guided Ditzy toward the kaosharks’ base and started this whole thing.

All in all it had been quite an exhausting adventure: Swimming for hours, battling monsters and solving ancient riddles. It had taken a toll on everyone. At the end of the day, though, love and friendship had won out.

“Hey,” began Bon Bon.

“What?” asked Lyra.

“I know you wanted to go to the museum tomorrow, but let’s just sleep in,” said the earth pony.

“Until when?” asked Lyra.

“Until forever.”

“Works for me,” Said Lyra, yawning.

The End

Author's Note

And that's all folk! Thanks for sticking with me despite all the waiting and months without update!

I hope you'll return when I come up with a different story, and this time try not to take FOUR FREAKIN' YEARS to complete it.

For all you Lunaverse authors out there, I hope you'll find some interesting element in this story to use in future work!

Catch y'all later!