Part One: Fuck'in Whales, Man.
My youth was simple, if unimportant.
I remember warm waters, and family. Friends of friends we all were, always willing to play and engage each other. There was danger, yes, but there were few who dared to go near us. There were too many of us, we were fifty-seven strong, each great and powerful and wise and, yes, willing to defend each other. I say this only to remind myself that, at one time, the world was happy.
My adult life was colder, but that was because of the waters I lived in. Oh yes, there was much traveling those days! What sight's there were and what wonderful things to meet! I remember the fifty-eight times my people gathered when I was of age to join the great migration, of which all of our kind was in, and swam across the world and to the cold waters to feast.
I could tell stories about those days, of the children I have had, or of the things in the great oceans of the world that are forever hidden to your eyes.
But I know you would not be interested in that story, so I will tell you of what was happening prior to the fifty-eighth migration that I joined.
Perhaps it is not wise to go in depth about my ideas about what was happening on the surface of the world. It is never wise to think about the creatures on the surface.
But, I shall tell you of the ships.
What, do you consider me a fool? Yes, ships is the word my people used for the great hulks of metal and plastics the above-waters used. It is the same word they use for them, is it not? Why would you consider us so different from them in mentality?
In my thirteenth year of life, I have been told, the creatures of the surface began to build metal ships. My people were no stranger to wooden ships, of course, but one's of metal? Metal was a rare thing that shouldn't have floated, after all, all the ships at the bottom of the sea were filled with yellow pieces of it, so it must not have floated well.
But the fact that it floated was not the issue.
It was the noise, that horrible, horrible noise!
The only way I could discribe it to you was that it was like a din of ever-present, constant chopping wave, a sort that disrupted any attempt to speak. Indeed, we had to strain to hear others from any depth or distance, and talking to others was a strain.
But what do you care? This isn't the story you wish to hear, after all.
Let me tell you of the day when the noises stopped.
It was sudden, at first. It was as noisy as ever, and in those days, those wretched days, we were fewer each day. Not in number, really, but my family had shrunken down to just a thirteen individuals. Those who were not with us were not dead, but rather lost. The noises, those cursed noises, they stopped our ability to communicate so much that some of us actually attempted to ram the ships themselves to make them stop moving, which only resulted in them getting injured.
But, let me restate this, one day, the noises stopped. I didn't know what to think, as I was dumbfounded. There were others with the same confusion as well, sudden clear vocalizations from farther away than I had remembered being able to hear.
Soon after they stopped, there came the triumphant calls of joy.
Those were good days, but in hindsight, I do not know why we cried out in joy.
Whatever happened to the surfacers, whatever made them stop, made the krill of the cold waters die. I myself ate fish, and while I was sorry for my kin who consumed the tiny beings I was just only slightly affected by the tiny animals vanishing. While I was unsure of how to react from long-distance cries from the cold waters declaring a lack of food, I wasn't entirely
But then, to my horror, I found that there was no fish in the cold waters as well.
And my kin, or what was left of them, anyway, were sick.
I will not tell you what I saw, if only to not remember what it was like to be the only whale in world who didn't go to the cold waters that year.
I fought against all my instincts, every bit of my own body's urge for the deep refreshing cold, and started to swim back into the warm waters, against the very current of the world. I did not know how long it took, but I soon reached the lands of my birth, and saw and heard nothing to eat.
I gave up living, in the end. Would you not? I had no family, or friends. I had nothing but the warm waters around me. I do not know how many children I had, or how they lived, for it was not our way. It was not our way to travel backwards during the time where we eat our fill and grow fat, but I also betrayed our way.
During the time my mind, in it's confusion, told me to find somewhere warmer, I heard nor saw no other whale. Fish of all sorts, yes, but they were all sick. Our little brothers and sisters, the dolphins and there own kin, I saw few, and they were...sick.
We talked little to them, my people, for they had the mentality of the cruelest individuals you could imagine. They killed for no reason and killed there own kin for amusement. I cannot say I miss them, but even then, at the end of my world, I felt pity for those mad individuals who sought out sharks and similar fish-folk to die, giggling as they did.
And so, that is how I lived my final days; in the warm shallow oceans, watching as it degenerated into oblivion. Not once did I notice that I had yet to be truly hungry, or that I had lost feeling in my body,for I was consumed by grief, for my people, for the other entities we could talk to and know that they lived lives of there own, and for my own fate.
Until, of course, I started to think about why this happened. The conclusion was simplistic, of course. It was the things on the surface who caused this unimaginable horror! It was they who killed the krill and the fish, and it was they who killed my kin!
It was a very long time until I heard another boat. It was small, and far off, but the noise it made angered me so that I left the place I had been floating in thought in and sped toward it. When I reached it, I saw that it's shadow was barely the size of a calf, but that did not matter to me.
I almost did nothing, content to stare at it with my ever worsening gaze, but a sudden impulse took to me to breach the water, something that had not done in a very long time as well.
Perhaps it was instinct that led me to fall on the boat itself, but it was my own idea to truly ravage the little creatures on it.
Is that so wrong, that I took revenge? I do not think so, for was it not the surface things that took away my people? Was it not them that ruined my home?
Soon afterword, I found that there were other ships, scattered near the shoars and boat-routes of old that my kin avoided for there very existance. Every so often, I breach near one of them.
The ships stop sometimes, then.
If they do not, I breach apon one of them.
That usually stops them coming into my waters for a very long time.
But they always keep coming back, bringing there noise with them.
But, as I have learned over my many years, with my body being cold and my flesh losing it's ability to keep heat, I need to do something to feel alive.
And so, I keep to my routine, with the hope that, some day, another of my kind will come and assist me.
"You signed us up to do what." I roared, knocking over the whisky bottle on the table as I reared up in my seat, making some of the other patrons in the diner look at me. Good.
The fool in front of me scowled and pressed a talon into the sheet of paper in front . "Look, it's a easy job. We babysit a crazy ghoul for a week and go back to shore. It's simple, Max."
We weren't even supposed to be here, anyway. We were supposed to have left on the last boat out, but noo, we had to stay another night on this stupid tiny island to wrap up the payment details of our last hit, some stupid pirate who thought that being as far away from the mainland as he was would make him free to dock freely.
"Tawn, don't fuck with me. This smells like bullshit. Are you telling me you have signed me-"
"Us." he interupted me, looking infuriatingly calm.
"You got us working as shipgriffons for some idiot who's looking for a whale!"
He shrugged. He was smaller than me and was far less well built, but that just made his shoulder all that more pronounced. "Yeah, your point? Easy job, Max. We stay on a ship and get our pay afterword."
I snorted and motioned over a scared-looking barmare to bring over another glass of whisky after I downed the one on the table. "Tawn, whales don't exist. Their like mergryffs and shit.This is a goose chase, you know this. Fuck, this is stupid, you...already set this up didn't you?"
Tawn gently wrapped his talons together and looked at me patiently. "You know perfectly well that whales existed at one point, but I do admit that our client is a fool. However, he is also quite agreeable in what he is offering."
I rolled my eyes. "Oh, like what."
Before Tawn could reply, the barmare shakily came over to our little white table and sat down two plates and my drink. The smell of good swordfish stew was one that I had been waiting for awhile, and even Tawn, who tended to be reserved, let his beak crack into a grin at the sight of his own. Looking at the mare, I smirked; she knew who we were, clearly, and that her boss probably didn't like her if she was serving us.
"Don't worry, cutie, we don't bite." I said, spreading my arms out wide and flaring my wings a little. That caused the barmare to do her best impression of a scared rabbit and quickly back off to a set of ponies who just entered the diner, sailors by the looks of them.
"Must you be such a fool in public?" Tawn droned on after I looked back at him. "You are hardly helping our reputation. We Talons are hardly appreciated as far from Equestria as we are."
I snorted and took the wide-handled spoon in the bowl in front of me and sipped the soup. "Tawn, you are the worst older brother ever. And these island ponies are stunty looking, it's hard to resist giving them a good scare once and awhile."
But he had a point, as much as didn't want to think about it. We had been operating out of Searoc's Rock for two years now, and during the first few months we had been out of work until we killed the pegusus bandit that had been using the lighthouse as a rest-stop. After that, it was all nice temp work, neither of us wanted to sell out our contract and we didn't have any friends otherwise. Seeing as the port was getting busier by the year,we never had any issues finding work in the Rock anyway. Two hundred ponies and growing in one of the few port cities not a completely soured hive of scum and villainy kept us working, considering most of the the little petty disputes that came with ponies were easy to solve with good guns.
Yeah, we had it made. Tawn was the marksgriffon while I handled the close combat. He was the short pony-sized talker, all black and weedy and brains, while I guess I was the big brown scary griffon who growled when I needed to and smiled when caps got exchanged after a job. We were a team, and a good one. 'The Crow and Eagle' we were called.
"Because I can, brother." I said, smiling after I swallowed a nice iron-y bit of swordfish. "So, why the hell are we working a boat? What sort of stuff are we getting out of this?"
He sipped his glass of red wine, which made him look like he had a bloody beak after he finished it. A happy accident in my book. "Simple. Look out the window."
"Oh, come on this isn't..." I finished lamely.
One of the many reasons this diner was frequently visited was that it was directly in front of the shipyard, which tended to have around five to seven in it at any one time. However, most of those ships were small fry compared to the one that dominated the shore now.
"Yes, before you ask, our client owns that ship." Tawn said mildly.
"What is he, one of those ghost-ship ghouls that pop up every so often?" I said mockingly.
That wasn't a joke. Insane ghoul crews operating ships out in the great blue sea were a real threat. Apparently there was one out in the Brayhamas that had a old working Equestrian aircraft carrier and another who used the 'undead pirate' motif who kept a whole crew on a old military craft.
And if my eyes were not betraying me, that ship looked military.
"A close guess, actually. He's old and senile, yes, but he's not feral just yet. The name of our client is Harpoon, and he is in fact a ghoul." When he saw the look on my face, he frowned. "There is nothing the matter with ghouls, brother. Anyway, he claims that he has no bits or caps, but we have free reign over what we would want on the ship."
I raised a eyeridge. "Really? See anything you like?"
Tawn shrugged. "Max, you know just as well as I do I would not have picked this up if I didn't. It is quite well stocked for a ship like it, and it has a small amount of interesting mechinery that we could use.
I gave it some thought, playing with the spoon in my claws for a few moments, and before I took a bite, I mumbled out a annoyed "Fine."
A day later, early in the morning, I was waiting on the deck of the ship, annoyed.
The ghoul was a crazy twit who had what seemed to be a small piece of wood where one of his hooves should had been, but Tawn agreed that he should be the talker here. That left me to fraternize with the crew.
And what a crew it was.
It was inspirational.
In a better world, thousands of weepy-eyed ponies would probably be watching a shitty movie about how they came together, despite there differences, to go hunt a creature that they knew didn't exist, while bonding and shit the entire time, all while talking about there friendship and there common bond of bloodlust and fish. They were all male, too, so I could only think about gay jokes.
There was earth pony navigator, Compass. He was a typical pony, slightly rounded and kind of paunchy, but he looked smart enough to carry on a decent conversation. He looked calm enough when we landed on the boat, so that was a good sign as any. He also told me the rest of crew's names and porpose on the boat as they came up from under it.
Four came up at once; their was a pegusi spotted by the name of Boomer, and he didn't seem to give a flippy fuck that I was lounging around, so I just made sure he saw me before he started flying. Two unicorn shipponies, Stubs and Starbuck, though, seemed happy to wander around a bit and not take notice of me at all. Stubs had a stumpy horn and Starbuck looked like he was hit with every branch on the ugly tree, and they looked like Dash addicts, so I didn't care if they didn't care about me. There was even a zebra by the name of Daggo, a harpooner, apparently, a big stout stallion with enough scars that it looked like he was pink from a distance.
He gave me a big friendly wave when he saw me from across the deck, so I didn't complain.
After a span of time that was too long for me, Tawn came up from below deck and told me where our rooms were, and I was glad to follow him. The entire upper ship stank of fish and rust, and it seemed that the below deck was a little better. Paint was ruined and the lights were jacked up, but I was happy to get out of the open with all the ponies above.
"You think this guy's well protected?" I said, a little pissed that I was here, fully armored and armed, instead of sleeping.
"You have yet to see the crew below deck, brother." Tawn replied.
I raised a eyebrow. He voice wavered a little. He must have had bodyguards or something. Could be other Talons, or even Dead Boys. Who knew what those fuckers were doing out in the ocean, but I'v seen them around. They wern't strong out in the seas like they were in the mainland, but they were around, and that was a concern.
"So, does Harpoon wish to see me?" I asked, bored already.
"No." Tawn replied quickly, quickly enough to make me raise a eye-ridge. "He was satisfied with what I told him of how we operate. You are going to handle a harpoon, while I take to one of the guns."
I opened my beak, opening and closing it a few times in pure rage.
"I'm going to be a what." I said, seething.
We were near the end of the hallway we were in, so Tawn took his time turning around. "He had a Balefire Egg."
I blinked. "What."
"It's in a glass case in his room. I asked for it, and he agreed."
"Tawn, you wonderful asshole." I said, trying not to sound too grateful. "Don't think this makes up for anything."
Tawn shrugged his bony shoulders and opened the door to our apparently assigned dwelling. "I know it doesn't."
I followed him into the room, taking care to look at it from a simple standpoint. It looked like a typical seaside dwelling, little knick-knacks all around. A tasteful picture of a boat here, a plastic lobster there, stuff you would expect to see. Two beds, one on each side of the room, seemed to be clean enough.
I chose the one closest to the air-conditioning.
Taking off my battle-saddle and all that was connected to it and laying it on a small pile on the floor, I yawned and hit the firm mattress.
"Tell me the real details about this 'morrow, okay?" I said, not caring if he answered. "I'm going to sleep."
"Okay." he said with all the emotion of a robot, "If you wish to do so."
Turning over in the bed, I flexed my wings once, put a arm out to use as a makeshift pillow, and fell asleep.
