The Pirate Master

The sun shone brightly. The town near the docks was a unique place and was unlike what Rusty has ever seen.

"Welcome to ShadowDale, captain," Shadow said, showing rusty the small town with a lot of different ponies and saddle arabians.

ShadowDale had several docks and structures, but is known for the extreme heat that may occur. You shouldn't ask why it is named ShadowDale.

"I suppose you've been here before?" Rusty asked, wondering if Shadow has been in a town like this.

The town itself was larger than it looked like from a distance. The buildings were mostly made out of wood. But they had to focus on why they travelled here for now.

"No, not really," Shadow answered. "But I took some time to read about the different towns in Saddle Arabia before we left Ponyville."

Rusty and the crew trotted through the small town, noticing different events that occured. There were some bars, hotels and even some stores who sold random things.

They went into an old building with a poster of a ship. They assumed this was where they had to go to deliver the goods.

Rusty looked at the stallion at the counter which seemed to be a salespony of some kind. "Hey, captain Rusty. Long time no see?" he asked. "Do you have the goods I ordered?" the salespony asked.

Rusty pointed towards some of his crew, who were holding some crates. "Yes, Cactus. We got the goods," Rusty said to the salespony named Cactus.

"Great, I suppose you want the money now," Cactus said, giving Rusty a large sack of bits. "I'll tell you when I will need another delivery."

_______________________

Shadow looked at Rusty. "We brought more goods than we had to deliver."

"That's not true, Shadow," Rusty said. "The rest of the goods wil be sold in the docks, earning us a lot of bits in total."

"Have you planned this well enough?" Shadow asked Rusty.

"To be honest, I'm not entirely sure. But I will tell you how much the final earnings will be."

They trotted a bit across ShadowDale before coming to a hotel. "I guess we will stay here for a while before traveling back."

_______________________

They decided to stay in ShadowDale for a day before leaving. Rusty came up with the idea of he and Shadow could stay at the hotel.

The following day, when Rusty and Shadow trotted across town, Shadow noticed Rusty acted a bit suspicious.

Rusty trotted in to an ally, followed by Shadow.

"Why did you go here?" Shadow asked.

"Because somepony were following me," Rusty answered while taking his sword and charged at a pony behind him, pinning the pony to the wall. "Who are you?"

"Not gonna tell ya!" the pony answered.

Shadow looked at a wanted sign with the pony on the picture. "It seems like you are a wanted pirate," Shadow said, noticing the pony grinning. "Why were you following Rusty."

The pony began to speak, but it wasn't what they expected. "I have nothing to tell you," the pirate said. He spat at Shadow.

"Tell us, or I'll cut your throat off!" Shadow warned.

"Wait... We don't need to get violent, do we?" the pirate asked. "Ok, I'll tell ya. There's a masterious guy who wants ponies to kill ya, but there's nothing you can do to stop him, he's a pirate master." the pirate told.

'A pirate master?' Rusty wondered. He were beginning to wonder if the pirate were telling lies. "What's a pirate master?" Rusty asked the pirate.

"I don't know, I've only met him for a few minutes before he ordered me to kill you," the pirate answered. "Honest!"

"Where is he?" Rusty asked, now getting inpatient. But the pirate simply pointed a hoof towards a bar.

"Let me come with you," the pirate said. This surprised Rusty and Shadow.

"Why?" Shadow asked. "Weren't he the one who sent you?"

"Yes, he was. But I didn't like him. He just bossed around everypony. He wasn't very nice either. Betraying him would feel so good," the pirate said, now having an evil looking grin across his face. This made Rusty and Shadow a bit worried.

"You don't want to tell him you hate him?" Shadow asked.

"At least not alone," the pirate added.

The three entered the bar, noticed by some random ponies sitting by the tables.

"Follow me," the pirate said while trotting towards a table where two ponies sat.

Rusty looked at the ponies. The first one was a dark grey coated unicorn with red eyes. The other one seemed like a strong pegasus stallion, that had white coat and red mane.

"Is this him?" Rusty asked the pirate.

"What are you doing here with the  target I ordered you to kill?!" the dark grey coated unicorn asked.

"I'm sorry, captain BlackTooth, but I am sick of your torturing commands and orders. I am free now and there is nothing you can do about it!" the pirate shouted, making the ponies in the bar starting to listen to the conversation.

"Hmm, I've always known you would prove yourself bad one day, but this is out of hoof, Luck Hoof," BlackTooth said. "And you can forget about being part of my crew anymore!"

"BlackTooth..." Rusty said. "As a captain of the royal navy, I will have to arrest you for the following reason being a pirate lord and murdering ponies," Rusty said, having confidence in himself.

"Arrest me?" BlackTooth said, beginning to laugh hysterically. "I think you've got something else to worry about now..."

BlackTooth took his gun and fired up on the roof, surprising Rusty and Shadow.

But what they didn't know was that the gunshot could be heard from the distance, and was the signal for a pirate captain in a ship in the distance to do something.

"Ok, NOW!!!" the captain shouted, while watching as the ship shot cannonballs and sieged the town.

The cannonballs destroyed some of the buildings, which were seen by Shadow and Rusty. "We're getting attacked!" Shadow said.

"The ship in the distance. That must be the attacker!" Rusty said. Indeed that was true. It was a big frigate in the distance that fired its cannons at ShadowDale.

"Retreat!" Rusty said. "We must get back to our ship!"

"But Rusty, the ship isn't repaired. It got damaged from the last battle, remeber?" Shadow said.

But Rusty had his focus on BlackTooth, who were laughing at what happened.

"Order them to stop the siege!" Rusty shouted.

"It is too late," BlackTooth said. "I cannot stop this!" he shouted, while laughing evily.

Rusty drew his sword. "It's not over yet."

"Are you going to challenge a pirate master?" BlackTooth asked. "Because I've trained my whole life, so don't think this will be an easy fight."

Rusty only grinned. "Let's see about that," he said while trotting towards BlackTooth.

Rusty were surprised by the amount of quick atracks BlackTooth attempted. Rusty tried all he could on blocking the slashes, but it became too much for him.

The blade of Rusty broke when it hit BlackTooth's sword too hard. "How are you going to fight me without a sword?" BlackTooth questioned the dark green unicorn.

"I guess I'll just do this," Rusty said while throwing a bit towards BlackTooth. BlackTooth took the bit before it hit him, and using the time of the distraction, Rusty took Shadow's sword, galloped towards BlackTooth and slashed the sword through BlackTooth's chest.

BlackTooth landed hard on the wooden floor, and dropped something from a pocket in his saddlebag.

Rusty picked it up. It looked like a gold medallion of a cutlass.

"Rusty... the Crusador, remeber?" Shadow asked.

Rusty instantly knew what to do. "Shadow, we'll need to fix the Crusador later. For now we have a ship to sink and a town to save," Rusty said while galloping towards the Crusador.

Screams could be heard in the town. Pirates and thieves began to roam the streets. There were even beginning to come more ship in the horizon that shot their cannons at the town. It was a total disaster.

Rusty saw the Crusador near the docks. "Get ready to sail the ship!" he shouted to the crew.

After getting to the wheel, Rusty began giving orders. "Release all sails and arm the cannons!" Rusty ordered.

"Rusty, it would be impossible to sink all those ships," Shadow said.

"That's not the point, we will only need to sink one specific ship," Rusty said, while turning the wheel to the right to evacuate from the broadside cannons of a pirate ship.

"You're going to take down that frigate?" Shadow asked. He did not like that idea at all.

"That ship started this. If we take the captain..."

"Then what?!" Shadow asked frustated. "How will it stop all the pirate ships?"

"If we can't get the pirate ships to stop, we will at least get to know who these attackers were. This ship was ordered to attack the town, that's why I want to find out about this," Rusty said. He noticed they were chased by two pirate ships. One brig and one schooner.

The crew of the Crusador could see the frigate they looked for in front of them, a few hundred metres ahead of them. Rusty got an idea by this.

"Shadow, bring a pony with you to drop a few of our barrels," Rusty ordered.

"Rusty, the ships behind us would see that coming," Shadow said.

"I know, that's the plan," Rusty said, making Shadow wonder, but he ignored it.

A few barrels were thrown overboard, and the brig and schooner sailed to the side, just as Rusty planned. This made it easier to quickly turn around and shoot the cannons.

Rusty quickly turned the ship to the left, surprising the pirates, and ordered the crew to fire the cannons.

The cannons fired shots that spread from the brig and the schooner.

There were a lot of explosions on the brig, and it sunk, but the schooner was nearly damaged, and was coming closer.

Rusty saw it was a bit destroyed and could see a small weak point.

"Shadow, have you reloaded your gun?" Rusty asked Shadow.

"Sure, what will you need it for?" Shadow asked.

"I will need you to shoot at the schooner's weak point," Rusty said. "And don't miss."

"Got it," Shadow said, while holding the pistol with his magic.

Shadow shot the gun and hit perfectly at a destroyed area in the schonner. A big explosion could be seen. He hit the gunpowder storage.

"The frigate is coming," Shadow said, pointing to the other side of the ship.

"Fire the cannons!" Rusty ordered.

The frigate got nearly damaged, due to the size of it.

"We can't let that ship hit us," Shasow said. "The Crusador won't survive so much damage."

"What are your orders sir?" Shadow asked. Now getting a bit more nervous now that the frigate came closer much quicker.

"Our onliest hope is to board them," Rusty said.

The Crusador sailed quickly towards the frigate, colliding with its side.

"All try to survive, I'll find the captain," Rusty said. He quickly galloped and jumped over to the frigate. It would be a hard fight, because the crew was a bit outnumbered.

Rusty saw the captain trot to him while holding a sword.

The enemy captain had a blue coat, black clothes and a hood. Nothing more was known about this mysterious pony..

"I'll give you one chance to surrender," Rusty said, but the enemy captain just laughed.

"We'll have to see about that," the captain said while charging towards Rusty.

Rusty was used to this, but used a new trick to block the attack. He blocked the attack and somehow managed to quickly disarm his opponent and used his magic to remove the hood of the enemy captain.

Shocked was the perfect way to describe how Rusty felt now. Removing the enemy captain's hood revealed a light blue maned, blue coated mare known as Trixie.

"I suppose you didn't expect this," Trixie said.

"You... You're just that magician from Ponyville," Rusty said, while still being a little shocked.

"Wrong! Trixie is more than that now," Trixie said, while beginning to laugh evily now.

"But... Why?" Rusty asked, clearly wanting an answer.

"The Great and Powerful Trixie has no reason to tell you anything, even though you're going to die anyways," Trixie said.

"Enough of this talking, you've... I mean... Trixie had no reason to become a pirate even after those small things she did in Ponyville," Rusty said.

"Wait, you thought that Trixie became a pirate just because of the small things she did in Ponyville?" Trixie asked.

Rusty thought about this. At least Trixie didn't fight him while talking to him. He could see Shadow a few metres away, but it looked like he heard what Trixie said.

Rusty did a quick sign with his hoof for Shadow to take Trixie.

"Why did you become a pirate then?" Rusty asked, making Trixie get tears in her eyes. It seemed like he had hit a soft spot. Maybe she was unlike he had thought of her. Maybe she didn't like talking about the past.

But, in a quick *thud* Trixie was knocked out by Shadow.

"Good, we'll deal with her when we come to Ponyville," Rusty said. He noticed a pirate run towards them. Using his reflexes, Rusty quickly drew his sword and blocked the omcoming attack, and countered by stabbing the pirate.

The fight was far from over. Both the pirates and Rusty's crew were injured.

A few gunshots could be heard, so Rusty and Shadow quickly went to the crew to fight with them.

"Shadow, send me a pistol," Rusty ordered. Shadow threw a pistol to him, and watched as Rusty catched the pistol. Rusty them aimed at a pirate and shot, leaving the pirate dead on the deck.

"Rusty, a little help here," Shadow said while fighting two pirates. The battle was getting harder, since more of Rusty's crew began to die in battle.

Rusty quickly galloped to help Shadow, but a few pirates were between Rrusty and Shadow.

Rusty tried all he could on attacking the pirates, but it was getting too hard, and Rusty got a scar on his hoof and began bleeding.

Rusty threw his sword at the pirate in front of him and tackled a pirate at the side. Only a few pirates were left.

A pirate took his gun, aimed it at Rusty and a gunshot was heard.

But Rusty wasn't hit, he didn't feel any pain at all, but there was a pony that went in front of him and took the shot instead of him, and that was Shadow. He sacrificed his life to save Rusty. Rusty watched as Shadow fell on the deck and got his body surrounded with blood. Sorrow and anger filled Rusty's heart, and he quickly galloped to the pirate who shot Shadow, and slashed his sword, cutting off the pirate's head.

Rusty noticed that they had managed to kill all the pirates, but a lot of damage were brung upon his crew.

Rusty trotted to Shadow, and watched as he laid there. "No, Shadow... This can't be possible... Why?!" Rusty shouted to himself. "Why you?!"

"...."

The crew gathered around Rusty and Shadow. They were feeling as sad as the captain were. Shadow was a great leader and fighter. They could never imagine losing him.

"Why?" Rusty said, more sounding sad.

"... Rusty.." Shadow said, surprising them.

"I'll have to tell you something."

"What is it?" Rusty asked.

"Tell Celestia I tried all I could on defending you, and that... I suceeded," Shadow said, closing his eyes.

"No... You won't die... You can't!" Rusty said. "Please..."

"Rusty..."

Shadow didn't move or say anything else. Rusty was now about to cry.

"Shadow..." Rusty said, now crying.

"SHADOW!!!!"