Sitting on the deck, Dissero couldn’t help but smile.

Just look at it all, the majesty of Equestria as visible only from the air! Thick white clouds floating gently past against the backdrop of a clear blue sky, framed by snow-capped mountains far in the distance. A verdant forest passed by underneath, next to a series of rolling hills that gently cradled a small village in their protective embrace. Hoofdale, was it? It was harder to remember the names of the smaller settlements; they all began to run together once you’d been to enough.

Closing his eyes, Dissero allowed himself to simply feel it all. The wind playing with his mane, the crisp scent of the chill air this far up, the gentle hum of the cloud reactor and the ever present buzz of the propellers. Here, on an airship, he was at total peace.

“Hey, Dissy!”

His eyes snapped open, the moment slipping away like a scroll in a strong breeze. “What, Silver?”

“Come check this out!”

Turning, Dissero walked up the length of the ship and down the steep stairs which led to the cockpit. Silver was there, his flight goggles over his eyes and his headphones around his neck. “What’s up?”

Silver pointed with a foreleg and, following his direction, Dissero’s eyes alighted upon what looked to be the wreckage of a small airship, the battered and smoking hull laying at the foot of a tall, rocky hill. He could spot a pegasus circling the wreck, as if searching for something.

“Take us down,” Dissero said. “They look like they could use some help.”

Silver nodded, already spinning a wheel on one side of the room. “Yeah, no problem.”

Dissero made for his quarters at a brisk trot, feeling the airship gradually losing altitude. Glancing out the windows, he saw the hill face growing closer, and for a small moment worried that they too might crash against it. He stifled the thought quickly. Silver was an excellent pilot, despite what a trained professional might tell you otherwise.

Arriving at his quarters, he quickly grabbed his first aid kid and survival package, finishing by strapping a small sheathed knife to his chest. Satisfied, he made his way to the reactor room, poking his head in to see Stormslider peering out a window curiously.

“Are we making a detour, Captain?” she asked.

“Silver spotted a crash, we’re gonna go investigate,” Dissero answered. “Head up to the deck, and bring your first aid kit.”

The blue pegasus nodded in acknowledgment, and Dissero wasted no time in stepping back into the hall. Heading to the crew quarters, he stopped before Ember’s door and knocked politely.

“What do you want?” Ember called, clearly annoyed.

“There’s a crashed ship nearby. It looks pretty beaten up.”

Almost instantly the door was surrounded in the harsh red glow of Ember’s magic as it swung open. She was laying on her bunk, a geometric puzzle resting before her. “Is it hurt?”

Dissero was careful to hide his smirk at the mare’s reaction. “I’m not sure, why don’t you come see for yourself?”

After a few moments, the door swung shut once again, and Dissero heard the sound of her hooves hitting the floor and racing across her room. The mare wasn’t a very approachable pony by any standard, but she held a strange love for machinery. No doubt she was already gathering the tools she would need to see if the crashed ship was “hurt.”

Dissero made one last stop at the lounge, a somewhat cramped room bordering the kitchen which gained its namesake solely from the presence of the table and two sofas which adorned it. Cleaver was there, nursing a bottle of vodka.

“Cleav, head up to the deck. We’re looking at a crash.”

The big white stallion raised his bottle with a murmured, “Yes, Kaptain,” and Dissero stepped out of the room.

Arriving back in the cockpit, Dissero saw that Silver had brought the ship down to hover just above the treetops, and was closing in on the wreck. Now that he was closer he could clearly see the damage done to the ship. The hull had broken into three pieces, and several smoking parts littered the hillside and the freshly formed clearing around the crash site. To his relief, he saw a few more ponies picking through the remains. He didn’t see any bodies.

“Yikes,” Silver said as they came closer. “That’s one mean crash.”

“Kind of reminds me of something,” Dissero said, looking at Silver pointedly. “You reminded of anything at all?”

“Aw c’mon, Dissy. That was eons ago,” Silver said, keeping his eyes forwards as he guided the ship over the treetops. “And besides, that other guy was trying to run us down. Y’know if I’d had a better ship I bet I coulda easily—”

“Yeah. Mmmmhm.” Dissero gave an exaggerated nod. “I’m sure you could’ve.”

“Pfft, whatever.”

The sound of hooves approached from behind, and Dissero turned to see the rest of his crew standing just outside of the cockpit, examining the crash curiously. Ember in particular seemed to be especially worried, the mare’s orange eyes flitting back and forth over the wreck.

Beckoning with his head, Dissero started for the stairs. “C’mon, let’s go.”

The four ponies clambered up onto the deck, waiting patiently as the ship drew ever closer. After a moment the pegasus hovering above the wreck seemed to take notice of them, and quickly closed the distance.

“Thank Luna you found us!” the pegasus exclaimed, her bright yellow coat nearly invisible against the light blue backdrop of the sky. “I didn’t know what I was gonna do if nobody came along!”

Dissero cocked his head curiously. It was very rare to hear an Equestrian-born pony favor the princess of the moon over that of the sun. “Are you all okay?” he asked, squinting as the sun shone into his face from behind the pegasus. “Do you need any assistance?”

The pegasus glanced back at the crash, swaying slightly in a sudden breeze. “Nobody’s hurt, I think we’ll be fine. Yes… but!” She hesitated, raising a hoof to her chin thoughtfully. “We could use your help with something.”

Dissero exchanged glances with the rest of his crew and, seeing no objections, looked back up to the yellow pegasus. “What is it?”

“It would be very helpful if you could carry our cargo for us.”

Dissero frowned, somewhat taken aback by the request. A merchant’s cargo was his life; and when an airship crashed its cargo was often all that could get the captain back into another ship. To ask another captain to transport the cargo instead was very… unusual. He wasn’t sure if he trusted this pony, but it was possible she was operating a ferry service of some type. At the very least, he could see if the destination was somewhere closeby.

He felt the ship coming to a stop and, allowing himself to sway slightly with the motion, took another look at the now much closer crash site. The crashed ship’s crew seemed to be unloading its cargo into the clearing. Surprisingly, the large wooden crates didn’t seem to be damaged in the slightest. “Where does it need to go?” he asked.

Silver Feather climbed up onto the deck, trotting up to join the rest of the crew. “Alright, what did I miss?”

The pegasus flew a little closer, her hooftips brushing against the smooth metal surface of the deck. “I need you to take these crates to Harmony City.”

“Harmony City?” Dissero had heard of the place before. An independent city-state on the far eastern edge of the Known World, nestled between the borders of Equestria and Gryphos, a haven for smugglers looking for a safe rest stop or temporary refuge. He’d even heard that the Cloudwall was weak there, weak enough for a skilled crew to get through it, out of the Known World…

But he’d learned long ago that one should take the word of a drunk airpony with a grain of salt. Again, he checked with his crew. Most of them didn’t seem to have any objections, and Silver was even nodding excitedly.

“C’mon, Dissy,” the pilot said. “Think about it. It’s been forever since we went anywhere new.”

Well, when he put it that way…

“We’ll pay you,” the yellow pegasus added.

And that just about settled it.

“Alright, sure,” Dissero said. “We’ll deliver it for you, after we hit Canterlot.”

The pegasus broke out into a relieved smile. “Oh, thank Luna. Come on, you can set down over there and I’ll have my crew load it onto your ship.”

She flew back to the crash site, and Silver hopped back into the cockpit. Dissero watched silently as his ship floated gently over the clearing and lowered itself to the ground, remaining on the deck even as his crew went to help with the loading. There was a strange feeling building up inside him, a sort of giddy excitement, an anxious curiosity that he hadn’t felt in a long time.

He’d have to update his map again.

Author's Note

The adventure begins!