Fallout Equestria: Homelands

By Somber

Chapter 1: To Distant Shores

“I’m bored,” Scotch Tape grumbled as she lay flat on her back, legs splayed wide as she stared up at the lead gray clouds overhead. “Bored bored bored bored bored. On a scale of one to ten, I am ninety-seven million, three hundred and twelve thousand seven hundred and fifty-two point five in terms of boredom. If my boredom were a mountain, it’d be this great big honkin’ rock of an island,” she said as she gestured at the blackened rocks around her. “If my boredom were water, it’d be this ocean surrounding us!” the olive green filly declared dramatically, sweeping a hoof at the gray waves that smashed against the boulders with great foamy splashes. She thrust her hooves into the air, wind snapping at her deep blue mane, declaring to the heavens, “I have become Ennui, Bored of Bored. Look on me, and give me something to frigging do!”

“So,” said a small, cloaked zebra filly as she pored over a number of worn and bent papers in the protection of the shallow alcove that was their meager shelter. Down by the waterline, Majina picked along gathering flotsam. Near Scotch Tape, on a rock, Precious snoozed beside a heap of firewood and seaweed. Large crab shells littered her rock, testaments to earlier victories over forays of dangerous sea creatures. “What you’re saying is… let me guess here… you’re bored?” Pythia didn’t look up, but in the depths of her hood, the satellite rings of an arcane tattoo were still barely visible.

“No, Pythia. I’m not bored,” Scotch Tape said as she glowered at the cloaked filly. Then she threw her head back and cried out, “I am booooooooorrrrrreeeeeeeeduh!”

“You can help me collect more seaweed,” the third occupant of the rocky spur in the ocean suggested as she set a wicker basket of the salty green fronds on a stone that had been dubbed the ‘kitchen’ simply because it was the only large, relatively flat place where they could build a fire and prepare meals.

“No, I don’t want to collect seaweed, Majina.” Scotch Tape grumbled, flopping back on her personal preferred rock. “Or eggs. Or starfish. Or those sour berries that give me the trots.”

“How about more driftwood? We can always use more driftwood, and your friend said we needed to collect lots,” Majina suggested brightly as she picked up a hollowed-out shell and started to rinse off the seaweed.

“I’m sick of hauling branches,” Scotch grumbled, glowering at the stack of salt-bleached wood she’d already stacked up next to the kitchen. “I don’t know why Thrush said to pick up sticks. It’s a waste of time.”

Precious lifted her head to glare at the three in annoyance before reaching over and grabbing some of the seaweed, balling it up and stuffing it in her ears, and flopping down again to resume her nap. The interruption didn’t suppress Scotch’s irritation with their situation one bit.

“Well, what about practicing your Zebra?” Majina suggested with a fragile smile.

“I’m tired of speaking Zebra. I’m so speaking Zebra that right now I’m not sure if I’m speaking Zebra or Pony!” Scotch Tape growled.

“You could always complain!” Pythia shouted at the young mare. “That’d be new!”

“Hey!” Scotch snapped, sitting up and jabbing a hoof at the zebra filly surrounded by papers. “We’re here only because you said we had to go to the zebra lands. This isn’t my fault!”

“Oh yeah?” Pythia narrowed her eyes. “Who was it that put us in touch with that drunk off her ass captain who left us here? Oh, right. That was you!”

“Girls,” Majina said as she moved between the two, stretching out her hooves.

“Hey! We were only supposed to be here for a week! One! Week!” Scotch snarled.

Pythia rose and mimicked staggering, swaying back and forth. “Ooooh. One doesn’t just sail to the zebra lands. My poor little piece of crap ship can’t make it. Wooooo… Gimme more rum…” she said in horrible impersonation of the unicorn captain who had delivered them to this rocky spar.

“Girls,” Majina pleaded as she glanced from one to the other and back. “Please stop! I don’t want to hear another stupid fight!”

Scotch ignored her, jabbing a hoof past Majina at Pythia. “It’s your fault we’re here! You can’t even say for sure what is in those letters, but instead of doing something smart, you say we have to go all the way to the zebra lands to figure it out!” Scotch Tape shrieked. “We should have asked somepony back home about it!”

“Right! Because ponies know everything! Oh, wait, you don’t! Because this didn’t happen in Equestria! Because Equestria isn’t the center of the damned universe!” Pythia shouted back.

“I... you... please...” Majina gasped as she stared desperately, and then she sat down in between the two and began to bawl at the top of her lungs. Precious sat up, glaring at the pair as her scaly tail scraped on the stones.

“Happy?” the dragonpony asked with a growl, a thin tendril of smoke issuing from a nostril.

As much as Scotch Tape might have wanted to keep yelling, or preferably start thumping Pythia, the sobbing zebra filly and angry dragonpony just took all the fight out of her. “Majina… I… ugh…” She rose to her hooves and walked away.

Not that there was all that far to walk.

The island Thrush had left them on was a twisted, blackened nub in the middle of the Zebrinica Sea, the large body of water separating Equestria from the Zebra Empire. Scotch had imagined a boat ride of a day or two. Imagine her surprise when they travelled for nearly a week before reaching this nameless series of blackened rocks sticking out of the sea. The highest point was about a thousand feet above the waves, the largest of a dozen or so rocky knobs rising from the water. There was no beach, save for a shallow spit of sand at what would generously be called a bay. Detritus was washed up along the shores, and during low tide the quartet gathered the salty green kelp that clung to the stones.

Scotch Tape clambered all the way up to the top of the island. She usually came up here between the rain storms that beat the island every afternoon, hoping for some sign of a sail or wake… or anything that might actually be a zebra vessel. And it was the only place where she could see something remotely interesting.

Foundations.

In the miles-wide shallow gulf between rocky spires, the eerie geometric patterns of foundations were still visible when viewed from a height. At low tide, they peeked from the waves in crumbling, barnacle-encrusted grids. She could make out streets, neighborhoods, and what may have once been a port of some kind. All of it had been burned down to the sea, along with whatever had covered the rocks they now called home.

Celestia One had been thorough. The pony solar megaspell had almost scoured the island completely from the face of the sea at the end of the Great War two centuries ago. Scotch Tape knew that, according to history, this island had been a base for balefire missiles and that had resulted in this destruction.

Not even Manehattan had been ravaged this badly. Even the Hoof…

“She stopped crying,” Pythia said glumly as she approached Scotch Tape from behind, making the pony start a little. Even after weeks, she still wasn’t used to how quietly zebras could move. The cloaked filly trotted next to her and sat down, gazing dully out at the ruins. “Sorry,” Pythia muttered, halfheartedly.

“She told you to say that, didn’t she?” Scotch Tape asked, and received a little smile in return. “I’m sorry I snapped,” Scotch Tape said, a little more sincerely. “I’m just so frustrated just sitting here.”

Pythia sighed, pushing back her cloak, her mane short and bristly. “You’re not the only one. I’ve read every single letter and note that Majina’s mom saved, and none of them are any clearer.” She withdrew one very worn and folded scrap of paper. The ink had faded, but the swirly zebra glyphs were clear enough. Though Scotch Tape could speak Zebra passingly, reading it was a whole different challenge. Apparently the zebras didn’t use an alphabet, but symbols for their words, each unique and with multitudes of meaning depending on their arrangement.

“‘Blind the Eye of the World.’ What does it mean?” Scotch Tape asked the question for what felt like the thousandth time.

“I don’t know,” Pythia growled at the letter. “I don’t even know what the Eye of the World is, but it feels important. But not even the stars are clear on it.” Pythia glowered up at the darkening clouds. “I wish my map was clearer!”

“Doesn’t it tell you anything?” Scotch Tape had asked that question a dozen times at least, in the futile hope that somehow the answer would change.

“I told you. All it tells me is that things up there are still interested in stuff down here. That’s really bad, but the whole future is covered in weird shrouds and veils and shadows that I can’t see through.” Pythia sighed, rubbing her face. “Once we’re with the zebras, I can try to find out more.”

“It must be annoying. Divination is your tribe’s thing,” Scotch Tape commented, earning a sharp glance from the marked filly. She raised her hoof in a placating gesture. “I just mean I understand. It’d be like me not being able to draw a straight line.” She glanced at her flank, the square and compass of her cutie mark signifying her engineering talent. Pity it hadn’t convinced others take her seriously.

Pythia, mollified a bit, sniffed. “Meddling with forces beyond the wit of mortals is the Starkatteri ‘thing’. But yeah. Frustrating. I know it’s important, though. This letter is from the Last Caesar to his personal priest, a high shaman. Anything between those two is a big deal. He wouldn’t just send gibberish. And the date.” She tapped the corner. “Sent on the Day of Doom, when your megaspells tore Zebrinica a new one.”

“Day of Doom.” Scotch Tape couldn’t find it as funny as she normally would, staring down at those ruins poking through the wave troughs. “So we need to go to Zebrinica to find out,” she said. “Do you have any clue where in Zebrinica we should start looking?”

“We've been through this. I’ve never been there. You always hear stories, though. Monsters. Megaspells. Malicious magic. Murderous meteorology.” She groaned. “Too much alliteration.”

Scotch Tape stared at her a bit. The earth pony might have been the oldest of the four, but even she wasn’t sure what that word meant in Pony. Zebra was refreshingly logical and lyrical, so she’d picked up a lot of the spoken word. Pythia’s word choice was occasionally just… weird, though. The zebra in question caught her stare, knitting her brows. “What?”

“Nothing,” Scotch Tape said, then gazed out across the waves. Since Blackjack had died, nothing had really gone right for her. Chapel, the town founded by orphaned fillies and colts, was now overwhelmingly adult. Stable 99, the place that had been her home, was now occupied by new ponies that might have welcomed her, but only as a curiosity. Psalm had been friendly enough, but she wasn't Lacunae. She wasn't really her friend. As for helping rebuild the Hoof, nopony wanted to listen to a filly. Damn it, all the ponies who hadn’t judged her on her age and size had run off, or worse… told her to be patient.

Her father wouldn't have been patient. He’d have done something, even if it was reckless.

But thinking about the past opened up a great big hole inside her, and thinking about the present frustrated her to no end. She glared out across the levelled city... and paused. “What’s that?” There, across the bay, something dark shifted behind the spires of stone. Something with sails. “Hey. Hey! There’s a ship there!” she said, springing to her hooves. She leaned over the edge and shouted down at Majina far below. “Ship! Light the fire! Hurry!”

“Wait, wait!” Pythia shouted, but it was too late. Precious turned to the prepared fire, took a deep breath, and let out a puff of emerald flame. Instantly the driftwood ignited, and damp kelp draped across the gaps started pouring out oily black smoke. “Damn it,” Pythia swore as Scotch Tape started back down, the cloaked filly close behind. “Didn’t you even listen to that rummed-up lunatic’s ramblings?”

“What? They’re a ship!” Scotch Tape said as they scrambled down to meet Majina and Precious.

“Yes, an Atoli ship!” Pythia said.

“So what? They’re sailors, right? Fishermen!” Scotch Tape replied, staring at the thick column of dark smoke rising into the sky.

“Right!” Scotch shouted as she ship came into view around a spur of rock, turning towards their spire. It was a true ship, rather than a patrol boat like Captain Thrush’s Seahorse. The sides were solid sheets of rust. Two masts held ribbed sails sewn together from dozens, perhaps hundreds of different pieces of cloth. Zebras milled about on the deck, and the sunlight that made it through the clouds flashed off the lenses of spyglasses.

There was one thing phenomenally clear, though: the black flag snapping atop the center mast depicting a decapitated unicorn’s head impaled upon a sword. “Also, pirates,” Pythia said glumly. “AKA, raiders.”

* * *

The zebras were divided into thirteen tribes, and according to Majina, those tribes were as distinct from each other as unicorns were from earth ponies or pegasi. The Atoli were born of the sea, their souls formed from sea foam and crashing waves, howling storms, and serene calmness. From the look of the half dozen zebras rowing over from the ship, a great deal of rust and shellfish was involved too. Four wore barding made of enormous spiny crab shells tied to frayed fishing net. The two that didn’t were no less intimidating, wrapped head to hoof in flapping canvas strips with strange wide-brimmed hats bleached white with salt.

“I’m thinking that Thrush’s whole ‘have no weapons’ thing was a big mistake,” Scotch Tape muttered as the longboat drew close enough for the gaff hooks, harpoons, and other spiny tools of maiming to be visible.

“Ya think?” Pythia muttered, taking a step back and pulling her cloak across her face. “Hopefully they don’t think my map and Majina’s blowgun are weapons.” She glanced at the small microcomputer on Scotch Tape’s leg. “What does your PipBuck thingy say about them?"

Scotch’s PipBuck could read a creature's hostile intent or lack thereof and show it as a colored bar in the direction it lay. Yellow was okay. Red meant they wanted to kill you. Scotch still didn't know how the damned thing made that determination, if it could see into the future or read minds or something even stranger, but it was more or less reliable. More or less. “Yellow be mellow,” she replied.

When they were only a few feet from the shore, the larger of the two canvas-wrapped zebras rose and stepped out… onto the surface of the water. She stood on the casually rolling waves as easily as if they were solid ground, walking towards the shore. The second and smaller wrapped figure tried to replicate the first’s feat only to sink up to their barrel for a moment, then struggle as if in thick mud to climb atop the waves.

The first looked back and… something… It felt like a lurch in Scotch’s belly or a pull right at the nape of her neck… but whatever the zebra did, the seas suddenly rose in a large wave, picking up the struggling zebra and setting both of the pair on a large stone at the shore. On dry land, both moved a bit more unsteadily; the boat remained off the sandy little beach, the four zebras left in it not leaving the surf.

The two seemed even more odd up close. Their canvas sashes were decorated with necklaces of fine gold chain. Pearls hung on strands that dangled from their ears, and the rims of their woven reed hats glittered with dozens of tiny shells. The only thing separating the two beyond their size and levels of seawater saturation was that the larger wore a prominent pendant made of large white feathers and coral beads while the smaller bore a blue pearl on a string around her neck. Scotch Tape and Majina shared a look, and then the pony pushed the zebra to the forefront as they approached.

“On our sacred island are you! How come to be here did you?” the larger of the two demanded in a haunty mare’s voice. Scotch Tape struggled to make sense of the Zebra. The mare's speech was so oddly accented that Scotch Tape wasn’t sure she heard correctly; it almost sounded like she was talking backwards or something! Then Precious moved between the fillies and the newcomers, and the latter's eyes widened in shock as they fell back. “That is what!?” The armed zebras in the boat began to move in alarm.

“She won’t hurt you!” Majina blurted, though Precious’s growl added an unwelcome degree of uncertainty to that assurance. The zebras down at the longboat started into the water as Majina squeezed her eyes tight before yelling, “We revoke the right of passage!” The pair froze and turned to regard each other, tilting their heads back a little. Pythia thumped Majina’s butt, and the filly gasped. “Invoke, I mean. Invoke the right of passage!”

That got eyes back on the fillies. The larger of the strange zebras pushed back her hat and pulled down a canvas veil and… wow. Scotch Tape wasn’t sure what she’d been expecting, but the larger zebra mare was… well… Blackjack would have been all over her. Glory, too. Eyes reflecting the depths of the ocean stared down at us. “Joking are you?” she asked. “Give passage to flotsam washed on our shores we don’t.”

“Traditions remember sister!” the smaller one said.

The larger sighed deeply. “Sky Altar call me. Blue Pearl call her. What name have you?” Their names were actually Ahulani and Lalahawa, but it was easier just to think of them with what their names meant.

“I am Majina of the Zencori.” Her name meant ‘A Happy Tale’, but Scotch couldn’t think of Majina as anything but Majina. “These are–”

Sky snorted with a disdainful toss of her head. “Care not I! Here stay shall you.” She started to turn away. “There. Satisfied Tradition have I.”

The smaller one pushed back her hat and yanked down her veil. “But invoked passage ship they have, Sister! Just ignore that–“ The younger mare, really a filly herself, was silenced with a glare and immediately lowered her eyes to the ground, tapping her hooves together as she swayed with the waves.

“Not important what invoke they,” the elder mare said, still glaring down at Pearl, before letting out a ‘tch’ of annoyance. She turned, her lips puckered sourly as she regarded the fillies. “How on our island come to be you? Castaways are you?”

“No!” Majina answered. “We are travelers seeking passage on the waves.”

“If from the sea escaped you, to the sea be returned should you,” she said lowly, now ominous.

“Try,” growled Precious, scraping her claws on the rock.

“See? Dangerous are they!” the elder said to the younger.

“Sister,” the filly growled back, impatient. “Rude being are you!”

“We are not castaways,” Majina repeated firmly. “We are passengers.”

“From the pony lands sound you,” the mare grumbled as she surveyed them. “Not free for all is passage.”

“We have firewood collected, and dry kelp for our feed,” Majina said at once, gesturing to the piles of each. “We’ve taken no treasures from the sea and bear no weapons.”

The mare’s lips twisted sourly, looking from the heap of wood to the kelp, as if searching for another reason for denial. The zebra mare’s eyes narrowed on Scotch Tape, and she instantly grinned. “Not to our enemies does extend passage! If you wish, swim, pony!” She turned immediately on her hoof.

“How our enemy is she, Sister?” the smaller one asked as she looked at Scotch. Unlike her sibling, her eyes were a lighter blue, like the clear sky. “Do harm wish you?” Scotch Tape struggled to keep her words straight and shook her head. The younger zebra turned to her sibling. “If not to the sea do belong they, and if no weapons have they, and if payment offer they, how deny them can you, sister?” Sky looked back. “Tradition,” Pearl pressed.

“Tradition,” Sky muttered darkly. The sister gazed out at the ruins in the sea, then turned and glared at Scotch Tape, lips pressed together in an ugly scowl. Then she pointed her hoof out at the waves. “That see you, pony? Now by the sea taken is our lands. Pony sorcery and pony megaspells by!” She turned her head and spat. “What to that say you?”

The earth pony stared out across the water. It was ridiculous to blame her for something that happened two centuries before she was born. On the other hoof, looking at those foundations poking from the waves. Block after block, disappearing into the distance of the bay. How large had the island been before it’d been melted away?

Scotch Tape blinked at the ruins amid the softly lapping waves. “I think...” she croaked dryly. “I think that you got it worse than we did.”

The mare blinked in surprise a moment, then narrowed her eyes again. “Ours were these islands. To a million Atoli people! By ponies killed. By ponies incinerated! Hear their cries can I!” She jabbed her hoof out at the calmly lapping waves, demanding, “Can you?” Scotch stared, imagining the screams of zebras as their islands were melted beneath the waves. Or maybe she wasn’t really imagining those wails.

“Two hundred years late to that battle are you, Sister,” the smaller one said solemnly. “Refusing them passage from the sea will not bring back our dead. Only disgrace them.”

The elder Atoli hissed through her teeth, glowering at the younger. Though Pearl recoiled, as if expecting to be struck, she did not lower her gaze. Finally, the elder returned to those seeking passage, examining the last of the four. After a brief look, she marched right up to Pythia and yanked her hood off. As the Starkatteri’s face came into view, Sky laughed triumphantly. “Ha! To bring a curse upon us seek they!” She laughed again, backing away and spitting to the side. “Not even should the seas dry take you would I.” She turned back towards the waiting longboat. “Come, Sister.”

“Of the blood is she!” the younger shouted, remaining where she sat.

“Cursed blood has she,” the other quipped flatly. “Stay here till she rots can she. Come, Sister,” she repeated.

“Here, in this place, passage deny you? Now? In the eyes of our dead?” the younger mare yelled back. “Who will curse our ship is you!” The older mare glared back, making the younger flinch, but she maintained her ground. The four armored zebras in the boat were looking pretty uncomfortable with all the yelling.

“Who you are talking remember you! Elder am I,” the older said firmly. “And sister!”

“Our Tradition remember you! For all of the blood passage!” She pointed a hoof back at Pythia. “Cursed and wretched be she, but better are we if abandon them here do we?”

“Hey, watch it with that wretched talk,” Pythia muttered. Scotch Tape was just glad they had an advocate.

“Not know what you demand do you, sister.” The elder pointed a hoof at Precious at the back of all of them. “That thing is what?! Nothing of transporting monsters says Tradition! Stays it!”

“Precious is our friend!” Majina said sharply. “How can you demand she be left behind?” Majina threw her forelegs around Precious’s neck, staring at Sky with wide, tear-swimming eyes and a quivering lower lip.

“Young as the three of you is she?” the little zebra shaman asked, and Scotch immediately nodded. “Before the age is it! Are they! That demands all Tradition!”

Scotch frowned. So was there some kind of protection for the young? “I’m not a filly anymore,” she muttered, only to get jabbed in the ribs by Pythia. Precious leaned away from Majina with an uncomfortable curl to her lip while the filly kept up the pleading eyes.

The elder mare stared at them for a long time, frowning and clearly not happy with this situation but now thinking. She groaned and covered her face with a hoof. “Not like this will the captain,” she muttered.

“Do what you say is right will our mother,” the younger said as she relaxed.

“On the docks stayed our mother. Only the captain is here,” she said gravely, then sighed. “Here wait. Some calming the waves require will this,” Sky said wearily as she turned and trotted back to the boat. After talking briefly to one of the shell-adorned zebras, she got back in the boat, and one of them remained behind, standing in the surf of their little island.

Pearl waited all of ten seconds before she began to dance on her hooves in glee. “Passengers taking are we! Passengers taking are we!” she said, grinning widely.

“Whoa, what’s the big deal about passengers?” Scotch Tape asked. Majina released Precious, who backed away a few feet and watched with sharp eyes.

She stopped her prancing in place and blinked. “Tradition!” she said, as if that explained everything. When she received blank stares, she went on, “Three old traditions has our tribe: Fishing, the waves protect, and passengers carry.” Her smile disappeared as she moved onto a boulder so she could better see the ruins. “Many traditions have lost we. No longer carried are passengers. Other ships fight Atoli. At what is lost despair our ancestors and the spirits of the sea.”

“You mean Atoli are turning into pirates,” Scotch Tape amended. “Raiders.”

She gave a nod. “Do many. Perhaps do most. But Tradition respects Abalone!” Pearl sounded optimistic, but Scotch couldn’t shake how eager her sister had been to leave them behind. The zebra shaman gestured to the ruins. “Us practicing Tradition see they. Honored are they.” Her smile and eyes faded a little, and she added, “Hope I...”

“You think your ancestors are still here?” Scotch Tape asked as she gazed out at the ruins.

“Do not you?” Pearl seemed shocked by the question. Scotch stared out at the grid left behind and shivered at the thought of thousands of ghosts wandering the waterlogged streets and cowering in the coral-encrusted basements. “From sea are born Atoli. To sea return we.” Her sad gaze returned. “Come to this place now do few Atoli. Someday, by reef and water covered will be they. Forgotten will be our ancestors.”

Pearl trotted down to the edge of the water, fished a coin from her scarves, bowed her head towards the ruins, and, murmuring, threw it out into the waves. The copper disk flashed in the light, and Precious bunched up and launched herself after it as it flipped through the air, coming to a skidding stop on the edge of the waves as the coin disappeared into the water. She pouted after it. A moment later, a wave ran over the ruins, running perpendicularly across the smaller ripples and splashing Pearl’s hooves and Precious’s face. She glowered grumpily at where the coin had disappeared before stalking back up to her perch.

Scotch Tape glanced back at Majina and Pythia, but the former was gazing out at the sky and the later wore a tired, skeptical expression. Then Pearl turned back from the sea and began asking questions of Scotch Tape and Majina. They told her about leaving the Hoof and how they’d gotten to the island, getting a little frown at the mention of pony sailors going there. By the time they finished, the longboat had returned with Sky Altar.

“Agreed has the captain,” she said evenly. “As partial payment will serve your wood. Some work must do you, pony.” Then she glowered at Pythia. “Not leave the longboat will you, until decides the captain!” Sky smirked, “A long long time take will that hope I!”

“Maybe in the meantime I’ll figure out why they’re backwards talking,” Pythia muttered.

They had to wait several minutes for the boat to be loaded with all the driftwood and kelp they’d collected. During that time, the two sisters did something over by the ruins that involved burning smelly wood and scattering petals of some flower on the waves.

“What are they doing?” Scotch Tape softly asked Pythia. “Some kind of spell?”

“They’re letting the dead know that they are not forgotten. They’re shamans. They deal with spirits. To them, the dead are just another kind of spirit,” Pythia muttered, her voice oddly respectful.

“Aren’t you a shaman?”

“Technically. More accurately, a seer am I.” She blinked and hissed softly, “Damn it, now I’m starting to do it!”

“What’s the difference?”

“Shamans make deals with spirits. Quid Pro Quo… this for that. They get the spirits to do things for them and serve as intermediaries between spirits and the people. Seers see and speak with spirits to know things. You saw how they made the waves do things and walked on water? That’s zebra shaman magic.”

“So why aren’t you a shaman?” Majina asked.

“Because you really don’t want to make deals with the kinds of spirits that my tribe does. They’re not nice at all. Cross a water spirit and, at worst, you spontaneously drown. Cross a star spirit and they’ll curse you until the end of time, leaving you trapped in a book bound with your own skin, or melting your body and eating the soul... need I go on?” she hissed, eyes angry as she glared at the filly, who averted her eyes with a shiver. “Even those spirits aside, my tribe attracts the worst kinds of other spirits. I wouldn’t attract a water spirit. I’d draw a toxic waste spirit. Trust me, we’re all better off if I don’t play shaman. I only did it once, for Blackjack. That was enough.”

Sky and Pearl finally finished their rituals, which concluded with some kind of elaborate, fluid dance on their hind legs, with swaying hips and hoof movements and singing in Zebra so accented that Scotch didn’t have a chance of following. Something about the voice of the sea, or something. After that'd been completed, everyone boarded the longboat, with only two zebras rowing. Precious sat in the dead center of the boat, curled up in ball. “A nice settlement is Rice River. There often trade do we,” Pearl commented brightly, before she frowned. “Though not off the ship allowed am I.”

“And never will you be, if anything about it say I! Not until older than me are you,” Sky replied, shuddering. She caught the four staring at her and snapped defensively, “Very strange is Rice River. Too strange! No more talk about Rice River shall I!” She clenched her jaw and gazed out at the waves as they approached the rusty stern of the ship, as if demonstrating her unwillingness to talk about it.

It was easily three times the size of the Seahorse, with two reefed masts. The ship was actually wood, deep red planks that gave an impression of rust. Not that there wasn’t also quite a bit of corrosion streaking the surface wherever metal was exposed. Scotch Tape nearly winced at the state of those poor winches.

“Well in that case,” Pythia asked, “have you heard of the ‘Eye of the World’?”

“Do not to me with your cursed words speak!” Sky snapped at the filly. “Not take you at all would I, but what harm you might do to the spirits of our people fear I!” When Pearl started to open her mouth, “Don’t to her speak you either, sister!” Pearl huffed, glaring at her sibling.

The marked filly rolled her eyes and gestured to Majina, who still stared off at some distant point, then jabbed her side with a hoof. “Oh!” She blinked and then looked at Pythia, then at the two zebras. “Have you ever heard of the ‘Eye of the World’? It’s not in any of my stories.”

Sky appeared to be sucking on lemons. Pearl glared daggers at her older sister. “Tradition!” hissed the younger mare, narrowing her eyes. “Passengers are they! Rude to passengers are we?”

“Better a hold of rotting fish to have,” the elder sister muttered, then relented with a sigh. “Not know do I,” Sky admitted, grudgingly. “Of sea and wind know we. With spirits of both do deal we. Enough for us is that.”

“In Rice River find more may you,” Pearl suggested.

The boat was hooked onto a gantry and lifted from the water up to the ship’s stern. Scotch Tape swallowed at all the yellow bars, and the few red bars mixed in. With this many zebras, she’d never be able to separate the most hostile from the others until they were up close–

Oh, this was the zebra in charge.

There had to be something about captains and hats. Maybe it was so that in an emergency everyone on board could find the person in charge by just looking for the hat. This zebra wore a brilliant red bandana decorated with hundreds of tiny gold coins that flickered in the sun. She wore red sashes around her neck and a matching vest that glimmered with the tiny golden disks. Her boots were every bit as brilliant. Once you looked past that, though, the frays and worn threads became visible. Still, there was no rust at all on the curved, thick chopping sword. The mare herself was thick and solid, too, with that authoritative glare that Scotch Tape associated with Rivets, the mare in charge of Maintenance back in her old stable.

“I welcome you, passengers, to the Abalone. I am Captain,” she said as unwelcomingly as possible. “I accept your wood as partial payment for passage to the port of Rice River.”

“Whoa! Why aren’t you talking backward?” Scotch Tape blurted, and was immediately nailed with a glare that would have done Rivets particularly proud. “I mean… ah… shutting up now.”

Her eyes drilled into Majina and then softened a little. “My shamans say you are Zencori, yes?” Majina gave a tiny little nod. “You can pay with stories.”

“I don’t know many stories,” Majina replied quietly, dropping her eyes. “Mother died before she could teach me all she knew.”

“Then you can tell us about the pony lands,” the captain amended, her voice a touch softer. Then she regarded Scotch Tape far more skeptically. “You. Pony. What can you do?”

Well, she doubted that these zebras needed a community designed or a bridge built, so she responded as she would to Rivets. “I can fix things. From the look of those winches, you’re in desperate need of someone who can do that.”

A grudging smile. “You two will bunk with me for this journey. I feel that will avoid the risk of accidents.” She nodded aside and let the two on board. The crew were dressed much like the captain, with scarves wrapping their striped bodies. They all reeked of fish. Precious hopped onto the ship, getting a dozen startled looks from everypony except the captain. The captain was silent a moment before saying evenly, “We will find somewhere, something, for you to do.” Precious kept her eyes to the deck as she slumped a little. Then the boat began to drop back towards the sea with only Pythia aboard.

“Let me guess, stay in the boat?” Pythia ask sourly. The captain nodded, and she sighed as she as she dropped below the rail. “Called it.”

“You will remain there until I decide where I can safely stow your cursed hide!” the captain called down at her. “If you do not like it, then swim!” And she turned away, walking towards a small cabin at the rear of the boat. Scotch Tape, Majina, and Precious hurried after her. Pearl and Sky followed close behind.

The captain’s cabin felt more like a storage locker with all the cabinets, shelves, and chests. Even the ceiling was covered with netting that held all manner of clothes, scroll cases, and equipment. Scotch wasn’t exactly sure where they were supposed to find room to sleep with everything so crowded. There was one bed with a rail around it, one desk, and one chair bolted to the floor.

The captain swiveled the chair and took a seat, regarding the pair of shamans. “A breeze entreat, Sky. The good sandalwood use you. The sooner at Rice River are we, the better. Remain, Pearl.” The elder sister nodded and left, and the younger took a seat on the floor. Majina, Scotch Tape, and Precious joined her. The Captain pulled her hat off, set in on the table, and vigorously scratched her matted mane before regarding the pair.

“To answer your question on deck, Scotch Tape, I don’t speak backwards. I speak Atoli. It is our dialect. I also speak to land dwellers like you, and have learned how to rearrange my words to suit.” She sighed, rubbed her eyes, and glowered at the pleased Pearl. “Do not look so satisfied. Yes, we are satisfying Tradition, but you have brought a Starkatteri, a pony, and a ponything to my ship. Not pleased am I.” That wiped the smile off her face. The captain stared at her for a few seconds more before finishing, “But I will honor Tradition,” she said as she regarded the four, “no matter what trouble it brings.”

“I can see how it’s a problem,” Majina said with a worried frown. “Four fillies showing up on your island demanding passage. Your crew must not be happy.” That made the captain’s brow lift a bit.

“You’re not afraid of me?” Precious asked, almost suspicious as she worked her claws in the wood of the floor.

In a snap, the captain’s hoof whipped around and smacked Precious’s head with a rolled up paper. “Do not scratch my deck!” she said firmly, getting an incredulous stare from the dragonfilly. “And no. I’ve seen and fought far worse things than you on my ship. If you try to cause trouble, or are careless with fire, you will see how easily I can throw you off my ship, even if you are little foals.” Precious glowered at the rolled up paper still in the captain’s hoof, but then looked away with a disdainful sniff.

While glad the captain wasn’t afraid of Precious as the others had been, Scotch couldn’t help but point out, “Hey, I am not a foal! I’ve done things! Grown up things. Multiple times!” That got shocked gawks from both the Majina and Pearl, while Precious and the captain just gazed flatly at her, clearly unimpressed. She wilted under their scrutiny. “Just saying… I’m not a child.”

The captain did not reply at first, but in her eyes Scotch Tape saw herself being tossed overboard. “Duly noted. Had I been told such, you’d have been left behind,” she said evenly. “I am under no Tradition to extend passage to ponies. So be aware that Tradition gives you protections as a child. You should be thankful for such before you are so quick to declare your maturity.” She rubbed her face. “And a Starkatteri. What madness would compel you to travel with such a creature?”

“Pythia isn’t a creature!” Scotch Tape defended immediately, but once again she withered under the glare of the captain. There was room in the trailing boat for two, she reminded herself.

“Please, Captain. I know the Starkatteri have a reputation for wickedness, but she’s different. She’s helped out,” Majina offered in much softer tones.

“If she has, it was only because it served her interests, not yours,” the captain said evenly. “Starkatteri are deceptive, manipulative, twisted, and vile. They attract the worst spirits and draw on the foulest natures of people. Had we some other rock to dump her on, I would say her passage ends there. Let the sea take her.” It was chilling how seriously she said such a thing.

“We’re trying to find out something,” Majina said. “Something about blinding the Eye of the World. She thinks it’s important. Given what happened in Hoofington, I think it’s important too. Mother always said the Starkatteri were always aware of the deeper story of the universe.”

“The Eye of the World is what?” Pearl asked her mother. “How blind the world can you?”

The captain closed her eyes and sighed. “Of the land, on the land, should stay troubles,” she told her daughter wearily. “Your sister go help,” she told the young shaman, in a tone Scotch knew well; she heard it every time an adult didn’t want to bother with her.

Pearl seemed to know it too as she trotted to the door and paused. She pressed the blue pearl to her chest a moment, and then said back to the captain. “Honor Tradition, we should, think I. And Abalone wants that too think I.” Then she turned and stepped out.

The captain sighed, seeming to reconsider, though not happy with it. “I will have her transferred to the hold when night falls,” she said at last. “She will remain there.” She fixed her eyes out the windows that ran across the back of her cabin. “It is bad luck to slay the cursed ones. They are to be shunned and punished. You will have great difficulty if you maintain company with her.”

“We can’t just abandon her,” Majina countered simply. “She’s our friend.”

“Your friend,” Precious muttered.

“Ehhh…” Scotch Tape began, then shrugged. “She’s a pain, but I think she’s trying to do a good thing.” Besides, it wasn’t as if she’d had much else to do with herself.

“Perhaps, though I expect a Starkatteri to change their nature as much as I expect a current to reverse its flow,” the captain replied, then rose. “For now, you have passage and protection of Tradition. Pearl and Sky will remind my crew what that entails. I ask you to show restraint and good sense. We are a long way from Rice River, and the sea is fickle.”

With that, she trotted out as well.

“I wish she’d given her name,” Scotch Tape muttered.

“She did,” Majina said. “A ship’s captain is named Captain while she’s on board. Technically, her name is ‘Captain of the Abalone’, but still, Captain. Any feats or heroics she performs will be the ship’s, the same with any failures.” She regarded all the parcels in the ceiling net. “Still, she’s going out of her way to help us.”

“Yeah. I know. They could have left us. Or killed us. Or enslaved us,” Scotch replied. Precious let out a skeptical snort, reaching out to scratch her claws on the deck before her. The earth pony sighed as she regarded two maps set on the wall. The zebra lands looked... odd. Equestria spread out radially from Canterlot. It really was the center of the realm. The zebra map looked like a blotchy patchwork. Roam was all the way on the southern edge of the landmass. It took Scotch a while to find Rice River. There, on the northeast corner of the zebra lands, a river driving north to the sea. The river bisected half the landmass, slashing diagonally across it towards high central mountains. There were all kinds of strange glyphs and markings drawn on it.

Each sector seemed to have its own different splotches of color, and somewhere in the past someone has scribbled pony comments here and there. Twelve o’clock was more mountains, these snowcapped. One o’clock was deserts. Two and three, grasslands. Four and five, forests. Six, jungle. Seven was more grassland, with Roam. Eight was plains with lots of cities. Nine, forests. Ten, swamps. Eleven, more grasslands, with Rice River cutting right down the middle. To the northwest of the map was a section marked ‘Yakistan’ in Pony, and a narrow land bridge at 8'o clock was marked ‘to Equestria’. There were other foreign lands marked around the country, too. ‘Cervinia’. ‘Dromidaria’. There were also areas marked with crosshatching, titled with ominous names like ‘Realm of Fire’, ‘Land of Eternal Ice’, ‘City of Murderous Apples’, and simply ‘Death.’

Nowhere was there an ‘Eye of the World’.

“Do you think we’re doing the right thing?” Scotch Tape asked Majina and Precious. The dragonfilly just gave an indifferent shrug.

The zebra filly hung her head. “I think it doesn’t matter what we do. We have no one back home. We’re too young to be treated as adults. There’s nowhere any of us really belong. So… why not go looking for the Eye of the World and find out if it’s been blinded or not?”

Scotch trotted over and hugged her. “It’ll be okay, Majina. We’ll be okay.” If only she sounded more convincing to herself.

* * *

The Abalone wasn’t what Scotch Tape imagined when it came to a zebra ship. Zebras were graceful and fast. The Abalone wallowed in the sea like a pig. Every wave seemed to make the ship wobble in at least two different directions, and it took three days for Scotch to settle her stomach. The two-masted schooner, which was what kind of ship it was, apparently, bobbed along almost casually.

This ship wasn’t made for daring raids or deadly fights or cutting swiftly to and fro. The Abalone was a fishing vessel, and so two trawling nets followed along on either side while a half dozen lines trailed her at any moment. When the nets were hauled in, they disgorged dozens of small fish into buckets that were then sorted, gutted, salted, and stored within the hour. The lines usually came up empty, but every now and then they’d reel in a fish bigger than Scotch Tape! The first time it happened, she marveled at their silvery sides and working gills.

Then the fish went on the table, and before it stopped flopping, the zebras had it sliced to pieces. They worked in teams of two, scooping out the guts, separating the filets, cutting them into manageable pieces, washing them in brine, and then moving them to the smoker in the middle of the ship. The large drum sat on a bed of wet sand and voraciously consumed the salt-impregnated wood that the four fillies had collected, producing gray smoke. Fish went in, smoked fish came out, and that went in padded boxes. The bones and guts were transferred to a grinder and chewed up into a reeking slurry, called shaloosh, that was collected in clay pots.

Scotch adapted to the Atoli diet by the third day. The Atoli ate mostly kelp; Scotch had thought seaweed was just seaweed, but apparently there was a great variety ingested by the Atoli. Flat leafy weed called sauri went into everything. Skinny red weed, shagi, was a bitter-tasting variety that apparently aided digestion. One weed covered with bright yellow gas pockets was chewed all day, the weed giving little bursts of energy if it was just masticated but cramps if swallowed. Blue, slimy weed was pulped up and used as a condiment, puki. It sure tasted like puke to her. Thin green weeds were stripped of their leaves and set aside to be woven into rope. There wasn’t anything grown in the sea that the Atoli didn’t use somehow.

Fish was always a staple, too. She couldn’t eat fish organs raw like they did, though. That was one place she drew the line. She knew ponies could eat meat, but she didn’t like it much. The only condiments besides puki were salt and a syrup called sahi, or ‘liquid sunlight’, that had to be the sourest-tasting gunk she’d ever tasted. And it was put on everything! They’d dribble the thick concoction over fish, kelp, rice, and anything else they could. The concentrate of oranges, lemons, and limes apparently warded off things that caused your teeth to fall out.

They stopped twice, the first time to break out a large fishing net and pull it around a school of fish lured in place by the contents of a shaloosh pot. The entire crew, with the exception of Captain and the two shamans, worked to turn those fish into smoked meat. A few fat ones that were full of eggs were tossed back free of the net. The rest fell to knives. Octopi caught in the net were devoured still alive with relish, the large ones chopped up, the small ones whole. The rest went into the grinder.

The second time was when they reached a bed of clams that were apparently the Abalone’s namesake. Here, the Atoli grabbed rocks tied to ropes and rode the rocks all the way to the bottom. They’d come up with nets and baskets full of oysters. Then a dozen zebras would haul the rocks back up. Then they’d do it again.

The clams went on the table and the crew went through them with more zeal and gusto than the fish. Knives artfully opened each bivalve and the meat was carefully searched. Every ten or twenty, a zebra would cry out when they found small pearls. These were passed with great reverence to Pearl, and the filly conducted them to the captain. The meat went in the smoker, if it wasn’t eaten raw by the worker, the guts went into the grinder, and the shells were saved until they were underway. The last trip down to the sea floor, however, one of the divers didn’t come back up. That had come dangerously close to getting ugly, with some of the zebras muttering about cursed tribes and casting dark looks to their passengers. The others said that the sea had simply taken its price. Either way, soon after, the ship moved on from the clam beds. They resumed fishing.

Once the ship was underway, the crew not running it or fishing carefully cut the rainbow nacre inside the shells into beautiful rainbow-hued tiles. The youngest mares and stallions used bony fish plates to carefully cut them one by one, while the oldest took the largest shells and cut tiny figurines for trade.

Not that every fish or clam could be eaten. For every one that ended up on the table, two more had to be thrown back. They were diseased, or mutated, or simply of a type so bony or scaly that they couldn’t be eaten, which was a feat. The Atoli ate almost anything that came out of the water, but if a fish clearly had bloody sores along its side or a clam sported gross, bulbous red tumors, they simply fed the whole thing to the grinder. Once, a beautiful silver fish was taken out, but the other side had been a mass of squirming pink worms growing out of its gills and eye socket. That had been dried and then fed to the fire.

And that was when Sky and Pearl got to work, placating the crew by placating the spirits. Pearl performed dances and dripped pristine water from the mainland into the sea, or occasionally tossed in gold coins. The spirit’s well wishes were apparently worth more! Sky burned special incense, tossed bits of chaff or dried petals into the air, or, most inexplicable of all, flew kites bedecked with a multitude of colorful streamers. And she looked so serious while doing so. And everyone else on board took it seriously, too.

Because any time a fish came up with worms or disease, or didn’t come up at all, one word was invoked more than any other: Starkatteri. Usually with ‘damned’ in front of it. Not that Scotch Tape had a free pass for this trip. ‘Damned pony’ was used quite a bit, but generally on a level of personal annoyance. ‘Damned Starkatteri’ was used almost like a religious oath.

Scotch had helped pay some of Majina's debt by spending the evenings telling Captain everything about her former life. About living in a stable, how her mother had been killed and she hadn’t even known who her father was till she’d left. About Blackjack, Glory, Rampage, and all the other ponies. About the Eater of Souls, going to the moon, and the end of the Hoof. About her father dying, and her getting hauled away. Captain might not have believed everything, but she didn’t question her honesty or sanity. And when she’d talked about feeling useless in the Hoof, Captain assured her that she would be ‘useful’ on the Abalone.

Scotch made herself useful as Captain had directed: fixing whatever she could. The Abalone suffered from corrosion in the worst possible way. While much of her was wood, metal bolted her together. The metal winches that were vital to the ship’s operation needed to be completely torn down and rebuilt. While much could be done with wooden pulleys and zebrapower, they needed the metal fittings to work right. Scotch spent hours with a rag and some shell grit scrubbing rust from fittings and oiling them with the secretions of a flatfish. The fishoil wasn’t industrial grease, but it would help shield the fittings from the salt. She also spent a lot of time scrubbing the deck with seawater and a white powder that apparently killed fungi and woodworms.

“Pony! Take this shaloosh down to the hold!” shouted a stallion. Another duty the zebras were happy to foist onto her. At least her time on the ship had helped her Zebra immensely. Their phrases no longer sounded backwards to her. The clay pots were heavy, and the wooden stoppers leaked, and one spill and she’d have a heck of a mess to clean up. Still, she was an earth pony, and it didn’t matter how much the ship swayed. She’d scrubbed the decks enough that she wasn’t cleaning up ground fish guts. She made her way below deck.

The only time the crew wasn’t doing something was sleeping. Even while they weren’t ‘working’ they were doing things. Gambling with bits of abalone shell. Playing strange little songs on flutes. Having sex. Her stable 99 upbringing had inoculated her against the shock of coming across two zebras rutting away. The one single time Majina had gone down below decks, the poor filly had returned with a harrowed expression and hadn’t left the captain’s cabin for a day. The Atoli didn’t seem to have marriages or set partnerships. ‘You, now’ seemed to be sufficient. Gender didn’t seem to matter. A pregnant mare was a blessing, but she’d be left at one of their ports till she’d given birth and the baby was weaned. Then, back to sea.

Down in the hold, things were quiet, but stinky. The odors of smoke mingled with salt and the sweet stench of fermenting and rotting fish guts. She passed two stallions having a discreet rut in the hold and made her way to where the shaloosh was being stored. The clay pots fit in wooden shelves snugly. After she roped the new one in, she trotted to Pythia, the bilge gurgling and sloshing like a miniature sea under her hooves.

The filly chilled out on a hammock of fish netting strung above the empty clay pots, poring through one book intently while another rested on her chest; her only source of light was a single fish oil lantern that cast a wan yellow flame. Precious had made a cozy bed in a broken pot lying on its side, her muzzle and forepaws sticking out as she snoozed. “How are you doing?” Scotch asked, getting a flat stare in lieu of an answer. “Right. ‘Stuck down here.’ I got ya.”

“I’ve been trying to think of what we should do when we get to Rice River,” Pythia answered as she put the book down. “Captain loaned me these so I could try to learn more about where we’re going. They’re out of date, but better than nothing. If we can’t find a shaman who can tell us what the Eye of the World is, we’re going to have to go to Roam.” She reached up to a little alcove between the beams and the deck above to pull out the letters.

“Is Roam still there? I thought it was destroyed like Canterlot,” Scotch replied, glad the two stallions were keeping it down.

“And how. You ponies did a doozy on it with your megaspells. However, the land around Roam is still there. If we’re going to find any hints of what the Last Caesar ordered, it’ll be there. Hopefully we’ll find some clue... some... something...”

“Roam? Isn’t that on the other end of the zebra lands?” Scotch asked with a frown.

“Yup,” Pythia said as she closed her eyes and leaned back in the hammock, hugging the letters to her chest. “If you want to go home, I wouldn’t blame you. You could probably talk to the captain about taking you back. Otherwise, it’s a long walk down to Shattered Hoof Ridge.”

Scotch thought about it, but really, what had she been doing in the Hoof that had been so important? If she’d been a few years older, maybe ponies would listen to her when she told them how to plan their reconstruction. “No. I think I’ll wait.” She paused, glancing at the composed filly. “Have the stars told you this is the right thing to do?”

“Shhh shhh shhh!” Pythia quickly hushed and paused, staring over by the stairs where the stallions were going at it. Actually, they seemed to be taking a breather, because they’d gone silent. “Don’t talk about stars,” she said in Pony. “Ever. Especially here. Understood?” The fear on her face was evident, and Scotch only nodded. She relaxed a little. “No,” she continued in Zebra. “And I’ll not ask them, as the captain insisted.”

A few seconds later, the pair resumed.

Scotch Tape stared back at their dim forms and then at Pythia. “Are they spying on you?”

“Of course. There’re always zebras sneaking down here. Some are overt and try to get me to say something stupid. Others are like those two, rutting away and hoping I’ll say something to you, or that I’ll try a scry, or something. A few just sneak down and watch me while I sleep or read.” She sighed. “They’ve actually been relatively nice about the whole thing.”

“Nice? They’re spying on you!” Scotch Tape said scornfully.

“They could be killing me. I think the captain stuck me here with Precious as a deterrent. They could toss me in their boat and cut me adrift. Tradition says they can’t murder me outright, but there’re plenty here who would.” She fished in the alcove and took out a folded rag. Unfolded, it revealed a black spot of dried blood and phlegm.

“What’s that?”

“A death threat. Found it last night, wrapped around one of those fishgutting knives,” the filly said evenly. “Gave the knife back right away, of course. Don’t want to be accused of having a weapon or stealing. Still, they could have cut my throat in my sleep.”

“That... we have to tell Captain,” Scotch Tape said evenly.

“Please. This isn’t the first threat I’ve gotten. I knew people hated me before I learned the word ‘hate’.” Pythia sighed, “If the captain thinks her crew are going to break, she might decide to cast me off sooner rather than later.”

“It’s wrong,” Scotch Tape said evenly.

Pythia sat up, swaying in the hammock and staring at her. “How so?”

“You shouldn’t be hated. Not unless you do something that deserves to be hated,” Scotch muttered.

“My tribe aren’t good people. There’s a reason why the villain is a Starkatteri in the old stories. We used forbidden magic and nearly took over the world. It might have been millennia ago, but so what? My tribe did that. We did wrong things. And thousands of years later, I’m still paying for it. As will my foals and grandfoals. We don’t get forgiveness. Not for what we did.”

Scotch stared at her in concern. “You know, you don’t talk like a filly.”

Pythia smiled a little and arched a brow. “Oh?”

“You talk like someone a lot older,” Scotch pointed out.

“Probably because I’m smarter than you,” Pythia retorted, going back to reading.

Scotch growled for a moment, narrowing her eyes and turning away. “You’re a lousy friend, you know that.”

“Didn’t know we were friends,” Pythia replied flatly. “I thought you were the pony getting me a ride on Thrush’s boat. Now that I’m here, I don’t know what you are.”

“You...” Scotch Tape glared at her, stung. “You... you... you bitch!”

“Guilty,” she replied, and smirked.

“Captain was right about you!” Scotch Tape snapped. “You’re just in it for yourself!”

“Well, I don’t think either of you care about this,” she said as she lifted the letter. “You’re better off knowing this now. So, go do what you have to do. I’ll get off wherever the captain dumps me and call it good. Better than I’d hoped. You head back to Ponyland.” She jerked her head towards Precious, “Take Scaly with you. I’ve been saddled with enough freaks for one life.” An irritated snort of smoke rose in reply, but nothing more.

Scotch whirled on her heel, heading for the door with every intention of doing exactly that, when she froze. “Wait,” she said, turning and narrowing her eyes. “You want me to leave you.”

“Yeah. Because you’re annoying.” Pythia frowned. “After a month on that island where you did nothing but whine about your dead parents and whatnot, I was pretty much done with you.”

“No. If you were this much of a bitch, you would have tried to get me to stay on the island and wait for Thrush.” Scotch Tape’s eyes dropped to the black spot. “You’re worried for me.”

“You’re a moron who’s going to get hurt worse than Blackjack was,” Pythia hissed, her eyes glancing back towards the stairs where the stallions weren’t even pretending to have sex, trying to stay out of sight as they watched.

“You’re trying to protect us,” Scotch Tape murmured.

“Damn it,” Pythia muttered, her eyes darting to the side before she switched to Pony. “Yes. I’m getting death threats now when things are okay. I’m one accidental death... one miscarriage... even one bad fishing haul away from being the scapegoat. You never know what it’ll be, but something will happen, and I’ll be the reason. And if I go down, Captain might toss you down with me. She might not have a choice. You’re one step above a Starkatteri in their eyes. So go back to Equestria. Take Scalebutt with you.”

“What about Majina?”

“She’ll be fine. She’s Zencori. Captain won’t let anything bad happen to her. She’s a zebra filly protected by Tradition and personality. Probably make a great addition to the crew,” Pythia said as she folded her forelegs behind her head, staring up at the ceiling in the feeble flickering of the lamp. “I’ll get out of this and find what I need to find. You don’t need to involve yourself.”

Scotch Tape frowned. She hadn’t known the filly long. She was obnoxious, abrasive, and more than a little bit strange. Still... “I’m not going to just abandon you. You have a better chance with us than on your own.”

Pythia sighed. “Something bad is going to happen. I can feel it. And it’s going to come down on our heads. If I could get out on deck and see the stars...” Pythia covered her face with her hooves with a groan. “Right now, I’d even endure Ashur’s declarations of doom for some hint at what’s coming.” She turned and glared at the pair listening in. “Hope those two don’t speak Pony.”

“I’ll talk to the captain. You’re not a monster,” Scotch Tape said firmly. “At the very least, you should get some fresh air.”

“If you say so,” Pythia muttered with a sigh. “Good luck with that.”

Scotch left her, walking past the stallions who stared at her, then immediately resumed kissing and cuddling. “Oh stop. You’re not fooling anyone,” she snapped before trotting out of the hold.

* * *

The Abalone never stopped. When she’d scrubbed the gutting table, there was the deck to scrub. When that was scrubbed, the ashes from the smoker needed to be saved in clay jars so they could be turned into soap. Then knives needed to be sharpened. Rust was not tolerated on their tools or weapons, and much of her time was devoted to obliterating every errant fleck of brown. Fish oil then had to be liberally applied with rags. Rope constantly needed coiling and placing on pegs for when they went fishing. Fat from the bottom fish needed boiling down to lard. Kelp had to be washed in seawater, dried, chopped, and added to kettles and pots. Then she would resume her maintenance of the mechanical bits.

Had it been just her, she would have resented it, but every zebra on board was busy doing something. Zebras who’d earned ‘reprieves’ stayed out of their way below deck or in the forecastle, where they smoked a particular dried red seaweed that produced thick clouds of hazy crimson. Kabalo was the Zebra word for it, and apparently it was a poor zebra’s version of tobacco. They smoked it, chewed it, and occasionally nibbled on it. Scotch had tried it, but a little red flake had made her tongue go numb and kept her up all night.

They also told stories, and right in the middle was Majina. The filly wasn’t made to scrub the deck or gut fish or anything. She listened to the Atoli telling her all about their lives and hardships on the sea. As Scotch Tape was scrubbing the deck around the gutting table on her knees, she thought it’d be nice if Majina could pick up a brush. Even Pythia wasn’t doing much in the way of sweat labor down there in the hold.

So when Majina drooped herself over Scotch Tape, she nearly fell over completely. “I am so tired of hearing about fish,” the little zebra whined. “One more fishing story, and I think I’m going to scream.”

Scotch froze, rolling her eyes up at the filly drooping over her shoulders. “Well, you can grab a bucket and brush and help me.”

“No thanks. I’m good like this,” she said wearily. “Besides, I’m not supposed to. I’m supposed to be entertaining the crew.” Scotch hunched and shifted her shoulders, but Majina just remained put in a perfect flop. Finally Scotch gave up, scrubbing the fish blood stains with greater malice. “I didn’t think it’d take so long to get to the zebra lands.”

“Have you heard anything about the ‘Eye of the World’ or blinding it?” Scotch asked as she worked the brush back and forth.

“Nope. They don’t want to talk about the land. They want to talk about fish. And catching fish. And clams. And finding pearls. And keeping away from pirates,” Majina said wearily.

Scotch rolled her eyes. “That must be so hard for you,” she grumbled.

“This one stallion talked to me for three hours about the way he fillets a fish. And it’s not just his way. It was his daddy’s way, and his granddaddy’s way. He wanted to make sure I knew exactly how to gut a fish.” She snorted into Scotch’s mane. “It’s a fish. It gets cut up! Enough said!”

“Why?” she asked with a frown.

“'Cause he wants to live in a story,” Majina replies.

“You... you mean he wants to... what? Live in a book?”

“No. A story. A zebra can live forever in a story, if the story’s told well. Like Firestripe the phoenix tamer. She lived centuries ago, and she’s still alive. There’re hundreds of people living in stories. Thousands. He wants to make sure that if I put him in a story, he’ll fillet fish the right way.” Slowly she slid off Scotch’s back as if she’d been deboned herself and flopped upright again beside the pony. “I hope we get to Rice River soon.”

“You and me both,” Scotch replied to the filly, then nodded to the brush, then to the bar of greasy fish soap she’d been using to clean. Majina just looked out to sea with a sigh, and Scotch gave the deck a vigorous scrubbing beside her, banging her flank with her hooves. Majina just leaned over and collapsed on her side with a flop.

It’s a sign, Scotch decided, abandoning both brush and soap and tugging Majina upright again under the metal table. “They must have some interesting stories. You said they talked about pirates?”

She nodded. “Mhmmm. Like raiders of the sea. Atoli who abandon Tradition and just do what they want. There’re lots of them.”

“I thought there’d have to be ships to raid for there to be sea raiders,” Scotch said with a sigh. Why couldn’t raiders have just been an Equestrian thing?

“They raid everything they can. Settlements. Other ships. Each other. And apparently the raiders in this ocean aren’t even the worst. The zebras in the south seas flay your skin off and wear it.” She curled her lips, thrusting her hooves out before her. “How do you even have that idea? ‘Oh, hey, I don’t like this guy! I’m going to skin him alive and wear him... because I hate him!’ Well now you have to look him in the mirror till the skin rots off!”

Scotch, tired and worried, chuckled and got a small smile in return from the filly. “Pythia thinks we should go home.”

“Sure. I love that idea! Did you ask her where exactly home is supposed to be?” she asked with a sad smile. “Mom’s dead. My brother’s dead. My father...” She just shivered and shook her head. “So, where is home, huh?”

“She thinks we’re in danger,” Scotch elaborated.

“Oh, no doubt about that,” Majina said with a roll of her eyes. “There’s one Captain Riptide that operates around Rice River. Has a whole little fleet of jolly pirate murderers. Takes young alive to raise them to be bloody butchers like she is. Or there’s a giant octothingy that’s bigger than whole ships and drags them under without warning. Or a giant whirlpool that devours whole islands! And apparently there’s this rash stallions get when they come in from port that makes their bits fall off.”

Scotch sighed, “I think she means the crew might turn on us because she’s from that star-worshiping tribe.”

Her eyes popped wide. “Oh! Maybe,” she said thoughtfully. “They’re not supposed to. Killing a Starkatteri transfers the curse to the killer for thirteen generations. So... like... almost forever. If you hurt one, and they die within thirteen days, cursed. So yeah.”

“But are they really?” Scotch asked. “I mean, is there some sort of magic backing up the superstition?”

“I dunno. If one of them kills her, we can do an experiment,” Majina replied with a shrug. “These zebras don’t know anything about an Eye of the World. They’re not even interested until it’s the ‘Eye of the Sea’, which they don’t know anything about either. I asked.” She rubbed her chin. “If we were looking for the ‘Eye of the Fish’, we wouldn’t have to get off the boat.”

“Well, we are,” Scotch said sourly.

“We’re looking for the Eye of the Fish?” Majina screwed her face up in bafflement, then pointed at the crew. “There’s a stallion over there who–”

“No! No! We’re looking for the Eye of the World,” she said hotly.

“Then why did you say we were looking for–” Majina asked curiously.

“I... just... forget about the eye thing. Do you think other zebras are going to have the same problem with her?” Scotch asked as she watched the crew going about their business. She couldn’t see the captain, though, and that was sending prickles up her spine.

“Probably. Even in Equestria, Starkatteri are feared. I mean, they’re evil. Pythia might not be, but that might be because she’s young. Give her a few years, and we can find out,” Majina replied.

“Majina, she’s our friend,” Scotch pointed out flatly.

“Yes, but I’m not sure she knows what friends are,” Majina replied, blinking at her with her brilliant verdant eyes.

Scotch sighed and decided to let that drop. “Can we hide those marks on her face with makeup or something? Say she’s your tribe?”

Majina rubbed her chin again. “I don’t know. Can we glue a stick of wood to your forehead and say you’re a unicorn?”

The olive filly groaned, rubbing her face. “Majina, I’m serious.”

“So am I,” the filly answered. “Would you be able to pretend you’re a unicorn with a stick glued to your forehead?”

“Of course not,” Scotch replied. “The second somepony demanded I do magic, I’d fail.”

“Exactly. And if I pretended to be Atoli, they’d all be suspicious when I couldn’t swim and got seasick. Tribes are who we are, and a zebra who doesn’t have a tribe...” She just shook her head. “Even when Mama and me were in the mine, I had my tribe. No one could take it from us.”

Scotch sighed, closing her eyes and rubbing her temples. Maybe Pythia would understand the need. It couldn’t be that hard to hide the marks on her--

Someone bit Scotch’s tail and dragged her out from under the table. The captain glowered at her from above the mouthful of hair, and Scotch gulped and gave a sheepish smile, then looked at the deck.

Right then she wished she were a unicorn as she took up the brush and got back to work.

* * *

It seemed odd that of the two, Precious drew less fear and animosity than Pythia. If talked about at all by the crew, she was referred to as ‘the Starkatteri’s monster’. Most of her time was spent snoozing away or clawing tic tac toe games in the barrels and beams. Since Pythia didn’t seem interested in playing, Scotch had to wonder who was her opponent in these matches.

Scotch trotted to her down in the hold. “Here,” Scotch said, offering her a small box of smoked clams and a bucket of fresh water. The shamans could apparently ask the water to lose the salt. Who knew?

“Thanks,” she murmured. She didn’t exactly have hands, nor hooves. Each limb had three claws popping out of the ends. The lavender dragonfilly just dropped her mouth into the box, snapped up a mouthful of clams, and started chewing.

“How are you doing?” Scotch asked nervously. She gave a little shrug and continued eating. “Are they treating you okay?” Another shrug and more chewing. “Are you happy?” Scotch asked, getting a pause in the chewing to receive a funny look, before a shrug and resuming chewing. Scotch sighed, rubbing the back of her head. “Okay... well... good talk,” she muttered as she rose again.

She made it three steps before Precious replied in her slightly deep, husky, low voice, “Hard to talk with a mouthful of clams. Like meaty bubblegum.”

“Oh. Right. Sorry,” Scotch replied as she turned to face her awkwardly. “Ya know... I’ve been wondering... we all have... um... Why are you here?”

Precious arched a brow as she stared at her long enough to make Scotch nervous. “In general, or with you?”

“Well, the second one. I mean, you weren’t really all that chatty on the island,” Scotch said as she trotted closer.

“You’re nice to me,” Precious answered simply, and chewed on some more of the wrinkly brown bits.

“That’s it? You get on a boat to go to a dangerous, unknown place, because I was nice to you?” Scotch asked in surprise.

She chewed thoughtfully a few more seconds, then nodded and swallowed. Then she started chewing on another mouthful.

Scotch flushed a little. Somehow she’d been expecting... she didn’t know what to expect. “It’s just, you would have been safer in the Hoof.” Boy, didn’t that sound weird to say! Precious stopped chewing and frowned. “Not that we want you to go away. It’s just... I got to wonder, Precious.”

Precious’s frown evaporated slowly, and she shrugged and swallowed. “Nothing to wonder. There wasn’t anything for me in the Hoof with you gone. So, I came with you.”

“Oh,” Scotch Tape replied with a flush. She hadn’t expected that. “Well... that’s nice.”

In truth, she’d been nice to Precious because the monsterpony had been part of a raid on Chapel. She’d lured Precious away and just talked with her as friendly as she could so that Blackjack wouldn’t have to fight her. Really, she’d done more talking at Precious than with her. After the leader of the raid escaped, Precious had stuck around. The few times they’d interacted after that, Scotch continued to be nice simply to avoid antagonizing the strange hybrid. Precious hadn’t been a friend so much as someone she was terrified of offending.

Now, apparently, it was getting Precious to follow her halfway around the world.

“Well, Pythia is nervous so... be careful,” Scotch Tape said lamely as she looked around the ship.

Precious’s eyes turned to the hull as she muttered, “Nothing on this boat scares me.” She buried her muzzle in the bucket, drinking deeply and nearly draining it before rising to her feet again. “Should get back before you're missed.” She turned and crawled back into her potbed, her tail hanging out behind her.

Scotch glanced over her shoulder at her as she made her way back up to the deck. She knew as much about the people travelling with her as the zebra lands themselves.

* * *

“Ugh,” Scotch Tape groaned as she trotted towards the front of the ship where the toilets were kept. That bitter red seaweed was making her guts gurgle. Placing them at the front of the ship kept most of the stink away. Thankfully, Captain hadn’t forced her to scrub them yet.

After using the facilities, and pining privately for a flushing toilet, she’d started to head back towards the captain’s cabin when she heard a strange clicking. After a few days, she knew most of the Abalone’s noises, and this was new. A rapid, very soft metal clicking. The engineer in her hated a mysterious sound that she might be required to fix, and so moved along the deck towards the source.

The stars glinted in the night amid the scudding clouds. Since the skies cleared, there’d been some beautiful nights in the Hoof. She still couldn’t bring herself to look at the moon, though. Not after everything that happened. Instead, she kept her eyes down as she searched for that tapping.

Wait? Why was that star on the horizon flashing?

Scotch moved to the rail and peered at it. A star on the horizon flashing on and off randomly. It was a tiny pinprick of light, barely visible. Then it disappeared.

“How does she expect me to do that? She sleeps with the captain,” a stallion muttered close by. Very close.

She peered past some folded sail at a zebra stallion with the strangest lantern. It had a little switch on the side, and as he flicked it, the shutter opened and closed. Scotch watched as he worked the mechanism for a minute, ending with the shutter closed.

Out on the horizon, the flashing star reappeared.

“What are you doing?” Scotch Tape asked. The stallion opened the shutter on the lantern and stared at her. Instantly, Scotch tensed. There was something wrong with that look in his eyes. That ‘can I get away with this?’ expression. “What are you doing with that lantern?”

At that moment, a quartet of zebras trotted up from below decks, and the stallion stared at her a second longer. Then he tossed the lantern overboard. “You should not have come, pony,” he muttered before trotting away from her.

Scotch Tape sat down hard. “What the heck was that all about?” She looked to the horizon, but the flickering star was gone.

* * *

The next day, she was given a reprieve. It was supposed to be a few extra hours to sleep and recover, which she was glad to take. She hadn’t really told anyone about the strange zebra she’d encountered. She didn’t have the lantern to show, and as much as she hated to admit it, she couldn’t tell the crew apart besides Captain and her daughters. The stallion could have been any one of twenty on board, and she wouldn’t have been able to point him out.

Still, this morning she kept looking for an opportunity to bring it up, but something was up with the crew. They were rushing about, making sure that the ship was secure. Scotch Tape scanned the skies, but, aside from a few sporadic clouds, they were clear. Thunder was rumbling from somewhere, though. She sought out the captain, finding her in tense talks with her two shamans. “What’s going on? Is there a storm coming?”

The three gave her an inscrutable look, and then Sky’s lip curled as Pearl tucked her ears and glanced away. The captain maintained the expression. “We’re getting close to Okambo. Best to be cautious.”

“Captain, last night–” Scotch began.

“Don’t you think she should see, Captain?” Sky interrupted, eyes narrowed in malice.

“See what?”

“I do not wish to go near Okambo if at all possible,” the captain said flatly.

“She should still see,” the elder shaman insisted. “She should be proud.”

The events of the previous night slipped away in irritation. Scotch wanted nothing but to hit her hammock for a few hours, and the fatigue and annoyance prompted her to take the bait. “See what? What’s Okambo?”

The captain gave her a long look and then nodded towards the second mast. “Climb and look to the south. You will see it.”

Scotch looked south, but all she saw was gray ocean. Climb? That was easier said by zebras who broke the law of physics and hoof capabilities with ease. The mast had to be nearly fifty feet tall. “I don’t think I can make it up there.”

“We can haul you up. A pony should see this,” Sky insisted.

Fine. Whatever. One rope around her waist later, and she was on her way up. She kept her eyes up, making sure she didn’t get caught on anything till she was near the very top and...

Oh, wow, that was high.

From up here, the Abalone appeared far too small for the sea around it. Then she began to understand. The sea was wrong here. Instead of waves progressing across the surface, there were ripples like a flowing river. They weren’t just near the ship; the Abalone was being carried along. The water wasn’t the normal blue green. It was brown and gray. She gazed south...

So, that’s what Okambo was.

A hole in the ocean.

They had to be miles away, and still what she saw at was an immense vortex at least a hundred times the size of the Abalone. The vast whirlpool boomed and popped, and she could hear the sounds of colossal rocks cracking together. The pit of the vortex was lit with a magical blue glow. Every now and then, jets of brown foam exploded from the depths, shooting far higher than the mast she now occupied.

Scotch sat her butt on a spar and stared. It was mesmerizing, and every now and then the glow would flare and a boulder bigger than ten Abalones would fly from the mouth and tumble to the sea. Even this far, it was impossible to miss the booming. The sheer power was incredible.

Before she descended back down, Scotch spotted something dark on the horizon ahead of them. She stared for several minutes with no idea what it could be. Finally, she started back down again–

And fell.

The rope whipped past her face as gravity yanked her towards the deck. Her flailing hooves struck the mast and the rope as she tumbled, hit a spar, fell some more. It was luck more than anything that the rope got caught around her PipBuck and yanked tight. Still, the filly dangled there for almost a minute before she could start moving again. Her back, head, and forelegs all ached horribly as she dangled twenty feet above the excited zebras. One of them nimbly ascended up the mast to carefully untangle her leg and lower her down.

“What were you thinking?” the captain was roaring at three stallions. “When you hold a weight, you never relax your grip! You should know this, you barnacles! Was this some kind of joke? Or would you dare threaten Tradition? That pony is our passenger. Do you want to curse the Abalone with her ghost should she die in our care?” She pointed a hoof at the hatch. “You three will do her chores all night in repayment for this! Understood?”

The three who’d been managing the rope skulked off, and the captain carried Scotch Tape to her cabin herself. Once inside, she opened a locked chest and withdrew two healing potions. They tasted like fish, but they also helped heal most of the injury. She’d still have a doozy of a bruise.

“So, are you proud?” Sky asked from the doorway.

“Stow your tongue!” the captain snapped immediately. “If you dislike her so, stay upwind and away, but enough with your ill winds!”

“I was only curious if she was proud–” Sky began.

“You will join the other three tonight! The bilge needs emptying, and you can see to the spirits down there,” the captain declared.

“But Mother!” the zebra protested. Scotch Tape winced... but also smiled a little.

“I am not your mother! I am your captain, and you are my crew! If you do not accept that, then you can wait at port for another ship to sail on! Now out!” she roared, and Sky Altar scampered out.

Blue Pearl, who’d been about to enter, watched her go with a puzzled but faintly amused smile she couldn’t hide. “Captain,” she said formally.

“Do not start either! I was mad to take daughters as crew, and shamans besides! She should be on the Orinoco or the Icewind!” the captain said as she pulled off her gold-coined hat and threw it on the desk before flopping in the chair. The chair arms could lock into place during rough seas, and she snapped them down now and rubbed her face with a groan. “I will have to make amends once we’re in port.”

Blue Pearl closed the door behind her, trotted up, and gave her mother a nuzzle. Captain scrunched up her face, then relaxed and accepted it. “She’s been rough waters since we left,” Pearl said apologetically. “It’s my fault. I invoked Tradition.”

“You invoked rightly,” the captain, now mollified, responded. “Tradition makes our tribe what it is. Otherwise we’re nothing but pirates and scum, not fit for the waves.”

Scotch Tape flopped in her hammock and sighed. “I knew that was coming. You don’t ever invoke the mother card to get out of punishment. My mom had me scrubbing a graywater pump for three days when I tried it. With a mouthbrush,” she added, and got a tired smile from the captain.

“I should add that. If she is going to speak foul, she should taste the foulness of her words,” the captain said with a sigh.

Scotch Tape glanced to the south. “What was that, Captain? Okambo?” She thought back to what Sky had taunted her with. “Why’d she think I should be proud...” And then she put it together. “It’s a megaspell, isn’t it?”

The captain sighed and nodded. “Yes.”

“I thought the megaspells were used two centuries ago. How can it still be going?” Scotch Tape asked.

“We do not know. Okambo used to be a great port on the northern sea, far to the south and west of here. On the Day of Doom, a great gyre opened in the harbor, swallowing and smashing ships and growing all the while. In a week, it had destroyed the port utterly. In a month, it had washed the city away completely. Then it began its wanderings.”

“It moves?” Scotch gasped.

“Indeed. Sometimes it bumps along the shore, like now, causing terrible flooding and erosion, devastating fisheries. Other times it goes far out to sea and turns colossal... so large that ships sail for days to miss it. When it reaches the icy shores of the yaklands, it consumes icebergs the size of mountains. Ships that sail at night have tumbled into its current and been unable to escape.”

“Are we in its current now?” Scotch asked. “It seemed that way.”

The captain nodded. “Only the farthest edge. It can be useful to those wary of its presence. It will speed us along towards our next fishery and Rice River, saving us a day’s travel at least.”

“But why is it still going? I’ve seen a megaspell go off. It crushed an enormous tower into a ball, but then it ended,” Scotch said with a frown and shiver, imagining the effect slowly spreading and crushing more and more together. It’d been detonated in the air; had that been the reason? What if it’d been on the surface and just kept pulling in more and more material? When would it have stopped?

“I have no idea. Honestly, pony, I would be grateful if you could explain it.” The captain appeared wearier than Scotch had ever seen her before. “There are many megaspells ravaging our lands. In the southern sea, a hurricane stalks the great ocean seeking any that dare sail.”

“I don’t know,” Scotch Tape replied with another frown. She’d seen a megaspell chamber before, and heard Glory talking about spell matrixes and the like. “I wish I did.”

“As do we.” Captain sighed, rose to her hooves, and started for the door. “Convalesce. In less than a week, we shall be at Rice River and part ways. Come, Blue Pearl. I need you to talk to the sea and foretell what the currents may bring.”

* * *

Two days later, after recovering from all but the ugly bruises, Scotch felt that while there was tons left to do on the Abalone, she was getting a little bit of respect from the zebras. Granted, it wouldn’t matter if they didn’t keep ahead of the rust, but that was their business. Scotch had gotten all of three sentences out regarding Pythia to the captain before being shut down hard. “Starkatteri are evil. I will not discuss this any further.” End of debate.

Majina, on the other hoof, was the darling of the ship. She didn’t have her mother’s talent for telling utterly horrible ‘funny stories’ where the worst things happened. Instead, she talked about what had happened at the Hoof with only a few inaccuracies, and the crew was enraptured by her stories.

“I don’t know how she does it,” Scotch muttered, watching her sitting on the cleaned-off gutting table talking to a half dozen swarthy zebras.

“She is Zencori,” Sky Altar answered from behind Scotch Tape, making the filly jump. “I’d be shocked if she couldn’t tell a tale well.” The zebra shaman sat with her sister as they stared at a pool of water intently. An unshucked clam lay in the basin. Pearl had her pendant wrapped around her hoof, the pearl dangling in the fluid.

Scotch walked to the pair. “What are you doing?”

Sky gave a little ‘tch’ of annoyance, but Pearl answered, “Trying to find out why the spirits in these waters are sickened. “There’s something wrong with these clams”

“It’s sick?” Scotch asked skeptically as she glanced down at the bowl. It was just an oyster... right?

“You’re wasting your time, Pearl. She’s a pony. They are blind and deaf to anything not mundane and material,” Sky sniffed.

“Look, just because I can’t see electricity flowing in a wire doesn’t mean I can’t understand it,” Scotch Tape said as she sat down next to the pair. “What is a spirit? Is it like a ghost or a soul?”

“Yes,” Pearl said as Sky answered, “No.” The elder zebra flushed as the younger rubbed her leg nervously. “Not really,” Pearl began as her sister stated firmly, “There are some similarities–”

Scotch fought the urge to giggle. “Need a moment to compare notes?”

“Spirits are ethereal beings of nature,” Sky stated loudly as Pearl flushed and stayed quiet. “They are immaterial, like souls, but unlike souls which are affixed to a living individual, spirits occur naturally in the world. Sometimes they spontaneously generate, and sometimes they are invoked by others.”

“And the sea spirits here are sick?” Scotch Tape asked as she pointed at the bowl.

“They are always sickly,” Pearl said with a sigh as she regarded at the bowl. “Two centuries of poison and megaspells, and several decades of industrial waste, left a legacy that still weakens the spirits of the sea. But the spirits of these waters are even more tainted than most, and they did not used to be. Two months ago they were far more vigorous.”

“How do you make a spirit sick?” Scotch Tape asked.

“Ask your friend below. She undoubtedly excels at it,” Sky snorted.

“By corrupting its nature,” Pearl answered with a scowl at her sister. “The sea fosters life. If the water cannot support life, the spirits weaken. They can even die, or, worse, be driven to terrible, vengeful rage.”

“Why?” Scotch Tape asked as she cocked her head, looking at the gray lump in the placid bowl.

“Spirits seldom understand our motivations and reasons. They only know when they are diminished or strengthened. Only the greatest spirits are aware and intelligent. Fear them,” Sky said soberly.

“What do you mean?” Scotch asked.

“Right now, we’re surrounded by little spirits. Spirits of the sea and air. The Abalone has a spirit, too, and it’s very happy with the work you’ve been doing to it. It doesn’t exactly talk to us, but we can share feelings. It wants to keep sailing with all of us on board, and we want a good ship. It’s good for everyone!” Pearl said with a wide smile.

“But there is also the Spirit of the Sea. Not a spirit. The spirit. And it is vast and ancient and terrible, quick to wrath and slow to forgive,” Sky said as she pointed over the rail at the gray waters. “It is capable of kindness and generosity, but also spite and callousness. Were we to anger that spirit, the Abalone wouldn’t stand a chance. None of us would.” She narrowed her eyes at Scotch and smirked. “And it hates you.”

“Sky!” gasped Pearl, then said to Scotch, “It does not.”

“It hates all ponies,” the elder zebra insisted. “That is why you need your motors and magic to travel upon the waves. Why you cannot see or hear their rage.” She rose to her hooves. “I hope that it only claims the two of you, and not all of us for carrying you. For Tradition,” she added scornfully before walking away.

Pearl slumped, sniffing and staring at her hooves. “I am... sorry she said that. Sky isn’t happy since we found you. She fears you will doom us.”

“Buck her,” Scotch Tape replied, narrowing her eyes as she thought. She had trouble believing in things like nature ghosts, but if there was a problem with the water... she extended her PipBuck over the bowl. Pearl looked inquisitively at her, but Scotch just kept it there.

Click... click... click... went the PipBuck, like a barely beating heart. “The water is radioactive,” Scotch Tape explained to the young mare, who stared at the device on her left hoof. “I don’t suppose you tested it for radiation before?” Scotch had met a ‘spirit’ what felt like a lifetime ago, but she wasn’t sure what Pearl was in contact with, or if she was in contact with anything at all.

“No. We never thought of it,” Pearl said as the crew started another round of clam harvesting.

“Try this,” Scotch said, digging through her saddlebags for a baggie of RadAway. “I have no idea if this is going to work,” she admitted as she carefully undid the seal on the little tube and let a few drops of orange drip into the bowl. “It neutralizes radiation in ponies. Maybe it will do something for spirits, too.”

Pearl positively beamed at her. “That’s a great idea!” She swirled the water in the bowl, examining the oyster within. “I think it’s getting stronger. Though maybe that’s just the attention you gave it. Offerings strengthen spirits, after all.”

Scotch carefully pinched the tube closed. Hopefully it wouldn’t leak all over the inside of her saddlebags. “Where’s the radiation come from? Can it tell you?” she asked the zebra.

Pearl shook her head. “It’s a little spirit. It knows good and bad, but it doesn’t understand things like we do. It understands things like sea and not-sea. Less and more. Tastes. Smells. Time doesn’t exist for the sea beyond the tide, and they don’t understand numbers.”

“Can...” Scotch frowned. “Can it tell you if it got sick many tides ago, or a few tides ago?”

Pearl closed her eyes and just sat there. Scotch alternated between looking at the zebra and watching the Atoli breaking out the diving rocks again. “Few,” Pearl answered.

“How did it talk to you? I didn’t hear anything, and you didn’t speak,” Scotch asked with a small frown.

“It just does. In here.” She touched her chest. Then she gestured to the dangling pearl. “This is my fetish. It connects me to the spirits.”

Scotch would just have to take her word for it. She suppressed the urge to quip about keeping one’s brain in one’s chest. “Can it tell you if there was another boat like the Abalone during those tides?”

“I’m not sure it understands ‘boat’. And the Abalone is a ship,” Pearl added with a small frown.

“Boat. Ship. Whatever. It’s a thing that floats on the water with people on it,” Scotch said with a roll of her eyes.

“Ooooh! It might just understand that!” She closed her eyes again, and Scotch watched zebras jumping into the water. Something was wrong. If the sea wasn’t normally radioactive here... The first baskets of clams was pulled up just as Pearl opened her eyes. “Yes. It doesn’t really understand when or why, but there was another ship here a few tides ago!”

The crew began to open the clams and gave shouts of alarm and dismay. While clams were ordinarily not the best smelling things from the ocean, these were positively foul. The flesh inside was dead, the nacre discolored. “Oh no,” Scotch said as she ran towards the table.

Her PipBuck starting clicking, and a lot faster than it had with mere water.

The Atoli glanced at one another. Then the haulers pulled up something much larger than clams, the divers shouting in Zebra too fast for Scotch Tape to follow. With a heavy clank, a metal barrel was pulled up on deck. It was barely rusted, but rainbow fluids dripped from holes punched in the side. The captain took one look at it dripping and ordered it into the longboat to stop it from spreading on deck. Even now, Scotch’s PipBuck was clicking softly.

Then the whispering began. “Starkatteri. Damned Starkatteri.” The captain stared at Scotch Tape hard and she felt her insides clench.

Just as Pythia predicted.

* * *

Once upon a time, Scotch Tape had lived in a stable. It hadn’t been the best stable. In fact, Stable 99 had been downright evil, callous, and ruled by a tyrannical overmare. When her mother had died, Scotch Tape had been forced to do her job, even though she hadn’t completed school or even had her cutecinera. It’d been just before the stable was reopened and invaded.

That was the Abalone right now. The soft mutterings. The stares. The growing tension. Radioactive poison dumped on their fishing grounds? On some of their best fishing grounds, according to the muttering. They’d held this one for last to fill their holds before heading to Rice River, and now it was ruined, and they needed someone to blame.

Scotch’s stomach sank in dread as the captain’s eyes bored into her. It had been just like Rivets as her supervisor weighed the choice of overthrowing the Overmare. That gaze carried so many unspoken questions. Finally, the captain said in a tone of finality. “Bring her.”

A cheer broke out and four zebras rushed below decks. Pearl rushed to her mother’s side, “We can’t! Tradition–” she began, barely audible over the mob.

“What does Tradition state for one who poisons a fishery?” the captain demanded, and the filly fell silent.

“Oh, come on! You can’t seriously believe–” Scotch began when the captain nailed her in place with a glare. ‘You will join her,’ promised that glare. Majina joined Scotch, and when she started to speak, she was bound in that silent promise.

Of course, that was the moment that Precious made things interesting. Precious, though large for a filly, was still smaller than the fully grown stallions who struggled with her. That said, she was still just as strong as a stallion, with claws, fangs, and fire breath. Fortunately for everyone, she seemed to have the presence of mind to know that fighting to the death right now meant setting the thing keeping them afloat on fire. Thus the lavender dragonpony was hauled on deck by three bloody and battered stallions. They’d muzzled and bound her with chains that she heaved and struggled against.

Then they tied her to the rope connected to several of the rocks that sent divers to the bottom of the sea. That was when she stopped struggling, chewing on the chain in frustration as she eyed the rock on the edge of the ship.

Pythia was brought above deck by the fourth zebra, her face bloodied from a gash above her eye and a swelling nose. She was hauled before the captain, crushed beneath two stallions. The mob fell silent as the captain turned to the barrel sitting in the longboat next to her. “Did you know?” the captain asked, her voice low and steady.

Pythia swallowed, her eyes kept low. “How could I? I’ve been below decks this whole time.”

“These fisheries were a closely guarded secret of the Abalone,” the captain said in a low voice. “Now we pick you up and days later they’re poisoned.”

Scotch Tape stared from filly to captain and back again. “You can’t think she–”

“You do not know of what you speak, pony,” the captain snapped. “The Starkatteri are insidious. Malicious. Manipulative. Conniving. This would not be above or beyond them.” She gazed at her zebras. “I must think of my crew. My ship. My tribe. This cannot go unanswered.”

Scotch’s breathing picked up as her heart hammered in her chest. She could hear Rivets, the old head maintenance mare’s voice echoing from a year ago, when it had all fallen apart. ‘I have to think of the stable. Of the ponies. If rigging this place to be gassed is the only threat we have to depose the Overmare, we should take it.’

“Keelhaul her,” a stallion shouted. “Her and her pony friend!”

Scotch’s mouth moved silently as dozens of zebras turned their ire from Pythia to her. For the first time, she thought she’d have been better off staying in the Hoof.

“Damnable pony!”

“Star cursed!”

“Nothing but bad luck since we picked them up!”

“It wasn’t her!” Pythia shouted, staring at Scotch from the corner of her eye, her voice cracking. “It was all me! I did it!”

The tone changed, both deepening and raising. “Did you hear? She admitted it!”

“Damned Starkatteri! How could the captain have brought her?”

“Tradition, Captain said. Tradition is no good to the cursed!”

The captain’s face turned grim as she contemplated Pythia again. “Do what you will with me,” Pythia shouted as the mob pressed in, “but take them back to their home. They did nothing do you!” A stallion grabbed her by the neck and flung her onto the metal gutting table. Scotch Tape lunged towards her, but two hooves immediately grabbed her, pinning her to the deck.

“You’re next,” a stallion hissed in her ear.

“Enough!” a filly shrieked at the top of her lungs. It cut through the shouting as all eyes turned to Majina standing on the aftcastle, staring down at them all. “You’re acting like a bunch of raiders! If you stopped for a moment and actually thought, you’d realize you’re in a lot more danger than you imagined!”

“What are you talking about?” the captain demanded with a scowl.

“It’s a classic in any story. Obviously, the ‘bad zebra’ hated by all being used as a distraction! You focus on her because it’s quick and easy, and meanwhile the people who did poison the fishery are getting ready to pounce!” Pythia said scornfully.

“How do you know she didn’t do it?” one of the mob demanded.

“Because she’s not stupid! Think. In any story, are Starkatteri blatant or obvious?” she asked as she walked back and forth. “No. They’re always unmasked by the heroes at the very end of the story! They make great and terrible plots!” She jabbed a hoof at the rail. “No Starkatteri worth her curse would be so sloppy!”

“‘Worth her curse’?” Pythia muttered in bafflement.

“If it wasn’t her, who, then? Why?” the captain demanded of Majina. Every few seconds she glanced back at the crew around her, watching their reaction as they stared at the zebra filly. “And how did they know this place?”

“Who? There’s all sorts of nasty people sailing these waters. You told me that,” she said as she stared at the others. “And how...” but here Majina faltered.

“They signaled with a lantern!” Scotch interjected, now drawing glares. “The other night I spotted a stallion using a light. I didn’t understand what he was doing, but there was a flashing on the horizon.”

“Why didn’t you say so earlier?” the captain demanded.

“I tried!” Scotch snapped, shoving against the stallion pinning her and kicking him sharply in the face. “But you’re a busy mare, and the next day I fell off the mast. Sorry it slipped my mind.” Scotch jabbed a hoof at the barrel they’d brought up. “I don’t know what that stuff is for sure, but if it isn’t diluted enough to be clear, it was probably just dumped in there recently!”

Doubt warred with anger in the mob, breaking its momentum. “Get aloft,” the captain ordered. “Scan the seas for another ship!” The crew hesitated a moment, and she barked, “Move or swim!” Now in motion, four zebras did their gravity-defying climb with hooves and a few ropes. How in the world did they climb like that?

“There’s nothing,” Sky said sourly, glaring at Pythia, who was still pinned to the table. “This is just a stupid distraction.” That was backed up by the zebras above, who called out that the sea was clear. “See?”

See. “Is there any way to hide a ship at sea? With magic or spirits or something?” Scotch asked Pearl.

The mare looked at her, then at Sky and the captain, and answered, “With a spirit of fog, perhaps, but the ocean is clear. The only place to hide is...” Her eyes widened as she stared at the captain.

“Where?” Scotch asked.

“Underwater,” Pearl answered.

Sky snorted. “There no shaman alive that could keep a ship submerged,” the older zebra scoffed. “It would have to be a...” Her contempt evaporated. “A submarine?”

“Riptide,” the captain said, and the name rippled through the crowd.

“It can’t be. She was off the coast of Yakistan a month ago. She would have had to sail at full steam to be here,” Sky muttered, staring out at the sea. “It can’t be Riptide.”

“You want to risk that?” Majina demanded, pointing a hoof at Pythia and Scotch. “If we’re wrong, you keelhaul us or whatever in an hour or two. But if we’re right and someone poisoned this place to keep you hanging around while they moved in...”

The captain’s eyes bored into Scotch and Pythia as well, but then said, “I will not linger while Riptide limpets my hull, or spikes my rudder.” Then she bellowed out at the crew, “Sails up! Get arms! Ready for a fight.” The crew immediately began to scramble, the four fillies abandoned in the rush to obey orders. Captain grabbed Sky. “Summon a wind. I’ll take north, south, east, or west, but get us moving!” She then turned to Pearl. “Ask the spirits. If Riptide is down there, they’ll know. Use whatever you must.” She turned and regarded Pythia levelly a moment. “Stay here.” Then she moved off towards the helm.

“Get this crap off me!” Precious growled out the corner of her mouth as she struggled and strained.

The captain rounded on the steps, jabbing a hoof at Precious. “You especially stay put till we figure this out, understood?” Precious slumped, grumbling and chewing on her chain. The captain nailed them all with a glare and then joined the zebra at the helm.

Sky immediately rushed to their cabin. Scotch Tape, Majina, and Pythia joined Pearl, who was grabbing a bucket on a rope and collecting some water. “What’s a submarine?” Majina asked.

“A pony contraption for sailing underwater, some of which were captured after the Day of Doom,” the zebra answered. “Riptide has three under her command. Two of them can’t go very fast or deep, but they don’t have to. They sneak close, surface, and swarm aboard. If we’d been focused on you, the Abalone wouldn’t have had a chance. They’d capture the ship and turn her to piracy, or sink her for laughs.”

Then, she stuck her head in the bucket.

The three stared at her for a moment, then regarded each other. “This Riptide is pretty nasty, huh?” Pythia asked.

“Oh yes,” Majina said with a nod. “The worst pirate on the northern seas. She’s smart and brutal. Settlements pay her tribute just so she’ll keep her fleet away.”

“Doesn’t sound like raiders, then,” Scotch Tape muttered.

“She’s just as bad, and worse. She can get raiders to work together, and is smart enough not to wipe out everyone that keeps her afloat. But if she’s going for the Abalone, then this isn’t good,” Majina said as she surveyed the crew. “If only we could help.”

“We can!” Pythia said as she looked around, then lowered her voice. “We can get on the longboat, load it up with as many supplies as we can, and get the heck out of here!”

“Pythia! We can’t abandon them!” Majina gasped.

“They were about to keelhaul me,” Pythia replied flatly. “I can abandon them. Easily.”

“We’re not going to just run,” Scotch said as she examined the crew. “But we are going to help.”

“How?” Pythia asked flatly. “Our monsterpony is chained up. Did you turn into a cyberpony badass when I wasn't looking?”

“The stallion I saw signaling the other night has to be a spy. That means he’s still here. If the captain’s getting ready for a fight, he’s probably going to try something.”

“Ehhh… Probably,” Pythia admitted, grudgingly.

“So we need to look for a stallion who isn’t getting ready,” Scotch Tape said with a grin.

“Okay. What does he look like?” Majina asked as she surveyed the crew.

Scotch paused and coughed, rubbing the back of her head. “Well. He has stripes...”

The pair blinked at her, then simultaneously sighed and groaned. “Ponies...” Pythia muttered in disgust. “Would it help if we were color coded? Maybe had a bright, individualized icon on our butts?”

“I’m sorry you all look alike to me!” Scotch blurted indignantly. “I’ve been more focused on learning how to speak Zebra than on memorizing stripe patterns, okay?”

“Please don’t start fighting again. Not now,” Majina begged, then asked Scotch, “You’ve been fixing all over this ship. If you wanted to stop her and not be caught, where would you do it?”

Scotch blinked and considered. The sails? No, there were dozens of eyes that could spot you. The wheel? Captain was right there. It’d have to be below decks. If they had a bomb, anywhere below decks, but it was hard to hide bombs and stuff. The Atoli used each other’s stuff without a thought as to property. Drill through the floor? That would take a lot of time, even if they drilled on a weak point. Besides, once water started going in, it’d be obvious.

Scotch was staring at the wheel when it hit her. “The rudder. It’s connected to the wheel by ropes. If they’re cut, the Abalone is dead in the water. At best it’ll only sail in a straight line. Let’s go,” Scotch said, then turned to Precious. “We’ll be right back.”

“I’ll be here,” she muttered flatly, ears drooped before she resumed gnawing the chain. To her credit, she was doing a number on the thick links.

The three ran below decks. All her work had familiarized her with most of the ship, and they scrambled towards the stern. The rudder worked due to an extremely tight rope that went from the wheel down into the ship, then spread apart to two little wheels that brought the rope to coil tightly around the tiller, then back up the other side to the wheel. Turning the wheel turned the rudder, but if something was cut... heck, if something was jammed into the works...

The hold was quiet, with none of the shouting carrying down to the shelves and boxes. The Abalone was fully loaded and in no condition to flee a fight. Maybe spirits could change that arithmetic, but things didn’t look good if this Riptide had faster ships. “Could really appreciate some help right now, Abalone,” she said, patting a wooden beam.

They pushed past the crates to the back of the ship, where the tensioned ropes sat still. And there was their zebra, trying to slip the rope off the little corner wheel with a prybar. It was tight and dark, though, and he struggled with getting the angle right. The ship groaned loudly, covering their noise.

After their little comment on appearances, Scotch focused on the stallion. His stripes had the characteristic waviness of the Atoli, but there were all kinds of little barbs like cresting waves to his stripes. His flank showed a ‘glyphmark’ that looked like some kind of coiled thing. Maybe a whirlpool? A coiled up worm or rope? Ugh, why couldn’t they have more straightforward marks? His frame was powerfully built, bluish black mane shaggy and tangled.

“Now what?” Pythia asked. “Go get the captain? Precious?”

“By the time we do he’ll have the rope off. Heck, he might be down here claiming he’s here to fix it, and blame us. It’ll take half an hour to get that back on the wheel. Maybe longer.” They had to do something... but what?

What would Blackjack do? Shoot, sing, seduce, or stamp him. Blackjack, the most incredible, and at times terrifying, security pony from her stable never lacked for ways of doing things, but Scotch Tape didn’t have a gun. She wasn’t a fighter, and even when she had a gun, she’d fired more to keep her enemies distracted while Blackjack mopped the floor with them.

She wasn’t Blackjack. She couldn’t do things like Blackjack could. Couldn’t do anything. Nothing at all...

“I have an idea,” Pythia muttered, staring back into the hold at the cargo.

It was about the size of a pony’s head and took two of them to move quietly into place. The zebra saboteur had finally gotten the prybar set and was working the rope off the wheel, which meant his back was to them. Which was good. There were so many ways this could go wrong.

Pythia mouthed something, and Majina nodded immediately. Scotch gaped cluelessly, forcing her to repeat. ‘On three’. One. Two. Three! “Asshole!” Pythia shouted, and the zebra turned to the trio.

Only to get hit in the face with a clay pot full of shaloosh.

The clay shattered immediately, and the gooey, rancid content splashed all over in a brownish-yellow slurry of rotten fish. The slimy contents coated half his body and landed in his mouth. Instantly, the bar was released as he heaved and spat, coughing and trying to scrub the concoction from his eyes. That was made infinitely more difficult when all three tackled him, knocking the already off balance stallion off his hooves.

Had she been Rampage, the immortal death filly, she could have snapped his neck or gouged out his eyes, but she wasn’t. And while they could stomp and bite, none of them had a weapon that they could use to kill him. Scotch even smashed him with shards of the pot, but they simply broke. Maybe this wasn’t the best-thought-out plan, she thought as she stomped him again and again.

Finally, he got his hooves under him and smashed Majina in the side with a kick. Then he hooked a hoof around Pythia’s neck and tossed her aside, into old boxes full of smoked fish and clams. His cold blue eyes locked on Scotch Tape, and his grin spread from ear to ear. “Finally!” he coughed as he scrambled for the prybar.

Then the sound of multiple hammers being drawn back filled the hold and he froze, bar clenched in his jaw. A few feet away, the captain stood with two of her crew, armed with pistols pointed straight at him. “What are you doing down here, Ako’e? Your station is on deck.”

The three kicked themselves away from the stallion now that the captain had arrived. “Ako’e?” Scotch asked, not familiar with the word.

“In Pony, I think it’s a bloodsucking worm. ‘Lamprey’, right?” Majina asked, looking at the captain for approval. When captain didn’t answer, her ears drooped. “Okay, not important right now, I guess.”

He looked down at the three fillies as they crawled towards the captain, then back at the captain, and then he spat out the prybar. “They came down here to sabotage the ship, Captain! I came to stop them.”

“Scotch could have sabotaged us a dozen times over, and sabotaging the ship carrying you to your destination is somewhat stupid. The Starkatteri are evil, but not stupid,” the captain said evenly.

“Thank you!” Pythia blurted, and then froze. “Wait a minute...”

Captain went on, “Why, Lamprey? You’ve been decent crew for three years. Why betray my ship now?” Scotch gave the captain a grateful smile. Finally! “Is it because my last payment to Riptide wasn’t enough? Does she want more?”

His cold eyes focused on Scotch. “She wants the pony. Dead.” He smirked as he stood and brushed some of the shaloosh off his face. “You could earn yourself a lot of money and goodwill if you just hand her over to Riptide.”

Scotch turned to look at the captain. The captain just glared at him. “The barrel of waste?”

“Needed some way to slow you down. If you hadn’t been crazy enough to have a Starkatteri on board, you would have wasted hours clearing out all the other barrels they dumped on this stupid reef, and Riptide would be here herself. Instead, you all went nuts with the star freak. Riptide will take her off your hooves as well. She’s not afraid of curses,” he added with a leer at Pythia.

The captain didn’t answer. She just stared at the trio, her eyes heavy with worry. If she were like Rivets, it would be no contest. Whatever kept the ship afloat was worth the lives of three strangers. “Captain,” Scotch whimpered, in spite of herself. “Please.”

“Be smart,” Lamprey said with a sure little smirk. “They’re not worth your ship.”

The captain reached over and rubbed the beams of the Abalone. How many times had Scotch witnessed Rivets doing the exact same gesture? She won’t risk her ship and crew. Not for me.

When the captain spoke, it was solemn. “Tradition says I protect my passengers from when they board to when they depart. They... even the pony... are our passengers. I will not forsake Tradition under any threat!” Her eyes narrowed. “And I suspect you knew this, or you would have asked me at the outset.” She straightened. “I am Captain of the Abalone. I am the ship, and the ship says 'Fuck you.'”

Lamprey hissed through his teeth. “Only the fucking Abalone would be this stupid.” He glared at the zebras with pistols trained on him. “She’s going to sink you if you listen to her!”

“Tie him up. It’s only fair I return him to his captain,” Captain said. In a minute, Lamprey was trussed up with a bit of rope; one thing the Atoli could do was tie knots. Lamprey didn’t go quietly, thrashing and cursing the whole while. Once he was secured, the captain turned to the trio. “Come. We need to move.”

Suddenly from above erupted the popping snap of gunfire. A machine gun chattered and popped, and bullets pierced the hull, spraying splinters across the assembled zebras and Scotch. Seawater began to seep through like blood from wounds before the burst ended.

Lying on his face, Lamprey leered up at all of them. “Too late, Captain.” He grinned at her. “Riptide has caught you.”

Author's Note

-So here’s my next big project. Thanks everyone for reading the chapter. For people who’ve never read my stories before, welcome. To people who read Project Horizons, welcome back. I’m trying to write Homelands so that if you haven’t read Horizons, you won’t be missing much. There’ll be some unavoidable references here and there, but hopefully you won’t have to wade through Horizons.So thank you for reading. Also, much thanks to Swicked, Hinds, and Bronode for donating their time to editing this. Thanks to Icy Shake and others who read rough drafts and gave me advice on things to change a tweak on the story. I’d like to mention that readers who enjoy the story that they can have access to rough drafts by donating to my Patreon. Every single bit is immensely appreciated right now, as it’s my only source of income at the moment.I hope the story continues to be good. Hope to get the next one out by the beginning of December.
Swicked- [Dickbutt.gif]-