Leaf covered her large fluffy ears, the screeching of the boilers was making her head split. Her teacher Steam Cloud was working as hard as he could to reseal the damaged pipes, and close off as many of the valves as he could. He pulled the down the communication horn with the bridge. "Captain I need back up in the boiler room, the steam is to much for Leafy's ears! And there's just to much damage me to handle by me self." The gray pegasus screamed as bolts started shooting off of one of the secondary pipes. "Damned star luck. What did we hit?!"
"Something hit us. Steam Cloud help is on the way give Leaf a wrench and send her to the steam guns. We're going to hit back." The airship jerked again, throwing Leaf to the wall. Steam Cloud dashed to her catching her at the last second.
"Aye Captain." Steam Cloud carried Leaf out of the boiler room, grabbing a wrench on his way out. "Alrighty las, get yerself down to the guns." Leaf took her hooves away from her ears. They felt wet. "Are you okay?"
"I'm fine just a horrible headache." She grabbed the wrench and flew down to the guns before Steam Cloud could object. Again the ship jerked violently under her hooves, causing her to stumble. Her exceptional hearing was slowly coming back to her, and she was quickly finding out how bad things were. She could hear the steam releases as the steam guns fired again and again and again. She could also hear dozens of stations calling the bridge, many had very grim reports.
"Leaf are you alright?" A zebra gunner snapped her out of her daze. "Do you need help getting to the med bay."
"No I'm fine, I was ordered to go and help with the guns."
"Okay, come on then." The two of them made their way down ever more crowded halls.
"Do you know what's attacking us?" Leaf asked as the ship jerked hard to the left. She heard hissing from up ahead as all the steam guns went off at once. Her heart nearly stopped as she heard a deep low growling. The zebra just shook his head. "I was afraid you'd say that."
The artillery bay doors were open giving a perfect view of the eternal night sky that was all around them. Many of the ponies, zebras an griffons were covered in a small layer of water. As the steam condensed into droplets. Dozens of fillies and colts were doing their best to mop away the water on the floor. Celestia looked down from the moon, it seemed looked like she was praying for the airship.
"Sungura, get to gun 5-16a." A white unicorn with a blue main and tail ordered the zebra who nodded and ran for the stairs. Shining Armor turned to Leaf.
"I'm fine," she said cutting of the former captain of the guard. "What do you need me to do Shining?"
"I need you to go to the third floor. The main boiler is out of commission and I need to know if we can get it back up." Their was a sudden gust of wind as something big flew between the ship and it's sole guardian angel. "Take a rifle and some extra bolts, for some reason the doors down there aren't closing." Shining Armors magic grabbed a riffle from the wall and dropped it into Leaf's hooves. She nodded and flew off for the stairs going down. all the steam from the ship's guns formed a mist that got thicker and thicker as she flew down the stairs. Her ears perked up at every roar, each roar was followed by the sound of steam being released, and a harpoon swooping through the air.
She flew down to the third floor artillery bay and quickly flew through the hall, the boiler of course on the other side of the ship, and while flying all the way around the ship was a longer flight, she doubted going through the ship proper would get her to the other side any faster give how chaotic things were right now.
"Attention Griffon Vanguard First Company Deploy immediately!" The captain's voice ordered through the communication horns, Leaf's ears hearing the echo as each horn repeated the order slightly slower or faster than the one on this floor. Something bad must have just happened, she thought to herself, as she doubled her speed. She turned the bend and came to a screeching halt. The doors weren't closed, they weren't even open. They were completely gone, along with many of the guns and gunners.
The mist from the steam guns was gone replaced by thick black smoke. She tried to convince herself that all the burning piles on the floor were rubble, but several were distinctly pony shaped. She walked over to the communication horn to Gunner control. "Shinning." She wiped the tears from her eyes many of the ponies, zebras, dogs, and even griffons on this ship were her friends. Now she couldn't even tell which ones she had lost, only that many of them were her age, or slightly older.
"Leaf, are you okay, where are you."
"Shining, I don't think it matters if I get the boiler on this floor working again. I don't even think I could at this point." She sniffed, the reek was horrible. "Everyponies dead."
"Leaf, get back up here." Leaf swallowed the lump in her throat, as another roar echoed through the eternal night air.
"No." pain and loss slowly fading to rage. "I have a riffle, and I'm going to use it." She screeched her battle cry and galloped out of the smoldering floor. She could hear Shining Armor saying something, she heard every word. She didn't care. She flew up the side of the ship, many parts were on fire as hundreds of the people that called the Night Wind their home worked tirelessly to put out the blazes.
She flew as hard as she could to the top of the ship. Not to far off dozens of griffons were firing on a great pale dragon. It was easily half the size of the airship. Larger harpoons sailed toward the dragon from the artillery pieces on the ship. She slid her goggles over her eyes and headed straight into the fray. Firing the first of her steel bolts at the dragon's hide. It bounced off of the dragons under belly like it was straw.
She flew around the dragon as fire spewed from its mouth. The griffon shots were a doing little as to the dragon as well. Leaf closed her eyes. She let out a soft click with her tongue against the roof of her mouth. Her ears perked up as an image formed in her mind. She flew toward the dragon repeating the action again and again. Finally she found what she was looking for, on the ridge of the dragons back, running parallel with its spine on both sides, ran a series of weak scales. She smiled, as she shot her second bolt into the dragons weak spot. It roared in pain. She shot another bolt into the dragon's back, again it roared in pain. She dove down as it turned on her spewing an inferno into the night sky. The griffons began firing into the dragons back the bolts striking the now exposed weakness. She flew back to the ship as soon as she fired the last of her bolts. Landing back on the third floor gun bay.
The fires were slowly smoldering out. It was harder to pretend that all the charred black things were just piles of rubble. She took three steps before breaking down. It didn't matted. They won they'd drive the dragon away or slay it in battle. The Night Wind would survive, but the ponies that were here were gone, and nothing would change that. She stayed there like that until Shining Armor brought Steam Cloud to her. The gray pegasus lead her back to her room. She sobbed like a foal as he rocked her back and forth.
She'd never unsmell the smoke or unsee the sights.
Author's Note
Leaf is a reference to the California Leaf nosed Bat.
A lot darker than I thought it would be had to change the tag from adventure to sad.