Survival Begins at Home

"I would help you if I could, but my expertise lies in wood. I'm not familiar with the new designs. Frankly, I think they're over the line."

Shining rubbed his temples. This was going nowhere. All of the zebras he'd captured were only recently trained in seafaring, and all of the soldiers trained in the use of the new black tubes had been killed in the process of taking the Aeolus. There was no one in here who knew how to use the new weapons. They were probably so green that they couldn't tell the difference between a bowline and a sheepshank.

"Did you ever see a demonstration of its use?"

The zebra shook his head. "I only know that it works with fire. You light some part with a glowing red wire, and it makes a loud noise and launches special stones. It was supposed to be devastating to even the sturdiest homes."

"Do you know which direction is the end you point at your enemy?"

"We always pointed the hollow end out to sea. That being the business end sounds right to me."

Shining nodded. "And these special stones. They're the round ones?"

The zebra nodded. "We had boxes of those, along with the kegs. I was having enough trouble finding my sea legs."

"Kegs?" asked Shining. "What kegs?"

The zebra scratched the back of his neck. "There were these kegs with the weapons, full of black... stuff. They gave us a lot to make sure we had enough."

"'They' refers to your superiors, yes?"

The zebra nodded. "I was just a First Lieutenant leading a scout force. I was supposed to find and bring back information, of course. However, my troop was supposed to wait for me to come back. I was very surprised when they chose to attack."

Shining leaned back. "Apparently, a few of the ranking officers were concerned, and started asking questions of every ship in the bay. That spooked your men, and they lashed out." There was a brief silence as Shining stood up and walked to the door, stepping through it. "Enjoy those hay fries. I'm going to look into some of your claims."

Walking out of the prison and down to the harbor, Shining found the impounded Aeolus tied up and being guarded. Under orders from the Rear Admiral, it was off-limits to all except ranking officers O-6 or higher, but Shining was given a special pardon to do so, as he had the most knowledge when it came to repelling the zebras, and his entire purpose in coming was to help show how best to do that. If he could glean anything from the devices, he would be doing his job.

He stepped up onto the deck and looked around. As expected, the weapons were still secured to the deck. The special round rocks were sitting in large boxes next to them, with big kegs on the other side filled with the black powder. Seeing them next to each other certainly did make it seem as if they were related to each other. There was also a long stick near many of the tubes, and one end had a cloth bound to each by wire. At the other end of these rods were large flat disks, exactly the same size as the inside of the tubes and the special stones. Picking it up and pushing it into the tube, it slid in very smoothly.

Shining found himself no longer alone as a captain climbed aboard. "Shining Armor. Good to see you again."

Shining looked up. "My apologies, but I don't really remember your face, captain. Can you remind me of where we met?"

The captain removed his helmet and shook loose his mane. "We bunked together at the Canterlot Royal Naval Academy."

Shining's eyes lit up. "Boom! You're a captain now?"

Boom smiled. "That I am. I was promoted recently, actually, after a campaign in the Stardrop Sea."

Shining Smiled wide. "And look at you now."

"Me? Look at you! Prince of the Crystal Empire, married, and to the Princess of Love. How lucky!"

"Yeah." The conversation dropped off for a moment. "So, what brings you aboard this ship?"

"I talked to one of the mares rescued from this vessel. She had some very interesting things to say about these tubes that I'm just dying to know if they're true."

Shining smirked. "I interrogated a zebra officer and learned a few things, myself. Care to compare notes?"

Boom approached the one shining was messing with. It was pointed at one of the ironclads moored in the harbor. "I think we should. It would be instrumental in fighting them off if we knew how they worked. We could find the weakest points and exploit them."

Shining placed his hoof on the open end. "The special stones come out this end, but I don't know how. Really powerful stuff."

"The process for loading should be to put in a fuse, add the black powder, tamp it down, put in a ball, and light the fuse."

Shining looked around. "Have you seen any fuses?"

"No. Have you seen any black powder?"

Shining lifted the lid off a powder keg. "It's in these barrels. If we can find the fuses, we can do a test fire. What do they look like?"

Boom shook his head. "She didn't see them, she just heard her captors talking about them. Apparently, some of the soldiers were unsure of how these things worked, and had to go over it several times. She memorized it just in case."

Shining smirked. "Smart girl." He made his way along the deck until he found a weapon that still had a fuse. Tilting it forward, one of the stones rolled inside the tube. "This one seems ready to fire. While I would like to not cause a panic, I think we should fire this one, both to learn how they work, and to make sure it doesn't go off accidentally."

Boom came over. "Excellent. Let's turn the ship and fire it out into the harbor."

A few sailors were brought on to shift the ship's position until the weapon was pointed out over open water. As it was lined up, Shining set loose a spark from his horn. An ear-splitting explosion sounded as the ball launched off into the open water, landing with a large splash. It set off the tinnitus of everypony standing on deck.

When their ears stopped ringing, Boom came over and patted Shining's shoulder. "That was loud. Really loud. What do you think? Worth it?"

Shining nodded. "Yeah. At the very least, we know for certain how they work."