Survival Begins at Home

The carriage arrived in Canterlot a day later than it was supposed to. After escorting Jericho to the hospital, Shining had gathered a handful of guards, brought them back to where they had found him, and followed the bloodstained drag marks back to the wooded area from whence he'd come. After looking over the area, Shining concluded that Jerry had been staked over the fire, and had managed to break the stake he'd been tied to. There was a knot in the wood at that point, which probably helped him. He undid his bonds somehow and then there was evidence of him checking all of the others to find out if they were still alive. He hit all of them, not leaving a single one behind. They were all dead.

As the carriage pulled up to the castle steps, Shining and Cadance stepped out and made their way inside. They hadn't changed clothes, as there wasn't a lot of time, and changing in the carriage was not an option, as there had been blood on the floor, and it would have done them little good.

They made their way inside and found the courtroom where Shining was supposed to have his hearing. It was a small courtroom, roughly the size of a conference room. He sat down on the far side of the table and waited. In the meantime, Cadance went to a courtesy room to clean herself up.

An hour and a half passed before the tribunal came in. At the center was one of the brigadier generals of the army, and at either side of him sat Celestia and Luna.

"Good afternoon, Shining Armor," said Celestia, opening a manila envelope. "How are you this afternoon?"

"Fine, thank you."

"You are aware that you were supposed to be here yesterday?" asked the general, raising his eyebrow.

"I am, yes. Unfortunately, we ran into an emergency situation on the road, which delayed us. Cadance and I have only just arrived."

"We might have guessed from your attire," posited Luna, gesturing to the bloody clothing and armour. "What was this emergency?"

"A young soldier, PFC Jericho of the hundred and eighth, was badly injured and in desperate need of medical attention. He is now under the care of a hospital in Tailedo. I did not stay long enough to gather his medical report, and instead opted to investigate his story. The rest of his group seems to have been wiped out, but I didn't have a list of their names, nor did I write down all of their tags. I placed five guards in charge of cleaning that up and continued out here for this as soon as I was sure it was taken care of."

"Commendable," chuckled Celestia. "Of course, we'll have to check into that later. For now, let's focus on the purpose of this meeting: the destruction of the Whinnypeg and her prisoners. The report we received indicates that you did not say what caused the detonation on board, so let us begin with what the explosion was. What kind of device was used to destroy the ship?"

"I don't know. I would guess that it had something to do with the black powder we found down there. I guess they didn't remove all of it."

"Except they had," interjected the general, pointing to a particular section of a document. "The report clearly states that all kegs of black powder were removed from the ship before the prisoners were tied down in the hold."

"Not so fast," said Luna. "The report also says that when Shining was fished out of the water, he was holding onto one of those kegs. At least one was clearly left aboard, so I find it possible that there were more. Likely, even. If there was one, there were probably others."

"Let's assume that there was more powder on the boat," shrugged the general. "How then would the prisoners be able to access it? They were tied up, were they not?"

"I can confirm that they were," replied Shining. "I personally made sure the bonds on their wrists were tight."

"And their ankles?"

"There was no place to tie them down. The Whinnypeg was filled with other cargo, and the tiedown anchors on the floor were crowded enough as it was. We also considered that we would have to just untie them again to drag the prisoners to their cells. It was deemed unnecessary."

Celestia clasped her hands and brought them up to her mouth. "Let's talk about why you were alone. Who decided that was a good idea?"

"She had... the ship, I mean... had damaged one of her masts, and as a result, she sailed significantly slower than usual. We knew that it would be slow going, so the plan was for me to turn the ship the right way and let her drift toward the harbor. In the meantime, other, smaller ships were to be deployed my way to help me come in. We never made it quite that far."

"I meant just you being on the ship."

"There was a weight limit, and we were fast approaching. If we had one more body on deck, we'd be easily taken out by a rouge wave."

The general looked up. "Were there rouge waves?"

Shining shook his head. "I didn't see any, but they can come out of nowhere with little warning." The door suddenly opened and a guard rushed in with a scroll, placing it in front of Celestia before leaving. "If the wind suddenly shifted and picked up speed, the ship might have sunk, with or without an explosion if we put another sailor on it. Essentially, all I had to do was hold the wheel to the right until we were facing land, then straighten it out and hold us on course. That really only requires one pony."

"So does blowing up the ship," scoffed the general.

"Yes, but he didn't do that," answered Celestia, looking at the scroll. "I've just received word from another ship that they picked up a survivor on their way to look into the explosion. After Shining passed out, the ship listed to one side, and an oil lantern fell on top of the powder stores. This was not a willful destruction of property, nor a war crime. This case is dismissed. Prince Shining Armor, you are dismissed. Take the rest of the day to clean yourself up, we may have an assignment for you tomorrow."

As the tribunal filed out of the room, Shining just sat there. He had been unaware of any survivors. He'd convinced himself that he'd actually blown up the ship, and was planning to turn himself in. Seeing Jericho suffer had caused him to reevaluate his stance on the matter, and he was afraid that he might have harmed somepony who hadn't deserved it. To hear that he was definitively not guilty was a relief, but it was harrowing to him to believe that he almost wanted to be. He would have to take greater care in the future.