Author's Note

This chapter was pretty fun to write. Just so you guys understand a bit the kind of feel I want this story to have. While yes it will have it's serious moments, it will have it's silly, funny, cliche moments too. I hope you all enjoy it and I hope you guys keep up with this little adventure of mine. Also, if you were wondering, a lot of my other stories usually have a lot of dialogue. So for this one I decided to go for a more word heavy explanation sort of approach with a little dialogue thrown in from time to time.

If you guys like how that's going and want more, please let me know. If the you don't like it then please by all means, let me know how I can change or better myself and my writing skills to make it better.

-StormHoof

Chapter 4: Castaways Creed

Elias and Star stared at Pip in bewilderment as he stuggled to get out of the barrel. His large size had caused him to be stuck inside it, which made for quite a hilarious sight. With a chuckle, the pair gripped his two front hooves and pulled him free where he sprawled out in the sand. With a bit of an embarrassed blush, he stood and brushed the sand off himself before saying his thanks.

"I appreciate that. I don't know what you got here, but I'd greatly appreciate you more if you could help me out" he said, brushing more sand from his mane before he continued. "I was on a merchant ship that was beset by pirates. I use to be a big fan of them until they threatened to kill us. Some mates of mine stuffed me in a barrel and said if I should wash ashore anywhere with somepony living there, I should get help and give them the last coordinates we had."

Pip's explanation was a bit of a doozy, and as the two pondered this, Pip reached into the barrel and pulled out a chart, a plotting compass, and what appeared to be an empty sack of potatoes. He grinned sheepishly and stuffed the sack back in before handing Star the charts. She looked at them with a raised eyebrow before hoofing them to Elias.

He had sailed before and had definitely dealt with pirates, though his were Somalian and had guns. Something he was sure that pony pirates didn't have other than cannons. He rolled out the chart and studied it while Star got acquainted with Pip. From what he had noticed thus far, she was good at that kind of thing. She was in human terms, a people person.

When he was looking over the map he managed almost easily to find the island they were on. It was jus shy of where their ship was attacked. The coordinates that were marked where to the east of where they were currently but if the ship was still nearby it should be viewable from there. He notified the other two who nodded and agreed to go back to camp to get Midnight. Elias waited and rolled the chart up, tying it off with it's fastening thong.

When the others returned, they set off as a group towards the eastern beach. When they reached it's curve and were able to view more of the ocean, they found the ship they had been looking for was currently moored at their shores. Elias and the others drew back into the trees and took stock of what was before them. On the beach two ponies were moving crates off the ship while a griffin and pony argued nearby. On the deck of the ship, a few guards patrolled and kept an eye out for anything suspicious.

While Elias would have seen this as serious in any other situation, in this he didn't. It reminded him too much of some of the really cliche scenes for combat in a pirate assassin game from back home. He looked around for anything he could use before remembering his thin hoodie that he had packed away. Glad to have his hiking pack with him, thank to Star and her quick thinking, he pulled out the hoodie and pulled up the hood.

With a bit of trepidation, he explained to the ponies around him what he planned to do, and that to that end he would be taking lives. This however was met with an eyebrow raise from each of them. They then sat there and had to explain that as far as the laws of Equestria were concerned, pirates weren't deserving of normal pony rights. It was highly advised that they be sunk on sight and captured pirates were to be executed.

Elias glanced at the three of them, and thought about what they had said. For a race of ponies that according to Star praised Peace and Harmony, they seemed rather blasé about killing pirates. Either way, what he was planning wouldn't upset them and that made this a bit easier for him to do. He grabbed his knife and hatchet and slipped them into his belt before nodding to the others and making his way from the trees into what Elias could only say were conveniently placed bushes.

He fought valiantly to suppress his laughter at the absurdity of how things seemed to work in this world. As quietly as he could, he crouched and moved from brush to brush, watching the pirates as he did. He moved specifically when he knew they wouldn't be looking and his attempts at stealth would have made Big Boss himself proud. Wearing a bright pink hoodie he moved into sparse growing grass and grabbed the nearest pony.

As quietly as he could he drove his knife into the stallions chest and covered his mouth with his other hand, dragging him into the brush with himself. Nopony noticed this and continued about as though nothing was wrong. With yet another suppressed giggle, Elias moved to a closer bush and did this three more times, systematically eliminating the pirates that had been working on the beach.

When he had taken out the last one, a guard on deck finally noticed that nothing was happening on the beach anymore. He looked down curiously, scanned the area and then shrugged before continuing back on his patrol path. Elias nearly facepalmed at this blatant display of disregard and figured much more couldn't be done other than rolling with it. Plus it was enjoyable to a point, on one hand he got to essentially relive a game for real. But on the other hand, he was in fact killing pastel colored ponies.

Granted these ponies and by extension griffins were also killing ponies and causing chaos, so it wasn't too bad in his eyes. If he had the chance to fight back against the Somalian pirates that had kept his family hostage on a cruise, it would have been nice. Shaking his head of his thoughts, he made his way to the plank that led from the open hull of the ship as it bobbed in the water. Quietly and while crouching for added stealth effect, he crept up and into the ship. He stayed close to cargo crates and watched for guards.

He counted three that were patrolling below decks and carefully he made his way to the one on his left. He waited for the mare to pass by him before he crept up behind her and placed a hand over her mouth before finding his knife a nice and comfy home in her chest. She kicked for a second before going still and he pulled her outside the ship and over the trees. He turned from her and looked at the rest of the bodies and moved them all to the trees as well. Just because his new friends could see what he was doing and understood, didn't mean they would want to see dead bodies.

With that done he went back into the ship and dispatched one of the other guards in a similar fashion. The last however was one he had an idea for. Up above his patrol path was a large wooden support beam and a platform that reached over to where he was hidden. He climbed up some cargo crates while the guard wasn't looking and pulled up onto the platform and looked around. What he found was a little surprising, In a few cages just ahead of him were two ponies who were chained up.

One was a white unicorn stallion with a firey orange mane and a cutie mark depicting a frying pan with an egg. The other was a pegasus mare with a bright yellow coat and a brown and tan two tone mane. Her cutie mark was a piece of wood with a hammer and nails, and she was shaking in the stallions hooves. As quietly as he could he, Elias crept up to the cage and got their attention. While they were a bit startled, they stayed quiet at his behest and he whispered that he would need to take care of the other guard before coming back for them.

They nodded in understanding and he crept a bit further, placing himself just above the guard as he walked around some crates that had been tied down with rope. Elias waited for just the right moment before jumping down and landing on the stallion with a satisfying thump. As he did so, he drove his knife into the guards neck. He immediately went limp and Elias carefully placed him with the others before going back to the two in the cage.

He took his hatchet and flipped it around and used it to smash the rusting lock. It cracked open and the cage door swung free with a loud creak. He winced and hurried them out quickly, leading them to the others as those up on deck discovered the that many of their own were now missing. With more shouts of alarm, the plank was pulled in and the ship set sail. Elias was breathing a little hard while Star got to taking a look at the two that he had rescued.

When she was satisfied that they weren't injured and were only going through a mild shock, they got their names. Gourmet Gruel was the ships cook before the mutiny and had been shoved in a cage when he had disputed the decision of transporting slaves. The mare was Free Feather, she was a shipbuilder that had been signed onto the ship for any repairs it would need during it's voyage. She was from the ship that Pip had been on and as far as she knew, her and Pip were the only survivors.

Pip looked down sadly at that, but when discussions were done and their two new guests were fed, they headed to the cave and Elias began setting up his bedding. When the others asked about this, Star explained it to them and they nodded, understanding the situation better than he would have thought. Once they were safe inside, he took his place and laid down to close his eyes. Soon he was off to sleep and dreams of games he had played as a kid.

Inside the cave however, the ponies were talking about events that had been happening recently and anything they had heard from the mainland. Apparently Princess Twilight had finally taken the throne and the two princesses had retired. Rumor was that they were planning on taking a sailing ship through the South Equestrian Seas and that it would be expected to be dangerous due to the high volume of pirates in the area.

What they also discovered was that Free Feather had a knack for feeling out special wood that could be used for ships. She explained to them that she knew as soon as they came close to the island that there is a tree here that would make the strongest ship she had ever built. The only problem would be finding iron on the island that they could use for nails. To this, Gourmet Gruel stated that he hadn't always been a cook, and that he had served some time in the Equestrian Military as a mine detector due to his unicorn magic. While some of the spells he knew were directly tailored to detecting mines, one was for detecting metal in general.

It would be useful, but it did have it's drawbacks. It couldn't tell him what kind of metal it was, only that either something metal was there, or that an ore vein was there. Star continued their conversation well into the night as they came up with a plan. She would let Elias know in the morning and she was sure that he would help. Midnight however sat slightly away from the group and looked out towards Elias.

She gave a sad sigh and laid her head down, closing her eyes as she allowed her thoughts to order themselves. She hadn't been fair to him lately, and she knew that she would soon need to rectify that.