Go With the Flow

~

‘A few days’.

It was the vague time period Flowing had given Seasmoke, before she’d swam off to parts unknown, to meet with her coltfriend.

It was also, infuriatingly, a time period that had come and was now going without Seasmoke having heard scale-nor-tail of her friend.

Seasmoke tried not to be a worrywort. Sirens knew that there were enough of those in Seaquestria, without her adding her own anxieties to the perpetually panicked nation she called home. Yet it was difficult to ignore them when they concerned Flowing.

Ever since they were guppies, it had been a similar narrative with Flowing. Always unable to keep her tail out of trouble. Always finding it hard to stick with the rest of the school when they were swimming outside of Seaquestria, it seemed like every single field trip or expedition ended up in Flowing’s siren tongue goading a few other fish—more often than not Seasmoke included—into conducting a bit of ‘extra-curricular exploration.’

Her taste for adventure hadn’t vanished when she’d grown older, either. Seasmoke had always known that Flowing hadn’t really felt comfortable sticking around Seaquestria, filling her time with seaweed wraps and mud-baths like their Queen so often endorsed.

It hadn’t come as a surprise to Seasmoke, then, when Flowing’s ‘soul-searching’ expeditions had started. Nor did it really shock her too much to learn that she’d acquired herself a stallion in her endeavours. And…as happy as Seasmoke was for it, it was another thing to cause worry.

Such worries were still firmly rooted in her mind when she’d decided that perhaps a bit of a surprise might be in order for the good ponies of Herring Harbour. She’d yet to meet Flowing’s coltfriend after all, and if it meant she could also ensure the trouble-prone fish was safe as well, then what reason had she to stick around Seaquestria waiting for the worse?

Seasmoke swam out of their sandy, cavern-home, and into the deep sea light of Seaquestria’s outskirts. It was morning, though Seaquestria herself was far enough under the sea to remain held in a sort of twilight. Keeping their homes and ‘streets’ lit by bioluminiscent coral was a necessity, and keeping their coral-reef homes properly cultivated and healthy was a job they all shared.

The result was a home that Seasmoke was particularly proud of. The perpetual darkness might have seemed disheartening to some, but it felt beautiful to her. She loved the way the corals and jellies suspended the entire city in a cool, colourful glow that was just bright enough to illuminate the swimming schools of fish and seaponies alike. She loved how clean and untouched the deep sea water felt in her gills, compared to higher above in the slipstreams of passing ships.

The main part of Seaquestria—where Novo and the majority of her hippogriffs resided—was built alongside and beneath an enormous sub-oceanic cavern. From above, there was virtually no way inside, though the cave itself opened significantly at the bottom of the ocean, where access to the city was reserved exclusively to ocean-dwelling beings that would have been able to make the swim down in the first place. Outside of the cavern, the city continued, with various neighbourhoods of sand-dune houses doting the ocean floor.

Seasmoke was leaving the city behind, and swimming surface-bound. As she swam, the warm glow of sunlight slowly began to ebb into the surrounding waters above her, growing brighter and brighter until eventually she could make out the vastness of the sky above, distorted by the rippling waves.

After a bit of prying, Seasmoke had been able to wrench a location for Herring Harbour out of Flowing. She’d also learned that Flowing herself had found a periodical oceanic current that she’d hop onto to hasten her swim. It took Seasmoke swimming a good distance to the north-west before she eventually found it herself, but when she did she was rather relieved at the opportunity to finally rest her fins a bit.

The current itself was visible only by the way the rest of the ocean reacted to it’s presence. An unobservant eye might have missed it entirely, but Seasmoke could see the way that various particles of sea-snow were being drawn in one direction… and how further on it seemed to be accelerating quicker. She could feel the current’s pull herself as she got closer, bracing herself and keeping her fins close to her sides before with an enthused lurch of her tail, she entered the racing oceanic current.

It might’ve been easy for Flowing… Seasmoke, however, felt like her heart was about to race away without her.

Eventually, though, she was able to straighten her swim and re-straighten her fins. Once she did, she could not help but grin as she rode the current, swimming faster and faster than she ever could with her tail and fins alone.

…Next stop, Herring Harbour.