Breaking into the heavily-armed stolen gunboat turned out to be pretty easy. Both Robin and May had reached Peak Human status, and the door was not created to withstand anything near the amount of force they could bring to bear. Controlling it would have been another matter entirely, but as luck had it, the pirates had already rigged the control panel to bypass the now-shattered number-keypad ignition.

They had mutually agreed not to deploy the dragonship yet. It would likely need both of them to operate, and… Robin had a feeling that the ship would likely have actual sails, something neither of the two knew how to handle. He was disappointed, but it would also likely mean they would have to abandon the gunship, and he definitely had no intent on that.

It had machine guns.

Robin had, at first, discounted the true efficacy of non-magical machine guns after the advent of the Ysari System. The ΔU-Revenant was amazing, sure, but it was magical.

He had been wrong.

As they travelled up the shore, the gunboat had been attacked by a group of animals that had produced dread even before enhancement by the Ysari System, plaguing the innocent and guilt alike. Harbingers of hunger and filth, screaming their gluttonous rage into the air with abandon, they were nonetheless often considered scavengers in the coastal ecosystem. That label was incorrect, however, and always had been. They were predators.

The massive seagulls had began circling the boat for only minutes before the first of them decided to make a dive towards Opal, screaming as it fell through the air.

Opal dodged it, of course, letting the motorcycle-sized bird continue through the air unmolested by razor sharp pink claws.

That had only been the first, though. Once one had braved an attempt and nothing had happened, the rest had begun swooping, claws and beaks ripping through the air.

Individually, they were no threat to anyone on board, but there were hundreds flying through the air, and May had made the decision to ready a machine gun.

Robin remembered the moment she began firing better than the rest of the fight. He had been mesmerized by the robotic, practiced precision with which she reloaded the machine gun, and had been about to ask her where she had learned how to reload the complicated machine when the burst of gunfire interrupted him.

The birds began hitting the water like hail, the bullets shredding through their feathery forms. May fired in steady bursts, counting to herself as she fired.

“One, two three, one, two, three, one, two, three…”

The birds had begun to fly off seconds after the rounds had begun to hit them, but the damage had been done - there were dozens dead, their bloody corpses bobbing in the water.

Robin had not underestimated the machine guns after that, non-magical or not.

The issue they were now facing was one of fuel. The gunboat only had a limited supply, and while the fuel tank was substantially greater larger in volume than that of a civilian vehicle, it was still just a mundane, non-magical vehicle, and they had no source of… Robin frowned.

“Hey, May. What does the gunboat use for fuel?”

She yelled down form the deck, where she had been keeping watch.

“Navy oil fuel.”

Robin silently cursed.

No chance of replacing that anywhere nearby, likely… We might have to abandon the boat soon.

Robin began taking stock of his items, making sure everything was where it was supposed to be. When he had reassured himself, he eased the throttle on the boat slightly, and went up to the top deck to speak with May face-to-face.

“So, we are running low on fuel”, he stated matter-of-factly.

May nodded, the too-big wide-brimmed Navy hat she had found in the gunboat flopping with her movements.

“Yeah, I kinda figured that was coming. Any ideas?”

“We have the dragonship, but I do not know if that is really an option. Neither of us know how to sail.”

May nodded slowly. She sighed, leaning her head back. “We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it, I guess. We’ll just need to keep thinking of ideas if we want to keep travelling by coast.”

“Do you think we should deploy the ship before we run out of fuel, so we can have a little practice before we have no choice but to use it?”

May stood up, grunting an affirmative noise at him. “Yeah, you’re probably right. I’ll admit I’m a little nervous about the ‘dragon’ aspect of it.”

Robin could understand that. Their encounter with a true dragon had been terrifying, humbling, and overall, not an experience he wanted to relive.

“I will go get the Toilet Seat of Seclusion from the bathroom. I am fairly certain it was the last of our stuff here…”

May gave him a cheeky grin. “It’s all our stuff, kid.”

“Yeah, I suppose so. It is going to be a lot harder to abandon this boat if we get attached to it, though.” Robin stood and headed to stairs that led downward, yanking the thick door open. May yelled after him, speaking quickly to get her words through before the door sealed shut.

“Oh! Grabthetee-!”

Robin went into the bathroom and quickly unscrewed the Toilet Seat of Seclusion using a screwdriver that had been under the small sink, tossing it into the Aliquam Pack. He followed it with the rolls of toilet paper and bar of soap that they had been using during their time on the boat, and lastly, the screwdriver.

He set the Aliquam Pack down on the ground and stopped to inspect himself in the mirror. He had not had many opportunities to look in a mirror, and the Wing of the Dragon probably did not have one.

Robin thought he looked taller than he had the last time he had really looked at himself. His black hair, a genetic inheritance from his mother, had gotten long, starting to creep past his dark brown eyes. He found himself staring at his own eyes, and broke the spell by looking at his armor.

Have they always been that… vivid?

His armor, the Shell of the Blue Entomage, covered every part of his body, save for his head. It was a light blue, a hair darker than baby blue, the chitin darkening to azure near the creases at his joints and underneath each layer, and lightening near the crests and high points of each plate. Each “layer” ringed his body, five centimeters long, give or take, overlapping the ring-layer beneath it. The layers were flexible, and as he moved and stretched in front of the mirror, they revealed the darker color underneath in small glimpses.

The blades granted by the Aspect of the Wasp were visible even when retracted, the three-sided tips barely peeking out of a small nook in the armor just above his wrists.

Robin looked behind him, scanning the cramped hallway, and then quietly shut the door.

Looking back at the mirror, he activated the Aspect of the Dragonfly, his nerdy heart soaring as the electric blue lines crackled over the creases.

A pounding at the door made him jump, and he hastily deactivated the Aspect of the Dragonfly, opening the door.

May was standing there, a big smile on her face.

“Were you looking at your Tron-armor in the mirror again?”

Robin groaned. How had she known!?

“Did you get the toilet paper?”

She peeked inside the bathroom before he could answer, and then patted him on the shoulder. “Good! C’mon, Kevin Flynn. We might as well get this dragon-party started.”

Robin groaned again and followed her, scooping up the Aliquam Pack as he left the bathroom.

* * *

They were standing on the bow of the gunboat, staring at the water.

Well, Robin was staring. May was trying to verbally prod Robin into activating the dragon ship, her eagerness to see the highest-tier item either of them had encountered overcoming her reluctance to potentially come face-to-face with another dragon.

With a sigh, he infused it with MANA, feeling the energy flowing from his fingertips directly into the miniature wooden boat in his hands. He was slightly startled when the boat kept pulling, not stopping until his MANA reserves were a few points shy of completely gone, and hurriedly tossed it into the water the instant it ceased channeling his magical energy.

It bobbed into the water, hopelessly outmatched by the gentle waves, which, from the perspective of the tiny ship, were hull-smashers the size of skyscrapers.

May and Robin stared at it from the deck, watching it …

Bob. It was just bobbing. May tried and failed to stifle a giggle as a small wave hit the toy boat from the side and capsized it, the tiny cloth mast dragging in the water.

Robin was thankful that the little boat was solid wood beneath the tiny hatches on the deck. If it had been hollow, it would have been completely swamped by now. At this rate, he was going to have to jump in to get it.

Did I… Do I not have enough MANA? It did not even take it all!

Robin turned to voice his complaints to May, but she was squinting upwards, her hand uselessly shading her eyes, and appeared to be staring at the sun.

“You might want to grab the boat, and we can figure it out later. It looks like we have another flock of seagulls coming, and these ones are smarter. They’re approaching directly from the sun, and I don’t think I’ll be able to hit them with the machine gun”, she said grimly. “Ready for some more shrieking rat-birds?”

Robin sighed, but nodded, double-checking the ammunition in the ΔU-Revenant. Finding it full, he activated the Aspect of the Dragonfly, feeling the sharp increase in his spatial awareness as his senses expanded.

“Stand down, I think. I mean, be ready, but do not fire.”

Robin sounded a little breathless, and May gave him a raised eyebrow, tilting her head back to allow Robin to see under the visor.

“I… I think that is the ship?”

May nodded, completely satisfied with that answer. She abruptly started, then gave Robin a cheeky, too-wide smile, waiting. Robin preemptively rolled his eyes, gesturing good-naturedly for her to continue.

“I guess that makes sense,” she began.

“It is called the Wing of the Dragon.”