| My Little Pony: Set Your Sail #3 | |
|---|---|
| |
| Issue №: | 3 |
| Published: | July 3, 2024 |
| Writer: | Megan Brown & Casey Gilly |
| Artist: | Amy Mebberson |
| Colorist: | Reggie Graham |
| Letterer: | Johanna Natalie |
| Editor: | Riley Farmer Bixie Mathieu (associate) |
| See also | |
| Credits • Gallery • Allusions | |
| Issue guide | |
| Previous Set Your Sail #2 |
Next Set Your Sail #4 |
My Little Pony: Set Your Sail #3 is the third issue of IDW Publishing's My Little Pony: Set Your Sail comic miniseries. In this issue, Pipp Petals and Izzy Moonbow hear the trenchponies' story while Zipp Storm continues to investigate their whereabouts.
Summary[]
Maris the Crow explains to Pipp Petals and Izzy Moonbow that she and her fellow trenchponies were driven into hiding by Queen Calla Lily because Calla Lily seeks the Shadow Pearl, the trenchponies' magical anchor and the source of their magic, and blames the trenchponies for the other kingdoms of the sea falling into ruin. However, the trenchponies do not have the Shadow Pearl in their possession, only a small handful of sentimental treasures that they have managed to protect from the Sparkling Sea's constant raids on their pirate ship.
According to Maris, Calla Lily has six of the seven kingdoms' anchors and believes bringing all of them together will give her the power to restore the fallen sea kingdoms and quell the turbulent ocean. However, an ancient text in Maris' belongings warns that if the anchors are united, the oceans will rise and swallow up the kingdoms on land. When Izzy mentions the Galloping Ghost books again, she and Pipp are greeted in person by the books' author: the elderly squid Creeping Jenny.
Jenny confirms what Izzy suspected all along: the fourth volume of the Galloping Ghost books (which portrays the heroic Galloping Ghost pirate crew as villains) was written not by Jenny but by an imposter seeking to make the trenchponies look bad, hence why all the copies of the fourth book were defaced with the word "LIAR". Realizing the trenchponies' dire situation and the grim state of their undersea world, Pipp and Izzy resolve to help however they can.
Meanwhile, in the Sparkling Sea Kingdom, Zipp Storm continues to investigate the kingdom's strange goings-on while searching for Pipp and Izzy. When Zipp points out to Princess Anemone all the bizarre things she has noticed, Anemone continues to pretend that nothing is amiss, but she is caught in her lie when the flower in her mane turns to dust in Zipp's hoof. They confront Queen Calla Lily in the royal library, and when Zipp angrily calls Calla Lily out on all the oddities she discovered as well as the fact that Pipp is nowhere to be found, Calla Lily gets offended and orders the guards to confine Zipp to the guests' quarters.
Anemone notices that Calla Lily has been using a forbidden magic to cover up their kingdom's deterioration and turns her back on Calla Lily. She goes to Zipp's quarters and confesses to her that Pipp and Izzy were taken captive by the trenchponies. Refusing to bend to her sister's desires any longer, Anemone sneaks Zipp out of the castle, and they go to rescue Pipp and Izzy together. As Anemone tries to rationalize Calla Lily's actions and what they were told about the trenchponies by their parents, she starts to come to the realization that her own kingdom is at fault for the ocean's current state.
Just then, Zipp and Anemone hear Pipp and Izzy broadcasting a radio message from the trenchponies' pirate ship, transmitted through jellyfish-like creatures that can carry radio signals. In their message, Pipp and Izzy announce to everyone that the trenchponies are not evil and that Queen Calla Lily has been collecting the anchors of the Seven Seas for herself. When they finish broadcasting, Captain Starboard warns that Calla Lily will try harder than ever to claim the last anchor.
Meanwhile, Calla Lily, having discovered that Anemone snuck Zipp out of the castle against her wishes, abandons all pretense of uniting the kingdoms of land and sea. With the forbidden magic she has been using to cover up the Sparkling Sea's deterioration, Calla Lily creates an artificial version of the Shadow Pearl and merges it with the other six anchors. This triggers a massive earthquake that is felt not only in the deep trenches of the ocean but also across Equestria on the surface.
In Zephyr Heights, Sunny Starscout, Hitch Trailblazer, Misty, and Queen Haven are shaken by the sudden and violent earthquake. Fearing the quake had something to do with the seaponies and that the rest of their friends are in danger, Sunny, Hitch, and Misty transform into seaponies and go to investigate. Back on the trenchponies' pirate ship, the earthquake is so intense that it causes their chest of sentimental treasures to fall off the ship and into a deep sea chasm below. Pipp, Izzy, and Maris the Crow swim down into the chasm to retrieve the chest before it is lost forever.
Quotes[]
- Maris the Crow: I can tell that I just bilged your anchors. You only just learned we existed and here we are, ponynapping you and asking you to 🎝work together, make it better!🎝
- Pipp Petals: You're a Pipsqueak!
- Maris the Crow: We don't have answers, princess. We barely know who we're supposed to be. But we do know one thing-- we are not villains.
- Maris the Crow: [reading] "If the anchors are united, the oceans will rise against the land, swallowing all in its path until nothing is left. Most of the others have fallen, their anchors pilfered and kingdoms in ruin. An ill tide whispered our fate. We gathered our most precious treasure and hid it away. May we one day set our sails again."
- Pipp Petals: That is nothing like the Unity Crystals.
- Izzy Moonbow: Yeah, that's the Disunity Crystals.
- Zipp Storm: Izzy doesn't wear her mane like that. That's not even my sister's crown! And where did this extra hoof come from?!
- Creeping Jenny: Creeping Jenny I be, the scribe of the sea, and my memories don't fail me-- much.
- Creeping Jenny: My stories are turned into lies--
- Izzy Moonbow: I knew it! I knew those weren't real GGM books!
- Creeping Jenny: Fooling all except the wise.
- Zipp Storm: There's the bizarre invitation you sent, a train that goes to nowhere, things turning into sand, books that make no sense... Oh, and-- my missing sister.
- Queen Calla Lily: How dare you! I am a queen! I have shown nothing but hospitality, and this is how you thank me?
- Princess Anemone: I've been ignoring a lot of your mistakes, sis. I've been...covering for you. I've always covered for you. But this? This has gone too far. You haven't wanted to fix things properly, and now look! Mom told you the Enchantment was for emergencies only. You erase everything you don't want to deal with. And now you've erased me. You're on your own from now on.
- Princess Anemone: Calla Lily said that sometimes lying is the right thing to do. That I don't understand that because I'm not queen. But I understand what it means to be a sister. Sisters look out for each other no matter what. I may be losing mine-- but I'm going to help you find yours.
- Zipp Storm: How do you know the trenchponies really tried to steal those anchors in the first place?
- Princess Anemone: Because our mom told us! And her mom told her, and her mom told her-- Plus, Creeping Jenny's latest book is pretty adamant on the subject.
- Zipp Storm: My friend was pretty adamant that book had to be written by a fraud. And your sister just happens to have a spell that can make things out of nothing. But why would she work so hard to keep up the lie? Why would your mom?
- Princess Anemone: ...Because otherwise we're the reason the Seven Seas is like this. Dark and cold and--and unconnected. We're the reason magic's all messed up. And if we're the ones who've been holding on to the anchors, then maybe...maybe we're the ones who stole them in the first place.
- Pipp Petals: I'm here to tell you the truth about the Queen of the Sparkling Sea. She hasn't been protecting you from darkness. She's been trying to collect the anchors of the Seven Seas for herself!
- Izzy Moonbow: And everypony who's anypony knows that forcing the power of the Seven Seas together is gonna be world-shatteringly, abso-positively catastrophic--
- Pipp Petals: Thank you, Izzy, for that totally level-headed and not at all ominous warning!
- Queen Calla Lily: I've made plants and animals. I've fixed buildings. I've kept the Sparkling Sea from falling apart, like my mother and her mother before. ...How hard could one measly little Shadow Pearl be?
- Queen Haven: My goodness, what was that?!
- Hitch Trailblazer: Some sort of...quaking earth...
- Sunny Starscout: An earthquake.
- Hitch Trailblazer: Yeah, that's a better name for it.
