"Okay, everything should be ready," Keith said.

  Dan just nodded. After stopping for the night, right after making it to where they guessed the danger zone started, they had spent a vigilant night while planning how to go about the coming stretch of their journey.

  What they had come up with at the end wasn't much really, mere precautions more than anything. It all came down to having everyone be in their rooms and prepared for some heavy weather, telling them that the deck was off-limits until they were out of the danger zone. On the other hand, they made sure that Voyager understood what was coming and how to deal with it. Dan even had her start messing around with her Aura Appendages, trying to see if they could be of help with her balance.

  Dan honestly thought that the Appendages were going to be extremely valuable for the coming stretch. Voyager already had retractable fins, stabilisers, that she could retract and deploy in bad weather to stabilise and stop herself from tilting too much. That is done by exerting force down or up under the water, controlling the way it's tilting or countering the waves.

  And, while those were only a few meters long at most, the Aura Appendages were 60 meters long and around 4 meters wide, which gave them around 240 square meters of area and a huge amount of counterforce to generate in times of need. Voyager could even extend them from wherever she wanted from her body, they were the perfect stabilisers that any ship would kill to have, which explained Dan's huge expectations for them.

  Like the day before, it was just after sunrise, and everything was ready. They had decided to start that part of the journey as early as possible so as not to be caught there at night -even though it didn't really make much difference for Voyager whether it was night or day- to put the danger zone behind them as soon as possible.

  Looking outside, Dan noticed the faraway dark and gloomy clouds, it was a sight that always humbled him, an angry and raging ocean was something no sailor wanted to see. With that thought, Dan glanced outside at the area of the bridge beyond the windows, where he saw Jackie, the Oceanic Druid, who seemed to be in a deep trance, uncaring for what was coming or what was happening around him.

  "Let's start heading in," Dan finally gave the order.

  With that, Voyager started moving ahead slowly. Dan knew that they didn't need to be that serious about the weather just yet, they were still hours away from there after all, especially with how Voyager was taking her time getting there. Even though he knew that, it wasn't like he, or anyone on the bridge that is, could change how they were feeling.

  So, the closer Voyager got to the dark gloomy clouds, and the more the blue sky and the warm sunlight disappeared, the heavier the atmosphere on the bridge became. Once the last ray of sunlight disappeared and the sky above them was just a blanket of dark clouds, the bridge was so silent that the only sound that could be heard was the shallow breathing of the people there.

  Splat!

  Suddenly, the silence was broken as the first drop of rain, the first one they were met by in this new world, fell on the centre window of the bridge, followed soon by more and more of them.

  "Jackie!" Dan shouted outside to his bosun as the rain showed no signs of stopping at all, getting stronger and stronger and the calm sea outside started showing signs of some waves.

  It took some effort, even Dan getting outside and shouting at him, before Jackie joined them on the bridge. By the time he got onto the bridge, his gaze never leaving the sea ahead of them, the Oceanic Druid was drenched from head to toe, but he didn't seem to care, all his attention was on the ocean outside, and the young storm.

  "It's going to be strong," he finally said, his voice heavy and deep, as if he wasn't really there, still lost in whatever he had seen, "Too strong, we need to prepare for the worst."

  Dan just swallowed as he listened to his bosun, he first had someone give him a towel and a change of clothes, he would have sent him away to rest, but he knew that the man wouldn't listen to him.

  Dan knew that the man wasn't just spewing nonsense, the Oceanic Druid had got a skill recently, a skill called Oceanic Whispers. The skill made it so he could connect to the ocean on a spiritual level or something, letting him get some information about the weather and the ocean itself, whether a place was safe for them or not.

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  As far as Dan knew though, the skill wasn't one he could use whenever he wanted. Just like the man's other skill, it had an almost shamanic, ritualistic feel to it. It took time to set up and wasn't something that he could turn on just with a switch.

  Keeping the warning in mind, Dan looked to the side where another person who shouldn't be there sat, Marcus. Probably understanding the look in his eyes for what it was, the chief security officer just gave him a serious nod without any words. Dan knew what the man meant and he did the only thing he had control over, tell Voyager to be careful and to use her Aura Appendages to get as much stability as she could.

  He was at least calmed down by how happy she seemed to be due to the weather and the waves, which maybe shouldn't have been that surprising if he thought about it for a bit, she was a ship after all. That she seemed to be getting a taste for adrenaline had nothing to do with her feelings at all, totally.

  With his mood lifted by those thoughts, Dan brought his attention to the weather outside, watching as the further they pushed themselves into the danger zone, the heavier the rain got and the bigger the waves. It eventually got to the point where Dan noticed many of his people finding it hard to stand straight, even while holding on. He didn't suffer from that, but considering how Advantage had turned him into a superhuman while he was on Voyager, he probably shouldn't have been that surprised about it.

  "Captain!" Keith suddenly said, a bit of panic creeping into her voice, "This is too much, it's getting so bad that I doubt we would be able to hold on for long."

  "Even if Voyager could," Robert said before Dan could reply to her. The chief officer's voice was heavy and his face grim. "If the waves get too bad, we might have some injuries among our passengers, we can't go on like this."

  "So what?" Dan said, his eyes still fixed outside, "We can't return from where we came, it would be just as hard and we would be wiping out all the progress we made today."

  Dan knew where his officers were coming from, but they had been moving inside the storm for hours, returning at that point would be too much of a waste, without even mentioning how it might be just as dangerous. Voyager trying to make a turn and presenting her side to the huge waves outside might prove to be fatal, it was too risky.

  "We can maybe wait it out?" Freddie asked.

  The Pathless Navigator was quite pale, steadying himself as he kept sneaking glances outside from time to time, appearing to get a fright whenever he did so, and yet, not being able to stop himself from taking another glance soon after.

  "There's no waiting it out," Jackie said in that same detached tone, "This storm won't stop anytime soon, it might take days or weeks."

  The bridge fell into an even more oppressive silence, they were stuck unsure of what to do and which of the choices was the safest for them.

  "How is Voyager?" Marcus suddenly asked, "If she's truly unbothered, we can see about moving deeper, try and slowly get to the other side."

  "I will see." Dan nodded as he focused on the connection between him and Voyager.

  "Hey, big girl, how are you doing?"

  Dan waited for an answer, but he didn't get one. The only thing he felt was how the fascination she seemed to have had for the weather and the waves was gone, replaced but a bit of puzzlement and interest as her focus seemed to be on something else. She was so into it that she didn't even hear Dan's words.

  At first, Dan was confused, but he soon felt his heart turn cold as he remembered how she was quite confused and interested by the single peak when she first saw it.

  Not wanting to take any chances, Dan hurriedly focused all his will on the connection between them as he tried to get her attention.

  "What is it, Voyager," he asked once he felt that he had got her attention, "Show me what you see."

  Once he got connected to Voyager deeply, Dan found himself looking through one of the starboard's cameras. He gravely looked on, trying to catch what she saw, but no matter how hard he looked, he couldn't catch anything. Only after some back and forth with her did he notice how she seemed to be focusing on a certain spot of the ocean. Even after that, Dan noticed nothing about the spot, it was like any other place in the stormy ocean.

  Seemingly frustrated by his reaction, Dan felt the Voyager suddenly take a more proactive part as she used her auras and her own will to focus her all on one specific point, and only then did he notice what it was that she had seen.

  It was a mass of fog, it gave him a sense of familiarity that was hard to pinpoint. Dan had to think for a bit to realise what it was, Enshrouding Fog, it felt just like the first skill that Voyager got!