//------------------------------// // Chapter 4 "Steps to the Truth" // Story: Equestria Noir Season 2 Case 2 "Dance of Death" // by Jacoboby1 //------------------------------// Chapter 4 “Steps to the Truth” I left the Violet Rose soon after hearing the information from Grimwing. It wasn’t easy to take in. To say this threw a curveball into everything was like saying the sun was hot. I ended up back at the library where I spent the next ten minutes explaining what I found from Twilight. The look on her face was one of shock. “I can’t believe Ivy would be married to a slaver,” Twilight said, shaking her head. “But what was he doing way out there?” I asked, shaking my head. “Why come to Ponyville of all places?” “Ponyville is pretty remote,” Twilight speculated, “And the Everfree Forest does make a good meeting spot, if our past cases are any indication.” I nodded and said, “Even still, we gotta figure out how he connects to all this and why would Ivy want to accuse Tappy.” “Tappy doesn’t seem like the murdering type,” Twilight agreed. “She was shaking all over last I saw her.” “We need to find that murder weapon,” I concluded. “If we can find that, then maybe we can find out how Prickly ended up getting sliced in the chest.” Twilight nodded. “But how are we going to find that out?” I smiled, “You still remember your tracking spell?” She smiled in turn, “Like I’d ever forget a spell.” __________________________________________________________ Twilight and I followed the glowing hoof prints in the ground. Luckily it was late afternoon at this point and most ponies were inside after a hard days work, so we had the street to ourselves as Twilight used her tracking spell to light up where Tappy walked. “Okay,” she began, “She took the street this way, but this is really weird.” I noticed it too, “Her tracks are perfectly normal, as if she knew exactly where she was going.” “Thankfully with Alicorn magic I can see them,” Twilight said, and then squealed. “Alicorn magic is amazing!” I smiled, happy to see her so giddy about her newfound abilities. We then made a turn towards where the warehouse was in the distance. “Looks like a straight path towards the warehouse. Still she’s walking with a purpose.” “No drag marks, no nothing.” Twilight shook her head. “This doesn’t make any sense, Tappy knew where she was going? She wasn’t kidnapped?” “This whole thing smells fishy,” I said, looking at the footprints glowing on the ground. “Hey! look over there!” Twilight exclaimed, pointing down an alleyway. On the street after that I saw another set of glowing hoofprints. “Tappy must’ve taken that route to get back,” I said, cutting through the alley and coming to the tracks. I followed them towards another alleyway. There the tracks glowed in front of a trashcan. I opened it and saw inside… a knife. It was a simple packaging knife. Mostly designed to open boxes that were taped shut to much. But on it, was a lot of dried up blood. I reached into my trench coat, put on some hoof coverings and gently lifted the knife out of the garbage. Twilight looked over my shoulder at it. “Three guesses that’s our murder weapon?” I nodded. “Has to be, look at the blood, it’s from an artery. We’d better take it to the morgue to be sure.” __________________________________________________________ “Yep, it’s yer murder weapon alright,” Forceps told us as he held the knife in the plastic bag. We were standing in Ponyville’s morgue. Luckily we caught Forceps before he went to whatever the hell he does on his time off. Part of me really didn’t want to know.“Compared the blade with the slice on the stiff’s chest. Perfect match.” Prickly himself was laying on the table, cold and stiff as death. Twilight took the knife in it’s bag and looked at it. “To think something like this could kill somepony.” “Anything can be used as a weapon Twi,” I explained. “Just takes a little ingenuity and the right amount of desperation.” Twilight nodded and looked at Prickly. “Maybe somepony found out about the slaving operation and then had him killed?” Forceps shrugged. “Possible, least a slaver deserves in my honest opinion.” I looked at the knife, and then at Forceps, “Would it be too much to ask for a blood sample from Prickly?” I asked. Forceps shook his head. “It would be my pleasure, just give me a second.” He then went about his work as Twilight walked over to me. “Private, you don’t think that his blood…” “Would be on Tappy when she was found?” I asked. “I have a hunch.” “Maybe she was close to Prickly somehow,” Twilight speculated. “Arterial spray can send blood quite a distance.” “With all the blood she had on her, she’d have to have been pretty close.” I said, putting a hoof on my chin. “There’s also the fact her hoofprints were right next to where the weapon was found.” Twilight shook her head, “There’s just something we aren’t seeing. Something that would make this much easier to solve. Something we’re missing.” “Here’s your blood sample,” Forceps said, walking over with a vial in his magic. Prickly’s blood was inside. “Thanks, Forceps,” I said as I pocketed the sample. The door opened right then and the yellow mare from before was standing there. “Hey, you two, we got the schoolteacher outside, hoping to talk about what happened.” “Cheerilee?” Twilight asked. Cheerilee is a close friend to Tappy, maybe she knows something we don’t. __________________________________________________________________ “Thank you both for coming,” Cheerilee said as we sat at Sugarcube Corner. The place, despite the garish confectionary exterior, was quite homey once you got inside. The floor was painted a soothing turquoise color, the walls the color of buttercream with oak wood beams showing through the plaster. Gingerbread trim, appropriately, added a certain flair to the posts and in between the wall supports. There were the occasional confectionery touches, but they were not overdone. Of course there were the titular display cases for showing off the treats, and shelves displaying candies from all over, though the lowest ones were given over to some of Bon Bon’s best creations. Overall you could definitely tell why Pinkie chose to stay here. Ponies around us were enjoying treats provided by a bouncing pink party pony named Pinkie Pie. Swarm was also helping out, and it seems a lot of ponies have gotten used to the white unicorn/changeling being around. Twilight however was focused on Cheerilee, “Private and I will do everything in our power to get to the bottom of this.” The school teacher nodded, “I hope so, Tappy’s asleep right now, they just gave her a bath to get all the blood off. They put her on something to help her sleep and I’m just trying to spend the non visiting hours not panicking.” “You and Tappy were close?” I asked. Cheerilee nodded, “I mentioned to Twilight we were friends in college. Canterlot University, go Lions!” She laughed a little, trying to elevate the mood. It only helped a little. Besides, everypony knows the Elk Ridge Chargers could beat the Lions any day. That’s not bias in any way at all. “You guys didn’t have any more trouble with Ivy did you?” I asked. Cheerilee looked down. “She tried to get in again while you two were gone. Thankfully guards were there to kick her out. She was so angry at Tappy. It’s sad really, she was closer than I was with Tappy.” “Wait a minute,” Twilight shook her head, “Tappy and Ivy were friends?” “The very best,” Cheerilee said. “Did everything together, homework, trips into the city, the two of them were like peas in a pod.” “What happened that caused them to hate each other?” Twilight asked. Cheerilee shook her head, looking down at her half drunk milkshake. “I don’t know, one day they were going to the movies, the next I find Tappy crying in her dorm. She said they got into a huge fight and Ivy didn’t want to see Tappy anymore.” “Did she ever say why?” I asked. “I respected her enough not to at the time. But, whenever I did ask she would just change the subject. We split after graduation and I hadn’t seen or heard from her since she came back after that battle here.” “Did Ivy ever mention anything?” Twilight asked. “I sort of stopped paying attention to her to be honest. I didn’t really like Ivy, despite how good she was to Tappy, she was just plain mean to everypony else. I had no idea why Tappy hung out with her. So, I just moved on with my life after college was done.” “So you didn’t hear anything?” I asked, tilting my head. Cheerilee shook her head, “I’m sorry I can’t be more help to you two.” “It’s alright,” Twilight said, putting a hoof on her shoulder. “the important thing is that you were willing to come forward with what you know.” Cheerilee smiled, but suddenly I felt my leg get pulled on. Suddenly I was staring into the blue orbs of Pinkie Pie. “Private, I need you stat!” “Pinkie, I’m right in the middle of an investigation,” I said flatly. “Can’t it wait?” “Somepony is being all saddy waddy and I can’t figure out why! She keep staring at you so I figure she wants to talk to you!” she said, smiling. “Makes perfect sense right?” Maybe in whatever cosmic anomaly your brain is Pinkie. I sighed, knowing I wasn’t going to get out of this. “Alright, where is she?” Pinkie pointed to a corner table, there sitting alone...was that red mare from before. I noticed this time that a small horn was coming out of her mane. She looked at her milkshake intently, as if trying to will the contents to tell it some unknown truth. Her verdant green eyes looked up at me for a moment, then back down at her glass. I’ll admit, I handled younger kids better than I did teenagers. But, if Pinkie wants me to see what’s wrong, I guess it couldn’t hurt. “You guys uh, talk for a bit,” I said, leaving my wife and Cheerilee behind with Pinkie as I made my way towards the table. The filly didn’t look up at me again as I approached. “Hey, uh, you okay?” She blinked, and then looked up at me, her eyes didn’t seem all there. “Are you… talking to me…? That pink pony… really likes to talk…” Her voice was distant, as if it was spoken from far away. “Yeah she does,” I said, trying to smile at her. “You, haven’t touched your milkshake.” She looked at it, and then shook her head. “That’s, what it’s called…? Where’s the milk…?” “Well, it’s made from milk, ice cream. Depending on flavor, it can have chocolate syrup or strawberries,” I said, giving her an odd look. Either she was very sheltered, or she was just plain off. “Okay,” she said, and then looked at me. “Do they taste good?” “Well, why don’t you try it?” I suggested. What was with her? She’s never had one before? She slowly pulled it to her, and took a sip from the straw. She tilted her head, and drank a little more. She looked at me and said, “It tastes weird, all thick and stuff.” “You didn’t order it?” I asked. “No, that pink pony put it in front of me,” she said, pointing at Pinkie who was talking a mile a minute with Twilight. Figures. Finally I asked, “What’s your name?” She looked a little wary. “Big Brother doesn’t like it when I tell others my name. Says it’s bad.” “Okay,” I smiled, trying to be approachable. “Your brother sounds like a good stallion.” “Big Brother is best brother,” She said, smiling to herself. “Twilight may argue that,” I chuckled. The filly looked at my wife, narrowed her eyes, and then smiled. “Her mane...” “Hm?” I tilted my head. “I like it,” she said, looking at me. “I’ll, uh, tell her you do,” I said, retaining my smile. I then decided to ask, “You’ve seen me before have you?” She slowly nodded, “Yeah, you’re the pony who was with the bloody lady.” That’s a bit of a blunt way to put it. But anyways I asked, “What were you doing there all by yourself?” “Big Brother asked me to,” She said, as if I asked what two plus two equaled. “He asked you to watch a crime scene?” I asked in confusion. She looked at me. “Hat man asks lots of questions.” I’m thinking she’s talking about me. “Uh, I guess you could call me naturally curious,” I said. “Uh, where are your parents?” “Dead,” she said, “Big Brother looks after me.” “Oh, okay,” I said. “Where’s your big brother now?” “He’s doing something important,” she replied, and then tilted her head. “More questions from hat man.” “Well, I hope he comes to find you soon. You could worry him being here all by yourself.” “Okay, hat man,” she said, looking at her milkshake again. That was the weirdest conversation I’ve ever had with a pony. Teenagers, I’ll never understand them. I walked back over to Twilight as Cheerilee left, my wife looked at me, “What was that all about?” “Twi, I don’t even know,” I sighed. “Let’s just, not deal with teenagers.” Twilight smiled and then said, “Well, I’m thinking we should probably check out the warehouse again. Maybe we can find some kind of clue there?” I nodded. “Sounds good, let’s get going.” As we left, I couldn’t help but notice… The filly was gone… ____________________________________________________________ Most of the cops had left the warehouse and the uniform guards let us in. Mostly it had to do with me saying that I know their boss. They were easy to deal with after that. Once inside Twilight and I began exploring every nook and cranny. Twilight lifted a box, “Nothing in here but dust, spiders, and some old parts.” Twilight said, levitating it aside. “Just keep the spiders far away from me,” I said, looking over at her as I opened a box of old parts. “Just what are we looking for?” Twilight asked. “Anything,” I said firmly. “We’re missing something, some kind of connection that would help this all make sense.” “That’s what I said earlier,” Twilight replied, “but just what is it exact- hey!” I looked over and saw Twilight had moved aside some boxes to an old desk. “Private, check it out.” I walked over to the desk, I noticed that on it was about an inch layer of dust. But the end of the part of the desk where one would sit at, had the dust slightly smeared. I looked under the desk and saw a small button was under there. “Doesn’t look like the cops saw this,” I said, pressing the button. I heard the sound of some kind of mechanism in the floor. A few feet away a trap door opened in the ground. Twilight and I looked down it to see a set of stairs. Twilight and I activated out horns and they acted as flashlights down stairs. “Secret passageways? How did the police miss this?” Twilight asked. “Sometimes the greatest finds are merely accid- Twi are you seriously writing that down?” I looked over at my wife who had a notebook out. “Sooner or later I’m gonna write that book with these sayings.” Twilight said. “Maybe I’ll make it as part of my autobiography.” I smirked, “You can entitle it, ‘Twilight Sparkle, Bookworm to Pretty Princess’” Twilight shoved me and laughed, “Come on, let’s get going.” The basement was not as musty as I would have expected. It was still part of an old, abandoned warehouse, and it showed its age in the darkening of the wood used in its construction, but there was one detail that stuck out. A door was down here, a metal padlocked door. I walked to it and lifted the lock on it, “No time to find the key.” I pulled out Blackbird, aimed it at the lock and shot it clean off. The chains holding the door fell away and I bucked down the door. “HOOVES IN THE AIR!” I yelled as I aimed Blackbird inside. “Wait! Mister don’t shoot!” A tiny voice cried. My horn illuminated the inside. I saw to my horror, tiny fillies and colts in cages. All of them looked half starved and skinny. They hadn’t been fed in days. There had to have been at least a dozen of them. Poor kids… Twilight and I ran to the various cages, using lockpicking and magic to remove the locks. The kids all came out, I recognized one of the aqua ones from the missing posters. She walked up to me, “Are you here ta save us misther?” “You’re Minty right?” I asked. The little unicorn nodded. “Miss Tappy said I was gonna have a private lesson with her, an I woke up here with all these other kids.” She started sniffling, “The bad guy kept us down here, an’ said we were gonna work all our lives at a mine somewhere. I was so scared…” “You poor thing,” Twilight said, going to nuzzle the little filly and catch her tears. Another colt walked up to me. “Are you gonna take me to my dads?” I recognized the colt from the poster Robust was putting up. “You’re Windstrum right?” “You know my name?” He asked, looking up at me. “Robust, your adopted dad, sent me to find you,” I said with a smile. “I knew he’d send somepony!” he cried, tears flowing down his eyes. “It was awful in here! He didn’ feed us an said all these mean things! I’m glad to be seeing my future dad again!” Then, something clicked in my brain, I looked at the other kids. “How many of you were going to be adopted by a family with two mommies or daddies?” They looked at each other, and one by one all of them raised their hooves. Twilight looked at me, she could tell I was onto something. “What was the last thing you all remember before being brought here?” I asked. One of the colts spoke up, “I remember Miss Tappy giving me a drink that tasted really funny. It made my head all loopy and stuff. I fell asleep and woke up here.” “She gave me the weird stuff too!” A filly piped up. “It smelled funny!” another colt said. “It was right after her class too.” “Wait,” Twilight said, looking at the colt who spoke. “You were in her class?” The colt nodded. “Yeah, I wanted to impress my moms so I took a dancing course.” Another thing clicked in my brain… I asked… “How many of you were a part of Tappy’s class before you arrived?” Every single colt and filly raised their hoof.