• Published 26th Jun 2012
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Starlight Over Detrot: A Noir Tale - Chessie



In the decaying metropolis of Detrot, 60 years and one war after Luna's return, Detective Hard Boiled and friends must solve the mystery behind a unicorn's death in a film noir-inspired tale of ponies, hard cider, conspiracy, and murder.

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Act 2, Chapter 33: "We never burned and tortured and ripped one another apart and called it morality."

Starlight Over Detrot
Act 2, Chapter 33: "We never burned and tortured and ripped one another apart and called it morality."

While the true origin of magic is a source of permanent debate and speculation, the most respected overall theory regarding the source of magic is summed up in the adage "True magic comes from within"; specifically, that magic comes from living beings, a byproduct of organic processes. By this - the Vivogenic theory of arcane origin - magic energy may simply be a waste product generated by life itself, stored within the body and radiated continuously or at regular intervals; arcane fertilizer.

Vivogenic theory has several advantages. It explains the source of the background emotional magic that pervades Equestria. It helps explain the emotional resonance and amplification that can be created between two or more ponies in states of kinship. And it explains why Ponykind, though particularly attuned to magic, is not alone in its ability to manifest voluntary or involuntary magical effects, a pedestal they share with griffins, zebras and dragons, to name just a few. In rare cases other species have been known to display arcane talent; One may recall the tale of Mr. Fluffypants, the household cat who, chased one too many times by the neighbor's dog, somehow cast a spell to 'blend' the offending canine. Mr. Fluffypants has remained reticent on his feat of arcanery.

Critics of vivogenesis note that unliving artifacts are wellsprings of power, and that this theory fails to explain their origins. And yes, nonliving objects of arcane power do exist, but so far every object of power with a known origin is either A) the product of a known arcanosensitive intelligence or intelligences, or B) is potentially the crystallized product of Equestria's magical background radiation, which, by vivogenic theory, has its origins in living beings.

The final major point in support of vivogenic theory is the unfortunate fact that living sacrifices generate an astonishing amount of raw power. While this could obviously not be the subject of controlled official experiment, the evidence consists of more than a few significant case studies. A number of foals sacrificing crickets in another cutie-mark hunt have actually caused an extraplanar incursion. (See LR 23 - The Go'Soth'Arok, Slayer Of Worlds incident. For further reference, you might also see the Mayor’s desk. Go’Soth has become something of an heirloom between generations of city-leadership. Look for the jar beside the Celestia bobble-head.)

Unfortunately, less scrupulous individuals do not limit themselves to sacrificing insects.

-The Scholar


I was thankful they were dead.

Small mercies, and all that.

Decomposition had hit them a little harder than the dragon, and the bodies were no longer in what I’d have called ‘good’ condition. Bits of sinew and flesh still clung to them, binding their joints and bones together, but they hadn't fallen apart entirely.

Swift was shaking, her eyes riveted on the hanging bodies.

I quickly got her attention with one hoof, waving her closer. She took several seconds to get moving, but when she gathered her faculties, she tottered over and collapsed beside me. I lifted Tourniquet, who squeaked softly like a piece of industrial machinery, and laid her in my partner’s forelegs. I grabbed one of her wings dragged it around the girl. Swift got the message and pulled the other one around, forming a protective shield with her feathers around the two of them.

I pulled my trigger into my mouth and trotted towards the hanging bodies, stepping over toys and skirting bits of furniture.

I hadn’t expected another investigation, but those pegasus bones they’d been using as loci in the robes had to come from somewhere.

Once I was underneath the seven bodies, I forced my revulsion to one side and I did my best to examine the bodies. It was tough to get a good look from below, particularly through the dangling coils of what my brain wanted desperately to label 'intestines'. I fought it hoof and tail, swallowing until my stomach was under control.

Taxi was still pulling on her jeweler’s glasses as she joined me. Limerence came along a minute later. For all the young buck was trying to put up a strong front, he couldn’t hide the quaking in his knees. I lifted my toe up to my nose and peered at it, willing it to be still, for his sake. No such luck. I wasn’t doing much better. I let my leg drop and looked up at the corpses hanging above us.

“Alright, what do we think?” I asked. “Just a general appraisal.”

“I... hmmm... I can’t tell." Taxi murmured. "Death could have been blood loss from the wings, horn, and broken bones, dehydration, or any one of a list I can see from down here. Massive trauma, almost certainly, but unless we can get the bodies down from there, I can’t give you anything more specific.”

Lim coughed, then found his voice. It was weak, but steady. “I believe it is neurotoxic shock, Detective. These ponies died of neurotoxic shock.”

I looked at him out of one eye. “How do you go about that diagnosis?”

“The professor at the Museum and Miss Ruby both displayed a similar condition. I had some time to get access to the reports on Ruby Blue’s death while you were resting. I thought my own analysis might prove worthwhile.”

“And?” I prompted.

“The chemicals in her system are consistent with a poison used in zebra rituals whose primary purpose is... is accessing the soul, for various reasons.”

"And you only thought to bring this up now?"

"Forgive me for failing to find a suitable window between our various brushes with Death, Detective, but only now did it achieve immediate relevance."

“So, are we still outright denying there might be necromancy involved?” I asked, forcing a cocky smirk. I needed that smirk. That smirk was all that was keeping me from having my own little break down. Standard weirdness aside, analyzing corpses strapped to a dragon’s insides was far down my list of ‘How I want to spend my nights’.

“I can not dispute what I see with my own eyes, Detective,” he replied, sadly. “I am disturbed and distressed by it, but I can’t deny it.”

For how long the body had been down there, I was surprised there wasn’t more smell. Even with the menthol spread, a rotting corpse left in an enclosed space produces a scent that will floor you.

“Why aren’t they more rotted?” I inquired.

Taxi shifted her hips a little, poking around the edge of the wound with her toe. “Probably a mix of the dry air and... huh... that’s funny…”

“Sweets, you know how much I hate those two words,” I growled.

“I know. It’s... just funny. There’s something wrapped around them.”

“I don’t have your eyes, Sweets. The light’s bad.”

Just as I said it, the light overhead shifted to a new angle, casting direct illumination on the bodies.

“Thanks, Tourniquet!” I shouted over my shoulder.

“Can... can you get them down from there?” Tourniquet asked, meekly, still hiding under Swift’s wings.

I glanced at Limerence and he shook his head. “Sorry, honey. Our unicorn’s still pretty burnt out.”

There was a paused, then she called out, “It’s okay…I... I don’t think Mister Girthranx minds anymore.”

Limerence gazed to the side, studying the dead dragon’s head. “Ahhh... this... is Mister Girthranx, then? I do wonder why Saussurea would cage one of her inmates with her daughter, unless there is some element we are missing.”

“I don’t know. We’ll ask the girl in a minute, but I want to see what we can see before we go traumatizing her with questions about this,” I said, then nosed my driver’s ribs. “You want to tell me ‘what’s funny’, Sweets?”

Taxi gnawed her lip. “It’s just something odd. Whoever put these ponies up there didn’t... tie them... in place. They’re wired up there. It’s like they somehow had... wires... sunk into their bodies. Look? See the unicorn’s neck?”

I focused on where she was pointing, and, in the improved light, I could see something silver glittering up there near the base of the unicorn’s skull. I thought she might be a slightly older mare, but age is hard to tell from a body that’d been decomposing for so long. I traced the wire with my eyes until it disappeared around the side of what was left of her neck.

“That... is very... yech. Funny is not the word,” I replied. “Thoughts on why somepony would perform amateur electrical work on a corpse?”

“Not a one. I somehow doubt that Skylark is trying to be the next Doctor Flankenstein.”

Limerence drew in a solidifying breath, pulling his kerchief from his front pocket and pressing it to his mouth. Taking cautious steps, he moved underneath the bodies and into the cavernous wound in the dragon’s belly. My stomach lurched at the sight of him simply hopping over the side, into the great beast’s gut. Whatever organs had been in there were largely reduced to ash when it’s fire-bladder ruptured, but that didn't improve the sight of my companion standing inside Mister Girthranx.

“Detective, I am... not unsympathetic to how vile a thing this may be to ask you to do, but I believe the two of you should... pop in and take a look at this.”

I dropped my head and spent a few seconds just looking at the carpet down there between my hooves. There was a loose, plastic building block that whoever had moved the toys away from the walls had apparently missed. I gave it a little kick back towards the center of the room, trying my best to calmly contemplate the capricious vicissitudes of fate that’d led me to a night where I’d have to walk into a carcass.

Taxi pulled her jeweler’s goggles up onto her forehead, then stepped into the hole. She didn’t even hesitate, but that was Sweets, through and through. Her ‘professional’ mode was a scary beast.

I clenched my jaw, shut my eyes, and followed her into the massive stomach. For some reason, I expected to step directly onto something wet, but the ‘floor’ was simply concrete covered in a thick layer of undisturbed ash. The exploding fire-bladder had vaporized the creature’s interior right down to the floor. I glanced quickly around the interior of the little cave. My insides crawled, but in truth, there wasn’t much to see. Everything had been charred black inside the creature, though there was plenty of room for me to stand upright without ducking. I supposed we were closer to his upper intestinal tract than his lungs.

“Detective, if you please?” Limerence’s horn glowed, lighting up the back ‘wall’ for us, along with Girthranx’ spine.

Taxi squinted at the sight, and I fought down my urge to puke for the second time that night.

“Sweets, that vacation you mentioned earlier? Can we go tomorrow?”

“I... am thinking so. Look.” She pointed her toe at the dragon’s vertebrae that were just above head height. I edged forward, sending swirls of ash around my knees.

“What the…” I trailed off, the thought unfinished, my brain refusing to make sense of what I was seeing.

Thin, spidery wire snaked around and around the dragon’s spine, winding up and down the wall behind him, into and out of the concrete. They seemed to pierce his bones at very regular intervals, creeping like vines through his entire lower body.

“What is that?” I exclaimed.

“That, Detective... is…” Limerence frowned, then shook his head. “I... hmmm. I fear I don’t even have a supposition. How a body might be impregnated with these wires is a hideous enough question without getting into 'why'. This beast must have been alive throughout this process and for some time thereafter. Look. The wires have calcified around the places where they intersect the bones.”

“Tourniquet said ‘Girthranx’ was nice to her,” I mused. “She said he burned a village and he was nice to her. Down here in the dark, his spinal column wired to a wall, still alive. What kind of... of awful creature is Saussurea?”

Lim shrugged and tipped his horn in the direction of Swift and the girl, who were still sitting in that same position we’d left them. “The most dangerous kind, I suspect, and one not unique to our species. She was a parent who’d lost her child. The war created many such monsters. I do wish I could say Saussurea was the foulest, but statistically, she barely rates. Those who died at her hooves, this dragon included, come to... a comparatively small number.”

“I don’t think any of those whackos ever wired someone to a wall, though,” I said. “This goes way beyond cruel. This is-”

Taxi’s voice was so soft I didn’t catch what she said.

“What was that, Sweets?”

She cleared her throat. “An ignition.”

I gave her a blank look. “A... what?”

“It’s an ignition. Look around us. This is how Saussurea started the machine. Remember what Limerence said?”

I thought back, then nodded. “You mean about how it takes more power to start this place than to keep it running?”

She waved her hooves at the dead dragon’s body. “You think a living dragon wouldn’t have enough magic pouring through his body to get everything up and functioning?”

Limerence grimaced. “That... does explain how Saussurea managed to hide Tourniquet’s presence here. Expecting an inspection? Have her turn herself off and go to essential functions only. No magical possessions, no extraneous arcane fields; nothing to tell the inspectors this was anything but an ordinary prison complex. When they’re gone, use this... unfortunate brute to turn it all back on.”

“But when the prison was closed, he died." I finished, just to indicate my comprehension. "With nopony to keep the power on, she went to sleep.” I looked over my shoulder at Tourniquet, who was quietly playing with Swift’s pinion feathers, her thin, pink face hidden against my partner’s tactical vest. For her part, Swift didn’t seem to mind, but she kept casting curious little glances in our direction. I mouthed ‘I’ll tell you later’ and she nodded.

A chill cut through that discovery, and the pain in my flank that’d been there since we entered the building subsided somewhat. I let the thoughts coalesce just a little bit longer, then took a few steps back, out of Girthranx’s stomach.

I peered up at the corpses hanging from his ribs.

“Limerence? Giving a general estimate, if you were to burn the souls of ponies while they were wired into the ignition system, how many would it take to restart Supermax and awaken the construct?” I asked.

Lim, whatever his social faults, was not a stupid pony. He looked up at the bodies and his lip twitched with disgust. “I would venture, based on the immediate evidence, that it would take approximately seven, Detective.”

“Why the injuries, then?” I wanted to know.

“My knowledge of necromancy is very limited, but... spell taps? They are probably places where one might channel and focus the magic within the body. Earth ponies focus their innate talents through their hooves. Pegasi through their wings. Unicorns through their horns. You must have a place to gather the energy of a burning soul and..."

I slapped my hoof against my face. “Alright!... alright. Understood. I wish I hadn’t asked. That’d be why they’re grey then?”

“Very probably. The soul, either removed or burnt, might produce any number of strange effects. As I said, I know almost nothing about necromancy.”

My stomach sank to someplace around my knees as the implications of that ground their way in.

Ruby. The Professor.

Skylark or somepony close to her fueled a spell with their very souls. They set fire to the things that make them living, thinking beings. They stole the magic from them so completely that it left nothing of worth or consequence; a shell of meat, to be tossed away.

I felt my anger start to grow, but shoved it away and marched back towards Tourniquet and Swift. My heart thumped against my breast as I slowed and finally stopped over them. The two fillies raised their heads in unison to look up at me.

“Tourniquet... your mother is in another prison for the things she did here at Supermax. She is safe, happy, has a good friend, and is in no pain, but she will not be coming back,” I said, in a firm voice. “She committed unspeakable crimes against Equestria and equine dignity. You... are the greatest of those crimes.”

Swift gasped and she half rose, but I glared her back into a sitting position. Tourniquet let out a faint, mechanical whine and the wires on her back drew taut. Before she could lift into the darkness, I took her in my hooves and pulled her to me. She tried, feebly, to push away but I held her fast until she slumped, brokenly, against my breast.

I patted her fiber-optic mane as her shoulders began to heave. She couldn’t weep. Weeping is for things with eyes. I wished she could. I would have given damn near anything for that little girl to be able to weep as I told her cruel truths. There was nothing for it. I couldn’t lie to her after seeing what these monsters had done.

In what I hoped was a soothing tone, I lowered my muzzle to her ear. “I’m going to take care of you.”

Tourniquet edged back a little so she could see my face. Her cheeks were dry, but I had the feeling if she could have, they’d have been drenched with tears.

“Why?” she whispered.

“Because I think you’ve suffered enough. I think you’ve been lied to enough. It’s time you know the truth,” I replied, pulling my coat around to form a bit of a pillow. “There are certainly a number of ponies in the city - good ponies - who will want to meet you. This isn’t the end for you, Tourniquet. You’re going to get to have a life, if it’s the last thing I do. Maybe, one day, somepony can arrange for your mother to see you. We might be able to repair you, too.”

Tourniquet’s lip quivered, then she shook her head and got up, trotting in nervous little circles. “I can’t help or they’ll hurt my Mom…”

“If we’re successful here, they’ll have no reason to hurt your mother. Your mother will be the least of their worries.” I grinned, hoping my eyes reflected sincerity. “We’re going to bring Celestia’s fire down on them.”

How? Miss Gypsy says the whole city is corrupt and nopony can do anything about-”

“Wait... Gypsy? The radio pony?” I interrupted.

Tourniquet gave me a curious squint. “You know her?”

“Yes... I mean, I know about her. She hosts an underground talk show. What I want to know is how you know about her.”

The girl pulled on her mane some, self-consciously. “Miss Gypsy talks to me sometimes. After I woke up, sometimes I could hear her. She’ll say stuff now and then.”

Taxi came up and pushed aside a couple of building blocks to make herself a place to sit. “You’re saying... you can hear her broadcast here?”

Tourniquet wiped at her eyes with both hooves, then seemed to remember there was no need. She appeared to be quite happy for the subject change. “No... I mean, not right now. I hear her sometimes. She’s out there, talking to ponies. I haven’t heard her in forever, though.”

Limerence, Taxi and I shared a silent, visual conversation while Swift scooted up beside Tourniquet and draped a comforting wing across her.

“We’re... in a magical disruption zone because of all the mining,” I murmured, “No long distance broadcasts could reach this place.”

Tourniquet put the tip of her hoof in her mouth and chewed on it slightly. “I know. I don’t know how, but I hear her. My broadcaster is broken, or I’d talk to her. I wish I could talk to her. I don’t know anything about what’s going on outside, anymore.”

“Detective, I think this may be a mystery for another time. We need information on what is going on upstairs and downstairs,” Limerence said, matter-of-factly.

“Right, sorry.” I turned back to the robotic filly, holding out my hoof. Without thinking, she took it and stepped closer, settling on her haunches. “Okay, honey, we’re going to handle Skylark. After tonight, I’ll put her in a hole so deep the sun won’t ever find her. Your mom will be safe. You have my promise. On my life. Got me?”

Princess help me, if I was lying to her. I didn’t know if I could promise such a thing. I hoped I could. At the very least, I knew I was committing to seeing Skylark arrested.

I let my eyes drift towards the seven nameless, grey ponies the head of the Lunar Passage had strung up from the ribs of a dead dragon.

Shutting my eyes, I thought in the direction of my artificial heart, ‘If I fail this child... you better stop beating and just let me go. I’m not worth a damn if I can’t keep this promise.’ I don’t know if Gale heard me. I didn’t know if he’d listen, either way.

“I’ve... I’ve got you, Mister Detective,” Tourniquet replied, at last. A tiny, genuine smile flowered on her lips and she threw her legs around my neck, hugging me with all the ferocity the little girl could muster.

“I’m working for some of the smartest ponies in the whole country here, so I want you to keep your chin up while we do this. Whatever happens, nopony is going to forget you down here again. Clear? I won’t let that happen.”

“How, though?” Swift asked, giving me a little poke with her hooftip. “It’s not like we can tell anypony she’s down here until we’re done with all of this craziness..."

“We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it, kid. The Don or somepony else-”

There was a little rustle in my mane. The ladybug, who I’d almost forgotten was there, buzzed out of my fur and landed on Tourniquet’s nose. She blinked at it, then giggled and shook her muzzle back and forth until it took wing.

“What is that?!” Tourniquet asked, watching the little creature with a certain amount of curiosity.

“That... is a nosey little insect who doesn’t know what constitutes important information,” I grumbled, then lifted my hoof for the bug to land on, “Couldn’t you bunch have warned me about running into Skylark upstairs?”

The ladybug had the grace to look abashed, scratching the back of what constituted it’s head with one claw and glancing to one side.

“What do you want?” I sighed. “We’re still going to need scouting information if we’re going to leave the upstairs in any sort of reasonable timeframe.”

Waving its tiny legs at the filly, then at me, the ladybug lifted off and settled atop Tourniquet’s head.

“You... want to stay here?

The creature wiggled its proboscis in a way I took to mean ‘affirmative’, then zipped right up onto my nose.

A burst of static flashed behind my eyes, and the world went dark.

****

I didn’t recognize Queenie’s new hotel room. It was a bit nicer than the old one, with a bigger bed and a decent sized TV. I thought I’d slept, or at least passed out, in every hotel in Detrot, but then, I hadn’t done stake-out work in months, so a few new ones had probably opened, shut, exploded, or been sucked into eldritch dominions. That’s how life is in the hotel industry, or so I’m told.

Queenie itself was sprawled on the flowery bedspread, its wings open, and a dozen or so ladybugs were giving it what I thought was probably some kind of massage.

“Huh... it’s good to be the queen,” I thought.

“Oh, yes, yes, yes it is, Detective Hard ‘Hardy’ Boiled!” The giant Essy lifted its head to look at the spot where my awareness floated, which was somewhere near the ceiling. “It is most wonderful. Now then, you have discovered something terribly interesting!”

“You’re talking about Tourniquet? Incidentally, where were you? Why didn’t you let us know about Skylark coming down?”

Queenie let out a noise I took for an embarrassed sigh. “The upper floors are sealed with air-tight doors! Stupid awful ones that we couldn’t sneak through. We had to wait for ponies to go through them. This building is super-de-maximally obtuse!”

“Aaand the first ponies through were Skylark and her cronies… Right. Got it.”

Queenie’s mandibles twitched as it rolled over onto its stomach. “Now... to busy-business! That sweet little puppet child! Do you know how especially fantastical she is? Her body is that entire building!”

“Yeah, I'm aware of that. Why are you interested? It's not like she's a jealous lover or a continuous running gunfight.”

“Oh, Detective, Detective! You do not understand! She is magnificently brilliant! A sentient construct like no other! She is a diamond, shining in darkness!” Queenie’s compound eyes swirled with a rainbow of colors as it flitted off the bed to perch on the nearest chair, picking up a cup and saucer from a silver tray somepony had laid out. It took a quick slurp of something I suspected was a good deal stronger than tea, then set the cup aside. “We wish to assure ourselves of her well-being.”

“Wait...are you saying you feel for this sweet thing?”

Queenie seemed to hunch forward a little, its wings clamping down on its carapace protectively.

I don’t usually pick up on whatever the ladybug collective has for emotions, but I was getting a definite sensation that there was something they weren’t telling me. For a species that thrives on spreading secrets around, it was a strange feeling.

“Queenie, you want my help with her, you’re going to have to be straight with me.”

The over-sized insect crawled off the fancy chair, back onto the bed. Reaching for the remote, it flicked on the television, straight to the middle of a soap opera. The volume stayed low, however, so I waited for an answer.

“We don’t want to see her be alone,” Queenie replied, finally, “Alone is awfully lonely.”

“You make it sound like you’re the one who’s lonely there.”

Flopping over onto its stomach, the Essy poked at the side of the bed until it found the vibrate function on the side of the mattress.

“We are,” it answered.

I glanced -- although ‘glance’ is the wrong word, since I didn’t have anything resembling eyes while tapped into the collective -- around the posh room at the swarms of ladybugs zipping to and fro, toying with the kitchenette taps and huddled in front of the television.

“Maybe you and I have different definitions of ‘lonely’.”

Queenie shook itself and eased up against the headboard, gathering its legs against its stomach. The buzzing tones of its speech were very subdued. Almost sad.

“There are none like us, Detective. None at all. You see many, but we are all... one. There are none... but her. She can live in her hole, down in the darkly dark. She can sleep, alone, and dead until everything she knows or understands is dust...or we can show her that whole big world out there! We would give her freedom. Free, like we are free. Free and away and seeing all the things there are to see!”

I wanted some hooves so I could smack myself in the face.

“So... stay with the girl, then. What necessitated a trip into the collective?” I asked.

“Our payment has changed,” the insect answered.

“Your…payment? We’re paying you, outside of letting you watch us get shot at?” I commented.

The creature ignored that and continued, “You intend to be emptying the cells of the Super-de-duper-Maximum!”

“That’s... right?” I replied.

“We do not wish the puppet girl to turn off. You will not empty them entirely.”

“Excuse me?!”

There’s no way to shout inside the collective, but the shrill buzzing of the insects darting around the room intensified as though I had. Even Queenie seemed to wince, its jaws drawing in under it’s head.

“Detective, you need us. We need the puppet girl, most lovely. This is not an equitable discussion of terms. Do this, and you have us until the madness is seen through. Do not, and you do not have us.”

It was a simple statement of intent, but it left me with a deeply inconvenient conundrum. Queenie was right. Painfully, abjectly, irritatingly right. I’d no good way of escaping Supermax without some functional knowledge of the interior, and the movements of our enemies. Beyond that, I’d no idea what our future might bring and having the collective on my side was damnably useful. Sure, I could ask Tourniquet for help, but who knew if she would?

I also didn’t know if I had it in me to put the girl back to sleep, knowing I might not be able to keep my promise to her for a long, long time. A whole dragon just to get the place operating? Right, because I have plenty of those on hoof.

Then, if I let this all go public, there would be the inevitable fight with the Essy office over letting her keep her various abilities, many of which were no doubt extremely dangerous in the wrong hooves. Then there was likely to be the monstrous fallout when the Princesses found out what Saussurea had actually done.

If I shut her down, it was far more likely, even if I could bring her back online, that somepony would think it a much better idea that she stayed a broken, comatose memory of the Crusades, hidden safely away in the bottom of an abandoned building.

Oh, for a drink. A beer. A puddle of vodka piss on the side of the road. Anything.

“You sure you don’t want me to see if I can get Princess Luna to make a cameo appearance on that silly show you watch as the father of Rachel’s egg?” I growled.

“Alas, alas, as much fun as that would be, Rachel’s egg turned out to be Gerrard’s. He scrambled it and served it to her for breakfast before the changelings got him. Although it could all be a dream memory concocted by Timothy to get the truth about Antelia’s marriage to the Archduke Friendmont. They’re going to-”

“Lemme out! Now!”

The hotel room faded to black.

****

“-Celestia’s fiery backside crapping heavenly merciful crap…”

I came out of the collective mid-tirade. My companions were looking at me worriedly, with Swift and Tourniquet standing side-by-side over me while Limerence checked over his crossbow. Taxi was still poking around the dragon. As I awoke, they all turned their attention in my direction.

Pulling myself to my hooves, I swatted the ladybug that was still on my nose into mid-air. It righted itself, then zipped over to Tourniquet and curled up on her shoulder.

“Alright. How long was I out?”

“About five minutes, Sir,” Swift answered. “Are you okay?”

“Right! Well then, we have a fresh... wrinkle. Nothing too serious, but we can’t call Jade in on this. Or Celestia and Luna. We have to handle Skylark ourselves. Nothing new there,” I explained, waving a hoof at Tourniquet. “You’ve made a new friend, honey.”

Swift shot to her hooves. “Wait! What?! Seriously?! Sir, what’s going on?”

“The long and short of it? Our... equipment... is rebelling. Queenie wants Tourniquet left on. No clearing the cells entirely or we’re out one extremely useful collective of surveillance insects.”

“A... a new friend?” Tourniquet asked, uncertainly, plucking the insect from her shoulder and holding it at leg’s length. It twirled on her hoof, then flitted up between her eyes and gave her a light bump with its forehead.

“Believe me, you may regret their interest at some point, but yes. I think it’s time for you to explain to my very intelligent and technologically literate friend here-” I held my hoof out towards Limerence. “-how your power system works and exactly how Skylark and her creatures have ‘broken’ you.”

Tourniquet perked up. “Oooh! I never got to tell anypony about my powers! I mean... ever! I mean, except Miss Skylark and Miss Geranium, but they’re always busy and don’t want to talk too much. Can we have a tea-party?”

Limerence stowed his crossbow across his back and checked his watch. “I wish we knew just how much time is available to us before Miss Skylark deems Cerise ‘ready’ for whatever this... ritual…is.”

A far-off look entered the little girl’s eyes and a burst of energy flowed up her sides. “I... I’ve been stalling the flow of magic so we’d have a little longer. The..uh... the humming upstairs is the cables in the walls creating a super-magical resonance from the diversion of power. When it stops, the…” Her lips twisted into a frown as she tried to find a word for something that obviously didn’t taste good, ”-the somepony up there is... I don’t really understand all of whatever they’re doing, but they’re ready. I’m supposed to send them a message when I get feedback. When I do, they’ll... um... that’s when they’ll come for her.”

“I take it you’re referring to arcane feedback? Is that not painful?” he asked.

“It would be, but my power sub-system is a composite matrix of thirty eight thirty a-volt-”

I tuned out the discussion before it could get too technical. I’ve long since discovered that technical conversations are most likely to lead to somepony getting electrocuted if you pay too much attention. Well, more accurately, if I pay too much attention.

Taxi was still over by Mr. Girthranx and seemed to be messing about under his chin. Swift was watching her, and followed me as I started over in that direction.

“Sweets?” I asked.

My driver pulled her head back from the under the dragon and wiped a bit of something I didn’t want to identify off of her forehead. Beside me, Swift choked.

“What? Oh, hey, sorry. I didn’t see you’d woken up. What does Queenie want?”

“The usual; complicating something that should be simple. It wants Tourniquet kept online.”

Taxi frowned. “That’s... going to make our lives harder, yes. No Jade, then?”

“No Jade. No Celestia. No dumping Skylark and our evidence out front of the Castle, and making for the border - or we forgo the Ladybugs' help, and I know we're not at the bottom of this hole yet. I don’t even have an escape plan, and we need an alternative to clearing the cells.”

“Well... that’s your department,” she replied, ducking back beneath the dragon. She seemed to be fishing about inside a sizeable hole that’d been torn as the creature’s flesh dried and contracted. “Ah... aha! Here we go!”

“Ugh... what are you doing down there?”

She spat something at my hooves, then grabbed a paper towel from her bag and began wiping her braid out. She positively reeked of dead lizard, but most of what was actually on her body seemed like dried flakes and bits of skin.

“I wondered if what I picked up in my vision of Saussurea might have actually been accurate. Thankfully, the brain was pretty far gone and this had fallen down through part of the neck that connected directly to the brain pan.” Sliding back in, she pulled her flashlight out and flicked it off, then dumped it in her bags. “Incidentally, if you ever need to kill a dragon, there’s about a twelve inch hole around the base of the skull that’s pretty soft and doesn’t have any bone between you and vital things. Of course, you have to get under his chin, but-”

When my driver is in her ‘professional’ mode, she’s capable of things that make me cringe.

“No, no, thank you... I shan't be fighting any dragons so you can just stop there. That... might be the most morbid thing you’ve ever said, Sweets,” I said.

“Believe me, I’m not thrilled to be digging around in a dragon’s brain, but I think this is important,” she said, nudging the lump of... something that she’d left on the carpet.

I carefully picked it up off the carpet, turning it over in my hooves. No amount of washing was ever going to make them feel clean again after the sewer, so why not? Not for the first time, I was glad I wore shoes.

The object I held seemed to be a piece of rock or stone that’d been cut very finely. It didn’t shine or reflect much of the light, and the cutting seemed purely functional. The entire surface was scrawled with tiny runes, much too small for me to read.

“What is it?” I asked.

“I think it’s how Saussurea controlled the dragons,” she answered. “She’d install one of these in their bodies, usually somewhere they couldn’t get it out. I believe it works like the prison uniforms or the robes of the Lunar Passage, although I’d be willing to bet it’s a much nastier piece of work.”

Turning to stone over, I found the little red moon on the underside. “Hmmm... alright, I can buy that theory. What’s it got to do with us?”

Taxi tapped the stone. “We’re inside Supermax and that-” she pointed at Tourniquet, “-is the control system. Maybe we can use this, somehow?”

I tugged at the fur on my chin, then pocketed the talisman. “If nothing else, it might help us get some information out of Skylark if she thinks we’ll force-feed her that stone. Alright, I think we have to-”

A loud siren sounded, sending Taxi and I scrambling for our weapons, then was abruptly cut off.

Tourniquet called out, “Detective! You hafta go now! They came for Miss Cerise and Miss Skylark wants to know why I didn’t call them when she was ready! I’m making excuses, but you need to get out of here! I left the door to the lower sub-basement open, but they’ll seal it once Miss Cerise is taken through!”

“Great flaming sun-butt…” I snarled, then charged over piles of toys and bits of Tourniquet’s long, lonely life, doing my best not to stumble over them. Swift took off and landed in front of the door, shoving it open just in time for me to dash through and careen off a piece of equipment. Taxi and Limerence were out a second later just as the secret panel began to slide shut.

I spared one last look back at Tourniquet. The light was already shrinking back to just the area immediately around her bed. She waved at us quickly, then the wires on her back tightened, pulling her off the floor into mid-air. She rose until she vanished into the dark and, with a great hiss, the hydraulics sealed the wall shut behind us.

“Pissing damn awful stupid... ugh!” I slammed my hoof on the back of one of the fake machines.

Swift tried to slow her breathing, putting her hoof to her breast. “Whew... Sir, we need to keep moving.”

“We’ve got no plan, kid. We can move all we like, but-”

Detective... You need to go upstairs! Quick!Tourniquet’s voice over the hidden speakers made me jump. “Take the hall on your left at the top of the steps. My sensors still aren’t working for some reason, but my cameras tell me there’s five ponies in Miss Cerise’s room, so if you move fast, you can get by them and into the sub-basement to High Security and the Mechanical Room. That’s at the other end. I’m afraid I can’t guide you after that. They’ve done something to my controls down below.

I put my face against my knee, then shoved myself back from the machine. “Alright! We’re moving. Can you tell that insect you’ve got with you to send us a fresh ladybug so we can get some recon?”

Will do! Please be safe!

Taxi and Swift were already struggling back into their itchy robes, while Limerence just stared at his, forlornly.

“What is it?” I asked.

“Such a waste of magic’s potential,” he sighed.

“I know. These could have done incredible things for pony society, but-”

“Oh, no. I simply meant the pitiful tail clearance. I felt, throughout our entire trip down here, as though I was getting a... mmm... what’s the colloquial term? A ‘wedgie’?”

I snorted and grabbed the robe, found the neck hole, and stuffed it down over his head. “We’ve got to move! Now, help me with mine.”

****

At the top of the stairs, I almost wet myself when the door out of Tourniquet’s chamber slid open of its own accord. Swift took point, her ears swiveling back and forth.

“Sir…” she whispered. “I hear somepony over there, I think.” She pointed down the hall in what I felt sure was a random direction.

“That’s Cerise’s cell,” said Taxi.

“Limerence, you think we can maybe extract Cerise from there, before she’s moved?” I asked.

He shook his head. “Based on the construc... er... Miss Tourniquet’s description, they’ve placed Cerise under a magical compulsion. Short of unweaving it or acquiring the magical frequencies it is keyed to, I doubt she can be moved without considerable difficulty so long as the spell is receiving power from Supermax. If nothing else, it will very probably alert our foes.”

“And she can’t just... shut off the power?” Swift asked.

“She is... aware of her own capacities in a strangely childlike fashion, but from what I gathered from her explanation, many of the construct’s abilities are being hobbled or routed through other systems which will set off alarms, though she seems unaware of how exactly that is being done. My best bet - and all this is merely untested hypothesis, bear in mind - is somepony has gained access to elements of her control system and re-wired them."

“So... we need to figure out what they’ve done. That means capturing Skylark or somepony near her,” I said, “I’m taking point, then. Don’t pull your gun unless somepony is looking like they’re going to pull theirs first.”

I looked right, then left, before following Tourniquet’s instructions and heading towards the sub-basement, doing my level best to look lost; it wasn’t far from the truth.

I still hoped we could avoid a gunfight. Extracting an enchanted girl from a room with five ponies wasn’t a thing I wanted to try, particularly if one of them was likely to be Skylark, and especially not without knowing exactly how many unicorns there might be. Sure, we might hit them with a stun grenade, but I wanted to be damned sure we wouldn’t be alerting the upstairs guards.

I felt the faint brush of air and the slight weight of a ladybug dropping onto my mane.

“Queenie,” I whispered to the tiny creature, “One buzz for yes, two buzzes for no. Can you help us talk to Tourniquet?”

I wondered for a moment just how the girl and the collective would interact, but the answer, when it came, was one buzz.

“Alright, excellent. Can she seal all the doors upstairs to keep anypony from getting down here?”

Another short wait, then two buzzes.

“Crap... okay…uh... what about the alarms? Can she keep the alarm from going up or cut off their communication system somehow?”

A longer pause.

One buzz.

“Excellent! Tell her to do that as best she can. We need as much time as she can buy us.”

Another buzz.

****

I wish I’d been paying attention to where I was going. I was largely just following Limerence’s occasional instructions, so it must be understood that, when I turned down what I thought was just another hallway, I didn’t expect to run head-first into somepony else.

Our foreheads cracked against one another, and we both went down in a tangle of robes and waving legs. I shoved the other pony away, and pulled myself upright, spitting out a wad of my own cloak.

The pony on the ground was still rubbing her forehead. Her hood flopped down over her face as she got to her hooves.

“Ugh... ow. I swear, Skylark, you are going to pay my hospital bills if I’ve got a concussion because of your dumb acolytes..." the other pony muttered. “Did you bunch at least get the girl, or did you get lost?”

That was a mare’s voice. In fact, it was a voice I’d heard very recently; the little blue mare following Skylark about when we ran into her in the cafeteria.

She pulled her hood out of her face and stared at me.

I stared back, gradually realizing my own hood was sitting on my back.

Her mouth fell open.

“D-D-Detective... H-hard B-boiled?!” she gasped, stumbling backward. Her horn started to glow.

In that close, she didn’t stand a chance.

I was on her faster than she could blink. Crashing onto the ground knocked the wind out of her and the light of whatever spell she’d been about to cast died instantly. Pinning her to the floor with my weight, I rested my hoof against the base of her horn, forcing her face to one side and making it clear what I’d be doing to her if she started flinging magic.

“Miss... Geranium?” I growled, softly.

Her eyes were as round as the moon.

“H-how do you know my name?” she squeaked.

“Good. I just wanted to be sure. I don’t think I need to threaten you, but just in case, I feel your horn warm up even a little, you’ll make a flimsy Earth pony. Do we understand one another?”

She gulped down a breath and tried to nod.

I looked around, searching for a nearby cell. There was an open one slightly down the hall, just passed the security door down into the sub-basement.

Limerence had his crossbow out and a bolt cocked. I indicated where exactly he should aim it, then pulled my hoof from Geranium’s horn. “Now, then. Here is how this is going to work. My friend here with the crossbow is going to point it at your spine. If he feels, for any reason, you’re not being cooperative enough, he’s going to take away your back legs. It probably won’t kill you, but you will have to forget any career aspirations that involve walking. Say, ‘Yes, Detective’.”

“Yes... D-detective,” she whimpered. Fear was rolling off of her in waves.

“Get up.”

I stepped back, letting her rise. It took her a minute to figure out how her hooves operated. That was good. I needed her scared.

She was half my height; only a little taller than Swift, and plain in that way that professional mares sometimes cultivate that’s meant to show they’ve no interest in the interest of stallions; it still, somehow, manages to be very interesting. Despite the name, her fur was baby-blue, topped with a tightly wound bun in pink so faint it was almost white.

I gestured to the nearby cell and her gaze followed my hoof. “We’re going in there and we’re going to have a quick conversation. How quickly you talk will determine how useful I think you are. How useful you are determines how long you live. Now move.”

Taxi stepped in beside Geranium, and Limerence moved up on her other side, boxing her in, on the off chance she thought pulling a runner was a good idea with the crossbow wedged firmly against her lower back.

“O-okay…”

I trotted over to the open cell and stepped inside as my driver and the librarian guided Skylark’s assistant into the room with us.

“Queenie? You still listening?” My mane buzzed. “Good. Could you see if we can shut cell... where are we?”

“Secure wing, bee-bee-thirty-six,” Limerence answered.

A few tense seconds later, the thick door began to slide closed.

“How... how are you doing that?” Geranium asked, dumbly, her eyes on the door as the bars slid into place.

I let out a derisive snort. “I hope you’re not stupid enough to think I’m going to tell you that, or this conversation is going to be very short.” I gave Taxi a quick head-jerk towards the door and she rose up on tip-toes, peering down the hall to make sure nopony was coming. Limerence, meanwhile, kept his crossbow aimed squarely at her forehead.

The girl backed up a couple of steps until her back legs bumped into the cot against the wall.

“I swear, I don’t know anything that’s going on!” she cried.

I smiled, mirthlessly at the cowering filly, “For your sake, that best not be true. I haven’t fed my partner here lately and she’s getting hungry.”

Swift flashed a puzzled look that morphed into understanding. She gave Geranium one of her big, happy-to-eat-you grins. It had the desired effect.

“Oh Celestia save me!” she shrieked, leaping backwards onto the cot. “I’m her lawyer! I’m Miss Skylark’s lawyer! I just handle the paperwork!”

“You knew I was bad news the second you laid eyes on me,” I reminded her. “You know my name. I’m betting you work for some very particular law-firm of my late acquaintance, too. I’m also betting you can tell me about seven dead ponies..."

Geranium raised her head a little, and underneath all that heaped up fear, I saw a hint of calculation. “I... I don’t know who you’re talking about. I just work for-”

“Umbra, Animus, and Armature,” I said, evenly.

Her ears fell against her head. “No... No, I mean... I... I... I just work for Miss-”

“Swift?”

“Yes, Sir?”

“Do you think a pony can still answer questions if you’ve eaten one of their legs?” I asked, casually.

Getting into the role, she picked her sharp canines with one toe. “You know, they probably can, Sir? If I take real small bites, I bet they could answer lots of questions."

Geranium threw herself off the bed at my hooves, blubbering incoherently, “Please, please, don’t let her eat me! I swear, I swear! I’ll tell you everything!”

I pulled my hoof away from her and stepped back, adjusting the robe more comfortably around my shoulders. “Good. You know, you’re the third pony in the last month I’ve threatened to feed to someone or something?” I chuckled, darkly. “If I ever managed to rejoin the Detrot Police force, I’ll have to write a manual on what an effective interrogation technique it is.”

The girl sagged on the floor, hiding her face in her forelegs. “Just... just please... get this over with…”

“You know Skylark murdered seven ponies?”

She mumbled something that I didn’t quite catch.

“I’m sorry, say again?”

“... yes…” she whimpered.

“Are you just fine with that?” I growled.

“I was... f-f-following orders.” She sniffed and wiped her muzzle on the back of one hoof.

“I’m sorry, I’ve heard that refrain from better ponies than you and it didn’t let them off the hook, either. You let that girl, Tourniquet, think her mother could come back to her one day. You let her keep thinking her chronometer was busted and kept her just happy enough so she wouldn’t try anything rash.”

“The... the construct?” Geranium’s eyes darted towards the door. “Why... why do you care about that thing?”

That was the wrong thing to say to me just then.

“You threatened that child with her mother’s life!” I snarled, shoving her backwards against the wall and pressing my hoof against her throat. “Now, you will tell me what Skylark is doing and how this moon-blasted lawfirm keeps sticking their noses into my life!

“I... I’m just a messenger,” she answered, quivering from nose to tailtip. “I... I wasn’t lying. I barely... I barely know anything! The lawfirm will remove my memories as soon as I’m done here. They... they might already have. I don’t remember when I started working for Miss Skylark..."

“Yeah, but you know about the corpses. You know the magical construct is operating. I want to know what’s going on downstairs.”

“I... I don’t know. Oh Celestia, you’re going to kill me…” Geranium collapsed onto her side, moaning pathetically. I would have felt sorry for her, if I hadn’t spent the last half hour standing in a room with seven corpses that probably had her name on them. “I helped her and I don’t even know how! She made them take all that from me! All I know is... she does this... this ritual and these ponies turn grey except their hooves or their horns or whatever... and then she... she takes the bodies away. All those other ponies... they’re just here to watch…”

“What about her little crew down there? All the ponies going to the ritual?” I asked.

Geranium’s nose wrinkled. “I... I can’t tell you. You don’t understand. The lawfirm... they’re not just lawyers. I don’t know what they really are, but-”

“You’re singing a tune I’ve heard already, kiddo. I want actual information or I’ll just feel free to feed you to my friend here.”

It’s a real beautiful thing when a pony starts really thinking. Especially when they start thinking of ways to please you. Sometimes it’s romantic, sometimes it’s social, and sometimes it’s spurred on by fear of being devoured. No matter how it happens, it’s always nice.

“I... uh... oh mercy of the sky... I... the law-firm is all about keeping secrets. I didn’t even work for them until about six months ago. Then they bought my old firm and we had this company party, and they offered everypony big raises to stay on, but said if we did, we’d have to accept the memory alterations and something called the ‘Scry’. I had law-school bills to pay…”

“Wait, the Scry?” I asked. “Back up and go over that with me.”

““I... ugh... this was just supposed to be a six month job.” Geranium rubbed her eyes with both hooves. “Look, I don’t know what it is, exactly. It’s like, magic of some kind. It can find anypony, anywhere. You drink it or mix it into somepony’s drink and they can track you. It was in everypony’s punch at the company party.” Her voice dropped to a whisper. “The partners who refused memory alteration... I never saw them again.”

“Madame, I don’t know if you are aware of this, but you let Astral Skylark burn souls,” Limerence put in. “For all you know, you gave her the spell that let her do it. Celestia will look very poorly on ponies who do such things. Necromancy, if you’ll remember, still carries extremely long prison terms. You are also a liability to your employers, simply for having talked to us. If Skylark doesn’t use you for fuel for whatever mad pursuit she is on, your employers very likely will.”

The girl hid her face against the cot, drawing her robe around herself. “I... I don’t know. Running into you four is a death sentence. I know that much. Everypony who works for the law-firm was told to watch out for you! Unless I show up with him on a leash-” She jabbed her hoof at me. “-then they’re probably going to liquidate me. If I’m lucky, that just means I get to spend the rest of my life drooling in a mental hospital somewhere..."

“And what if you did? That... hmmm…” I tapped my chin, thinking. “We might bait them out-”

Geranium threw her hooves up. “You’ve no idea how these people operate, do you?!”

“You were just enlightening us.”

“They won’t do that stupid thing of showing up to interrogate the prisoner, personally! This isn’t a movie!” she shouted. I hoped the door was good and thick. “They’ll dump you in some industrial garage somewhere, pull your hooves off, and when whatever anonymous killer they’ve hired to skin you alive has everything they want to know, you’ll be burned with spellfire until there’s nothing left. They’ll never get their hooves or wings or whatever it is they have - they’ll never get themselves dirty! You’ll never see them!”

She flopped back on the cot, tossing her foreleg over her eyes.

Limerence hummed softly to himself, then tilted his head towards me. “Detective, we can’t kill this pony. Not that I think it likely that was your plan, but nor can we trust her. Nor can we keep her locked up in this room. If she is not at the ritual, Skylark will know.”

I felt a flicker of movement in my mane, then three insistent buzzes.

“Hold that thought!” I said, quickly, then dropped onto my stomach just as my vision fuzzed into darkness.

****

I came out of the Ladybug network hanging in the hallway with Cerise’s cell.

Five robed ponies were moving down the hall, with a sixth tethered behind them on a rope lead. Cerise was following, but her gait was badly uncoordinated, like she’d had a few too many to drink. Her horn was spitting sparks atop the thin, continuous glow that occasionally flashed in a way that somehow suggested an engine heading for over-heat.

Despite the slow pace, none of the ponies with her seemed inclined to rush her along. The one in the lead kept checking a watch, but made no move to press the girl for greater speed.

After just a moment, the view slid away.

****

My eyes popped open and I leapt up.

“We need to move. We’ve got maybe five minutes before the ponies with Cerise are here.”

Taxi cocked her chin in Geranium’s direction. “You said it. What are we doing with this one? It’s not like we can leave her here, and her best bet for walking out of this is to stab us in the back.”

Geranium cowered on the bed, her wide-eyes fixed on me as I considered our options. More likely, she thought I was deciding her fate.

She wasn’t a victim.

Not like those corpses in Tourniquet’s pit. Not like the poor girl that Reginald Bari had used for sex in exchange for drugs. Not like Ruby. She’d benefited from her servitude, and while it may not have been kind work, it was well paying.

What Geranium was was a potentially lethal millstone around our necks, and shooting her might have been a mercy, considering the grace her employers were likely to extend.

Still, I wasn’t there yet.

I couldn’t just kill somepony because they were in my way.

That didn’t mean I had to be nice.

Reaching into my pocket, I felt around for the rock that’d been in Girthranx’s head. Pulling it out of my pocket, I turned it over in my hooves until the side with the red moon was facing Geranium

“You know, I really wish I didn’t have to do this. It might surprise you to find out that I’m not a bad pony. In fact, it surprises me, now and then. Unfortunately, for you, I’m afraid that won’t mean you get to walk away unscathed.”

“W-what are you going to do?” she asked, swallowing.

“It’s not what I’m going to do. It’s what you’re going to do.” I held up the glyph covered stone. “You know what this is?”

She shook her head.

“It’s... well, it’s like the robes. I assume you’re aware of the secret spells woven into the robes of the Lunar Passage?”

A gradual nod, this time.

“This was how the Jailer of Supermax controlled dragons, back in the day. She’d stick these things in their brains and her girl... that sad, sweet little creature you brought back to life so you could power these beastly spells... she could make them dance. We’re working with the ‘construct’ as you call her.”

There was no mistaking the look of shame that crossed Geranium’s face, but nor was there any disguising her disgust at the mention of Tourniquet.

“You’re going to swallow this,” I stated, evenly. “I don’t know what it’ll do to your digestive tract, but I doubt it’ll be good. Still, it’s this and a trip to the hospital for a stomach pump or you die here, tonight, and those student loans you worked so hard to pay off will follow you into the afterlife.”

Geranium gulped, uncomfortably, still staring at the runed stone.

“Look, I can’t trust you, I can’t leave you here, and, believe it or not, I don't really want to kill you,” I added. “This is my solution. I don’t know precisely what Tourniquet can do to your body if you were to try something stupid with this rock in your gut, but I think it would be a whole lot less pleasant than that stomach pump. Now, do you want something to wash this down with?”

The mare licked her lips, nervously, then shut her eyes and took a couple of steps closer, opening her mouth. I gently placed the stone on her tongue and she took the canteen of water that Taxi proffered.

It took three attempts for her to get it down and she almost vomited on the third try, but with more than a little retching, she managed to swallow it.

I admit it.

I felt a bit guilty.

Unfortunately, showing guilt is a great way to get shot, arrested, or used by a pretty face.

Geranium was panting heavily by the time she managed to force the rock down. I helped her off the bed, then went to the door, which opened without being asked.

“If things get loud, you go find a place to hole up,” I murmured, stepping out into the hallway.

“Wait! What? Where are we going?” she asked, frantically.

“We’ve got a party to attend, sweetheart,” I replied, just as a group of six ponies rounded the corner at the far end of the hallway. “We’re your ‘plus four guests.'"

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