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// 1: The Pony Club 
// Story: Magical Undead Human Princess of Friendship 
// by totallynotabrony 
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Seattle Sunshine should never be confused with actual sunshine.  In a place where rain was more likely, sunshine was more a state of mind than anything else.
 
And for some people, it wasn’t even that.
 
“I’m not eating a serial killer!” Liv argued, flicking her hand at the body on the autopsy table.
 
“Salvatore Rey is not just any serial killer,” Ravi countered, holding up a finger.  “You’ll recall he had time to get a psychological examination before escaping and subsequently being shot by police.  He kills, certainly, but what he really enjoys is slicing people up.”  
 
Ravi spread his arms to the morgue around them.  “If you take any traits from eating his brain, you’ll at least have a safe place where no one will notice you carving runes into bodies.  Plus, perhaps we could gain some helpful insight into the minds of ritualistic multiple-murderers.”
 
The two of them were alone in the morgue.  Both wore white lab coats, but that was where any similarity ended.  Ravi was tall, British, and of Indian descent, with a full beard and dark hair.  Liv was short, petite, and sharply pale, both her skin and hair.  Also, she was a zombie, hence the discussion about brains.
 
“Eating a serial killer’s brain doesn’t strike you as risky in any way?” Liv said.
 
Ravi’s face sobered.  “I’m more worried about the risk if you don’t eat something soon.”
 
Liv sighed.  “What is it with this city?  It seems like everything is all sunshine and rainbows lately.  People aren’t even dropping dead like they used to.”
 
It was true.  Most of the refrigerated drawers around the room were empty.  Which, for a hungry zombie working in a morgue and in need of regular access to brains, was starting to worry her.
 
Just then, the double doors at the end of the room opened and two paramedics pushed their way in, wheeling a stretcher with a body bag on it.  “Doctor Chakrabarti,” greeted one, handing Ravi a clipboard.
 
He scanned the first page.  “Twilight Sparkle, suspected alias.  Killed while jaywalking.”
 
“Over here,” Liv directed.  At her call, the paramedics lifted the body bag onto an unused examination table.  That done, they left.
 
“Well, I suppose that’s an alternative to serial killer,” said Ravi when he and Liv were alone again  “With a name like ‘Twilight Sparkle’ I daresay this is one from the vegetarian menu.”
 
Liv’s reply was cut off by the phone ringing.  She was closest and picked it up.  “Coroner's office, Olivia Moore speaking.”
 
“It’s Clive.  I understand you got a vic with no ID.”  Detective Clive Babineaux was a frequent contact at the morgue.
 
“They just arrived,” Liv confirmed.
 
“I’ll be down in a few hours.  See what you can find,” he directed.
 
“That’s kind of what we do here,” Liv reminded him.  Something about Clive’s tone signaled that there was something special about this case, something more than just a pedestrian traffic accident.  He wouldn’t have called otherwise.
 
Liv hung up and turned back to where Ravi was unzipping the body bag.  A girl, probably no older than eighteen, was inside.  Her hair was purple, with a few streaks of pink in it.  In fact, that seemed to be the theme of her whole outfit.  Also, her lower body was mangled beyond recognition.  It certainly looked as if she’d been run over by a car.
 
Putting on her fittingly purple nitrile gloves, Liv helped Ravi move the body out of the bag and onto the table.  It was nearly lunchtime, so Liv picked up the bone saw.
 
She’d brought salad today, a nice leafy mix with habanero-mango dressing.  After getting Twilight Sparkle’s brain out of her skull, Liv weighed it, washed it, recorded the medical information, and then chopped up the brain into small pieces to put on her salad.
 
Ravi stayed on the other side of the office, eating his own lunch.  Liv looked over.  “It’s not like you haven’t seen me eat brains before.”
 
“It’s the dressing.  It’s making my eyes water.  This is coming from an Indian.”
 
Liv shrugged.  “You know, I actually like salad a lot better after becoming a zombie.  I can’t taste anything that isn’t measured in Scoville units, so I think I’m actually eating more vegetables now.  Can’t think vegetables are icky if you can’t taste them.”  There were occasionally benefits to being a zombie.
 
Clive appeared after lunch.  He was a black man in a black leather jacket, and barely taller than Liv.  More importantly, he was a good detective and wasn’t afraid to work hard.
 
He glanced briefly at Twilight’s remains and came over to Liv.  “What have you found out?”
 
“The car hit her from the side.  She probably never saw it coming,” said Liv.  “It’s interesting how, other than that, she’s in great shape.  No calluses, no scars.  Her elbows aren’t even wrinkly.  It’s like she came out of a test tube or something.  Even her dye job is perfect.  I still haven’t been able to wash it enough to get down to the original color.”
 
“It gets stranger,” said Clive.  “She had no ID.  No records.  No purse.  Custom made clothing.  It’s like she just appeared out of nowhere.  Fortunately, we have several witnesses.  Friends of hers, I was told.  Maybe they can tell us more.  Are you free?”
 
“I’ll come along,” Liv agreed.
 
She usually wore a hooded sweatshirt against the chill of the morgue.  Going outside, she topped it with a maroon faux leather jacket against the weather.
 
The two of them got into Clive’s unmarked detective car.  “Had any visions yet?” he asked.
 
“It’s not on-demand,” Liv reminded him.
 
“Right, right, psychic patience,” he muttered.
 
Liv was not psychic, but that was easier than explaining how she relived memories from brains she’d eaten.  Either way, Clive was the only cop willing to overlook the method as long as it got results, and the two of them had solved more than one case based on a victim’s memories.
 
They pulled up to an apartment building and took the stairs up.  Clive knocked on a door.  After a moment, a pale girl with indigo hair styled into an extravagant wave opened it.  Her eyes were red, blue mascara running down her cheeks.  “May I help you?” she sniffed.
 
“I'm Detective Babineaux, and this is Olivia Moore from the Medical Examiner's office.  I’m looking for Sunset Shimmer.”
 
“This is her apartment,” said the girl.  She stood back to let them in.  “My name is Rarity.”
 
Clive looked as if he were skeptical of that, but said, “Pleasure to make your acquaintance.”
 
Rarity showed them into the apartment.  It was small, but decorated brightly and eclectically.  The living room walls were a friendly yellow, with paintings of landscapes.  The coffee table had several crystals on it.
 
The couch and and a few chairs were occupied by five other girls, all in various states of despair and generally sporting bright, highly styled hair. 
 
Clive introduced them again. “I’m here to talk about Twilight Sparkle.  I understand Sunset Shimmer was a witness.”
 
The girl with red and yellow hair stood up.  “We all were.”
 
“What happened?” Clive asked.
 
“She was so happy to be here,” murmured a girl with straight pink hair.  “But she didn’t know how things are here.  You can’t just walk into the street like that.”
 
“We should have told her!” burst out the athletic-looking girl with rainbow hair.  “She didn’t know.  She’s from a different—”
 
The rainbow one’s mouth was abruptly clamped by the hand of a tall blonde who wore jeans.  Also a cowboy hat, but even that made her the most normal looking of the lot.
 
“—a different country,” Sunset finished.  “She wasn’t a local.  She wasn’t used to lots of traffic.”
 
“What country was she from?” Clive asked, taking out a small notebook.
 
Sunset appeared to pause before speaking.  “Estonia.”
 
Just then, a memory flashed through Liv’s mind as if it had happened to her.
 
“Equestria welcomes its newest princess!”
 
Around the room, which appeared to be some sort of castle hall, horses applauded.  As if that weren’t strange enough, their coats were as colorful as the dye jobs the girls in Sunset’s apartment sported.
 
A tall white horse—unicorn?—came over and smiled down.  “You’ll do great things, Twilight.  I’m so proud of the friends you’ve made.”
 
Liv gasped.  She seen some strange things before, but never a hallucination that looked like a cartoon.  She was definitely going to look at Twilight Sparkle’s toxicology report when she got back to the office.
 
Clive gave her a knowing glance and then returned to speaking with the others.  “I suppose being from Estonia would be why we couldn’t find any records for her.  What was her real name?”
 
“Twilight Sparkle was her real name,” provided Rarity.
 
“You’re telling me some parent—in Estonia no less—named their child Twilight Sparkle?” said Clive.
 
Nods all around the room.  Some looking decidedly less convincing than others.
 
Clive changed tactics.  “We have lots of witnesses and footage from nearby security cameras.  We don’t suspect foul play at all.  This was just an accident.  All I’m trying to do is make sure we know who she really was.  Won’t her parents want to know?”
 
A girl with pale pink hair had been sobbing quietly ever since they’d entered, but now she broke out bawling.
 
Sunset came over, shielding her from the two visitors.  “Don’t worry about her family.  We’ll tell them.”
 
Her attitude was clear.  Clive put a business card in her hand, which she didn’t look at, instead staring at him and Liv until they went out the door.
 
Outside, Clive looked at her.  “You had a vision.”
 
Liv nodded, and said deadpan, “Twilight Sparkle wasn’t from Estonia.  She was from magical pony land.”
 
“Doesn’t surprise me,” grumbled Clive.  “Let me know if you figure out where she was really from.”
 
Back at the morgue, Liv told Ravi about the memory.  He frowned.  “There was nothing in the tox report to alter her mind.  Liv, if that was in her memory, she might not be a stable person.  You could inherit some kind of schizophrenia from eating her brain.”
 
“What if there’s some other explanation?” said Liv.  “If that was in her memory, then she believed it.  I saw it through her eyes, after all.”  She frowned.  “That combined with her suspiciously unblemished body and apparent lack of any personal records…”
 
“So you’ve got a hobo with strangely good personal care?” Ravi tried.
 
“No, what if she really was a magical horse and was put in a human body?  That would explain why she doesn’t have paperwork, why her hair seems permanently colored, why her body looks like it grew yesterday, why she didn’t look both ways before crossing the street, and why her friends are so reluctant to talk about it—”
 
Ravi raised his hands.  “Liv, slow down.  Do you really believe this?”
 
“Well, no.  I need evidence before coming to a solid conclusion.  But don’t you think it’s an intriguing hypothesis?  Why not magic?”
 
“Come on, Liv.  Magic, really?”
 
Liv spread her arms.  “I’m a zombie.”
 
“A condition which we are working on medically identifying,” Ravi pointed out.
 
“Yes, but even if we do, this is not conventionally biological,” Liv said.  “If I can get memories from eating brain, then why can’t magic exist?  Magic is just science that hasn’t yet been explored.”
 
“I believe the quote is, ‘Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic,’ and I don’t think Arthur C. Clarke was talking in the context of the pony club,” said Ravi.
 
“Speaking of the pony club, I’d bet Twilight’s friends know a lot more than they were telling,” said Liv.  
 
She turned to go, but Ravi put his hand on her shoulder.  “Hang on, give them a little time to grieve.  They’ll be more lucid tomorrow.”
 
“Oh.  You’re probably right,” Liv allowed.  She frowned briefly.  Since becoming a zombie, she was constantly considering what other people might be thinking, but she’d had a momentary lapse and was about to charge off to interrogate grieving friends of Twilight in the name of...science?  Was this an effect of Twilight’s brain?
 
Other traits began to show themselves over the afternoon.  Liv found herself humming.  She idly read the medical reference books.  That was something she’d done before, for work, but now she found it fun.  Whoever Twilight had been, it was seeming less and less likely that she was a delusional nutcase.