//------------------------------// // The One Who Eats the Tail Pt 4 // Story: These City Walls // by KitsuneRisu //------------------------------// These City Walls Chapter 2: The One Who Eats the Tail, Part 4 "Twilight, I really don't think..." Never before was there a more hopeless case of persuasion, something that would have been a little bit more remarkable had it not occurred nearly every week. When a little baby dragon was the voice of reason over that of a fully-grown adult, there was cause for concern, and truly, Spike felt far older than his plentiful lifespan would allow him. Yesterday, he thought he found his first grey spine. "Of course you don't think, Spike!" was the bubbly and cheerful response. Twilight Sparkle had a way of sounding cheerful about everything. More accurately, she was merely being dismissive, something that Spike had learnt to live with. "That's not what I pay you for, after all!" "Uh... you don't pay me at all, Twilight," the dragon scratched his head. "Well, that's right. what I meant to say was, there's really no need for concern. Anyway, I've made up my mind!" It was those five words that truly marked the end of what could have been an extended discussion of any sort; and how many times had Spike heard her say that before? 'I've made up my mind', indeed. Under normal circumstances, Spike would have parted way for Twilight, happy to allow her to steadfastly blunder into situations which would fall apart at the seams and result in her writing some sort of letter of epiphany to Princess Celestia. This time, however, Spike realised that perhaps it wouldn't be that good if that epiphany came in the form of Twilight's obituary. Therefore, it was on this day that Spike decided, against all known logic, to actually attempt to convince Twilight out of her latest idea in a long line of ideas whose explicit purpose was to show off to her benefactor. "Listen, Twilight, seriously," said Spike, gathering up his thoughts, and forming his words incredibly carefully to deliver a poignant and effective argument. "This is a really bad idea!" "Don't be silly, Spike!" said Twilight, once again dismissing him, as she poured over book after book in her library cum home. "Now, if you really want to help me, go see if you can find me any book on ancient pony legends. Specifically, something called the Wicked Stable." "But Twilight, this might be really dangerous! I really don't think it's a good idea! I mean... this isn't just a normal every day kind of thing like hydras or manticores or parasprites or anything! It's a special case!" "Oh, I'm sure everything will be alright, Spike! You needn't have to worry. Anyway, I'll figure this out by tomorrow!" "Um... Twilight? I know you're really smart and good with magic, but that's stretching it a little, don't you think?" "Ok, fine, Friday, latest. You'll see, I'll catch this murderer and everypony will be safe and Princess Celestia will be happy and... ooooooooh!" Twilight shuddered. "Don't you think Princess Celestia would be happier if you stayed out of trouble?" "Well, if she was concerned, she would have said something, wouldn't she?" "Well, that's true, but she doesn't really... brrraaaaaaaauuughh" Coughing like there was a steak rammed down his throat, a green flame shot forth from the gaping maw of Spike the dragon, conjuring up the presence of a scroll that bore a very familiar, very royal seal. "Ahem," said Spike, picking it up and unrolling it. "Dear Twilight Sparkle. It is about this time when I realise that both curiosity and an urge to fix things has overtaken you, and that you are about to embark on something extremely foolish and dangerous. As Princess, I urge you not to traverse down paths of dubious intent, and hereby order you to stay in Ponyville for the duration of the matter. You know what I'm talking about. Yours sincerely, Princess Celestia." "It does not say that!" said Twilight, incredulously, pulling the scroll out of Spike's tiny hands and reading it for herself. "Blah blah blah... extremely foolish... yadda yadda... dubious intent... blah blah... stay in Ponyville?" "Why do you sound so surprised? I just read that," said Spike. "Because... because this is... did you tell her what I was up to, Spike?" "How could I?" he shrugged. "You just told me yourself only ten minutes ago! Where'd you come up with this lame-brain scheme, anyway?" "I read a book, Spike!" "A book." "After that whole thing with the police station the other day, I got curious, and I just had to read about it. Detectives for Dummies, The Collected Stories of Hemlock Holmes, and some strange books about policeponies on beaches. I had no idea they loved beaches that much." "I always told Princess Celestia those books were nothin' but trouble, but does she listen to me?" "It's... so exciting, Spike! Tracking down clues, revealing the culprit in the middle of a crowded room, and the final showdown; and the detective always gets appreciation by the chief!" "And by 'chief' you mean...?" "Princess Celestia, of course!" "Of course," Spike said dryly, narrowing his eyes, and letting his arms fall lifelessly by his side. "Anyway, there's no point now, Twilight. The Princess doesn't want you leaving Ponyville." "Well, If... that's how... it has to be..." "Don't even think about disobeying her, Twilight!" "Ooooh no. Oh no. I can't leave Ponyville. But..." "Don't say 'but', Twilight, come on! Don't say 'but'!" "... I can still bring them to me!" "It's gonna be a long week, isn't it?" Spike groaned. "New plan, Spike. Take a note," Twilight said, a glint in her eye. ,---(*< ~---, '---------------'   "Well, that's interesting," said Canary, giving Blitz the once-over. In the dim glow of Lumi's magical light, not a single speck of blue shone upon her coat. Canary checked twice just to make entirely sure, but it was true - Blitz was clean. "Looks like you aren't a murderer after all," Canary told her, mockingly. "Looks like you are, on the other hoof," joked Lumi. "Yeah, yeah. Don't mind the stains. Comes with the territory, huh?" she consoled Blitz, who had remained quite silent during the whole thing, until now. "I'm pretty used to a few stains," she then said in reply. "In any case, I'm not afraid of a little blood." "That's good, that's good. Stronger stomach on you than that last one," Canary lifted her shoulder flanks. "Well, guess you're clear. That's the good news. Bad news is, you're still somehow involved in all this, and until we can discern what that is, exactly, we aren't too eager to let you go. If anything, it's for your own safety as well." "Trust me, that comes as a welcome bit of news, officer. Duriandal and I, we both came here for that safety. And I know that you guys are just doing your job and I do understand, so let's just put it behind us and move on, alright?" "You're pretty down to earth for a Pegasus," Lumi commented. "It's not really the time to be flippant," explained Blitz. "Yeah, well, maybe you could teach that friend of yours something. That Flare pony. Anyway, we'll get you back to breakfast now. Thank you for your time," Canary said as she directed Blitz toward the door. Just as they left, Blitz stopped suddenly, causing Canary to back up in her place as well. "Sorry, officer?" asked Blitz. "Yeah?" "Far... far be it for me to tell you folk how to do your job, but... Duri... Duri's sensitive. She's... and I'm going to say this nicely, she's like a child. Literally. I don't think she likes blood very much. I'm not trying to... you know..." "Yeah, yeah. I get it. We'll take care of her, alright? You just head back to your cell now. If you wanna take a shower, go check in with my colleagues." "Thank you, officer. A shower would be nice." The usual sound of a police station doesn't always include the noise of stampeding, especially that of applause. Even when they did a job worthy of such recognition, a chummier slap on the flank or a desk upgrade sent the message across perfectly, and as such, Canary found it slightly bewildering that a small group of bemused-looking police ponies had gathered in a small group around Duriandal just outside the room, and were, in fact, giving her stamped hooves. Cries of 'that's amazing!' and 'there's gotta be some trick' also interjected the air and a set of photos that floated in front of Berry's face gave away some sort of clue to what they were up to. Canary sensed a bad situation about to start and quickly said something, just as Blitz's mouth opened to say something herself. "Hey, get back to the cell. I'll handle this. Ok?" Blitz paused, giving it some serious consideration, and then nodded in agreement, before walking off slowly. To Canary's surprise, she didn't turn around to look as she went, something that was rare indeed. Better live up to the trust, then. "Ok, ok, what's going on?" she said, annoyed, as she pushed to the middle of the crowd. "Sarge, girl's a genius or sum'in!" exclaimed one of the other members of the station. "Where can we get one of these for ourselves?" "Berry," Canary said, ignoring that other fool. "Oh, er... hi Sarge," said Berry, sheepishly. Canary looked at Duriandal. She did not look at all too comfortable. Her legs were stood tightly closed together, her head was tilted down, and her eyes snuck away into an empty space between the ponies surrounding her. She wasn't exactly frowning, but she wasn't the posterfilly of carefree joviality either. "Er..." Canary's eyes flicked back to Berry. "What... is going on here? Weren't you going through the books?" "Yeah, I was, Sarge, but..." "But?" "I got... distracted?" Canary let out a low rumbling sound. It was a breath trying to break free from her lungs, but was pressed down into the deep recesses of wherever anger was made. Most of the police ponies recognized it and decided that it was time to leave. "G'luck, Rebs," whispered Silver, as she flitted past. "Constable Berry," Canary spoke, each word sharp with razors. "Do you not understand that there is a murderer out there?" "Yes Sergeant," she squeaked. "And when I asked you to look through the books, I expect you to look through the books?" "Yes Sergeant." "So, explain to me the missing part between looking through the books and you now parading one of our witnesses around like a damn parade float?!" "I... I wanted to help," said Duriandal, suddenly, a drop of rain fighting to be heard in a storm. "What?" "I wanted to help," Duriandal repeated. "It's true, Sergeant," Berry added, in her own defense. "Listen..." "I know, Sarge. I know! Things got a little out of hand, alright? And I'm sorry. I really am. But she approached me first. Helped out a little, and then I remembered her memory thing back at her shop, and we just got carried away. Really, Sarge, it was only for a moment!" "You know that's still no excuse!" "I know, Sarge. I'm sorry, ok? I'm sorry!" "We'll talk about this later. What exactly happened?" "She just came by my desk, Sarge, and it had the evidence on it and everything, I didn't even notice her coming along! And then suddenly she just said 'that's wrong', out of nowhere." "That's wrong," Duriandal repeated, just in case. "Just like that, Sarge," Berry explained. "And she was looking at it, and I was asking her, what's wrong? And she was like 'that is. That's wrong.' and was pointing at the cloud puffer thingie." "And what's wrong about it, Miss Duriandal?" asked Canary. "It is not broken," she said. "It's not broken? What are you talking about? It's clearly broken. It's got some of its insides on the outside." "That piece of wire does not go into the construction of the device," she went on. "There are no wires inside it." Canary looked across the room at the thing on the desk, with the half-open lid and the long piece of string dangling from it. "Are you saying that that piece of string or wire or whatever it is... that doesn't go into the construction of one of these things?" "No," she said softly. "It seems that somepony has made it look as if it was, but it is not." "I... see. I don't know what that means, but thank you anyway." "There is... more," said Duriandal. "I'm all ears." "This... unit... is exactly the same one that was stolen from my shop by the first pony." "Wait, what?" "When we spoke, I informed you that there had been a theft of a cloud puffer the day before the incident. That cloud puffer is this one." "How... could you possibly tell?" "The cloud puffer that was stolen was one out of sixteen of this particular shape that I had on display. I had placed it in the rear of the shelf because it had a slight deformity. There was a 2.3 centimetre-long scratch on the bevel of the lid. Three units had been sold since display, but this one was the one that was stolen. I have surmised that this one was chosen because it would not be readily noticed if it were missing, since I had placed it all the way in the back." "But..." "But I noticed," she continued, looking at Canary. "The cloud puffer on your desk is of the same shape, size and dimension, and has a 2.3 centimetre-long scratch on the bevel of the lid," she concluded. "Clouds... can be scratched?" asked Canary. "Yes," said Duriandal. "If they can be cut, they can be scratched, yes?" "... Yeah, I'll buy that," mumbled Canary, thinking. "Alright, that's... interesting. And what happened after that?" "Well, she came over, Sarge. Said all this stuff to me, as well. I was like, wow, that's pretty amazing, and then the lads came over and they were like commenting on her detail and I just let it slip that she had an amazing memory, and then they started to quiz her, Sarge." "Quiz... her?" "Yeah, like... uh... like, 'in this photo, how many muffins are on the ground'?" Berry gave an example. "None," said Duriandal, almost instantly. "Wha... uh..." Berry took a closer look at her own photo. "Because they're cupcakes, Berry. How many cupcakes." "Fourteen," said Duriandal. "Um... you get the idea, Sarge." "Yeah, great sideshow. Listen, what you did? I get it, alright? Just... as long as you know what you're doing. I'll trust your discretion. I just don't like... you know." "Yeah, I really am sorry, Sarge." "Don't be, alright? I just got angry. It was... it was really my... look, anyway," she passed through. "Maybe we can use this to our advantage. I'm just going to run her quickly through Lumi first, she's been waiting a while, and then I'll be back to look through those books with you, ok?" "Alright Sarge," Berry nodded solemnly, and headed back to her desk. "Alright, Miss Memory," Canary turned full attention to her. "You ok?" Asking her was quite redundant. She was very twitchy. Clearly, something wasn't ok. Her body movements, even down to those borderline imperceptible ones that only a trained police officer bothers to notice, were jerky and random. If anything, Canary would have said that she wasn't taking the stress at all very well, and she didn't know exactly what it was about her, but she knew that something up there worked differently from everypony else. This was going to be quite tricky. Her head was still bent down low, and the highest she could look was up to Canary's chest, maybe. She worked hard to avoid direct eye contact with anypony. Maybe even avoiding the entire face altogether. Normally, Canary would read that as a sign of guilt. Maybe she did feel guilty, Canary didn't know. She also spoke wordily, and fast, but soft and with a very non-confrontational tone. That told Canary that she was smart but unsocial, a mix usually reserved for malcontents or certain breeds of psychopaths. Ok, Canary. Don't start profiling her now. Quit your habit and treat her like a person. The problem, of course, with Canary's amazing acumen in pony behaviour was that she only knew how to apply it to bad ponies. Outside of that... she had no idea how to apply it. She wasn't one of those damn shrinks down at the facilities. She hated those shrinks. She always felt they allowed criminals to get away with terrible things, and get put in a 'facility' instead of behind bars where they belonged. All it took was for a 'doctor' to peer into his mind and go 'oh, the poor dear isn't right in the head'. Yeah, obviously they weren't right in the head, otherwise they wouldn't be going around committing rampant crimes, you stupid damn son of a... "Yes, miss police officer," Duriandal said, cracking through Canary's mind like a shot. "What? Oh. Well, alright, just... follow me if you would. Tell me," Canary said, leading her to the interrogation room. "Are you afraid of blood?" The non-response was response enough for Canary. "Well, I just want to tell you before we go in there, what we're going to be doing is a little test. My friend in there can ah... reveal blood. Sort of. What's left behind when you wash things away. We're going to see if there's any blood on you, and that's all we want to see, alright?" Duriandal nodded. "Uh... there's going to be a lot of blood in there, actually. I just want to warn you because I don't want you to get... upset or anything." "It will be... alright. I am not really afraid of blood." "Alright. That's good to know. Thank you for... your participation. Could we get you to just... yeah..." Canary opened the door for her to enter where Lumi stood, waiting patiently. "Who have we here?" she said kindly as Duriandal stepped in. "Hello," said Duriandal. It's what one does when meeting ponies for the first time. "Well, aren't you polite?" "Yes." "Uh..." Lumi tilted her head. "Don't mind her," said Canary, shutting the door and turning off the lights. "Let's get going." Lumi's horn flickered on, sending the walls into a deep velvet and brought them swimming in a hazy mist of magic. Again, the stains on the floor and the table lit up as well as the ones that so irregularly decorated Canary herself. Canary could hear Duriandal's eyes widen. She had started to wheeze, grating, rough tones scratching against her constricting chest, as it became more and more rapid by the second. "Oh boy, ok. Ok. Lumi, turn it off. Quickly," Canary instructed, checking out Duriandal's body as fast as she possibly could before returning normal light to the room. She looked on in dismay as the form of Duriandal was reduced to a quivering, twitching mess, those raspy breaths still coming thick and fast, and her eyes watering. "Miss, are you alright? Do you need some water?" offered Canary. Thereupon came a muttering from Duriandal's narrowly parted lips, a mere whisper from a child. "I'm sorry, beg your pardon... could you..." "IT'S SO DIRTY!" Duriandal screamed. "Oh my Colt so many stains! Why are there so many stains? Why can you not see it now? Where are they? Are they there?" "Uh..." it was Canary's turn to be taken for surprise. "What is that, officer? What is that? Why is there invisible stains? Are they everywhere?" "No... it's blood... just blood, when you clean it up it remains..." "Oh... oh my Colt oh my Colt oh my Colt," she started jumping up and down in place. "How do you clean it, how do you clean it?" "We... can't really tell you that, Miss..." "TELL ME!" she shrieked again. Her mane seemed to be unravelling. "My shop! Oh my shop! There are stains all over and I can't see them!" "Please calm... down... miss..." "You, can you come? I'll pay you. There are invisible stains on my floors!" she turned to Lumi and begged. "There's no need!" shouted Canary. "Just calm down!" Duriandal stopped. "Just... calm down. Ok? Please." Canary lowered her tone cautiously, like lowering a lowered crossbow. Bunch of whackjobs, she thought. Each and every one of them. Why couldn't she just have normal victims once in a while? Where were the days gone by where not everypony suffered from some odd strange quirk of behaviour? "We... know how to clean them, alright? We have ponies for that. They'll go down soon, it's part of the service, and we'll get them to clean up everything, including the... invisible ones." "Do you... do you promise?" "Yes, promise. So just... please. Calm down. And before you ask no, they won't get on you if you touch it like this, so they're not going to get on you or spread around, alright?" "Urrrrhhhhhh." Duriandal moaned, like a song with a single note. "O...kay. How about we get you back to the cell with your friends? Would that make you feel better?" "Urrrrrrhhhhhhhhhhhh." "Right then. Lumi? Thanks for the help. I'd love to catch up but as you can see I have my horn full. You can pick your fee up at admin, as usual." "Lively bunch this time 'round, aren't they?" "You have no idea." "Uuuurrrrhhhhhh" "Alright! Let's go, miss." The nearly comatose pony was led out - carefully - from the room back to the cell. Canary felt it might be a bit more wise to bring her herself, considering she didn't seem to have use of her senses any longer. Maybe she should offer her some kind of paper bag or something. If anything, she could put it on her head and go sit in the corner and pretend the rest of the world didn't exist. "And I'm telling you that you're being a stupid face!" came a voice, shrill, bouncing off the corridor and hastening Canary's step. "Please, do go on," retorted Blitz Breeze, her hair shifting as she placed her weight on her front legs. "Tell me how my face is stupid." "It's just stupid," replied Flare. "Brilliant. Such wit," snorted Blitz. "At least I know how to behave myself and be polite." "Yeah? Well at least I know how not to go dropping off ponies in night clubs when they clearly can't take it!" "That again? Seriously?" "Ladies!" said Canary, commanding the room to a halt. "Do we have a problem here?" "No officer," said Blitz, backing up and stepping away from Flare. "Yeah we got a problem," said Flare, under her breath. "Holy..." said Blitz. "Alright, relax, ladies. Finish your breakfast. I want to hear no more arguing or else some of you are going to have to sit alone in a very small place, alright? Here, I brought your friend back. Catch up," she ushered in Duriandal. "You three just stay quiet and on your best behaviour, and you'll be out of here in no time, alright?" "Yes officer," said Blitz. "Yeah yeah, whatever," muttered Flare, going to the corner and dropping down, head to herself. Duriandal just went back to the same spot in the room where she had taken up squatter's rights the night before and lay in the same position. "Shower's free if you need one, Miss Duriandal. Just let any one of my colleagues know if you want, alright?" Holy manure buckets, that was a mess, thought Canary to herself as she returned to Berry. Her drive to solve this case was almost overtaken by this urge to get those three out of her station, as bad as that sounded. But she shook some sense back into her head as she grabbed a book off Berry's desk and swung it around to the other side so that she could read it. "Oh, hey Sarge," said Berry nervously. "At ease, Berry." "Um... thanks, Sarge." "Found anything so far?" "Well... yes and no, really." "Berry, if there's any one time I didn't need some sort of food-related elaboration, now would be it. Tell me straight." "I found a lot of things, Sarge, but I don't understand most of it. There's a lot of stuff about the Wicked Stable, but all of them just talks about those five evil thingies... um... trespass, avarice, hypocrisy... that other one..." "Hubris." "Yeah, and prejudice. Um... It's just a lot of poems and warnings against doing them or else bad stuff will happen to you, but there's this one thing here that I found which is the part I don't understand." Berry swung the book around, where a large diagram faced Canary on one page, and some old text met her on the other. The diagram was crudely drawn, obviously by a pony who had no time to bother with intricate detail. It seemed more like a sketch in ink, and it did run here and there where the quill was freshly dipped. There was a large circle drawn out that took up the majority of the page in fading ink, and five smaller circles were drawn along the circumference. Each one of those circles was paired by another small circle, but those five remained alone. In the center of the diagram was drawn a symbol that Canary recognized well; it was a horseshoe drawn upside down. At the top of the page there was a curvy line that stuck out like an errant hair or a worm breaking through the soil. There seemed to be writing on the inside of each circle as well, but that had long since faded away and was no longer recognizable. Parts were blotted out here and there and it all was very unclear at this point. Berry poked her hoof at the drawing in question. "See, that, Sarge That's the thing." "What am I looking at?" "One of the old stories, Sarge, it had an extra bit at the bottom. It said something like... I'll find it later, but it said something like 'you who don't what obey shall be visited by the spirit of Ouros'." "Ouros?" "Yeah, Sarge. Oh-you-ar-oh-ess. It was the only one I came across that actually named something. So I went searching for that instead, and it said like... like... your soul will be consumed and your flesh will be sacrificed for the great work. It's all very dark stuff. Might have been some kind of weird cult, Sarge." "Ancient cult, at least. Never heard of this Ouros fella before." "I dunno, Sarge. There's a lot of ancient things in our past. Lots of weird characters and all. So this picture here," she tapped the book, "Seems to be this old thing on how it works. This Ouros fella found five victims, all of whom betrayed the Wicked Stable, and visited another five, which is symbolised by... something in this picture, I don't know what, actually, it isn't too specific. But it does say something about those who have managed to break free of the chain of eternal sin." "Ok, this is a lot of information, here. Let's take it bit by bit, alright?" "Sure, Sarge, I think I need to slow down a bit myself, really." "Alright, so the Wicked Stable, this cult used to use it to target individuals in society, some sort of punishment thing. The cult of Ouros, right?" "Yeah, I guess, Sarge." "Well I've never heard of it before and... hey, hey! Silver!" "Yeh, Boss?" came the reply from across the room. "Ever heard of Ouros?" "Heard'a what?" "Nothing! Shut up!" Canary turned back to Berry. "So it's not very common knowledge, this cult thing." "Guess not, Sarge." "You said that they would take the lives of five, each of whom, I think we can agree, committed a different sin of the Stable, and then... you said, visited some others?" "Yeah, let me get it for you, Sarge," Berry said, taking the huge tome back and flipping through some pages. "Here it is - Ouros appeareth bearing gifts to the worthy; the ones who haffeth... haffth done what broken out... Sarge, I can't really read this." "Just paraphrase, Berry!" "He visits the worthy, the ones who've broken out of the circle of eternal sin. Circle, not chain. I said wrongly earlier." "Same difference, I think, Berry." "The condemned and praised will both be signed... " "I think it means that a sign will be left with them, Berry. Like that horseshoe print thing with the victims." "Or maybe it means they've been marked down on some sort of huge tablet, Sarge, like a hit list." "And where do you get that idea?" "'Cuz it says here, the condemned and praised will both be signed upon the stone, which will seal their fates." "Yeah, that makes more sense." "And some bother about being careful and stuff." "Let me see that picture again, Berry." "Sure Sarge." The pages flipped back. "Now see... there's a ring connecting five circles, right? And each of those circles has a pair on the inside..." "Right, Sarge." "Now, what if the inner bunch of circles was the five victims? You have them all surrounded by the others and then you have that Wicked Stable nonsense in the middle..." "Right, Sarge." "And this outer ring maybe stands for these five 'worthy' ones?" "Seems logical, Sarge." "Who are connected in a circle..." "What are you thinking, Sarge?" "I don't know, but... suddenly all these coincidences lately are starting to make a bit more sense." - - - Her head was spinning. It had been spinning since Monday, but it seemed to increase with rage and force for as long as this whole thing went on, and right now she was sitting in the middle of a calamity of wind and rain that beat down upon the door of her defences and threatened to bring her crashing down upon herself. The voices that came from the room were muffled, like as if she were listening through earmuffs but in this case it was her own legs wrapped securely around her green little head. "Would you please sit down?" asked Blitz. "No! They can't keep us in here! We have our rights! We're innocent and they just proved it so why are they still keeping us in here? We want out!" yelled Flare. "Come on, Flare. Just calm down, alright?" "No!" Each word made Duriandal's head throb, it was hard to concentrate, it was hard to focus. She had always lived in a world where everything was neatly laid out in front of her in columns and rows, where everything was just so, and it just took this kind of chaos to throw everything out the window. She didn't know what went where anymore, and she couldn't sort it out as much as she would have loved to. She needed to, really. She needed to take a break from this. She needed to settle it and get everything over with as quickly as possible. She needed to leave this cell. Behind the two arguing figures, she went almost unnoticed as she crept to the bars and knocked it slightly with a unsteady hoof. The bell rang out, bringing a guard back. "Yes?" he asked, politely, as the other two kept chittering in the background. "I... understand that... um... shower..." she muttered. "Oh yeah, of course. Let me get you out of there," he unlocked the door, sliding it open. "Hey! Hey!" Night Flare bounded to the opening. "You're letting us out?" "Um... no, sorry," replied the guard. "Your friend here wants a shower." "Yeah well so do I!" "You just had one half an hour ago, ma'am." "I have my rights!" "Yeah..." said the guard, shutting and locking the door again, with Duriandal on the outside. "Nope." "Oh come on!" whined Flare, as the guard helped Duriandal to a fresh towel and the way to the shower stalls. "You've got to be kidding me!" "We have to stay here! What is so hard to understand about that?" "I don't wanna stay here! What, you wanna stay here?" "No!" "Then join me! Let's break out of here together, come on!" "For crying out loud, Flare, do you not know how to be responsible?" "Yeah, this coming from the pony who left another pony in a nigh..." She never managed to finish her sentence. Her mouth hung open, shock freezing her entirely. Her head was tilted to the right, although she did not have any recollection of turning it herself, and slowly, a stinging pain came to her left cheek. Blitz lowered her leg, with a gaze that could cut through the clouds she used to make her statues. It was her silent kind of fury that crept through the bushes and struck when you least expected it, albeit when you most deserved it. "Uh... uh....." Flare started whining, her eyes filling up against her every wish, a few chokes making themselves heard as fluid went down the wrong pipe when she began to cry. It did not take long for it to erupt into a full bawl, the noises akin to a terrified cat escaping her throat. "Wuh... why did you... hit me?" coughed Flare, her wings running all over her face, wiping away the moisture as she sniffed. "What is troubling you so much?" said Blitz, in a calm, sedated voice. It was a genuine question, one that came out because the wise, matron side of Blitz was drawn forth. "Wh... what do you mean?!" shot back Flare, blurting out her words over her distressed state. "You... you... can't see how wrong this...this is? "What's wrong?" "I... my life is ruined! Can't... can't you see? I... I... some sick pony dropped some other pony on me! I'm arrested for murder! We're all in trouble! I'm going to die here!" "And?" "And you... you just sit back like you're Princess Celestia and nothing is gonna go wrong! I'm..." "What?" "I'm scared, ok!?" Flare let loose another barrage of tears. "I'm scared! I'm scared... I'm scared..." A shadow appeared above her; this pale figure with dead-set eyes and a steely conviction. "Sit down, Night Flare." Night Flare did as she was told, just doing it because it was the only thing she could do at the time. "Listen. We're all scared. You may not think so, but we're all scared. We're all stuck in this thing that's happened, and let me tell you I don't want to be in here as much as you do. But there is no reason, no reason, for you to act like you are." "I'm n...not..." "Oh, please. The big and mighty Night Flare, right? All cool and distant? You think you're the only pony who can't admit things easily? Give me a break. What are you trying to prove? That you're on top of things? That you're not scared?" Night Flare just sniffed. "Yeah you act 'cool'. You think image gets you recognition, don't you? Not actions? What was it? Brother who always got the attention no matter how nice you were? School mate? Childhood friend?" "Whatever," mumbled Night Flare, her cheeks burning red. "Yeah, that's right. Don't think I don't know that you gave your blanket to Duri last night." "Whatever." "And I also know that you bring the leftover bread from your bakery to the local school. Anonymous donation every Wednesday and Friday, huh?" "Wait, how do you know about that?!" "Flare... everypony knows about that." "Ah... I don't..." "See, what everypony doesn't know is why you always want to hide it. Honestly, I don't care. I don't care if you want to pretend to be an uncaring little filly but you're really annoying the flank out of me, and you're seriously upsetting Duriandal. So just take it down a notch, alright? I don't know what happened when you were younger, but welcome to the real world. You'll find that we're actually a lot less shallow here." Blitz left it at that, and turned, leaving Flare curled up on the ground, walking to the wall and leaning on it, occupied by her own thoughts. "I'm sorry," said Flare. Blitz turned her head slightly. "It's alright." "But really, it gets you nowhere, does it?" "What does?" "Being nice. You see it everywhere. People act nice. They end up last. I just wanna not be last. I wanna be known. Be respected." "That's fine, Flare, but you know? You still do nice things, don't you?" "Yeah, so?" "That's because you're a nice pony." "Dude, c'mon," she began to blush again, glad that Blitz wasn't watching her, and that her coat was so dark. "It's not a sin, Flare. It's a virtue. Maybe once you realise that, you'll be able to behave in a way where everypony and yourself can be happy." "Look, whatever it is... I'm sorry, ok? I was acting like a jerk. I was just... I dunno." "Yeah, don't explain. It's really not worth it. Just play nice." "Yeah... alright. I will. But you owe me." "For what?" "For the smack in the face, man!" She rubbed her cheek jovially. "That really hurt, you know?" Blitz smiled. "Alright, I owe you. Anyway, let's see this through together, and then we can all forget about it and get back to life, alright?" "Deal." It was at that point when again, a guard appeared at the gates, clinking his keys and offering release. "Ladies, Sergeant Canary would like to speak to you in the main floor. If you would both follow me please?" Flare gave a worried glance to Blitz. "It'll be alright, Flare. It'll be alright." - - - "Nice of you to join us," said Canary, as Blitz and Flare walked up. "We seem to be missing one..." "She went for a shower, I believe," said Blitz. "Alright. We'll fill her in later. In any case, I just want to start by saying that this is... very irregular." "What about, officer?" "We never... never include civilians in an investigation. Ever. I just got out of a meeting with my chief and we're going to make this exception just once." Blitz and Flare didn't respond. They just stood and stared, not sure what to make of this information. "Alright then. Uh... the reason for this is... well. Berry?" Her assistant offered up the book with the drawing on it, hovering it in full view of the other two. "We believe that... there is a pony, or a group of ponies out there, working under the guise of an old cult called the Circle of Ouros. What they do is... pick out five victims with shared backgrounds, and five... I don't know, 'chosen ones', all of whom are also linked in some way or another. We're not sure what the link is between victims yet, but we've managed to think our way through and figure out who the chosen ones are." "Let me guess, officer," said Blitz. "Yes, it's us. Miss Duriandal, Yourself, Miss Night Flare, Constable Berry and myself." "How did you come to this conclusion, officer?" "Because of the coincidences, Miss Blitz. There's just too many, and it just seems like they're obviously targeting the three of you. As for myself and my partner... we're the only other ones involved and that makes five. We figure that whoever's responsible for this has been planning very carefully, tracking us for weeks; maybe months. They've been watching our movements so carefully that they were able to engineer these so-called coincidences to this degree." "But, officer. Duriandal was the one who invited me down here in the first place. I don't think that they'd have been able to predict that." "That's true, but, we think that's why they left your cloud puffer thing at the second body. Eventually, we would have tracked you down anyway." "Alright, so why... are we being included in this?" "There's two reasons, Miss Blitz. First of all, and I'll just be honest here, we want to keep you close. Keep an eye on you. There won't be any better proof of your innocence than aiding us. The second reason is that all of you, and us included, has probably seen this guy before, or these bunch of people. They love leaving signs and they love leaving clues. This is something where a really good memory would come in use, and we... where is she, anyway?" "I'll go get her, Sarge," said Berry, trotting off toward the shower stalls. - - - The drops of cool water felt good against her face and skin, as they trickled down and fell to the floor. She closed her eyes, finally free of the worry that plagued her all these past few days, finally able to gently nudge things into order. It was good to be alone, even if she was just standing here at the edge of the docks. She'd always liked this place. The mists that ran from the nearby waterfall beaded into a cooling spray that always gave her a sense of serenity. She came here often to think, and there wasn't any better time than now to reflect on all that had occurred. - - - "What do you mean she's gone?!" yelled Canary. "How could she have possibly escaped? Did she just walk out?" - - - Leaving the police station was easy. There were only eight police officers on the floor. A glance would have been enough; but she had been watching them for a good few hours now. She recognized all the patterns. When that one there in the corner always left for coffee every half an hour on the dot. How that other one was too busy with his filing to care about what was going on. The rest was all position and, with the right stops at certain places, one could simply stroll out as easy as day, as long as one was willing to backtrack a bit and weave around the desks and keep pretty low to the ground. She had flagged a taxi down as soon as she left the station and brought herself to the docks, the same one which had that one in-operable station. - - - "What do you mean her things are gone?" screamed Canary. "How did this happen!?" - - - Of course, Duriandal had had the withal of mind to get her little purse back from the holding cage. She'd already seen them enter the code to the lock on the door once, earlier when they put the things in. The tricky part was turning the knobs with hooves. She even tidied up a bit while she was in there, and filed everything away. And now she stood, here, at the edge of the cliff, looking down upon the forests below. She was determined, a slight fury building up, to find out who was doing this herself. She had enough of waiting in the by-lines, and it was time, she reckoned, to start moving things along at a pace that she was comfortable with. A scroll, magically, appeared in front of her face. It came from nowhere, blinking into existence and catching her slightly off guard. It landed on the ground in front of her, and it was the kind of thing that you don't really want to touch at first because you don't know where it's been, and you don't know if it's really meant for you or not. But curiosity got the better, and she unrolled it across the floor, eyes scanning each word carefully. It was... fate. It had to be. There was no mistaking this sort of thing, and it was clear, extremely clear, where she had to be next. - - - "You know what, if she's the murderer, she's really good, Sarge," said Berry. "I know! I can't believe... how did she even manage this?! We were standing right here! Did she have inside help?" "Officer... I think I know why she left," offered Night Flare, in the meekest voice she ever gave thus far. "It... it was my fault." "What did you do?" "I think she didn't like my arguing..." "There's no time for this. Either way, we need to find her. She's either suspect number one, or in a lot of danger. Listen, you know her best, right? Where would she go?" "Uh... I... I don't know, Sergeant," said Blitz, truthfully. "She wouldn't go back to her store, I don't think, she wouldn't feel safe there. And I don't know any other place she'd really hang out. She wasn't the kind of travel out of her zone of comfort." "No idea where she'd go?" "I'm sorry, Sergeant." - - - The chariot was comfortable, and in fact, quite a lot nicer than she thought it would be. She had never taken one before, but there was always a first time for everything. The past few days had been infused with so many 'firsts' that this really wasn't much for her any longer. She was even a little proud. It was a first step for a adventure, and one in which she would close these plaguing horrors on the by-line. "Where to, miss?" said the Pegasus driver. She looked down at the scroll again to make sure. "Ponyville, please," she said. "Take me to Ponyville."