Equestria Noir Case 4: Skies of Cloudsdale

by Jacoboby1

Chapter 1:Letters

Sunlight met my eyes as I slowly opened them. I sat up and shook my head to get the grogginess out of my eyes. I must’ve fallen asleep on the office floor in the middle of the night. I stretched my legs and got up. I picked up my fedora and slapped it on my head.

I tried to forget all about last night. What I said…what I did…the feelings of hurt and pain afterwards…but nothing worked. I kept thinking of the mare I cast out and the words I said to her. The irony of it all? I found out I was in love with that very same mare right after I tossed her out.

I shook my head. Come on Private, you can get over her. I just needed a drink…or just anything to get her off my mind. Damn, it was Larksong all over again. I started walking back toward my desk. I needed something to distract me from all this. I could never get over her if I don’t do something.

“Maybe somepony will have a case for me, I can solve it right?” I said looking at myself in the glass of my window.
“Twilight didn’t affect me that much. Did she? I’m still a detective! I have years of skills and training! This is a just a bump in the road…right?”

Truth was I was just kidding myself. I sighed and set about organizing my haphazard desk. Normally I would ask Spike to do it but the baby dragon was nowhere in sight. If I knew Twilight she probably told the dragon not to come in, and rightly so. I levitated some papers off my desk when I heard a crash coming from outside the building. Not a good start to my day.

I stepped outside the office building to find a strange sight. She was a Pegasus my age with a grey coat and a blond mane. She was trying to haphazardly fix the sign hanging above my door. It was swinging rather dangerously and the poor thing was trying the best she can to fix it.

“Are you alright?” I said looking up at the Pegasus

“Yeah, I’m fine…sorry about the sign, my bad…” she said in a rather cute voice. It was almost childlike; right now it was ridden with guilt over what happened. “I was trying to watch where I was going and then this bird came around and…well you can guess the rest”

I smiled at her and my horn glowed a pale grey. I wrapped my magic around the sign and put it back in place. “There, no harm done. It was bad sign anyway”

The Pegasus landed in front of me and smiled. When she opened her eyelids I couldn’t help but stare. Her yellow eyes were completely lopsided; one was looking at me and the other off in some other direction. Dear Celestia…can she like see other dimensions or something?

She frowned “Mister it’s not nice to stare…”

“Oh sorry” I said apologetically “Um…I’m Private, I own the building you just crashed into”

She smiled “I’m Ditzy Doo, sorry about the sign...”

“No biggie, I’ve been meaning to fix up that ugly sign anyway”

She nodded “It just came out of nowhere as I was flying over” She frowned at my sign “Bad sign! It’s not nice to get in the way like that!”

I chuckled a little at the Pegasus scolding the sign “Yes I shall reprimand my sign profusely” I noticed the mare had a saddlebag on with a mail symbol on it. “You’re the mailpony?”

“Yep!” She made a salute “Ditzy Doo Delivery! We deliver anything you could possibly need in the general direction you want it to go!”

Not a very encouraging slogan but I wasn’t about to rain on her parade. I nodded at the strange pegasi “So what brings a young lady like you around here?”

She reached into her saddle bags and pulled out a letter with her mouth and I levitated the letter in front of me. “Delivery for Private Eye!” Ditzy said happily.

I raised an eyebrow “Funny…I never get mail that isn’t bills”

“Not a very funny joke mister…”

“No Ditzy it’s a figure of speech”

“Oh! Carrot Top uses those all the time, they always confuse me”

I wasn’t about to ask. “Thank you Ditzy for the timely delivery…but I have to ask why you delivered mail to me so early in the morning”

Ditzy looked at me…or did she look at the sky? I can’t tell. “Ugeeines said this was a very important letter to be delivered immediately”

“Okay, thanks again” I said as the young pegasi flew away. She almost hit my sign again but made a scene of avoiding it. I don’t know why but there was just something charming about the clumsy Pegasus. I bet she makes a lot of ponies happy without even trying.

I stepped inside and opened the letter while sitting on my desk. I noticed a royal seal on the letter. Also it was written in Princess Celestia’s hoof writing. I’ve suffered way too many burns from spike not to know what a letter from her highness looked like. I wish she would deliver by Ditzy more often. It was certainly safer than me getting scorched every time Spike got a letter.

Dear Private Eye

I’ve heard from Twilight about what happened with the last case. I cannot say I condone with the actions you took but I’m willing to offer a distraction. Judging by Twilight’s description of the event it was hard on both ends. So as consolation I’m willing to offer you two tickets to the Cloudsdale Derby. The Wonderbolt Spitfire is going to be racing so it will be exciting. I want you to go and have some fun. I can understand personally how bad losing somepony can be. I know that the best medicine is distraction and a little bit of cutting loose. The extra ticket is for you to give to anypony you choose. I suggest you give it to somepony who wants to go desperately. I know you have a kind heart Private, try and have some fun.

Sincerely

Princess Celestia

Okay, this has got to be the strangest request I’ve ever gotten. Why in the world would the monarch of the entire known world want me to go to a race? Was this her idea of a distraction?

I looked inside the envelope and found two sky blue tickets inside. Why would she give me the extra ticket? I had no friends in town aside from Rarity and Pinkie Pie. I wanted to avoid an encounter with them as much as possible. If Celestia had heard of what happened from Twilight then her two friends probably have also. I couldn’t bear the thought of a sad Pinkie Pie again. That and I don’t think a race would be Rarity’s kind of idea of a great outing. That and Spike would probably kill me in my sleep for asking out his crush.

I could try and track down Ditzy, but the tickets are dated for this afternoon and the mailpony probably had other plans. I levitated the tickets into my trench coat. I needed some air to think about this.

Outside I found that the sky was clear and the air crisp from last night’s rain fall. I saw some ponies looking at me with mixed expressions. Some were looking at me with daggers and others with sympathetic looks. Neither helped in my attempts to forget about what happened last night. Neither was this rain. Wait, rain?

I looked up with a bemused expression. Of all the clouds in the sky the one rain cloud left over from last night just happened to be in my path. I swore under my breath as I heard a voice shout.

“Aww dang it Thunderlane! He can’t ever clean up after the rain clouds he leaves behind!”

I looked up and saw a rainbow colored blur fly past me and cut into the rain cloud. It dispersed into tiny clouds and the blur kept cutting the cloud into smaller pieces. Ultimately the cloud was gone and I was left with another strange looking Pegasus in front of me.

“Sorry about that, Thunderlane just left that cloud over from last night”

“Uh, thanks” I said as I wrung out my hat to get the rain water out.

The Pegasus in front of me was one of the strangest I’ve ever seen. She was the color of the clear sky above me with magenta colored eyes. Her mane was also very unusual, whereas most ponies have a solid or dual colored mane she had a bright rainbow colored mane. Was that her natural hair color or did she dye it that way? She was also very well tuned and muscular, obviously some kind of athlete.

She flattened her ears in apology “No really I’m sorry. I’ve never seen you around town before”

A pony that hasn’t seen me before? What did she sleep on a cloud all day? I smiled a little “Detective Private Eye”

Her magenta eyes lit up “Oh my gosh! You’re that detective that Twilight told me about!”

This caused a frown to develop on my face. Damn it just when I thought I was done thinking about her. “Yeah that’s me”

“Can I just say how awesome it must be to be a detective?! Solving crimes, putting bad guys in jail, doing all sorts of awesome things along the way!” She said with bright magenta eyes.

I guessed her favorite word was “awesome”. I nodded “It’s not all glamour and fun, its hard work”

“I know that but it’s still cool” She put her hoofs on her cheeks and let out a small squeal “So, awesome!”

“I don’t think I’ve caught your name in your praise for the local law enforcement” I said

She blushed a little “Oh right, I’m Rainbow Dash” She flew up several feet in the air and puffed out her chest. “Greatest flyer in all of Equestria!”

I remembered Pinkie Pie mentioning a “Rainbow Dash” when I first came into town. Could this be her? I let out a bemused snort “Greatest flyer? On what grounds?”

She frowned at me “On the grounds of being able to perform a Sonic Rainboom on command!”

My eyes widened “A Sonic Rainboom? You’re the one that performed that?”

“Cha!” She grinned widely “And that my dear detective is why I’m the greatest flyer in all of Equestria”

I tapped my hoof to my chin in thought. “A great flyer like you must be on some kind of flying team am I correct?”

The roygbiv maned Pegasus flushed a little “Well no, not yet but someday! I hope to be on the greatest flying team in Equestria! The Wonderbolts!”

I smiled a little “That’s a pretty high mountain you wish to climb, they don’t take in just anypony”

“Yeah well they just have never got a good look at me is all” She sounded like she was trying to convince herself more then she was trying to convince me.

I then remembered the tickets in my trench coat. Is this what Princess Celestia meant? Give the extra one to one who wants to go desperately? I wondered if she was interested.

“Are you aware of the Cloudsdale Derby?” I said curiously.

“Yeah, I’m from Cloudsdale ya’ know”

“Well, I heard that Spitfire was racing in it…”

“OH-MY-GOSH!!!! Really! Spitfire of the Wonderbolts?! I haven’t seen her race in a long time!” She then started flying around the air squealing in glee constantly repeating “ohmygosh” over and over again. Just then her wings drooped and she came down to earth. “Dang it who am I kidding? I haven’t gotten paid yet and it’s this afternoon. How can I get the bits for it in one day?”

Celestia’s powers of foresight are amazing to behold. It was like she knew Dash would want to go. Question is why? Oh well that was for another time. I reached into my trench coat and pulled out the extra ticket. Dash let out a gasp of sheer delight.

“I have an extra ticket that I wasn’t going to use" I smiled a little "If you want it it’s yours”

Suddenly I was tackled by the cyan colored Pegasus and was being hugged tightly. “Oh thank you! Thank you! Thank you! I can’t ever repay you for this!”

“Dash…rib cage…is being…crushed…” I said fighting for air from the mare’s hug.

She let go of me and blushed a little “Sorry, I just got a little excited there” A little? My ribs will say otherwise Miss Dash. “But really thank you so much for this, you have no idea what this means to me”

I smiled and hoofed off the ticket to her “Just think of it as a first gift between friends”

She held the ticket like I’ve just handed her one of the elements of harmony. She smiled at me then started to fly off. She smiled back at me then let out a squeal of delight.

In the end I didn’t really know why I gave her the ticket. I guess after yesterday it was nice to make somepony’s day. I shook my head; this town has really made me go soft. Then again Rainbow did remind me of myself back when I was learning to be a cop. I to would’ve squealed like that if somepony gave me a chance to see my hero in action. I watched the young Pegasus flying around in the sky like she was queen of the world.

I smiled, there just was such a small joy in giving a fan a chance like this.