"You know, even after all these years running the Herdbook Registry, making sure every new foal is properly recorded in Equestria's files... it never fails to amaze me just how careless some parents are about naming."
"Got a good one, Rete?"
"In the sense that everypony should know that names are destiny and being this careless with your child's life ought to be a crime? Yes. Listen to this one. 'Flurry Heart'. Exactly what were they going for there? The poor filly is probably going to be stuck at the Weather Bureau examining snowflakes for flaws. If her parents had any sense, they would have named her something which guaranteed her a good career. Like yours and mine did. You've been happy with your life and mark ever since you learned what a Carbon Copy was. And me? My parents had the common decency to name me Anal Retentive and clearly I'm perfectly fine! 'Flurry Heart...' some ponies -- hel-lo... don't see this one often..."
"Powderblue form? I've never seen that one at all. What is it?"
"You've only been here for five years, Carbon, even if you've worked enough hours to be good enough for nine. And have I ever told you that I admire the way you sleep in that back room, almost never leaving the office, making sure you live and breathe the job at all times?"
"I learned it from you, Rete. And... I like it better in here. With you. It's more -- comfortable."
"And that's why we're friends. Anyway, that's not long enough to have one come across. I've been here for twenty, and I've only had three. This is a birth application for dual citizenship. You usually get it when the foal was born outside Equestria and the parents want them to have a connection to both countries. Which means we need their paperwork. Let me check the sire and dam's names -- okay, go into the files and pull me Shining Armor and Mi Amore Cadenza. That last one may be under immigrant transfers. Sounds foreign. I'll just put this form aside until you get back and work on somepony else. No sense in wasting time!"
"So they're both Equestrian?"
"The father definitely is, Rete. I had some copies of his other paperwork sent over."
"'Other.' That's hardly official. Not like ours."
"I wanted to see where he'd wound up, with a name like Shining Armor. He's military."
"...good, good. Not a bad career. Nothing near as good as ours, but he has a purpose. Paperwork needs guarding. And the dam?"
"Her paperwork is... strange."
"How so?"
"For starters? There's a birthdate error."
"An. Error."
"Rete! Take your pill! You know what's going to happen if you don't --"
"An. Error. What kind of error?"
"Birthdate. Somepony recorded the year as -- well, it's just well too far before what it should have been. If this was right, she'd be too old to do a few things. Like have a foal. Or a heartbeat. And whoever passed this paperwork through filed it in the appropriate temporal section. Which was well before the range where I started looking. That's why it took so long to come back. The pill, Rete: swallow --"
"Not your fault, not your fault... I just wish I could get my hooves on whoever did it. Before my time, clearly. So what else is strange about her paperwork?"
"I'm still going through it. But so far, the birthplace isn't showing up as any part of Equestria. I'm starting to wonder if somepony was trying to fake the credentials for a citizenship."
"...and they're using the foal as an anchor to weigh down the mother's forms. You see, Carbon? This is why we're necessary. We don't just start the trail of paperwork, the surest proof of a pony's life. We catch crimes. I'll pull out the report form for the police, but we shouldn't fill it out until we're done. We need more evidence. Also somepony to leave the office and go down to the station. We'll try to flag down a passing pegasus from the window."
"We're -- going to open the window. We've never opened --"
"-- desperate times, Carbon: desperate times. I'm sure all twenty of those cabinets can be moved away from it. Temporarily. You keep looking over the forms for 'Mi Amore Cadenza', if that's even her real name. Sounds like something a teenager calls themselves. Or it came from parents who didn't care. I'll go back to 'Flurry Heart'. Dual citizenship as part of their game? So that's for Equestria and... what?"
"Rete? You just went pale under your fur. Is the pill doing that? You've never gone --"
"What the buck is 'The Crystal Empire?'?"
"...I don't know. I've never heard of it. Let me get our world map. Here we are: folded and holding up the corner of my desk, right where it belongs. So as of seven years ago... nothing, Rete. Didn't exist."
"A whole Empire doesn't come out of nowhere! Not in just seven years! Empires are huge! They take over major swaths of the planet! We would have had Notice! And somepony would have sent in a new map!"
"Maybe they did."
"Really?"
"Well, I've been sleeping under something. It's colorful enough. But it's kind of blurry now -- no, you're right: somepony would have told us. We would been informed of something that important. If nopony sends in an update, it's not relevant."
"Right. Like when Sun didn't come up for hours. That wasn't important, because nopony sent us a memo about it. Clearly just the Princess finally taking a few hours for sleeping in. Still don't know what all that stupid screaming outside was about..."
"It was a horrible temptation, I remember. Feeling like I should be doing the same."
"We can't. Our job is far more important. And remember when that messenger was dropping off a packet and turned into something with insect eyes and holes in his legs? Not important, because the paperwork in the packet was properly filled out. Now when that giant thing with the four legs and two arms stomped by outside, that was important. Vibrated a few things out of place. Had to spend hours picking it all up. Giant things should be more careful about where they step."
"It's offensive, Rete."
"Isn't it just? All right, I've got part of the shape of it now. They're trying to fake a whole country. Like those ponies who say they're 'sovereign citizens'."
"How does that work?"
"They declare they've seceded from Equestria, so the one and only Princess in the world has no authority over them. They're their own government, which means they don't have to pay any taxes. Had one living next door to me, before I moved into the office. Lived in the Duchy Of MeMeMe. Kept saying nothing Equestria did or wrote down had any real power. How was I supposed to put up with that? And do you know who he sent for when I finally got sick of him? The police. Real quick to turn towards something official just because I got in his face, wasn't he? They gave me the pills after that... Anyway, some of them try to set up their own currency, stamps -- the works. And this one is an Empire. Dual citizenship for a nation which doesn't exist. So they can say the laws don't apply to their foal, but still call for that protection if they need it. Those... those..."
"Rete?"
"Hang on. Can't swallow -- there. Huh. Usually don't take two pills. So a military father meets somepony foreign, goes over to her side or just gets tricked... maybe she's using him. Have the police look into that, too. So moving down the form -- OH, FOR SUN'S SAKE! THIS IS GOING TOO FAR!"
"Rete -- Rete, give it time, you know they don't work instantly --"
"-- there aren't enough pills in all the world! Look at this, Carbon! Just look at it!"
"...oh no..."
"See? Right there! The 'species' boxes! See all the erasure marks? Filled in and wiped out all three! Here, let me do a quick rubbing... what did they try writing down there for an extra line before they took it out -- oh, there we go: 'crystal'. So now their fake Empire has its own pony species? And since that wouldn't have flown, they went for something they felt we'd just accept! ALICORN! They want us to just think there's an alicorn that's been foaled? This... this... what are they even trying to do...?"
"...conquest..."
"...Carbon?"
"What if... they're not trying to just fake a nation? What if they're trying to fake a Princess? Somepony to take over when she comes of age? And that's why they called it an Empire. They're laying the groundwork for the future... Rete, this is too big, it's too big for us, we need the police now..."
"...no."
"What?"
"This is our department. Normal records fraud, we'd send for them. This is something bigger, just like you said. But they tried to get it past us. It's too much for the police, or the Guards. They don't understand paperwork like we do, they don't live it. We can write something up for the palace and have it sent in the event of our deaths --"
"-- our what?"
"-- but this... this is an offense against our marks. There is no such thing as an alicorn foal. No Empire. None of this is real. It doesn't deserve to be paperwork. You said the birth year was wrong on 'Cadenza'? Go back to her forms and look for more. She's a fraud. What else is she trying to get away with?"
"...Rete?"
"What is it?"
"I just found it. There's a crossout on the 'Cadenza' form. Somepony altered a section."
"Which section?"
"...species."
"..."
"Maybe -- maybe you should take the third pill before you look. Your tail is --"
"-- yes, there it is... Sun and Moon, how long has she been setting this up... This packet -- it just came in, didn't it? Just now. And let me see -- yes, the birthdate listed on 'Flurry Heart' was a couple of moons ago. Let me find the return address -- ah, here we go. The best hotel in the capital. All right. So they're traveling. Scouting out the enemy, and decided to get the paperwork sent while they were in town. And this gives us their hotel room. So now we have a plan."
"...which is?"
"The original birth race on 'Cadenza' was pegasus. Easy to fake a horn, isn't it? Wings would be harder: nothing would move right. But you could build a pretty realistic-looking horn. Maybe give it a little spell so it glows and sparks once in a while, like a foal's would. So that's what they must have done. Put a fake horn on a newborn pegasus foal. And they're in the capital not just to scout, but so they can announce the birth of a new alicorn. Playing the long game. So we're going to catch them at it, right now. Wait until the parents have to leave for something, making sure we never see them because that's the best way for them to never see us. Then it's just the foal and the hotel's sitter. Present our credentials, because somepony from the Herdbook Registry can legally get access to a foal on a matter of paperwork. We bring a camera, we pretend we're just admiring her, and then we go for the horn. You get a picture of me taking the fake off. Might upset the foal a little, but -- hah! -- it's not as if she's got unicorn magic, right? And if her natural magic acts up, you can deal with a little pegasus Surge."
"I always knew my wings were good for more than reaching the top files. But... Rete... this means... going outside... for hours..."
"It'll be all right, Carbon. We're doing it for Equestria. For our nation, and our one and only Princess. Besides, it's been a while since we've been more than a block from the office. It's been... it's been... you got here in... well, nothing should have changed too much. Maybe we can even pick up a newspaper on the way back. I know you don't read them at all, but I haven't seen one of those in years. Might be worth seeing how our stories are written down, right?"
"So -- we're going outside. Both of us. To a hotel. In order to uncover a fake alicorn foal. By pulling the horn off in front of a camera, so there's photographic proof of the fraud."
"With our teeth: better leverage that way. Because it's what our marks ask of us. Our names. Today, they want us to be heroes. Besides, as long as the parents are gone and the sitter is distracted, she's just a foal. What's the worst that could happen?"