“Stho, what exacthly isth de prhoblem here?” Stamped Passport growled around the ice pack he was holding to his nose.
Tempered Steel shifted on her hooves nervously. The palace travel director had delusions of power on the best of days, and she really didn’t want to sit through a grandiose lecture about ‘being the best of the best’ while the pony delivering it was literally ‘bloody mad’. “There is an… issue with the Princess’ room.” She held up a hoof to forestall Stamped’s ire. “We just discovered this. You are being ‘informed immediately’ as per your request.”
Behind him, Agent Johnson rolled his eyes. The day he rolled over like that for the agency travel coordinator was the day he turned in his badge and went to work as a school crossing guard.
“Whath the isthue?” Stamped demanded. “Isth tshe uncomforthable? Isth tshe unwell? Out with it!”
Tempered decided to just get it over with. “She’s missing.” She said, aware that all eyes in the room were now on her. “The night shift guards went into her room ten minutes ago to check on her and she wasn’t there. They found the bathroom window open - we think she flew out. There wasn’t any sign of coercion.”
“FLEW OUT?! FLEW OUT?!” Stamped raged from behind his ice pack. “DHOSE WHINDOWSH WEHRE SHUPPOSED TO BE BULLETPROOF! HOW COULTH TSHE EVEN GET OUT?!”
“It appears that we missed one. She opened it normally.” Tempered was glad her fur was so brilliantly red - it meant that nopony could tell when she was red-faced in embarrassment. This was a simple oversight and she was supposed to be better than this.
“WHAT? YUO MISSTHED ONE? YUO MISSTHED ONE?!” Stamped had a very annoying habit of repeating himself when he was upset. Considering how often he was upset, this got very annoying very quickly. “I’LL TSHOW YUO WHAT IT’SH LIKE TO MISTH ONE!”
“No,” Said Agent Johnson, who had abruptly discovered the end of his patience. “You won’t. Just sit the fuck down, shut the fuck up, and let the professionals do their jobs.”
Considering that Johnson had already bodily attacked him twice in the past two hours, Stamped just sat the fuck down, shut the fuck up, and let the professionals do their job. Johnson quickly herded the travel coordinator into a side room before addressing Tempered directly while dialing the in-room phone.
“Do we have any leads?”
“How did you do that?” Tempered said instinctively, her shock at seeing the pugnacious travel coordinator so effectively silenced overriding her training for a moment. She winced internally, realizing that this was a serious situation and answered Johnson's question. “Uh, We’re working on it. She requested to be left alone around 8:30 - that’s the last time anypony saw her.”
“Good to know.” He addressed the phone. “This is Johnson. Swan has flown the Nest. This is not a drill. Last reported around 8:30 - no coercion believed.” He listened for a moment. “The bathroom wasn’t secured. She literally flew out of the window. I see. Call me the instant you have any leads. We’re setting up operations in room 20-405.” He hung up, turning back to Tempered. “I broke his nose.”
“What?”
“Stamped. I busted his nose. Twice.”
“Really?”
“Yes. Where are your people?”
Tempered blinked. Now was the time for action, not mindless questioning. “Examining the room. Nothing seems to be out of place except the window.”
“Good. Do we know where she might have gone?”
“I couldn’t speculate. Her Majesty doesn’t really do things like this.”
“Well, every law enforcement officer in Philadelphia is on the case now.”
“You have my thanks, even if I wish it wasn’t necessary.”
“Just doing my job.”
The two made for the hallway. They had a rescue to plan.
“Can I geht up now?” Stamped asked from the next room.
Johnson had been expecting a lot of things to have happened to Equestria’s leader while she was in the United States. Kidnapping, by foreign agents or by domestic nutjobs who wanted a ransom; maybe a murder attempt by some crazed cult lunatic; or perhaps a ritual sacrifice by some lone whackjob who wanted to bring about the end of days. The FBI had even provided a list of local organized crime figures to watch out for, in case one of the Five Families had decided to make a play for the interdimensional crime market.
What he really hadn’t expected was a phone call from Amtrak, saying that Princess Celestia had been seen wandering around 30th Street Station, alone and apparently unharmed, asking about catching a train to New York.
While he waited for someone from the railway to call him back with a list of trains that had departed within the right time frame to have the wayward Princess aboard, he checked in with the Equestrian brain trust.
“We have no idea why she would be going to New York City.” Tempered Steel reported back to him from the doorway to the Equestrian delegations’ hastily established command suite - which had previously been Per Diem’s hotel room. “She barely left when she was there. I doubt there’s anything she could want to do there.”
“Maybe she wants to negotiate more deals with the United Nations!” Per Diem suggested from inside the room.
“Thaths sthupid, Per. Why whould sthe whant to gho back? Sthe did evehrythring alhready.”
“I don’t know Stampy! Why does her majesty wish to travel at all? All of her needs are provided for at the castle. She doesn’t need to go anywhere.”
“Will you two keep it down!” Tempered barked into the room. She hated diplomats only slightly less than unknown situations and now she was forced to deal with both.
Johnson blinked slowly. He suddenly had a very good idea of why Princess Celestia may have flown the coop, even if he still didn't know where she had flown to.
“Get your team together. We’re going to the station to interview staff in 5 minutes. Muster point is the basement garage.” He said to Tempered, who was pointedly ignoring the growing argument from inside the room.
“Tsho my job doeshn’t matter?!”
“You couldn’t even get a Goddess-be-damned Cake!”
“I’ll accompany you.” Tempered slammed the door to the suite behind him with her magic, cutting off the sounds of stupid before she could get drawn in. “Dagger! Halberd! With me!” She called down the hallway.
Two large guard stallions, one a light pink Unicorn and the other a green Pegasus, fell into step behind their leader as Tempered followed Johnson to the elevator.
25 minutes later
“I do not get paid enough for this.” Johnson groused as he looked over the dispatch logs from Amtrak, Conrail, New Jersey Transit, and SEPTA.
Beside him, Tempered had to agree - dealing with trains was always a pain back in Equestria, but at least there was only one line into and out of Canterlot. Spread out in front of them were timetables and records from four different railways, two omnibus companies, and the city transit agency.
“Do we have any way of narrowing these down?” The guardsmare asked as she stared at the mass of paper.
“This is every train that’s left since 8:30.” Johnson said, pointing to a long sheet of printer paper that was covered in highlighter and pen markings. “Philly PD always has a transit cop on the bus platforms and the taxi stand, and nobody saw her all night, so we’re focusing on the railway. Everything in yellow is a passenger train, the green is freight, and the orange is maintenance trains.”
There was so much yellow ink on the paper that it was actually damp. Tempered’s heart sank. She didn’t have enough ponies to stop and search every train. “What’s that one? She said, pointing to a listing near the bottom that was marked with a hand-drawn star.
“Light engine move.” Johnson squinted to read the paper more closely. “One engine, no cars - oh.” Realization hit him like a train running over a cake. “I know what that one is. Unless the Princess is in the habit of stealing trains, this one isn’t important.”
“Well.” Tempered sighed. “She isn’t, so that’s one down. Two hundred more to go... ”
“More than one, Boss!” Halberd announced as he charged into the room, a notebook held victoriously in a wing. “Station staff says that the Princess came in from the commuter platforms at around a quarter past ten.”
That was over half of the trains eliminated in one move. “Great work Corporal.” She praised. “Did you say that she came in from the commuter platforms?”
Halberd flipped through his notes. “Yes. They said she came in from the upper level - which is the commuter platforms - asked about trains to New York City, and was directed to the Amtrak lower level platforms. She went down there and didn’t come back. Dag’s looking down there now. We assume that she flew in from outside the station - the ends of the upper level platforms are natural landing sites.”
Tempered and Johnson’s gazes met as they both realized that their previously-impossible task was now much more manageable. There were only a handful of Amtrak trains that left after 10:15. “So, which train did she get on?”
Turning back to the timetable and the dispatch logs, there were only four Amtrak trains that left within that time frame - a southbound express, a southbound local, one northbound semi-fast, and the northbound light engine move. “I have no idea.” Johnson said after a long minute. “We don’t know if she managed to get on a train at all. Or which one.”
Halberd cocked his head in confusion. “Wouldn’t she get on the northbound train? There’s only one. She’s The Princess - I’m sure she’s capable of telling trains apart.”
Johnson merely got up and opened the door to their planning room. It was located just off of the main concourse, and the sounds of late night passengers running for their trains could be heard echoing throughout the large, airy space.
Then, over the noise of passengers, a station announcement cut through the air. “Attention passengers. Attention passengers. SEPTA train *kssssh* will now be arriving on platfo*ksssssssssh*. I say again - *ksssssssh* train thirty-*ksssssssh* now be arriving on platfor*ksssssh*”
Over Johnson’s shoulder, the ponies watched as the massive rotating flap display clattered into life to reflect the change -
1:20| 31 | SEPTA LOCAL | from TRENTON to PHILADELPHIA | status: ON TIME | using stairway A
changed to:
14:79| P4Q | S1L7ER METPOR -T | from MONTREAL to CAPE COD | status: CONNECTION | using stairway 22
As if realizing its error, the board flipped through a variety of new and equally improbable trains and destinations before settling on:
1:23| 3X1/ | SEP4A L0CVL | from PHILADELPHIA to PHILADELPHIA | status: SPECIAL TRAIN | using stairway _
“Albert Einstein could get on the wrong train here.” Johnson said finally, as the board settled into silence.
The ponies didn’t know who ‘Albert Einstein’ was, but understood the sentiment.