//------------------------------// // Chapter 1 "Preparations" // Story: Equestria Noir Case 13 "Blue Moon" // by Jacoboby1 //------------------------------// Equestria Noir Case 13 “Blue Moon” Written By Jacoboby1 Edited by: ShatteredIllusions Dedicated to: Aegis Shield Chapter 1 “Preparations” Spike paced the library floor impatiently. He looked to the door to the room where I was changing. Twilight and I were going to show off our Nightmare Night costumes. The celebration was only a week away and I always looked forward to it every year. “I'll just be a minute, Spike!” I called, from inside the spare room. I looked at myself in the mirror. Red shirt? Check. Tan overalls? Check, Blackbird? Check. Holstered in gun belt? Check. Brown coat? Check. Yep, Malburn Raystar from Firebird is ready to roll. I opened the door and held Blackbird in a very stylistic pose. Tailspin who was sitting nearby reading a book looked up and frowned. “What exactly are you supposed to be?” I looked at my brother and opened my forelegs to show myself. “Space Cowpony.” Tailspin sighed. “First of all there are no cows in space, and second of all haven't you worn that thing every Nightmare Night since Firebird got cancelled?” Spike looked at my brother with a raised eyebrow and asked, “Wasn’t that like, 8 years ago?” Tailspin rolled his eyes. “Some ponies just don’t know when to move on.” “I like it,” I grumbled. Tailspin rolled over to me and put a hoof on my shoulder. “Why don’t you go and pick a different costume this year, I’m sure you’ll still be fine at the celebration.” I sighed, relenting, and holstered Blackbird. “Where’s Twilight? Is she still getting changed?” Spike nodded. “She should be out soon.” All three of us looked up as Twilight descended the steps from her room wearing her costume. She was clad in an ornate robe with stars adorning the blue fabric. She wore a large wizard’s cap on her head, with bells along the rim. She also wore a fake white beard around her neck. “Great costume, Twilight,” I said, with a smile. She smiled back at me. “You really like it?” I nodded. “Yeah, you look just like Hordalf from Lord of the Horn Rings.” Her jaw dropped and she shook her head. “Private, I’m Starswirl the Bearded!” I blinked, the name not registering in my brain. “Father of the amniomorphic spell?” She asked, trying again. Private’s brain has failed to search, please try and rephrase that sentence so his brain can compute it. “Didn’t you read that book I gave you about obscure unicorn history?” She asked, narrowing her eyes accusingly. “Um, Tailspin, didn’t you say you wanted to look at costumes?” I looked pleadingly at my brother, starting to sweat. “Nope,” he replied, still looking at his book. “I'm not bailing you out of this one.” “Traitor,” I mumbled, under my breath. I looked up at Twilight apologetically. “Well, there’s a reason why it’s called ‘Obscure’ unicorn history.” She sighed and levitated off her costume. “Aw, well, I guess I can’t expect you to pay attention to every book I make you read.” “History was never really my best subject,” I said sheepishly, shrugging. “At least not ancient history.” Twilight just sighed, and went back to the checklist she had on her desk. “That’s costumes all done, now we just go to make sure all the decorations are set up in the town square.” “Decorations?” Spike gasped, in shock. “I forgot! Tailspin, we were supposed to help decorate the school!” Tailspin face hoofed. “I can’t believe we forgot! Come on, let’s go before the crusaders decide that pyrotechnics is their special talent.” With that the pair ran/rolled out without another word. Twilight looked over at me with a small smile. “I find it ironic that a detective would fall in love with a show like Firebird.” “If it’s a good enough story, then it doesn’t matter who the characters are,” I replied, sagely. “You ever think of writing a book of all those things you say?” Twilight suggested. “Maybe, when I’m retired,” I mused, taking off my costume's brown coat. “You have any more costumes for me to try?” “There's a box in the closet,” she answered, pointing with her hoof. “Spike bought a bunch of them for materials.” I went inside the closet and searched through the boxes until I found the one marked “costumes”. I opened it and dug through the clutter until I felt something metallic. I pulled it out, and saw it was a Lunar Stallion helmet. Lunar Stallions are the most recent additions to the Equestrian Royal Guard. They started out originally as Luna’s personal guards. Most were pegasi with wings that resembled bats, thanks to Luna’s magic. Although their appearance is quite scary at first, they have been known to save many lives while on the watch. As I stared at the helmet, something seemed… familiar almost. I shook my head and set the helmet back in the pile of costume gear. Maybe I’ll just go as a detective this year. I already have everything for the costume. ___________________________________________________________ Twilight walked along beside me, checklist levitating in front of her. Twilight had dragged me along to make sure everything was perfect for Nightmare Night. As she talked to herself, I saw ponies around me decorating their homes for the night. Pumpkins were being carved into Jack o’ Lanterns. Bats, and fake spider webs were being hung everywhere. One spider looked a little too realistic for my tastes, causing me to jump as we passed it. Twilight giggled a little. “You’re afraid of spiders, Private?” “I’m not scared of them,” I replied, half honestly. “I just don’t like it when they crawl near me.” Twilight just smiled and rubbed against me. “Don’t worry, Private. I’ll protect you from all those big scary spiders,” she said, in the most agonizingly sweet voice I’ve ever heard. I just smiled and pecked her on the cheek, “You’re lucky I love you so much.” “Come on,” she said, as we walked on. “We still got a lot of work to do.” I nodded and fell in besides her once more, looking at all the decorations for the celebration. “Ponyville sure likes its holidays it seems.” “What was Nightmare Night like in Manehattan?” Twilight asked, curiously. “Oh, it was the best!” I exclaimed, smiling at the memories. “You would have entire city blocks where everypony would just party. I remember I would take Tailspin out in his little Wonderbolt costume and-“ KRACK!!! I leapt nearly out of my skin as I heard a crack of lightning behind me. I looked up to see Raiden and Rainbow Dash. They were rolling around laughing on top of a storm cloud. Twilight frowned at Dash, “It seems somepony didn’t learn her lesson from last year.” “Lighten up, Twilight.” Rainbow grinned down at us. “Nightmare Night is the best night of the year for pranks.” “We’d never get to do something like this in the city,” Raiden said, with a laugh “Private, I don’t think I’ve seen a pony jump that high in my life.” “I’m starting to regret hooking you two up,” I grumbled, hanging upside down from a store sign. “Aw, you’ll get over it,” Raiden said, smugly as, he turned to Dash. “Come on! I’m going to show you how to make a real light show with this thing!” The excited couple flew off with their new toy storm cloud laughing all the way. I got down from my perch and dusted myself off. “Let’s just hope they don’t scare any old people to death.” Twilight just shook her head. “Some things never change, I guess. It’s good to see them getting along though,” “I guess,” I agreed, straightening my hat. “Let’s go check out everything else.” We walked a little further and saw Applejack setting up her apple bobbing station. She waved heartily, upon seeing us. “Howdy, guys. Everything’s just about set up over here.” Twilight smiled happily. “Luna will love it, Applejack.” “Luna?” I asked, looking over at Twilight. “Oh, I didn’t tell you!” Twilight exclaimed, as realization dawned. “Princess Luna is coming to Ponyville again this year.” “Princess Luna is coming?” My mouth gaped open in absolute shock. “We’re going to be hosting Royalty here?” Twilight smiled a little guiltily. “Sorry I just heard about it yesterday, and I only told my friends. I didn’t think to tell you that she would be coming.” I didn't know why I felt excited, and not nervous. For some inexplicable reason, I’ve always felt a special connection with the Princess of the Night. When I was a colt I would get mad at other ponies whenever they played games about Nightmare Moon. I felt sympathy for her plight of being trapped on the moon. I didn’t fee it was something we should make a game out of. Suffice to say, I was not popular when recess came… Applejack simply smiled. “Hopefully this year we can keep Pinkie’s yap shut long enough for the princess to have some fun.” “Speaking of Pinkie Pie,” I said, my horn glowing grey, as a pink pony fell from a nearby tree. I looked over at Pinkie with a scolding look on my face. “Pinkie, how many times do I have to tell you to not sneak up on me like that.” Pinkie looked up at me with a big grin. “Hiya, Private. Sorry for sneaking up on you like that, but I’m practicing my spy techniques!” I facehoofed. “That’s gotta be the worst sneak attempt I’ve ever-“ “Who are you talking to, Private?” I heard another voice ask from behind me. “I’m talking to Pinkie, Pinkie.” I then realized what I said. I whirled around and sure enough, there was another Pinkie Pie. I looked between the two Pinkie’s my jaw dropping. “There are two of you now?” This is bad! Very Bad! One Pinkie Pie is enough but now there are two of them? This could mean the end of Equestria as we know it! Pinkie 2 looked at Pinkie 1 with big grin. “Swarmy, you’ve gotten pretty good at imitating me! We had Private completely fooled!” Say what now? Pinkie 1 smiled and transformed back into the red manned white unicorn, the Changeling, usually looked like. They both started laughing out loud at my dumbfounded look. My ears flicked in anger and I retorted, “Not funny you two!” Suddenly Swarm transformed into me and imitated my voice perfectly. “Not funny you two!” This caused even Twilight and Applejack to start laughing. I looked at Pseudo Private with a frown. “Swarm, cut it out!” “Swarm, cut it out!” He imitated me. “Look at me, I’m Private Eye. I’m the world’s greatest detective and I can’t figure out that there is only one Pinkie Pie.” Everypony kept laughing out loud except me. “You two will be the death of me!” Swarm suddenly transformed into Fluttershy and imitated her sweet voice. “Aw, Private, you can’t hate us too much, can you?” pseudo Fluttershy asked sweetly, giving the biggest puppy dog eyes ever. “Damn it, Swarm!” I said, face hoofing. “You know I’m helpless against that!” Swarm transformed back into his normal unicorn form and just laughed out loud. Twilight trying very hard to contain most of her laughter. She looked at the pair. “All right, that’s enough you two, Don’t you have sweets to make?” Pinkie nodded. “Yeah, but we were waiting for the oven to be done, it was soo boring…” Swarm transformed into Pinkie right there. “So we decided to play around with my transforming ability.” Pinkie giggled. “Then Swarmy showed me how he can imitate everypony perfectly.” “Anypony?” Twilight asked, with a raised eyebrow. “Do me!” Swarm smiled, as he transformed into her. “Hi I’m Twilight Sparkle, I like books, studying, magic… and detectives,” he said, that last bit, with a very sly smile I’d never seen Twilight wear. Twilight blushed bright red, and I couldn’t help but laugh. Swarm left with a giggling Pinkie Pie. I looked over at Twilight. “They do say imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.” “Somehow, I don’t think I’ll consider that flattery,” Twilight said with a sigh. Applejack, who finally stopped laughing, got up and smiled at us. “Ya'll take care now; I gotta take care of mah-“ She suddenly turned around. “Aw, tarnation! Derpy, for the last time, ya bob fer apples, not fer the plug!” She ran off to rectify the mistake of the cross eyed Pegasus. Twilight and I laughed and walked on, just as the sun was about to set on the day. _________________________________________________________ “That should be everything” Twilight said, finally ticking off the last item off the checklist. “All we need to do now is head back to the library to drop off the checklist.” I nodded and looked up, the moon was shining brightly tonight. Its light dappling the town. I felt calmed during a clear starry night like this. I could never explain why, I just felt better at night. But that’s when I heard a howl; I recognized it as Luca’s. “Twilight! That’s Luca’s howl!” Twilight looked over at me. “Him howling on a moon lit night is a bad thing?” “It’s the tone of the howl I’m worried about,” I replied, grimly. “Somepony is in trouble!” I took off running with Twilight falling in beside me. “Private, what’s going on? How can you understand what Luca is saying?” “I can’t explain it,” I said, as I kept running out of town. “I just know Luca is calling because somepony is in trouble.” “I knew you liked the wolf, Private, but this is too weird,” Twilight observed, as she kept up with me. “How do you know?” “I just do” I answered, looking back at Twilight. “That and I’ve been training Luca to howl if he comes across somepony hurt.” “I pray to Celestia that it’s nothing too serious,” Twilight said grimly. We stopped when we got to the edge of town. We were right smack dab on the border to the Everfree Forest. Twilight looked around nervously. “There’s something in the air, Private, I don’t like it” My magic wrapped around Blackbird, in case anything came out and attacked us. Luca wouldn’t howl like that if it wasn’t an emergency. The question is what was cause for it? HEEELP!!!! “It came from this way!” Twilight said, taking off into the bushes, with me in hot pursuit. We leaped over the bushes and came onto the scene. Luca was standing protectively over a young mare. He was howling at a strange black figure in a blue cloak. I pulled out my gun. “Back away with your hooves in the air!” The mysterious pony looked at me. He looked just like me, only his eyes were a cruel red, and his mouth had blood seeping from it. He hissed and ran with blinding speed into the woods. I fired a couple of shots after getting over my stupor, but I didn’t hit him. I swore under my breath and looked over Luca. He looked at me a little guiltily as he stood over the mare. “You kept him from hurting her more, that’s what counts.” Luca seemed reassured by that , as Twilight lowered herself to the mare. Her eyes grew wide, “Platinum Blade?” I looked at the mare, she was a unicorn mare with a white coat and a long platinum blond mane. i imagined that was how she got her name. She was well built with scars on her body, She’d obviously seen battle. I looked at Twilight, curiously. “You know her?” “She's a friend of Shining’s in the royal guard,” Twilight explained “but she’s supposed to be in Canterlot. What is she doing way out here?” “She was probably sent to help guard during Nightmare Night,” I suggested, as I examined the mare. I noticed the golden armor she wore, “She’s a solar guard?” “Yeah, one of Princess Celestia’s personal fighting forces” She said with a nod “She’s essentially the female counterpart to all those solar stallions you see.” “I didn’t know they had female counterparts,” I said, with a hoof on my chin. “She doesn’t look hurt beyond-“ She let out a gasp, and fell back. “Private, look at her neck.” I tilted the mare’s neck and pushed aside her mane to reveal, two small red punctures. The edges looked white and worn. Something bit her. Twilight looked at me grimly. “Private, those look like bite marks of a Vampony…”