24th of Second Ember, part 1.
I had just forgotten about my response to Pinkamena’s challenge when the first letter arrived.
The envelope sits on my home’s desk, undisturbed as I study it. The seal is a little smiley sticker and the edges are tainted with a brown smudge that I quickly identify as blood. Strange, this made all its way through the postal system, and nopony noticed?
The yellow figure splits in half as I open the letter, using my teeth. Sometimes, when dealing with gross stuff like this, I kind of wish I was born with a horn. The paper itself is even more smudged by blood than the envelope, but the text is still perfectly legible.
There's no need to wait, ‘cause it finally came:
Welcome to Pinkie Pie’s awesome guessing game!
Yes, it might be a crime
these murders sublime
But it's more fun that watching this town go lame
To be successful, you must first master your fear
The rules are quite clear, I will state them all here:
I'll send you two clues
and now you must choose
To which path you’ll finally steer.
These point to the pony whose number
and life that I chose to encumber
The victim won't wait.
And I won't hesitate
To put them forever in slumber
This is a gift, your chance to rejoice.
Through this game I have given you voice.
Will they be saved
or put in their grave?
Because now it comes down to your choice.
PS: If you tell anypony about our little game, expect the body count to grow.
I furrowed my brows after reading the letter. Just to be certain, I read it two more times. On all the stanzas, I scan the words and their contexts for any kind of double meaning or subtlety. I read the first word of each paragraph, then the first letter, then do it backwards.
Nothing.
The gist of it all is quite clear, at least. She will apparently send me two clues, and if I fail to figure them out, somepony will die. Also, anypony who hears about this will quickly follow. My throat knots at the realization; it feels as if Pinkamena Pie just put a millstone around my neck and kicked me out of the boat.
I consider the option to bring this letter with me to the station and show Mully, who’d surely either fire me on the spot for keeping a key piece of evidence to myself or chew my ass over it. Then when the first clue arrive, he’ll sentence me to write so many reports that by the time I’m done, Pinkie will have moved on to the next unfortunate victim.
And that’s exactly why I didn’t show it to him, Pinkie can run in circles around the ponyville police department, and she knows it. If I want any chance of catching her, I gotta do it myself.
To the caretaker of miss Sunset Snow (Arty Eyes)
On behalf of Ponyville’s police department, I apologize for my actions and the distress I might have caused you or miss Sunset Snow. I was acting contrary to specific orders not to put undue stress on the witness, orders which I ignored. My actions and statements did in no way reflect the official stance of Ponyville’s Police Department.
I sigh as I look at what I’ve managed to produce. Mully was of course less than pleased with the fact that I hoofslapped the caretaker of an important witness. But instead of doing the merciful thing and killing me on the spot, he sentenced me to write a letter of apology. Of course, he never specifically said I had to send it... When I’m done, it’s going straight into the trash can!
The important thing to Mully is that he can point to the fact that he ordered me to write it, in case anypony involved decided to raise trouble with the department. That’s the PPD in a nutshell, so much of it is about generating the right paperwork to make the bean-counters go away. I abandon this trash-can fodder of a letter before slipping off to do some actual police work.
In the basement of the police department is the archive, rows of hoof-cranked shelves on wheels with just enough room for one pony to squeeze themselves between one row. The atmosphere is tempered with dust and cobwebs, neglect and abandonment. This isn’t exactly a place you go to hang out, and in a way that’s helpful; it gives you a place to think without anypony to disturb you.
I have little need for the shelves full of routine paperworks, ignored forms and reports of trivial crimes. But down here we also have the really good stuff, files on some of Equestria’s most notorious criminals. Every aspect of a case you could ask for recounted in great, sometimes excruciating, detail.
I put the file with Pinkamena Diane Pie on the lectern and find the psychiatric reports. I’ve already read these to the point of memorization, but perhaps there’s some detail that can shed light on her cryptic poem. After all, even before it all came to light, she was unusually cryptic when she wanted to.
“Ahem... still on the Pinkamena case, I presume?” I hear someone behind me asking. I don’t need to turn around to recognise Mully’s rough voice. So much for this place being free of distractions! I hold my breath in order to calm myself.
“Yeah... I figured that we should try to find more clues about what happened. You know, so we could save her next victim.”
“Buckshot,” he says, sounding almost like my father, “you’ve been losing your sleep over this case for days now. All of us, in fact. Believe me, this girl knows how to cover her steps. If even the best psychiatrist of Canterlot failed to figure out what goes on in that sick mind of hers, what chance does we have?”
I don’t reply, keeping my eyes locked in with her psychiatric report. I’ve picked up some medical books these last few days. I figured that I’d have to be up-to-date with everything if I hoped to catch her. however, all it really taught me is the myriad ways a doctor can phrase the statement “I don’t have a clue.”
“Buckshot.” I keep ignoring Mully, hoping he’ll get the message. I don’t think I can take seeing another pony like Sunset Snow put in a hospital or worse. If only I could find something. Anything. The doctor must’ve noticed something she said. Even though she trick—”Buckshot!”
“WHAT!?”
“I don’t get all up in your grill just to annoy you, y’know?” Mully said with a faint note of irritation in his voice. “I have a job to do just like you! And right now it’s to keep you in check.”
“What do you mean?
“Do you remember officer Cold Gaze?” The question is rhetorical. He is the stallion I whose job I replaced when I first came to Ponyville all the way from Manehattan. Mully continues without waiting for my reply, “have I ever told you why he left the force?” This manages to get my curiosity.
“Four years ago, Ponyville was almost destroyed by a pony named Firebrand. He was an arsonist who lived here.” I nod for him to go on, I had read about the Great Fires once before, but I had never known the real story behind it. Mully doesn’t like talking about the past much, unless he has a point to make.
“Cold Gaze was one of the best officers this city had.” Mully sighs and rubs his forehead with his hoof. “Something changed, though. I don’t know what exactly set my alarms off, but I just knew something was wrong, so I conducted my own private investigation. Turns out that Cold Gaze began to sympathize with Firebrand.”
“Why? Why would anypony, especially a police officer sympathize with an arsonist.”
“I don’t know, Buckshot.” He say, and I notice that he looks almost forlorn. “I really don’t know. We had Firebrand pinned down as exceedingly clever, leaving almost no evidence behind. I, however, found out that Cold Gaze purposefully sabotaged our investigation; removing crucial evidence and planting misleading ones.”
I blink twice at this, somepony tampering with the evidence in a small sleepy town like this?
“We arrested him, of course,” Mully continued, seemingly able to see my shock. “Cold Gaze refused to say a word. The only thing he let slip was Firebrand’s name. By the time we were at his door, however, he was nowhere to be found. Still is. Even now, most ponies don’t know about Cold Gaze. We decided that it was for the best that things be kept beneath the rug.”
I shoot Mully a harsh, inquisitive stare and he sighs. “You’ve got to understand, Buckshot. We symbolize hope. I like to think that more than the Princesses themselves. Especially on these troubled times.”
“Get to the point already, Mully!”
“My point is that it’s not unlikely for criminals to sooner or later contact the police. If she should contact you directly, promise to tell me, alright?”
Silence. I am stunned for a moment, wondering if Mully had somehow entered my mind. It would be impressive, especially since he lacks a horn. “Yes. You know I would tell you if I knew anything.” My eyes dart frantically from one side of the room to another.
“This is why I’m here. I—we need to everything we need if we want to catch her again.”
I am reminded of the poor farmer as the next words form in my brain and coalesce into a sentence, ‘I did not become a cop to see truth get tarnished, y’know?’ Mully lingers for a moment, looking strangely at me before nodding and turning around. As he go up the stairs, I look at the psychiatric file once more. I can see myself reflected back in the glossy paper.
“Honesty never really was your Element, was it you son of a bitch?” I mutter to myself once I’m sure he’s out of hearing range.
Thank Celestia for lunch breaks! The good thing about working as a cop in a small town as opposed to Manehattan is that you have time to eat lunch in the comfort of your own home, a luxury you never get in a bustling city.
I close the door to my house behind me and breathe a weary sigh. I lock the door behind me and leave the keys on the counter next to it. I slowly drag myself to the living room and plop onto the couch. Even though I am in this comfortable position for less than ten seconds, my eyelids already feel heavy. I inhale deeply and stretch my four members as the air leaves my lungs. I hear my spine popping and I can’t help but to mutter a satisfied moan.
I allow myself a few more moments of relaxation but get up once I’m certain that I’ll fall asleep if I stay in this position for long. I open my refrigerator and take out some tomatoes, lettuce, white cheese and some walnuts.
“Hm hmm hmmm hm hm hm. Hello! Hm hmmm hmm hm hm hm. How’re you doin’?” I hum as I begin preparing my bowl of salad. Tomatoes and white cheese sliced, lettuce cleaned and walnuts grinded, I place the bowl over the kitchen table and look for some oranges in my fruit basket.
“Hm hmhm hm hm hmmmmm hmhm hm hmhm hmhmhmhmmm. Hoof bump!”
I cease my humming and dig into my bowl. I’m not a chef by any means, but it’s hard to go wrong with a good salad. I feel pleasantly full as I walk back to the living room, wanting nothing more to sit down and rest, but my break is almost over and I need to get back to the police department.
My attention is picked when I see an envelope beneath my door. I curiously approach the item and pick it up with my mouth. I set it onto my table and tear the envelope and remove what’s inside. The first thing that falls out is a plastic spoon, the kind little foals use to eat their cake on birthday parties.
The envelope still doesn’t feel empty, but a quick shake dislodges the second item from its innards. It’s a postcard, the kind you would find at any gift shop. But there’s nothing written on its back whatsoever, even tough it very clearly has lines for an address and a greeting.
“What the hay?” I flip it over to look at its image. The photograph depicts a wolf howling at a crescent moon. This is most clearly the clues Pinkie pie told me would arrive, but that’s pretty much the only thing clear about it. I set the postcard down near the plastic spoon and begin to ponder on its meaning. There is something about this combination, a kitschy picture of a wolf in a noble pose and a sorry-looking spoon that sparks memories.
If you made the photograph into a velvet painting and turned the spoon into a metal one with its underside forever scarred black by flames, it would look like the things you’d find in any run-down apartment in downtown Manehattan.
This mental image, of basements lined with posters, of soot-stained spoons and shoelaces, is so vivid that I’m sure it’s not just a random thought. I pick up the postcard again, this is screaming out a name to me, but what?
And as if in a snap, it all becomes clear. I mouth the name to myself:
“Crescent Moon!” I quickly back away from the table and dash towards the door.