It was a very stormy night, nopony would disagree with that. Frankly, all the pegasi who were working the night shift were rather miffed at the thought of a storm being scheduled for so late, but a job was a job. If it paid…
It was worse for ponies on the ground, however.
“Stop her!”
A loud male voice rang out in the middle of the thundering rain and wind on the outskirts of Ponyville. It was hard to make out in the awful weather, but it appeared to be a group of Royal Guard ponies chasing after what looked like a pony wearing a black outfit, clutching an emerald. Both this pony and her chasers were having a difficult time running against the wind.
The streets were winding, and so as soon as the chased pony was able to run down a street where the wind was no longer against her, she picked up speed, and opened a gap between her and her pursuers. But it didn’t last. Before she knew they were about to catch up with her, she found herself outside Ponyville’s famous apple farm, Sweet Apple Acres. The pony quickly ducked straight into the mass of apple trees.
It wasn’t long before Officer Clue and the rest of the other guards arrived.
“Where’d she go?” Officer Clue had to shout to the others over the rain. “She can’t have gotten far!”
“Maybe she ducked into those trees there,” one of the officers pointed towards the apple trees.
Clue looked around. Certainly, apart from that path, it looked very much like a dead end. “I know that!” he eventually said. “Fine, let’s go search. Follow me!”
He then pulled out a luminous white gem, and shined it into the darkness of the orchard before stepping into the trees. Nervously, the other guards followed Officer Clue.
Only Luna’s moon was providing any light, apart from the light stone Officer Clue was carrying, and even that was swiftly being blanketed by the masses of leaves from above. At the very least, however, the wind and the rain were beginning to become slightly less tolerable. The chase continued until the group found themselves straight on another side of the orchard, right on the edge. Right back into the worst of the storm.
“Sir, this is insane!” said one of the officers. “We’ve totally lost her, and I’m not going any further in this weather!”
“And that…” Clue said, pride carrying in his voice despite conditions, “…is why I am a Royal Guard! I never give up! Ever! Even now I…wait, who’s that over there?”
He seemed to have spotted somepony in the rain. He held his light stone up against the face of the new pony. The light revealed the pony to be orange, with a blue mane. She was soaking wet, as were the Royal Guards. Seems she got caught up in the awful weather, too.
“Hey!” Officer Clue asked. “Have you seen a suspicious looking pony come by here?”
“Uh, would you class somepony in a black outfit, running like crazy as suspicious?” the orange pony asked uncertainly.
“That’s the one!”
“Uh, straight past me,” she replied. She pointed towards the distance, away from Sweet Apple Acres.
“Thanks! Come on, everypony, we have a thief to catch!”
“…Shouldn’t we ask her for more details, or…?” yet another officer pointed out.
“In this weather? When the thief is escaping? Fat chance!” barked Clue. “Come ON! I’ll talk to you later, miss!”
And with that, the group vanished in the direction where the orange pony pointed. She sneezed. “Guess I should probably get out of this, too.”
-
“I did it! I think this actually works now!”
“Great, Twilight,” said Spike, as he got plates out for today’s breakfast. “Does that mean you’ll come down now? You pulled an all-nighter again.”
Twilight stumbled downstairs. Sure enough, there were quite the bags under her eyes. Despite this, she looked considerably content, and very excited. She was clutching what appeared to be a small black machine on wheels, with a small camera mounted on the top with nuts and bolts.
“…What is that?” Spike asked Twilight. “The thing you were working on?”
“Correct,” Twilight said happily. “I, Twilight Sparkle, have invented the very first portable investigative research machine! With this baby, anypony will be able to observe any investigative spot without needing to be physically there for themselves! No more wandering into dangerous territory or go somewhere far away when you have this!”
Twilight then conjured up a small remote control out of the ether, and started to press some buttons. She then set the “portable investigative research machine” onto the floor, before pressing a small green button that said ‘Go’ in black ink. The machine began to move underneath the breakfast table, rather slowly, but surely. It then turned around the legs of the table, before trundling back to where Twilight was standing.
While all this was going on, Twilight had summoned another machine; a very small television-looking object, with a monitor about the size of Twilight’s head. On the monitor, Twilight could see the table and the floor in detail, and was observing with barely-concealed delight.
“Isn’t this fantastic?” Twilight then turned to Spike, who was looking rather impressed, despite not knowing too much about magi-tech.
“How can you see what’s going on with that?” Spike asked.
“Nothing hard. I just rearranged the magic signature in two very similar gems so that one would receive the waves from the other, and vice versa. So the…I can’t think of a good snappy name so I’m calling it the ‘probe’…recognises the signals and acts according to what sort of magic waves it picks up!”
“Can it come back to you?” Spike asked, trying to find anything wrong with it before Twilight did anything foolish in her quest for science.
“Of course it does. It’s hardly convenient if you have to go out to where it is to retrieve it again. Don’t worry, it does that automatically.”
“Well, you can play with that a little later,” Spike said firmly. “Right now you really could do with some breakfast.”
Twilight then remembered just how hungry (and caffeine deprived) she was, so she sat down at the table, used magic to pour herself a coffee, and picked up the morning newspaper as she ate her toast.
The headline directly at the front of the page was quite the attention grabber. Unique Antiques Plundered in Dead of Night, it said. Twilight skim-read the article; she hardly seemed to be paying attention, but she did pick out some key excerpts, such as how the store was broken into late last night (the same night Twilight was putting the last touches to the probe), and how the thief apparently lost them outside Sweet Apple Acres. The thief had apparently stolen a rather pricy emerald from the store, worth hundreds of thousands of bits.
Spike found the news boring, so he decided to find a different topic to talk about. “Did you hear the storm last night? Seriously, I thought this library was about to come down!”
“Relax,” Twilight said, munching on the last of her toast. “Golden Oaks Library has had worse storms than that, and it’s still standing. Besides, it wasn’t THAT bad. I managed to not get distracted by simply closing the curtains.”
“You wouldn’t think so if you opened them up again and you found your room was staring at the ground,” Spike said.
“Well, it didn’t,” Twilight said, reaching for an apple from the fruit bowl. She was just about to bite into it, when she paused. She stared at the apple for a while.
“What’s wrong?” Spike asked.
“Oh, just thinking about Applejack,” Twilight said. “That storm must have been bad news for the trees at Sweet Apple Acres; she must have a tough day ahead of her today.”
“Oh yeah,” Spike agreed. “That was really rough.”
“I should probably visit her today, see if there is anything I can do to help,” Twilight said, as she got up from the table. “Come to think of it, I was hoping to ask about whether I could use the place to test my probe today.”
She then turned to Spike. “You’ve got the to-do list for today, don’t you?”
“Right here,” Spike said, holding it up. “And yes, I have ticked everything that has been done today. I thought you were doing something odd; you usually leave the list for the next morning, not last night, like this time.”
“Had to be done,” Twilight said. “Wanted to work on this little baby.” She stroked the probe affectionately. “Alright Spike, I’m counting on you to keep everything under control while I’m gone, alright?”
“Of course,” Spike had resigned himself to doing a lot of the chores while Twilight was gone. However, he found that he didn’t mind too much; Twilight always made sure to properly thank him, as well as treat him to a nice big gem according to his mood for the day. “Just don’t go over the top this time.”
“It’s INVESTIGATIVE SCIENCE,” Twilight said excitedly. “No boundaries are set when it comes to discovery! See you later, Spike!” And with that, Twilight carefully put the probe and its controllers into her satchel, and was out of the door.
Spike stared after her. “She forgot to do that scourging spell. It MUST be good.”
-
As Spike noted, Twilight had indeed forgotten to freshen up in her excitement. She remembered to clean herself (after several ponies had stared at her unkempt appearance) as she trotted straight towards Sweet Apple Acres.
The ground underneath her was still rather damp, but had dried up after the storm, for the most part. Twilight could see ponies all over town, either patching up some of their homes after the rain, or others complaining to their Pegasus friends about the misery, with them nodding and agreeing with how they thought it would be a hassle.
Twilight didn’t pay it too much thought though. Before she knew it, she had arrived at the entrance of Sweet Apple Acres. She recognised it instantly by the straight path that led straight to Applejack’s house, and the big red barn just next to it (which had all things considered done well; its structure had barely changed even after the storm).
Twilight trotted up to the door, and knocked. Shortly, the door was answered by a big red stallion; Big Macintosh, Applejack’s older brother.
“Eeyup?” he asked.
“Hi, Mac. Is Applejack in?”
“Eeyup,” Macintosh nodded. He turned his head upstairs. “Applejack! Twilight Sparkle’s here.”
“Hold yer horses, Mac, ah’m comin’,” came the voice from upstairs. Applejack trotted down, readjusting her Stetson hat along the way.
“Hey, Twi.” Applejack smiled at Twilight.
“Applejack,” Twilight waved. “You know the storm from last night?”
“Do ah?” Applejack let out a loud breath. “Boy, was it strong. It couldn’t have done the littler trees any good.”
“As I thought,” Twilight nodded. “That’s why I came. I was wondering if you needed any help?”
“Mighty nice of ya to offer,” Applejack nodded. “But ya any good with sawin’ wood or pulling? ‘Cos that’s what today’s gonna be, mostly. Have to prop trees back up, or cut the ones we can’t patch up, poor things.”
“Um…” Twilight thought of how she could help. She wasn’t a physically strong pony (magic does little to muscle tone), and she wasn’t sure how much magic she’d be permitted to use in front of a traditional earth pony family’s place. Then she remembered the probe.
“Actually, I could help to look for the damaged trees,” Twilight said. “It’s a big place, after all.”
“If ya say so. But ya do have a lot of orchard to cover, ya know.”
“That’s why I brought this along,” Twilight smirked, fishing the probe out of her bag. She placed it on the ground, staring at it proudly.
“What the heck is that?” Applejack asked.
“A probe. I made it so that it could investigate places without needing anypony to be there themselves. I could use it to sweep the orchard.”
Applejack stared at the machine. “Well, ah don’t rightly understand it mahself, but it sounds real useful. If ya think ya know what you’re doin’ with it…”
“I’m fine,” Twilight assured her. “I can show you how it works, if you like.”
“Well, ah am mighty curious, ah guess,” Applejack said, stroking her chin. “But just for a little while. “Ah’ve got work to be doin’.”
Twilight nodded. “Okay. Can I use your barn, by the way?”
-
The inside of the barn was as Twilight remembered it. The bales of hay on both sides, and a large open space directly in the middle. Twilight set up the probe, as well as the monitor, and sat down on the floor. She then pressed a series of buttons before getting it to go, and the next thing she knew, the probe was trundling out of the barn.
On the monitor, Twilight could see everything that the probe’s camera could see. Twilight had directed the probe to travel towards the edge of the orchard, and she could see that was exactly what it was doing.
Twilight and Applejack watched the monitor for several minutes. Before long, an interesting sight came into view; a tree that was almost on its side, with only a few of its roots on its left side keeping it fixed in the ground. Right beside the tree was a rather large hole, which was rather shallow, as far as Twilight could see, but quite wide.
“Aw, no,” Applejack groaned. “Looks like the storm tore this one right out. I wonder if it can still be saved…”
Just then, Twilight noticed that there was another pony; an earth pony, doing something on the top branches of the tree. She couldn’t make out the pony clearly, for the monitor was showing it in black and white, but Twilight could see that the pony was wearing a cap, which looked rather dirty. She was clutching a chainsaw in her hooves.
“Who’s she?” Twilight asked.
Applejack stared at the monitor. “Oh, her? That’s Buzzer, she’s a part-timer we recently hired. Real nice gal. She works as a woodcutter, and she comes around often to tend to all our trees when we don’t have enough hooves on us. Quite the worker. She even asked me early this mornin' if she could start work early. Probably wanted to check the orchard for damage, I reckon.”
“I’ve never seen her before,” Twilight remarked.
“We just hired her recently. She’s been workin’ for us for about two weeks now,” Applejack explained. “She came askin’ for a job, and said she was good with takin’ care of trees. And, well, we couldn’t rightly say no, so here she is.”
“It’s right on the edge of the orchard…” Twilight said. “Looks like there were no other trees to take the brunt for it, and it collapsed.”
Applejack sighed. Twilight, eager to find out a little more, brought the remote out again, and programmed the probe to move into the whole where the tree had been planted. The probe obeyed, and it trundled right in the middle. Twilight took extra care to avoid the small pond just near the tree, making sure it didn’t fall in by accident. Twilight had a manual override for such occasions.
Twilight swivelled the camera around for about 30 seconds, inspecting the hole. “Applejack, how old was this tree?” she asked.
“Not that old, ah don’t think,” said Applejack. “Didn’t have time to really get a good grip for times like these. It’s sad…”
“Well, I suppose I should probably move this out,” Twilight remarked, and bring it back here…”
But before Twilight could say anymore, she caught the camera staring at the tree. It was moving.
Towards the probe.
Twilight had no time to react. In a matter of seconds, the tree had fallen straight back into the whole, collapsing onto its other side onto the probe. Twilight saw the camera go completely black, and the gem installed in the remote blinking, indicating it could not pick up the gem from the probe anymore.
There were several uncomfortable seconds. It wasn’t long before the two of broke the silence.
“Oh, Sweet Celestia, is Barry okay!?” Applejack made sure to name each tree individually. They were as much a part of the family as the rest.
“MY PROBE!” screamed Twilight. “My probe…I spent a good month’s worth of all-nighters on it! Oh, I hope it’s not too badly ruined…”
“…we headin’ to the edge, ya reckon?” Applejack asked uncertainly.
“Yes!” Twilight answered instantly.
“Well, can’t say fairer than that,” Applejack and Twilight sprinted out of the barn, and made straight for where Twilight saw the incident.
-
Twilight was mostly following Applejack, since she knew her way around the orchard better than Twilight. In about 30 seconds, they found themselves beside the tree that had fallen over, and an orange pony in a grey cap; Buzzer, the pony Twilight saw on the monitor, who Twilight could now see was sporting an orange coat with a blue mane. By the tree, Twilight could see some of the branches had been cut off, and were lying just outside the hole. Buzzer was next to them, as was the chainsaw, and she was wringing her hooves.
“Oh, Applejack!” Buzzer sounded frantic. “Aw, geez, I am so sorry, I didn’t think the tree would fall over like that. I was trying to cut it up, I saw that it was beyond saving, this one, and…I swear, I didn’t mean to…”
Twilight wasn’t listening. She was in the middle of the hole, inspecting the part of the tree that had crushed the probe. Twilight could see several pieces of the probe had come off, and that the little machine had been mostly flattened. Twilight gently moved the tree up slightly with magic, to retrieve the pieces. She looked like she was about to cry.
Buzzer saw Twilight. “Oh, was that thing yours? I’m sorry, I saw it, but I decided to leave it alone. I didn’t see it go straight into the hole…”
“My. Greatest. Invention. Ruined,” Twilight said jerkily. She turned to Buzzer. “RUINED!”
“I’m sorry!” Buzzer said again. “If there’s any way I could make up for it, anything at all…”
“No need,” said Applejack, stepping in. “It was all an accident, that’s all. Now Twi…” she turned to Twilight, who was still staring numbly at the wrecked probe. “…it’s a mighty big shame that your li’l do-hicky got smashed, but Buzzer said it was an accident. An’ she’s awful sorry. So ya should do the honest thing and accept it, okay?”
Twilight summoned up a bag, and scooped the ruined pieces in. “Of course…” she said quietly. “I’m sorry, Buzzer. I know you didn’t mean it.”
“Huh?” Buzzer looked puzzled. “You know my name?”
“Ah introduced ya to Twilight,” Applejack told her. “She caught ya on camera thanks that machine, and I told her who ya were.”
“Ah, that makes sense, I guess,” Buzzer said, nodding.
“Still…” Twilight muttered.
“Still nuthin’. Now Buzzer, you and ah should probably give the trees over here a good look. This un’s had it rough, and it might be the same story with some of the others.”
“No, it’s fine,” said Buzzer, “I’m fine with searching this part by myself…”
“Mac and Granny Smith are coverin’ the other parts,” said Applejack. “So it just leaves you an’ me. So that’s how it is. Besides, I’d rather have somepony with me; somepony was trespassin’ on our property last night. I think I’ll feel safer if there’s two of us...”
“There was a trespasser?” Twilight asked. She thought she heard that phrase somewhere before.
“Yup,” Applejack said. “Wasn’t there when I got there though…”
Applejack rose from her bed. The rain just wasn’t doing her any favours when it came to getting any sleep. She sighed. It was going to be a long day tomorrow, and she needed to preserve her strength and rest. But it was impossible.
Just then, she thought she heard voices. She tried to look out of the window, but it was no good; she couldn’t see through the rain and the dark.
“Burglars?” Applejack thought. She grabbed her waterproof coat and her light stone, and shone it towards where she thought she heard the voices. By then, though, the voices had seemingly stopped. Still uncertain, Applejack went outside through the front door, out to where she heard the noise. By the time she got there, she didn’t find anypony.
“Nuthin’.” Disappointed, Applejack trudged back towards the house. And not too soon; by the time she got back home, the wind and rain were really starting to pick up now.
She had half a mind to complain to Ponyville’s weather team the next morning.
“…an’ that’s what happened. So Buzzer, you understand? You’re comin’ with me.”
“Um…alright,” said Buzzer.
“You go ahead,” Twilight sighed. “I’d like to be alone for a little while…”
Applejack nodded. “C’mon, Buzzer.” And with that, the two of them left, leaving a dejected Twilight by the base of the tree.
-
Despite being told the whole thing was an accident, Twilight couldn’t help but feel a nagging at the back of her head. She chose to ignore it, however. Right now, the more pressing matter was the destroyed probe, and she was thinking about how much time she’d need to repair it.
Certainly, she did remember how she built it first time round, and what spells were required, so making it again shouldn’t be much of a problem, but…
Twilight’s thoughts were interrupted by a small yellow pony, with a red mane sporting a matching ribbon, trotting to her side. This was Applebloom, Applejack’s younger sister. She hadn’t earned her cutie mark yet, and Twilight knew her as somepony who was going to great lengths to find it.
“Hey, Twilight,” she said softly. “You okay?”
“Yeah,” Twilight said softly. She was about to ask why Applebloom wasn’t at school, but then she remembered that it was a Saturday. “I’m fine. This can be fixed…”
“Your li’l gadget?” Applebloom asked. “Ah was watchin’. Buzzer was cuttin’ Barry, Barry just fell over, an’ then you an’ sis arrived. I saw you, sis an’ Buzzer makin’ a lotta noise, and so ah decided not to get involved. Poor Buzzer, she probably didn’t mean nothin’, doin’ that.”
“You saw the tree fall on it?” Twilight perked up a little after hearing this.
“Sure,” Applebloom nodded.
Twilight paused for a bit. The nagging feeling hadn’t gone away. It was then she remembered that the camera didn’t pick up Buzzer that much, and so deciding that the best way to keep herself occupied was probably to indulge it, she decided to talk. About the important things.
“What did Buzzer do?” asked Twilight. “How was she cutting the tree?”
“Gosh,” Applebloom asked, thinking hard, trying to remember. “Well, ah think she started on the top. Usin’ that chainsaw to start cuttin’ the branches off. Then she got started on the bits underneath, but while she was doin’ that, the tree started to lean towards the other side. A li’l bit, then it just fell straight back in the hole. An’ that’s what happened.”
Twilight processed what Applebloom had just said. She suddenly got up, any weariness having disappeared completely. “Where ya goin’?” Applebloom asked.
“Just for a walk,” Twilight replied. “Just need to clear my head. Don’t worry, I’ll be right back.”
-
Twilight spent a good few minutes walking alongside the edge of Sweet Apple Acres. No matter how she looked at it, she couldn’t stop thinking about the tree and the probe. The nagging feeling at the back of her mind was growing stronger than ever, and showed no signs of going away.
Just then, out the corner of her eye, Twilight saw a group of ponies in what appeared to be Royal Guard armour heading towards her.
She heard voices. “Now, then, you know what we’re back here for. To pick up where we left off. So I don’t want anypony slacking while I’m here!”
Twilight sighed. She recognised Officer Clue’s voice anywhere. She was just about to duck away back into the trees, hoping that she wouldn’t be spotted, but it was too late. Clue had seen her.
“You!” he exclaimed triumphantly. “So you’re the thief from last night!”
“Wait, what?” Twilight looked confused.
“Don’t play dumb!” barked Clue. “Culprits always return to the scene of the crime! You were the one who broke into Unique Antiques last night!”
Twilight remembered the robbery vaguely from the papers, but hadn’t paid as much attention to it as she should have. She sighed. “Wouldn’t that make the scene of the crime Unique Antiques…?”
“Don’t be pedantic!” snapped Clue. “You’re the pony in this photograph, aren’t you?”
Clue then whipped out a photo of what appeared to be an intruder breaking the glass of the Unique Antiques shop. S/he was wearing a black disguise which covered the entirity of the body, save for the eyes, and was clutching a brick in her hooves, which were covered in hoof-gloves.
Twilight stared blankly at the photograph. “This pony doesn’t have a horn,” she said with condensing scorn, pointing at the pony’s head. Or wings, Twilight noted.
Clue stared at the photo, and then at Twilight, before nervously laughing. “Sorry, even a genius makes mistakes! Laugh it off and forgive me, yeah?”
Twilight her eyebrow. “…Bah.” She decided to set the conversation somewhere meaningful, if only out of pity for Clue. “So you’re looking for the thief?” Twilight remembered reading it was just outside here that the thief lost them.
“Yeah, just lost them. Saw them duck straight inside these trees here,” Clue grumbled. “Lost them after that.”
“Ducked inside…?” Twilight said. The newspaper certainly hadn’t mentioned that in the article. Or maybe they did, and Twilight wasn’t paying attention. It was one or the other.
“Then we asked this orange pony, and she points us away, since she said she saw the thief run away there. So we’re lookin…” Clue paused. Just then, an angry expression fell over his face. “Hey! You’re trying to get information out of me so that you can show me up again!”
“What?” Twilight sighed. “I didn’t say I was.”
“I know you!” Clue said warily. “You picking up the clues, trying to solve it before me! Well, this is MY case. MINE, okay? I don’t want you poking around this time, alright?”
“I wasn’t trying to,” Twilight said, honestly. “Duly noted. I was investigating something else, anyway.”
Officer Clue nodded. “Good. Now spread out! Search around the borders here for any clues. Anything!” The officers quickly complied.
-
Twilight the group, and headed back to where the tree had collapsed. She was briefly thinking about the breaking and entering, even though she promised Clue not to investigate. She quickly put the thought out of her head, turning her attention back to the strange incident that she picked up.
It was then that THAT thought quickly left her, when Twilight thoughtlessly approached the pond. As she peered into the water, she saw something fine and black clinging onto the side. Twilight picked it up into her hooves. It was apparently black nylon.
“Hmmm, wasn’t that thief wearing a black outfit?” Twilight said to herself.
Then she paused. She sat in silence for a good few seconds, processing what she just found, along with goodness knows what else.
Then suddenly, for the first time since this morning, she was alight with enthusiasm. She was awake now, and was grinning from ear to ear.
She had solved everything.
-
“Ah still don’t get why we have to be here,” Granny Smith grumbled, as she saw Buzzer and the rest of the Apple family gather together. Twilight had entered the house in a frenzy, urging Applejack to get everypony together and meet her outside, raving about how she figured out the truth and more. “It’s a real strain on these old bones, see.”
“Twilight, are ya gonna do that whole explanation thing?” asked Applebloom. “The best part of being a detective?”
“Exactly! I’ve been racking my brain all day, trying to make sense of what’s been going on today,” Twilight said excitedly. “But now I think that I’ve figured out exactly what happened.”
“This seems a little much for a small accident,” Granny Smith whispered to Big Macintosh.
“Eeyup,” Macintosh agreed.
“Um, Twilight?” Applejack said with considerable deadpan. “Ah think ya might be thinkin’ about this one a little too hard. Ah mean, it was just bad luck that tree crushed your little do-hicky.”
“Under the care of a professional like Buzzer? It doesn’t sit right with me,” Twilight said, readying herself for the usual summation. “Allow me to explain. It is my belief that we have all made a big misunderstanding about the whole incident. Buzzer goes to cut up one of the apple trees that had been blown down by the storm last night, and while cutting she accidentally sends the tree toppling on my probe,” Twilight’s left eye began to twitch, but seeing the Apple family’s curious looks on their faces, she carried on. “But that was all a big mistake.”
“I don’t see how it could be a mistake,” Applejack remarked.
“Nnnope,” Big Macintosh replied, succinct as ever.
“Because Buzzer didn’t cause the tree to fall like that by accident,” Twilight replied smugly. “She did it on purpose.”
“What?” Buzzer said rather flatly.
Applejack’s eyes widened. “You’re kiddin’. What makes ya think that?”
“Because of the way Applebloom described how Buzzer went about cutting the tree down,” Twilight said, turning and nodding to Applebloom. She then looked sternly at Buzzer. “She said that you, Buzzer, cut the branches off first before you got started sawing away at the parts just underneath. A professional woodcutter like you wouldn’t start cutting away at the upper half of the tree unless the aim was to get the tree to fall back into the hole. Without them, the tree would lose the counterweight that would prevent the root system and the stump from falling back into the hole. There is no other explanation except that it was intentional.”
Buzzer could only grimace. There was a pause, before Applebloom spoke up.
“So…you’re sayin’ she tried to crush that lil’ bot?” she asked. “What for?”
“It’s a bit of a stretch, but I can only assume…” Twilight said thoughtfully, “…that she wanted to draw our attention to the ruined probe. It got too close to the tree for her liking.”
Buzzer grimaced. “That’s right, isn’t it?” Twilight said to her. “You were keeping a huge secret hidden in or by this tree, weren’t you? You didn’t just break my experiment.
“The Royal Guard caught up to me, asking about somepony who had fled into Sweet Apple Acres to try and escape them after stealing from an old shop, Unique Antiques, last night. Applejack, you said you went outside during the night to deal with the intruder, right? And by the time you arrived, they had gone.”
“Yeah, but…” Applejack said.
“If I’m right, you were that intruder, weren’t you, Buzzer?”
“Wait, you’re sayin’ Buzzer was the one who robbed that store?” Applejack gasped.
“That’s CRAZY!” shouted Buzzer. “Ya can’t pin that robbery on me? What are you talking about, and what’s it got to do with me accidentally breaking your little toy?”
Twilight nodded at Applejack, selectively ignoring Buzzer. “This is what I think happened.
“Buzzer, you broke into that antique shop and stole the emerald. However, you got caught by a patrol led by Officer Clue, and ducked into Sweet Apple Acres to lose them. You tore up the disguise that you were wearing while robbing the store and sunk them in the pond, just before Clue and his entourage caught up with you. You also took the opportunity to hide the gem inside the tree hollow you were hiding behind. This one, the one you cut down.
“Taking advantage of his gullibility, you misdirected him away from the place, giving you more breathing room. But that was when you hit a snag. Applejack heard intruders in the orchard, and went to investigate. To get out of there, you had to leave the gem behind. So you were intending to retrieve it the next morning as early as possible, even asking Applejack to let you start work in this part of the orchard earlier than usual. Unfortunately, to your horror, when you returned, you saw the storm from last night had ripped the tree out, which risked exposing the gem. To make matters worse, I had come visiting today too, wanting to test my probe, and the tree was the first place I sent it.
“You saw that it had a camera mounted on and thought it might have spotted the jewel. So you had no choice but to cut the tree stump and crush it while it was still in the hole, getting rid of the potential evidence against you. You couldn’t destroy it yourself with your bare hooves, otherwise I’d have seen you do it. So the only thing you could do was hope for an opportunity to make it look like an accident. Lo and behold, I directed it into the hole, where you seized your chance.”
Twilight scowled. “That little probe was a whole month’s work, and you brought a great big tree crashing down on it!? I mean, stealing a gem from that old shop was bad, but INTERRUPTING SCIENCE IN PROGRESS is just deplorable!”
“Uh, Twi,” hissed Applejack. “Priorities, girl. Get ‘em straight.”
“You’re just making it up!” Buzzer said desperately. “You don’t have a shred of proof it was me!”
“As for proof,” Twilight said, “you’re still carrying it, right now. Applejack and the rest of the Apple family have been keeping a good eye on you since the incident with the tree, so you haven’t had time to hide that emerald anywhere. Chances are you’ve got it hidden. Underneath your hat, most likely, when you came back to the tree this morning.”
Buzzer began to sweat. “That’s not all,” Twilight went on, conjuring up the plastic bag with the nylon thread inside. “I found this small piece of black thread hanging over the edge of the pond, proving you dumped the disguise there. Chances are, we can fish the costume out and give it a thorough dusting for hoofprints, which would prove you wore this costume.”
Buzzer sank to her knees. She had gotten caught.
“How?” she whispered. “How did you know it was me? Anypony could have stolen that gem and broken in…”
“I saw a photo showing the thief,” Twilight explained. “Clue showed it to me. I saw that the thief didn’t have a horn or wings, so the thief must have been an earth pony, like you. But the biggest clue lay in the fact that the thief ducked into the orchard and hid the gem. You’ve worked there in that one orchard long enough, so assuming nopony in the Apple Family is the culprit, only you knew that there was tree with a hollow that would make a good hiding place. A stranger wouldn’t know, they’re not usually allowed to go that far in. With knowledge only somepony who worked at Sweet Apple Acres would have, the culprit couldn’t be anypony else.”
Buzzer sighed. “Sorry, Applejack. Sorry I had to do that to your tree…”
“Buzzer…” Applejack said sadly.
“Why?” asked Macintosh.
“…because being a part-time lumberjack wasn’t making enough bits,” Buzzer admitted. “I…lost most of my cash gambling at the watering hole. The bills started to catch up to me…and I couldn’t pay it back. Nothing I did was enough. I was desperate. I…panicked when the Royal Guard caught me. I ditched the disguise and managed to throw them off my trail, but even then…the rest was exactly like you said.”
-
“And done!”
Twilight was putting the finished touches on the newly mended probe back at the library straight after breakfast.
“I swear I’ve seen this somewhere before,” Spike muttered to himself, as he bit into his sapphire. “Let’s just hope it doesn't break again, huh, Twilight?”
“Oh, don’t worry,” said Twilight. “I’ve decided not to take it back to Sweet Apple Acres this time. Too much going on at once, I discovered. No, I think there will be fewer things to get in the way at Rarity’s.”
“Rarity?” Spike perked up at the name. “Um…can I come? You know, just in case it…”
Twilight knew it was only an excuse to come and visit her, but she decided to play along. “Sure, the more eyes to keep on it, the better.”
Rarity found herself enthralled at Twilight’s newest invention. “I must say, Twilight, this is quite the machine. I do believe this would have quite the niche.” She watched the probe walk around in circles before trundling underneath Rarity’s work desk.
“You’d buy it?” Spike asked.
“Of course, darling. This machine could be used to see whether if the really are a slew of gems down any shaft I see, without me having to get my beautiful hooves dirty!”
Twilight smiled. “See, this is exactly what I was hoping it would do for ponies. I just need to patent this so…”
Just then, Twilight heard a rather frantic squeaking coming from the next room, followed by a rather furious growling. A mouse suddenly ran from the next room, scrambling over the probe. It soon became apparent why, for a large Persian cat (Opalescence, Rarity’s cat) came tumbling into the next room.
“Oh no, Opal, don’t you go…” Rarity began to say, but the cat wasn’t listening. Opalescence spotted the mouse climb over the probe and made a beeline straight towards it. And the probe.
“NO!” Twilight screamed.