Crystal had allowed them to use a seldom used solarium as a base for their investigations. The room had large panoramic view windows with warm sunlight filtering in through the dusty blinds. A coffee vending machine lay in the corner, nestled in between two leather couches. Small tables with lamps were beside the couches, with magazines and health awareness fliers that appeared to be twenty years out of date.
Twilight had dragged one of the tables to the center of the room, sliding all the, “Have the stallion in your life get his prostate checked, it could save his life” fliers off the table, dumping them on the couch. She then unfurled a map of Ponyville onto the table, and pulled out a box of colored pin needles. “Alright, Mr. Rich’s son, Firespark, is our index patient.” She picked up a bright blue pin. “He started showing symptoms when he was in a water gun fight with his friends.” She stuck the pin down near a stream, only a small distance away from the Everfree Forest. “This is where it happened. This is where this chain all started.”
It took a minute for Twilight to use the hospital’s records to chart where all the other infections occurred. “Now,” Twilight said, putting the last pin down. “We have to look for patterns, and try to trace the epicenter of this epidemic.”
Applejack stared at the map, but all the pinpoints were randomly scattered. There was no inherent pattern. “Hmmmm…I don’t know, Twi. I don’t see any patterns at all.”
Twilight shook her head, “That doesn’t make any sense. Maybe this will help.” She began sticking numbers onto the pins. “See, now we can observe the chronology of the infections.”
Fluttershy was looking over at the map. “I don’t understand, Twilight. If this disease is contagious in nature, then shouldn’t the pins be in clusters?”
“You’re right, Twilight said. “None of the victims ever had any contact with one another.”
“But my animals…” Fluttershy muttered. “I thought Angel had gone into the forest, picked up the disease there, and brought it back home to my animals. But according to this data, that isn’t a correct assumption.”
Twilight scratched her head. “This is perplexing. According to this map, the disease isn’t contagious at all. Or the victims would be clumped together. No, this disease isn’t behaving at all like a normal disease.”
“Maybe there are other clues here.” Applejack said, rubbing her muzzle with her hoof. “What were all these foals doing when they got sick? I know Applebloom was eating corn, Firespark was in a water gun fight….”
Twilight shook her head. “Nothing strange or out of the ordinary. We had one filly doing laundry, another colt was taking a bath…These activities aren’t related at all, are they?”
“Twilight,” Fluttershy said. “Look at this.” Everyone looked over at her and Fluttershy pointed at the numbers on the pins. “Firespark, our first case, got sick near a stream on the northern edge of the Everfree Forest. Angel also got sick in the Everfree Forest, but the clearing where I found him was several miles south from where Firespark got sick.”
Twilight nodded. “Oh, I see.” Twilight traced the numbers down. “You’re animals got sick then, which is a few more miles down south, then to Applejack’s farm, which is even further south…and the disease just fans out from there, but there is still a pattern. These cases were occurring in a southern pattern, until they hit this building and then the distribution of cases became random at that point.”
“What is that building?” Fluttershy said, pointing at what appeared to be some kind of utility building. “It’s certainly not a residence.”
Twilight looked through some papers and records regarding the layout of the town. “Oh, here it is!” She slapped the paper down on the table. “It’s a water purification facility. The only one in Ponyville.”
An eerie hush fell over the three mares. “It’s in the water,” they said all at once.
Applejack pointed at the water facility. “All the town’s drinking water goes through that building for purification, and then is distributed to everyone’s homes. That explains the random distribution once it reaches that point.”
Twilight traced the chronology back from there, her hoof hovering over Applejack’s farm. “Here. So, how did Applebloom get sick again?”
“She was eating corn,” said Applejack, concerned.
Twilight stared at Applejack. “All those crops on your farm, how do you get them all watered?”
“Oh, we have a fancy irrigation system that draws water from…” Applejack silently put her hoof over the same stream which Firespark had been playing near when he had gotten sick. “We draw our irrigation water from this water source.”
“What about you, Fluttershy?” Twilight said, facing her. “Where do you draw your water from?”
“Oh, I only use well water for my animals.” Fluttershy’s face scrunched up. “Is there diseased water in my well? Was I the one who was making my animals sick?”
Twilight held Fluttershy’s hoof. “It’s not your fault, no one could have known the disease was waterborne.”
“That’s right." Applejack said. "All the foals got sick when they were in contact with the infected water. Applebloom was eating corn which had been soaked in that water, Firespark was splashing himself with his water gun, the filly was doing the laundry, that other colt was taking a bath….”
Twilight looked at all of them. “This is officially a health crisis. The water is making people sick.” Twilight traced her hoof upward. “It’s this stream. That’s where it all started.” Twilight dug through the maps of geographic layout, elevations, weather patterns, and then finally pulled out a map of Ponyville’s watershed. “This stream gets its water from this river.” She traced her hoof northward, drawing deeper into the Everfree Forest and the elevation was increasing. “Somewhere along this river, something went wrong. The epicenter of this disease shouldn’t be too far from the first infection….”
“Hey!” Applejack shouted. She pointed at the only building near the river. “Isn’t that Mr. Rich’s chemical factory?”
Twilight’s eyes went wide. “Yes, it is!”
“Do you think that’s where this contamination is coming from!?” Fluttershy squeaked.
“It would appear so,” Applejack said, glowering. “Filthy Rich is dumping his chemical waste into the river!”
Fluttershy jumped. “We have to tell someone! Before more foals get sick!”
“No wonder he wants to keep this outbreak a secret,” Applejack said, crossing her hooves.
Twilight waved her hooves. “Now, hold on guys. This is just speculation. We need more concrete evidence before we expose ourselves. Once this gets out in the open, people might come after us. This is a company that churns out billions of bits in a week.” Twilight looked around at all of them. “If we dare to throw a stone at a giant, we must have a rock-solid case. We’ll be going against the toughest lawyers….”
Applejack slammed her hoof down on the table. “He’s poisoning our town! He made Applebloom sick!”
“Maybe we can inform the town council, and maybe they can shut down the water distribution center.” Fluttershy suggested.
“Then our town won’t have any drinking water,” said Twilight. “And that facility is also owned by Mr. Rich.”
Applejack grunted, throwing up her hooves. “Does that stallion own everything!?”
Fluttershy continued. “Then we’ll all drink bottled water in the meantime. We have to tell the mayor.”
Twilight shook her head. “You guys aren’t thinking clearly! Even if we go through the town council, Filthy Rich will easily trace back to this hospital, then us! He’ll find out very quickly that we know about his secret. He'll go through whatever means it takes to silence us, including shutting down this hospital.”
“But his own son is brain dead because of it,” said Applejack. “Is he that crazy? I’m sure the stallion loved his son. I saw pictures in the newspaper of them together.”
Twilight nodded, reconsidering. “Maybe even he doesn’t know what’s happening at his chemical plant. Maybe there was a leak or something.”
“We have to explain it to him,” Fluttershy said. “We have to tell him what’s going on, and reason with him. Filthy Rich is an honest businessman and a loving father, he’ll understand.”
Twilight agreed. “That’s a good plan. Agreed?”
They all nodded. Applejack raised her hoof. “I know where he lives. I deliver Zap Apple Jam to his mansion a few times every year. It's in a very secluded place and hidden place, very few ponies know about it.”
“All right, let’s go!” Twilight said, rushing out of the room. “There’s no time to waste.”
They all left the room, trotting to the Rich residence to save their town.
The room sat empty for a few minutes, and the three mares failed to notice the small, blinking red light in the corner of the room. The security camera swiveled around, its lens zooming in on the table.
In a secure facility many miles from the hospital, a specter stared up at the live security camera feeds. The dark voice whispered, “They know.”