//------------------------------// // Chapter 4: No Accounting for Taste // Story: Twilight’s Final Exam // by Pascoite //------------------------------// Twilight snapped her head up—she must have nodded off. Not good to get caught doing that. She looked up from her coffee and donut, her eyes briefly lingering on the clock before flicking to the window. Well, little bit of window. From her cubicle, she could only see one corner of one window, and the view only afforded her a patch of gray mountainside. At least it let in some of the sunlight. It was nice to have the occasional reminder that a world existed out there, with ponies enjoying the grass and parks and sun and each other. Or… an image of a dilapidated town square, soldiers on patrol. Then failing at math in high school. Odd. Not just nodding off—she must have fallen completely asleep and had quite the dream. Really, her landlord Applejack as a resistance fighter? She chuckled before she caught herself in the quiet room, the dream’s details already fading. A couple of her coworkers did glance at her, but most just stayed with their tasks. No talking, no laughing, just a susurration of pencils against paper. Only nine thirty? It felt like she’d gotten a day’s work done, maybe two, but only halfway to lunchtime. Back to work, then. Numbers. Lots of them in rows and columns, doing exactly what they were supposed to do. They made good friends: they never lied, never stole, never cheated. Accounts receivable, accounts payable, debits, credits, interest, depreciation, all following their little laws. She’d even shown enough aptitude at them that her supervisors had started letting her experiment, sometimes even during working hours. She’d made those numbers march and dance until they said a lot of things nopony ever thought they could. Organizing them first one way and then another, finding statistics, trends, relationships, disproving conventional wisdom that everypony knew for certain and discovering new wisdom that nopony would have suspected. After all, numbers only told what was—the easy part. The hard part: getting them to tell what might be. And the scary part: she could probably organize them to convince anypony of whatever she wanted. Risk, chance, probabilities, not the absolute truth that most expected of numbers, but true in the aggregate, and more so than the hunches and gut feelings that drove most finance. In the wrong hooves, that information could prove quite lucrative. Good thing Twilight was hopelessly honest. Even thinking about using it for ill-gotten gains sent an angry tremor through her body. But she could do so much good with it! So the only proper answer: keep it to herself and a few trusted others until she could disseminate it widely. If a lot of ponies understood, then a lot of ponies could catch any misuse. Or so she kept telling herself. Anyway, enough time wasted on daydreams. She glanced down the aisle at her old college roommate, Moondancer, who’d broken into a sweat. The poor girl must have gotten sick again. She’d never take time off, and with the winter months approaching, she must have come down with a cold or the flu. Twilight would ask her about it at lunch and tell her to go home, and Moondancer would refuse and say she had too much important work to do. If lunch ever got here. Twilight looked up at the clock. Nine thirty-five. So back to the grind. And to a particularly messy column of numbers on the more mundane side of things. For weeks now, one of the accounts had been consistently off by ten bits. A small amount, probably not worth worrying over. None of the other checkers had caught it, after all. Somepony must keep copying over a digit wrong. If it persisted much longer, she’d have to march right down to the boss’s office and tell Ledger DeMane that one of the junior receivables accountants was throwing everything off. Then, if he’d allow her, she’d head downstairs and lecture that whole room on careless errors in basic arithmetic. Twilight set her jaw and braced a hoof on her desk to rise, but… Moondancer. She’d let her gaze fix on Moondancer, who returned her stare. Her mouth hung open like… like Twilight had walked into the room in the middle of Moondancer insulting her behind her back. What had her so upset? But just as quickly, Moondancer turned around, gathered up her papers in a neat stack, and bent over them again. Twilight rested her chin on a hoof. What had…? Oh, yeah. The ten-bit errors. She tapped a pencil tip against her notebook and leaned forward. That made Moondancer just visible through one of the brass loops of her desk lamp. A couple times, Moondancer peeked over, out of the corner of her eye. And each time she did, a few rapid breaths followed. If she was sick, Twilight wouldn’t do anything to her! It wasn’t like they had a procedure to report anything like that. That was Moondancer’s business, as long as she didn’t get anypony else sick. At lunch, Twilight would say something to her, broach the subject gently. Another glance at the clock. Nine thirty-nine. Now, those ten bits. Twilight took another bite of her sandwich and tore open her bag of pretzels. Moondancer hadn’t said a word in the first seven minutes, and now they only had twenty-three left. At most, anyway, but they usually finished early and went back to their desks. But for all that they’d work quietly, they always had nice conversations over lunch. “Are you feeling well?” Twilight finally asked. Moondancer only hunched up her shoulders and shook her head. “Then why don’t you go home? We don’t have any urgent reports due soon.” “But if I save up my sick days, then when I retire—” “In thirty-two years?” Twilight gaped at her. Moondancer never made that argument. In fact, she was the one who’d calculated that a sick day would only cost her about one bit every six months of pension. In other words, she was digging for excuses. Twilight reached for Moondancer’s hoof. She flinched back at first, but eventually let Twilight take it. “Please. I’m worried about you. You don’t look right.” “I’m fine,” Moondancer mumbled through a mouthful of soup. “Don’t worry about it.” What kind of absurd—? “Of course I’m going to worry about it. You’re my best friend! You’ve been acting like you had a fever all morning.” Moondancer jerked upright in her seat, and she raised her eyebrows. “Really? Is that why you…?” “Yes! Ugh!” Twilight tossed her hooves in the air and rolled her eyes. “You sure can be blind sometimes!” With a giggle, Moondancer tapped her glasses. A little joke they’d shared for years. Finally, her friend showed some life, had a little color in her cheeks. “No, no, I feel fine. Really. I haven’t come down with anything. I just have a lot of work piling up.” Now Twilight raised an eyebrow. “What kind? I didn’t hear about any new accounts.” “Nothing, really. I just… I must be working slow. I don’t know.” Well, no use in pressing the point. She clearly didn’t want to talk about it. So Twilight smiled at her, and Moondancer slouched in her seat again, a little easier this time. “So, do you want to catch a movie tomorrow night to kick off the weekend?” Moondancer immediately shook her head. “No, I’ve been using the weekends to catch up. I’d planned to come in to the office Saturday, bright and early.” “Oh…” Wow. That far behind? Twilight had never seen her doing anything but faithfully tallying away at her desk. She almost asked, but no, she’d already decided to let it drop. “What are you working on lately?” Moondancer asked. “That special project still?” “Yeah, the usual checking, too, but I’ve been calculating my risk tables. I think that could be a very promising avenue of research.” Not to mention fun. Moondancer giggled again and shoved her glasses back on her nose. “I never understood that class. I might have failed if not for your help.” Quickly, Twilight dabbed a napkin at her mouth. “But it’s still so new. I mean, we might have the first practical application of it. It’s always hard to wrap your head around new concepts. Besides, you aced all the calculus tests, and you don’t even need that for your job. And don’t get me started on abstract algebra.” Twilight grimaced. “Give me concrete things any day, but hypothetical number systems and all—you got me through that class.” One last spoonful, and Moondancer had finished her soup. “Yes, a mathematical powerhouse. That’s us,” she said with a grin. Another little joke between them, usually while watching the other students go on dates. “Listen—you’re going places,” Twilight said. “You have ‘management’ written all over you, and you could do some really special things with this place. Me? I’d rather blend into the sea of cubicles and crunch numbers.” “I’ll never manage,” she replied, too rapidly. And there her eyes went, staring at the table as if it kept going down into ocean depths. Hm. “Anyway, I’ve got quite the little puzzle myself. Almost every day, I find an error in the account totals that the girls downstairs calculate. It’s always ten bits off, so probably a wrong digit somewhere. But it happens at least once a week. I might have to go down there and give them a little talk about double-checking their work. I haven’t said anything yet, since I don’t know whether it’s in the numbers coming in the door or going out, so…” Twilight shrugged. “Oh! I… I think I know who does those accounts. I’ll talk to her for you,” Moondancer said, rushing her way through. “I didn’t realize you supervised her.” “You sure? I don’t mind.” Twilight resisted the urge to ask who. Moondancer gave a quick wave of her hoof. “No trouble at all. I’ll track it down, and you shouldn’t have a problem with it anymore.” She was awfully sure of that. But she did know several of those mares, so having an embarrassing mistake pointed out might go down easier when a friend did it. Fair enough. So Twilight shrugged again. “Okay. And thanks.” “No problem.” Twelve twenty-eight anyway. Time to get back to work. But as they stepped away from the table, Twilight gave her a hug. “I’m glad you’re okay.” If she wasn’t mistaken, Moondancer trembled, just a little. And like clockwork, the mistakes stopped. Good, reliable Moondancer. That was why she’d make a good manager: she saw a problem and tackled it decisively. How thoroughly had she checked, though? Just with the one mare she suspected, or had she gone through all of them? And why so certain of who had done it? She’d blazed through her morning checks, and she still had an hour left before the courier brought the next packet of ledgers up. So she had time. Twilight got up from her desk and headed for the staircase. In no time, she could spot-check two or three of the accountants. In an hour, she’d found the same ten-bit error in one of the records. In the second hour, she’d found two more, and the third brought the total to four. Upstairs, that envelope would have sat on her desk for hours now. At all the desks around her, the ponies would be wondering where she’d gone. Yet another floor up, the executives waiting for the morning summaries would be checking their clocks. Twilight missed lunch. Her other classmates from college—Lyra, Lemon Hearts, Twinkleshine, and Minuette—all with identical errors. But they handled the small accounts, personal deposits from local banks and such. When Twilight had first come in and told everypony she was conducting a minor audit, nothing to worry about, all eyes had turned to Roseluck. So Moondancer must have meant her the other day. And come down here in full view of everypony to discuss it with her. But her ledgers all stood in order. So, late in the afternoon, she sat down at Lyra’s desk. Shame to have everypony see them, but it couldn’t be avoided. “Lyra,” she said in a low voice, “your total is off by exactly ten bits. Did you copy over a digit wrong?” Lyra frowned. “I don’t think so. I went through all the numbers three times.” Twilight quickly waved a hoof. “It’s not that I don’t trust you, but we’ve seen this upstairs off and on for weeks now. I only want to find out where in the chain it happens. You might have gotten a bad report from the bank on the individual accounts, and by the time I see the total, it doesn’t add up.” “Oh… okay.” Lyra scooted back from her desk and let Twilight take over. Not for long—she only needed to check a few of the accounts, and Lyra hadn’t made any mistakes. So that meant… Oh! “Your math checks out perfectly,” Twilight said, loud enough for everypony in the room to hear. Bad enough they’d all seen Twilight single her out, but at least she could quash any rumors before they started. “Good job!” So the banks had made the errors. At least that meant they had to cover the discrepancies, too. Twilight would send out a notice to them in the morning. “Thanks, Lyra.” But Lyra leaned in closer and whispered, “What is this all about? Are we getting a government audit?” “No, no,” Twilight said with a wave of her hoof. “Nothing like that. Just an odd error I kept seeing, and it looks like it’s with the banks. Nothing to worry about.” Yes, she’d take a memo in the morning. Or afternoon. She grimaced at the size of the pile that must be sitting on her desk by now. What had made Twilight think that only the personal accounts could be affected? They processed corporate accounts, securities, foreign exchanges… anything. She’d fixed that particular problem, and she could have easily considered the matter closed. But as much of an expert on risk as she’d become, that would never sit right. So later—much later—once she’d caught back up on that stack of ledgers, she rose from her seat, grabbed her key ring, and headed out. Three floors down, the vault held all the confidential records. Moondancer watched her leave, so Twilight gave her a small wave. Moondancer didn’t smile. After a short walk down a few flights of stairs, Twilight twisted her passkey in the lock and got the guard to use his. The massive metal door swung open, and Twilight waded through stack after stack of forms. Once a year, they had to take inventory and destroy the outdated ones, but it had been a while. Still, that smell of old paper. Twilight took a deep breath. If she could relocate her desk down here… Well, maybe not. Sure, it was quiet, but it’d also keep her isolated from her friends. To the reports, then. It probably made sense to start from the same dates as the bank errors. Twilight pulled out the binders showing market transactions and levitated her abacus out of her saddlebag. Lots of numbers, too many to keep a running total in her head. At least she’d chosen a day the markets closed early, so it was a shorter list than usual. So it only took thirty-five minutes to discover that the balance was off by… One thousand bits. Exactly one thousand bits. What? How…? Enough of this. Twilight clenched her jaw. No need to check out more of these time-consuming business accounts. She quickly found the cabinet with the original paperwork forwarded from that particular bank where all this had started, then leafed through the pages until she’d found the correct day. To the last page of it, and… sure enough, it had reported an incorrect total. Ten bits off from the amount on the front page summary. Just a matter of contacting the bank and letting them know they had some internal inaccuracies, then, or so she would have thought yesterday. But… oh, she was awful, wasn’t she? As trustworthy a pony as she was, nopony would ever know. Which account was it? Maybe somepony she knew, and she had to get to the bottom of this anyway. So she paged through until she found one of the line items that didn’t add up and— No. No, this wasn’t right. No error on the bank’s part. The incoming line showed the correct balance. The line had been altered. Altered!? But that would require— Her eyes tore across the sheet until they zeroed in on the one piece that didn’t belong: a number, rewritten, so precisely that she wouldn’t have noticed it as different from the typeface if she hadn’t been looking for it. And even then, it’d taken her three passes to catch it. Who’d approved this form? The cover page. Twilight turned the whole sheaf back to the beginning, and on the front, “LH.” Lemon Hearts? L-Lyra Heartstrings? She couldn’t think of any others right now, nopony else who might have the same initials. But those two did handle these kinds of accounts. Both friends, both… Could Lemon have done this? Or-or Lyra. Had Lyra told her a blatant lie? To her face? Twilight pounded a hoof on the shelf, slammed the cabinet shut, and stormed back up the stairs. “Lyra,” Twilight whispered, every ounce of concentration devoted to keeping her voice down. She clenched her jaw until her teeth hurt. “Did you falsify bank records?” Lyra whipped her head around. Her pencil clattered to the floor, and she shoved her chair back from her desk, knocking over a stack of folios. “N-no!” she hissed. “Why would I do that?” “I’ll only give you one chance to come clean. Then I’m taking it upstairs.” A tremor shot through Lyra’s body, and she braced herself against the desk. “P-please, Twilight! No! I didn’t do anything!” More and more heads turned their way. Only the closest could possibly have heard what they said, but no matter. She deserved this. “A series of forged adjustments,” Twilight said, jabbing a hoof toward the vault below, “all initialed ‘LH.’ And not with the little loopy ‘L’ that Lemon Hearts uses. I checked the writing. It’s yours.” She didn’t even bother whispering anymore. “N-no, I didn’t—Twilight, somepony’s trying to frame me!” Lyra sank into her chair, slumped forward, and buried her face in her hooves, teardrops trickling around them. “Please! You have to believe me!” “Who? Why?” Lyra didn’t have any answers. Still, a knot formed in Twilight’s throat. Her good friend, for a long time now, and— Twilight put a hoof on Lyra’s shoulder. “I think you should find a lawyer. I guess you probably thought you had a good reason. Maybe your counsel can convince a jury of that.” Her mouth gaping open, Lyra looked up. Her face went ashen. “Over ten bits!?” “How did you know it was ten bits?” “You told me yesterday!” Lyra said, her gaze flashing around to all the onlookers as if they might corroborate her story. That part, yes. “Lyra, it’s the corporate accounts, too. Stocks, transfers, exchanges. Thousands of bits. Thousands.” Twilight shook her head. The fire in her gut had burned down. A good friend, but one who’d tried to cheat her. Or cheat the company, but same thing. Its reputation reflected on her as well. Twilight lowered her voice again. “Look, if you admit what you did and put the money back, maybe… maybe I can…” “No!” Lyra wailed. “I can’t, I didn’t do it, I don’t have the money to put back, because I didn’t do it!” she blubbered through her sobbing. “It wasn’t me! How hard is it to fake my initials?” “I compared the writing. It’s the same,” Twilight said. But Lyra did have a point. In fact—she should have checked as far back as possible. She should have… A light flashed in her eyes. “Lyra, don’t move from this spot.” Lyra hurriedly shook her head before blowing her nose. “I’m trusting you.” Lyra nodded, almost too quickly. Then Twilight rushed back to the vault. All those records. Too many things to verify. Papers flew right and left—she could get them back in order later. That wasn’t important now. First, the original errors that had caught her eye, from Roseluck, the only one of her own team whose name had ever turned up. All initialed by Lyra. Lemon Hearts, Minuette, Twinkleshine, all on Moondancer’s team. All initialed by Lyra. The corporate accounts, too. Dates, going back two years—two years? June second, only a few weeks ago. May sixteenth, April twenty-fifth— April twenty-fifth. Why did that date stick in Twilight’s mind? A… a Friday. What did she do on Fridays? Go out to dinner, sometimes see a movie… Oh yeah, that new tear-jerker had come out then, and— And Lyra hadn’t gone with the group. She’d been out of town to attend her cousin’s wedding. She hadn’t worked that day. She couldn’t have done it. She couldn’t have done it, and Twilight basically called her a criminal in front of all her coworkers. Sweet Celestia, please let her still be at her desk. If she’d panicked and run… Twilight took a cleansing breath. Much of the evidence still pointed at Lyra. Twilight could help her by figuring this all out. So all ponies from Moondancer’s team, except Roseluck. Why Roseluck? What made her different? Twilight didn’t even know her that well—she’d only moved over to Twilight’s accounts a couple of months ago, from Moondancer— Twilight’s knees wobbled, and she plopped roughly to her haunches. Her best friend. Her best friend ever since they were fillies. She’d cheated them, she’d threatened Twilight’s reputation, she’d implicated another of their friends. What had she done? What had Twilight done? She’d jumped to conclusions and nearly wrecked Lyra’s life! Time to end this. But without flying off the handle this time. If she found what she thought she would in Moondancer’s desk, she’d have all the proof she needed. Behind her, the vault door closed. Whirling around, Twilight took a defensive crouch, her horn blazing. What good would it do to lock her in here? Worst case, somepony would come by next morning. It wouldn’t erase any of the evidence— Moondancer stood just inside the door, her eyes swollen and red. She had only a small notepad with her, which she tossed to the floor in front of Twilight. “I think that’s what you wanted,” she said. Then she collapsed to the floor. “I’m sorry!” she squeaked. The glow of Twilight’s magic softened, and she flipped open the notepad. Doodles, reminders, numbers. Then a few pages in, “LH.” Hundreds of times, over and over again, sloppy at first, but improving to the point that Twilight would never be able to discern it from the authentic one. Pretty much what she’d expected to find, but now she didn’t have to go looking. But Moondancer… If somepony as trustworthy as Lyra had surprised her, then Moondancer… “Why?” It was all Twilight could say. Her own tears ran down her cheeks. “Please,” Moondancer said, gazing up at her from the floor, “just hear me out. All of it. Then I’ll do whatever you say.” Twilight nodded. The first few words echoed as if coming from the far end of a cave. Twilight shook her head—she had to concentrate. “…And he said if I didn’t cooperate, he’d…” Twilight’s head swam. Her best friend. Her best friend, who earned a very comfortable living, stole money? Her mind wandered back to their school days, taking accounting classes, studying together, doing their internships at the bank. Moondancer had stopped talking. She just stared. “So…?” With a sigh, Twilight squeezed her eyes shut. “Okay. Start over. Why did you take the money?” “Because if I didn’t, he said he’d have me fired, blackball me… He said I’d never work in this industry again. But it was only ten bits here and there. Nopony would miss it. So I believed him, and…” She dropped her gaze to the floor. “Ten bits that belonged to somepony else! It might not seem like much to you!” Moondancer coughed up another little sob. “But the company would cover it! We can afford it!” “It drives up everypony’s costs. You know that. And who? Who told you to do this?” Moondancer only gave an incoherent mumble. “Who?” With a whimper, Moondancer covered her face. “L-Ledger. Ledger DeMane.” The… the boss? The one who made all this happen, the one who’d let Twilight have the freedom to develop her risk theory? The one she’d admired for years? Her knees gave out, and she thudded to the floor. “Ledger?” she said quietly. “He convinced me ten bits wouldn’t hurt anypony, that he would fire me if I didn’t, and nopony would believe me over him. But I was stupid enough to sign those forms with my own name. He said he’d protect me, but then—” she shuddered “—he started asking for more: a hundred from this business, a thousand from that security. He… he had the proof. He had the proof that I’d forged transactions, and he said if I ever refused him or told anyone, he’d turn me in. Nopony would believe me. Or even if they did, I’d go down with him. I’m in too deep, Twilight. I-I don’t think anything can help me now.” Moondancer sat up, rubbed her nose, and sniffled hard. “It’s all over, isn’t it? Nopony will ever hire me again, no matter what. I don’t know what to do.” Her ears couldn’t possibly droop any lower, and she had her face pressed to the ground. Twilight walked over to her, wrapped a hoof around her, and pulled her into a hug. Moondancer let go, her body shaking and her tears running down Twilight’s withers. “Shh,” Twilight said, stroking Moondancer’s mane. “It’s okay. Shh. I’ll take care of it.” “But what can you do?” Moondancer replied, choking on the words. “Let me worry about that.” Twilight ground her teeth. Ledger would pay for this. Her best friend, life in tatters now because he had sticky hooves. Never satisfied, always wanting more. Well, he’d get it. “I only need one thing from you. I assume you’ve put the money in a secret account for him. Where?” Moondancer took a tremulous breath. “N-number’s in my desk. In the hidden compartment. You know where.” Twilight nodded and patted Moondancer’s shoulder. “Go home. Get some rest.” “But—” “I’ll have this sorted out by morning. Go home.” Moondancer took a step away and looked back. “Th-thanks, Twilight. I don’t deserve you as a friend.” In response, Twilight gave a wan smile. “Tell Lyra to go home, too. And tell her…” Twilight let out a heavy sigh. “Tell her I’m sorry.” She didn’t watch Moondancer leave. A lot to do and not a lot of time to do it. She’d fix this for Moondancer. She’d fix this for Lyra as well. But Lyra would probably never forgive her. Morning. Twilight sat at her desk as the first few employees drifted in. They did a little double take; she always showed up another twenty minutes later. Always. So she sat there, stock still. Five minutes passed. Two of the couriers came by, dropping off yesterday’s reports for her to check. She let them pile up; somepony else would have to take care of them. Ten minutes. Another three dossiers and an intra-office memo added to the stack. Still she sat, staring ahead. Whispers started up around her. Lyra should have gotten to her desk right about then, and Moondancer would show up any second. They needed to be here before anything could happen. It was important. Fifteen minutes. Moondancer took her seat down the aisle, unpacked the bagel she always brought for breakfast, and glanced curiously at Twilight. No need for her to worry, but she trembled anyway. Poor girl. It would all be over soon enough. And twenty. Right on schedule, a flurry of conversation sounded in the hall. Half proceeded up another flight of stairs, and half came up the aisle toward her. “Miss Twilight Sparkle?” a gruff voice said. She swiveled around in her chair and looked up at its stocky owner. “Yes.” As he stared, she let her gaze drop to the floor. Something about his eyes, or the way he slightly shook his head. “Do you have it?” Twilight nodded and pointed at the notepad on her desk. Two of the other ponies in the group flashed badges and flipped through it. She already knew what they’d find. First page, account numbers from an overseas bank. Next, detailed notes about transactions, too numerous to be coincidental. Times Ledger DeMane had taken vacations, bought a beach cottage, replaced his old carriage. Matching withdrawals from the account, conveniently in the same amounts. Finally, page after page of “LH,” over and over again, by the end quite indistinguishable from the real article. It had taken her all night to get that down, but if asked for proof now, she could provide a demonstration. And then a page of Moondancer’s signatures. She’d learned that one way back in college. It hadn’t taken her five minutes to get it right again. The stallion nodded to his associates. “Twilight Sparkle, you are under arrest for embezzlement, securities fraud, conspiracy to commit securities fraud…” Only then did Twilight look over at Moondancer. She’d gone pale and shook so hard that she nearly spilled her coffee. “It’s okay,” Twilight mouthed to her. “…the right to remain silent. If you give up this right, anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law…” She pursed her lips and nodded to Moondancer, who slumped in her chair and heaved for breath. Then one of the officers approached Twilight with a set of shackles. “You aren’t going to make these necessary, are you?” the detective said, angling his head toward them. “No.” He shook his head, and the officer flipped the chain across his back. “I’ve spoken with the district attorney. If you’re willing to plead guilty and testify like you indicated in your letter, she’s prepared to offer you probation. The judge would give you a suspended sentence,” the detective said. “I understand.” Twilight rose and walked out with him, every eye on her. Moondancer could have done this, too. Except she was right—she’d never work in this industry again. A job she enjoyed, a field she’d invested her life in, forbidden to her forever. No legal absolution would change that. Of course, Twilight would never work in the industry again, either. She had another way out, though: her risk theory. Only Moondancer and Ledger DeMane knew about it. And after today, if Ledger tried to say she’d developed it on company time, who would believe him? What did he have to gain from it anyway? Only the company would reap the benefits, though she wouldn’t put it past him to do it out of sheer spite. Still, when she was the one cooperating with the authorities, and nopony would back his accusation… She’d sell her research, maybe to this company and maybe to another, and continue to develop it. She’d do quite well for herself. One more piece of the puzzle, though. The officers escorted her down the stairs, in full view of all the accounts specialists. Lyra glared at her. Maybe Moondancer would tell her someday, much later, when it couldn’t possibly change anything. But for now, Lyra needed to see this: the one who’d so loudly accused her, under arrest for the very same crime. Let her hate Twilight; she deserved it, at least in part. Down more stairs, past venom-filled gazes, and finally out into the street. The police station was only a block away, and up ahead walked Ledger, who apparently did require shackles. It all went as a blur. She sat in a crowded room, answered a few basic questions for the paperwork, stood in line. When her turn came, she held up a card with her name on it and turned to the side. A camera flashed. “Face forward,” somepony said. She complied. The camera flashed again, and— Everything stopped. All the buzzing of voices, gone, the whole room bathed in white. Then the white flaked away, peeled off like birch bark, leaving behind only an endless black. All alone, in the dark. Her body gave way and collapsed to the floor as she fought for breath. Finally, she rolled onto her back, the cool stillness a welcome respite from that bustling, humid press. Were her eyes even open? She couldn’t see anyway, so she drank in the chill air and swallowed against the dryness in her throat. With a sigh, she surrendered to the oppressive grip of her cramped muscles and overwrought mind, allowing sleep to claim her.