Inside her office Dean Cadence sat behind her desk, surrounded by towering piles of paperwork. In her hand she held the speaker of her telephone, sounding rather stressed as she talked into it.
“Yes, Principal Cinch, the students all have calmed down... No one had to be sent home... Yes, we cleaned that up... No, I don’t think they will tell their parents. Most of them are probably ashamed of their outbreak... What?... A disciplinary class?... Principal Cinch, I really don’t think a weekly lecture to all the students about the importance of discipline is necessary… How am I supposed to squeeze it into the timetable? It’s overbooked already!… Look, I think if we just-”
The door to the office suddenly swung open. Stopping mid-sentence Cadence watched in surprise as Sour stormed into her office.
“DEAN CADENCE!!” she shouted, but then stopped. Hands on her knees she bent forward, panting heavily for a few seconds. Behind her Sunny, Sugarcoat, Lemon and Indigo rushed into the room, stopping behind Sour to catch their breath.
“I’ll call you back in a minute” Cadence spoke into the speaker before hanging up. Arms crossed on her desk she looked at the quintet in front of her. “Girls, I wanted to talk with you. A number of students came by earlier, and said you had grabbed them on the hallway and practically kidnapped them-”
“That’s not important!” Sour cut her off. She jumped forward, slamming her hands on the desk and staring the dean directly into the eyes. “I know where the pudding is!”
Surprised Cadence raised her eyebrows. “Really? Where?” she asked.
Behind her Sour’s friends were still panting. “We’ve been trying to get that out of her on the way here” Sunny huffed angrily.
Lemon nodded. “Yeah, she was suddenly all like ‘I know who’s did-done-do it’ and then she rushed here.”
“Couldn’t you have taken a minute to tell us what happened?” Indigo asked annoyed, stretching herself.
Folding her arms Sour wrinkled her nose. “I don’t like to explain things twice” she simply replied.
The other girls formed a half-circle around Sour, looking sternly, but with interest at her. “Alright, Miss Holmes” Sunny said, a slightly smug ring in her voice. “Now that we’ve all gathered around the dean, please do enlighten us. Who are the thieves?”
“That’s right!” Indigo yelled, punching into her palm. “Tell us the names of those dorks so I can give them the clobbering they deserve!”
Cadence glared at the blue-haired girl. “No one will be clobbered at this school!” Cadence clarified, causing Indigo to duck herself slightly. The dean then turned her attention back to Sour. “Still, I must admit you made me rather curious. Who do you think stole the pudding?”
Sour glanced around her. Everyone was staring at her, expecting her to say the name of the culprits. She took in a deep breath, before saying in a perfectly straight voice: “Nobody.”
There was a long silence following Sour’s one-word reply. The Shadowbolts stared dumbfounded at her, blinking several times in confusion.
“Er… what?” Lemon eventually broke the silence, sounding just as puzzled as she looked.
“You think nobody stole the pudding?” Sugarcoat asked as if she hadn’t heard her right.
Sour nodded. “Yes. The pudding wasn’t stolen.”
The shoulders of Indigo slumped. “Aw man, then who am I supposed to beat up?” she moaned.
The dean also had raised her eyebrows slightly, but otherwise remained calm. “So what happened to the pudding if it wasn’t stolen?” she asked. “You said you knew where happened to it and where it is.”
Again Sour nodded. “The pudding is in the truck that brought it to the school this morning” she answered, causing her friends to wince in surprise.
“So the deliverer has taken it!” Sunny declared, but Sour shook her head.
“As I said, nobody stole the pudding” she repeated “Neither a student nor the driver of the truck. It got back inside by accident.”
Sugarcoat looked incredulously at her. “And how did that happen?”
“Did the pudding suddenly grow feet and walk back into the truck?” Indigo asked sarcastically.
The eyes of Lemon sparkled with childish glee. “Dude, that’d be so cool!”
“It didn’t walk out!” Sour snapped at her. Regaining her composure she explained more calmly: “We can assume the deliverer stacked the pallets of pudding to a single tower. After putting down the second last stack on top of the others, I think he accidentally bumped against the tower as he left for the last one. The floor in the cold store is frozen, and very slippery. Because he was in such a hurry he didn’t notice the pudding glided over it, towards and then out of the backdoor.”
Sour was met with the wide and bewildered gazes of her friends. “Wait, you think the pudding just… rolled out of the room?” Indigo asked, looking at Sour as if she was crazy.
“That sounds very unlikely” Sugarcoat bluntly told her. “Especially since the door to the outside was closed.”
“Yeah, even I know pudding can’t open doors” Lemon agreed.
Sour turned towards her first assistant of the day. “Sunny, you only needed to lean lightly against the door to make it open, right?”
Though looking skeptical of Sour’s assumption Sunny thoughtfully tipped on her chin. “That’s true” she admitted.
“And the pudding tower must have been pretty tall” Sour continued. “I’m pretty sure their combined weight was enough to make open the door after bumping against it. The pallets rolled out of the cold store and then down the ramp in front of it. Because the deliverer didn’t know the door was jammed from the outside he probably parked his truck in front of it when he arrived, and left it open to save time. So the pudding moved over the asphalt and then up the ramp of the truck right, back into it.”
The four girls exchanged some glances. They still didn’t seem completely convinced, but they appeared like they were starting to consider Sour’s theory. The dean only quietly looked at Sour, her face not betraying her thoughts.
“Okay” Sunny eventually said “Let’s imagine the pudding actually rolled out like that and landed back inside the truck. How come the deliver didn’t see it when he picked up the last pallet?”
“The lunch lady said he was in a hurry because he was late for his next delivery” Sour reminded her. “Considering his truck was full of food crates for other schools, if the pallets rolled to the back of it and additionally toppled over and were scattered all over, he could have easily overlooked them when he picked up the last one in haste.”
Slowly the traces of doubt were vanishing from the girls’ faces. Only Sugarcoat furrowed her brows. “Now hold on!” she harshly said to Sour. “I don’t know how high the ramp of that truck is, but it’s definitely higher than the one behind school. And while I could imagine the pudding to glide over the frozen floor out of the cold store, I doubt it could have kept its speed on hard asphalt. It is hardly likely the pallets would have had enough momentum to roll all the way up the ramp, and even more impossible for them to get further than a few inches inside the truck.”
Unfazed Sour turned to Sugarcoat. “You remember that oily stuff you crawled over, close to the door?” she asked.
Sugarcoat rubbed her hand off on her vest. “It’s still on my fingers and uniform” she murmured.
“What if it wasn’t just at that one spot, but if there was originally a trail leading from the door towards the truck?” Sour speculated, surprising everyone. “The pallets would have not lost much speed when gliding on it, and could have just gained enough momentum from the ramp to rush up inside the truck.”
Her thumb under the leather-strap of her goggles Indigo scratched her head. “And where did that oily stuff come from?”
“Did the truck have an oil leak or sumthin’?” Lemon asked.
“Possible, but I think it came from the chemistry lab above the cold store” Sour told them. “One of the chemicals could have been smacked off the window and fallen to the ground, where it left a trail for the pudding to slide on.”
Indigo looked at the subtle stain of oil on Sugarcoat’s vest. “So you think this is one of the chemicals from this school?”
“We have so many chemicals here” Sour said “I wouldn’t be surprised if some greasy, disgusting oil was among them.”
“But the chemicals are usually contained in glass bottles” Sugarcoat objected. “If one really had been dropped from that height, we would have found shards.”
“And I doubt any teacher would allow the students to place the chemicals on the windowsill, dearie” Sunny added.
“If it had been in a glass bottle, you would be right” Sour confirmed. “But what if one of the students filled that that oily chemical into an empty bottle of lemonade?”
That was when it clicked in Sugarcoat’s head. “You mean the one we found behind the school?”
Sour grinned. “That’s the one!”
Hands on her hips Sunny looked skeptically at her. “Now why would any student try to smuggle some oily, slippery liquid out of the chemistry lab inside a lemonade bottle?” she asked.
Indigo smirked slyly. “To spill it somewhere on the floor and then watch everyone fall on their butt!”
“Or in the cafeteria” Lemon said with a grin “Right at the end of the counter where everyone passes with a full try!”
“Or on the basketball field before a big game!” Indigo exclaimed.
“Or in a changing cabin!” Lemon yelled.
“Or in the teacher’s longue!” both girls shouted in unison, clapping into each other’s hand while Sunny rolled her eyes.
Clearing her throat Sour regained the attention of everybody. “As you can see Sunny, there is a demand – for childish pranksters, but still. He or she either mixed the chemical together or refilled it into the lemonade bottle and then put it on the windowsill, but accidentally knocked it out. Because it’s a plastic bottle it didn’t break, instead rolling from its landing spat on the ramp of the cold store over the whole loading zone until it reached the sidewalk. And since there was no top on it, it left a trail of oil on the way for the pudding to glide on later.”
Quietly her friends stared at Sour for a moment. “If that were true” Sugarcoat then said carefully “we would have found a trail leading from the door to the bottle. But there was only a small puddle on the asphalt. What happened to the rest?”
“It probably evaporated” Sour assumed. “Oil usually doesn’t have a high boiling point, and asphalt can get pretty warm. So when the sun heated it up the liquid slowly evaporated, and by the time we arrived only a puddle was left. It was probably right at the spot where the truck had parked earlier, since its shadow would have kept the asphalt from heating up there and therefore prolonged the time of its evaporation.”
“And why the driver didn’t notice all the oil?” Indigo asked. “Cause the way you explain it, it must have been there when he parked the truck already.”
Sour shrugged. “Either he didn’t notice it because he was in a hurry or he didn’t care.” Facing her comrades she stemmed her hands against her hips, looking determinately at them. “From all we’ve seen, I am convinced the pudding accidentally rolled out of the cold store, and then glided over the path of oil back into the truck to a position where the deliverer didn’t see it. So, right now, the pudding meant for our school is still in this truck, driving from school to school as he makes his deliveries, and he probably won’t notice before he finishes his tour sometime in the afternoon.”
Quietly the other four Shadowbolts stared at the detective, who seemed very convinced of herself. Eventually Sunny raised her voice: “When you say it like that… it could have actually happened this way. Maybe.”
“But it sounds very fabricated” Sugarcoat remarked dryly.
“How can you be so sure the pudding wasn’t stolen?” Indigo asked, arms crossed defiantly. “Seems more likely to me than what you said.”
With her index finger Sour tapped against her head. “Think about it: We are talking about over a thousand pots of pudding here. Even for a dozen thieves, it would have been enough to just grab a couple of pallets and get away. Carrying the entire stock would have been too much of a risk, especially since they couldn’t eat all of it anyway before it became bad.”
The others pondered for a moment. “Maybe they were greedy and just took it all without thinking?” Lemon suggested.
Sour shook her head. “I doubt it ” she said, before clenching her hand into a fist. “Of all the students at this school, there is only one who is actually crazy enough for cherry-cream-pudding to steal the entire school supply!”
“And you know you didn’t do it?” Sugarcoat guessed.
A big smile formed on Sour’s face. “Exactly♥”
Having listened without saying anything Dean Cadence sat up. “So, you are convinced the pudding is still inside the truck?” she asked.
Turning back to her Sour nodded. “I think so” she said, leaning over the desk. “Dean Cadence, if you have the number of the driver or of his company, could you call them please? Maybe there is still time to come back here before lunch.”
Cadence placed a hand on her chin. “I don’t know” she mumbled. “It all sounds plausible, and I’d be really happy if the students got their pudding.” Her hand moved up to her forehead and rubbed it. “But if the pudding turns out not to be in the truck, the school could get into trouble for pestering the deliverer with the convoluted theory of a high school student – no offense.”
“I’ll take the responsibility” Sour assured her. As the dean still seemed unsure she leaned even closer, staring at her with big pleading eyes. “Please!”
For a moment Cadence thoughtfully stared at Sour, before she let a sigh. “Alright” she said, causing the five students in front of her to perk up. She grabbed into one of the many staples of documents on her desk, and after searching through it she pulled out a sheet of paper with many different phone numbers on it. “The catering company has given us the numbers of the drivers in case there is an issue with the delivery” she explained while moving her finger down the list, until stopping at a certain number. She picked up the speaker of her phone and began to type it in. While she was holding it to her ear the five girls stared at her, especially Sour growing more nervous with each “peep” of the dial. Their hearts then made a skip as someone picked on the other end of the line.
“Yeah?” the grumpy, rough voice of a man said through the speaker.
Though he couldn’t see her Cadence smiled politely. “Hello, this is Dean Mi Amore Cadenzia from Crystal Prep Academy. I’m sorry to disturb you, but-”
“If tis still ‘bout yer pudding call my boss, lady, I’m mighty busy right now” the man interrupted her, sounding rather annoyed.
“I understand that” Cadence assured him, nervously twirling the phone cable around her finger. “And I don’t intent to keep you from your work for long. I just wanted to ask you of you could, um, take a look into your truck and see if the pudding was… inside it?”
There was a long pause on the other end of the line – so long Cadence began to fear he had hung up.
“YA THINK I’M DUMB OR SUMTHIN’?” it suddenly blared out of the speaker. Startled Cadence pulled her head back while the girls winced. “I spent half morning carrying the damn puddin’ all the way through your school! I’m WAY behind my schedule, my feet still ache, and I nearly twisted my side because the damn pallets were so heavy! And now ya got the nerve to call me and ask if the puddin’ is still in here?!”
With her pinkie Cadence bored in her ear, before carefully putting the speaker back on it. “Look, if you would just take a look around your truck-”
“Listen, lady” the man interrupted her again, sounding like he was just about to explode. “I’m stand’n right here in my truck, and like I told’cha this mornin’, there ain’t no puddin’ and I can’t just pull it from my-”
Suddenly he stopped. Once more it became silent on the other end of the line – not even the man’s breath could be heard. The dean, Sour and the other girls stared at the speaker of the telephone. When the man spoke it was so loud everyone in the office retreated slightly.
“HOW THE HECK DID THAT GET IN HERE?!”
As she returned the speaker to her ear a slightly sly smile grew on the dean’s face. “I take it you have found the pudding?” she asked.
“I-I-I swear, lady… I mean M-Miss Cadenza, I-I brought the stuff… the pudding into your school!” he told her. All the anger in his voice was gone, sounding so panicked the girls could basically hear the sweat rolling down his face. “I-I don’t know how it got back in here-”
“It’s okay” Cadence assured him. “We know it isn’t your fault.”
“Please, don’t tell my boss about this!” he begged her. “I already messed up a delivery this month! If he finds out about I screwed up again…”
The smile on the dean’s face became even bigger. “Well, we did pay for the pudding already, so I’m afraid I’ll have to talk with your superiors about how we could get our money back.” She leaned back in her chair, tilting it in a more comfortable position. “Of course, there would be no need for a refund if we actually got what we paid for…”
“On my way!” the man immediately promised her. “Won’t make it before 12, but once I’m there, I swear I’ll have the puddin’ back in your cold store before you can even blink!”
“Thank you very much.” The dean hadn’t even finished the sentence when the deliverer had already hung up. Leaning forward again she put the speaker back on the phone. “Maybe I enjoyed this a little bit more than I should have” she said, still grinning as she looked at the girls. “But it seems your pudding is on the way.”
Having been stiff and nervous before all five Shadowbolts broke out into a loud cheer, raising their fists into the air. Sour was about to shout “PUDDING” when suddenly Lemon jumped at her back, wrapping her arms around Sour’s neck while nearly knocking her over. “Great job, Sour!” Lemon screamed, hugging her so tightly it was embarrassing the detective.
At the same time Indigo put a hand on her shoulder, smirking right next to her face. “Yeah!” She winked. “Guess all the talk about being a genius really wasn’t all hot air.”
Smiling Sour freed herself from Lemon while brushing off Indigo’s hand. “Thanks girls – but I’m not a genius.”
Surprised her friends grew silent, staring at her with big eyes.
“Seriously?” Scowling Sunny stemmed her hands into her sides. “The whole day you boasted about how brilliant you were, but when we call you a genius you deny it?”
“You found the pudding” Sugarcoat said to Sour, who however shook her head.
“No, WE found the pudding” Sour corrected her, winking at her friends. “I wouldn’t have found out what had happened without you girls.”
The others looked at her in confusion. “Really?” Sunny asked.
“But we didn’t do anything!” Indigo argued.
“You did” Sour countered, counting with her fingers as she recited the traces: “Sunny slipped on the floor and fell out of the cold room through the door, so I figured the same could have happened to the pudding. Sugarcoat found the oil. During my interrogations there was a guy who had mixed together a stink bomb in the chemistry lab. When Indigo and Lemon mentioned they had a race to the chemistry lab I remembered the window of it was right above the cold store. So, combined with how the juice left a trail on the asphalt when Indigo dropped it from the windowsill, I figured this way the oil Sugarcoat had found could have been the remnants of a trail left by a bottle a prankster had prepared and that had fallen out from the window of the chemistry lab.”
Quietly her friends stared at Sour, their look on their faces equal to a dropped jaw. “But… you were the one who connected those dots” Sugarcoat managed to say after a while.
“None of us would have figured that out!” Lemon yelled.
With a warm smile Sour let her eyes wander over each of her friends. “Maybe” she said to them. “But without you girls, I wouldn’t have found those dots in the first place.”
The girls blushed, looking somewhat flustered, but also flattered. Folding her hands in front of her Cadence smirked. “Sounds like you learned a lesson in friendship” she happily noticed.
“That’s right!” Sour confirmed, cheerfully turning towards the dean. “You don’t need to be a genius to solve a crime. All you need are friends!”
Sunny, Sugarcoat, Lemon and Indigo smiled.
“Friends who are so clumsy to slip on the floor, drop juice bottles from the window, have no shame to crawl through the dirt if you ask them to and are dumb and reckless enough to risk their heads in a race on some unstable vines” Sour then proceeded in a less chipper tone, causing her friends to drop their smiles and frown at her.
“Hey, you were climbing on the vines first!” Indigo told her angrily, to which Lemon nodded in approval.
The dean looked horrified at them. “You girls did WHAT?”
“Nothing!” the three girls immediately replied, showing angelic smiles to the dean.
“There is one thing I don’t quite get though” Sunny chimed in, rubbing her chin with a finger. “How does the button you found fit into all of this?
Putting a hand into her pocket Sour pulled out said item, holding the blue piece of plastic up in the light streaming in through the windows. “It doesn’t” Sour simply said. “Looking at it closely it’s probably from an older design of our school uniforms. Could have been in there for ages.”
Sugarcoat adjusted her glasses. “So the only clue you found by yourself was a red herring” she stated.
She ducked as Sour threw the button towards her face
“I will inform the principal right away” Dean Cadence told the quintett, looking with great pride and relief at them. “I’m really in your debt, girls. Thanks to you, the students of Crystal Prep Academy can enjoy their Pudding Tuesday after all!”
Once more the girls jubilated, Sour seeming especially cheerful of their accomplishment. “PUDDING!” she screamed, raising both arms into the air. Just then she could feel two hands on each of her shoulders. Looking left and right she saw Sunny, Indigo, Sugarcoat and Lemon each having put a hand on her shoulder. As they smiled at her she grew calm, smiling back at them.
And so, the case of the stolen pudding that never was had been solved. It turned out to be just a series of ill turns of fate, a slap in the face to a couple of innocent and hard-working high school students by a higher entity with a twisted sense of humor. And while it was my mind that eventually tracked the mystery to its bottom, without the help of its pack this lone wolf would have never been able to hunt down its prey. As for me, I was left with little more than the appreciation and gratitude of my assistants and the dean – nothing that could help me pay my bills (if I had to), but in this corrupted cruel world, I guess the respect of those you really care about is worth way more than any fancy reward or money could be.
“Really? Because I actually intended to reward you all for your service to the school, but if you prefer to be a hard-boiled detective underappreciated by the cruel world she lives in…”
“What? Nonono! Forget that noire nonsense! Sour wants her reward, please!”