//------------------------------// // Casing and Questioning // Story: The White Phoenix // by Quick Fix //------------------------------// February 22nd I should get some kind of neckwear for my outfit. Rarity would probably suggest a cravat or...Oh, yeah. Stay focused Sweetie Belle. If somepony had told me several months ago that I would be a singer-slash-shopkeeper by day and a private investigator by night, I'd have told them that they had a neat idea for a book. Turns out I'm living that book though and time to finish it does not feel on my side right now. While The White Phoenix may have settled down for now, I have a new, more personal case in the meantime. The Equestria Today has crossed the line with it's attacks on me and my friends, all I need is evidence to prove there's a personal motive behind it. I have an idea how I can get it though. I've offered them an exclusive interview on the upturn of my music career and they accepted eagerly. I've spruced myself up and prepared for any attempts to undermine me they may have prepared. They wonder what I get out of this. I get the chance to look around their offices a little, see if I can see or hear anything that might give away a hint of their motivations. It isn't going to be easy, but then it never seems to be. All that matters is I can make sure my friends are no longer under pressure from this hounding enemy. ...Hmm, I can see why Rarity enjoys doing these detective's monologues. They're actually pretty fun. Sweetie Belle set those thoughts aside for now and focused again. She needed to be on top of her game today, going in to be interviewed by what amounted to her worst enemy in all Equestria right now. Negotiations to make this happen had been surprisingly quick and in her favour however, including giving her the right to veto any segments that appeared unfairly biased. If it was an attempt to get her to relax her guard though, it wasn't working, she was still wary of what they might be hiding behind such niceness. For now though, she just had to make her way there. The Manehatten streets were in something of a lull at the moment, that brief midday calm as ponies almost collectively decided to break for lunch within the same three quarters of an hour. It was still busier than the average day she'd seen back in Ponyville but Sweetie was used to both types of activity level. As she made her way up toward her destination just off the city's north edge, she idly thought that the general atmosphere, down here on the streets, definitely felt a lot calmer than when she had arrived nearly two months ago. Originally the ponies she had seen on the streets betrayed a sense of tension, worry about the greater threat they seemed to be under. Now though, she could see them looking more optimistic as they made their way about, the snippets of conversation she heard were just about everyday life again. Granted, their sense of safety was being paid for by the extra pressure on the likes of Babs and Truth, but it really did feel like they were all making a difference. Before long she reached her destination. The main offices of the Equestria Today looked rather unassuming at a glance, a seven-story building with the company logo fitted above the double door entrance in a deep blue. She couldn't help but notice that the walls actually had a small silver looking trim along their edges, an inconspicuous move to increase their flair, possibly to look more imposing to those entering. Sweetie shook the thought and entered, looking round the entrance lobby that was surprisingly welcome looking in comparison to outside. After a moment to take it in she stepped up to the reception desk, manned by a white earth stallion. "Hello there, I'm here to be interviewed, Sweetie Belle." She said, waiting as the receptionist checked his notes and nodded. "Pleasure to see you, head up to the third floor where somepony will be waiting for you." He replied with a demeanour that seemed to indicate his professionalism was barely containing his enthusiasm at getting to meet her, motioning to the doors just to the right of the desk. Sweetie nodded her thanks and headed through the indicated door, finding herself in a stairwell that seemed to run all the way up the building. Silently cursing the stairs for their seemingly constant need to tire her out, she made her way up to the third floor and stepped through the door there. From the looks of it, she'd stepped into the main center of operations. The setup reminded her of her days working on the Foal Free Press, only more professional and with individual working spaces for the dozens of ponies placed in here. Standing nearby was a middle aged unicorn stallion with a tan body, russet coloured mane and tail kept short and kempt along with some matching stubble, orange eyes and a cutie mark of a quill writing on a newspaper. He turned on hearing her enter and broke into a smile that, to Sweetie's confusion, didn't have any sense of hidden motive behind it. "Miss Sweetie Belle, it's an honour," He said, offering his hoof for her to shake, continuing as she did. "My name's Ink Slinger and I'll be interviewing you today. Do you have any questions about today? Anything you require?" Sweetie knew from years of dealing with Diamond Tiara when a pony was acting up their niceness and had only been half listening while she tried to ascertain if that was happening here. To her surprise, he didn't seem to be hiding anything in his body language or voice. He genuinely seemed to be a nice stallion. She looked over the offices of the other ponies, not seeing any hints that any of them were against her, even the ones that kept newspaper clippings of reports they wrote didn't include anything about her. There was always the possibility that either they were deliberately hiding clues or that it wasn't one of these ponies slandering her. She'd have to look into it a little later, for now she simply nodded in response to the questions. "I'd just like to know how this is going to go." "Alright, if you'll follow me." Ink Slinger motioned toward a room nearby and the two of them moved for it. "It won't take too long. I'll try and keep it about your music as best I can, though the editor-in-chief probably added one or two more questions that I'm duty bound to ask you, due to not reading my contract well enough. You'll be able to look through my writing once we're finished and anything you indicate you want unpublished will be so, as promised." "Thank you." Sweetie replied simply as they entered the interview room, looking like it was a boardroom that had been hastily rearranged for todays use. Most of the tables had been pushed up to the walls, leaving a pair in the center of the room with seats for both ponies either side. One of the walls had been left clear, it's full size window giving a clear view out to the north of Manehatten. The two of them took their seats and Slinger brought out a box containing a stack of parchment, a pair of quills, a red highlighter and two ink bottles, one black and one blue. "The black's just for casual comments between us so I don't lose my place," Slinger explained, checking the ink was ready for use. "Any questions and answers will be in blue, the highlighter is all yours for checking over. Anything else or are we ready to start?" "Go for it." She replied, doing her best to match his casual friendliness. Even if he was just really good at faking it, there was no reason to be unpleasant herself. Slinger nodded and took a parchment and both quills in his orange magic, making sure the ink was wetting them properly before beginning to write as he spoke. "Well, Sweetie Belle. First off, thank you for joining us here today and congratulations on your improved fortunes over the past weeks. How does it feel to be one of the biggest pony song stars in Equestria again?" "Well..." Sweetie mused for a moment, looking out of the window view as she actually gave it some thought. "I wouldn't call myself one of the biggest, there are names that deserve that title a lot more. Being a famous name again though, it's actually kinda nice. Mostly because it means ponies pay attention when you say you want to do something to help them. When my career was in its downward spiral, they tended to either ignore me or respond rather negatively to me...No thanks to your paper's comments." Her voice had come out a little harsher than she meant it to there, feeling bad as Slinger folded his ears back and looked away. "Yeah, sorry about that." He apologised quietly, taking a few moments to recover his composure. "Well, I won't go into that territory again. For now, tell me about the turns of events that helped your career pick up again." Sweetie nodded, resting her chin on a hoof as if in thought, though in reality she was trying to mask her slightly frustrated expression. No matter how much it helped her out, she still could never enjoy being questioned by anypony. As she began to explain the various influences that had first motivated her to try again, she hoped that she wouldn't have to spend too long on this interview. An hour and a half later of questions and looking through the two dozen sheets of parchment later, they were finally done. Sweetie Belle sighed slightly as she put the highlighter down and pushed it and the last paper of questions and answers back over to Ink Slinger. She'd done her best not to cut out too much, limiting to a trio of questions that, judging by their attempts to put both her and the other Cutie Mark Crusaders down, had been the ones the editor included as well as a few comments of hers that came across worse without the context a voice provided. "That should be everything. Thank you for taking the time to do this." Slinger said as he gathered up everything and placed it in the box by his chair. "No problem, hopefully it provides an interesting read." She replied as she got up and stretched slightly. "...You know, you're a good mare, so I'm going to be honest with you," She looked up at those words, seeing that Slinger was looking at her with a rather weary look on his face. "Odds are, you're going to be disappointed when this is published tomorrow. The boss tends to go over any articles involving you herself and it rarely turns out flattering." "Why though? Who are they?" Sweetie asked, waiting as he folded his ears back and looked away, a sense of regret practically radiating off him. "I...I want to tell you, really, but we're not supposed to tell you anything that could benefit you. The boss has...connections, I could get in trouble even for mentioning this much. She slipped all this into my contract and as I said, I didn't read it thoroughly enough so...I'm kind of stuck. I-I should get this interview moved into production." "Ok...I'll see myself out." Sweetie replied, suddenly feeling very uneasy as she shook Slinger's hoof in farewell and made her way back toward the ground floor. Part of her wanted to just teleport home right there but that would probably look suspicious at a time she really didn't need it. She'd learned more than she'd expected to during this little fact finding trip and yet she felt so much worse than she had anticipated about doing so. She now knew the pony responsible for giving her and her friends so much flak was powerful, influential and really hated the CMC, especially Scootaloo. There weren't any obvious suspects anymore since she was still good friends with Silver Spoon and Scootaloo was the same with Diamond Tiara. Who else could they have upset that much? As she finished making her way down the stairwell and reached the door she froze in place, making a possible connection in her mind to who it might be. She hadn't heard anything about them in years though...It couldn't be, could it? "The Sweetie Belle interview, brought straight up as requested." Ink Slinger said as he placed the papers on the desk before him. He'd gone straight up to the top floor and to the editor-in-chief's office there as soon as she had left the interview room. Now he stood there, waiting for either a reaction or dismissal. Sitting on the other side of the desk was an earth mare in her late fifties. Pink of coat with her mane done up in an attempt at modern styling, its two tones of moderate and dark purple faded slightly, piercing turquoise eyes and a sneer that barely veiled her contempt at hearing the unicorn's name. She took the papers and a quill and started going through the written version of the interview quickly. Slinger already knew what she was doing, scoring out any comments that showed Sweetie Belle any sympathy, casual or otherwise, as well as adding in points where she felt less lenient wording needed to be included. On seeing the highlighted questions and answers she gave a small, dark chuckle before moving on. Before long she finished going through them and passed them back over, letting him take them in his magic. "Start shaping this up according to my editing, disregard anything she may have put down." The editor ordered, her voice eloquent but undeniably snobbish as she turned her muzzle up slightly. "Ma'am, with respect, she had a signed contract that allowed her to veto any statement she wished." Slinger reasoned, withering slightly under the glare she gave him in response. "If she tries to kick up a fuss over it, who do you think ponies are more likely to side with. A degenerate lowlife from a backwater town who got lucky with her voice or a pony who knows enough ponies in the right places to help them open their eyes to the truth?" "...You," He replied with a sigh, biting back a retort that opinion and truth were totally different things. "If I may ask though...Why do this? Sweetie Belle is-" Any further attempts to make a case were stopped as a furious pair of hooves slammed into the desk, making him jump a foot in the air. "Because that mare and her 'innocent' club of blank flank scum took my daughter from me!!! Especially that talentless, flightless pegasus that Equestria would better off without!! All of them need to pay in kind for what they did to me and my family. Now get out of here before I give you a hooves on example, and that article'd better be perfect!" Slinger backed out of the office quickly, keeping his head down until he was safely away and had the door shut. His back pressed against the wall and he took several deep breaths as he got his heart back under control. He'd never seen the boss so angry before, a small part of him considered it lucky that she'd been in too much of a rage to punish him outright. All the same, he was probably going to pay for it later somehow and he couldn't do a thing about it since his contract kept any freedom of activity here wrapped around her hoof. As he steadily got back up and set off to begin editing the story, he managed to keep his sole thought to just that rather than spitting it out where she could hear it. 'Curse you to Tartarus, Spoiled Rich.'