The Sharpest Tool

by Samey90

To Live is To Die

Vinyl Scratch felt chills down her immobilised spine, when she looked into the eyes of the mare in front of her, who was grinning at her maniacally, clearly waiting for her to say something.

“So,” she said flatly, “I’m bucked, huh?”

“If I understood the rules correctly, you have to take five cards unless you have a King of Hearts,” Rainbow Dash explained, looking at the King of Spades Schwalbe put on the table.

“Crap,” Vinyl cursed, and levitated five cards from the deck. Schwalbe nodded with approval, and turned her gaze back to her cards.

“I really liked poker more,” said the DJ.

“Me too, unless I lost all my bits,” Dash deadpanned.

“Hey, it’s not my fault! How about scrabble? We can always steal scrabble from kid’s ward.”

“Vinyl, you can’t even move, Schwalbe and I can barely walk, besides, you can’t go to the paediatrics’ ward to steal scrabble!”

“Warum nicht?” Schwalbe asked. Rainbow Dash gave her a nasty look, only to remember that maintaining eye contact with bat-mare without feeling uneasy was impossible. She focused on Vinyl again.

“And also, I don’t want to spent the rest of the day explaining Schwalbe that “Panzerkampfwagen” is not a word.”

“Hey, das ist ein Wort!”

Suddenly, Dash’s phone, lying on the nightstand, started to ring. She picked it up.

“Dash?” she heard Twilight’s scared voice, “Are you ok?”

“Well, no better than yesterday, but also not worse. At least I don’t pee in a bag,” she looked at Vinyl, “Why are you asking?”

“Haven’t you heard? Our airship crashed!” her voice cracked, and Rainbow Dash fell her throat dry.

“D-did Scootaloo…”

“No, she’s fine, her father took her to Ponyville.”

“How about the others?”

“Surveillance is dead, I was almost arrested, and Flitter…”

“WHAT?”

***

“So, Ms Sparkle, you’re telling us that a serial killer who might have survived the airship disaster sneaked into the hotel at night just to kill somepony and leave a message?” the Royal Guards officer watched her, his eyes half-closed.

“Well, I…”

“Not to mention the fact that you were the last pony who saw Apple Fritter alive…”

“I met her accidentally in a bathroom, then she went to her room and I went downstairs to the café, that’s all.”

“But still, it’s interesting that the last pony who talked to her was also the pony who found her body,” he put his hooves on a table.

“I SAVED HER FROM THE BURNING AIRSHIP, SHE WAS MY FRIEND’S COUSIN, WHY WOULD I WANT TO KILL HER?” Twilight shouted, standing up.

“I’ve heard it was an arson… Well, I’ve also heard lots of things about you,” he smiled, “PTSD, previous fits of rage, for Luna’s sake, you had caused a pony to be in a coma for a year! She did something, you snapped…”

“I…”

Someone knocked the door.

“Excuse me, sir,” another Royal Guard entered the interrogation room, “Some lunatic mare came here, claiming that Twilight Sparkle has alibi.”

“A friend from the nuthouse?”

“Back off, The Great and Powerful Trixie is here!” the blue unicorn stormed the door. She was apparently sober, though she smelled of booze, and her fur was covered in coffee stains. Twilight slammed her hoof against her forehead. The Royal Guards’ officer looked unimpressed.

“Do you know her, Ms Sparkle?” he asked.

“Yes, her name is Trixie Lulamoon, she’s a travelling magician.”

“Exactly! Trixie’s career was a bit down recently, and Trixie was really depressed, other ponies wanted Trixie to enrol to sect, Trixie was drinking and then, last night, Twilight Sparkle came and helped Trixie go back to the room.”

I’m so bucked…

“Ms Lulamoon… do you have any proof?”

“The keys to Trixie’s room! Twilight opened the door with them and there’s a trace of her magic on them,” said Trixie.

“How can we know if she hadn’t levitated them before? Or even today?”

“The café owner can confirm that,” said Twilight, “She surely saw us last night.”

“Yeah… I guess your friend is really hard to forget…”

***

Ten minutes later Twilight was standing with Trixie and Scootaloo (who came to the station with the blue unicorn) outside the Baltimare Royal Guards station. The magician was breathing heavily, as if the conversation with the police had exhausted her.

“Thank you, Trixie,” Twilight said.

“Don’t need to thank me,” Trixie replied, “I just thought about some stuff…”

“I’m worried about you. Flitter wrote that she’ll kill everypony I met one by one,” Twilight said, staring at the pavement, “What if she’ll get you?”

“Trixie knows how to defend herself,” the magician tried to say boastfully, but her voice cracked by the end of the sentence. She turned back and made few steps.

“What are you planning to do now?” Twilight asked. Few years ago she’d never thought that she’d feel better having Trixie around. Unicorn looked at her.

“I don’t know yet. Maybe I’ll learn some magic, get myself together, find a job… You know, the normal, sappy stuff.”

Then she walked away.

“Take care, Trixie. And thank you again,” said Twilight.

“She’s a bit weird, isn’t she?” Scootaloo whispered.

“I don’t know. It’s always hard for a pony to change,” Twilight explained, “When I was at your age I thought that I didn’t need friends.”

“Yeah… And I almost got used to being an earth pony with additional limbs,” Scootaloo stretched her wings.

They trotted down the street, heading to the airport. The distance between Baltimare and Ponyville wasn’t very big, so instead of an airship, Scootaloo got into the ordinary flying chariot. It calmed Twilight down – this time there was no hydrogen to blow everything up. Also, Vindaloo was one of the pilots – Scootaloo said that he asked his colleague to swap the flights with him, just to meet her in Baltimare.

“You won’t be flying with us, Twilight?” the filly asked.

“No, I’m going to find Flitter here, before she gets to Ponyville.”

***

“Nice,” said Rainbow Dash, “So, have you found something?”

“Well, I went to the crash site…”

***

Mayday was a middle-aged red pegasus with yellow mane and a magnifying glass as a cutie mark. Twilight quickly apologized to her for being late and looked at the photo of the unknown unicorn’s body.

“It’s definitely Surveillance. Where did you find him?”

“Here, near the remnants of the airship,” Mayday pointed, “It’s strange, the other bodies we found were practically burned skeletons, and this one was only slightly charred.”

“So what exactly happened to him?”

“Most of the bones were broken, so our hypothesis is that he jumped off the aircraft.”

“Why would he do that?”

“We’re not sure. We hoped that you’d explain that to us, since you were working with him.”

“Well…” Twilight looked at the pile of charred beams that used to be parts of the airship, and noticed something shiny.
“It’s a pair of hoofcuffs,” she said, examining them closer.

“We already photographed them, but we weren’t moving anything so far, except the bodies,” Mayday explained, “The hoofcuffs were opened, we thought that this… Surveillance did it to evacuate himself and his prisoner.”

“Maybe. But where’s she?”

“Well, one of the skeletons we found belongs to a pegasus, but it’s probably a pilot – there were the remains of the goggles and aviator hat near it. We also found this,” she shown her a photo of partially melted silver lighter, with barely visible letter “V” on it.

Twilight nodded her head, staring at the place where Surveillance’s body was found. Suddenly, something clicked in her brain.

“You said, you haven’t moved anything from here?”

“Yes, why are you asking?”

“There’s a trace on the ground, as if somepony was dragging something heavy here.”

Mayday followed her gaze. The trace on the ground led into the forest, marked by squashed understory and occasional dark stains. Twilight rushed forward. The forest was dark and moist – it started to rain the day before, shielding it from the fire from the aircraft. Soon they found some other parts of the vehicle scattered between the trees.

“Do you think she’s hiding somewhere here?” Mayday asked.

“No, the trail continues,” Twilight replied, looking at the layer of last-year leaves, which were moved recently. They followed it, jumping over the small gorge with a creek on the bottom.

“There’s nothing here…”

“Twilight! Look!” Mayday exclaimed, pointing at the bottom of the gorge.

“Well, now I don’t understand…” said Twilight, staring at the creek.

***

“FIRE!” somepony near them yelled. A black cloud of smoke engulfed them, and Flitter started to cough. Some more cries pierced the silence, many ponies stood up from their seats, trying, in panic, to run away from danger. Surveillance, however, remained calm.

“Hey, Mr Perfect, you won’t leave me here like this, huh?” Flitter asked him, pointing at the hoofcuffs.

“If it was up to me, you’d be long dead,” he replied, “I’d have pulled the plug on you three years ago.”

Tears run down her face, only partially being the effect of the smoke.

“And don’t tell me any bullshit about redemption, since you ran away, you killed two ponies, foalnapped a filly and made this idiot in fancy shades jump off the building.”

“Hey! If you let me here to fry, they’ll be lots of paperwork…” she tried.

“Frankly, I don’t give a fuck,” he said, standing up and looking for Twilight Sparkle. Unfortunately, there was no trace of a lavender unicorn.

“Problem?” Flitter asked.

“None of your business.”

“I can help you. Disabled or not, I’m still a pegasus…”

Surveillance cursed under his breath. He sighed, levitated the keys and opened Flitter’s cuffs.

She jumped out of her seat, tackling him and ran to the emergency exit. He recovered and chased after her.

“You…” he shouted. Just before she reached the exit, he caught her. She thrashed and kicked, but Surveillance had her pinned to the ground. After a short fight they rolled over the edge of the deck.

Flitter felt a jolt of pain when she was trying to spread her wings. Surveillance was holding her, despite her desperate attempts to beat him. Suddenly they heard a loud explosion and the airship disintegrated in an orange fireball.

She woke up on something soft. Around her flames were roaring, but she couldn’t hear anything. She felt something warm dripping from her ears and realised that her eardrums were shattered. She was lying on her left side, feeling the pain from her left wing – it was now looking even worse than her right wing, with some fragments of broken bone penetrating the skin. She rolled off the thing she landed on, and looked at it.

She smiled at the irony of the situation: Surveillance, so reluctant to free her, accidentally saved her life, when she landed on him, crushing his bones and killing him. She tried to get up only to find out that she was out of luck: her hind legs remained limp and lifeless.

Too bad Vinyl Scratch can’t see me now, she thought, She’d probably babble about poetic justice… if she even knows that word…

She gritted her teeth, trying to crawl away from the crash site. Intense pain from her wings almost rendered her unconscious again. Despite that, she continued to crawl, leaving a trail of blood and urine – with a severed spinal cord she lost the control of her bladder – and, after a painful effort, she managed to hide between the bushes, where she spent several minutes, panting and coughing.

It was almost dawn, when she reached an obstacle she couldn’t pass – a small gorge, about a yard wide. Her front hooves gave up and she fell, face first on the ground. Her throat was dry, her whole body was aching. The paralysed part of her body was dirty and grazed, almost skinless from dragging it. She crawled to the edge of the gorge and rolled on the bottom, splashing into the creek.

Cold water alleviated the pain, Flitter began to drink it, feeling a coppery taste in her mouth, as her blood mixed with it. She looked up, her vision growing darker, despite the Celestia’s sun rising. Her breathing was shallow and jerky, she could feel the numbness slowly spreading from the paralysed part of her body.

The Celestia’s sun emerged from behind the trees, but she wasn’t able to see it, instead seeing the random scenes from her life: her childhood in Cloudsdale; her first flight; her cute-ceañera, when Cloudchaser accidentally ripped her dress; school days with Krissy and Parasol, work in the weather team, first time taking control over Parasol’s mind, when yellow mare started to have doubts… Then the endless violence: her both dead and alive victims and tools, Rainstorm, Scootaloo, Bon-Bon, Parasol, Krissy, Cloudchaser, Lightning Dust, Berry Punch, Rainbow Dash, Golden Heart and Cloud Counter stood there, looking at her: some with hostility, some with compassion, dead ones were calling her, but she only smiled at them.

“I can’t die now!” she shouted, spitting saliva and blood at them, “My final, sharpest tool is about to be used, and nopony can stop me! Understand? NOPONY!”

She fell on the ground, trying to reach them with her hooves, but spectral ponies disappeared, when she exhaled air from her lungs for the last time.

***

It took some time, before Twilight managed to look into Flitter’s gimlet eyes without fear. Her body froze in a dramatic pose, with front hooves outstretched and hind ones unnaturally bent. Her teeth were bared, lips forming a sardonic smile, which caused Twilight to avert her gaze.

“She had crawled for over a mile before she died,” Mayday said, staring at the body.

“I don’t understand…” Twilight repeated, “If she’s here, then who killed Apple Fritter?”

Comments

[Rainbow87dash]

Still guessing Trixie