Case One, Chapter Two: On the Job Training
Phillip turned and exited the room, retreating back up the hallway to the front door. Daring slowly sank into one of the couches, her head spinning. Had she really been hired that easily?
The door opened and there was some muffled conversation, then the sound of hoofsteps. Phillip reappeared, followed by Orange Slice. He was an older, portly earth pony with a yellow coat and reddish-orange hair; as Phillip had predicted, it was cut short. He was wearing a faded brown jacket and had the cutie mark of a plate holding an orange that had been sliced in half. Daring quickly noted the pack of Frosty cigarettes in his jacket pocket.
“Sit here, sir,” Phillip told his guest, gesturing him into the sofa. He took the chair next to Daring and sat down. Orange Slice glanced at Daring, then slowly lowered himself onto the sofa, licking his lips. Daring noticed his crooked incisors.
“They said I shouldn’t have come here,” he said in a low, throaty voice; the smoking must have done its damage on his vocal cords long ago. “But I have to be sure.”
Phillip interrupted him with a raised hoof. “Start from the beginning,” he said calmly.
Orange Slice sighed and rubbed the back of his mane, staring at the floor in front of his hooves. His hoof twitched towards the pocket with the cigarettes. “It’s my daughter, Scribbled Note,” he explained. “She’s dead. The police are saying that it’s a suicide, but I know it can’t be. Not my daughter.” His lips quivered and he shook his head. “Not my daughter.”
Phillip paused for a moment, his face expressionless, then leaned forward. “Just tell me what happened, sir,” he said in a gentler tone.
Orange Slice took a slow, shaky breath, wiping his face with a hoof, then started speaking. “Scribbled was supposed to take a day off from work this morning; she’d been trying for months now. She just wanted to spend some time with me.” His lips quivered for a moment and he had to take a deep breath before continuing.
“The morning started out perfectly fine; we slept in late, went out for breakfast at the pancake house down the street. Then we went down to the Battery Park and fed the ducks…”
Orange Slice continued his story, describing the morning’s activities, before finally getting to their return home. Phillip and Daring both listened in silence.
“It had been a wonderful day, but then when we got home, it all changed,” Orange Slice said, rubbing his hooves together. “After we had lunch, she went upstairs, saying she needed to take care of something. I heard her typing for a long time in her room, then it went quiet. I went up to check on her, and…” He swallowed and took a shaky breath, his eyes shining with tears. “...and she was hanging there. She...there was nothing I could do.”
Phillip was silent for a few seconds, then asked quietly, “She was completely fine before this? No signs of depression?”
“None!” Orange declared, looking up for the first time. “Everything was perfectly all right before this!” He lowered his face into his hooves, then whispered, “Scribbled wouldn’t kill herself. Not my daughter.”
Phillip was quiet for several seconds, then asked, “What was she doing before she went upstairs?”
Orange Slice shrugged. “Well, she was reading the newspaper while having lunch.” He swallowed and looked up, his expression as desperate as a pony sliding into icy water.
“Please, detective,” he begged. “Will you come and help?”
Phillip leaned forward and laid a hoof on Orange Slice’s knee. “I will,” he replied, standing up. “Daring, you coming?” he asked.
Daring blinked. “Are...are you sure?”
“You’re my partner, aren’t you?” Phillip replied in a matter-of-fact tone.
Daring cocked her head to the side. “Am I?”
“...yes,” Phillip said slowly.
Daring raised an eyebrow. “Just like that?”
“Not quite,” Phillip replied. “Need to see what you’re capable of. You coming?”
Daring thought for a few moments. It’s either this or working retail.
“Sure,” she shrugged.
“Ripper,” Phillip nodded. “Lead the way, mate.”
Looking immensely relieved, Orange Slice stood up and started down the hallway. Phillip followed, retrieving the hat and vest from the coat rack and donning them as he exited. Daring exited after them.
“It’s not far from here,” Orange Slice declared, starting up the street. Daring and Phillip silently followed, both of them lost in their own thoughts.
The house wasn’t hard to identify: the two-story light brown cottage with the open porch that stood at the side of the road still had a pair of black and white cruisers sitting on the curb in front of it, and a yellow and black “CRIME SCENE: DO NOT CROSS” tape was stretched across the front door. Two officers stood sentry in front of the porch steps, watching for any unwanted visitors.
The trio approached the house. One of the officers, a turquoise unicorn with a red mane and bushy mustache and the cutie mark of a trio of red stars, turned towards them. His eyes narrowed.
Daring felt her pulse increase as her eyes were instinctively drawn towards the golden badge on the cop’s chest. Her training kicked in, and she began considering her options, determining the best routes that would allow her to quickly slip out of sight, preparing to take off into the sky, studying the cop’s posture for any sign of impending attack.
She continued walking forward, following close behind Phillip, as if she were subconsciously hoping that he would shield her with some aura of honesty and respectability. The officer glanced at her, then looked at Phillip. “This is a crime scene. No entry,” he stated gruffly. He reached one hoof subtly back towards his holster, the hoof strap attached to the weapon's grip visible over the top of the holster.
“My client has hired me to investigate the death of his daughter,” Phillip stated bluntly. “Let me in.”
“You’re not coming in, snoop,” the officer growled.
“Star Cluster? Maybe we should let him in,” the other officer said. This was a younger pegasus, with an orange coat, electric blue hair, and the cutie mark of a shield with a lightning bolt. He looked nervously back and forth between his partner and the detectives. His uniform was clean and pressed, the badge polished to a bright shine. “I mean, you do know who this is, right?” the pegasus offered.
“I know who he is, Sentry,” Officer Cluster replied curtly, not taking his eyes off of Phil. “The question is, do you?” He glared at Daring. “And what about her?”
The pegasus blinked in uncertainty. “Couldn’t we at least—?”
“Oh, joy,” another voice said. “Exactly what I needed.”
A reddish-pink pegasus with an untidy brown mane, the cutie mark of a fishing pole and a deep scowl was stepping off the porch of the house, walking towards the intruders. “Phillip Finder, come to stick his high and mighty nose into our business again,” he growled.
“Detective Herring,” Phillip replied coldly. “Of course it’d be you.”
Herring glared at Orange Slice, who fidgeted in obvious discomfort. “Didn’t I tell you that the police could handle this?” he snapped.
“B-but he can help!” Orange Slice protested.
“Right,” Herring commented. “His presence here is filling us all with confidence. Especially his new partner.” His gaze turned to Daring and focused on her like a pair of searchlights. Daring felt as though her stomach had fallen onto the floor.
“Since when were you interested in taking on convicts, Finder?” Herring asked. Orange Slice and Officer Sentry both started in surprise and turned towards Daring, realization and recognition dawning in their eyes.
White-hot anger flashed through Daring’s core; the muscles in her forelegs instinctively tightened and her heart began to pound against the inside of her skull like a heavy drum, a battering ram against the walls of her self-restraint. The brand on her right hoof began to burn, the pain inching up her foreleg; she hissed under her breath and raised her hoof off the ground in an attempt to lessen the pain.
Thief. Convict. Killer. Always.
“She’s with me,” Phillip replied, with no change in tone, as though this statement solved everything.
Daring blinked and turned to stare at Phillip. Am I?
“You’re kidding, right?” Officer Cluster snorted. “You do know what she’s done, right?”
“She’s. With. Me,” Phillip repeated icily. “And the victim’s father is my client, which means I have a legitimate interest in this case.”
Detective Herring glared at Phillip for a few seconds, then sighed. “You’re just going to sneak in here after we’re gone, aren’t you?”
“Yes,” Phillip replied bluntly.
Herring grunted. “Fine. You get five minutes. Let them in.”
Scowling, Officer Cluster lifted the tape up to allow Phillip to pass beneath. He ducked beneath the tape, then paused on the other side, looking back at Daring. “You coming?”
“Uh...okay,” Daring said, following him under the tape, forcing herself not to limp on her still-burning leg. Orange Slice started to follow after him, but Officer Sentry gently stopped him, shaking his head.
“I’m sorry, sir. I know this is hard, but you need to let us deal with this, all right?” he said. Orange Slice stared at him, looking as though he might protest, then nodded and retreated.
Daring and Phillip trotted up the pathway to the porch. “So, what is this?” Daring asked Phillip. “On-the-job training or something?”
“Something like that,” Phillip replied as Herring pushed the door open for them. They entered the house, the floorboards creaking beneath their hooves. A framed photograph was hanging on the wall to their left, depicting Orange Slice with a young cream-colored earth pony mare. She had a neat chocolate brown mane drawn back in a bun and bright blue eyes hidden behind a pair of glasses. Her cutie mark was a notebook and dark brown quill. The two of them smiled welcomingly at their visitors from behind the frame. Daring’s stomach twisted at the sight.
“The vic’s room is upstairs on the right,” Herring said, jerking his head towards a flight of wooden stairs. Phillip climbed up the stairs, with Daring following behind. There were two doors on the landing, one directly in front of them, and the other down a short hallway to the right. This second door was open, with more crime scene tape stretched across it. A gray unicorn with a wispy blonde mane and a haggard face stood on the other side. He had a cutie mark of a test tube and a magnifying glass.
“Finder,” the pony said in greeting.
“Trace,” Phillip nodded.
The detective glanced at Daring but did not comment, to her immense relief. “Red gave you five minutes, right?” he said, lifting up the tape.
“Yes,” Phillip nodded.
“Then five minutes is what you two get,” Trace replied, stepping aside to allow Phillip and Daring to pass beneath.
They entered a small, tidy bedroom. The pale pink sheets on the bed were made with an almost military neatness, and the dresser pressed against the wall was dusted. Sitting on the desk was a stack of papers, an ink bottle and quill, a planner, and a framed photograph of a younger Orange Slice holding a small filly with chocolate brown pigtails.
But there was one detail that was glaringly out of place. That was the body of the mare hanging from the open closet door. A spare bedsheet that had been tightly wound into a rope was coiled around her neck and looped around the top of the door. Scribbled Note had not died recently: already there was a dark purple tinge to her hind legs, and her face was turning pale. Her purple tongue hung out of her mouth and her eyes were closed, never to open again. An overturned chair lay on the floor beneath her.
Daring flinched, hissing out an exhalation through her teeth. Phillip paused and looked back at her, raising an eyebrow. She took in a deep breath and forced herself to keep calm, stepping into the room.
Immediately, Phillip held out a hoof and stopped her. “Never step right into a crime scene without looking around first,” he instructed her.
“I did,” she protested.
“No, you glanced around, and then you focused on the body,” Phillip stated, his eyes narrowing. “Crime scenes are three-dimensional. You have to check everything in sight: the floor, the walls, the ceiling. You don’t touch anything, you don’t walk anywhere, you don’t do anything until you’ve taken stock of the entire scene.”
Daring glared at him, then sighed and began to look around more carefully. She slowly began to scan the room more carefully.
“Divide the room into three layers,” Phillip instructed. "Search from eye level and above, then eye level to knees, then knees to floor.”
Daring bit back a retort and began to sweep the room more carefully, studying the walls and ceiling more carefully. Even the ceiling was clean and dust-free: the only noticeable detail was a small air vent over the bed. Seeing nothing else that seemed unusual, she moved down to the next level. The window on the far wall was closed and latched from the inside, and there was no sign of any markings on the windowsill. The photographs and framed Pranceton University diploma on the wall held no interest to her, so she crouched and started sweeping her gaze over the floor. The only point of interest she found other than the boxes of books underneath the bed were some scuff marks leading from the desk to the closet door, apparently left behind from dragging the chair over to its position.
“What am I supposed to be looking for?” she huffed, climbing back to her hooves.
“You’re not supposed to be looking for anything,” Phillip explained, with a bite of impatience in his tone. “You’re supposed to be observing everything.” He entered the room with careful step, his eyes panning from side to side.
“Every detail, even the innocuous ones, tells a story,” he continued. “No matter what we do, we always leave a trace everywhere.”
“I know,” Daring deadpanned. “I was taught not to leave any.”
Phillip paused, blinking as though he didn’t know how to reply to that, then returned to his lecture. “Unless they’re a ghost, all ponies will leave traces everywhere they go. You just have to find those traces and learn to interpret them.”
He passed over the bed, then crouched by the scuff marks on the floor, pulling out a magnifying glass out of one of the pockets on his vest and studying the floor for a few moments. With a grunt, he stood up and turned towards the body. His eyes swept her up and down as he slowly circled her, studying her closely through the magnifying glass. Daring watched his observations with a small feeling of queasiness twisting in her gut, especially when he peeled the dead mare’s eyelids back to study her eyes, then felt underneath her jaw and began gently testing and pulling on her limbs.
“Petechiae, hyoid bone broken,” Phillip muttered, observing the knotted sheet. “No other signs of trauma. Livor mortis and rigor mortis suggests that time of death was...within four hours.”
“Agreed,” Detective Trace nodded. “There’s nothing to contradict what the father told us.”
Perhaps mistaking the look of uncertainty on Daring’s face for confusion, Phillip turned to explain. “Petechiae are these red dots in the vic’s eyes: they’re burst blood vessels. The hyoid bone is in the neck; you’ll usually find it broken in the case of hangings. Livor mortis is this purple color in the legs: it’s from gravity pulling down the blood. Rigor mortis is this stiffening of the joints.” He demonstrated by gently trying to bend Scribbled Note’s knee, but it refused to yield.
Daring nodded, licking her lips and glancing down at the pack of Blue Camel in her pocket. Just as long as I don’t have to go near the thing, we’re good.
Phillip looked around the room once more, frowning. “Wait. Something’s missing here.”
Trace Evidence and Daring both looked around the room. “What?” Trace asked.
“Her typewriter,” Phillip said. “Where’s her typewriter?” He turned to Daring. “You remember?”
Daring thought for a moment, then her eyes widened with realization. “You’re right: Slice was saying that he heard her typing.”
“He didn’t mention that,” Trace frowned, looking around. He turned and shouted down the stairs. “Hey! Did anypony find a typewriter?”
Phillip peered out the window. “Flowers below the window have been squashed,” he declared, turning and heading back down the stairs. Daring followed, with Trace Evidence on her tail. They exited out the back door and went around to the back of the house, where the flowerbed sat. Phillip crouched down before the flowerbed and briefly studied the crushed petunias, then stood up and looked around.
“Where did they take it?” he muttered to himself.
“I’ll look around,” Daring said, taking off. She hovered above the ground, her head panning from side to side. She spotted a dumpster sitting in an alleyway not far from the house and swooped down to investigate. Lifting up the top, she peered inside and was rewarded with the sight of a broken typewriter, smashed into pieces.
“Found it!” she called. The other two stallions hurried over, with Red Herring and Orange Slice sprinting up after them. Phillip studied the broken pieces, lifting them up out of the dumpster and scattering them on the floor.
“Hey! That’s evidence!” Red Herring protested.
Ignoring him, Phillip began to sort through the broken pieces, muttering to himself as he worked. “Damn,” he muttered.
“What is it?” Trace Evidence asked.
“They took the typewriter ribbon,” Phillip said, standing up. “There’s no way of knowing what she typed.”
“But why would they take the typewriter?” Red Herring asked.
“Obvious,” Phillip grunted. “Whoever killed her didn’t want us to know what she had to say.”
Orange Slice turned pale and slowly sank to the ground. Daring hesitated for a moment, then walked over to him. “Uh...you okay?” she asked.
He blinked several times, then replied to the ground. “I don’t know how I should feel,” he whispered.
Daring was faintly aware of the three stallions behind her discussing something. She hovered for a moment, then bent down and sat next to the mourning father.
“Well...don’t worry, okay?” she said slowly. “They…” She stopped herself. “We’ll find out what happened.”
Orange Slice looked up, his wet eyes hopeful. “Can you promise me that?” he asked.
Daring hesitated for a moment longer, then nodded. “I promise.”
A wide smile split Orange’s face. With a sudden motion, he lunged forward and hugged her, tears falling from his eyes. “Thank you!”
Daring froze, then awkwardly patted him on the back, silently pleading with him to let go. His tears were soaking into her coat.
Suddenly, the stallion’s voices behind her became raised. She turned around to see Phillip, Trace, and Red arguing with each other.
“Bulldust!” Phillip was saying, stamping his hoof. “You need my help on this!”
“Right, because we’re apparently so helpless that we need the great Phillip Finder to hold our hooves,” Red scoffed.
“That’s not what I—” Phillip started to say.
“This is a crime, that means it’s our responsibility,” Red snapped. “You’re not a cop anymore, Finder. You’re a private detective. That means that you don’t have any legal authority anymore.”
Trace held up a hoof in front of his partner. “We appreciate your help: you just gave us evidence that this is more than just a suicide, and we’ll look into it. But my partner’s right: there’s nothing more you can do here, and your time’s up. Time to go, Phillip.”
Phillip glowered at the detectives, then turned and walked away. He laid a comforting hoof on Orange Slice’s shoulder for a moment, then jerked his head to Daring and led her away. They walked back up the road and away from the cottage, Officers Cluster and Sentry watching them go.
“So you were a cop?” Daring asked.
“Yes,” Phillip answered.
“But not anymore?”
“No,” he grunted. “Too restrictive. I prefer doing things my way.”
Daring nodded. “So where are we going now? We are going to keep investigating, right?”
“Yes,” Phillip answered. “Yesterday, there were several other suicides similar to this one.”
“Yeah, I read something about that in the paper,” Daring agreed.
“I think they may be related,” Phillip continued. “I want to go down to the precinct and see what I can find.”
“Well, why didn’t you say so?” Daring said with a grin. She grabbed Phillip underneath the forelegs and lifted off the ground with a great flap of her wings.
“Hey!” Phillip shouted in protest, instinctively trying to escape her grasp before relaxing. Looking down, he watched as the city of Ponyville sped by underneath them. From his new vantage point, the ponies below looked like toy versions of themselves, and the rooftops were merely squares of a wide variety of colors. The wind kissed his face, cold and sweet smelling, a refreshing relief from the noxious mixture of garbage, steam, and all the diverse odors of ponies on the street level.
Daring easily shifted her grip on him to keep him from falling and continued flying towards the center of town. Her wings were spread wide to catch the rising thermals, occasionally flapping hard to keep them aloft. A grin was spread across her face, her eyes wide with delight.
“You could’ve warned me you were going to do that,” he grumbled.
She glanced down at him. “What, don’t like flying?”
“If I’d been meant to fly, I would’ve been born with wings,” Phillip answered.
“Well, I was, so I’m meant to,” Daring replied with a smirk. They flew in silence for a few moments more, then she spoke up again.
“So, you can tell all about a pony just by looking at them?” she asked, her face falling into more serious lines.
“Not everything,” Phillip answered. “But I can learn a lot. World’s full of obvious things. Most ponies just don’t know where to look.”
Daring was silent for a moment more, then asked, “So what can you tell by looking at me?”
Phillip looked up at her. “I can tell you’ll be needing a place to stay.”
She scowled. “And how do you know that?”
“I saw your keychain,” Phillip answered. “Safe-deposit key, mailbox key, but no house or apartment key, but there was a mark where something had been yanked off. Also, the pack of cigarettes. Balance of probability is, you got them at the same place you bought your newspaper and your lunch—I could smell it on your breath—but the newspaper wasn’t wet from the rain. In the span of about an hour, you’d smoked three cigarettes. You were stressed about something. Two and two together, you were kicked out of your home.”
Daring didn’t answer, but she could feel acid rising up from her stomach.
“I have a spare bedroom if you want,” Phillip added.
She looked down at him, her eyebrows almost disappearing into her mane. “You’d...let me stay in your house?”
“Yes,” Phillip answered.
“But…” She swallowed and spat the rest of the sentence out. “I’m a criminal. You have to know that, right?”
“Were,” Phillip replied. “You were a criminal.” He looked up at her. “You weren’t planning on stealing from me, were you?”
She blinked. “No.”
“Good,” Phillip answered. “You wouldn’t get away with it, anyway.”
She laughed through her nostrils. “Keep thinking that,” she said, flapping her wings to keep them on course.
For a moment, she thought she saw the ghost of a smile flicker on Phillip’s face. There was a moment more of silent flight, then Daring sighed.
“Thanks,” she said.
“No worries,” her partner replied.
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Yeesh, Detective Herring gives me shades of Sally Donavon from Sherlock. God, I hated that bitch from the moment I met her... (Probably a meaningful name though, I'm willing to bet.)
I detect overtones of the first episode of the BBC 's Sherlock in this. Unfortunately, it gets in the way due to the recognition factor. I hope that Finder will grow away from this stock police-detective relationship in time.
There are some points of description and dialogue in this chapter that I think are spot-on. The devil is truly in the details, but these are the bits that I thought were done well and are appropriate to the genre:
Good. Very kinetic and visceral. More of this, please.
The first two paragraphs are a lovely exchange. The third paragraph's first sentence says almost nothing and could have been accomplished by simply writing "Philip blinked" or something else equally abrupt.
Good, quick patter and sound logic. Your dialogue is enjoyable.
There is one paragraph that would be better cut outright:
Exposition should not make the reader despise the main character. Even if you did not mean for this first sentence to mean what it says on its face, it is more wont to provoke disgust than sympathy. The second sentence is awkward due to "mourning" and "morning" being homophones.
8328299
That suggestion has been noted and the paragraph has been corrected.
GIven time, Phil's relationship with the police can and will change.
I appreciate the criticism! Please keep it up!
Is this stallion going to ask for help with finding a missing train car?
He's clueing for looks.
Where is the suitcase? THE PINK SUITCASE!
Hmm... Seems there's more to this than meets the eye....
Mmm... Tis very interesting...
So okay, I know everyone else probably has figured it out long by this point, but I still wanna see if I can use some form of reasoning here.
So okay, this mare had no depression issues from what the dad described. And judging from the squashed flowers, and the typewriter tossed in the alleyway along with the missing paper, I believe the stallion or mare who did it was probably someone who knew her very well. If they didn't want them to see what was written, it was probably something incriminating, maybe.
... that's all I got.
Darling Do a thief? Cool.
I know this is just a story and all but that sounds like pretty solid advice when working as a detective