Ichor

by Ice Star

Chapter 11: Jane Doe

[Excerpts seen here come from the early morning issue of The Manehattan Times during the discovery of the remains of the Original Jane Doe.]

---

As the city slept, another senseless attack happened. This is the eighth murder in the recent chain of attacks on this city. Small signs of a scuffle were heard shortly after midnight in the southernmost point of the Balikun-Shetland neighborhood, which alerted residents to investigate the source of the noise. Those that reportedly left their buildings to investigate found no sign of violence. When morning came, residents were not so lucky. Their investigations may have been insufficient if any had been done at all. The remains of a young doe were found not far from the area that was impacted by the reported disturbance last night, which residents say sounded much like somepony slipping on ice, so they did not have extreme urgency in locating the source.

Those who discovered the scene were quick to summon the EUP who quickly secured the scene. From the reports of media pegasi, the remains are a mess of butchery intersected with a most peculiar red crystal. The whole body was not observed to be intact, and one anonymous passerby wished to comment that the torso was "in ribbons" to one of the press-ponies flittering around the edges of the scene. The area is popular for transients to cross and the neighborhood not having a pure status means that crimes involving sex offenders are not unheard of. No further identification has been released, and the features and props located at the scene are currently being withheld from the public.

---

[The following notes are from one of the top coroners working in Fort Barnacle at the time. These were her first impressions of the victim that became the Original Jane Doe.]

---

From the desk of Ebony Henbane, Head Coroner at Manehattan-Barnacle:

The victim is a doe no older than twenty-five years. One of her knees was dislocated prior to the attack upon her, and there are signs of an old break that meant she would have walked with a limp. Her purse matches an item reported stolen from a Bucklyn-import store a few months ago, though no identification was found within or from that report. A few cosmetics, stray bits, and fragments of tart cards were found within. All of the whores listed in those tart carts have been in contact with the EUP for their arrests or their bodies have been through Fort Barnacle for the usual: accident of drunkenness, starvation, cardiac arrest, suicide, deadly tonic, undetected cancers, falling into a sewer, abortion gone wrong, etc.

Isotope spell-scans show that she was an immigrant and was originally from an area near the Capreolia-Ibexia border. The specifics are being withheld with the hopes that an Equestrian diplomatic team will be able to bring untarnished information to the officials of the area in hopes of making a positive identification. As I had nothing to do with this process, I can only sign my agreement with the foreign-reach-out attempt on the required forms. One must note the horrifying rarity that is an immigrant in the self-exploitation scene. This creature would not have spoken the first language of those in it, and the scene is one overflowing with sadists and species discrimination. There is a reason dead whores are almost always ponies. Dragon attacks might as well be more likely than non-pony sex offenders. Over ninety percent of those found to solicit sex offenders have been shown to have violent levels of hatred for non-pony races. Earth pony separatists are not entirely uncommon among the ranks of those convicted for such an offense.

The creature has since become known as Jane Doe in her death. The public sees fit to apply a pony name to her, and without any other name by which we can refer to the deceased, I see no problem with applying a pony name to her. Perhaps something can come from this, a system of decent placeholders in a city that desperately needs them.

The cause of death from the mare (as I will henceforth be referring to her) is a mix of exsanguination and shock. The latter would have come from the pure force of the crystals tearing up the poor thing from the inside. Most of the garish things that were done to this poor pony were done postmortem, but her death was undoubtedly a nasty one. I can find little in the way of any marks on her remains suggesting she fought back against her attacker. It is almost certain that they were a customer, one who was brutal enough to be able to drag her away. With the stomach and ribcage destroyed, I cannot say what she might have last eaten.

Her species was mixed between fallow deer and reindeer. This is something that would possibly increase the likelihood of her death being a hate crime, something I feel the EUP should waste no time investigating. With the blessings of Princess Celestia, we will likely be able to find her residence before she is 'evicted' in her absence alone by impatient landlords instead of being declared missing. This is no uncommon event, for the deaths of whores to bring illegal landlords to such a level of behavior. The seediest areas of the city might as well be turned inside out to look for where she lived. I did not find enough traces of anything to suggest she was living in sewers, only traveling through them occasionally.

Any clues to be found could be the first thing to link these murders other than these damned blood crystals. There has yet to be any luck at all in providing the identity of such a fiend.

Sincerely,

Ebony Henbane

---

[The following text is an excerpt from the evening issue of The Manehattan Times in the week following the murder of the Original Jane Doe. What can be noted in the article are the journalistic biases that were a key identifier of pieces written during the Solar Millenium.]

---

In the aftermath of the recent doe murder near Bali-Shet, Manehattan is awash in outrage! Immigrant communities of deer have been protesting alleged discrimination at the hooves of ponies in squares across the city. These picketers claim that without protests, their fallen sister will not be identified. Many deer carry signs showing that they are not content in Equestrian land, and that they feel this is the mark of an uptick in violence towards their species. Many cite the failure of the peaceful protest for mixed-species accommodations in school at the City Square last month as an example of how they feel ponies have been mistreating them. There, non-violent protestors from an array of oddball species many Manehattenites had only heard of demanded things like usable desks, writing utensils, and species-inclusive health textbooks. All of these are radical departures from the Equestrian way, and the silent majority of Manehattan showed that they weren't the only ones to think so. Earth pony separatists showed up last month wielding bottles, stones, lanterns and similar objects to holler against the school protests.

Now, we see the so-called 'bigotry' has reversed. New Shirdal has completely closed its borders to all members of ponykind. The griffins have armed themselves with their peculiar, hostile brand of weapons that they call firearms. Guard patrols are being refused entry unless they're with anti-self-exploitation protests that have erupted all over the city. For those who pass the whims of the griffin brutes, they learn why New Shirdal is adamant about staying self-operating until further notice. Various griffins interviewed at the border say they'll tolerate no more crime, and that they will fight back against whores and murderers themselves. Until then, they wish to tolerate no outsiders.

Mares Against Monsters, the radical social group, has taken the opportunity to be found within the chaos. They have made firm alliances with the griffins, lending them educational material, schoolbooks for their young, and care packages during this shutdown of the neighborhood. Various chapters of the organization have taken a stand all over the city. When asked why she participated in the protests, one mare replied: “If you would not let your neighbor set themselves on fire in their flat while they and everypony else are in the building, why in Princess Celestia’s name would you let them sell themselves and make the whole community suffer for it?”

This attitude is one that is prominent among all members of the organization, but also among the other communities that feel impacted by this murder. The zebra community in the city has withdrawn to have many meetings among themselves; these are broken only to send somepony out to any who is with the press to deliver art and letters to communicate alienation, grief, and supposed injustice being done to non-ponies. The deer community has voiced that they may start charging extra for ponies at their laundries until the murder is solved. Should this be put in motion, there is cause to believe the courts of the shire would see a non-discrimination case.

---

[Two days later, The Manehattan Times had one of the decade's most iconic headlines drop.]

---

BREAKING NEWS: Princess Celestia Doubles Minimum Sentence for Self-Exploitation

by Extra-Extra

This just in, Princess Celestia has offered an unprecedented edit to the laws of the nation. In response to the recent string of murders in Manehattan, she has doubled the minimum sentence for self-exploitation to fifty years. This means that Equestria will now be sentencing its offenders for such a crime in a similar manner to Germaneigh, Trotsia, and most other nations in the United Council of Civilized Kingdoms. The Princess has stated she is taking time to consider whether it will be applied retroactively to those who are already imprisoned or have recently been convicted of the crime. She also is considering rewards in instances of citizen's arrests against those caught doing self-exploitation[...]

Comments

[Ice Star]

This was added to the 'snuff' group despite not being porn, and literally being an inversion of that genre. C'mon folks. Also, this is literally the SFW version. And regarding the deleted comment: feel free to comment on both versions of the story. I don't mind. You don't have to delete your comment on one version just 'cause you commented on the other one.