Inquisition

by Zemez

Welcome to S.M.I.L.E

By opening this book, and reading these words that may be the last I will ever write, I now induct you as the last remaining agent of S.M.I.L.E, the Security of Magical Investigation for Laughs in Equestria. I am, or was agent Dark Noir, director of S.M.I.L.E. inlaid in this book is my experiences for a little more than half a year. I hope you find somewhere I made a folly, somewhere I did not look in my experiences that Equestria's enemies hid from my sight, from my ears, from my hooves.

Good luck director...

---

Today was the afternoon before the summer sun celebration. Dark Noir was outside of one of the few interrogation rooms. Although Dark wouldn't have called them that. Instead of the many ways to unnerve a pony he could think of, the table was the perfect height, several paintings, not very expensive ones, hung on the walls, and a selection of plush cushions, both for questioner and questionee. Then again, this was Canterlot, perhaps the cheapness of the room would unnerve some of the richer ponies.

He was here because Celestia had turned down all 34 suggested plans for her, as is his job as the director of S.M.I.L.E. to do when an extinction class threat to Equestria is about to rear its head. While nopony actually knows that Celestia's sister was driven mad by feelings of social isolation, a not isolated case, but when a being of enough power cracks, it gets noticed easily, is coming back a thousand years after she was banished with no input from Celestia on the matter, as far as Dark could tell, it was Celestia's punishment as much as it was her sister's.

Point is, he was taking a case because Celestia, instead of taking one of his many suggestions to apprehend her sister and bring her to one of the many facilities that now specializes in treating what is coined, 'Pariah Syndrome', has rejected them all, and sent her current student, number 7 if his records are correct, which they usually are, Twilight sparkle, to the town closest to where her sister was banished to the moon. Foolish.

In the meantime, he snagged a case that would have went to one of his agents here in Canterlot, while most citizens outside of the incident were told that the area was cordoned off for illegal use of magic, a catch-all excuse. Both Dark Noir and the guards knew the whole story, a unicorn with some sort of hooflet, a new fashion accessory popping up in the past decade, in which a chain is put around the fetlock like a necklace, had blown up a city block, everypony evacuated before the trouble started, but that left the guards with shaky eyewitness accounts, no suspects, and no clues except for guesses what the motive for destroying the area would be.

Dark Noir, as the director of one of the most secretive official organizations, wasn't here as himself. No, he was here as Amorous Aurora, unfortunately being the only pony in the S.M.I.L.E Canterlot disguise pool who was both knowledgable about complex thaumaturgical theory and pony psychology, while being a close acquaintance with the local garrison, he could only pick her. Yes, her, for Amorous Aurora was a mare, so it was with no reluctance, that had disappeared after doing this job for so long, that he used the standard S.M.I.L.E "Maren's dye" spell on his grey coat to turn it light blue, a weight distribution spell, normally used on objects, with the side effect on living beings be a literal mass shift, which if you weren't using it in the capacity S.M.I.L.E was with the training to go along with it, usually meant a trip to the hospital to have the spell reversed and your quite necessary organs being put back where they belong. This instance, shifting his mass into a more marish shape.

Finally, a quite ingenious spell of his own involving a bastardization of the Maren's Dye spell and Starswirls Modern Disjunction, a spell which replaces a magical aura for another of the casters choosing, with "modern" being a misnomer considering Starswirl lived and invented his spell almost a thousand years ago. This spell of Dark Noir's however allowed him to create a cutiemark on the spot, of which normally would be quite impossible, as cutiemarks were manifestations of a pony's internal magic circuits and couldn't be changed without rewiring their whole thaumatic system, and would thus be impossible to use Modern Disjunction on... Dark noir however didn't have that issue, so a red Heart in a beaker his, or rather aurora's, cutiemark is to be.

Making sure his mane and tail, a swirl of light red and deep purple, laid straight and weren't at any odd angles before he was called in. Putting a hoof on the door, Dark- Rather, Amorous Aurora walked in. Inside the room, a Cream colored mare with a one-toned Cyan Mane was sitting at the table, her back half covered by the guard, more lenient with the color-changing enchantments color range, was a light grey and sitting with his back facing him.

"Miss Light Blend, this is one of our consultants. Amorous Aurora, a professor at Canterlot University, she'll be asking some questions." Generic guard pony said; Although the genericness was more protection on their part, hard for a criminal to target one of them if he doesn't know which one is which. Never stopped an insane convict from just attacking guards indiscriminately though.

"That would be quite alright." Light blend intoned, her voice giving that small inflection of insecurity, probably at the fact that she's both being considered the only suspect, and that her reason for being a suspect is that she claims something of hers was stolen.

"I won't take up too much longer of your time miss Light Blend, you'll be out of here faster than a thaumic charge can pass through a Cortical Bone structure." Dark Noir Intoned in a light cheery tone as he sat down, Decades of disguising himself giving him quite a vocal range, none of them would suspect Aurora wasn't exactly a mare. "I understand you claim the blueprints for a Positive Emotional Feedback Reaction Matrix was stolen the night before the current incident you have been informed of?"

"y-yes." Her one-word answer was probably brought on by the Personality of Aurora, and the cheeriness of her tone during what is no doubt an interrogation.

"I quite find that hard to believe, A PEFR Matrix is still theorized to be a Decade off with our current knowledge of thaumic theory." Dark intoned. While he knew a PEFR was quite far off, a NEFR, or Negative Emotional Feedback Reaction had been invented a millennium ago by a Mad Tyrant to the North. His name was unimportant to Dark Noir at this moment.

"well.. it still is miss Aurora. The drawing of the matrix contained several theoretical connections." Light blend circled a hoof on the table as she said this, looking down.

Dark resisted the instinctual urge to squint his eyes in thought, it was already hard to create a Matrix, essentially a magic drawing that acted like a pony's internal magical Circuit, but for a single purpose. It was even harder to create one out of Theoretical Magical connections, even if it was only a drawing and not an actual thaumaturgical construct.

"If the Matrix contains several theoretical connections, then why did you come to the guards with the concern that the pony who destroyed the block was the thief?" Dark had to resist showing his annoyance at the mare, as Amorous was a happy-go-lucky Average Pony, Unfortunately, Dark Noir was not.

"Because," She began with a head dip, "The hooflet the mare was wearing was the same accessory I drew the Matrix on the outside of."

"And you didn't think of coming to the guard and informing them of this directly after the incident took place because?" Dark couldn't help but let a little of his snark bleed through the disguise, despite his experience. He wasn't worried about this destroying his cover, however, as the guard next to him seemed to be fuming even more than Dark felt like doing at the moment.

Light Blend pinned her ears back, a sign that either she was ashamed, or that she was angry at the accusation. Dark couldn't tell; for some reason, this mare was springing all his alarms, but so far, her story and body language, aside from not going to the guard immediately, showed no guilt, and the report on the theft clearly stated that the matrix was written on a fashion accessory. She also described the scene similarly to the other ponies who witnessed the event.

Dark sighed before beginning. "Thank you Miss Light Blend, that'll be all the questions I have."

Better to let the guards continue the questioning from here. Dark thought as he walked out of the room. The whole thing left a bad taste in his mouth. He'd have to see if he could have better luck at the Scene.

---

North Briar Street was a mess. Dark noted that the destruction wasn't able to be accurately portrayed in a report. The entrance to the street was cordoned off not with the tape that most ponies would think of, but large paper cones painted red and white. Each one, of which there were three for a street this wide, had a guard posted next to it in charge of keeping anyone out.

A quick Dark blue glow of his horn on a spell from Gale's Chronology series gave him the time of day, which told him he only had 9 hours before the guard was forced to relinquish information to the public on the events. And without a lead or massive progress, the guard will have to dedicate more ponypower to keeping ponies from panicking, which as herd animals, could spiral out of control to dangerous proportions in Canterlot or other large cities.

Dark Noir stepped up to the guards, no disguise this time. His actual identity, still hidden behind several layers of falsification so that those not in the know or high enough on the chain of command to know small snippets, was enough to get into the scene of the incident. He ran a few strands of telekinesis through his short dark blue mane.

With identification detailing him as an agent of the crown, nothing more, nothing less, with several magical seals of authenticity needing enough knowledge on both complex spell weaving and having closely studied Celestia's magic to replicate. He was let through with the guard having a clear question on his tongue as he stared at Dark's Flank. It seemed the guard thought better of it as Dark was already past the pony before the guard continued their impression of fidgeting statues.

He looked around in the middle of the destruction, the entire marble and granite street was scorched. The granite road at the epicenter was smooth unlike the rest of the Sett patterned street, which is impressive considering much of the scorching was consistent with mana scorching. Either the pony who did this Deliberately melted the Granite under their hooves, or they were outputting enough thaumic charge to create an enormous amount of waste heat, which, while it wouldn't create an illusion of a star during the day, would explain why no eyewitnesses could describe the unicorn as much more than that, they would have been nearly blinded just looking this way.

The marble shops on either side of the street had most of their product either half scorched or incinerated. A cursory search led him to believe the destruction wasn't systematic, as any safe or cash register wasn't left unharmed. So the motive of greed was thrown farther out the window.

Dark would have to check for links between the store owners or their product. It was still possible that this was motivated by revenge or competition. Although he couldn't think for the life of him why 7 different types of stores would all have a common competitor, he wouldn't rule it out just yet.

With heavy hooves Dark Noir left the scene, the nagging feeling from earlier was back, that just something was wrong with the scene, but he just couldn't put his horn on it. Ponies don't just randomly start outputting enough thaumic energy to power the enchantments on the castle for years. A Thaumic reaction provided by a PEFR is even more unlikely, as it would have to run off of positive emotions, and the urge to destroy everything in sight isn't exactly a positive emotion in his book.

---

Dark Noir Rubbed the base of his horn with his hoof. He was inside his office at the S.M.I.L.E Central communications Center. This was an underground complex on no maps Dark was aware of, not even the city's original building plans. Inside his quite sparse but roomy office was a desk in which he was currently sat at was piled high with reports on the PEFR theft and the incident at North Briar Street. to the left was a small table with a faux automatic Xenial stylus, Its use was still too expensive to the majority of pony society. It was little more than an enchanted stone stick that would write down whatever was sent to it via a certain spell taught to most agents. His was obviously not one to receive any from any agents as the director, that was what the other Command Agents were for.

All the was left was a clock ticking by on the far wall facing him above the door, beyond which he knew the compound by heart, as outside his door was the hallway which contained doors to the other support staff or command agents. The ones who would actually receive stationed agents' before and after-action reports. After that was the Cafeteria, filled with food magically prepared by complex enchantments, not much for taste, but S.M.I.L.E Agents won't complain, most bring food from home. through the cafeteria is a basement which leads up to one Hearts and Hoove's bakery, owned by one miss Loon Loveheart, a ponysona that the mare who dons it enjoys so much she's decided to keep it. The shop certainly sells an assortment of sweets and even has some special items for Hearts and Hoove's day you can't get elsewhere, but the most important is the code phrase that allows agents access to S.M.I.L.E.

"I'd like a blueberry cupcake with no frosting and only lime-colored sprinkles."

Regardless, he was at a dead end. Nopony knew the exact appearance of the mare that had attacked North Briar Street, there was no connection between the shops or their owners, three of which were in fact on bad terms. All products in the shops were accounted for, and the melted bits in the shops were on weight with reported estimates, so nothing was stolen. The anonymity deadline was in thirty minutes, and staying up through most of the night was not doing him any favors. It would be morning soon, Celestia's sister would be free to try and take over once more in less than an hour, and he was stuck here in a dead-end case. Even worse, twenty minutes ago, he got a report that Celestia had disappeared from her retinue.

"That mare sometimes makes me-" Dark paused. "Wait, mare?" He had already ruled out purposeful destruction of the granite road, which meant the Unicorn would have to be giving off so much waste heat and energy that it would be impossible to tell much more than that they were a unicorn from their silhouette.

In fact, he mused as he was already racing out of his office, any writings or accessories would also be impossible to discern. so how had Light Blend known that the Unicorn was both a mare and was wearing her specific hooflet?

He breached out of the bakery, not even bothering with a disguise. Time was of the essence, and he only had twenty-seven minutes to get to where he needed to be.

The Canterlot streets were sparse and quiet this time of night when most are awaiting Celestia to raise the sun on the longest day of the year together. While the occasional pony would be out and about, far off the road in a park or some late-night establishment, there was nary a hoof to stop his mad gallop. He burst into a house in lower Canterlot, his frame breaking the hinges with his abandon. Ignoring the pain in his withers he raced through the house, finding very little. The Living area looked barely touched, Kitchen was barely stocked, Bed hardly slept in. All Dark Noir could find was what Light Blend claimed was stolen, the original drawings of the Positive Emotional Feedback Reaction Matrix, And it made his blood run cold.

There was only one other place he could find Light Blend, The Canterlot University for Higher thaumaturgical learning. The only place which would have enough equipment to make this abomination, and her place of work.

He didn't care about the Deadline anymore, He didn't have time to check what time it was, although Dark was sure it was past it. No, he was going to save this mare from what she wrought if it was the last thing he did. Galloping through the Streets, he could feel his ears splayed back. He wouldn't let it happen again, he wouldn't let- Let what happen? Dark almost paused before reaffirming his steps and continuing, that line of thought all but forgotten as he barged the strangely unlocked doors of the University open.

The room he came to, Light Blends research room, Granted on a short stipend, Pitifully short in fact considering her research topic, he saw her. That frazzled Cyan tail, and her cutiemark, a cup of coffee with a stirrer. The twitching form of the cream-colored mare bent over one of the tables. The room had plenty, being an actual classroom used for lab experiments. The lights weren't on, but he didn't need them to see her, Light blend was lit up in a black tinged cream-colored thaumic aura.

"Light blend, Please-"

"go away! I can fix this!" She shouted at Dark, her voice manic as the aura grew slightly bigger.

"no Light Blend, I n-" Dark was interrupted as she looked behind her at him. Her eyes were as manic as her voice.

"You don't think I can do this either, nobody does, well Just go away!" she yelled at Dark, not giving him a chance to even respond as he felt himself be lifted in her telekinetic grasp before being shoved towards the wall, Unfortunately, with that much charge, his sidelong rush wasn't arrested by the wall.

With a deafening crash, the wall crumbled. Dark coughed, feeling a tender rib or two before looking up at the sound of clopping. Light Blend had walked through the hole she made with his grey form, The Hooflet around her fetlock and her horn once more charged up, which Dark rolled out of the way to his hooves as she blasted the spot he was laying at moments ago with pure thaumic charge.

"listen to-" he began, beginning to strafe around the rubble before being once more interrupted by another beam.

No more trying with words then, the feedback was too advanced. He couldn't use many conventional thaumic duel tactics. His own thaumic charge wouldn't hold a candle to what she was giving off, so he had to improvise. His Cobalt Blue aura surrounded his sharp horn, unlike many other unicorns with blunted tips. The light flickering amongst the overwhelming thaumic radiance of Light Blend.

Three beams were sent his way, two were deflected with a Hooflight's mirror barrier before the aura constructs shattered to nothing, bringing pain to Dark Noir's horn that he ignored. The last barely missed, causing his side to heat up before it struck the faux grass of the lawn. The crackling of a fire starting was ignored by both as Dark Noir broke into a gallop, he had little room to maneuver near the rubble-strewn wall.

Stepping onto the Lawn, he looked behind when none of the expected beams came. Light blend stepped through the small wall of fire that had started, its radiance eclipsed by hers, the ground beneath her not even gaining the chance to ignite, being directly turned to ash.

Dark Noir was out of options. He wanted to wait to use it when Celestia's sister eventually bested her student who had no formal thaumic combat training, but both he and Light blend would die here if he did. He looked back at his flank, he couldn't remember much from the first time he cast the spell, but this always struck him, where his cutie mark was supposed to be, there was but a patch of burnt fur.

He looked back at Light Blend, the mare was smirking. He didn't know who hurt her, why they hurt her, or how they hurt her enough to have her resort to this, but she was waiting, happy to see someone put in her position, unsure what to do.

He was going to disappoint her.

His horn glowed brighter, He could feel it, Light Blend wasn't a threat to Equestria, so he couldn't bring the full might of the spell to the forefront, but Canterlot was a big city full of some of the best and brightest unicorns. He could feel the unique Matrix of the spell, intertwined with his own Internal Circuit converting the snippets of magic he stole, barely enough for a pony to even notice it was gone before it was replenished.

Normally, that magic would be unusable, but the spell was converting it to his own circuits. After doing this for decades, he had become accustomed to the bloated feeling. His own thaumic field formed, still outshined by Light Blend's, but at least he wouldn't instantly turn to pony ash by getting close to her.

They both moved. Many of their muscles moving faster than their mental impulses could catch up so saturated with magic were they. Her beams were deflected, the Thaumic Mirrors didn't shatter this time as he sent them towards Light blend, Encasing her as they grew bigger.

That lasted all of a second as she overwhelmed the spells with pure energy, Sending another barrage Dark's way. Her repertoire of attack spells may be pitifully small, but her raw thaumic power made up for it. he rolled out of the way and looking behind himself at hearing the beams strike nothing, and was alarmed to see he was already at the edge of the lawn, and Canterlot itself.

A telekinetically charged charge solved that issue, as he ducked and jumped over beams before getting a solid strike to Light Blend's side with a hoof, his own Thaumic aura lightening as it expended itself protecting him from the heat of hers.

Light Blend stumbled, her eyes refocusing and beginning to back up while laying even more beams in a wide sweep towards Dark. Her eyes were no longer manic, they were scared, she was losing.

Dark couldn't even get close, so focused on dodging the barrage when he suddenly realized that they had stopped. Looking up, Light Blend was trying to keep her balance from tipping over the edge of the city. Taking his chance, he rushed towards her, grabbing her and pushing her down on the edge of the lawn, keeping her there and preventing her from falling off.

"Who hurt you!?" Dark yelled over the hum of their thaumic auras colliding. Light Blend only shook her head.

"I said who hurt you!?" He shouted more forcefully, draining his already thin Thaumic aura to put even more force into the words.

"Everypony!" She yelled, her fear palpable... Buck it, Celestia outlawed the spell as dark magic, Well, that mare wasn't stopping him from saving this one. The spell on his horn, he touched the base of her horn with the tip of his. The world went white.

"Wants to be among the greatest-"

"Doesn't even have a talent for-"

"She'll fail and a real-"

"Doesn't need a real lab, just-"

"Failure."

"Wannabe."

"Worthless!"

Dark plunged back into reality with a crack. nothing but the air in his hooves, and his thaumic aura was all but gone. The Lawn couldn't take the auric Pressure anymore... and collapsed, sending Light Blend down a very steep fall.

He moved before he was even conscious of it, the air rushing past his mane, he could see Light blend far below him, he looked left and right, no pegasi to come to the rescue, and he couldn't arrest both their falls, you couldn't just lift yourself with telekinesis without enough power, or a cutie mark in magic, to break thaumic laws. It would be like trying to lift yourself over a ledge that didn't exist.

His scanning didn't catch any feathered ponies, but did catch a rainbow-colored flash off in a forest somewhere below them. Dark's eyes reflected the brief color.

"With heart and hooves I do declare."
"To protect all I see and care."
"My destiny freely given."
"Protection for all, Newly Arisen!"

he squinted against the air as he looked down at Light Blend as his voice echoed in his mind. The words felt distant, like someone else had spoken them, but it was definitely his voice he remembered. They were both now at terminal velocity, and without wings, he couldn't catch up, unless he did something stupid.

All of Equestria's magic was at his beck and call for its defense. He knew that from his decades of serving it, while normally he wouldn't even try calling upon it twice, that was just asking for trouble, and not the clean kind, but if that flash was what he thought...

It was there, still lingering, he could feel more of it, raw, unbridled, but he instinctively knew that mass wouldn't obey his call, even if the entire world were ending. The free-floating stuff was no longer part of that mass, quickly dissipating, so he strained, and scooped it up like a foal playing in a sandbox.

It bypassed his spell, dumped directly into a magic circuit, and it burned, oh it burned, but one thought burned even more in his mind, that he'd feel even worse if this pony below him died.

Dark's Thaumic aura blazed into intensity once more, He was sure if someone looked up at Canterlot right now, they'd seem like two stars falling to Equestria. Buck the thaumic laws; a large thaumic pane appeared under his hooves as he shot off of it, giving him even more speed before he figured that wasn't enough. the thaumic aura, like Celestia's free-flowing mane, quite literally reached in front of him and grabbed the air, pushing it apart, speeding his descent even more.

Light Blend chose that moment to look back up, seeing him getting closer. "Leave me alone! I can't even die correctly, taking somepony else with me..."

Her last words were nearly lost over the sound of the air rushing past.

"I don't care!" He was surprised at both the content and strength of his voice. "I have dreams too! Dreams of saving everypony I can, I won't let anypony tell me differently, not you, not the princess, not even myself! Now let me help you!"

Dark Noir reached out his hoof towards her, they were close enough that All she had to do was grab it. He could see the ground approaching. If she didn't-

Light Blend grasped his hoof tightly, a small smile on her face, her own thaumic aura dissipating. He strained, pulling her close and hanging on tight to her, he summoned the Thaumic pane once more, before gripping himself in his telekinetic grasp. The crack of bones impacting a surface didn't escape his ears, but the expected pain escaped his senses as he could feel the wind slowing down, his aura spreading out like a parachute, trying to grasp as much air as possible to slow them down.

It ended abruptly as it started, all of it, his thaumic aura, the wind, their fall, he couldn't feel anything, except the mare still in his death clutch, not the grass all around them at the bottom of the mountain, not the breeze gently blowing it around, not even the warmth of the sun as it rose, signaling that Celestia's sister did not in fact murder one twilight sparkle in cold blood and went on to conquer Equestria.

He looked at the mare in his hooves. Today did not go at all how he expected.